Pin-Up (Le Pennetier and Berthet)
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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From 1995, Dargaud has published a series of Franco-Belgian graphic novels entitled Pin-Up, aimed mainly at adults, written by Yann Le Pennetier and drawn by Philippe Berthet. The series describes the adventures of Dottie Partington, who gets involved with a variety of people, and events both factual and fictional. An adventure set in 1960 has her staying over at the Bates Motel. Dottie, who at this stage looks a little like Marion Crane, takes a shower and is spied on by Norman. Fortunately Mrs Bates is still alive, catches him in the act and orders him to stop peeping and get back to his taxidermy. "Are you trying to drive me crazy?" she bellows. When Norman later attempts to stuff the pet skunk of Dottie's troubled step-son, the young boy punches him on the nose, leaving him bleeding and calling for his mother.
Caniff as comic character
The strip features a number of real-life characters and situations, albeit in a fictional setting, including Gary Powers and the U-2 Crisis and Hugh Hefner.
During the war Dottie becomes the model for Milton Caniff, an artist who has been commissioned to draw a strip to raise the morale of the troops. He comes up with Poison Ivy, a strip-within-a-strip, in which the titular character is a combination of Lace of Male Call and Mata Hari (though she fights with the Yanks against the Japs). Milton is later shown working on Steve Canyon.
This version of Caniff is not a particularly sympathetic one, with him caught in a loveless marriage while obsessed with Dottie who has rejected his advances.
