I think there's a difference between gatekeeping and just calling someone out on making plain wrong assumptions.
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"Ms. Marvel" writer takes issue with New Yorker snarky piece on Marvel's "A-Force"
- Thread starter Dalek
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AbsolutBro
Member
Wait, why does Jubilee on the A-Force cover have her sparkle powers back? Did she stop being a vampire or something?
Mh, that's some ether drop.
Outside-the-field commenters can be useful, but ultimately, they literally don't know what they're talking about - While we have people inside the whole process, trying to get a better gender representation, speaking up.
You have something to say, say it.
We'd all be thankful for additional context on the story.
This isn't really conductive to discussion.
Outside-the-field commenters can be useful, but ultimately, they literally don't know what they're talking about - While we have people inside the whole process, trying to get a better gender representation, speaking up.
You have something to say, say it.
We'd all be thankful for additional context on the story.
This isn't really conductive to discussion.
AbsolutBro
Member
Ffffffffffffffffffff
How far behind is Marvel's Comixology ap? And is there any way to read current comics without actually ordering physical books (because shops don't stay alive in my area)?
Discotheque
Banned
Ms Marvel is great. She really blends the Muslim female youth experience well with superhero fuckery
Like, for YEARS, the idea of She-Hulk was to have a woman in a position of power who has to deal with balancing the ideas of heroism and personal satisfaction, often dealing with the very flak Leporte is talking about. "Why are women who sleep around sluts while men who do as such are heroes? Why should your cheating be absolved and forgiven while the mere thought of me being with another man (or woman) is grounds for public ridicule?" It was a comic that constantly attacked the double standards that come up in comicbooks.
To use that as your lead example, then to dismiss the MCU because "it's for children" is dismissive; to the point where it really makes you look like you don't care whether comics are inclusive or not, because you don't think they're worth the time.
6 months. By design.
It's amazon who owns Comixology, Marvel has their own app Unlimited.
Comixology is pretty great IMO- you get new books basically right away each time they release. Comixology is growing their backlog all the time too, and you can find just about every new and ongoing series and many famous arcs, from Marvel, DC or otherwise (except for Dark Horse, who have a third app).
Pai Pai Master
Banned
Its funny because I could see someone taking issue with She-Hulk because some of her arcs and moments directly deal with her sexuality, sometimes in some pretty good ways but often in some pretty bad ways.
But nope - it's bad because there's already a male Hulk and She-Hulk is apparently dressed like a pornstar.
Comixology is always up to date. If you actually mean the Marvel unlimited app, that's always six months behind.
But... on the cover... you can see her legs and an outline of her boobs...
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
The entire piece was weird considering that the actual costumes on display in the A-Force run a healthy gamut from "sexy" to "sleek". I mean, yes they're for the most part all form-fitting, but that's always been how superhero outfits look like, and holy shit look its possible to make a female form-fitting outfit not look like a latex catsuit.
This:
is not this:
_Head.jpg)
The problem with superheroine costumes hasn't been that they're form-fitting, its that they so often resembled swimsuits and were drawn in ridiculous poses showing off their T&A
This:
is not this:
The problem with superheroine costumes hasn't been that they're form-fitting, its that they so often resembled swimsuits and were drawn in ridiculous poses showing off their T&A
AbsolutBro
Member
Crap, show's how often I even use the Marvel AP (which is the one I have). Thanks for the info.
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
Honestly the only thing I find a bit tacky about the designs in the OP is that many still do that weird-ass boob clutching thing where they either go down into the cleavage or up underneath. Is that any woman's fantasy, even as a sexiness fantasy?
Zen_Arcade
Banned
Exactly. She-Hulk, possibly more then any other female super hero is a great example of balancing sexuality and power in a female character. She is absolutely a sexual being, and it's brought up, but it's not the basis of her character and she has far more layers then that.
FlashbladeGAF
Member
See what?
Women with nice figures = porn stars now?
Just because you can't help but look at their bodies doesn't make them pornstars.
It makes you a perv.
Welcome to the club!
But that cover being called pornographic is just silly.
Writer of the article wanted attention, plain and simple ...Nothing to see here.
