DC Brings Snagglepuss Back As A Gay Playwright
This makes perfect sense. Not only does it make perfect sense, it's actually something I'm going to pick up the moment it comes out. DC comics is re-imagining one of Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera's classic characters as a Southern Gothic playwright along the lines of Tennesse Williams in mid-twentieth century New York in Exit Stage Left: The Snagglepuss Chronicles, what will undoubtedly be writer Mark Russell's next weird-yet-amazing social satire.
Oh, and he's going to be gay this time (albeit closeted given the time period), but you could easily make the case that he always has been. Here's what Gay Snagglepuss Who Writes And Probably Fucks is going to look like:
Buddy, that is a straight-up Furry comic. That isn't inherently a bad thing, though if you're wondering why my first response wasn't immediate dismissal at the thought of "sexy Snagglepuss," one, you're reading this article on Riverdale central, and two, Mark Russell put out a Flintstones comic for DC over the course of Junes 2016 through 2017 that, well...
It's what I can only describe as "Ultra-Woke Social Satire" to the point of self-parody (based on what would be an obliviously heteronormative cartoon by today's standards; there's a whole section in there about marriage equality now), but somehow, all of it works. What's more, it isn't afraid to get ludicriously dark in the process of deconstructing the original:
"We participated in a genocide, Barney."
- Fred Flintstone, 2017
My point is, Mark Russell knows how to balance the modern mature and socially-aware take with just enough self-awareness that it doesn't feel like sermonizing, but with enough to actually say that doesn't feel like a pointless exercise in self-reflexivity either. The Flintstones comic was drawn by artist Steve Pugh, but it'll be Mike Feehan who joins Russell on Exit Stage Left, with Mark Morales seemingly doing the art for at least one cover:
Here's what Russell had to say about the project while speaking to THR:
Snagglepuss in this story is having to live a double life as a gay playwright living in New York, and he's closeted. But he has values and integrity as an artist, and he's trying to stand up for people who otherwise would be shoved under the stairs in this time of great national paranoia in the Red Scare mentality. It's very easy in a time of national catastrophe — of perceived national catastrophe — to throw people under the sink and forget about them, and Snagglepuss is unwilling to let them do that to people he knows and loves. He's willing to stand up for people when the rest of the country is not.
In a lot of ways, that frees me up to say what I think about what's going on in the world now, just putting it in the context of 1953 America.
Somebody once said that history never repeats itself, it just rhymes an awful lot. Unfortunately, there are these themes in history — particularly American history — that never really seem to go away. Themes like marginalizing minorities and immigrants, using fear of military threats to make people go along with abuse. These themes quiet down every now and again, but they never seem to go away, so unfortunately, when you're writing about these things, they will always be timely or relevant.
If you ask me, this thing is ridiculous enough to work. I'm here for Woke Gay Snagglepuss, and there's not a damn thing you can say to stop me.
Exit Stage Left: The Snagglepuss Chronicles was previewed in Suicide Squad/Banana Splits #1 earlier this year. The first issue arrives January 2018.
