Gender Trouble: Frank Miller's Revision of Robin in the Batman: Dark Knight Series

Gender Trouble: Frank Miller’s Revision of
Robin in the Batman: Dark Knight Series

N AT H A N G . T I P T O N

           ‘‘Don’t laugh. At least I turned out straight.
           All my friends who read Batman ended up queer.’’
           Terrence McNally, Where Has Tommy Flowers Gone?

F
       OR COMICS AND GRAPHIC NOVEL AFICIONADOS, READERS, AND DETRACTORS
       alike, the relationship between Batman and Robin has always been
       a bit of a worry. After all, what are readers to make of an older man
who is often described as a socialite, a confirmed bachelor, or a millionaire
playboy with a propensity for adopting young boys as his ‘‘wards?’’ Ec-
centric? Definitely. Dangerous? Probably. Homosexual? Arguably, though
not proven conclusively.
   Of course the mere suggestion of any untoward relationship between
Batman (nee Bruce Wayne) and his partners/protégés Robin/Night-
wing (nee Dick Grayson), Robin II (nee Jason Todd), or Robin III (nee
Tim Drake) evokes from many Batman fans both swift and vitriolic
denials. With almost perfect unanimity these fans point to Dr. Frederic
Wertham, author of the reviled 1954 study Seduction of the Innocent as
the sui generis cause of the Batman ‘‘troubles.’’ Wertham, who focused
particular attention on the fraught rapport between Batman/Wayne
and Robin/Grayson, observes:

   Sometimes Batman ends up in bed injured and young Robin is
   shown sitting next to him. At home they lead an idyllic life. They
   are Bruce Wayne and ‘‘Dick’’ Grayson. Bruce Wayne is described as a
   ‘‘socialite’’ and the official relationship is that Dick is Bruce’s ward.
   They live in sumptuous quarters, with beautiful flowers in large

The Journal of Popular Culture, Vol. 41, No. 2, 2008
r 2008, Copyright the Authors
Journal compilation r 2008, Blackwell Publishing, Inc.

                                     321

322                                                    Nathan G. Tipton

  vases, and have a butler, Alfred. . . . It is like a wish dream of two
  homosexuals living together. (190)

It is easy, in retrospect, to view Wertham’s ‘‘gaydar’’ as a hyperbolic
reflection of McCarthy-era societal posturing. In the years since Seduc-
tion’s publication, many of Wertham’s psychiatric methods have been
dissected and widely discredited. However, even in the face of this
critical reassessment, Wertham’s work remains a problematic touch-
stone for comics and graphic novel scholars.
   Indeed, the effect Seduction of the Innocent had on the comics industry
was both chilling and devastating. Moreover, the book was certainly a
contributing factor in the creation of the Comics Code that, according
to Joseph Witek, was formed ostensibly for ‘‘the protection of young
and impressionable readers from graphic violence and celebration of
crime.’’ But, Witek is quick to add, ‘‘its provisions work(ed) mainly to
quell the vitality of the comics and to ratify authoritarian social con-
trol’’ (49). Well, of course. Ultimately the Comics Code, aided and
abetted by the eminent Dr. Wertham, sought to reassert a wholesome
American lifestyle free from the disruptive influences of ‘‘commies’’ and
queers.
   What better way, then, to rein in potentially subversive activity in
young people than to ‘‘out’’ Batman and Robin, two of the most pop-
ular comic superheroes? Faced with Wertham’s damning evidence
Freya Johnson declares, with hilariously sarcastic accuracy, ‘‘Obviously,
they must be fags: otherwise they’d have a butler named ‘Butch,’ live in
cramped quarters littered with beer-cans, wouldn’t show concern for
one another’s injuries or be caught dead in a dressing gown and cul-
tivate only (what?) cactuses in small ugly metal pots?’’ (emphasis in
original) (1). Holy homoeroticism, indeed.
   In fact, until the 1986 publication of Frank Miller’s landmark re-
visionist Batman series The Dark Knight Returns (in which the character
of Robin returns, somewhat problematically, as a genetic female), ru-
mors abounded routinely about the barely sublimated homoeroticism
extant in Batman’s relations with his partners/protégés/wards. These
rumors, surprisingly, appeared several years before Wertham’s book,
and stretched back almost to Robin’s debut in Detective Comics #38
(April 1940). Batman creator Bob Kane, however, conceived Robin’s
appearance innocently enough. According to Kane’s assistant, Jerry
Robinson, ‘‘He (Kane) wanted someone the young readers could