The entire piece was weird considering that the actual costumes on display in the A-Force run a healthy gamut from "sexy" to "sleek". I mean, yes they're for the most part all form-fitting, but that's always been how superhero outfits look like, and holy shit look its possible to make a female form-fitting outfit not look like a latex catsuit.
This:
is not this:
The problem with superheroine costumes hasn't been that they're form-fitting, its that they so often resembled swimsuits and were drawn in ridiculous poses showing off their T&A
The sort of larger issue is that super hero outfits have two default modes: Swimsuit or tracksuit. It's VERY rare to have something in between because something that doesn't show off how much more superior the hero is compared to regular people isn't considered heroic.
So for men, it's the muscular physique and for women it's the super sexy beach body, even when it's completely meaningless and often stupid to the n'th decree. See Leifeld
I get how people can get tripped up on that stuff, I do. However doing so is similar to refusing to see a movie because of it's poster art.
The entire piece was weird considering that the actual costumes on display in the A-Force run a healthy gamut from "sexy" to "sleek". I mean, yes they're for the most part all form-fitting, but that's always been how superhero outfits look like, and holy shit look its possible to make a female form-fitting outfit not look like a latex catsuit.
This:
is not this:
The problem with superheroine costumes hasn't been that they're form-fitting, its that they so often resembled swimsuits and were drawn in ridiculous poses showing off their T&A
couldn't you say the same about a lot of male costumes tho?
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
The primary reason why I think people aren't getting into comics is that you can't fucking buy them anywhere. (well anywhere except comic book stores)
The digital initiatives from publishers are a great start though.
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
Being like the second? Not in my experience. How many male heroes literally went around in a speedo, like three?
They're usually not drawn with female/gay male gaze (w/ the exception of Nightwing) though, since "Stupid Sexy Flanders" would generally be seen as off-putting to the target audience. The big change has been a push to get the default to being a more neutral gaze for everyone in the art style - people will sexualize them anyway because they're attractive people in tight clothes, it's not like they need the help from the artist.
Femmeworth
Banned
I don't know. I think it's the combination of it trying to present itself as classy while also using some cheap techniques that makes it sort of reminiscent of old school (or conservative might be more apt) erotic imagery.
Yeah, Wilson tries to make it seem like that is how latex works. Sure some of the outfits look more realistic but then Jean Grey.
SHAAAAAME
I...don't think that's true at all. Their poses are simply less ridiculous. But comics are RIFE with buffalo shots.
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
All of the costumes in the OP honestly look pretty great to me. They're still superhero ridiculous without being as weirdly sexy, and a lot of that has to do with how they're being presented and framed as well. Like I said, the boob clutching thing is still kind of weird, but aside from that I like a lot of what I see there
The poses/art direction are what I'm talking about. Female/Gay male gaze is rare enough that I notice it immediately if it appears in a medium. (Case in point: Orphan Black episode 1.)
Oh I don't know. How often do the MCU movies now have pointless shirtless scenes?
This problem seems to extend to a lot of male superheroes too. I blame lazy artists for that more than anything.
While true, that's not a problem exclusive to women. But yeah, there is a very large lack of heavies or super heavies in Marvel. The fact that She-Hulk is considered to be the bodytype equivalent of the juggernaut is sort of crazy.
But then, you make a cover like this and people get vocal about how much they hate it.
People were SUPER fucking pissed about this spread.
I think the only noticeable part is that spider woman is back to her old one. Though depending on who is drawing it her costume doesn't have to be overly revealing.
You can have someone shirtless and still have a neutral gaze.
ElBoxyBrown
Banned
That depends if the artist abides with how the costume should be drawn.
Simply Sarah
Member
Ignoring everything else for now, I need to agree that I have always considered breasts on the Rescue suit to be utterly ridiculous. That and the many things like it in fiction are terrible designs based on "Woman = boobs" instead of anything rational or reasonable.
Even as a straight male, both me and my lady friends who went to see AoU definitely enjoyed Under Armor Chris Evans and Randomly Shirtless In A Pool Chris Hemsworth.
