![]() ![]() Every time I see Arkham Asylum I go nuts.ĭenny O'Neil has himself been very open with Harris' role in the creation of Arkham Asylum, so it is not like Harris is claiming glory that is in dispute. But Denny did it first in that issue of Batman and I'm the one who gave him the idea for it. Now I think it was Len Wein who picked up on that idea and later expanded the whole history of Arkham. And that's Denny O'Neil's tip of the hat to me for the Arkham idea. The guy who breaks him out is a military man named John Harris. ![]() If you look at it, if you read it, the story involves Two-Face being brought in out of Arkham Asylum. If you check it, this is the first time it's ever been mentioned, in this story. It's been reported elsewhere, but that's incorrect. That's the first mention of Arkham Asylum in DC comics history. And if you look, it was in Batman #258 from September of 1974. And what better one than Arkham Asylum from the Lovecraft stories?" He thought that was a great idea. So I was talking to Denny and I said, "Denny, you know criminals like Two-Face and the Joker shouldn't be just jailed. But during one of those times that Denny O'Neil came to visit and talk at my college course, I remember we were at dinner. It's nothing that anybody at DC came up with. They were committed to Arkham Asylum, which is in Massachusetts in the Lovecraft stories. Arkham Asylum is where all the nuts who were driven crazy by Lovecraft's elder gods go. The story goes like this: Of course Arkham Asylum was not created by anyone at DC, it was created by H.P. Stroud, longtime DC writer and editor Jack C. RELATED: Marvel’s Wild Secret Wars and He-Man Connection, Explained However, while O'Neil was definitely a Lovecraft fan and surely let that influence his darker version of Batman in the 1970s, in the case of Arkham Asylum, we know that the Lovecraft influence was more direct, especially since the creator was not actually Denny O'Neil. I was being influenced by writers like Lovecraft and Poe, and I didn't think about Gotham City." I just wanted to make it Gothic and spooky. So I think that it is clear that the Lovecraft inspiration would be the central influence upon the introduction of Arkham Asylum, as O'Neil was a big fan of Lovecraft himself (when asked about his early Batman stories in 1970 and how it was so different than earlier versions of Batman, he explained, "I'm sure we didn't give that a second's thought.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |