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beccaelizabethI've been thinking on superhero comics again.
When I was a teenager I spent so much on comics I had to skip meals to afford them. And, granted, I was a crazy teenager, but that's not just want, that's need. Comics were providing me with something I desperately needed, a mythology that showed me how to fight, and a way out into a world where the battles were won not just already but always. They were hope and courage and escape in one brightly colored bit of paper. And I don't know if, in trying to reinvent themselves for a new audience, DC have realised what it is their audience needed them for.
Wonder Woman was born in a women's shelter where every single woman knew how far male violence could go, but she wasn't made of bitter or angry, she was just strong and loving and good. It didn't matter what they'd done in the past, she could grow up and be awesome. And the world women made together was worth dreaming on.
Oracle got hurt (by a man, again), but she never got beaten. Whatever she lost she fought her way back to by another route. She could still take you in a fight. And her brain made her the most powerful character in the DCU, by virtue of an encyclopedic knowledge of her world. A data set a fan can understand.
Canary's mum saved the world a lot and now she does too. There's bad men in her history too - comics tend to do that - but it never seems to bother her much. She kicks too much arse. And with the Canary cry there's some power out of perceived weakness - women who scream a lot, they're the victims in movies, right? But when Canary screams it's a weapon. Screaming as power is a great inversion. Still, she doesn't need it, doesn't always have it, and she still wins.
Together the Birds of Prey, at least initially, were women who had been defined by their relationship to a man - mentor, father, partner, lover - and now were out on their own, finding out who they could be. Junior to nobody, not any more. Strong alone and stronger together.
Huntress's father was a very bad man, and bad things happened to her because of it. So now she stops the bad men. While people around her worry she'll go too far, with the crossbow and all, and become one of them. There's a simple hope in finding one's own strength, and a more complex layer in the balance between strength and violence.
I could keep going. Fire and Ice and female friendship, forged from opposites, passion and love, and how it's not just the leader that saves the world a lot. Barda being the drill sergeant, keeping Fire going through finding her strength. Power Girl - how simple the appeal should be there! Everyone sees girl, but hello to the power. Only the first comic I picked up about her - one of the first ones I picked up ever - was about her going through surgery and losing a lot of her power. So again, she's been beat up, she's lost some, she has to re-evaluate herself, but she never lets it stop her. But the more you read about her the more she's about being messed around by men, people telling you who you are is about where you came from, people trying to use you. Which, yeah, is mostly writers not knowing what to do with her. But there's still story there. That's what standing up and trying to be powerful gets you, users and abusers, so how do you deal?
And then there's the guys. Guy Gardner, actually brain damaged, and how often do heroes with that kind of disability show up? But he only needs willpower, and that he has in spades. Plus he's about being the guy who isn't chosen. Second choice for the GL ring, depowered repeatedly, he just gets up and keeps going and finds enough strength to get it done again. And, yeah, he's a jerk, but there's story there. Who isn't, sometimes? We can all shape up and do better. And the story calls him on it over and over, so just turning up and fighting isn't enough, his friends draw lines and hold him to them. That story needs told. Especially to teenagers.
There are other stories that need told too. Lessons for the straight white guys of the world. The ones who have all the power and need to learn how to use it. So they've got Superman, who can smash anything if he sets out to, so he needs to learn to aim real well. He's a journalist, looking for truth, and he works partners with Lois Lane, because she's at least as good at that side of it as he is, without the powers. (Lois Lane rocks. We need more Lois Lane.)
And then there's Batman. He's rich, he's the best martial artist in the world, he's crazy prepared and can take down any other character in the DCU. And he does it by becoming an object of superstitious fear. So on the one hand he's a power fantasy, and it's a real trip being the scariest thing there. But on the other he's about the line you draw even in the darkness. When the DCU goes dark dystopia, when the rest of the world goes too far and hands it all over to the superhero and forgets about justice, Batman is the man who will not follow them down. Because he has looked in the darkness and decided, this far and no further. And that is absolutely essential. Because you get the power trips that tell lies, that torture for information and get the guns out and promise a bit of the ultra violence can actually solve things. Batman must not be about that. He ties up the criminals and leaves them for the cops to find. He investigates with a super computer and meticulous care. And he does not work alone. The police have the bat signal, he has the friendship of the commissioner, and he's had Robin beside him since very nearly the beginning. Whenever he goes all Grim and Gritty and Dark they've missed the most important point. He's already as dark as a good man can get and stay good, and any further is him falling. So he needs his Robin. (I started reading just about as Tim Drake started. Batman needs a Robin. You get lost in the dark, without bringing the light in.)
