As Marvel’s What If…? started trending on social media shortly after its premiere on Wednesday, an animated series at the Distinguished Competition (that’s DC Comics, for you non-nerds) decided to get in on the action with a highly suggestive tweet. While jumping on the What If…? hashtag, the Twitter account for HBO Max’s Harley Quinn proposed a scenario that had already kicked off a hilarious social media firestorm earlier in the summer.
“#WhatIf Batman does do THAT 
” the Harley Quinn account tweeted in a not-so-subtle reference to the now-infamous Batman-and-Catwoman oral controversy.
Back in June, Harley Quinn co-creator Justin Halpern commented during an interview that using mainly villains in the animated series gave the writers an incredible amount of leeway because DC Comics is very protective of its heroes. Specifically ones that are the face of major blockbusters and merchandise empires. Case in point, Halpern revealed that a proposed Batman and Catwoman sex scene had the higher-ups at DC Comics freaking out.
“We had a moment where Batman was going down on Catwoman. And DC was like, “You can’t do that. You absolutely cannot do that,’” Halpern told Variety. “They’re like, ‘Heroes don’t do that.’ So, we said, ‘Are you saying heroes are just selfish lovers?’ They were like, ‘No, it’s that we sell consumer toys for heroes. It’s hard to sell a toy if Batman is also going down on someone.’”
DC Comics’ prudish approach to Batman kicked off a field day on Twitter that Val Kilmer couldn’t resist jumping into. The Batman Forever actor fired off a tweet that suggested his version of the Dark Knight is up for anything.
(Via Harley Quinn on Twitter)