Archive

Can boobs and substance co-exist in comics?

This is the most you see of Catwoman’s face on the first page of Catwoman #1.

And this is just one of the shots of her cleavage on that same page.

And so you don’t feel shortchanged in the imaginary breasteses department, Catwoman’s apartment is also scattered with bras. (Finally, a character who really speaks to me!) The Catwoman reboot has come under a lot of fire for being so centered on Catwoman’s cleavage, but that really isn’t fair; it completely ignores how much attention is lavished on her pleather-clad ass.

And then there is Red Hood and the Outlaws, which features a re-imagining of the character Starfire, who, um, wears bikinis and blows stuff up, I guess? Oh, and she has sex with both of the main male characters.

DC Comics has been rolling out “The New 52” for a month now — reboots of classics that restart on issue #1, with a few new titles thrown in. They clearly expected to set the world of comics on fire, but not quite in the way they have in this case. Their bid for new readers — it’s a little easier to dive in at issue #1 than #437 — has hit a snag with some of the very readers they had hoped to attract.

New or returning female comic readers who pick up one of these two books first are likely to sigh, assume they’re in adolescent male fantasyland, and never come back. Starfire and Catwoman are pinups, but that’s really only part of the problem — the core of the problem is that they’re sexy and nothing else. Zippo.

I was actually a perfect target for DC’s new releases — I followed a couple of comics for a while in intermediate school, then faded on them. I’ve read and enjoyed some stuff since then, like Watchmen and Hellboy, but that was after they’d been put into collections. I couldn’t really call myself a comics fan, but as a huge, huge nerd, I was certainly open to trying them out.

I read both Catwoman and Red Hood for this article and I wasn’t even interested by them enough to be offended. It’s just the same old mindless T&A stuff you’ve seen everywhere else. The depiction of hot female bodies isn’t necessarily a bad thing; it’s the lazy storytelling and nonexistent personalities that really rankle. Catwoman — who should be a compelling-repelling, amazing, screwed-up, exciting, giant hot mess — is just a random collection of reactions threaded together by poor impulse control. She’s like that friend you hung out with for a while because she seemed to be madcap and fun, but then you let it go because she just turned out to be exhausting and she slept with one too many of your close friends and you realized that she was never, no matter what was going on in either of your lives, going to ask you how your day was.

Except not, because you can already think of some things about that friend that made her a unique human being and this version of Catwoman doesn’t have those. Unless you’re talking about her sexytime sartorial choices.

I wasn’t familiar with Starfire before I read Red Hood, and I can’t imagine that the acquaintance will continue. She’s a blow-up doll that can make it to the bedroom by herself. There are even a few scenes where she’s just posing in her bikini, and in case you miss what she’s there for, there’s a kid taking pictures of her and uploading them to the internet. Classy.

She is the shallowest of shallow fantasies — she has no-strings sex, physical with no emotions, she poses in beachwear, and she conveniently zaps some bad guys to help the men escape.

You half expect her to offer to get them beer and sandwiches.

Some longtime comic fans have been infuriated by it (Danielle Riendeau addressed why these books are so exasperating in yesterday’s Weekly Geek), whereas other women merely give the weary sigh that’s all garden-variety sexism can elicit on some days. And the frustration has been made all the more keen by the oddly tone-deaf reaction of DC Comics to the backlash. After io9 ran a fantastic piece on why a 7-year-old comics fan was disappointed in the new sexxxay Starfire, DC suggested that readers check the maturity ratings on the cover.

Which only misses the point entirely. Readers — and not just female readers — don’t object to the fact that the characters are attractive or have sex. They object to the fact that the characters are empty, the stories are dumb, and alleged action heroes keep standing around in impractical cheesecake poses.

My friend who works at a comic book store in Seattle summed it up pretty tidily:

I was actually pretty pissed off by the Catwoman comic. In a medium where every frame matters to tell the story, they devoted multiple pages to a sex scene. I have nothing against sex scenes, but there was no damn storytelling going on.

Among my regular customers, I’ve seen men going for the comics because they like the sex appeal, and women dropping the comics because they’re pissed that there’s no real character there – just blatant T & A.

I don’t think DC is going to see any problem in what they did. Any publicity is good publicity. And, boy, the boys like titties. The comics are selling out everywhere. It’s also not exactly a new phenomenon with them. They have done a poor job of providing comics for kids for years. They’ve only got three super hero monthlies that are geared for young readers and they let all of their kid-friendly digests go out of print.

They also have years of emphasizing boobies over character for the heroines. It can be done in a playful way that doesn’t demean women; and they have succeeded at that in the past. Power Girl had a lot of female readers and her body is way wicked top-heavy. I just feel that these recent comics emphasized sex over story and over character-development. You only have one chance to make a first impression, and these comics led with their tits.

Exactly. The characters can be sexy all they want. They just have to have minds and wills and interests and desires. They can’t be boring. And female comics characters demonstrably don’t have to be that way. Not all of DC’s new releases are misfires. I picked up Batwoman #1, and though I am astonished at how many different people are running around Gotham City dressed like bats, I really enjoyed it.

