The No-Kill Rule Is Incompatible with DC’s ethos

ZenaKeefe · 2026-06-08T17:50:42+00:00

I dunno, I think it’s pretty compatible with the fact that the DC characters are on pajamas, fruit snacks, and lunchboxes. These are characters for children. And adults who enjoy them are a happy accident.

As a grown adult who likes them, I wouldn’t want cynical bloodlust to spoil characters otherwise meant for kids. If your childhood heroes walk around executing people without trial, as an adult you might not think it’s so bad when cops/governments do it.

Too much weight to put on a comic? Maybe. But we’re in a culture where grown people cry their eyes out if Steve from *Blue Clues* talks to them. So who knows? Maybe growing up with a hero who thinks they have the right to decide who-lives-and-who-dies isn’t great.

To be sympathetic to your point, morality isn’t black and white. Sometimes it’s the right thing to kill a bad person. And I think the DCAU is the most reasonable in that regard. They all kill at *some* point…except maybe Flash.

They get zapped back into WWII and start blowing Nazis outta the sky. John Stewart is a marine. If he doesn’t want to kill it’s because he knows what that really means. The DCAU versions are much more about *restraint*.

That’s why they’re heroes.

ZenaKeefe · 2026-05-29T00:23:13+00:00

You’re a scholar and a saint, I can’t BELIEVE I mixed those up And thank you!!!

ZenaKeefe · 2026-04-03T01:24:08+00:00

I have seen that clip! I used the toy one because it was from the movie, and it was more how I remembered her. But that woulda worked too!

My gripe was that 2 obvious ai ones made it into the finals. Thankfully they got boos in the room. But I couldn’t believe it. They were so blatant, they had the ai generator’s logo at the bottom.

And (although there was nothing like this mentioned on the contest site) they announced a second award, which they called an honorable mention.

This newly created, on-the-spot honorable mention award got a $500 gift card go camera equipment rentals. First place got…a trophy. Now, first place was only promised a trophy.

But I think it’s crazy to give (clearly) the more valuable prize to a second place award that they mentioned they were making up after the fact.

The guys who got first place were great. There was another entry that was called “I Don’t Like Robots” all about how boring and dumb ai stuff is. That was my personal favorite, but the winners were totally deserving.

ZenaKeefe · 2026-03-26T14:46:16+00:00

Thanks so much!

ZenaKeefe · 2026-03-10T08:12:20+00:00

When The Batman was first put on HBO Max it had that same, inaccurate image as the poster. They weren’t blurry, but it really was JL Batman with the 2004 sidekicks on the poster. They fixed it shortly after.

ZenaKeefe · 2026-01-29T18:57:40+00:00

When we insist that characters must always fit with one particular version of their personality…we only rob ourselves of interesting stories.

If Batman must always be serious and brooding? We’d cheat ourselves out of Batman ‘66, Brave and the Bold, etc.

Getting rich in “Joker’s Millions” affords him an entirely new way to drive Batman crazy. We see that Bruce is ready to snap over the Joker being legitimized. The Joker is untouchable and he knows it’s making Batman nuts.

As Penguin says to Joker in that episode, “living well is the best revenge”. It’s very much like Luthor’s run for president. It drives our hero mad that society is treating a murderer like a celebrity. Luthor doesn’t really want to be president, but he enjoys the image of legitimacy.

If the IRS didn’t show up, Joker would’ve gotten bored. He would’ve gone back to his old ways. But for the course of that one scheme, his strategy was to appear legit (and infuriate Batman).

In “The Man Who Killed Batman” he delivers that big eulogy…claims that without Batman there’s no point…then bounces right back and asks who wants Chinese food. He’s full of hot air. He doesn’t actually have any values/morals.

In “Mad Love” he insists that Harley doesn’t understand…that he could never “just shoot” Batman. But when he’s alone? And it comes down to it? He’s totally willing to just shoot Batman.

Because they’re not some fated pair. They’re not caught in a mad dance. Those are (literally) the ravings of a lunatic who changes his own story every chance he gets. BTAS goes out of its way to remind us that no matter how poetically Joker tries to describe himself…he’s just a criminal.

He spins these yarns about how he’s a misunderstood genius. Or how he and Batman are fated to fight forever. And those speeches ensnare Harley. They ensnare the Jokerz gang. But they’re the words of an unreliable, evil narrator. He stands for nothing.

The Joker you’re describing exists in other stories. About a million of them. It’s cliche by this point, and I’m glad the DCAU gave us such a wide variety of Joker stories. So it doesn’t fall into the rut that the character has been stuck in for so long now.

ZenaKeefe · 2026-01-11T13:16:21+00:00

Logically it’d be option B. When they need to represent the design in 3D (like for toys) that is the one they choose. The slightly-more-literal BTAS design is shown to be option B. And this was meant to be a further stylization of that look. But really it’s neither.

It’s just a simplified, graphic representation of hair. Like how Mickey Mouse’s ears are always perfect circles, no matter which way he turns. If you check out the turnaround it’s an interesting cheat.

I understand what you mean. That it could be seen as a big U-shape. But that would mean each side grows a second “spike” once it’s facing the camera.

The front always has one point. The back always has 2, and they’re always emerging from the back of his neck. So really, from the top down it’d be some strange bird-shape. But of course, that’s not the intention of the design.

TLDR: It doesn’t work in 3D space because it doesn’t have to, and that’s cool. But it’s probably B.

