Marvel apparently rejected an Art Spiegelman essay about fascism because of a Trump reference

In an extra addendum, Spiegelman says that a Folio Society editor told him that Marvel (as co-publisher of the collection) was trying to stay “apolitical” and wanted him to remove the “Orange Skull” reference. “I didn’t think of myself as especially political compared with some of my fellow travelers,” Spiegelman explains, “but when asked to kill a relatively anodyne reference to an Orange Skull I realized that perhaps it had been irresponsible to be playful about the dire existential threat we now live with.” Spiegelman says he decided to withdraw his essay from the publication because of that, adding that he had also recently learned that Marvel chairman Ike Perlmutter and his wife had both recently given the maximum donation of $360,000 to Trump’s reelection campaign.

Perlmutter has been a not-so-secret Trump supporter for a long time, and Spiegelman uses that opportunity to bring his whole thesis on the intertwined histories of superheroes and fascism together, noting, “I’ve also had to learn, yet again, that everything is political… just like Captain America socking Hitler on the jaw.” You can the full essay at that Guardian link up above.