5 Ways Marvel Movies Keep Screwing Up Female Superheroes

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Re: 5 Ways Marvel Movies Keep Screwing Up Female Superheroes

Postby archaeologydalek » Fri Jul 24, 2015 5:40 pm

REDACTED
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Last edited by archaeologydalek on Wed Apr 13, 2016 11:08 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 5 Ways Marvel Movies Keep Screwing Up Female Superheroes

Postby AdricDePsycho » Fri Jul 24, 2015 6:33 pm

archaeologydalek wrote:Nope, we're still best budz 4 life.

I had assumed we were merely acquaintances.

But OK, best budz 4 life it is! Let's go do illegal activities!
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Re: 5 Ways Marvel Movies Keep Screwing Up Female Superheroes

Postby sunglasses » Fri Jul 24, 2015 6:36 pm

AdricDePsycho wrote:
archaeologydalek wrote:Nope, we're still best budz 4 life.

I had assumed we were merely acquaintances.

But OK, best budz 4 life it is! Let's go do illegal activities!


*chokes, coughs, and sputters on coffee*

No, no, no.

You can play gin rummy all you want but by god in these United States you cannot gamble on the game. BAD.
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Re: 5 Ways Marvel Movies Keep Screwing Up Female Superheroes

Postby AdricDePsycho » Fri Jul 24, 2015 7:01 pm

Uh...we were gonna hire some hookers, score some heroin, and rob a bank.

Gin rummy is for losers.
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Re: 5 Ways Marvel Movies Keep Screwing Up Female Superheroes

Postby D-LOGAN » Fri Jul 24, 2015 7:48 pm

PSTN wrote:Eh, I've seen videos of dudes jerking off on plastic effigies of women who weren't half as hot as Scarlett Johansson.


JAYSUS! You upload one video to youtube on a lonely drunken night, and for the rest of your life you never hear the end of it! Can we just move on people? Honestly, as if none of you'se have had your indiscretions.
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Re: 5 Ways Marvel Movies Keep Screwing Up Female Superheroes

Postby sunglasses » Fri Jul 24, 2015 8:21 pm

Yeah, we would let it go Logan but a NUN DOLL?
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Re: 5 Ways Marvel Movies Keep Screwing Up Female Superheroes

Postby Askias » Sat Jul 25, 2015 11:49 pm

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.
Spoiler: show
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.
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Re: 5 Ways Marvel Movies Keep Screwing Up Female Superheroes

Postby AdricDePsycho » Sun Jul 26, 2015 2:57 am

Askias, that is the most well thought and best worded critique of what the article got wrong, and I applaud you for being able to write such a thing.

Also, Agents of SHIELD's second season actually has an additional female cast member: Bobbi Morse, known in the comics as Mockingbird. Currently there are four major female characters on the show. Additionally, a big part of Agent Carter (a part I felt was a bit too blatant early on) is the sexist environment of the era and Peggy proving her worth in it.
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Re: 5 Ways Marvel Movies Keep Screwing Up Female Superheroes

Postby 52xMax » Sun Jul 26, 2015 1:52 pm

Late to the party as always, and the things that needed to be said have mostly been said, but I still want to say my piece about the things that ticked me off about this article.

First of all, I don't think that Cracked hates on the MCU, but let's not forget that they are in this for the money, and Marvel movies are really popular, so talking about them in any way guarantees more visits to the site. As for why the articles they post are usually negative, it might be because it is easier to tear down than to build up. I would've been okay with all of this if their arguments were well constructed and their criticisms valid, but as it's become more common at cracked, especially when trying to push certain agendas, what ends up happening is that any good points that they raise are brought down by poor research, lack of objectivity, and very serious cherry-picking. I normally like Kathy Benjamin's articles, but this was far from her best work, and I was very glad to see I'm not the only one who thinks so, as it was reflected by the top voted comments. So I'll just sum it up point by point.

