EXCLUSIVE – Comic book veteran and former "Punisher" and "Batman" writer Chuck Dixon said that the "Big Two" comic book companies, Marvel and DC, have both been invaded by woke politics.
"I think both DC and Marvel are politicized but Marvel's taken it to a whole new level. They killed Tony Stark as Iron Man. They've gender swapped and race swapped every character they can," Dixon told Fox News Digital in an interview.
"DC’s bad, but Marvel's worse."
Dixon made waves after he criticized Marvel for undermining and minimizing one of its most popular heroes, the armed vigilante known as the Punisher. According to Dixon, the company is "embarrassed" by the "working class" hero and his appeal within military and police ranks.
"Punisher, I think, is totally a lost cause. They've destroyed the character. I mean, they ripped the guts out of it in a way that for comic fans, discontinuity is so important is irreparable," he said.
"I think it's unique in publishing to take a character that you own, a character that you've made money off of and that people like and just entirely destroy it and try to erase it from the readers' memory. I've never seen anything like this."
Dixon said that while the politics at DC was still visible, the ideologues were strongest at Marvel. "Marvel, it's like no holds barred," explaining that Disney's ownership of Marvel may contribute to the conformity in thought.
"As we've learned in recent months, Disney is probably down with everything they're doing because Disney is pushing their own agenda through their entertainment," he said. "So it's pretty much the lunatics running the asylum at Marvel, whereas at DC, I think Warner [Studios] at least once in a while pays attention and says, ‘No, you can't do that. You can't go completely crazy with these characters.’"
He emphasized the ideological conformity in the comic book industry was not a "conspiracy," but a matter of business culture.
"You can say it's ideology, it's left leaning, it's whatever. But what it comes down to is an understanding between these people. They only hire people who agree with them. It's like trying to explain to a fish that water is wet. They just think this is the way you think. And it's invaded every aspect of the Big Two comic companies," he said.
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Dixon said that while DC was not perfect, Batman as a character was too valuable to be "ruined."
"They haven't totally ruined. Batman has risen from the ashes many, many times in the past," he said. "He's been rebooted and reborn many times over his near 100-year history. So, I wouldn't worry about Batman."
He said that despite all the bad news he gave about groupthink in the comic industry, he was still "hopeful."
"I'm hopeful about the future of comics because when DC and Marvel basically shed most of their readership, those people still want comics. They just didn't want their comics," he said. "They didn't want to be preached to. They didn't want to be scolded. And so they're in search. You know, most of them just go to the comic shop and go through the back issues or catch up on things maybe they hadn't read before."
He added that Marvel and DC have driven away loyal readers to independent artists and comic writers.
"But the readership for DC and Marvel has fallen away steeply. I mean, they've lost tens of thousands of readers who are underserved. And of course, if you offer them an alternative and you offer them good, solid, escapist entertainment, they're going to come to you. And that's what we're seeing happening. These are people abandoned and sometimes literally chased away by DC and Marvel, who are now coming to these crowdfunding and independent and self-published comics and buying them up."
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Fox News' Alexander Hall contributed to this report.
