Time and time again Batman and his trusty ward have been linked to latent homosexuality and have ultimately been the bearers of campy burden, with jokes about their relationship and Robin’s role in such being the butt of jokes for years. Batman has changed pop culture and Americana, though. Take, for instance, in 1951 an issue of Batman came out that must mention the word “boner” like a hundred million times. Boner originally meant “to make a foolish mistake” but in the 1950s became slang for an erection—probably due to this story.

In ”The Joker's Comedy of Errors!”, the Joker rips off the electric company. We’re not sure what the Gotham power company did to piss the Joker off (other than raising his rates—the summers in Gotham must be hell!) but all he really manages to do is turn off the power so it complicates the company’s means of collecting revenues.

In the midst of all the excitement, the Joker forgets one minor detail—the elevator he and his men were planning to use as their quick getaway no longer works because all the power is off. They must now turn to the stairs, but before reaching them they see the Dynamic Duo heading their way. The Joker sets the building on fire in a desperate attempt to ditch them and escapes.

The Joker’s stunt makes front-page news the next day, with the headline reading “Joker pulls boner of the year!” And here we thought the Joker was merely pulling a heist! Maybe we missed something when the lights were out? Regardless, the Joker is pissed over the bad publicity and incessantly carries on about making boners, vowing that Gotham City will rue the day they ever laughed at his boner. Seriously though, we don’t see why this is such a big deal—Harley Quinn must laugh at his boners all the time.

The Joker becomes obsessed with boners big and small and launches a crime spree pulling boners all over Gotham City. As exciting as this must sound, all he is doing is mimicking the great boners of history. That must have taken lots of long, hard hours searching through their stack of magazines, er, historical books to do their “research”.

Their first boner mimics the Battleship Missouri, which ran aground. They rearrange buoys in the Gotham River to throw the S.S. Capetownia off its course. It gets stuck in the mud as planned and with the help of his men, the Joker steals the cargo of diamonds aboard the ship.

Their second dastardly boner mimics the leaning Tower of Pisa. Conveniently, there’s a castle in Gotham owned by an oil tycoon. It was transplanted brick by brick from Europe including the castle walls which the oil magnate boasts can hold out any cat burglar. Outside of these walls a bell tower stands which is the target of the Joker’s boner. The Joker and company dig a trench on one side of the tower under the foundation to make it lean over, allowing them easy access over the wall. The Joker successfully pulls the boner leaving one hell of a mess for the tycoon to clean up.

However foolish the Joker’s boner crimes may be, they’re still creating sticky situations which attract the attention of the Gotham Police, who have caught onto the pattern of his crimes. Commissioner Gordon asks Batman to hurry and track down the Joker because all the boners are making the police look bad. We suppose this is a legit concern considering male enhancement products were not yet available.

Next, the Joker hijacks Gotham’s radio signals, announcing that he will force Batman into a boner—which has the Boy Wonder deeply concerned. The Dynamic Duo conduct their own study of history’s greatest boners (and from the looks of their library, Batman’s collection of “historical books” must rival the Joker’s) to see if they can outwit their enemy and make his boner backfire. OUCH!

The Caped Crusader anticipates the Joker’s next boner happening in a Trojan—horse, that is—that’s being used on the set of a movie. The Joker and his gang sneak inside the movie prop hoping to steal furs that are stored in the studio. When the horse is being hauled outside, Batman swoops down to nab the Joker. Meanwhile, the Boy Wonder is fighting off some thugs when he slips in oil. At least we think it was oil—we’re not sure what the Joker and his men were doing all night in that Trojan… horse.

Fed up, The Joker is ready to spring his ultimate boner on Batman. Batman and Robin must leave to testify at a trial in California. Leaving in the Batplane, Batman sets his boner in motion. The Joker uses a directional transmitter to steer them off course sending them to England instead.

The Joker is so busy celebrating his victory over Batman’s boner that he didn’t even realize that he made a fatal boner of his own. Batman allowed himself to be forced into the Joker’s boner so they would have enough time to trace the transmitter signal, revealing the location of the clown’s hideout. In the end it looks like Batman and Robin got the last laugh. Ha-Ha, Ho-Ho!

Although it’s easy to point fingers at the Dynamic Duo, The Joker is in fact the one screaming about boners and threatening to cause more of them (which we’re sure for a select few he’s caused plenty). Stranger still, Batman willingly lets the Joker stick it to him! Instead of Batman and Robin being an alleged item how about Batman and the Joker? We’d rather read about Jason Todd getting killed off in a crime of passion because Batman was fooling around behind the Joker’s back.

There is a reason why no one else ever speculates about any other DC Universe characters being gay. This isn’t to say that some don’t have their theories, it’s just none of them are nearly as popular as theories about Bruce’s relationship with Dick. But then again no other title (that we know of) mentions the word “boner” so many times in a single issue.

Paige & Kevin Alexis (PKA) are the ambitious souls behind FairyFabulous.com. Kevin is a self-trained artist and Paige has been a longtime writer of all things gay. Both share a love for comic books and have finally put their talents into one medium.

All images and characters TM and © 1951 DC Comics, Inc. Review © 2005 Paige & Kevin Alexis (PKA).

Prism Comics promotes the works of the LGBT community in comics. It does not implicitly endorse any other material or products associated with those works. Any opinions expressed are those of the author(s).