Tagged: Wonder Woman

Mike Gold: The All-Star Secretary

Wonder Woman for PresidentHere’s what gets me about Wonder Woman.

She is, rightfully, symbolic of strong women who can take care of themselves, stand up for themselves, and help others – men and women alike – do the same. These are very good things. She started out before America entered World War II, so you can’t really attribute “Rosie the Riveter” juju to her origins: she was created at a time when most strong women were to be found in movies, and by then almost always in front of the camera and not behind it.

To be sure, there were plenty of other women super-heroes in comics.  Some were spin-offs or sidekicks to male superheroes – Mary Marvel, Bulletgirl and the original Hawkgirl come to mind – but others were stand-alone creations: the original Black Widow (1940), Phantom Lady (1941), the original Black Cat (1942), Liberty Belle (1943), and my personal favorite, Miss Fury (1941), the only one of the bunch that was created, written and drawn by an actual woman. Wonder Woman thrived and was the principle reason DC Comics bought All-American Publications for the simplest and best of reasons: she was the most fully realized of them all.

But in lesser hands than those of her creators, she encountered her own glass ceiling.

Wonder Woman got her start in All-Star Comics #8, December 1941, as a nine-page feature backing up the usual Justice Society of America story. It was a bonus for the readers, as pages were added to the issue for the story. No mention was made of any of this on the cover. One month later, her series debuted in Sensation Comics #1 and she was so popular she was awarded her own title several months later.

She would return to All-Star Comics in 1942 when the Justice Society guys voted her in as their first female member, something long denied to Hawkgirl or Liberty Belle or even Merry, Girl of 1,000 Gimmicks (don’t ask). This was only a few months after the publication of Wonder Woman #1, and only 10 months after her debut appearance in All-Star.

Talk about the fast track. But, sadly, it was the fast track to that glass ceiling.

Wonder Woman joined the Justice Society not as a full-fledged member, but… wait for it… as the Society’s secretary.

No shit. While the readers’ moms were working at the defense plant, the phenomenally popular super-heroine was relegated to taking notes about the adventures enjoyed by the men. In fact, just like Rosie the Riveter her position was only guaranteed “for the duration of the war.”

Whereas she occasionally played an enhanced role in the story, Wonder Woman did not become a fully active member of the team until All-Star Comics #38, December 1947, six years after her debut in the same title. Coincidently, that story also offered a guest-shot from Black Canary, who was asked to deliver a message (“everybody else in the JSA is dead”) to Wonder Woman. In turn, WW picked up the bodies of her fellow JSA members – her fellow JSA fellows – and brought them back to life using the Amazon’s Purple Ray, a staple in the Wonder Woman series.

Amusingly, it was Black Canary who saved the JSA members at the end of the story. As a reward… no, she wasn’t made the new secretary… she was given the team’s thanks and a nice pat on the back and was made an honorary member. Three issues later, Black Canary finally was given full membership.

When the Justice League of America debuted in 1960, Wonder Woman was there as a fully involved member of the team. I’d say this represented progress, and I guess it did but those initial stories only had five fighting members of the team, Superman and Batman being “too busy” to join in the fun. That only left four other DC superheroes plus Wonder Woman. But there was no relegation to second-class status for the iconic heroine… and that does represent progress.

It would be a while until women were regularly involved in creating Wonder Woman’s stories, not to mention those of the other DC superheroes which were expanding like amoebas. But, hey, Eisenhower was president. The New Frontier didn’t start until the following year.

Mindy Newell: The United States of Theocracy

wonder_woman

I am angry.

Just finished reading School Daze, Martha’s latest column.

I clicked on her last link.

Are you fucking kidding me?!

Everybody knows about Kim Davis, but how many of you know about Charee Stanley, the United Airlines ExpressJet flight attendant who refuses to serve alcohol because she is a Muslim? The problem was handled a while by the other flight attendants who shared flights with Ms. Stanley; they served the drinks while Ms. Stanley did other duties. But eventually another employee filed a complaint, and ExpressJet suspended Ms. Stanley (administrative leave for 12 months without pay) for not fulfilling her expected duties; if there is no satisfactory resolution by the end of that time period, Ms. Stanley will be terminated. She has filed a complaint with the EEOC (Equal Opportunity Commission).

Newsflash, people. The United States of America is not a theocracy.

So the simple answer to Kim Davis and the flight attendant is “Get another job.”

But is it so simple?

Aside: Though my gut reaction is to say, “yeah, it is simple, get another job,” I was born on the cusp of Libra, (Justice) and Scorpio, (The Scorpion). So although my gut reaction, my stinger, is to say, “yeah, it is simple, get another job,” my intellect is constantly balancing the scales.

