San Diego Comic-Con: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Picard

Okay, it’s time to talk San Diego Comic-Con superhero news and I’m sorry, Picard was the best announcement at the whole con for me. Sorry, that’s just my opinion. Especially since it looks like Santiago Cabrera (of BBC Musketeers’ Amaris fame) is involved.

Marvel and DC didn’t have a bad showing either.

Let’s start with DC because Crisis on Infinite Earths is happening as the big crossover this year. I like that they are suiting up Brandon Routh as Kingdom Come Superman. I can’t wait to see him interact with Tyler’s Superman from Supergirl. It’s going to be great.

And they confirmed that all the shows are part of the Arrowverse, so shut up:

Arrow: Final season for the show. I’ll miss it especially since I just did an episode on Season 2 that’s waiting to be released, but at least I can catch up now? I am digging the logo though for the final season. It looks great. I also like the mix of some of the previous seasons and the glimpse of Ruby Rose as Batwoman in there. Bravo!

Batwoman: I like that right of the bat (pun intended), Batman seems to have abandoned Gotham. “I’m not about to let a man take credit for a woman’s work.” OH MY GOD, I have a mighty need. I can’t wait to see how this series takes off, especially with Arrow ending.

Black Lightning: I love this show with a fiery passion. Tobias is still around, but I still like that the show is focusing on the family. I also like the rules that Jefferson has set down: don’t reveal your identity, don’t go it alone, and don’t kill. Can’t wait for this season

Flash: Oh, goddammit, Barry. What is going on this time? Bloodwork. OH NO. But it has apparently been teased that there will be a Pre-Crisis and Post-Crisis villain. I’m all for Goddammit, Barry as it is my favorite of the Arrowverse shows, but goddammit, Barry, what have you gotten yourself into this time?

Legends of Tomorrow: I’m still salty about Captain Cold, but I have high hopes for how well this show is doing.

Supergirl: The technology addiction angle is a good way to go and I like the motivation of Lena Luther. Also, always nice to see Lex. (He’s still better than the current President, fight me.)

Watchmen: Okay, I’m intrigued, but not much else. The trailer is interesting and Regina King as the main character is nice, but I don’t have much else to go on.

Doom Patrol and Titans: Haven’t watched them yet, but I hope to at some point in the near future.

DC Movies: The promo art for Birds of Prey looks good and James Gunn has confirmed he’s finishing Suicide Squad before he goes to Guardians of the Galaxy 3. Which brings to the MCU.

Eternals: Female director, all star cast including people of color. I’m not entirely sure if I’m on board with the story, but I will wait for a trailer before I say anything more.

The Falcon & Winter Soldier: Glad they have the Cap shield in there and that Zemo is coming back as a villain. The dynamic between these guys is hilarious and I cannot wait for more.

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings: I’m glad Marvel Studios has decided to get freaky with Phase 4 and try out some new things. Can’t wait.

WandaVision: Looks interesting, especially with Maria Rambeau in there, but I’m still unsure how that’s going down since Vision is dead.

Loki: Great that Tom Hiddleston is still going to be Loki. That logo could use some work though.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness: Together with Scarlet Witch, huh? That looks pretty damn fun and if it’s a horror movie? All the better.

What if…?: Though animated, it looks like a ton of fun. I won’t be covering it on Superhero Rundown as per my strict live-action media rule, buuuuttt, I might tweet about it when I finally see it.

Hawkeye: Kate Bishop? HELL YES. I’m in.

Thor Love and Thunder: Tessa and Chris  are back and Natalie Portman is wielding the hammer as Thor. I’m excited especially since Tessa has said the King of Asgard needs a queen. Also Watiti is back, so I’m here for it. Ragnorok was great and I am certain this one will be good too.

Black Widow: I’m on the fence about this. I would rather a new character introduction, but I know that a lot of people were clamoring for this.

Blade: Mahershala Ali is our Blade. I’m stoked. I don’t like that it seems they are leaving the Netflix shows behind because Jessica Jones, Kingpin, Daredevil, Foggy Nelson, Karen Page, Luke Cage, Night Nurse, Madame Gao, and Colleen Wing were PERFECTLY cast. But whatever.

