Welcome to the troubling trend known as “Current Year”. In “Current Year” everything is problematic, everything is troublesome, and everything can be cancelled. Regardless of your position, or extreme, if you do not like something odds are your going to have it cancelled. Now, while the charges alleged against Warren Ellis are quite severe, at present they are still allegations. Until the due process of law is sorted out? We can no more find guilt, or innocence in turn, only know what is alleged and what must be uncovered. But with that said? Welcome to “Current Year”, and the cancellation of… two-pages.
According to the article by Games Radar, the contribution by Warren Ellis and Jim Cheung to August 4th’s Dark Nights: Death Metal – Legends of the Dark Knights #1Â anthology is being pulled. The planned two-page story (which Games Radar says was to be “the origin of the alternate universe Batman who lived in a robotic Tyrannosaurus Rex – B-Rex.” will be replaced with a story by Marguerite Bennett and Jamal Igle.
The two-page story was removed “just days after several women alleged sexual misconduct by Warren Ellis dating back to the early 2000s and a day after Ellis himself released a statement seemingly in response to the allegations.”
“Katie West, a former friend of Ellis’s, was the first to allege misconduct in a now-deleted Twitter thread. Following West’s statements, Meredith Yayanos, a former colleague of Ellis’s who inspired a character in his comic book series Planetary, followed, describing her own series of allegations and characterizations of Ellis’s conduct.”
The statement made by Warren Ellis quote “did not address any specific allegations or alleged victims directly, but admits some culpability in what he refers to as “these mistakes…”,”
Warren Ellis (from his Orbital Operations email newsletter)
“I hurt people deeply. I am ashamed for these mistakes and I am profoundly sorry,”
“I will not speak against other people’s personal truths, and I will not expose them to the toxicity of the current discourse. I should have been more aware, more present, and more respectful of people’s feelings and for that I apologize.”
For the record, while DC has pulled his two-page contribution to Dark Nights: Death Metal – Legends of the Dark Knights #1, there is presently no plans to cancel the Batman title he is presently writing (The Batman’s Grave). He is also presently working on the Netflix series CastleVania, which is of course based on the popular game series of the same name. To my knowledge there is no indication of either Netflix or the people behind CastleVania cancelling Warren Ellis in turn.
At present only allegations exist. Even the article makes that clear. What the future holds for Warren Ellis, and the allegations presently before him, is a thing only the future can sort out.
To Be Continued…