I think feminism is far less of a monolith than it is often made it to be, especially in relation to representation - and that the disagreement they are having is one of subsection within feminism. I'm glad they're at least sort of having this disagreement; most of the times this argument just leads to one side yelling at the other "you're sexist!" Can't say I agree super wholeheartedly one way or the other reading through the two articles. I get where Wilson is coming from; but I also get where Lepore is coming from - and fundamentally, they are coming from two different places. The art creator vs the art critic is a pretty timeless pissing contest, all things considered.
Pai Pai Master
Banned
I'm not a very good judge of this as I happily appreciate both male and female T&A in my comics and comic movies, but they don't always come off as neutral to me.
Thor's shirtless scene in both of his solo movies emphasize his sex appeal (the one in TDW not so much but it is completely pointless). In GOTG you have your standard prison showering scene but the camera lingers on Pratt's body much longer than it needs to in order to get the point of the scene across once Rocket walks into the room.
There is nothing neutral about this scene. In fact, it encourages the sexualization of Thor as it shows Dennings character eyeing him up afterwards. Not to mention how often Thor's looks are brought up in the media tours and in the movies themselves. It's pandering, Marvel is full of it for both sides. It's how comic books work because they're full of attractive people in amazing shape and it works incredibly well for them.
While true, that doesn't really happen in the MCU. Every bit of TnA in those things is pretty pointed, DareDevil in particular.
Tangential, I don't understand Charlie Cox's abs.
Something like 47% of the audience of MCU movies are female. They're most certainly not intended to be neutral. The lady fans get some eye candy love too in this 'verse.
What were they pissed about?
However, I can still see the problem with the spread, because it's largely just fanservice for guys. The obvious reason being that all of the males in the spread look like they're doing something, while the females are clearly just posing.
AbsolutBro
Member
As in not overweight or obese? Sorry, honest question. I mean, Jubilee, Pixie and Nico Minoru are on that cover; they don't exactly measure up to someone like She-Hulk or Rogue.
I guess male characters at least get divided into two camps: Big bulky brawn (a la The Thing, Hulk or Juggernaut) or tall muscular (a la just about every other male character outside of The Blob).
I've not read Lepore's book, but most reports from fans of the character say it's not very good. Mark Waid, in fact, was just on Twitter last night calling it poorly researched trash.
I'll have to give it a look myself one day.
"WHY IS SHE SO FUCKING MUSCLY?!? THAT'S FUCKING GROSS DUDE! WOMEN DON'T HAVE MUSCLES LIKE THAT! DON'T YOU READ COMICS?!? SHE HULK DOESN'T LOOK LIKE THAT! NO ONE WANTS TO SEE WOMEN WITH MUSCLES LIKE THAT! MARVEL IS FUCKING STUPID!"
And the like. And you're right, it was fanservice for guys that was shit on because it wasn't sexy enough. And they never made her look like that ever again.
Eh, there are a wide range of body types for guys in marvel. While most of the look like captain america, you have super heavies like blob or super lights like Toad or Nightcrawler.
But there are no Heavies or Super Heavy females. She Hulk comes the closest and that's mostly because she's really tall.
Palette Swap
Member
Carol is a great example. She's totally a military type, member of the USAF, etc and somehow the minute she gets powers, she decides to wear a swimsuit. That redesign is totally in character and functional as it absolutely suits who she is and what she does.
I wouldn't want Steve in striped speedo with a star on his bulge.
I love that we're progressively getting all these different archetypes of great female leads, which makes that article utterly misguided.
Pai Pai Master
Banned
Very good point about older female hero costumes didn't have that much thought put into them beyond the sex appeal.
It's fucking awesomely poetic that Khamala's Ms. Marvel costume, on the other hand, is a Muslim-friendly bathing suit repurposed into a superheroine costume.
Sure, and in this case, it explicitly frames it through the view of her character. It's just not the default for the entire film - which was the case for a long time in the comics world when it came to female characters. The point about the uniforms is the type of thing I'm getting at.
When I think of neutral, I think of something like Chris Evans in an Under Armour shirt- or tank top- it's definitely there as eye candy, but the camera isn't really paying any extra attention to it.
on point.
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