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identify with more readily than this masked, mysterious figure. It was
a brilliant idea and we all saw enormous story potential in the new
character’’ (Daniels 27). Kane and Robinson were, naturally, concerned
with boosting sales and attracting younger comic readers. For the
Batman writers and illustrators, the most logical, practical, and ulti-
mately successful solution to this readership quandary was the creation
of an exciting, death-defying kid who would lighten both the look and
tone of Batman. Neither Kane nor Robinson, though, could likely have
anticipated Wertham’s homoerotic reading of the crime-fighting duo
because Robin was, for them, merely Batman’s sidekick.
    In matters of textuality writ large (texts encompassing the wide
scope of media, including, but not limited to, books and films), the
notion of the sidekick is not unique, and these hero/sidekick pairings
were usually, up to the 1960s, comprised of two males. Both American
literature and American cinema have long established traditions of
‘‘buddy’’ storylines, ranging from the literary pairings of Ishmael and
Queequeg in Melville’s Moby Dick or Jay Gatsby and Nick Carraway in
Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby to the cinematic adventures of The Lone
Ranger and his Indian sidekick Tonto. With the development of com-
ics and graphic novels as a branch of popular literature, many of these
same literary traditions, including the imprimatur of male homoso-
ciality, were subsumed by the genre.
    That said, because comics (as literature) also contained this mapped
terrain of male – male homosocial relations, which Eve Kosofsky Sedg-
wick describes as ‘‘social bonds between persons of the same sex; it is a
neologism, obviously formed by analogy with ‘homosexual,’ and just as
obviously meant to be distinguished from ‘homosexual’ ’’ (1), it became
forever marked with what I term (pace Sedgwick) the anxiety of
potentiality. In other words, whenever male homosocial ‘‘bonding’’
occurs, there is always already the possibility for an eruption of desire
that, ultimately, culminates in two problematic endings: the disrup-
tion and/or destruction of the ‘‘bond,’’ or the deepening of the bond
into homoeroticism and/or homosexuality.
    Moreover, because comics were also illustrative, these heretofore
‘‘meta-textual’’ homosocial relations became both ‘‘felt’’ and seen, thus
making open interpretations qua close readings like those of
Wertham’s that much easier and certainly more plausible. Such, then,
is the underlying problem extant in Batman and Robin, and one that
makes Frank Miller’s decision to reprise the role of Robin as a genetic

324                                                      Nathan G. Tipton

female at once reasonable, but also troublesome. Miller, in fact,
remarked in the Introduction to Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, ‘‘I’d
never intended to use Robin. But then, one day, I pictured a little
bundle of bright colors leaping over buildings, dwarfed by a gray-
and-black giant . . . and there she was. Robin’’ (my emphasis) (8).
While I do not meant to imply that Miller is in any way homophobic
or homosexually panicked, his ‘‘troubling’’ of Robin’s gender suggests
that he, along with many comics business-people and aficionados alike,
was troubled by Batman and Robin’s continuing homoerotic legacy.
   When I speak of Batman and Robin’s relationship as homoerotic
I am, necessarily, moving beyond the boundaries of ‘‘mere’’ homosociality
and thus ‘‘troubling’’ their close bond by injecting into it the impri-
matur of sex. Although I do not intend to suggest that Batman and
Robin were engaged in sexual activity, nevertheless the odd (and on-
going) sexual ambiguity in their relationship is a far cry from the relative
safety of a father – son connection. Thus, it is not enough to say, as Mark
Cotta Vaz notes, ‘‘Batman and Robin had a blood brother closeness.
Theirs was a spiritual intimacy forged from the stress of countless battles
fought side by side. But Batman was also a mentor, protector, and father-
figure’’ (53), precisely because of the plethora of homoerotic signifiers
permeating the various Batman comics since their inception.
   For instance, in a seven-panel excerpt entitled ‘‘Around the Clock
with Batman!’’ (Batman #12, August – September 1942) Bruce Wayne
and Dick Grayson are shown engaging in a typical daily routine. The
initial ‘‘wake-up’’ panel shows Bruce the father-figure standing beside
Dick’s bed and shaking him gently on the shoulder. Panel two moves
the pair to the gym, where Bruce (dressed in a mid-torso length
sleeveless top), while working over a punching bag, states, ‘‘Every time
I hit this, I keep thinking it should be the Joker’s face!’’1 What dis-
turbs Bruce about the Joker? His perpetual sneer, his mocking laugh-
ter, or the curious combination of pleasure and pain that Bruce gets
from imagining the Joker’s face getting pummeled? While in this
panel Bruce’s muscled figure, along with his attendant puzzling re-
mark, is foregrounded, Dick is seen in the background, shirtless and
wearing barely noticeable shorts, swinging from a trapeze bar.
   The third panel shows the two men seated in a cozy, if suspiciously
elegant, breakfast nook and eating a ‘‘good hearty breakfast,’’ including
quart jars of wholesome milk for each person. Dick declares, ‘‘Now
I feel ready for anything! What’s first on the program?’’ and Bruce