What if a superhero refused to do his or her job because of religious reasons? I have previously stated that I believe that Wonder Woman, for all her stature as a modern feminist icon, is firmly in the anti-abortion, pro-life camp, owing to her own miraculous birth on an island where the usual biological procreation of children is impossible, and has been since the Amazons arrived on Themiscrya. How conflicted would Princess Diana be in upholding Roe vs. Wade? Very, I think.

And let’s say, for argument’s sake, that Kitty Pryde has become shomer Shabbat, which in modern lingo means a Jew who has “returned,” after living an assimilated or non-practicing life, to following the commandments honoring the Sabbath and God as laid down in the second book of the Torah (Deuteronomy), i.e., an Orthodox Jew. Would Kitty be right in refusing to aid the other X-Men in a fight against the Brood if it happened to be a Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, or Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year in Judaism, spent in fasting and prayer?

Uh, actually, no. The preservation of life, the act of preserving life, is, in fact, the most important principle of Judaism superseding all others and all commandments. “The Mishna says: “’Whenever a human life is endangered, the laws of the Sabbath are suspended’. The more eagerly someone goes about saving a life, the more worthy he is of praise.” (The Babylonian Talmud, tractate Yoma, page 84b)

So what’s the answer?

I don’t know, but I’m glad I live in a country in which Amendment I of the Constitution states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…”

And I’m glad I live in a country in which Article III, Section 1 of the Constitution says that “The judicial Power of the United States shall be vested in one supreme Court…”

Despite what Mike Huckabee says.

Martha Thomases: Wonder Women and the Men Who Don’t Get Them

Conan O'Brien San Diego Comic Con

I wasn’t at the San Diego Comic Con last week, but I kind of feel like I was. I watched Conan O’Brien every day. I read updates on line. I watched movie trailers from panels I probably couldn’t have got into. It was just like being there, except I didn’t have to wear underwear, I could knit, and I had a cat on my lap.

Still, I missed seeing my friends, and people who aren’t exactly my friends, but we know each other well enough for them to hug me.

And I missed seeing a comic culture that, finally, accepted women as true fans. Instead of raging about Twilight fans (which is my last memory of SDCC), or bitching about cosplayers, the reports I read from SDCC 2015 were remarkably cheerful and inclusive and accepting. Crowded, and with long lines for the bathrooms, but full of good will.

And then I read this. Two veteran Hollywood reporters lamenting the “fact” that movies today are all about women heroes, and that the “real” men can’t catch a break. Never mind that nothing they say is even remotely factual.

Look, I get it. They’re old, and the movies they grew up with are no longer fashionable. In some ways, I share their feelings. I love John Ford westerns. I adore the free-wheeling movies from the 1960s and 1970s, before movies cost so much that the marketing departments took over the studios. But my nostalgia for my lost youth doesn’t blind me to the fact that those movies, for all their brilliance, for all their art, ignored the existence of most of their potential audience, and denied the experiences of people who weren’t white and straight and conventionally beautiful.

At the same time, the United States women’s soccer team won the World Cup and Serena Williams conquered Wimbledon. Now, I generally couldn’t care less about sports, but even a curmudgeon like me was excited to see talented, motivated women win.

In parallel to the ridiculous old men who wrote the piece in Deadline linked above, there were men who used the occasion to bewail Selena Williams lack of “femininity.” These ranged from the Newspaper of Record to the ungovernable Twitterverse.

To me, Serena Williams looks the way Wonder Woman is supposed to look. She’s a big girl, with solid muscles because she needs her strength. She dresses for competition the way I imagine a super heroine would dress, in clothes that allow her a full range of movement and provide support where she needs it.

Serena Williams is not the only woman with a body that’s heroic. There are body-builders and gymnasts and runners and swimmers and soccer players, too. There isn’t just one kind of strong body for women, just as there is no one kind of strong body for men. None of them look like the tits-and-ass fantasies of too many artists, but I think that style of art is losing popularity.

In times of change (by which I mean, forever), some people will always get upset. They will be threatened by the change and worry that they will lose something, whether that something is power or privilege or just stories that they like.

(I’m like that, sometimes. Move a favorite television show to a different time-slot, and my world falls apart. Even knowing how to use the DVR doesn’t make me feel any better.)

People who are not powerful know there are no guarantees in this world, that there is no stability, no permanent comfort. It’s those who are complacent in their wealth and power and privilege who are surprised. At best, if we find ourselves uncomfortable in these positions, we can hope to have empathy. At worst, we can dig in and be jerks.

(Last week, I was kind of a jerk. I’m sorry about it, and I appreciate those who cared enough to educate me.)

Relax, uptight men. Most movies still focus on heroes who are white and male and straight. So do most comics. No one makes you pay for any stories about women or people of color or queer folks.

