I am working on several fan projects based on Barbara Gordon/Oracle that fully embrace her status as a full-time wheelchair user (I'd love to do something official - It's an extremely long shot, but we can all dream, can't we?) A key part of these would be learning as much as possible about Barara Gordon's disabilties and the way they work. How would the Joker's close-range bullet to the spine (a bullet that was deliberately filled with less gunpowder to ensure it caused paralysis rather than death) specifically paralyse Barbara? How would the time spent on the floor being tormented by the Joker exacerbate the injuries?

I would be interested in learning more about the specifics of Barbara's daily life as Oracle (which DC Comics understandably glossed over somewhat during the Oracle era).

- How much would the pain disrupt her daily life?

- How much would it affect things like going to the toilet?

- What would the effects of the disability be in the first few months - how would they be managed longer-term?

- How would Barbara work to maintain her health to ensure that her disabilities do not have any adverse effect on her life expectancy?

- What specific forms of training can Barbara do?

- What disability networks would she be part of?

- Would Barbara be able to do anything with her lower body at all?

- Barbara didn't get into many Damsel-in-Distress situations as Oracle (The Black Mirror and being captured by Spellbinder in the Black Canary/Batgirl early Birds of Prey story are two notable exceptions) but if she did get into peril, how would she try to escape it herself - would she be able to untie restraints on her legs?

If I spend long enough on AO3, I can find some fanfics that explore these, but I would like to go to the source and hear from people who know more about the topic and can provide me with information or direct me to relevant links. I would also be interested in being directed to the comics stories that specifically highlight the various aspects of daily life with her disabilties.

I would also like to learn more about other ways to disable Oracle - move away from "The Joker Shot Her In The Spine" to look at different causes...

Aside from the main DC Continuity, there are some adapted takes on Oracle that DON'T use the traditional approach, but tend to be pretty vague about the nature of the injuries that paralysed her (an unspecified "accident", a gunshot from a random heavy) - the Adaptation of Oracle with the most detailed alternative explanation of her paralysis is Young Justice, but that raises a few questions of its own - How would that sword sever her spine without damaging any internal organs?

How could explosions or car accidents cause a level of paralysis similar to the comics? What additional complications would there be?

It's a lot of questions, but I'd love to see them all answered...

The OnCamera Site with details of Masked Singer filming seems to have revealed the Season 15 theme weeks, with four of these being themed around a specific artist. The issue is that all four of these artists have been covered pretty frequently on this show...

(Note - this list includes songs notably covered by the artists below)

Elvis Presley - A Little Less Conversation (Banana Season 3), Bossa Nova Baby (Taco Season 3), Suspicious Minds (Cyclops Season 7), Jailhouse Rock (Doll Season 9 and Croissants Season 14)

Coldplay - Fix You (Turtle Season 3), Viva La Vida (Frog Prince Season 7), Yellow (UFO Season 9), The Scientist (Mad Scientist Monster Season 13)

Pink - Lady Marmalade (Flamingo Season 2), So What (T-Rex Season 3), What About Us (Popcorn Season 4), Raise Your Glass (Season 4 Group Performance), A Million Dreams (Banana Split Season 6), F***ing Perfect (Harp Season 8), Try (Squirrel Season 9 and Galaxy Girl Season 14), Just Give Me A Reason (Ant Season 13)

Britney Spears - My Perogative (Hippo Season 1), Oops I Did It Again (Unicorn Season 1), Baby One More Time (Seahorse Season 4), Toxic (Crocodile Season 4), Circus (Bull Season 6), Lucky (Gazelle Season 10), Stronger (Snowcone Season 14)

I prefer it when the show avoids repeating song choices and encourages performers to do songs not yet covered on the show, but given how many seasons of The Masked Singer we've had so far, it was inevitable that we would see songs get repeated more frequently. However, it is still pretty annoying when that happens too often - Last season, we had one episode where ALL FIVE of the songs had been performed before....

Here is a list of notable songs by all four artists that haven't been done on The Masked Singer USA yet - I would love to see as many of these as possible in their theme nights...

