Okay. Breathe in, breathe out.
I am going to post here again. I do not expect an answer, as this thread is several days old and never had much discussion. But I might feel a little better.
My earlier response was vitriolic and unconstructive. But more than that, it was unfocused. As such, I will not repeat all the points I made.
Biases on the table then. Cracked had been talking how Marvel will fail for over two years now. I am not here to criticize every article they made on the topic. I considered it. But as I started reading through the articles Cracked has published on the subject, I disliked them for a vast variety of reasons, be it misrepresenting facts, twisting evidence to fit a conclusion, calling people idiots on people for liking something, or just obsessed with proving how Marvel sucks. Figures since they were by different writers. Also, none of them drove me into rage. Certainly not to the same extend.
I wondered why that was. I like the Marvel movies, sure, but I’m not even interested enough to bother watching them as they come out. I still haven’t watched the Thor sequel and Iron Man 3. Age of Ultron is one of my all-time favorites, but even then I know there are things wrong with it. Also, my tastes in entertainment are pretty damn mindless and I can't recall other occations where I got angry over someone disagreeing with my opinions on entertainment, or even giving very negative opinions on stuff I liked and considered good.
I think this article hit me harder for another reason: I want to agree with the point it makes. The same thing that makes me hate David Wong’s writing so much. I want to agree with the author, but as the article goes on, I am forced to rip my own position apart. It feels like attacking myself.
However, while it angers me, that drives me even more to argue against it. But I should do so in a honest manner. I should never have lowered myself to slinging mud from the gutter. Enough with the apologies. My problem with the article lies primarily in two areas: #2 and #1. In my original post, I also ripped into #5 and #4, but although I think my facts were valid I have decided against repeating them. They were only partial, as the points covered multiple factoids.
I am not someone who dismisses calls for equal representation in the media. I want more female leads in movies and superhero movies too. And I know saying ‘’Well this is what makes a good character’’ is pretty hard to do. But...
And if it seems insulting that the people in charge are abusing outdated gender roles to make money, well ... you've seen the movies, right? That shit is all over the place.
SHIELD is gender-neutral, their TV show has a gender-balanced cast and their second-in-command is a woman. There was gender bias in CA; the First Avenger and Agent Carter, which took place in the 1940’s, and references to it in Thor, a word based on Scandinavian myth. The picture of the Helicarrier is baseless, as we’ve never seen sexism by SHIELD agents in the modern time. I will say that I have not watched season 2 of Agents of SHIELD or Thor: the Dark World - Maybe it's in there. Maybe they display SHIELD as a cesspool of sexism.
But that’s not my problem. Here’s my problem: #2 and #1 both are trying to tear down attempts by Marvel to do
exactly what the author wants.
#2 first. I read both sources provided. Neither say what the article says. Both say that Marvel is trying to branch out to
women through diverse marketing efforts. The article rebrands that as ‘moms’, despite neither article doing so, one specificically mentioning products aimed exclusively at a more adult audience and the other naming the intent as 'reaching female shoppers looking for healthier options' (granted, you could call that assumption sexist in itself, but demographics stats are what they are and it's just one thing among many). The presentation is skewed to leave out Black Widow on the healthier options (where she appreared according to the sources, plus the ones presented are specifically aimed at children) and to put her on the Doritos deal (which included every character). This way, an attempt by Marvel to reach out to a female audience is presented as re-enforcing the notion that Marvel doesn’t try to do that. It’s what I keep bashing whenever I come across it: Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
#1. I point out that the argument regarding the actors and fans is completely valid. A good point is a good point and should be acknowledged. #5, #4 and #3 make varying degrees of good points as well. I focus on the negative here, but the article isn't without merit.
In Guardians Of The Galaxy, the unbelievably badass Gamora still has to deal with being called a whore, even by her allies. It turns out that way out in outer space, people happen to be idiots about that, too.
I complained about this for another reason, but as stated, we weren’t supposed to agree with that, and she shuts Drax up loudly. Still, it’s the one I’m most lenient towards. It could have been replaced with any non-gendered insult and the movie probably would have been better for it.
Despite the fact that one is a deity and the other is a human, [Lady Sif and Jane] have to have some kind of catfight over a guy going on because they are ostensibly female -- otherwise, how will the audience understand how realistic this world of Norse gods is?
Thunderous wrote:Or, alternatively, it's about a god who has been friend and battle companion with another god for countless years looking at that big lunkhead falling head over heels for a pretty face, neglecting his duties to try and be with her, and even bringing her home and forcing people to deal with the mortal.
Scarlet Witch and Gamora both start off as villains, because women still have that whole "Eve" thing bringing us down. The ladies have to start off bad and then be tamed by the men in their lives.