Gender Trouble                                                              325

replies, ‘‘I want to test that new wing placement on the Batplane!’’
Segue then to panel four, in which the aforementioned Batplane
hurtling downward at a perilous angle, takes on an oddly phallic shape.
This panel is accompanied by the innuendo-filled caption, ‘‘Into the air
as the Batplane spins, turns, power-dives in a grueling test that some
day may save their lives!’’ The fifth panel compounds the suggestive
atmosphere as the pair returns to Bruce’s laboratory. The panel caption
reads, ‘‘Then . . . back to the laboratory . . . for another type of test,’’ and
the panel’s artwork shows Bruce, muscular forearm prominently dis-
played, holding aloft a smoking test tube. Bruce observes, ‘‘Fine! This
test shows shavings of iron metal were in Maroni’s pocket!’’ Dick,
dressed again in a preppy shirt/sweater vest ensemble, watches him
admiringly and states, ‘‘That proves his guilt! I’ll notify Commissioner
Gordon!’’ Exactly how Bruce Wayne was able to procure iron shavings
from a criminal’s (coat? shirt? pants?) pocket is never established, but
Dick Grayson is suitably impressed all the same.
   In panel six, following this successful experiment, Bruce and Dick
move to the study for even more ‘‘testing.’’ The caption reads, ‘‘Next,
Dick drills Bruce in identifying wanted criminals . . . a daily routine
that produces his amazing photographic memory!’’ Dick holds up a
‘‘mug shot’’ and quizzes Bruce by using only the criminal’s name, to
which Bruce must describe significant identifying features. Dick’s
criminal of choice is ‘‘Trigger’’ Daly, which could easily be read as a
phallic pun. As well, Bruce’s ‘‘amazing photographic memory’’ of
Trigger’s facial characteristics reveals both nothing and everything.
Bruce responds, ‘‘Eyes small, shifty . . . nose flat . . . thin lips . . . scar on
left temple!’’ Given Kane’s illustration of the pair in panel six, the
description could easily fit Bruce. Moreover, Bruce does not include in
his catalog hair, ears, or facial shape. Instead he recalls, significantly,
Trigger’s small eyes and thin lips.
   Surprisingly, only in the final panel do Bruce and Dick costume as
Batman and Robin. They do so in order to help buy and sell war
savings bonds. The panel is utterly patriotic except for a shadowy
figure lurking on Batman’s right side. Although the man is shown in
profile, it is easy to discern both a flattened nose and thin lips. Even
more interesting is the illustrative ‘‘placement’’ of the man’s shadow,
because part of the shadow falls, rather obviously, over Batman’s crotch.
Could this be Trigger, and if so, what is his presence triggering in
Batman?

326                                                    Nathan G. Tipton

   At first glance, this innocuous scene contains all the overdetermined
hallmarks of a typical, heteronormative father and son dyad. Or so it
seems. The queer eroticism is not, however, far from the surface of even
this most innocent sequence. Kane and Robinson are, in fact, contin-
ually guilty of illustrating homoerotic potentiality, even as they elide
intentionality. Indeed this potentiality was already obvious enough for
Dr. Wertham to spot a mere twelve years later. Thus, it is surprising to
read Mark Cotta Vaz’s hysterically damning categorical pronouncement
inveighing against ‘‘Gay Batman and Robin’’ interpretations. Cotta Vaz
writes:

  Bob Kane has dismissed the notion of Batman and Robin as ho-
  mosexuals, aghast that anyone would read into his characters some
  subliminal ode to homoeroticism. After all, Bruce Wayne regularly
  squired the most beautiful women in Gotham City and presumably
  had a healthy sex life. Even Dick Grayson, who showed no fear when
  battling crooks, would occasionally get all flustered and tongue-tied
  in the presence of a female classmate who had won his heart. (47)

I hardly think that Bob Kane would have been aghast, to use Cotta
Vaz’s term, at the unwelcome discovery of homoerotic elements. Will
Brooker notes, in fact, ‘‘according to an Internet report, Bob Kane
claimed in the 1980s that, surprised and amused by Wertham’s
interpretation, he ‘eventually decided to play into it, injecting double-
entendres into the stories’ ’’ (152, 179n), although Brooker adds to this
quote a cautionary note indicating Kane’s selective and revisionist
memory.
    Whether or not Kane consciously included in his Batman oeuvre
homoerotic elements, though, is perhaps best left in abeyance. What is
rather more noticeable throughout the history of Batman, and partic-
ularly during Kane’s tenure, is the notable dearth of females. In fairness
to Cotta Vaz, Batman/Bruce Wayne is indeed shown at various junc-
tures in his tenure alternately squiring or squaring off with a number
of female characters. The appearances of these female characters are,
however, always short-lived, distanced, and usually framed as oppo-
sitional from Batman and Robin’s unique bond. Cotta Vaz remarks,
somewhat petulantly, ‘‘For a virile, passionate man such as Batman, it
must be frustrating to steel himself against love’s siren call, giving
himself totally to his crime-fighting obsession’’ (125). Maybe so, but
if indeed Batman’s crime-fighting obsession is so consuming, it is

