Artist Randy Queen Abusing DMCA to Silence Critic

More than a few of you may be familiar with Escher Girls, a blog that (with a good does of humor) criticizes unrealistic portrayals of women in comics. It happens to be a personal favorite of mine, and I’d recommend any comics fan check it out.

Randy Queen, best known for Darkchylde, has had his work end up on the site several times (and rightfully so). Rather than accept the critique (or even just swear a bunch and have a tantrum), Queen sent DMCA takedown notices to Tumblr, which hosts Escher Girls, for any posts which contained his art. These posts included “redraws,” in which Escher Girl readers submit their own art in which they attempt to correct the anatomical errors in the original work, and in all of these cases there is a solid fair use defense.

But Randy Queen doesn’t care.

Escher Girls made a post about the take downs, and in a display of pure ludicrous chutzpa Randy Queen sent a takedown notice for that post even though it contained no art whatsoever.

It’s just bizarre.

The story continues (and gets more complex), but Ami (the sole person running Escher Girls) has posted a comprehensive timeline of events along with what’s happening now.

It’s definitely worth a read.

Update: It looks like Mr. Queen may have come to his senses. (thanks Wurm!)

Update 2: Randy Queen reached out to Ami of Escher Girls, and it looks like things have ended amicably.