But some of us want those stories. We’re going to tell them and watch them and read them.

Molly Jackson: Cosplay for a Cause

Cosplay For A Cause

This past weekend I took part in the Black Widow #WeWantWidow flash mob that swept through the world. If you happened to spend the past few days hiding under a really big rock from news sites and Facebook, here are the details about what happened.

This was cosplaying for a cause. Kristin Rielly, of RiellyGeek and formally Geek Girls Network, organized this event as a fun protest to the treatment of Marvel’s Black Widow, in terms of exposure in movies and merchandising. When I asked her the why of doing this event, she stated “After seeing Age of Ulton and Black Widow’s lack of character development (or her abrupt back story scene), and writing several posts for Fashionably Geek about the new Avengers line this and that – almost all missing Black Widow images, I just had enough. And then then to top it all off, Hasbro and Mattel both released action figures of Captain America and Iron Man on Black Widow’s motorcycle in her most badass AoU scene, instead of a Black Widow action figure.”

People from the US, Canada and Australia took part, dressing as Black Widow or in merchandise for the character. I was one of them, participating in the NYC demonstration outside of ReedPop’s Special Edition comicon. At least, that was the plan. The standard rule for most New Yorkers: if you are running late, the subway will make it worse. So I missed out on the big group photo shoot by a few minutes.

However, I lucked out that another late person and a few other Black Widows were out front when I arrived. So I still got my group shot! (I am weirdly proud of the belt buckle that I made. Never underestimate the power of twist ties!)

cosplay for a cause 2As I walked the floor of the comicon, some exhibitors remarked to me about the sheer number of Black Widows in attendance. I came to realize that this flash mob was sending a message to the people in the room that we want to see a change. I am so proud that I took part in it, even if I was late. I made a difference in that room.

The truth is that this really applies to all female and minority characters in comics. If DC had done the cinematic universe building first, we probably would have been tweeting We Want Wonder Woman instead. (That outfit would have been harder for me to make though.) I can hope that the industry heard us and saw the aftermath of supporting coverage.

In case you were wondering what to do now, I did ask Kristin how she thought we should continue. Rielly said “Let’s keep talking about it until we can make a difference. Keep sharing the hashtag, keep posting photos online of Black Widow images and cosplay. Maybe Marvel and Disney will see that they really do have a demographic ready for more female superheroines on screen and on the shelves.”

So, it is now in your hands. Go tweet #WeWantWidow. Go tell Marvel, Mattel, Hasbro and any other licenser that you want to see more Black Widow. Or go tell DC that you want to see more female coverage. Go use your voice to make sure that change happens.

Martha Thomases: Wonder Woman, Goddess of What?

Hera help me, but I think I have to write about Wonder Woman again.

I know, I know. I already wrote about the new team of Marilyn and David Finch in which I said “She is supposed to be strong and independent and a peaceful warrior, not armored eye candy.”

The second issue wasn’t much better. It involved a rather convoluted effort to (re)create the original, Donna Troy Wonder Girl, but in a way that made her grim and gritty and probably the pawn of an evil, power-hungry crone. As a power-hungry crone who doesn’t like to think of herself as evil, I found this to be a personally distasteful plot development.

Still, I recognize that I don’t represent a significant part of the audience, so I thought I’d give it one more try. Open-minded… that’s what I am.

By the first page of issue #38 (current run), I knew this would be my last issue.

If you haven’t read the story, Diana is not only Wonder Woman but the new God of War as well, so there are lots and lots of battle scenes. The story opens on Themyscira, where the Amazon army fights a big, bad monster.

With bare midriffs.

Not the monster. It is, I presume, naked, but covered in scales and shadows. Most of the Amazons, however, leave their bare skin fully exposed. They might have metal bras, and possibly metal thongs to protect their sexy bits, but otherwise, they are naked. It also seems that the higher one’s military rank, the more clothing one is entitled to wear. No one, however, gets to have any protection on her thighs.

Am I supposed to believe that this is what a warrior society does when faced with danger?

It’s not even lazy. It would take nothing more than a different choice by the colorist (and/or whomever supervises the colorist) to make a bare torso look as if it were covered with armor. I have to believe that someone thought it was titillating for the Amazon cannon fodder to be semi-nude.

There are other ridiculous and incoherent parts to the story. Diana is haunted by nightmares and wakes up in a bed with bloody sheets. Every woman on this planet who is lucky enough to sleep on sheets has had this experience. I would imagine that writer Meredith Finch has had this experience. However, rather than being something normal, an event that requires nothing more than a trip to the bathroom for a tampon (or its Amazon equivalent), it’s presented as being a Portent of Things To Come. I find this almost as difficult to believe as bare-belly fighting.