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therefore easy to surmise that Batman is incapable of having any re-
lationships, and particularly one as close as his relationship with Robin.
   Why then has the partnership with Robin been allowed to continue
and, perhaps more important, how does Frank Miller’s gender trou-
bling of Robin affect this partnership dynamic? It is interesting to note
that, soon after Batman’s debut in 1939, the comic came under harsh
criticism for its dark, menacing atmosphere. Robin was, therefore,
created by Kane to lighten up Batman, injecting youthful insouciance
and humor into the series, in order to ‘‘make crime fighting FUN’’
(Cotta Vaz 53). Frank Miller’s statement, ‘‘I’d never intended to use
Robin. But then, one day, I pictured a little bundle of bright colors
leaping over buildings, dwarfed by a gray-and-black giant,’’ then, has
surprising echoes to Bob Kane’s own decision to create Robin. How-
ever, by intersecting two long-standing Batman traditions, those of the
Robin character and the incidental female character(s), Miller creates
for himself an inevitable catch-22. Miller is aware that Robin must
continue as a character, but he also knows that Robin cannot continue
as a female.
   This is precisely what happens in his Dark Knight Returns oeuvre.
Carrie Kelly, a young Gotham City teenager, takes up the mantle of
Robin in Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. However, with the 2001
publication of The Dark Knight Strikes Again (DK2) Carrie renounces
her Robin incarnation in favor of a new identity as Catgirl. She does
not arrive at this moniker until the second issue of DK2 when, after
Batman instructs her, ‘‘Fire up the Batmobile, Robin,’’ she replies
tersely, ‘‘That’s Catgirl. Get a clue’’ (54). There is no apparent reason
why in DK2 Carrie/Catgirl shirks the Robin persona, but possible
answers abound in Miller’s original series, The Dark Knight Returns.
   Following its release in 1985, the eponymous Book One of Batman:
The Dark Knight Returns was widely hailed as a revolutionary work.
Indeed, its vivid portrayal of Batman as an aging, battle-scarred cos-
tume hero diverged sharply from the ‘‘timeless’’ Batman put forth by
other DC writers and illustrators. This is not to say, however, that
Miller’s Batman is debilitated or incapacitated due to age and injury.
Instead, Miller’s focus shifts from an emphasis on the physical and, in
the process, portrays the ‘‘new’’ Batman as a methodical, always think-
ing, crime-fighting machine. With this overt emphasis on Batman’s
highly individuated strategic genius, it appears that Miller calls into
question the necessity of a sidekick. Thus, although Carrie appears

328                                                    Nathan G. Tipton

fairly early in Book One, she does not transform herself into Robin
until early in Book Two, ‘‘The Dark Knight Triumphant.’’
   Somewhat surprisingly, her transformation initially goes unnoticed
by Batman. As a child growing up in Gotham City, Carrie is keenly
aware of the Batman mythos, and her awareness includes knowledge of
Batman’s sidekick, Robin. Although it is unclear whether or not Carrie
is also cognizant of the former Robin’s ( Jason Todd’s) demise, Bruce/
Batman is clearly haunted by memories of this death. Jason’s death,
though, presents an interesting paradox, precisely because Batman: The
Dark Knight Returns appeared in print two years before another rev-
olutionary series, Batman: A Death in the Family, actually portrayed the
death of Robin II/Jason Todd.
   If Miller was remarkably prescient in predicting Jason’s death, it is
likely he was also aware of fan’s negative reactions to Jason. Batman
readers, in fact, never liked Jason Todd. Since his appearance in 1984,
readers regarded Jason as an arrogant usurper to the Robin ‘‘mantle’’ and
in 1988 decided, through a telephone call-in poll, not to spare his life.
   Despite this harsh fan sentiment, however, Miller includes through-
out Batman: The Dark Knight Returns several sympathetic references to
Jason. Early in Book One, Alfred, Bruce Wayne’s longtime butler and
confidante, confronts Bruce as he gazes at Jason’s Robin costume, now
encased in a museum-like canister. Alfred says dryly, ‘‘It’s the spirits,
I suspect, tends to make one sentimental,’’ which could be read al-
ternately as a reference to Bruce’s alcohol use or to the felt presence
of ghosts made manifest in Bruce’s memories. In the next panel,
though, Alfred is much more forthright, remarking, ‘‘Come, sir.
Hardly the hour for antiques, is it?’’ (20). The statement could easily
be read as Miller’s own thoughts about Robin, almost as if, through
Alfred, Miller declares his independence from the long-standing Robin
tradition.
   Indeed as Bruce/Batman’s closest confidante, Alfred repeatedly
appears as the dual voices of reason and reality. Thus he becomes
Miller’s perfect vehicle for ‘‘cleaning house.’’ By this I mean that
Alfred’s pointed comments can be read meta-textually, as directed not
only at Bruce/Batman but also to the comic reader who is, like Carrie,
mindful of the Batman and Robin mythos writ large. For example,
after their initial conversation, Bruce and Alfred return to the Wayne
Mansion study, where Alfred serves Bruce a glass of wine. Alfred states,
with no small amount of sarcasm, ‘‘That will be all, Master Bruce? I’m