Gamora turns against one of the most terrifying foes in the Marvel Universe, despite being literally broken to bits and modified under his command (as has Nebula – you can see how she bounced back from Drax’s missile) of her own volition. The most Quinn does is convincing her along with Rocket to fight Ronan after he got the Infinity Stone, which she knows as ‘the thing Thanos wants and can destroy planets’. And if you know Thanos, you know to stay away from things he considers ‘powerful’.
Scarlet Witch…
Astfgl407 wrote:Scarlet Witch (and her brother Quicksilver, let's not forget him) start off as villains because they were born into a war-torn country, had their home destroyed and their parents killed by Tony Stark's missiles, and were raised and experimented on by the leader of a Neo-Nazi terrorist organization.
But that’s not what ticks me off. This is Hawkeye’s speech to Scarlet Witch in Avengers: Age of Ultron, and the reason I’ll watch a Hawkeye movie before a Black Widow movie. Spoilers, I guess. Scarlet Witch has been helping Ultron before finding out his true intentions, because… Well see her backstory above.
SW: This is our fault… This is all our fault…
Hawkeye: Hey, Hey. This is your fault, it’s everyone’s fault who cares. Are you up for this? Are you? Look, I just need to know because the city is flying. The city is flying, we’re fighting an army of robots, and I have a bow and arrow. None of this makes sense.
*A bullet comes through the wall and passes between the two. Hawkeye returns fire with his bow through the hole before continuing.*
Hawkeye: But I’m going back out there because it’s my job. Okay? And I can’t do my job and babysit. It doesn’t matter what you did or what you were. If you go out there you fight, and you fight to kill. Stay here and you’re good, I’ll send your brother to come find you, but if you step out that door, you are an Avenger.
Hawkeye gets back out. A few moments later, Scarlet Witch comes out too and sends her spells flying. Granted, it’s rushed, but this a character growing from a justified villain to a youngster in way over her head into a heroine risking her life against Ultron's forces. Or to this writer, it’s Hawkeye ‘taming’ her like she’s an
animal. She’s not a person who rises up as the area she tried to protect from Stark (and allowed freak experiments to enable that) is being torn from its foundations, it’s a woman being ‘tamed’ by a man and this whole scene is just a writer’s biblical sexism showing in his work.
And if you are not convinced yet, look at how they built up Black Widow's "red in my ledger" backstory for numerous movies, only for us to find out that it all comes down to the fact that she can no longer have children.
No, it doesn’t ‘all’ come down to the fact that she can no longer have children, it comes down to the fact that she’s been subjected to mental and physical
torture, for years, to become a living weapon. Cutting out her ability to have children just one part of that, one more part of humanity removed to become a better weapon, but since Banner brought up how he can’t have children anymore, she told the part. This has been covered better than by me, the Banner/Widow romance is my least favorite thing about AoU.
And there was no need for all of this. There's a pretty good pattern in these three heroines: they were, all due to circumstances against their will or without their better knowledge, recruited by males or male-lead organisations (Thanos adopted Gamora, the Red Room Initiative [Sovjet Government/Military] recruited Black Widow, HYDRA and specifically Strucker experimented on Scarlet Witch). Given that these 3 are the 3 big female heroines in the MCU, and Captain Marvel's backstory in the comics is similar (getting her powers accidentally as a result of the male Captain Marvel colliding with a villain) plus the Wasp being introduced through Ant-Man, there is plenty of thread here to weave a tale on how female main characters are, as TvTropes would put it, ''Never a self-made woman''. There's no equivalent of Steve Rogers, enlisting because he wants to do the right thing (although Agent Carter could qualify - I haven't seen Agent Carter), and most of them exhibit what we consider female stereotypes (Hell, Black Widow pretty much is a female stereotype). That would have delivered on the title and if done right be interesting. But instead, we get the narratives of two of the most viewed Marvel movies summarised wrong.
Now, I get that it's a comedy site and I don't expect actual journalism, so this critism is void from the get-go. I get the site doesn't promise correct information and you should be able to tell from the outset that articles will get things wrong. I don't know why I'm typing all this out, but I've done weirder things. This isn't intended as a bash of Cracked as a company, or even the article's writer. I can accept that this was done in good faith. I do believe it was done badly, and I believe I can make a counter-case if I so please. Although I don't expect the author to read this, I hope the comments on the article at least give her reason to re-think her judgement.
PS. I don't know how much of this was due to editors. Cracked has a history of being slanted against the MCU, so editing may have made wordings stronger, cut reasoning short, removed acknowledgements of progress, rephrased in a more absolute manner, and so on. I have no interest in finding a 'culprit', so I do not care.
If there be here lesson or moral, it lies beyond the competence of him who wrote this post.
(Jack Vance, Emphyrio)