Later in the story, a female television news reporter is doing a story from Peru. Her head is covered as it would be if she was a Muslim woman, or a Catholic woman in a church. She could be Muslim and this is an attempt to bring in more diversity to the landscape of the DC Universe. If that’s the case, it is haphazard. Perhaps I’m over-reacting, but it took me out of the story.

Especially since I thought the reporter was Lois Lane. And then I realized I thought that because she was a female reporter with dark hair, and other than that, looked like every other female character in the story. Why is Lois Lane there? If it isn’t Lois, what’s the news agency? How did they find out about the big, superhero emergency?

I don’t think I’ll ever find out, because I don’t intend to buy any more issues by this particular creative team. Please tell me if it ever gets any better.

 

Mindy Newell: Je Ne Suis Pa Charlie Hebdo

SoBigYesterday I had a thought – which I do have on occasion.

I have always considered myself a “socially conscious” comics writer. This means that, if you look over my body of work, you will notice that I have told stories that, in one way or another, reflect “real world” events and the consequences of those events on my characters. Notably, of course, in my 1986 Lois Lane mini-series about child abduction and abuse, “When It Rains, God is Crying” (coincidentally edited by ComicMix’s Robert Greenberger when we were both working for DC, he an editor and me a freelancer), but also as far back as “Moon River,” my first story in New Talent Showcase, an admittedly tyro effort to portray the outcome of a closed, dictatorial society on an individual. And of course there was “Chalk Drawings,” which I co-wrote with George Pérez for Wonder Woman, which was a story about suicide.

These efforts do not make me Edna Ferber (a member of the Algonquin Round Table, a group of renowned and influential New York City writers, critics, actors, and wits who gathered at the Algonquin Hotel every day for lunch from 1919 to 1929), whose “socially conscious” novels include, among others, So Big (1924), for which she won the Pulitzer Prize, Show Boat (1926), which was adapted into a musical by Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein, and Giant (1952), which was made into a movie directed by George Stevens and starred Rock Hudson, Elizabeth Taylor, and James Dean – his third and last role before his death by car accident – who did admirable jobs in a no-way-was it-as-good-as-the-novel script adaptation. So Big was about the war between art and finance, Show Boat was about the racism between black and white and its price, while Giant dealt with the racism between brown and white, the antipathy between cattle ranchers and oilmen, and, as well, the clash between liberalism and conservatism. All are issues we face today.

Nor am I Laura Z. Hobson, whose 1947 Gentlemen’s Agreement attacked post-World War II anti-Semitism in the United States. It was made into a film produced by Darryl F. Zanuck, who, according to Wikipedia, was approached by Samuel Goldwyn and other Jewish filmmakers. They asked him not to make the film because it could “stir up trouble,” and feared that Hays Code enforcer Joseph Brown would not allow the film to get by the censors because of his openly known anti-Semitism. But Zanuck essentially said, “Fuck him,” and the film went on to be nominated for eight Oscars and to win three – Best Picture, Best Director (Elia Kazan, no stranger to controversy), Best Actor (Gregory Peck), and Best Supporting Actress (Celeste Holm). Just a brief aside here: in my not-so-humble opinion, John Garfield should have won a Best Supporting Actor for his role as Dave Goldman, a Jewish WW II vet and best friend to Gregory Peck’s main character, journalist Phil Schulyer. Oh, and young Dean Stockwell (Quantum Leap’s Admiral Al Calavicci and Battlestar Galactica’s Brother John Cavil) played Schulyer’s son.

But, getting back to my original sentence, in which I said I had a thought…

Am I still listed in the phone book?

Of course it sounds silly. I mean, who uses a phone book these days?

But the point is, how easy am I to find?

And the answer is: All too easy.

So what if I offended someone out there? Certainly in these past two and so years I have stated my opinions loudly and frequently. And I’ve done the same on my Facebook page.

Is it that inconceivable some one could decide to meet me in the parking lot at work, or in front of my apartment building, or even in my apartment? Some one with a pathological chip on his or her shoulder and a knife or a Luger or a Kalishnikov?

Or maybe while I’m shopping at the Jewish deli?

No, I’m not inflated with self-importance.

No, I am not Edna Ferber or Laura Z. Hobson. Neither am I Lawrence Wright or Bob Woodward or Carl Bernstein. I’m not Maureen O’Dowd. I’m not Rachel Maddow. I’m not Chris Matthews or Ed Schultz. I’m not Megan Kelley or Sean Hannity or Ann Coulter. I’m not Jon Stewart. I’m not Steven Colbert. I’m not Louis Black or John Oliver or Bill Maher.

I’m not Thomas Nast. I’m not Art Spielgman and I’m not Jules Feiffer. I’m not Nigar Nazar of Pakistan.

I’m not Alan Moore or Neil Gaiman or G. Willow Wilson.

