Catwoman Poster #1 FRAMED Catwoman #2 (2002) Darwyn Cooke

Description

You are purchasing the item pictured, framed. Priority mail, tracking and $50 insurance is included with purchase. Item will be bagged to protect from dust, packed in packing peanuts and boxed. Just open box and hang it on the wall…makes a perfect gift!

Originally known as the Cat, whip-wielding cat burglar Selina Kyle is one of Batman’s oldest and most popular adversaries. Unlike the Joker, whom she debuted along with in Batman # 1 (1940), she has undergone some major changes in costume over the decades. In some of her earliest appearances, she sported a fuzzy feline mask, soon to be relaced by a purple catsuit, cape and cowl combination. Through the years, her outfits grew progressively more streamlined and skin-tight, culminating in the glorious era of the black PVC bodysuit inspired by Michelle Pfeiffer’s portrayal in the 1993 feature film Batman Returns. In 2002, artist Darwyn Cooke and writer Ed Brubaker joined forces on a revamp of Catwoman. They supplied Selina with a shiny new catsuit (modeled on the one worn by Emma Peel on the classic ’60s TV adventure series The Avengers), infrared goggles, and a modified leather aviator’s helmet. Her eponymous monthly alson featured a new supporting cast led by Slam Bradley, DC’s venerable Golden Age private detective, and had Catwoman eschewing straight-up villainy for a more heroic role as the guardian of the inhabitants of Gotham’s East End. While the new direction came with critical and fan acclaim, Cooke left the series after just four issues- leaving behind several memorably sexy covers like this one. “My wife suggested giving her an Emma Peel catsuit, and I always wanted her to wear a hood/leather aviation style helmet that buckles under her chin, and Darwyn took all that, added all the cool stylistic stuff, and the whip and made it work.”- Ed Brubaker. Catwoman is historically a supervillainess, the character was created by Bob Kane and Bill Finger, partially inspired by Kane’s cousin, Ruth Steel, as well as actress Jean Harlow. The original and most widely known Catwoman, Selina Kyle, first appears in Batman #1 (Spring 1940) in which she is known as The Cat. She is usually depicted as an adversary of Batman, known for having a complex love-hate relationship with him. In her first appearance, she was a whip-carrying burglar with a taste for high-stake thefts.4 For many years Catwoman thrived, but from September 1954 to November 1966 she took an extended hiatus due to the newly developing Comics Code Authority in 1954. These issues involved the rules regarding the development and portrayal of female characters that were in violation of the Comics Code. Since the 1990s, Catwoman has been featured in an eponymous series that cast her as an antiheroine classy cat burglar rather than a traditional villain. The character has been one of Batman’s most enduring love interests. A popular figure, Catwoman has been featured in most media adaptations related to Batman. Actresses Julie Newmar, Lee Meriwether and Eartha Kitt introduced her to a large audience on the 1960s Batman television series and the 1966 Batman motion picture. Michelle Pfeiffer portrayed the character in 1992’s Batman Returns. Halle Berry starred in a stand-alone Catwoman film, 2004’s Catwoman, which was a box-office flop, and bears little to no resemblance to the Batman character. Anne Hathaway portrayed Selina Kyle in the 2012 film The Dark Knight Rises. Catwoman was ranked 11th on IGN’s “Top 100 Comic Book Villains of All Time” list, and 51st on Wizard magazine’s “100 Greatest Villains of All Time” list. Conversely, she was ranked 20th on IGN’s “Top 100 Comic Book Heroes of All Time” list, as well as 23rd in Comics Buyer’s Guide’s “100 Sexiest Women in Comics” list. During the Batman: Hush storyline, Batman and Catwoman briefly work together and have a romantic relationship, during which he reveals his true identity to her. At the end, he breaks off their relationship when he suspects it has been manipulated by the Riddler and Hush. This is the second story to establish that she knows Batman’s true identity. In an early 1980s storyline, Selina and Bruce develop a relationship. The concluding story features a closing panel in which she refers to Batman as “Bruce”. A change in the editorial team at that point, however, brought a swift end to that storyline and, apparently, all that transpired during the story arc. Darwyn Cooke is a comic book writer, artist, cartoonist and animator, known for his work on the comic books Catwoman, DC: The New Frontier, The Spirit and Richard Stark’s Parker: The Hunter. In the early 1990s Cooke decided to return to comics, but found little interest for his work at the major publishers. Eventually he was hired by Warner Bros. Animation after replying to an ad placed by animator Bruce Timm. He went on to work as a storyboard artist for Batman: The Animated Series and Superman: The Animated Series, and in 1999 he animated the main title design for Batman Beyond. In 2001, Cooke and writer Ed Brubaker teamed up to revamp the Catwoman character. They started with a 4 issue serial “Trail of the Catwoman” in Detective Comics #759-762 in which private detective Slam Bradley attempts to investigate the death of Selina Kyle (aka Catwoman). The story led into a new Catwoman title in late 2001 by Brubaker and Cooke, in which the character’s costume, supporting cast and modus operandi were all redesigned and redeveloped. Cooke would stay on the series, which was met with critical and fan acclaim, up until issue #4. In 2002 he would write and draw a prequel, the Selina’s Big Score graphic novel which detailed what had happened to the character directly before her new series.