Michael, Will Eiser would've been about 21 or 22 years old in 1939.

Edited: Oops! The other Matt beat me to the punch! :-)

BTW, here's more info on Eisner's Wonder Man for those interested:

http://willeisner.com/biography/2_eisner_iger.html

Thx for the link Matt.

It says he also did Blackhawk and Dollman.

Matt Reed summed it up pretty well for me, as well. Quitely isn't the greatest artist I've ever seen but I don't feel there's anything sexual about anything he's drawn for DC, much less Batman and Robin's relationship.

I have to say that unless you can show or cite a specific, definitive example of anything sexual going on between Batman and Robin, that it's you which is inferring this perverse sexual meaning into Batman and Robin's relationship; which reveals more about your mindset than either Quitely's or Morrison's.

My mistake about Quietly "sexualizing", because I didn't mean Quietly specifically. I didn't elaborate and my quote-- What was wrong with non-adultified, non-sexualized art in major-title comics from these companies?--  I was trying to include Ed Benes' JLA work into the mix, and other artists like Benes. Horse before cart and all that.

I agree 100 percent that Quietly doesn't sexualize in his art. His character designs and layouts are about as far from sexy or engaging as I've ever seen.*

*Again, on superhero comics.

I have to say that unless you can show or cite a specific, definitive example of anything sexual going on between Batman and Robin, that it's you which is inferring this perverse sexual meaning into Batman and Robin's relationship; which reveals more about your mindset than either Quitely's or Morrison's.

Never has it been stated that Chad Carter believes there's sexuality between Batman and Robin. I just want that reiterated. But there's enough of a blanket mentality, a juvenile aspect, to the "jokes" about the relationship in a comic book which is embarrassed to be a comic book (as Morrison's work invariably is) to make me wonder about the reasons behind a Boy Wonder in the current comics. These sexual jokes are "baggage" , and part of the cultural mainstream, a joke John Q Public can tell.

Just like John Q can now tell you how Scott Summers is a douche (because the movie said so) or the Joker has a scarred face (also from the movie.) Those aspects are accepted as fact by the Public. The movies are the cultural "generalizations" which inform everyone, not just the niche 100 thousand men between ages 24-55 for whom superheroes have been specialized.

So Robin becomes an anachronism for the 100 thousand, or he's redesigned as a ten year old child...in a Gotham City repurposed over the years as a kingdom of psychotics and serial killers and mass murderers and bizarre gangsters and outright monsters. This "adult" Gotham teeters on the brink of anarchy and darkness, with Batman and James Gordon and the Batman Family holding it together. In this blood-splattered shadow-obsessed adult Gotham, created mind you to satisfy the 100 thousand fans of Batman who have grown too old, too needful of more explicit violence, more intense storylines and more grotesque villains...it is in this Gotham that Morrison implants a ten year old Robin. Not only that, but as a fully-functional crimefighter, apparently greenlit by Batman.

I mean, Gotham City in the 1980s was a pretty tough place, but it was also a place where Harvey Bullock stumbled around and Batgirl ran around in her goofy but wonderfully mod yellow boots, and Catwoman knew about as much kung fu as I do and mostly came off like a dominatrix in purple cat ears. Gotham City had a basic tradition up to then of being a "dark" environment where people found their morals and ethics constricted, their bodies pummeled...but since the 1990s it had become something more grim, and the villains (like Killer Croc) clearly changed to reflect that change.

This is okay? My problem with the "new" Robin is not the new Robin, but the conceit established about Gotham decades ago, many moons before Morrison brought his solid gold touch to the proceedings. Gotham City is a very dangerous place. More dangerous even than that time Robin got his head caved in by the Joker weilding a crowbar. No, in this Gotham City, you can be tortured, killed, and eaten.

The Batman which exists in that adultified Gotham City should never have his own Robin..."trained by the League of Assassins" or not. It's irresponsible. It's reckless. It's stupid. On top of that, the way genius writers decide Robin is best used is as an annoying caricature that makes Jason Todd in the 1980s seem introspective and meaningful. Each new Robin is more irritating than the one before, since each new Robin has to "change" to supposedly mesh with A) a more violent Gotham City and B) because the customers are aging fans whose underwear gets tight when you say, "New Batman and Robin." Or "One million Kryptonians." Or "Red Lanterns."

Change is welcome because aging fans don't change. They always want more, even knowing more is actually less, in the long run and for superhero comic books. Comic books which, say it together boys and girls, are meant as adventure fiction for pre- and pubescent boys and girls.

As somebody has pointed out, this is just a temporary stunt by DC Comics. And yet it doesn't alter the fact that there's some very intellectually-corrupt people running the creative output from that company.

EDIT for clarity sake.