Women in Comics and Women in Refrigerators

[Loony BoB]

To be fair, I think everyone who knows anything about X-Men knows that the 'Men' covers the original meaning of the word 'man' (ie, 'mankind'). Fun fact: There was a female member of the X-Men from the very first comic (Jean Grey) and she was probably the most powerful X-Man at the time, too. She was certainly more than capable of sticking up for herself and putting males "in their place".

I suppose they could rename the team retrospectively but I think there are better things that comic book writers can do than rename people. If they went down that road, I would argue that things like "Superman" and "Wonder Woman" should drop the their gender references at all because they shouldn't matter, but that's a whole different kettle of fish...

I do think that Lara Croft is already the female superhero (certainly as much as Batman) that has proved they can be successful. I wasn't a huge fan of the TR movies but you don't get a third movie by being rubbish. Also, Buffy was inspired by a movie, so I would argue that the Buffy movie was so much a success that they did a TV series (as opposed to the other way around), sort of like how Batman/Superman/Avengers stuff has been made into TV series after the success of recent movies.

It's just a case of finding the right story and the right actresses. And hype, I suppose. Marketing plays a big role in this kind of thing.

EDIT: Also, I swear they almost made a Xena movie, I wonder what happened with all that?

EDITRA: Apparently said Xena movie is a possibility that Lucy Lawless is in favour of! You never know!

[Shorty]

Lara Croft is not a superhero.

It pissed me off that Spiderman 2 Spoilerthey made Gwen Stacy so bloody awesome in Spiderman and then killed her to motivate Peter.

That is a perfect example of the Women in Refrigerators trope I was talking about.

[krissy]

and it is unfortunately because they are following the original comic storyline for this incarnation, more or less.

i dont think women in fridges is a comparable trope to kryptonite unless you're willing to say that women are indeed just a thing in these stories and not really characters. i.e. they're there to inspire the male characters and their development but are potted plants otherwise.

the recent Wood/Coipel/Lopez run of X-Men in Marvel NOW! features pretty much an all-female field cast of the team, with STORM leading! its not bad but i think i found some of the art questionable? subjective i guess.

also, thor is female now (for now likely). it's pretty cool.

[Vyk]

Lara Croft is not a superhero.

She's comparitively similar to Batman. Just not as much of everything. Not as much money. Not as much experience. Not as much drive. But she's a good example of that kind of hero. She's no Tony Stark, but she has had comics and adventures no normal person would experience. She's more than a normal person. Perhaps not a "hero", but could loosely be described as "super" human, if only in circumstance

The point though is that if Black Widow got her own movie, that would count. Even though she's not super. That's why I mentioned Tomb Raider, Aeon Flux, and Ultraviolet as examples for comparison. They're just normal people with lots of experience and technology to back them up

Also, since there's really not a lot of female hero movies, we really have to scrape the bottom of the barrel and lower our standards and definitions to draw comparisons from. Which definitely points to the root of the problem. There should be more, if only for argument's sake. So people can't say "that failed because of a woman". Eventually we'll be able to prove that wrong and say "Well, such-and-such did well. But it also had a good directer, writer, and editor"

[Shorty]

I understand the difference between being super and being someone like Batman. The point is that having those qualities do not default you to a superhero. Lara Croft is a video game character who has branched out into other franchises. Calling her a superhero woukd be like calling Yoda a superhero because he has also appeared in comics.

"Action hero" would more appropriately describe Lara Croft.

Also, going back to the article about President Marvel's comments, it mentions how Scarlett Johansson just starred in Lucy, which is essentially a science fiction action film obviously starring a female, and it apparently did much better than predicted at the box office. It shows she can carry a starring role like that in a heavy action film as an action/super hero. So there's really no excuse.

[Vyk]

Ah, I thought you were splitting hairs on semantics, not definitions. Sorry again. You're right. Legit female comic heroes are quite a bit more rare in cinema. And I guess they do fare worse when they happen. But again, the source material is always treated much worse with writing, directing, and everything. Laura was pretty much a shoe-in anyway due to the sexism appeal Hollywood and video games were enjoying at the time. I'm honestly surprised the Dead Or Alive movie didn't receive a bigger budget and marketing in that regard lol

And again, you're right. Any generic action movie could have easily been a representation of a comic of some sort. The formula is pretty much exactly the same. Just like video game movies would (and do) translate just as well by the same formula. Things like Columbiana would have been perfect in a graphic novel, and made for a pretty decent generic action flick with a completely competent and badass protagonist. More of an anti-hero. But again, we have to scrape. There's better examples in this regard. But there's still 10 Expendibles movies for every Salt movie. But at least they're treated better in that regard. Better acting, budget, directing, edting, etc.

[Shorty]

Natalie Dormer just actually made some statements about how she wishes there were more female anti-heroes, and she is totally and completely right. I honestly think that with 50% of a female readership as some statistics show that we're going to see more female creators arise with the next few years to show some balance to the industry, because it's clear that we can't really rely on men to do it. They are probably on the rise even now and just don't have the recognition yet. At the point in time when they do, I hope we do see more prominent female anti-heroes, because I have a freaking sore spot for anti-heroes.