And as for Robin... from here I have a whole bunch of thoughts about child soldiers, but when I was a kid I just knew I couldn't afford to wait and let adults solve everything for me. Adults were the problem. So the kid sidekicks, the things they could do and the ways they weren't yet ready, they were important. I worry, from here, about Robin going into the dark after Batman, trying to bring him back. But then I knew, sometimes the adults get crazy, so what can you do?
That standing on the edge of crazy and beating it both out there and inside, that's another thing the Bats are for. They're all Bats, one way or another, but they have to deal.
And then there's parents. Teen Titans, in whatever incarnation, is about all the shit you have to deal with because of your parents. You get Robins growing up trying to not be Batman, while at the same time trying to measure up to him. Dick, the Robin who really brought the light in, affectionate and awesome, keeps getting darker and more constrained. Growing up to be his father. And everyone around him worries about that, and he keeps wondering how he can get strong enough to deal like Bats does, and misses that Bats does it by knowing him and the whole rest of his family. Team, team is essential, all the books I read are about team, even if the team is also family. Because we can't do this stuff alone.
The Titans, they've got the whole spectrum of parents. The ones you can't measure up to, the ones you fear you'll grow up like, the ones the whole world fears you'll grow up like. Pushy parents and distant parents, ones who don't understand and ones who have been there done that bought the t-shirt. But I never read Teen Titans when I was a teenager. I don't know, it just didn't turn up in the shop, was it even going then? Past a certain point we need stories about having become, not just fearing it. Having fallen and needing to get back up.
Arsenal - whatever he's calling himself at the time - that is so very a story we need. Because the drug addiction was not the end. There's a way out. And being a single father, that whole load of responsibility, that turns out to be awesome. He still saves the world a lot. But he goes home and hugs his kid at the end of the day. Comics need more of that. He's the light at the end of the tunnel. You can't make that the oncoming train every damn time and still think people will have any use for these stories. But as the guy who got better, he shines.
I could keep going. And going. Superhero mythology, it does not end. There's layers and layers out there. And I know I've pretty much picked white people (Dick and Roy's complex ethnic identity notwithstanding, and come to think the stuff with Fire that was invisible to me, they all seemed white to me). Everyone's got a different cross section of people they need. People like them, only better at it. People who are making it through.
I look at the bits and pieces I've heard about DC since I stopped reading, or I look at the reasons I stopped reading, and I don't get the feeling the writers understand all this. I don't know what they think we need.
Or maybe I do. A bunch of people are power trip fantasies. A lot of rich white playboy guys. And a lot of the rest, I don't know who they imagine would wear those costumes. They're not there to be any more, just to be looked at.
It's like they've emptied out their world. About all it tells us now is there are monsters. And some of them wear fancy suits.
I don't know though, I stopped reading when it felt like they'd slapped me and my dreams around just one too many times.
But if they're having sales problems, if they can't get people to read any more - if they're blaming something other than the changing media landscape and how people maybe want more out of their stories than flat pretty pictures - maybe they should look at what they're offering, and what it is different people might need. Not just what their monsters are, but different ways to beat them. And stop being them.
When I was a teenager I spent so much on comics I had to skip meals to afford them. And, granted, I was a crazy teenager, but that's not just want, that's need. Comics were providing me with something I desperately needed, a mythology that showed me how to fight, and a way out into a world where the battles were won not just already but always. They were hope and courage and escape in one brightly colored bit of paper. And I don't know if, in trying to reinvent themselves for a new audience, DC have realised what it is their audience needed them for.
Wonder Woman was born in a women's shelter where every single woman knew how far male violence could go, but she wasn't made of bitter or angry, she was just strong and loving and good. It didn't matter what they'd done in the past, she could grow up and be awesome. And the world women made together was worth dreaming on.
