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comics - In Sandman: A Game of You: Why were Weirdzos used instead of Bizarros?


In Sandman Vol 5: "A Game of You", Wanda dreams of Weirdzos which are the same as Bizarros from Superman lore.


Indeed this site notes a misprint:



The word “Bizarro” that had accidentally appeared in Sandman #32, has been changed back to “Weirdzo”. (DC had nixed the use of the word “Bizarro” and “Weirdzo” was used instead. When #32 was printed, one of the “Weirdzo”s had fallen off revealing the “Bizarro” underneath.)




and a comment on this site says:



As an old Superman fan, I quickly figured out who Weirdzo and Lila were; obviously, Bizarro and Lois Lane. But this is a DC imprint; why couldn’t the real ones be used? Well…, I guess DC didn’t like the idea, somehow.



This question and answer, seems to note that it was Gaiman's choice to stop using heroes, but that doesn't quite gel with the misprint noted above in this case.


I haven't been able to find why DC apparently didn't want Bizarro being used. I am assuming that it was down to a Vertigo / Mature Readers imprint vs normal DCU issue, but can't find for sure.


Does anyone know the full story here?



Answer



In "The Annotated Sandman" Gaiman is quoted on the subject (I found a reference including the text here) as saying




"The production error on that was the funniest thing about it. I wrote it as the Bizarros, because I thought nobody would mind, what with them being out of continuity; they vanished off in CRISIS, so I thought nobody would mind my having them as comic characters. And some people at DC did. And so, after it was already lettered, somebody went in and stuck 'Weirdzo' over all the places where it said 'Bizarro'...except one fell off and confused everybody. I've heard wonderful conspiracy theories about that, but one simply fell off. By the time Shawn McManus drew the second issue, he knew it had to be different, so the character has a big 'H' for 'Hyperman' on his chest, instead of a big 'S'."



(bold highlights by me).


Also from The Sandman Companion, written by Hy Bender:



HB: Now that you mention it, I was wondering why the characters in the dream are called "Weirdzos", when they are clearly meant to be the Bizzaros from old Action and Superman comics.


NG: They were Bizzaros in my script, but some of DC's Superman people caught sight of the story and wouldn't green-lit it. Therefore, I simply changed a few names around: Superman became Hyperman, Lois Lane became Lila Lake, and Bizzaros became Weirdzos.



And in an interview with Chip Kidd for the 20th anniversary of The Sandman (starts at 1:00:01):






So it was DC after all who didn't like it.


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