“That is, is This a Fraud Fraud?”- On the Rob Granito Hoax That United All of Comicdom

• “Wait, wait is “Gabe” for real? Or is someone having a laugh pretending to be Granito? That is, is this a fraud fraud? A question for the ages, I suppose.” – Kate Fitzsimons

Think, if you will, to the climax of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbon’s seminal Watchmen. I’m going to simplify it (severely) but essentially, Ozymandias fakes an extraterrestrial invasion with the intent of unifying the world as they’ll be forced to work together against a common threat.

Now imagine that the comics community had such a threat as to unify all sides, creators, fans, the press, and so forth. Amazingly, it rarely happens in our ever-accelerating political era, or you’d likely have seen more public discourse about the recent Diamond bankruptcy suit.

No, to really bring people in comics together it would have to be more of a hot topic than just a bland legal story involving finances and data and several other rather “dry” elements.

Almost a decade and a half ago, one figure rose to outrage many– a figure whose apparent deeds and public confessions spurred bombastic comments and essays alike: a man whose lack of both perception and basic grammar brought fan-sites record amounts of visitors, a man whose malaprops and non-existent words were placed on t-shirts and used for websites; his last name became both a verb and an eponymous adjective at the same time.

The collected industry waited each day for the next scandalous statement or public relations misfire; fans themselves found humor in the clumsy justifications of what constituted working with a famous creator and began to substitute themselves in various false collaborations; famous comic artists like Ty Templeton immortalized him in strip form.

Of course, I’m talking about the infamous Rob Granito.

And I’m a bit late to the party, since it seems as if all the deeds and commentary on Granito have since come and passed. People were stunned enough in 2011 by Granito’s grandiose claims and antics- what more is there to discuss today, you might be wondering.

I’m so glad you asked.

At the time of this writing, there’s been ongoing discussion on the state of “Comics Journalism”– again, I wonder how much of the comics industry warrants or justifies numerous comics journalists, just saying- and, believe it or not, this humble blog has been somewhat critical of the job said journalists are doing. I don’t even think they’re journalists.

Rob Granito ties into that, past or not. (And this piece assumes you will be somewhat familiar with the Granito scandal going forward.)

Because, you see…? All of the Granito antics? The interviews, the one man show, the proposed comics line, the glorious pop single, and so forth…?

They WEREN’T REAL.

Rob Granito’s story, largely, was a HOAX. Read it again and say it with me. Rob Granito’s story was largely a hoax. Initially perpetrated as a casual gag, it took the easily pissed off comics blogosphere and an all-too-willing Rich Johnston to really knock it into the stratosphere. And boy, did they…!

I can hear you now, dear reader. You’re saying “but how could it be a a hoax? We all saw Granito’s photographs, his false claims, the video where he was called out at the convention!”

Yeah… that stuff was real. It was everything else that was a hoax: Bad Boy of Comics. Press Releases. Petitions. Pop Songs. Legit-O-Mite. Scrapegoat. Innocence Children. John Shields, Attorney who starts each word with a capital letter. Frequent debasing of Jamal Igle’s name. Purposely using the same IP Address to make multiple fake comments (Dave Call, Gabe Carey, etc). Josh Hoopes collaboration. One Man Show at NYCC. The list goes on and on.

None of that was the real Rob Granito. I believe it was the work of someone- not anyone in the comics journalism community if that’s where you think I’m going with this– who began to troll for laughs and then, presumably shocked that their efforts went as far as they did- kept trolling.

Allow me to briefly get into the story of Clifford Irving, as I think it best sums up and explains what happened comparatively, in the Granito Scandal: in the early Seventies, Irving committed an incredible and lucrative hoax where he and an accomplice put immense effort into convincing publisher McGraw-Hill that he was exclusively ghost-writing the autobiography of Howard Hughes.