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hoping that the next generation of the Wayne family shant face an
empty wine cellar. Though given your social schedule of late, the
prospects of there being a next generation . . .’’ whereupon Bruce in-
terrupts him, replying tersely, ‘‘That will be all, Alfred. Good night’’
(emphasis in original) (21). The implications, again, are multifaceted.
Alfred’s reference to Bruce’s wine consumption harkens back to his
previous comment about spirits, while his biting comment about
Bruce’s nonexistent social life also presents an open challenge to comic
readers who, like Mark Cotta Vaz, constantly defend Batman’s sup-
posed heterosexuality.
    The difficulty with this interpretation, however, is that it presup-
poses Miller’s reliance on stereotypes, because at this juncture it appears
that Batman has become a lonely, self-loathing homosexual bachelor
whose only solace is found in alcohol. Miller, of course, briefly sidesteps
this quandary by revisiting Batman’s origins (something he does more
fully in the 1988 series Batman: Year One), but he seems unable to
divest himself completely of this problematic reading. Miller begins by
bringing Bruce out of a horrible reverie, in which he recalls his parents’
deaths, through a series of phone messages that are both innocuous and
yet significant. The first two messages are both from men (Harvey Dent
qua Two-Face and Clark Kent qua Superman) who, for Bruce/Batman,
occupy the liminal space between homosocial/homoerotic partner and
adversary. The third caller, Selina Kyle (qua Catwoman), also shares this
liminal space, although her message is more specifically situated in
heteroeroticism. She states, plaintively, ‘‘Selina, Bruce. I’m lonely’’ (26).
At this point, in a dreamlike re-enactment of Bruce’s first ‘‘coming out’’
process as Batman, a bat slowly glides toward, and ultimately crashes
through, Bruce’s window.
    In these panels Miller seems intent on repudiating the homo-
sociality qua homoeroticism that surrounds Bruce/Batman. Selina’s
presence in this heretofore strictly homosocial/homoerotic arena is,
therefore, disruptive and transformative. Indeed, Miller suggests,
women are able to break the always problematic male bond through
a simple expression of female heteroerotic desire and, thus, reveal the
‘‘real man’’ lurking underneath. Put more simply, all Bruce/Batman
really needs is a ‘‘real woman’’ to turn him away from the worrisome
imprimatur of homosexuality.
    But is Selina the right woman for the job? Evidently not, because
Selina disappears until the very end of Book Four. Who, then, remains?