Elvis Presley- Love Me Tender, Hound Dog, Blue Suede Shoes, Can't Help Falling In Love, Burning Love, Always On My Mind, Viva Las Vegas

Coldplay - Trouble, In My Place, Clocks, Speed of Sound, Paradise, Princess of China, Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall, A Sky Full Of Stars, Something Just Like This, Higher Power, My Universe, Feelslikeimfallinginlove,

Pink - Most Girls, There You Go, Get The Party Started, Just Like A Pill, Don't Let Me Get Me, Trouble, God is a DJ, Who Knew, Nobody Knows, True Love

(Note: One of the other Season 15 themes is Mean Girls Night, and that film used God is a DJ on the soundtrack)

Britney Spears - Sometimes, (You Drive Me) Crazy, Born To Make You Happy, I'm A Slave 4U, Overprotected, I'm Not A Girl Not Yet A Woman, Me Against The Music, Everytime, Gimmie More, Womanizer, Hold It Against Me, Till The World Ends, Scream and Shout, Work B**ch, Hold Me Closer

I’m interested in finding fanart of the three core Batgirls (Barbara, Cassandra and/or Stephanie) - can you recommend some great fanart depicting them?

The depleted husk of Disney’s live-action division announced that Lilo & Stitch 2 would feature an updated take on Angel from the Lilo & Stitch series - as far as I can tell, this is the first time a live-action remake has openly adopted elements from the spin-off shows. This news has fuelled my personal belief that if live-action Tangled does well enough for a sequel, it should involve the characters and concepts of Tangled The Series.

Whilst condensing the Tangled The Series mythology into a 2 hour movie could lead to a lot of cutting things down, the increased length and scale of the live-action medium can have its advantages. Many of the flaws with how Cassandra’s villain arc was handled are closely tied to the TV format - they wanted Rapunzel’s mission to redeem Cassandra to be the driving force of S3, but this meant they couldn’t actually redeem Cassandra until the climax of the final episode. This was a major factor in the pacing and characterisation issues that made her arc so polarising. Therefore, a movie version has considerable potential to depict her more efficiently and effectively…

What are your thoughts on a live-action Tangled movie using elements from the series?

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Barbara Gordon: Breakout has not acknowledged Barbara’s history of disabilities at all so far, despite all the injuries she’s suffered (including being electrocuted) throughout the first few issues - it feels like a waste of a compelling complication that would enhance Barbara’s underdog status and resilience, and feels like an insult to all the Oracle fans who want to see her disabilities represented with some degree of authenticity. Also, it’s remarkable how few Elseworlds fully embrace the idea of Barbara as a full-time (or even part-time) Wheelchair User (In contrast, DC Media aimed at younger audiences such as the YA Graphic Novels and Wayne Family Adventures are allowed to embrace Barbara’s status as representation…)

The whole things feels like DC have an ulterior motive for refusing to properly acknowledge or respect Barbara’s history as a wheelchair user (disrespecting a huge chunk of her fanbase who really need the representation she can provide). I get that Barbara is nearing her 60th anniversary and they want to keep her as Batgirl for that celebration, but can they please provide some major Oracle content?

My Personal Ranking of the Caped Crusader Villains (listed separately by season)

Season 1

13. Onomatopoeia
14. Detective Corrigan
15. Gentleman Ghost
16. Catwoman
17. Rupert Thorne
18. The Penguin
19. Firebug
20. Two-Face
21. Detective Flass
22. Detective Bullock
23. Nocturna
24. Clayface
25. Harley Quinn

Season 2

16. Rupert Thorne
17. Dr Hugo Strange
18. The Mad Monk (and Dalia)
19. Triad Industries/The Terrible Trio
20. Scarecrow
21. The Riddler
22. Mr. Zero
23. Hattie Tech
24. Detective Flass
25. Mark “Dez” Desmond
26. Roxy Rocket
27. Thorn
28. Detective Officer Bullock
29. Detective Corrigan/The Spectre
30. The Joker
31. Harley Quinn

What Are Your Personal Rankings of the Villains?

- Either of the Gordons running for the now-vacant role of Mayor
- An S1 villain like Catwoman or Clayface returning.
- A corrupt official (Flass or a less prominent character) coercing Barbara into defending them in court à la And Justice For All…
- Barbara adopting the Oracle identity (possibly after being disfigured or disabled like her canon counterpart)
- The other orphans (Dick, Tim and Stephanie) making an appearance
- Magic-users like Zatanna or Constantine making an appearance
- Villians like Ra’s Al Ghul appearing to give Batman adventures beyond Gotham

what S3 ideas do you have?