Hughes was a famous and wealthy recluse at this point and hadn’t been seen publicly in over a decade. Irving’s hoax was predicated on his assumption that Hughes was so out of it and living like a hermit, he wouldn’t bother to call out the book publicly as it would then draw unwanted attention.

And for a while, Irving believed he was right. Hughes did not immediately make any statements, which lent more credibility to what Irving was doing. After all, if it wasn’t the truth, wouldn’t Hughes have said something? (A film about this case made some years back starring Richard Gere and Alfred Molina which I haven’t seen, but Molina is a fine actor so maybe it’s worth checking out.)

What helped Irving get away with it for as long as he did was the unwitting support of the press; they accepted the manuscripts and supposed transcriptions of interviews and believed it to be genuine, even journalists who had met and spoken to Hughes in the past.

This story lines up with the Granito scandal nearly perfectly; the only difference is that, as far as I know, the real Rob Granito never spoke out or contacted anyone to explain that the person being interviewed in Bleeding Cool simply wasn’t him.

(I would like to take this chance to state for the record that I have (sadly) never spoken to Rob Granito, even though I did make numerous attempts to contact him. I have never spoken to Rich Johnston either and did not make any attempts to contact him though I have been told he is approachable.)

But please, please- let this sink in. Really stew over the fact that not just one site, but EVERY FUCKING SITE repeated and regurgitated what was, in fact, FAKE SHIT. I don’t blame Johnston that much, but you’d think if Heidi MacDonald is also reporting on this- plus Comics Alliance, WIRED, ConventionFansBlog, etc.- that’s more than one “comics journalist” available to, I don’t know, maybe try to vet some shit before writing an article.

Now here’s where I seem to contradict all of what I’ve written above: I don’t know who the fake Granito is/was. I don’t have a secret “deep throat” recording or expose. I am doing what I usually never do, and I am speculating based on observation/hunch. But hear me out, if you will- maybe some of you had a similar inkling over the years.

What stirred my interest were a few random things, spread out over several years. A comment on a video from four years ago which plainly states that everything after Johnston’s initial interview with Granito was a prank and not actually Granito.

Something else told to me by a guy that used to work with the con circuit for various dealers like Harley Yee mentioned he’d seen the actual Granito one year later in upstate New York and was friendly and talkative, but claimed ignorance when the online antics were mentioned, explaining that he “couldn’t go back on the internet” since conventions stopped booking him.

Oh, and…! I always thought this was telling. Rich Johnston eventually had to have gotten wise– Johnston’s not stupid, and well, y’know- you can’t bullshit a bullshitter as the saying goes- wrote this:

For me, it’s a sort of awkward way to phrase it as if Johnston was hedging his bets, proactively saving face- but it is the most public “admission” of sorts we’ve gotten that confirms that the Granito Tapes (as I’ll call them) were utterly fabricated.

There’s much to be said about the stranglehold that Granito held over comicdom’s psyches back then. It was a form of Social Mobilization to all share in the glee and collective outrage over Granito’s supposed hi-jinks, a mass ego reinforcement where fans and pros alike could get pissed off and take it out on a deserving figure: one whose conduct was proven to be immoral and dishonest. And believe me- people got really into it. It isn’t often that there’s one singular figure that’s so blatantly inept and untruthful that also screwed people over.

This was a sort of accepted permission to go carte blanche on letting the bastard have it.

Granito did indeed deserve a lot of scorn. His swiping and outright plagiarism is so blatant as to be off-putting. His claims were so grandiose and easily disproven that they’d have made more sense if a seven-year-old had made them. All of that warrants exposure and punishment to be sure.

It’s these other things that were quite tellingly fake that really fascinate me: the justification and rationalization of claiming that multiple supporters all unknowingly must have used the same public computer in the same public library, all within the same time frame– to defend Granito- I mean, that literally makes me laugh.

Granito was not a savant; this was purposely written in such a way because the person writing it knew what it was going to provoke in the comics community.