5. They Ignore The Huge Number Of Women Who Like Comics.

I will contest that ever since the first Marvel movie there's been strong female characters who are not limited to being stereotyped love interests or damsels in distress. From Pepper Potts to Peggy Carter, Maria Hill, Betty Ross, Sharon Carter, Nova Prime, Frigga, Jane Foster, Lady Sif, plus many more if we include the TV shows, every single one of these characters have self agency and are multidimensional, at least within their limited screen time. That's just supporting characters, though. The presence of Gamora, Black Widow, Scarlet Witch and Wasp (you know it's gonna happen) shows that Marvel cares about female representation more than they give them credit for.

Even if that wasn't the case, the stats they showed to back up this statement were used in a very dishonest and manipulative manner. For one, comic books in the 1940s were much more diverse than they are even today, so those numbers on the percentage of girls who read comics were not necessarily representative of superhero title readers. Someone on the comments also pointed out that the so called study they linked (misleadingly titled "market research says 46.67% of comic fans are female" which is immediately followed by a quote explicitly stating they did not conduct any market research) was actually taken from a facebook survey. And their example of 18 titles with female leads, as impressive as it sounds (and it is an accomplishment indeed) forgot to mention that those 18 were taken from a sample of more than one hundred. I know, because I followed the links and did the math, instead of following a narrative.

4. They Blame The Lack Of Women Superheroes On ... Women Superheroes.

There is no lack of women superheroes. Black Widow has already appeared in 4 films, and if their complaint they should state it that way, so they could follow it with demands for a Hawkeye standalone film, or at least a new Hulk. Captain Marvel is in the making, and there's already a very healthy representation of female heroes on TV, with more coming on the pipes (Agent Carter and Jessica Jones).

I think the way things developed was because Marvel had franchised out their most iconic characters already, which included the X-Men and Fantastic Four, along with their more recognizable female members. The first Iron Man movie was a gamble on the part of Marvel Studios, and once that one worked out they decided to play it safe, by introducing the "big 3" (Iron Man, Thor, and Cap) and building up from there into a big event that resulted in the Avengers, where they would gradually introduce us to this new universe. And while each of these movies represented a huge risk for Marvel (before they were acquired by Disney) doing movies based on even more obscure characters would have deterred any potential investors, for the same reason that they didn't do a sequel to the Incredible Hulk after its lukewarm reception. Introducing Black Widow in Iron Man 2 (and Hawkeye in Thor) was the smartest move, and now that Marvel Studios has proven its worth (and is backed up by a corporate giant) they can take risks such as Guardians of the Galaxy, Ant-Man, Dr. Strange, Captain Marvel and Inhumans, which are not very known characters outside fanboy circles.

3. They Go Out Of Their Way To Exclude Black Widow In All Merchandising and
2. They DO Market To Females (Just Not The Ones You Think)

This is a valid point, and I'm on board with the idea on principle. Except that numbers do show that Marvel merchandise is heavily targeted towards boys, including most of the stuff they said was aimed at moms. I think it is ridiculous to erase Widow from tie in branding because she is a badass character, and kids don't mind having a female character stamped on a t-shirt so long as it's part of an ensemble. However, there are action figures of Black Widow for every one of the movies she has appeared on, it's just that they don't sell as well so they're produced in fewer numbers. Also, most of the examples which were not toys or clothing only show the big characters, which means no Widow, but also no Hawkeye, Falcon, War Machine, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver. This makes sense from a branding point of view.

Again, someone in the comments pointed out that one of the main reasons Disney bought Marvel (and Star Wars) was so they could target specifically boys, since they've already got the market for girls covered with the Disney Princesses line. Fair or not, you gotta admit that makes sense.

1. Gender Roles Somehow Transcend Space And Time

No. Just... no. For many reasons already covered on earlier points and by other people here and in the article's comments.

Despite disagreeing with pretty much everything, the article does make some good points and it is well written (if not that well researched). And it's a masterpiece compared to the piece of crap McKinney wrote about Ant-Man last year. He should do a follow up titled "Here are 90 million (domestic) reasons why I was so wrong about everything".
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