330                                                     Nathan G. Tipton

Carrie, of course, but she is a problem in her own right. Miller first
illustrates Carrie as a tomboyish teenager whose only overt signs of
gender are her name and, in a more stereotypic vein, the way she carries
her books flat against her chest. Despite this initial ‘‘genderfuck’’ por-
trayal, however, Miller carefully imbues Carrie with an awareness of her
incipient heterosexual desires.
    After being rescued by Batman from a mutant attack, Carrie and
friend Michelle are interviewed by a television reporter. In response
to Michelle’s description of their rescuer as a ‘‘Monster! Like with fangs
and wings and it can fly,’’ Carrie states unequivocally, ‘‘Reality check,
Michelle. . . . He’s a man—about twelve feet tall’’ (emphasis in original)
(34). Carrie’s pronouncement is superimposed over the page’s dominant
image of a larger than life, heavily muscled Batman who, like his
archrival Superman, is shown leaping tall buildings in a single bound.
As Batman descends from the dizzying heights, he echoes Carrie’s
remark, declaring, ‘‘But I’m a man of thirty—of twenty again. The rain
on my chest is a baptism—I’m born again’’ (emphasis in original) (34).
At this defining moment, Batman and Robin are indeed born again.
They are not, however, ‘‘bonded’’ until late in Book Two.
    While Batman continues waging his one-man vigilante ‘‘war’’
against the mutant hordes, Carrie takes her first, tentative steps as
Robin. With two weeks lunch money she purchases a Robin costume.
The costume, though, is not transformative, because Miller continues
denying Carrie any sense of femininity. She is, in fact, shown several
times from ‘‘street perspective,’’ looking up into her groin. Again,
Miller’s only concession to Carrie’s gender is in seeming contradiction
to her open-legged stance. As she eases onto the window ledge outside
her apartment, Carrie thinks to herself, ‘‘Wind’s aces, and the ledge isn’t
too much smaller than a balance beam. Sure. Just slippery and about a
mile up’’ (emphasis in original) (60). The balance beam is an overde-
termined reminder of Carrie’s femininity, but it is also an historical
reminder of the original Robin’s (Dick Grayson) origins as a gymnastic
circus performer.2
    Miller, in fact, seems to intertwine Carrie’s identity with that of
Dick Grayson, as if positioning her for an inevitable meeting with
Bruce/Batman. Carrie follows her ‘‘balance beam’’ by performing a
flying somersault between two rooftops, thus recalling again Dick
Grayson’s own phenomenal gymnastic abilities.3 But if Miller is con-
tent to reference continually Dick Grayson, why then does he insist on

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including Carrie’s intrusive presence? Simply put, Carrie is Miller’s
connection to heteronormativity, and her appearances begin to coincide
more and more frequently within scenes of overt homoeroticism. Thus
she is able to distract from and disrupt scenarios that threaten to ‘‘cross
the line’’ into homoeroticism.
   For example, Carrie trails Batman to the city dump, where he and
the mutants battle for control of Gotham City. In the midst of the
ferocious fighting Carrie appears and hides, in relative safety, behind
the newly modified Batmobile. Sandwiched between Carrie’s ap-
pearance and a panel showing the mutant leader in horrific close-up,
however, are two seemingly unrelated panels (what comic theorist
Scott McCloud, in his seminal work Understanding Comics, calls ‘‘non-
sequiturs’’) (72). Miller, though, does not place these panels here
accidentally, because they are eroticized, representations of Police
Commissioner James Gordon and his wife whose sexual act is sym-
bolized by the postcoital cigarette smoke rising and intertwining to-
gether. The covert heteroeroticism of these two panels occurs, of course,
in the comic ‘‘gutters,’’ but Carrie’s presence in the first panel exac-
erbates the ‘‘intrusive’’ heterosexuality and, in so doing, displaces the
overt homoeroticism of the remaining panels.4
   Or does it? Batman’s Batmobile leers down at the young mutant
leader, but something stops Batman from annihilating his foe, though
it is certainly not an act of mercy. Instead, for Batman, the mutant
leader seems too good a challenge to pass up. Batman responds and, in
fact, relishes the idea of a face-to-face (or, more appropriately, ‘‘man-to-
man’’) test of physical strength. His initial thought processes are rem-
iniscent of Bruce Wayne’s early ‘‘Joker as punching bag’’ statement
and illustrate the unbroken tradition of Bruce/Batman’s propensity for
enjoying a good, ‘‘healthy,’’ and naturally masculinist physical release
of aggression.
   Indeed, almost instantly after the mutant leader’s declaration,
‘‘Come out, coward—face me—I kill you—eat your heart’’ (emphasis in
original) (76), Batman begins to weigh his options mentally. Ulti-
mately, however, his emphasis returns from the mental to the physical.
Here is what he concludes:

   I can’t think of a single reason to let him live. Except . . . except he’s
   got exactly the kind of body I wish he didn’t have . . . powerful,
   without enough bulk to slow him down . . . every muscle a steel spring

332                                                       Nathan G. Tipton

   ready to lash out—and he’s young . . . in his physical prime . . . and I
   honestly don’t know if I could beat him. (emphasis in original) (77)

