At last, Batman, but he was smiling . . .

Somebody, I think the C.I.A. guy, had decided to produce a collection of our cartoon drawings and present them in book form to Fidel Castro, hoping he’d be so impressed that he’d want to meet with us. Dumb idea, since this was a predominantly editorial cartoonist crowd. These guys made statements that Castro wouldn’t be too happy about, but ... worth a try.

I discussed the matter with the group, among them a classic artist in the world of cartooning, Jerry Robinson. Jerry was the 17-year-old wunderkind hired by Bob Kane in 1943 to draw the Batman comic book and hey, Jerry created, designed and drew that original character called "The Joker."

Classic is one of Jerry’s descriptions, nice guy is another. For some years, I’d been pressing his nice-guy cotton during lunches at a restaurant on the boat basin at 72nd Street on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. I wanted a Batman drawing for my daughter, Jennifer. Jerry was the artist at the birth of the Caped Crusader’s comic art career. Yes, doting dad, love the kid, drawing for Jennifer, yada, yada, but up to this point it hadn’t happened. Frankly, I’d stopped asking, but now, in the middle of a large gathering of cartoonists, Jerry’s presence had triggered an idea.

I thought of Castro drawn as Batman, so, I drew it, placed the headdress on the bearded guy, finished the outline, blackened the cowl, drew the beard, luckily recalling the bumps of his nose and, in all modesty, it was a damned good Bat-Dictator drawing and surprisingly, wonderfully, Jerry Robinson smiled, pointed and asked, "Can I have it?"

Gotcha! "Jerry," I said, "Yes, you can have my drawing, but what about a Batman drawing for my kid?" Pause ... Answer, "OK, Bill." So Jerry drew a Batman for Jennifer.

u u u

The drawing was wonderful, but Batman was smiling. I mentioned that smile to Jerry; he growled an indiscernible answer. Now, I recalled his anger at the first Batman film and Jack Nicholson’s not resembling Jerry’s creation of The Joker. Fact is, Jerry wasn’t happy about Hollywood’s version of the Batman comics.

And, this Batman was smiling. Yes, dare I say (I dare), that all the superheroes of my childhood had moments of ... levity? And the coloring of those comics was yellow, orange, red, bright colors as opposed to the blue-blackened grays which came later — after all, they were referred to as "comic" books, so it was OK if Batman smiled occasionally. When I was a kid, the "Dark Knight" was nowhere near today’s pitch darkness, as seen in "The Punisher."

I saw the recent Batman film, Christian Bale’s, throaty rasp of a voice and tributes to annoying, noisy doses of sadomasochism accompanied by a total bastardization of The Joker’s character to "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" proportions. The Dark Knightmare ain’t what Bob Kane created and Jerry Robinson illustrated.

All of the cartoon characters and comic book characters of my childhood had some moments of non-darkness, even smiling occasionally. The Punisher’s Joker destroys all of his money, burns it with a guy seated on it, murders his own henchmen, yet maintains an unending supply of dedicated psychos who build intricate bombs — shoot, boom, death, destruction, Sorry, Jerry, the non-comic book has arrived.