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May. 14th, 2010 07:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
labellementeuseThis post at Comics Alliance about race in DC at the moment is really good. Someone in the comments made the really cogent thought that this is basically what happened on Batgirl in the last couple of years - Cass Cain, a Batgirl who was clearly part of the grim & grittier, (more) modern school of comics, and a character of colour, left her own book (which was really damn good) and was replaced by Stephanie Brown, who looks a lot more like bright, bubbly, sarky Babs-style Batgirl. Other comments have pointed out that this is sort of happening on Batman right now: Dick, a Romany* character, is going to be re-replaced by Bruce Wayne, Ultimate WASP.
Now, you can sort of try to justify these. Steph becoming Batgirl is a really cool, logical move, displaying both her growth and her close relationships with both the former Batgirls. Meanwhile Dick, unlike Cass or the other characters mentioned, probably isn't going to die or get put on a bus (after having had her character fucked around with in the most insanely infuriating ways... but don't get me started) when Bruce gets back.**
However, I think in both cases it's still a good call. Cass, a terrific character, was put on a bus partly because I suppose they were morons who couldn't figure out a way to use her and all her friends had kind of left the city (Tim was away, Kon was dead... on the other hand, Steph had even fewer friends around). But realistically, as cool a move as I think Steph being Batgirl is, it wasn't entirely necessary. Spoiler was always a pretty cool identity (IMO, YMMV) and they could have given her growth in some other way. (I don't know. But unlike oh, say, everyone who works for DC, it's not actually my job to figure it out.) Meanwhile, when Dick goes back to the Nightwing costume, if he does (come on: no way are they going to kill Dick, but equally no way is he going to keep the cowl - as cool as that would be) it's really only going to be a step backwards for him as a character. Finally becoming Batman was actually a big fucking deal for a character with Dick's history. Returning Bruce is just going to reboot Dick to where he was a year or two ago. Growth is cool, y'all, and sometimes legacy characters should actually stay de-legacied.
I don't know if I actually have a point! Talk to me about the Batbooks this week, y'all!
In order of least to most excited:
1. If you're going to make Bruce speak phonetically, which I did think was a great idea, I don't get why you'd make the cavemen speak ungrammatically. So everyone's SUPER SUPER CLEAR that these are CAVEMEN, RITE?
2. Apparently Morrison's said that he intends to play with archetypes & shit and the cavemen were supposed to be archetypes, a five man band kind of thing. So, awesome, guys have five different archetypes (old dude, surly kid, joker, big dude, some other dude... I wasn't really paying attention). Guess how many archetypes girls get? So far, ONE: the Martha (someone pointed out very smrtly that White Fawn's beads are a visual reference to Martha Wayne's classic pearl necklace). People have speculated that the girl at the very end was Kyle of some kind - I don't know if that's true. But if it is, wow: the Martha and the Selina. It's like the Madonna/Whore complex hasn't changed at all. oh, wait.
3. Batgirl this week! Weird? I didn't follow 52 so I really don't know who calculator is or why Wendy's in a wheelchair but this story does seem like a terrific story for Steph and Babs to play along in, both women with famous daddy issues. (Remember that issue of Batgirl where Cass and Steph bond over having fathers who are villains? 'When my dad was mad at me, he'd lock me in the closet. What'd yours do?' 'Shot me!' 'AHAHAH!' 'AHAHAH!' ♥ so cute) I really liked the last couple of pages.
4. Birds! Birds. What to say? it was pretty introducey but I suppose they're trying to bring in new readers, so OK. Art... eh, OK? I would prefer it if I could tell Dinah and Zinda apart? (I know, fishnets, but Dinah used to have a costume with pants, remember? I really thought it was Dinah for half the scene in the bar.) Speaking of costumes, I HATE HATE that Huntress has gone back to that stupid fucking costume. HEY REMEMBER HOW YOU'RE WEARING A SENSIBLE OUTFIT IN DETECTIVE COMICS RIGHT NOW? yeah. Go back to it, Helena! I liked Dove but it would be cool to see the team get an injection of colour somewhere.
5. Speaking of! Woman at the end. Can we accept Dinah's assessment that this is either Shiva or Cass? She ought to know both of their styles really well, and the woman certainly demonstrated the skills you'd expect either of them to have;I also can't think of anyone else it might be (except perhaps one of Cass' nutty sisters? But what would her motive possibly be?). Plus it seems like it would kind of undermine Dinah's skillz if she was wrong. On the other hand, it would be a bit lacklustre if Dinah goes 'It's Shiva! or Cass!' and then... it's one of them.
