Kite Man Is An Actual Supervillain And He’s Getting His Own Show, Are Supes Dead Yet?
Harley Quinn series villain, Kite Man, is now getting his own spinoff series called Noonan's.
D-list supervillain Kite Man is getting his own animated series on HBO Max. Comicbook.com reports that along with a fourth season, HBO’s beloved Harley Quinn animated series is also getting a spin-off centered around the obscure Batman villain. The spinoff is called Noonan’s and revolves around Kite Man and love interest Golden Glider operating a bar for supervillains.
According to Harley Quinn showrunner Justin Halpern, the new show will be like “Cheers, but for B-list supervillains.” Sarah Peters will serve as executive producer of the new series, while Dean Lorey and Katie Rich will act as showrunners. Matt Oberg and Cathy Ang will be returning as Kite Man and Golden Glider, respectively.
Kite Man may seem like an odd choice to carry a whole series. The character’s obscurity and history as a joke character almost make it seem like Warner Bros. is so desperate for content they’re scraping the bottom of the barrel as far as DC IP is concerned. However, fans of the Harley Quinn series know that couldn’t be further from the truth.
Kite Man might have started out as a joke character when he was introduced in 1966’s Batman #133, but he’s since evolved into a cult favorite with fans. The lovable scene-stealer is one of the best parts of the Harley Quinn series. His signature catchphrase of “Kite Man, hell yeah!” may not have the punch of “I’m Batman” or the gravitas of “Up, Up, and away!” but it’s become iconic in its own way.
As far as the executive vice president of alternative programming for Warner Bros. Animation, Peter Girardi is concerned, the Kite Man spinoff is an act of good Karma. “After getting dumped by Poison Ivy, the least we could do was give Kite Man his own show” joked Girardi in a recent interview.
Kite Man is just the latest in a long line of obscure, one-note characters from the anything-goes silver age of comics to be brought into the modern day and recontextualized as something more. Calendar Man, for example, started off as a goofy criminal who committed crimes based on–you guessed it—the calendar. When Jeff Loeb and the late Tim Sale brought the character out of mothballs for Batman: The Long Halloween, they redeemed him by making him a creepy Hannibal Lecter clone.
Kite Man was likewise redeemed when Batman scribe Tom King used the character for his The War of Jokes and Riddles storyline. King managed to transform Kite Man from a pathetic gag to a tragic figure. Kite Man, otherwise known as Chuck Brown, started off similarly on Harley Quinn as a pathetic gag of a character but quickly morphed into a beloved fan favorite.
The announcement of the Kite Man spin-off comes as HBO Max is under fire for getting rid of a significant chunk of their animated content as a cost-cutting measure. Hopefully, some kill-happy executive won’t axe the project for tax purposes before it comes out. No word yet on whether DC is planning on a similar spin-off for the even more pathetic joke character Condiment Man, but I wouldn’t hold my breath.
