Good point, Joanna. Comic books have always done a fair amount of serving (or at least tickling) fetishy itches, and now that we're all agreed they are an
adult's medium as much as a children's one, there isn't anything really wrong with that. As long as the proper titles are directed at the proper
audience, it's fine.
I think they get into the most trouble when the hypocrisy kicks in: when they start pretending there ISN'T a bondage fetish, or that men DON'T like looking at big bouncy breasts, or that degrading a woman's icon actually empowers them. That's where their credibility goes down the toilet with all but the terminally gullible.
The fact is, comic books have not evolved past "Quiet or Papa spank" while the rest of the world HAS, and their attempts to appear enlightened about women come off like the 70s sitcoms making a production of the black guy who was a lawyer and not a janitor. It's your father showing up at the prom, dancing "like all you kids do today". It is embarrassing. And it may well kill the medium eventually.
The conflict comes when this awkwardly locked in the past medium meets a mainstream one like the movies. Hollywood may have its flaws, but it has to be living in the present with the rest of us, not in an arrested adolescent mindset circa 1952. There it is pretty simple: more men see action movies than women. Can you have women starring solo in an action film? Yep: Kill Bill. Are here 10 Die Hards and Terminators for every Kill Bill? Yep. Is there anything wrong with that? Nope. That's the end of the hollywood conversation. All of the superhero-specific and quasi-feminist pontificating is completely off-point in terms of making movies. There, it is very simple: is this likely to make money? Based on what has succeeded and failed in the past, is it likely to MAKE MONEY? Will enough people want to pay to see it that we get our $100,000,000 back?
Come on, everyone, a little honesty. Check all the knee-jerk talk show responses, and just think about that honestly: if you were going to put $100 million of YOUR MONEY into a project, wouldn't your principle concern be whether or not you would ever see it again?
I think they get into the most trouble when the hypocrisy kicks in: when they start pretending there ISN'T a bondage fetish, or that men DON'T like looking at big bouncy breasts, or that degrading a woman's icon actually empowers them. That's where their credibility goes down the toilet with all but the terminally gullible.
The fact is, comic books have not evolved past "Quiet or Papa spank" while the rest of the world HAS, and their attempts to appear enlightened about women come off like the 70s sitcoms making a production of the black guy who was a lawyer and not a janitor. It's your father showing up at the prom, dancing "like all you kids do today". It is embarrassing. And it may well kill the medium eventually.
The conflict comes when this awkwardly locked in the past medium meets a mainstream one like the movies. Hollywood may have its flaws, but it has to be living in the present with the rest of us, not in an arrested adolescent mindset circa 1952. There it is pretty simple: more men see action movies than women. Can you have women starring solo in an action film? Yep: Kill Bill. Are here 10 Die Hards and Terminators for every Kill Bill? Yep. Is there anything wrong with that? Nope. That's the end of the hollywood conversation. All of the superhero-specific and quasi-feminist pontificating is completely off-point in terms of making movies. There, it is very simple: is this likely to make money? Based on what has succeeded and failed in the past, is it likely to MAKE MONEY? Will enough people want to pay to see it that we get our $100,000,000 back?
Come on, everyone, a little honesty. Check all the knee-jerk talk show responses, and just think about that honestly: if you were going to put $100 million of YOUR MONEY into a project, wouldn't your principle concern be whether or not you would ever see it again?