I’m not Mike Gold or Denny O’Neil or John Ostrander or Marc Fishman or Martha Thomases or Michael Davis or Emily Whitten or Bob Ingersoll.

I am Mindy Newell.

Je ne suis pa Charlie Hebdo.

But I could be.

We all could be.

And so could you.

 

Mindy Newell’s Year-End Bests And Worsts

So here we are at the end of 2014, which is the time for media folk to opine about the best and the worst of the year in all the different areas of our overcrowded, put-upon lives. So though I rarely think of myself as part of the media folk crowd, I’ll include me in that description for this column, since all of you have so kindly considered my words, thoughts, judgments, attitudes, and so forth important enough to peruse over the last twelve months.

So here we go, in no particular order, and not divided into “best” and “worst”…

I applaud Marvel Comics’ writer G. Willow Wilson (great name, by the way, so alliterative!) and artist Adrian Alphona for introducing the comics world to Kamala Khan, an American Muslim teenager from Jersey City, New Jersey. Kamala’s parents and family are traditional, observant Muslims (for the most part), but Kamala just wants to be what every teenage girl wants to be – not different from her peers. But she is. Not just because she’s Muslim. It’s because she’s also Ms. Marvel.

In a time when bigotry is rampant in these United States – our President is a Muslim Kenyan socialist dictator terrorist determined to destroy America, and, oh, by the way, he’s *gasp* B-L-A-C-K – I just absolutely love that the House of Ideas has embraced the opposite of the disease named xenophobia. There is no better cure.

Just a few weeks ago at my daughter’s birthday dinner, we got into a discussion of the state of music these days. I said that I think there is nothing out there that can compare to the music produced during the ‘60s, certainly nothing like the great concept albums of the Beatles, the Stones, and so forth. Not for the mass public, anyway. It’s all manufactured pop crap. Certainly nothing that is going to hold up to the test of time. Said brother Glenn, “So where do you think great popular art is being produced?”

“Television,” I said instantly. “We in a new ‘Golden Age.”

“When she’s right, she’s right,” said Glenn.

There’s been a lot of really fantastic television these days. Game of Thrones, Orange is the New Black, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Downton Abbey, Transparent, Outlander, and certainly comics are rocking our personal screens with The Flash, Arrow, Gotham, and Marvel’s Agents of Shield. But my vote for the best TV show of 2014 – as if regular readers can’t guess before I type out the letters – is Homeland.

Homeland not only made everyone forget – well, sort of – Brody (for more see my earlier column on the series here), but it amped up the tension to equal the heyday of 24 – and beat Jack Bauer at his own game by never forgetting that it is also a study of the emotional, and psychological scars borne by those who serve their patriotism in the coldest of wars.

Best taking on of a role already inhabited by fan favorites: Peter Capaldi as the Time Lord in Doctor Who. David Tennant and Matt Smith made indelible marks on the saga of the Gallifreyan, between them raising the Doctor into the realms of a worldwide phenomenon shared by only two modern myths – Star Trek and Star Wars. I can well imagine the trepidation with which Mr. Capaldi must have felt when he was given the keys to the TARDIS, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he hadn’t slept the night before the his debut premiered. But he made it his own; an original interpretation in which, im-not-so-ho, the Doctor had to figure out if, of if not, he’s a good man. “I don’t know,” said Clara. And I’m still not sure if the Doctor can accept that maybe he is, even if he did, at long last, salute Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart.

Politics and World Affairs 101. (Hey, you know me – I wasn’t going to let this topic slip away.) This year was definitely one that went way beyond any introductory college course. The most “do-nothing” Congress in the history of this country, all based – again, im-not-so-ho, on the biases held against our President. (Reference first sentence in fourth paragraph of this column, please.) ISIS, jihadist Crusaders determined to raise the Ottoman Empire from the dust of history using beheadings with modern-day scimitars and social media propaganda, is the biggest threat to any type of peace in the Middle East – and the world – since Adolph Hitler and the National Socialist German Workers Party. And yes, that is really how I feel.

Meanwhile Vladimir Putin seems determined to lead a new Soviet Union – and for those who may point out that the Russian economy is in freefall…well, countries have gone to war because of failed domestic policies. And homosexuals in Russia are the new scapegoat, replacing Jews.

Best (and worst) on the domestic front this year. It seems to me that the American people have finally woken up and are marching in protest again against our own “black boots” (not to reference Nazis again, but…) who – shades of the pre-Civil Rights Act era – seem to feel they have a right to kill black men and anyone else who doesn’t “salute” them fast enough. I only hope the protests continue to the level of the social activism in which I grew up during the ‘60’s, and now dwindle away like the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Worst “Oh, God, I knew this was going to happen” moment: “The Mystery of Malaysian Flight 370” was televised on CNN. Just waiting for it to show up as an episode of “Ancient Aliens” sometime in 2015.