Oracle got hurt (by a man, again), but she never got beaten. Whatever she lost she fought her way back to by another route. She could still take you in a fight. And her brain made her the most powerful character in the DCU, by virtue of an encyclopedic knowledge of her world. A data set a fan can understand.
Canary's mum saved the world a lot and now she does too. There's bad men in her history too - comics tend to do that - but it never seems to bother her much. She kicks too much arse. And with the Canary cry there's some power out of perceived weakness - women who scream a lot, they're the victims in movies, right? But when Canary screams it's a weapon. Screaming as power is a great inversion. Still, she doesn't need it, doesn't always have it, and she still wins.
Together the Birds of Prey, at least initially, were women who had been defined by their relationship to a man - mentor, father, partner, lover - and now were out on their own, finding out who they could be. Junior to nobody, not any more. Strong alone and stronger together.
Huntress's father was a very bad man, and bad things happened to her because of it. So now she stops the bad men. While people around her worry she'll go too far, with the crossbow and all, and become one of them. There's a simple hope in finding one's own strength, and a more complex layer in the balance between strength and violence.
I could keep going. Fire and Ice and female friendship, forged from opposites, passion and love, and how it's not just the leader that saves the world a lot. Barda being the drill sergeant, keeping Fire going through finding her strength. Power Girl - how simple the appeal should be there! Everyone sees girl, but hello to the power. Only the first comic I picked up about her - one of the first ones I picked up ever - was about her going through surgery and losing a lot of her power. So again, she's been beat up, she's lost some, she has to re-evaluate herself, but she never lets it stop her. But the more you read about her the more she's about being messed around by men, people telling you who you are is about where you came from, people trying to use you. Which, yeah, is mostly writers not knowing what to do with her. But there's still story there. That's what standing up and trying to be powerful gets you, users and abusers, so how do you deal?
And then there's the guys. Guy Gardner, actually brain damaged, and how often do heroes with that kind of disability show up? But he only needs willpower, and that he has in spades. Plus he's about being the guy who isn't chosen. Second choice for the GL ring, depowered repeatedly, he just gets up and keeps going and finds enough strength to get it done again. And, yeah, he's a jerk, but there's story there. Who isn't, sometimes? We can all shape up and do better. And the story calls him on it over and over, so just turning up and fighting isn't enough, his friends draw lines and hold him to them. That story needs told. Especially to teenagers.
There are other stories that need told too. Lessons for the straight white guys of the world. The ones who have all the power and need to learn how to use it. So they've got Superman, who can smash anything if he sets out to, so he needs to learn to aim real well. He's a journalist, looking for truth, and he works partners with Lois Lane, because she's at least as good at that side of it as he is, without the powers. (Lois Lane rocks. We need more Lois Lane.)
And then there's Batman. He's rich, he's the best martial artist in the world, he's crazy prepared and can take down any other character in the DCU. And he does it by becoming an object of superstitious fear. So on the one hand he's a power fantasy, and it's a real trip being the scariest thing there. But on the other he's about the line you draw even in the darkness. When the DCU goes dark dystopia, when the rest of the world goes too far and hands it all over to the superhero and forgets about justice, Batman is the man who will not follow them down. Because he has looked in the darkness and decided, this far and no further. And that is absolutely essential. Because you get the power trips that tell lies, that torture for information and get the guns out and promise a bit of the ultra violence can actually solve things. Batman must not be about that. He ties up the criminals and leaves them for the cops to find. He investigates with a super computer and meticulous care. And he does not work alone. The police have the bat signal, he has the friendship of the commissioner, and he's had Robin beside him since very nearly the beginning. Whenever he goes all Grim and Gritty and Dark they've missed the most important point. He's already as dark as a good man can get and stay good, and any further is him falling. So he needs his Robin. (I started reading just about as Tim Drake started. Batman needs a Robin. You get lost in the dark, without bringing the light in.)