1. Brute Force - Tries to do too much, setting up about six or seven different plot threads as it introduces 4 villains and provides status quo changes for two more >!(if you count the Joker as being introduced in S1, the ratio is 3:3)!< Whilst the concept of The Riddler as a Richard Widmark style psychopath gangster isn’t the worst in the world (after all, Widmark was one of Frank Gorshin’s key inspirations for the Batman 66 version of Riddler!) the lack of interest in puzzles or games feels pretty frustrating. The violence is ramped up, including a kill borrowed from Raiders of the Lost Ark. The ending cliffhangers are effectively intriguing…
2. Rocket’s Red Glare -

A return to the classic BTAS formula of a traditional villain seeking revenge on corrupt capitalists - Roxy Rocket (already one of the most benign BTAS rogues) is a good fit for this approach. The true baddies - a trio of dodgy businessmen seeking to sell Roxy’s revolutionary rocket fuel to warmongers - are effectively a riff on the Terrible Trio, but the only thing lifting them above the generic is their designs. The fact that they are introduced a good while before Roxy leaves her feeling underdeveloped in comparison to the tragic villains before her (maybe it’s the relatively short episode length - Amazon Prime episodes are always a couple of minutes shorter than indicated due to the foreign language end credits taking up the remaining time). The episode does a decent job of establishing that Batman is becoming more compassionate, with a genuinely lovely way of honouring Roxy at the end…

>!The Joker humming “In The Hall of the Mountain King” à la Peter Lorre in M during the ending teaser is a great concept, but him killing off Dr Strange feels like a pretty shabby way to treat a villain perfectly suited to this series…!<

3. Deep Cover - An intriguing experiment which adopts a much slower pace and primarily focuses on one crook and his relationship with two other characters (The Riddler and Matches Malone/Batman) - However, because Mark Desmond is a pretty flat protagonist and The Riddler is offering little but uncontrolled violence (and money!) It’s hard to get sufficiently invested in the story. Despite this, a few key moments at the end work reasonably well..

4. The Devil’s Due - The gory opening moves too quickly to be shocking, but the concept is solid enough. The Bat Cult have decent designs but feel pretty generic. Mad Hattie is a solid comic villain on her own terms (The concept of Batman and his allies having to deal with a Hedda Hopper-style celebrity gossip-monger is pretty fun) but doesn’t work as an adaption of Mad Hatter (Her “Curiouser and Curiouser” line, like the Riddler’s Grenade riddle, is a halfhearted attempt to link her to her classic gimmicks). The twist linking these two villains is pretty fun, but Hattie’s disrespected producer feels too underdeveloped for her climactic descent into insanity to have the power it needs. Eel O’Brien the annoying photographer returns, but the true highlight is the return of Papa Midnite, whose single scene single-handedly lifts the episode a few notches - “Villain allies” can really stand out, and his Baron Samedi style makes him both sinister and charismatic in equal measure…

5. The Spectral Hand - Who expected a generic bent cop “surprise villain” from Season 1 to be the focal point for the best episode of the show so far? This episode isn’t flawless, but it’s considerably ahead of the other four - The Christmas setting works effectively, it provides some interesting material for Barbara as she reckons with the trauma caused by Corrigan betraying her, the initial transformation scene feels genuinely unsettling, and there is something genuinely fascinating in Corrigan trying to wipe out the “loose ends” of his police career - someone trying to do good whilst recognising they are pretty much beyond redemption. The visual homage to The Shadow in Bruce’s winter wear is pretty fun too…

What Wheelchair types should she use? Which ones would be best suited for her needs?

I have a tendency to focus on Oracle’s more physical side as opposed to her tech skills - which wheelchairs would work best for those two facets of her personality?

P.S - The new (celebrity) series of my reality TV guilty pleasure Hunted starts tomorrow, with the disability activist Sophie Morgan becoming the first ever wheelchair-user on the show. Seeing how well she does could be a real inspiration for takes on Oracle…

For anyone who hasn't played my previous Guess The Celebrity Games, they are essentially a non-competitive version of a fantasy tournament where readers are invited to guess the identity of mystery celebrities based on TMS-style clues. They are pretty time-consuming, but I really enjoy creating them. It's been a while since I made one, so I decided to revive the format...

To mark the return of Batman: Caped Crusader on Amazon Prime on Friday, this Guess The Celebrity Game will feature five celebrities linked to the world of Batman in some way. Considering how many adaptations of the Caped Crusader there have been, there are a lot more options than you would think, and I plan to do more Batman specials in the future.

In this game, the five contestants are Fireball, Lynx, Mrs Golem, Robin Redbreast and Surfboard.