Dumbest comics controversy of 2014 (though I can understand the uproar) was that cover. Yeah, you know the one I mean. Jessica Jones as Spider-Woman with her ass up in the air.

The other dumb comics controversy – the stupidest, I mean – was DC’s decision not to allow Batwoman to marry her long-time love, civil rights lawyer Maggie Sawyer. Not only does it reek of bigotry and ignorance, not only does it go against the biggest non-issue in recent American history, i.e., gay marriage, but it’s based on an edict that “no DC superhero is allowed to be married” as “heroes shouldn’t have happy personal lives” because it would make for “less dramatic stories.” As if marriage is always a state of bliss. Um…no. And kudos to J.H. Williams and W. Haden Blackman for walking away from such ignoramity.

Most exposed comic character: Starfire. Once upon a time, back in the Wolfman-Pérez days of New Teen Titans, she was a nuanced character. Now she’s just…exposed.

Speaking of DC and stupidest. How about their contest concerning Harley Quinn? the company asked for tyro artists to draw a scene from Harley Quinn #0 which specifically asked for: “Harley sitting in a bathtub with toasters, blow dryers, blenders, appliances, all dangling above the bathtub and she has a cord that will release them all. We are watching the moment before her inevitable death. Her expression is one of, ‘Oh, well, I guess that’s it for me,’ and she has resigned herself to the moment is going to happen.”

Announced just before National Suicide Prevention Week.

Oh, wait, a lot of that happened in 2013.

Well, it’s still “worst of” bad news.

So what kind of stupidest stuff has DC done in 2014?

Turned Wonder Woman into a caricature of a feminist icon – whiney, spoiled, and bitchy.

Batgirl featured a literal “cartoon” of transgender characterization in the imposter Batgirl, who was actually a dangerous, deranged man. Um, btw, that’s not transgender. That’s cross-dressing. Either way, it was incredibly insulting to too many individuals. (The creative team of Brendan Fletcher, Cameron Stewart and Babs Tarr apologized…and meant it.).

Merchandizing sexualized and insulting t-shirts with Superman “scoring” with Wonder Woman, and mottos like “Training To Be Batman’s Wife.”

Releasing a book for toddlers and early readers called “Superheroes Opposites” in which “Wonder Woman pushes a swing” with a little girl on it, while Superman, on the opposing page, “pulls the machine,” which looks like some combination of a Deere tractor and deep-sea oilrig. Anyway, it’s enormous and definitely very heavy. Yeah, I’ll be buying that book for my 15-month-old grandson soon.

DC sure isn’t Jenette Khan’s company anymore!

But DC didn’t just become the leading anti-feminist comics company in 2014. I found this at www.Whatculture.com:

“2014 also saw DC leaning on some wonderfully old-school gimmicks to try and boost sales, including falling back into the nineties speculator boom trope of providing shiny covers to try and entice people into buying flagging books. They planned to provide 3D variant covers for climactic final issues of their year-long crossover event Future’s End, a process which apparently requires certain special chemicals.

“One of which is called microcystin, and is highly toxic. Exactly the sort of thing you wouldn’t want to, say, get into a municipal water supply.” Woops, that’s exactly what happened though! Some sort of spill at the printing plant where the books were being published caused the deadly toxin to end up in Lake Eerie, which provides the water supply of eleven million coastal inhabitants in Northwestern Ohio.

Yes, DC poisoned the water supply of eleven million people. Lex Luthor would be proud.”

Okay, I’m sure DC comics weren’t the only books being published at the printing plant. But I just have three things to say:

How come stuff like this doesn’t happen at Marvel?

And, at least based on this list of “worsts,” I don’t think I’ll be working for DC anytime soon.

And, based on this list of “worsts,” I’m not sure I would want to.

 

Martha Thomases: And Today’s Holiday Is…

Today is Boxing Day. According to Wikipedia “Boxing Day is a holiday traditionally celebrated the day following Christmas Day, when servants and tradespeople would receive gifts, known as a ‘Christmas box’ from their bosses or employers… in the United Kingdom, Canada, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, Kenya, South Africa, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica and other Commonwealth nations, as well as Norway, the Netherlands and Sweden.”

Which is, as the British say, bollocks. With no history or evidence whatsoever, I consider Boxing Day to be the holiday in which we put all our unwanted gifts into a box they came in and return them to the , store for something we want. And since that works better as a premise for this column, that’s what I’m going with.