And as for Robin... from here I have a whole bunch of thoughts about child soldiers, but when I was a kid I just knew I couldn't afford to wait and let adults solve everything for me. Adults were the problem. So the kid sidekicks, the things they could do and the ways they weren't yet ready, they were important. I worry, from here, about Robin going into the dark after Batman, trying to bring him back. But then I knew, sometimes the adults get crazy, so what can you do?
That standing on the edge of crazy and beating it both out there and inside, that's another thing the Bats are for. They're all Bats, one way or another, but they have to deal.
And then there's parents. Teen Titans, in whatever incarnation, is about all the shit you have to deal with because of your parents. You get Robins growing up trying to not be Batman, while at the same time trying to measure up to him. Dick, the Robin who really brought the light in, affectionate and awesome, keeps getting darker and more constrained. Growing up to be his father. And everyone around him worries about that, and he keeps wondering how he can get strong enough to deal like Bats does, and misses that Bats does it by knowing him and the whole rest of his family. Team, team is essential, all the books I read are about team, even if the team is also family. Because we can't do this stuff alone.
The Titans, they've got the whole spectrum of parents. The ones you can't measure up to, the ones you fear you'll grow up like, the ones the whole world fears you'll grow up like. Pushy parents and distant parents, ones who don't understand and ones who have been there done that bought the t-shirt. But I never read Teen Titans when I was a teenager. I don't know, it just didn't turn up in the shop, was it even going then? Past a certain point we need stories about having become, not just fearing it. Having fallen and needing to get back up.
Arsenal - whatever he's calling himself at the time - that is so very a story we need. Because the drug addiction was not the end. There's a way out. And being a single father, that whole load of responsibility, that turns out to be awesome. He still saves the world a lot. But he goes home and hugs his kid at the end of the day. Comics need more of that. He's the light at the end of the tunnel. You can't make that the oncoming train every damn time and still think people will have any use for these stories. But as the guy who got better, he shines.
I could keep going. And going. Superhero mythology, it does not end. There's layers and layers out there. And I know I've pretty much picked white people (Dick and Roy's complex ethnic identity notwithstanding, and come to think the stuff with Fire that was invisible to me, they all seemed white to me). Everyone's got a different cross section of people they need. People like them, only better at it. People who are making it through.
I look at the bits and pieces I've heard about DC since I stopped reading, or I look at the reasons I stopped reading, and I don't get the feeling the writers understand all this. I don't know what they think we need.
Or maybe I do. A bunch of people are power trip fantasies. A lot of rich white playboy guys. And a lot of the rest, I don't know who they imagine would wear those costumes. They're not there to be any more, just to be looked at.
It's like they've emptied out their world. About all it tells us now is there are monsters. And some of them wear fancy suits.
I don't know though, I stopped reading when it felt like they'd slapped me and my dreams around just one too many times.
But if they're having sales problems, if they can't get people to read any more - if they're blaming something other than the changing media landscape and how people maybe want more out of their stories than flat pretty pictures - maybe they should look at what they're offering, and what it is different people might need. Not just what their monsters are, but different ways to beat them. And stop being them.
no subject
Date: 2012-04-01 05:04 pm (UTC)Actual comment: I don't think that when Batman goes grim & dark they've missed the True Bat-Nature (although some authors do), but that Batman needs to come out of that, that he can't *stay* grim and dark but has to get the boot-to-the-head from the universe that being only angsty and violent means he's doing it wrong, that the "endless quest for JUSTICE" has to include enjoying life, too.
(Other actual comments may happen later when I have more time.)
You should submit this to
oops, forgot to answer before
Date: 2012-05-16 11:07 pm (UTC)*nods* about copyright. not enough room now, too busy money failing.
Yeah, some authors miss the Bat nature, and they seem to be the ones I see when I dip in. :-(
But yes, when he goes that far, someone helps him out, or he realises he needs to come out.
This is what the cyclical nature of comics stories can do real well, set a low point and a way out and keep going around the wheel.
I very rarely submit stuff to comms. I just get like when I try and speak out loud. Is always easiest to just vaguely hope someone will link to it... or not, and then no one will see it and I won't have to worry it's no good...
no subject
Date: 2012-05-17 01:09 am (UTC)~ c.
no subject
Date: 2012-05-19 03:20 am (UTC)