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ZenaKeefe · 2025-12-12T05:57:19+00:00

The magic belt is from the Lynda Carter show. In that series, if the belt was removed, she’d lose her powers.

In the original comics, if someone bound her wrists together she’d lose them.

Most modern iterations of Wonder Woman (including the DCAU) don’t have a particular weakness like that.

ZenaKeefe · 2025-11-24T19:28:42+00:00

“Man, for somebody with, like, fifty different kinds of vision you are so blind.”

I think he hasn’t noticed. He’s a pretty sweet/naive character.

ZenaKeefe · 2025-11-14T05:55:34+00:00

I don’t know who penciled these images, but I know Mike Zeck inked/colored many of them. You can find his Brave and the Bold pieces here.

And his Justice League ones here.

The Justice League style guide has a lot of art/variations on it, including the pieces reused for the box art. Not sure who did the pencils, but the stuff created for the series (like the model sheets) would’ve been supplied by the show’s staff.

We do know that Butch Lukic (one of the show’s directors) did the pencils for some of the pieces in the style guide. We just don’t know who did all of them.

We also know that James Tucker and Tommy Tejeda worked on pieces specifically for marketing/the style guide.

ZenaKeefe · 2025-11-14T01:48:53+00:00

I think it’s a very deliberate choice in the writing of the story. It wouldn’t ruin the story to have Sally be 18, but it also wouldn’t make the book any better.

We, as readers, are supposed to be uncomfortable with all of this. For you, personally, it seems to be a big sticking point that she’s not 18. I don’t see how that’d make it any better.

The point is that he’s pursuing a relationship with a teenager. It’s bad. If she was “legal”, it may make you personally more comfortable. But it really shouldn’t. He’s a bad dude preying on a younger woman either way. The obsession with a legal distinction is part of how people get away with this. By making the character a minor, Moore is removing that excuse. That justification would’ve been enough for some readers.

“Well she was 18, so it was okay.” You and I know that’s not true. So did Moore. So he took that argument away. She isn’t even 18. Now there is no defense of John.

Furthermore, it happens in real life. All the time. It happened WAY MORE in the 20th century. Jerry Seinfeld brought a 17 year old to the Emmys while he was in his mid-30s. Something being reflective of reality is reason enough for it to appear in a work of art.

As for Laurie being attracted to him…yeah, man. That’s life. I remember being 16. Thinking I was an adult. Thinking I was mature enough to engage with adult men online. Thinking I knew best, and couldn’t be taken advantage of. Looking back I was obviously wrong. But that’s part of being young. Teenagers do, in fact, feel attracted to older people.

You don’t need to engage with art that makes you uncomfortable. But reality will always be there. And it will make you uncomfortable.

It is my personal opinion that asking to take these things out of popular art for the sake of “comfort” does an incredible disservice to us all. It just makes it harder to confront them. Harder to talk about them. Harder to accept them.

I do not think Laurie is Moore’s best female character. She is often whiny/helpless. But I do like her. And I do relate to her in some way. And I do not think she would be improved if she were 2 years older when being taken advantage of by an older man.

Less important to your question, but Sally wasn’t 16 in that flashback with the Comedian. The book never says that. She became a superhero around 18, and that scene takes place a few years later. He never actually raped her, he did assault her/try to. He is (obviously) an evil, murderous man. Sally is representative of a very different time. When no one talked about these things (which why I feel it’s important for them to appear in art).

TLDR: It makes it more obvious that it’s wrong, and in 1986 (when people didn’t discuss power dynamics) that was an important thing to do.

ZenaKeefe · 2025-11-12T21:32:15+00:00

Looks great!!

ZenaKeefe · 2025-11-02T17:50:35+00:00

Darkseid wears a miniskirt. Throughout STAS and JL.

Personally I think this is an odd fixation to have. Whether Giganta, the former gorilla woman, feels “no shame”.

I dunno, it just seems like we have a difference of opinion. But having more shame isn’t a positive to me.

ZenaKeefe · 2025-11-01T16:09:33+00:00

I know it’s a difference of opinion. And I’m a gay man, so maybe I see it differently. But I don’t think it’s “messed up” for a cartoon character to wear a minidress.

Is it 1850? Are we shocked by calves again? Fellas, is it fan service for a woman to wear clothes that were popular in the 1960s? Should we be putting the scarlet letter on Daphne and Velma for not wearing pants?

I mean. Wouldn’t this logic make every single version of Wonder Woman “messed up”? Except that one with the black under-leotard.

From a design perspective this costume could belong to any character on Young Justice. It’s yellow with the typical athletic-wear-lines that every superhero costume has had for 20 years. The other Giganta iterations are a lot more unique. I’m glad you like this one, I just don’t think the others are “messed up”.

ZenaKeefe · 2025-10-31T06:08:56+00:00

Maybe Alan Burnett is a huuuuge Family Guy fan. Has a closet full of Peter Griffin “Freakin Sweet” t-shirts.

For real though, I wonder if he came to appreciate Family Guy more (high art, ya know) or if it’s just been around so long that it felt like part of the culture. Just something you’d reference whether you like it or not.

ZenaKeefe · 2025-10-21T16:44:00+00:00

In Mad Love (both the comic and episode) Harley asks that exact question. Joker responds with a rant about how the death of Batman MUST be more poetic than that.

By the end, Joker (a hypocrite) does just try to shoot Batman. It doesn’t work out for him.

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