Do I know this absolutely? I do not; I am speculating on my instinct and my hunch and believe that too many elements of the famous story demand further consideration and evaluation.

Here are the reasons I believe the “Online Granito” was a hoax:

• Dwayne McDuffie: While a morbidly obtuse and blatantly dishonest Granito could easily offend thousands on his own, I always felt this was a fairly blatant red herring, almost designed to stir the reader’s outrage while still winking at the minority of readers who suspected this was a long troll job. (Indeed, a few people commented that this had to be a prank. But they were the minority.)

McDuffie was well known for parodying and speaking out against the Black comic characters of the Seventies; Granito’s specific choice of words here- “more gangsta” and “from the streets” both show a deliberate intent to subvert common knowledge and rile people up while having a laugh at their expense, while also betraying the previous thought trajectory structure of his delivery. I believe this over-the-top answer to the real Granito’s resume claims is proof of the hoaxster’s humorous intentions, no doubt emboldened by what they’d gotten away with thus far.

• Rich Johnston’s Watchmen Parody:  The fake Granito claimed that Rich Johnston specifically targeted him because Granito was his chosen preference as artist for Johnston’s then-recent Watchmen parody comic, Watchmensch.

This is a clever example of using Johnston’s ego to cloud his better judgment as an experienced comics journalist; no doubt, the hoaxter felt assured that these submitted answers would be published if he mentioned the interviewers recently released project. Remember at this time, Granito coverage was attracting record numbers for nearly every site or blog that featured it. I remember finding it curious at the time that Johnston’s side project- I do not mean that in a derogatory way- would be mentioned at all.

• Jamal Igle’s name constantly misremembered:  This one is pure comedy, but really- it’s a device to continue misspelling Igle’s name in similar variants literally each and every time, even by someone as inept and clueless as Granito seemed to be. This was delivered for comedic effect, which the real Igle took in stride, creating a fake Facebook account where he simply drew a mustache over an existing photo of himself. Still, this is one of those things that people wish were true, as it adds to the general “can you believe this guy” energy… why Granito would misspell one name wrong multiple times but not others signifies to me that it was a specific comedic routine rather than a display of ongoing confusion.

• The Petition to bring Granito back to Conventions: As it’s been several years, I looked at the petition in doing my research and noticed that now, it’s displaying people who signed it- mostly the hoaxer(s), of course- includes a ‘rich@bleedingcool’. Let me clarify- in NO WAY do I believe this is Rich Johnston, nor am I implying it- I believe the hoaxer purposely included Rich’s e-mail when leaving a fake signature, to ensure that Johnston would then see it, which would ensure that Johnston would then POST about it. Would Granito do that? He would not- and even if he did, he already had a direct contact to Johnston so wouldn’t need to resort to this tactic.

• Comics Line with Josh Hoopes: Again, so insane but also has a BleedingCool connection which ensures it’s going to be shared. The logic that Hoopes- who, unlike Granito, seemed somewhat shrewd to a certain extent- would involve himself with a man that has publicly lost everything (therefore, had no income) and who is certifiably toxic within comics, is ridiculous.

This scenario is a comedic dream, a mash-up of Johnstone’s two greatest foes, now haplessly and ineptly starting their own comics line with the logic of it being that Hoopes is steering Granito only to inevitably rip him off. This is perfect as it also enables Johnstone (unintentionally) to be a sympathetic figure, now placed in the position of having to warn the gullible Granito.

This was never real and never going to happen. Look at every documented case of Josh Hoopes and he would never have been so blatant. If anything, seeing that this story was published probably gave him temporary confidence in doing more underhanded art scams, in that he had to be stunned such an obviously unverified report could have the reach that this one did.

• “Don’t Judge Him”: Unless the Granito critics were projecting and really believed Granito was as witless and possibly schizophrenic as he apparently seemed- there’s no way this recording, with its sassy finger-wagging “don’t judge him, boy” sung in falsetto, was a serious demo or presentation piece of any sort.