Here are some trends from 2014 popular culture that I would like to see returned and exchanged for something better:

  • The new Wonder Woman team. I don’t know anything about the strategy that involves putting a married couple to work on the same book at the same time. Perhaps the editors thought everything would flow more smoothly if the writer and artist were in the same house. However, in the case of Meredith and David Finch, I think they made a poor choice. Finch’s art is too reminiscent of the kind of T&A that passes for story-telling these days, and Meredith’s words and plots don’t help any. I don’t think I would enjoy their characterizations of any super-heroines, but certainly not Wonder Woman. She is supposed to be strong and independent and a peaceful warrior, not armored eye candy.
  • Making trilogies into four parts. I understand that movie studios want to get every last penny they can from the ticket-buying public (and, later, the video-on-demand buying public and the DVD buying public). I understand that lots of people get jobs from making an extra movie. Unfortunately, they don’t take the epic and re-divide it into four parts. They take the first two parts, then split the third in two. The first part of the third book ends on a cliff-hanger and is not in the least bit satisfying. That’s not how story structure works.
  • Incompatible media. I’m old enough to remember the conflict between Beta and VHS. More recently, I remember the conflict between Blu-Ray and HD. It was incredibly aggravating and stressful to want new technology, but to also know that picking the wrong format would cost thousands of dollars.

The problem this year is not the machines, but the purveyors. I enjoy lots of streaming services, especially Netflix and Amazon Prime. Unfortunately, my Apple TV won’t let me watch the latter on the big TV in my living room. I could buy the plug-in that Amazon makes, but that way lies madness. I don’t want a bunch of little plastic devices sticking out of my television set. I want one that lets me access whatever I want.

  • Intolerant fan bases. I never thought I would live to see the day when my beloved comic books would be an important part of the popular culture. Not only do they inspire movies and television shows that win awards and top the ratings charts, but they earn spots on top-ten lists. It’s really great. People I know from the non-comics parts of my life read graphic novels now.

Unfortunately, not everyone is happy to see nerd culture in general, and comics in particular, become popular. Gamergate is still an issue. Women at comic conventions still get hassled, especially (but not only) if they are cosplayers. Twenty years ago, when a bunch of us started Friends of Lulu, we were harassed by those who were threatened by our involvement in the industry>.

I think the reactionary voices are louder now than they have been because they are on the way out. I think the capitalist glee at the new customer dollars will eventually overcome the boys club (and the white club, and the straight club and the Christian club etc. etc. etc.).

Here’s wishing you more and better in 2015.

 

Mindy Newell: Baby Mine

Baby mine, don’t you cry. / Baby mine, dry your eyes. / Rest your head close to my heart, never to part, / Baby of mine. • From Walt Disney’s “Dumbo”(1941), Words and Lyrics by Frank Churchill and Ned Washington

So Donna Troy is coming back.

Only this isn’t the vibrant, intelligent, powerful, and oh-so-very human – with all the foibles and strengths inherent in homo sapiens – young woman that I came to know and love back in the day when Marv Wolfman and George Pérez created and collaborated on The New Teen Titans.

This is a Donna created through the teamwork of Meredith and David Finch, who has been granted life through the dark arts, through black magic, and as she rises naked from the brewing miasma of a black cauldron, and so we react with fear and horror, our intrinsic fear of human sacrifice, blood ritual, and “unnatural” life causing us to recoil in horror and to whisper a psalm of David, to cross ourselves in supplication to God, to ward off this, this thing with shaking hands making patterns in the air, signs and symbols as ancient and as useless as our dead forefathers who huddled in fear on the plains of Africa as the light left the world and the darkness arose.

This thing is something forged in fire and brimstone. This thing is evil personified. This thing is wickedness beyond redemption.

This thing is sin come to life.

Yet once there was a woman, whose soul was dying from longing. Yet once there was a woman whose arms reached to hold nothing but empty air. Yet once there was a woman whose life was desolate with the silence of her home. And so this woman prayed to her gods for relief from this sorrowful existence, begged them to release her from her solitary misery.

She fasted in repentance; she washed only enough to ward off evil odor; and she put off wearing colors and smooth satins and silk, and dressed herself in haircloth and solemn hues. She ate sparingly, only enough to keep her alive, and took the bounties of her kitchen to the sick and needy among her sisters. And yet, for so long that Queen Hippolyta of Themiscrya lost track of the days, months, and years of her travail, the gods were silent.

And her Amazons whispered behind her back, and some thought that she must be overthrown, for she was mad, they said, and death will come to us all in following her, as surely as it did to the daughters of King Cecrops of Athens, who threw themselves from the Acropolis, or into the sea. But others calmed them, saying that the melancholia in their queen’s heart would find respite in their loyalty.

Then, one night the queen had a dream. Hermes, the messenger of the gods, came to her and whispered instructions into her ear. “Do not speak of this to anyone,” the winged herald said. “For if you do the gods will turn away from you and your life, such as it is, will continue in solitude as you watch your sisters and this paradise come to enmity and fall into entropy and chaos.