However, let's assume it is either Shiva or Cass. If it's Shiva it's just kind of boring. Shiva's harassing the Birds, must be Tuesday! OTOH, if it's Cass... I'm conflicted. On the one hand, yay, Cass. On the other hand, for fuck's sake, DC, stop making Cass evil. Cass is flipping amazing.
OK, I just realised that it's probably Sin. Stupid, because Sin can't have had time to grow that big, but at least it would be classically Birdy.
But to let me get back to what I was saying about Cass. Cass spent a whole book struggling with herself ethically in a way that is really very Batty, but never got freaking boring the way Bruce's Issues do. But she really faced her demons. She examined the way she had been raised to kill and she repeatedly made high-level, difficult moral decisions not to kill. Cass is the character who was tempted the most into a face heel turn but the overall message of the series was that someone who had struggled with this for so long had an incredible strength of will. Consequently it really, really pisses me off that for the last couple of years they've basically had her in the wilderness, no idea if she's a good guy or a bad guy. Bruce trusted her judgement implicitly - and he really had his faith in her tested. My point here is that there are so many characters out there (cough HELENA cough) who are so much less convicted. Why the hell can't they be wandering in the wilderness and bring Cass back for fucks' sake.
OK. End rant, which is not very articulate. But then again nor is Adam Beechen, ha-ha!
*As plenty of people pointed out, Dick was white for a really long time - or at least he looked white. Devin Grayson was the one who wrote him as Rom, I guess about ten years ago? On the other hand, as someone else pointed out, there's really no reason not to embrace that. On the other other hand, I'm not sure that, if DC rewrote all its characters to give them ambiguously non-white backgrounds - say, the traditional my-great-grandmother-was-a-%fill in a stereotypical name for Native American group here% - that this would really fix the problem. On a fourth hand, widespread confusion about what the hell Connor Hawke or Lian Harper's ethnicities were doesn't make them not mixed race? Someone give me a sword, please, this knot is becoming a problem.
** Speaking of which, I sort of liked the first issue of Return of Bruce Wayne or whatever it's called? IDEK
Now, you can sort of try to justify these. Steph becoming Batgirl is a really cool, logical move, displaying both her growth and her close relationships with both the former Batgirls. Meanwhile Dick, unlike Cass or the other characters mentioned, probably isn't going to die or get put on a bus (after having had her character fucked around with in the most insanely infuriating ways... but don't get me started) when Bruce gets back.**
However, I think in both cases it's still a good call. Cass, a terrific character, was put on a bus partly because I suppose they were morons who couldn't figure out a way to use her and all her friends had kind of left the city (Tim was away, Kon was dead... on the other hand, Steph had even fewer friends around). But realistically, as cool a move as I think Steph being Batgirl is, it wasn't entirely necessary. Spoiler was always a pretty cool identity (IMO, YMMV) and they could have given her growth in some other way. (I don't know. But unlike oh, say, everyone who works for DC, it's not actually my job to figure it out.) Meanwhile, when Dick goes back to the Nightwing costume, if he does (come on: no way are they going to kill Dick, but equally no way is he going to keep the cowl - as cool as that would be) it's really only going to be a step backwards for him as a character. Finally becoming Batman was actually a big fucking deal for a character with Dick's history. Returning Bruce is just going to reboot Dick to where he was a year or two ago. Growth is cool, y'all, and sometimes legacy characters should actually stay de-legacied.
I don't know if I actually have a point! Talk to me about the Batbooks this week, y'all!
In order of least to most excited:
1. If you're going to make Bruce speak phonetically, which I did think was a great idea, I don't get why you'd make the cavemen speak ungrammatically. So everyone's SUPER SUPER CLEAR that these are CAVEMEN, RITE?
2. Apparently Morrison's said that he intends to play with archetypes & shit and the cavemen were supposed to be archetypes, a five man band kind of thing. So, awesome, guys have five different archetypes (old dude, surly kid, joker, big dude, some other dude... I wasn't really paying attention). Guess how many archetypes girls get? So far, ONE: the Martha (someone pointed out very smrtly that White Fawn's beads are a visual reference to Martha Wayne's classic pearl necklace). People have speculated that the girl at the very end was Kyle of some kind - I don't know if that's true. But if it is, wow: the Martha and the Selina. It's like the Madonna/Whore complex hasn't changed at all. oh, wait.