I will provide five rounds of clues (over the next 10 days or so) for each contestant before revealing their identity. Can you correctly identify which celebrities are playing these characters?

I've decided to mix up the formula in two ways. First of all, the Introductory Clues will be revealed now, with Part One following tomorrow...

Introductory Round

Before we started, Catwoman stole the following items from our contestants and gave them to us…

Fireball – A Whistle

Lynx – A Spray Can

Mrs Golem – A Deck of Playing Cards

Robin Redbreast – A Box of Eggs

Surfboard – A Golf Club

Having only one clue for each contestant seems like a pretty difficult start, but this Introduction is also being used to introduce a new feature - The Guest Character...

The Guest Character

To spice things up a bit, each round will feature a Guest Character inspired by the wider world of DC Comics. There will be only one round of clues for these characters, but there will be twice the number of usual clues in order to help you figure out their identity. They will be unmasked the following day, with a new guest character taking their place.

The first guest character is Wonder Wombat. They will provide a clue statement, and reveal three personal items. There will also be a clue based on a date, and a clue based on a number.

Wonder Wombat's Clues

Statement: "I found fame playing other celebrities, and soon found ways to learn from them - I starred alongside numerous entertainment legends, from Matt Damon to Bugs Bunny. However, I’ve managed to find my own identity and welcome others to my unique world.. I’ve been listed as one of the 100 most important people in the world – Twice!"

Wonder Wombat's Items

A Razzie Award – It’s pretty painful to win one of these, but I have enjoyed more respect elsewhere – I have been nominated for an Oscar…

A Dollhouse: I have appeared in numerous family movies, both animated and live-action (And sometimes both at once!)

A Diary: When you’re younger, you realise how important it is to write your memories down…

The Mystery Date – Presidents Day

Number Clue - 135

Who do you think is under Wonder Wombat's mask? You only have this round to figure out their identity...

I am interested in reading Batgirl Zines - does anyone here wrote them, own them, or know how to get them?

I am interested in reading Batgirl Zines - does anyone here wrote them, own them, or know how to get them?

I know this sounds morbid, but what are your favourite death scenes in OI?

What are your favourite accident scenes, murder scenes or executions scenes?

I’m sure there are a lot of examples, but I can’t put my finger on them…

However, there are some notable instances of aggressively right-wing actors playing right-wing villains - Kelsey Grammer voicing Sideshow Bob in The Simpsons and Kirstie Alley in Drop Dead Gorgeous are the first examples to spring to my mind…

Two of my favourite takes on Barbara as Batgirl are DC Super Hero Girls 2019 and LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight - both among the most comedic Batman media. This got me thinking...

For many Barbara fans, her becoming Oracle is an integral part of her arc - the "secret ingredient" that elevates her beyond being a "sidekick". However, not every adaptation of Barbara is well-suited for transforming into Oracle. Even if you choose not to adapt The Killing Joke and go with a softer explanation for the disability (e.g an accident of some sort), there will always be a level of tragedy in Barbara being forced to give up her Batgirl mantle due to a disability beyond her control. Needless to say, this can feel like a really awkward fit for comedies. At the same time, Barbara being disabled as Oracle has far more power and meaning than her simply becoming Oracle because she's bored with being Batgirl...

I personally think another issue is the comedic styles of these specific adaptations. The DC Super Hero Girls 2019 version of Batgirl is extremely cartoonish in her fast talking and hyperactive movements, and a lot of her humour involves cartoonish movement where she quickly moves between various exaggerated poses (Sometimes involving Cartoon Physics and OTT slapstick injuries). It would be awesome to try and adapt this for a wheelchair user, but it would create a tonne of challenges, particularly if her abilities go from "Power Fantasy" to straight-up impossible. Meanwhile, in Legacy of the Dark Knight, one of Batgirl's main comedic highlights is turning into a hyperactive tech addicted-teen when she takes over the Batcave computers - I dread to think how hard it would be for her to stay focused when she's parked in front of computers full-time as Oracle...

What are your thoughts on this? How could you make a comedic take on Oracle work whilst respecting the character?

Note - Wayne Family Adventures is a borderline example, but Barbara's spotlight stories as Oracle have often tended to be a bit more serious (Even before the shift to more dramatic and serialised storytelling starting with S3...)

Even though the new trailer for Caped Crusader allows us to hear the voices of Mad Hatter, The Riddler and The Joker, the voice actors haven't yet been officially revealed, which seems pretty odd to me - Does anyone recognise any of these voices?