Batman’s ‘‘coming out’’ is a horrific experience, and the sheer brutality
extant in the battle at once celebrates male homosociality, but also
introduces a disturbing note of homophobia. As the mutant leader
pummels Batman mercilessly with a crowbar, Batman’s thoughts turn
to Dick Grayson. He thinks to himself, ‘‘You were always . . . my little
monkey wrench . . . Dick . . . Got yourself in deep again, Dick . . . Always
. . . in over your head . . . Remember Two-Face, Dick . . .? Robin the Boy
Hostage . . . that’s what Two-Face called you . . . heh . . . you hated that’’
(emphasis in original) (82). Given the deadly pounding Batman is
undergoing, his thoughts are, at this juncture, remarkably clear. They
are also filled with homoerotic innuendo, particularly when Batman’s
thoughts turn to Dick getting himself ‘‘in deep again . . . Always in
over your head.’’ It is not surprising, then, that in the midst of this
beating Carrie herself ‘‘comes out’’ of hiding and intervenes to try and
stop the mutant leader.
     Her intercession is fortuitous, of course, because it distracts the
mutant leader and thus allows Batman to exercise one final, desperate
act that overcomes the mutant. Therefore is the comic’s homoeroticism
again sublimated and heteronormativity restored. Miller also reprises
his exacerbation of heteroeroticism accomplished through Carrie’s
presence by interjecting in the scene a television reporter who notes,
‘‘Porn star Hot Gates today signed a twelve-million dollar contract with
Landmark Films to star in a screen version of Snow White. ‘I’m doing it
for the kids,’ says Gates’’ (83). Although Miller’s inclusion of the porn
star playing Snow White is obviously, on surface, a conscious send-up
of Gotham City’s societal mores, it also serves as a further reminder of
the defiant power of heteronormativity.
     However, this is not to say that, even in the face of Carrie/Robin’s
insistent presence, homoeroticism vanishes completely. The mutant
leader, bowed but unbroken, appears on another television screen
and again challenges Batman. His words, unsurprisingly, are choice,
announcing:

   Batman is a coward. I broke his bones. I conquered the fool. I made him
   beg for mercy. Only by cheating did he escape alive. Let him go to his
   women. Let him lick his wounds. His day is done. Gotham City
   belongs to the mutants. (emphasis in original) (85)

Gender Trouble                                                         333

It is interesting to note that the mutant leader resorts to questioning
Batman’s manhood and declaring that he, for all practical purposes,
‘‘unmanned’’ (literally) Batman. Can these accusations, though, be read
as homoerotically tinged or homophobic? I would argue a little of
both, precisely because of the conflicted terrains of desire that Bat-
man inhabits. Thus when the mutant leader says, ‘‘Let him go to his
women,’’ he is at once reinforcing heterosexuality and yet valorizing
homosexuality as superior to heterosexuality. He implies, further-
more, that (contra the presence of Selina and Carrie) only through other
men can Batman become a ‘‘real man.’’
    But Batman will, of course, have the last word. Batman and Carrie/
Robin return to the Batcave where Alfred tends to Batman’s wounds.
After some tense hours during which Bruce/Batman decides whether
he wants to live or die, he and Carrie/Robin embrace (92). What is
troubling about the ‘‘splash page’’ image, however, is that although
Carrie remains costumed as Robin, Bruce has stripped off his Batman
suit. The underlying implication, then, in this illustration (and, in-
deed, Bruce’s conversation with Alfred in the panels following) is that
Batman and Robin (qua Carrie/Robin) will never attain the true part-
nerships forged by Dick Grayson and Jason Todd. In other words,
Miller seems to here acknowledge that Carrie as Robin is a ‘‘one-off’’
occurrence that will not be repeated in his future Batman works.
    Alfred, in fact, seems to voice this opinion directly. Carrie overhears
Bruce and Alfred arguing over Carrie’s suitability as a sidekick, and yet
the name ‘‘Robin’’ is never uttered. Instead, Alfred refers to her as ‘‘the
girl’’ or a ‘‘sweet young child.’’ Batman, for his part, calls her ‘‘Carrie’’
and states, ‘‘She’s perfect. She’s young. She’s smart. She’s brave. With
her, I might be able to end this mutant nonsense once and for all. You
see, it all gets down to their leader. They worship him’’ (93). Why, in
the midst of extolling Carrie’s virtues, does Bruce stop to ruminate over
the mutant leader? Has the mutant leader’s ad hominem assault hit a
nerve? Alfred seems to think so, because he knows too well Bruce/
Batman’s history with women.
    Moreover, Alfred is also keenly aware that Batman’s too easy choice
of Carrie for a sidekick cum ‘‘new’’ Robin is a decision made sans
emotionality. Alfred knows, deep down, that without a certain emo-
tional connection between Bruce/Batman and Carrie/Robin, Carrie’s
life will be in extreme danger. More to the point, Alfred tacitly re-
inforces the ‘‘male’’ Robin tradition and tries, in the process, to remind