3. Batgirl this week! Weird? I didn't follow 52 so I really don't know who calculator is or why Wendy's in a wheelchair but this story does seem like a terrific story for Steph and Babs to play along in, both women with famous daddy issues. (Remember that issue of Batgirl where Cass and Steph bond over having fathers who are villains? 'When my dad was mad at me, he'd lock me in the closet. What'd yours do?' 'Shot me!' 'AHAHAH!' 'AHAHAH!' ♥ so cute) I really liked the last couple of pages.
4. Birds! Birds. What to say? it was pretty introducey but I suppose they're trying to bring in new readers, so OK. Art... eh, OK? I would prefer it if I could tell Dinah and Zinda apart? (I know, fishnets, but Dinah used to have a costume with pants, remember? I really thought it was Dinah for half the scene in the bar.) Speaking of costumes, I HATE HATE that Huntress has gone back to that stupid fucking costume. HEY REMEMBER HOW YOU'RE WEARING A SENSIBLE OUTFIT IN DETECTIVE COMICS RIGHT NOW? yeah. Go back to it, Helena! I liked Dove but it would be cool to see the team get an injection of colour somewhere.
5. Speaking of! Woman at the end. Can we accept Dinah's assessment that this is either Shiva or Cass? She ought to know both of their styles really well, and the woman certainly demonstrated the skills you'd expect either of them to have;
However, let's assume it is either Shiva or Cass. If it's Shiva it's just kind of boring. Shiva's harassing the Birds, must be Tuesday! OTOH, if it's Cass... I'm conflicted. On the one hand, yay, Cass. On the other hand, for fuck's sake, DC, stop making Cass evil. Cass is flipping amazing.
OK, I just realised that it's probably Sin. Stupid, because Sin can't have had time to grow that big, but at least it would be classically Birdy.
But to let me get back to what I was saying about Cass. Cass spent a whole book struggling with herself ethically in a way that is really very Batty, but never got freaking boring the way Bruce's Issues do. But she really faced her demons. She examined the way she had been raised to kill and she repeatedly made high-level, difficult moral decisions not to kill. Cass is the character who was tempted the most into a face heel turn but the overall message of the series was that someone who had struggled with this for so long had an incredible strength of will. Consequently it really, really pisses me off that for the last couple of years they've basically had her in the wilderness, no idea if she's a good guy or a bad guy. Bruce trusted her judgement implicitly - and he really had his faith in her tested. My point here is that there are so many characters out there (cough HELENA cough) who are so much less convicted. Why the hell can't they be wandering in the wilderness and bring Cass back for fucks' sake.
OK. End rant, which is not very articulate. But then again nor is Adam Beechen, ha-ha!
*As plenty of people pointed out, Dick was white for a really long time - or at least he looked white. Devin Grayson was the one who wrote him as Rom, I guess about ten years ago? On the other hand, as someone else pointed out, there's really no reason not to embrace that. On the other other hand, I'm not sure that, if DC rewrote all its characters to give them ambiguously non-white backgrounds - say, the traditional my-great-grandmother-was-a-%fill in a stereotypical name for Native American group here% - that this would really fix the problem. On a fourth hand, widespread confusion about what the hell Connor Hawke or Lian Harper's ethnicities were doesn't make them not mixed race? Someone give me a sword, please, this knot is becoming a problem.
** Speaking of which, I sort of liked the first issue of Return of Bruce Wayne or whatever it's called? IDEK
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Date: 2010-05-14 06:08 pm (UTC)You know that when they killed Kon it was 50/50 that they were going to kill Dick? The vote was between the two of them. So, again idk, I think they could very well kill him.
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Date: 2010-05-14 11:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-05-15 08:26 am (UTC)I think a reason they probably considered Dick a few years ago is because his then-identity, Nightwing, wasn't really super familiar - he wasn't part of the JLA, he didn't have much of a profile outside people already pretty familiar with the medium - but Dick Grayson the person had been around basically forever and knew everyone in the DCU, had been in basically every team book other than the JLA/JSA, had had around a million girlfriends, etc. Basically, cheap grief for everyone!
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Date: 2010-05-15 08:21 am (UTC)Hm. I'd still be really surprised if they killed Dick because by this point I feel like he might as well be a character that it's not sustainable to kill, he's just been around way too long, but he would also be really hard to plausibly bring back - like 85% because we already had two Robins come back to life in what, the last 5 years? I feel like the fact that they went with Kon is indicative of this - they must have known that they'd be bringing him back (and Kon is, IMO, a less significant figure than Dick.)