Successful announcements all around. I’m stoked for a lot of this. I’m glad that some things are happening and disappointed about some others, but I’ll take this as a win for DCTV and the MCU.

Why Justice League is a Good Step in the Right Direction for DCEU after Batman v. Superman

I’m going to preface this post with a number of things: First, this post took me three weeks to write because I’m still reeling from a number of personal things. Second, in order to understand waht I’m writing about I have to discuss Batman v. Superman (which I hated for the most part) and Wonder Woman (which I loved for the most part) and not mention Suicide Squad or Man of Steel (if I can at all help it). Finally, the last preface is: THIS WILL BE A LOOOOONNNNNGGGGGGGG post. But if you make it all the way to the end, I hope you’ll leave constructive analysis in the comments or something.

READY?

In order to understand the title, we need to understand what went wrong with Batman v. Superman. And there are a million thinkpieces about it, but so far Moviebob’s analysis on Youtube here has been the most thorough and as of this writing Part III has yet to come out. But the first 3 HOURS of the analysis are well worth watching as you see the breakdown in narrative structure and he made me rethink some of the things I actually liked about the film (I.E. Wonder Woman).

I’m not going to rehash it all here, but his analysis is thought-provoking to say the least and I am extremely impressed with the amount of time, energy, and content. So what went wrong with Batman v. Superman? Well, the concept on paper is interesting: having a vigilante in Gotham not like a Jesus-like figure from Metropolis sounds like a good idea if the reasoning is good, but spoiler: it wasn’t a good reason (Martha indeed) and the movie fell flat on its face in terms of narrative structure and overall tone (which was DARK). Zack Snyder has remade Watchmen like 5 times now and I want a DIFFERENT thing.

Okay, so fast forward to Wonder Woman in Batman v. Superman: firstly, though she loosely held the plot together and showed up at the end to help our titular characters, did she have any other role in the film? Not really, other than to set up her own titular movie.

Which was good for the most part. Ares, my god, man. SHAVE YOUR MUSTACHE. But I digress: The point here is that Wonder Woman was a movie that many of my friends wanted and though they had problems with the villain, it was a movie that we could very easily see what Wonder Woman stood for. Also, that No Man’s Land scene was amazing and so was the village fight scene and I will fight you. Importantly, it was the film leading up to Justice League.

SO…

Justice League. THERE ARE SPOILERS STARTING HERE.

There were a lot of things in the structure that could have made sense had it been Darkseid, but you know what? It worked for me. I liked that they brought in the New Gods (even though it was a throwaway, but the mere fact that they exist in the DCEU is good enough for me). I liked that they had Superman fight the Justice League, even if the way they brought him back was dumb. I liked that Aquaman was at least fun. I didn’t like Flash, I wish they had gotten Grant Gustin, united the universes and had a bunch of cool stuff happen, but you know what? For what Justice League was? It was a step in the right direction.

Did it help that Joss Whedon stepped in to help with reshoots? Yeah. But honestly, it does feel like an apology for Batman v. Superman and I wish other people would realize it, even if it blatantly ripped off Marvel, but that’s a ball of wax that I will not be getting into here. Maybe soon, but not here.

Justice League had a good concept going with the motherboxes, even if I wish that Cyborg was a fourth one, but on paper the concept sounds great: New God from space comes to Earth, steals a bunch of shit, outpowers all the superheroes, so the heroes band together and use magicky science to bring back Jesus after he died saving the world. Jesus gets muddled and fights the team until his lover shows up and he takes off leaving the rest of the team to fight the New God from space until the final act where he actually SAVES CIVILIANS INSTEAD OF CAUSING COLLATERAL DAMAGE (looking at you Man of Steel) and helps the team beat the New God from space and they agree to be a team when the need arises again.