It’s obviously manufactured, complete with a purposely poorly done video, which notably includes photos of several people that I presume Granito had ripped off. Think about that for a second. Would a fearful Granito, having been exposed and lost all his bookings, go and try to provoke the people that wanted to sue him?

It’s a prank, created by a prankster to be purposely grating and mocking. But this- this was a headline on BleedingCool? Allah be merciful.

• Granito-isms were plentiful:  Consider a legitimate (no pun intended) dull-witted person. They might, quite possibly, contribute a couple misspelled words to the lexicon, sure. But the fact that Granito was the golden goose of misspelled malapropisms that kept catching on, indicates that this was a deliberate routine by the hoaxer after they saw how “legitomite” took hold and even inspired both a website and t-shirt, at that.

It’s too far a reach that Granito would keep it up with things that seemed designed to be repeated and mocked: “scrapegoat”, “innocence children”, “defecation of character”, “randifications”- these are all obviously intentional, and also imply that the real Granito would have even casually used “defamation” or “ramifications” in his everyday speech to begin with.

• John Shields, Attorney (and others):  The idea that someone would invent a lawyer to defend them publicly in a forum and then, in their mind, believe that it somehow seemed more lawyer-ish if that lawyer began each and every word with a capital letter… is really the behavior of an invented character for a comedy show. I can hear some of you saying, “that’s the point!” but I’m being literal– this was a blatant maneuver designed to look as fake as it was, knowing people would therefore blame Granito for being bad at lying. He was already bad at lying. The person that wrote these comments knew how ip addresses worked; they also knew that the moderators of whichever sites they were commenting on could see they were all the same person.

They banked on that- otherwise, the gag falls flat, the joke doesn’t work. Comedians and stage magicians both use plants; the moderators pointing out basic internet protocol logistics publicly unwittingly became plants for the hoaxer. Because comic sites kept responding, they were, as they put it, “feeding the troll”- therefore, a clever hoaxer can gauge what’s going to work and what isn’t.

Again, I am most entertained by the defense of “well, they’re all other supporters/fans of Rob Granito who must’ve also used this computer when I got up”- especially as people accepted it as an actual excuse someone, even an exposed creative thief, would seriously make.

I get it; it’s the perfect story. A foil so clueless, so baffling, and whose crimes were indisputable, blatant and instantly understood. There was no grey area, no margins to trouble your conscience in- Granito was a thief of other artists’ work, an oblivious and pitiful promoter, and a liar when it came to his credentials.

All of that is clearance enough for most to attack the person; it was the hoaxers’ contributions that really emboldened and enflamed the minds of so many.

Really, what does this say about “comics journalists” that not one of them paused when hearing about these mad statements and thought “hmm… maybe…”

Not a heck of a lot, I’ll tell you that much. But the comics people are big on self-delusion. It is an industry of escapism, after all. To be fair though, a huge component of the Granito story being as big as it was had to do with- community. There was a palpable feeling of being unified, of sharing the joke which is a feeling that is often contagious as it contains connection and camaraderie.

Granito was the fall guy for that brief period of agreement, helped on by an unknown trickster (or tricksters?) that, at times, brought him fleeting moments of undeserved sympathy.

Please think on the points I’ve raised and let us know what you think regarding this batshit insane scandal from recent comics history. If you’re Rob Granito, especially get in touch with your feelings.

I generally take recorded statements and verifiable facts and present a case. This time around, I presented some points and proposed my theories. This may dilute the general mission statement here on Four Color Sinners, but- the truth is- I’m positive I’m not wrong about there being another person involved in the Granito story.

 Someone out there reading this? They know it too.

With thanks to Rich Johnston, Kate Fitzsimons, Ty Templeton, Josh Hoopes, and all the lonely souls out there aching for a gang of pals to chew the fat with.