You youngsters may never have heard of good ol' Snagglepuss, but for many of us slightly older folk he was one of the few gay characters to ever make his way into children's cartoons. Okay, he was never outed, and he was a stereotype in almost every way -- from his mannerisms to the way he talked to his pink fur -- but he was all we had at the time.

 

Well, DC Comics has announced it will be revising the popular Hanna-Barbera character in a more contemporary form. In the new comic, Snagglepuss is a “a gay Southern Gothic playwright.”

 

“It was not much of a stretch at all,” explained writer Mark Russell. “I envision him like a tragic Tennessee Williams figure; Huckleberry Hound is sort of a William Faulkner guy, they’re in New York in the 1950s, Marlon Brando shows up, Dorothy Parker, these socialites of New York from that era come and go.”

 

Before the actual series starts later this year, an eight page teaser will introduce the updated character in the Suicide Squad/Banana Splits Annual in March. It will be "about Snagglepuss being dragged in front of the House Committee on Un-American Activities!" Oh oh!

 

 

“It’s natural to present it in a context where everybody knows, but it’s still closeted,” Russell added. “And dealing with the cultural scene of the 1950s, especially on Broadway, where everybody’s gay, or is working with someone who’s gay, but nobody can talk about it -- and what it’s like to have to try to create culture out of silence.”

 

As Snagglepuss would say: "Heavens to Murgatroyd; Betsy, even!"