SOLID foundation of a concept. Was it poorly executed? Yeah. But it was colorful (at least more colorful than Batman v. Superman) and it was somewhat fun. Though Wonder Woman and Superman match each other’s strength, so…

But I digress. Justice League was okay. It was a good step, but not much more than that. Though I did genuinely laugh at a few of the one liners. Specifically, “I’m rich” and the pay off that came with it at the end of the film with Martha getting her farm back.

So where does the DCEU go from here? Hopefully up, but if it doesn’t, maybe using Justice League as a template and improving it wouldn’t be the worst thing.

 

Inventing Sources and the New Frontier of Comics Research

Research for Captain Marvel, Black Canary, and Storm is going well. As for Huntress, there’s not a lot of scholarly research for her other than when she’s with Birds of Prey along with Black Canary, Lady Blackhawk, and Oracle.

That being said, it looks like I’ll be reading a lot of Huntress comics and drawing my own scholarly conclusions, hence “inventing sources” in the title. How do I plan to do this?

Well, considering the lack of comic book heroine research out there in the first place other than Batgirl (for disability/feminism intersection), Wonder Woman (because feminism), Harley Quinn (for abused victim turned anti-hero along with her relationship to Poison Ivy), and Jessica Jones (for her Netflix series on rape culture), there are a ton of sources about Storm (first Black superheroine) and about Captain Marvel (mostly as a comparison to Kamala Khan (who in turn will have her own section on the website at a later date)).

It’s hard researching scholarly articles that don’t exist. I have found plenty about Huntress in regards to the failed Birds of Prey television pilot, a lot on the Arrow version of the character, and a lot of the Birds of Prey comics. With that said, there isn’t enough about Huntress by herself unless it’s in one of these three forms. It’s frustrating.

So, I feel like this will be a reoccuring theme for me with this project. Some heroines will be easier to find than others. Kamala Khan will be easier than Wonder Girl if for no other reason than Kamala representing a minority in America after 9/11 and what that means for the hero who idolizes Captain Marvel.

My goal is to have these resources fleshed out by the end of August and written by the end of September. My end goal for these four is October 15th. Whether that actually comes to fruition depends on a lot of factors, but this is my current goal.

Comic book research is not fledgeling by any stretch, but some heroes are more neglected than others. A lot of research has been put into Wonder Woman, Batman, Superman, Captain America, Storm, Kamala Khan, and a few others. Some have more intersectionality with other subjects like patriotism (Captain America/Superman), vigilantism/justice (Batman), African-American experience (Storm), Muslim experience (Kamala Khan), and feminism (Wonder Woman). But many are neglected.

I’m hoping to change that. This project, I believe in my heart of hearts will make people realize how important heroines are to research. While there is scholarly writing of how comics are used to teach values, very little of it is in reference to heroines or their superpowers. They are usually mentioned in passing, but not as the crux of the genre.

And that’s the problem. Because women are also part of the conversation. They draw, write, read, cosplay, and breath comic books. It’s time to give the superheroines their due time in the sun and it’s time to tell people why they are important to life, our values, and most importantly our culture.

Wonder Woman did so well as a film. And it’s not an anomaly. It’s a powerful message that women are part of the industry. It’s a part of our culture. It might not be the perfect movie, but it definitely shows heart and qualities that define Wonder Woman herself.

Shouldn’t we want that for other superheroines? Shouldn’t we want to idolize all heroes, not just men? Culture is ever-changing and it’s time to adapt to what comics have been telling us for over 75 years with Wonder Woman: Women are heroes too and they are here to stay.

Wonder Woman, Batgirl, Harley Quinn, Jessica Jones

These four women are what I have decided to focus my thesis on in addition to female action figures. One of the main reasons for this is that each one represents something that resounds with women: Wonder Woman for strength, Batgirl for disability, Harley for abusive relationships, and Jessica for trying to move on.

One of the biggest problems with a thesis is narrowing it down, but for me the problem seems to be where do I go now? In addition to setting up some interviews over the next two weeks or so, I am also going around to stores and recording their boys and girls toy sections. Why? Well, mostly to show that we need more action figures that portray women as strong and not needing saving. Is that so much to ask?

Perhaps so, but if this past month has been any indication, there’s a LOT of research I still have to get through and I cannot wait.