Batwoman, by the way, is a lesbian in the reboot. She’s stern and dark and noble and interesting. There’s also a lesbian police detective who’s smart and caring and looks like a lesbian you’ve probably hung out with, rather than like a lesbian in a straight porn movie. I don’t know if I’m in for the long haul, but the book drew me in enough that I’ll probably check out issue #2.

And then there is Wonder Woman #1. And, as a sophisticated consumer of literature, my assessment is that it is REALLY FREAKING AWESOME! The story is compelling, there are terrifying evil centaurs, and Wonder Woman herself is so great I want to follow her around and see if she needs anything. Coffee? Anything?

Yes, ma’am.

And here’s the thing: Wonder Woman is sexy. Her first appearance is in bed, naked under just a sheet, and I did not mind one bit. Because she starts kicking ass in the very next panel and then becomes a tower of skills, smarts, and even a moment or two or wry humor. And did I mention the ass-kicking?

Wonder Woman really cares about the stranger who appears in her room in need of help, and I think in the end that’s why Batwoman and Wonder Woman are so engaging and Red Hood and Catwoman suck. (Which I’m sure they will do in a more literal sense within an issue or two.)

If I may jump to another illustrated medium for a moment, I think there’s an analogy in the fact that Warner Brothers writers used to note that Bugs Bunny was much harder to write storylines for than Daffy Duck. It’s because Bugs is so nonchalant. His whole deal is that he doesn’t get scared and doesn’t care about what the other characters do or say to him. If nothing can touch the character it’s tough to get the viewer involved in the story. Sound familiar, Catwoman?

Daffy, on the other hand, cares too much about everything. His stories go zooming off in a thousand directions and, love him or hate him, he’s worth watching.

I guess I’m saying that Catwoman could use a little more spitting.

And, of course, the desire for intriguing characters and a great story crosses gender lines. Every male fan I talked to recommended the new Wonder Woman as a must-read — whether or not they knew I was working on an article about female characters — and most made retching noises when I brought up Red Hood, or immediately brought it up themselves as sexist and annoying.

I don’t think DC would lose anything by making Catwoman and Starfire more complex and less Maxim.

There’s still a long way to go for fans of nonsexist comics, but there’s a lot of really interesting stuff out there. I am deeply indebted to the amazing staff at House of Secrets in Burbank for helping me figure out what the hell I was doing when I started this article.

When I told Paul, the owner, what I was working on, he immediately had suggestions. And then on the day when a ton of new high-demand issues had just come out, he let me monopolize one of his staff members for close to 45 minutes while she gave me a whirlwind education on women in comics. (Thanks, Amy!)

Amy brought up the interesting point that any given comic will have a writer, an artist, and then usually another artist doing the cover. Sometimes you have to suffer through creepy sexist art to enjoy a good story (or vice versa) — and sometimes a standard boobalicious cover can turn potential female readers off a book that has great content inside. Amy picked up the new issue of the superhero series I followed way back when and explained her frustration with the artist. “You used to be able to tell the female characters apart,” she said. “He used to really try to make art. Now he just traces porn bodies.”

As any woman knows, whether it’s songs or comics or movies, sometimes sexism is something you put up with.

But there are refuges.

In addition to DC’s women Bat and Wonder, Amy mentioned that Spiderwoman has been doing some interesting things over at Marvel Comics. Marvel is also re-releasing former titles from a publishing house called Crossgen, including Mystic, a little more magic than superhero, but with an interesting story and two distinct, real-looking heroines, and the Victorian-era mystery comic Ruse, which is what I will be diving into three seconds after I turn in this article.

Amy also recommended indie publishing houses as being less, you know, fusty about women and what they assume readers of either gender might want. Dark Horse has Buffy and Angel & Faith, and Image has The Intrepids, a bracingly weird series about a team that specializes in fighting mad scientists. Amy also recommended Vertigo titles in general for good characters and storylines a little off the beaten path.

I went in to research a story on sexist comics — and Catwoman and Red Hood and the Outlaws are still depressingly lunkheaded, no question — but I left genuinely optimistic about the way comic book culture is going. As Amy led me from rack to rack, showing me the books she was particularly annoyed by or really excited about, she explained that there has never been a better time for girls and women to get into comics. On the Internet, you can be genderless, if you choose, so it’s that much easier to jump into the discussion.

Yes, there is a lot of disturbing piece-of-meat sexism out there, especially in hero comics (check out Women in Refrigerators if you’d like a literal list), but I think the passionate female comic fans I met during my foray can turn it around. The backlash over the sexist New 52 titles is a good thing. It will make cardboard sex objects tougher to get away with the next time. If you’re a female comics fan, keep insisting on good. Stay strong and stay vocal.

And if you’re Wonder Woman, please stay awesome. I’ll see you next issue.

Lesbian Apparel and Accessories Gay All Day sweatshirt -- AE exclusive

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Back to top button