That morning the queen bathed once again in the milk of heifers, and had her attendants clothe her in the magnificence that was her due. She perfumed herself with the musk of roses and broke her fast with jellied eels and warm bread, and once again slaked her thirst with the waters of the Pool of Life. Her attendants asked her many questions, but, remembering the words of Hermes, she silenced them and sent them away.

Alone now, Hippolyta made her way to the shores of Paradise Island, where in a hidden cove she stripped herself of her finery. Naked, the queen made absolution to the gods, smearing her face with the mud of the ocean, and also over her womb and breasts. She knelt in the wet sand, and from that same mud formed the figure of a newborn babe.

And she prayed, repeating the words that Hermes had whispered in her dream.

The sky darkened and night fell upon Themiscrya, though it was noon. A cold wind blew and Hippolyta shivered as it battered her naked body. She looked up into the sky and saw that Selene, the goddess of the moon, had eclipsed Helios, the god of the sun, for this was the time of woman.

She looked back down upon the clay figure, and as she did so, she felt her breasts suddenly grow heavy and milk leaked from her nipples. A great pain spasmed through her loins and up into her uterus, and the queen lay down, crying out in a moment of fear as her legs drew up over her stomach and something moved within her body. For what seemed a lifetime Hippolyta lay there on the beach, wracked with pain, unable to stir afraid, sure that she was being punished for her arrogance in not accepting the fate woven for her by the Morai.

“Clotho, Lachesis, Atropos, forgive me,” she groaned. “Forgive my presumption. Allow me to live to serve you and my Amazons.”

There was no answer.

And then there was a light, such a bright golden radiance, so that Hippolyta closed her eyes against it. And there were two voices.

“Do not be afraid, daughter,” said Leto, the goddess of motherhood.

“I am with you, as I am with all women at their time,” said Eileithya, the goddess of childhood.

Hippolyta opened her eyes. The goddesses, bathed in a glow that had no earthly source, stood before her.

“We have heard your prayers,” said Leto.

“And they are answered,” said Eilethya.

Suddenly the queen felt as if a great chariot lay at the doorway of her secret place, that place where no man had touched in so long. She felt, rather than saw, the two goddesses kneel on either side of her, then one was behind her and pushing her up into a sitting position, but taking the weight of Hippolyta upon herself. Opening her eyes, Hippolyta saw the other – was it Eilethya? – crouch before her, a blanket of silver cotton in her hands. “You must push now,” said the goddess. “Lean again Leto. She will be your rock.”

Hippolyta felt as though she was falling off a great cliff. From high above her, she heard the goddesses speak. Their brightness was as a pinprick in the darkness starting to envelop her.

“She will be the greatest of the Amazons, a gift not only to yourself, but to the world, for it is to the world she will belong.”

“A great warrior against the darkness, yet her soul and heart will be full of love,” said Eilethya. “All the glories and gifts of all the gods and goddesses of Olympus will be hers.”

“Her name will be Diana,” said Leto.

Warm salt water was in her nose and her mouth, and Hippolyta sat up with a start. The sun was warm on her hair and shoulders; it was noon, judging from the position of the sun; she was still in the cove, with only the sound of the surf and the cry of seagulls for company. Why had she come here? She had a memory of covering her face and parts of her body with mud, but reaching up to her cheek, there was nothing there except for a few wet grains of sand. She lifted her gown, which was soggy with ocean water. Her body was clean except for a few stray pieces of seaweed on her belly.

The queen shuddered. Had there truly been an eclipse? Had she dreamed it all? Or was she, as she knew many whispered, truly mad?

No.

That wasn’t the sound of seagulls.

A baby was crying somewhere.

But there had been no babies born in Themiscrya for millennia, not since the last children were born to those Amazons who had been raped by the men of Greece and Sparta in that terrible final war. A war which had led Queen Hippolyta – she herself raped by Hercules, though no child had resulted – to lead those surviving sisters who were willing to turn their back on what came to be known as “Man’s World” to Paradise. The immortal island.

The baby – if that was what it was–was still crying. Hippolyta followed the sound with her eyes.

There. Just where the surf met the sand. Something was lying there. Shakily, Hippolyta rose to her feet.

As she did so, she felt a warm gush of liquid spurt from her breasts, staining her gown. And a trickle of blood slid down her inner thigh. As if….

She stared down at the baby. It had black hair, black like the waters of the River Styx, and eyes were a strange green-blue, reflecting the color of the Aegean Sea where it met the Mesogeios.

The queen picked up the infant, who was wrapped in a blanket of very fine and very soft silver.

“Diana,” Hippolyta whispered.

The baby found the mother’s nipple, and nursed.

 

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