334                                                   Nathan G. Tipton

Bruce/Batman of this salient fact. His trump card is, in fact, Jason
Todd. Alfred says bluntly, ‘‘Very well, sir. I shall come right out with
it. Have you forgotten what happened to Jason?’’ Bruce’s icy reply,
‘‘I will never forget Jason. He was a good soldier. He honored me. But
the war goes on’’ (93), is equally blunt, but utterly disingenuous. On
some deeper level, Bruce/Batman recognizes that Carrie as Robin will
be a temporary arrangement.
    What then does this tacit acknowledgment mean for Miller’s treat-
ment of the homosocial/homoerotic Batman tradition? For the re-
mainder of Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Carrie/Robin becomes
an increasingly ancillary character. Batman, however, compounds his
attacks on various (and all male) criminals. Surprisingly, though, one
of his most potent nemeses is new Gotham City Police Commissioner
Ellen Yindel, a replacement for retiring Commissioner Gordon. Yindel,
who Gordon refers to simply as ‘‘A woman. Christ almighty’’ (72),
is motivated politically to capture Batman. She is also, however, dis-
turbed by the incipient eroticism between Batman and Carrie/Robin.
Following a fierce gun battle with police, Batman and Carrie/Robin
escape, Carrie wrapping herself (literally) around Batman. Yindel views
this seemingly tender embrace with alarm, and as she orders a ceasefire,
she asks, ‘‘Is that a kid with him?’’ Her marksman answers, ‘‘Boy
Wonder—got to be,’’ whereupon Yindel radios one of her lieutenants,
stating, ‘‘Call Ingersoll, Merkel. Tell him to add child endangerment to
the . . .’’ (emphasis in original) (138). Although Yindel charges Batman
with, among other crimes, child endangerment, she does not react
directly to her marksman’s reply. Obviously the fact that Batman and a
young ‘‘boy’’ are sharing a midair embrace does not signify so much as
does Batman, through his vigilante activities, putting a child in harm’s
way. On the other hand, Yindel’s child endangerment charge could also
be read more globally, as Miller’s way of circumventing an even more
troublesome portrayal of homoeroticism and, thus, avoiding an almost
certain maelstrom of negative criticism.
    Carrie does survive as Robin until the conclusion of Batman: The
Dark Knight Returns. Her intended heteronormative effect on Batman’s
homoerotic milieu, however, remains diluted at best. Indeed, the very
fact that in Miller’s sequel series, Batman: The Dark Knight Strikes
Again Carrie disavows her Robin persona wholly, in favor of the more
specifically female gendered role of Catgirl, indicates that Miller’s
gender troubling of Robin was an interesting, if ultimately failed,

Gender Trouble                                                                              335

experiment. In the end, then, it seems that the male bond between, and
attendant homoerotic readings of, Batman and Robin, must remain
forever intact and forever problematic. As Andy Medhurst points out,
however, ‘‘If I had a suspicious frame of mind, I might think that . . .
maybe Dr. Wertham was on to something when he targeted these
narratives as incitements to homosexual fantasy. And if I want Batman
to be gay, then, for me, he is. After all, outside of the minds of his
writers and readers, he doesn’t really exist’’ (162).

NOTES

     This paper could not have been completed without the help of my co-worker, friend, and
     Batman aficionado Melissa Skipper, to whom I am indebted for her sage advice and good
     humor about all things Batman.
1.   Of all the villains that Bruce/Batman faces, The Joker is perhaps the most sexually trouble-
     some, so much so that his character in Frank Miller’s Batman: The Dark Knight Returns was
     openly queer.
2.   One of the most interesting ‘‘full story’’ treatments of Dick Grayson’s transformation into
     Robin occurs in Batman: A Lonely Place of Dying, which also introduces the character of Tim
     Drake, who later becomes Robin III.
3.   In Batman: A Lonely Place of Dying Tim Drake discovers and discloses to Dick Grayson his
     knowledge of Dick’s crime-fighting alter ego. Tim tells Dick, ‘‘C’mon, Dick—that flip you did
     as Robin. It was a quadruple somersault. The circus ringmaster said only three people could do
     that. I knew that somersault. Knew it like my own name. And it all made sense. Batman
     showed up at the circus and took you with him. About six months later, Robin made his first
     appearance’’ (emphasis in original) (15).
4.   McCloud explains this unseen experience that occurs ‘‘between the lines’’ by remarking,
     ‘‘Nothing is seen between the two panels, but experience tells you something must be there!’’
     (67).

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336                                                      Nathan G. Tipton

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Nathan G. Tipton is ABD in Textual Studies at the University of Memphis
(with particular focus on queering Southern writers of the early- to mid-
1950s), and is currently serving as Editor in the Anthropology Department’s
Institute for Substance Abuse Treatment Evaluation (I-SATE). He has
published numerous encyclopedia entries, book reviews, and critical articles
on everything from Martha Stewart to Robert Penn Warren to Cartoon
Network’s ‘‘Cow and Chicken.’’ He can be reached at ntipton@memphis.edu