Is Marvel's "Minority"/PC Month trying too hard?

[empsolo]

Sam has access to technology that should make this fine. I agree I would have probably used Luke or even Blue Marvel (just to see a meta playing Cap, and he is a marine). But Sam should be fine.

That's the other thing, I forget if 616 Falcon has the same attachments to the Military that Blue Marvel or Luke Cage have. (in Luke cage's case it would be the SSR project)

We have already see that Sam has a suit where he fought in a intergalactic space war. So the Street-level excuse doesn't work.

See the dude in Red, with wings--that's Sam. Hardly "street" and while he does operate at the street-level most of the time, there are not limits but the ones placed on him by fans and writers. Here he as a high tech suit that allows him to fight in a intergalactic war. So nothing should stop him from taking on Cap's foes or anyone else--unless the writer limits him to doing so.

Note, I did say by himself.

[BlackGodKing]

Minority gold star for empsolo

[afrocarter]

I understand that and that's fine. It's same reason why I'm not a fan of when Dick Grayson made the transition to being Batman.

....then you must understand that you're making a terrible argument. Yes, it's your opinion, but your opinion has no weight because you can't put forth any logical arguments to back it up.

[Victor Freeman]

That's the other thing, I forget if 616 Falcon has the same attachments to the Military that Blue Marvel or Luke Cage have. (in Luke cage's case it would be the SSR project)

Note, I did say by himself.

Again, that's a personal limit you have place on Falcon. This is fiction, meaning the only limits are what the writer chooses to write and what you choose to personally accept. There is no reason Sam could not take on something alone. If you read that event, he took on a aleph or two alone. There is nothing stopping a writer from writing him like that.

As someone pointed out, some consider Cap Street. I don't, but some people do. It's not a valid excuse, imho.

[Daymare]

I'm not sure, but the Japanese pop-star in Invaders is too stereotypical to last long.

Oh my, when I saw that I was a little...wow'd. With Namor going rogue again, and Captain America and Bucky becoming something "new" I think November will be the final issue anyhow.

[Kieran_Frost]

As for Bucky even with PTSD and POW status I can't really call him a "minority". That's like calling John McCain a "minority". I love the character and will buy the story anyway.

I assume someone called Bucky a minority due to missing an arm (therefore being a minority due to disability), not being a POW or having PTSD. I could be wrong. I'm always wary of labelling someone missing a limb (but in magic Marvel world now has his or her arm/leg/hand back in a way many don't even realise they are missing a limb). U.S. Agent definitely. Flash or Hellion, fine. They explored what it means to be disabled. Karma... sure. Bucky? Love the guy, but I don't think his 'may as well be an arm, in-fact it makes him strong' is a disability worth counting. If that makes sense?

[Conway]

I hope I'm reading this wrong, but this sounds like you've changed your mind about the Storm book because of stuff that has nothing to do with the Storm book.

No I just started to doubt how much TPB at Marvel really wanted to do it now.

Or trying to open the door for a new audience.

No, it's an attempt to assuage a group that has consistently been against the "prototype" superhero story even though Superman saving Lois doesn't really exist anymore. The fact that they spent the next minute talking about her bra didn't help.

Incidentally, funny thing about that word, "pandering": Its original meaning was of someone acting as a go-between between a prostitute and a john. So maybe not the best word to be using in this context.

Actually... pimping out their female and diversity characters is exactly what Marvel is doing.

One's a subset of the other. And I'm not sure what the appeal to ignorance is supposed to prove.

This is asinine. I was simply saying that my description of her as being of Middle Eastern decent wasn't really inaccurate or and attempt to belittle her heritage but an attempt to describe the "minority" she belonged to.

Marvel's been doing this for about twenty years or so, so I don't know why you're complaining about it now.

Ah, yes, that lucrative Inhuman market.

Forcing minority sales by making them hang out with the stereo-typical macho man, and making them part of an even smaller minority is annoying.

I've been reading her as dark-skinned Latina, myself. And what's the problem with "adorable"? You want her to be ugly?

The problem is that she is an example of forcing minority status into a title that already has a strong black female character.

Those complaints have been around a lot longer than a couple months.

How do you know they're being disingenuous? Is there a video going around that I'm not aware of showing Quesada stepping off-camera on the Colbert set and saying "That oughta hold the little SOBs"?

And ultimately, what skin is it off your ass if Marvel makes some books that appeal to people other than straight white dudes?

I think the complaints had been leveled off and then became much more prominent again recently partly because of new readers that the movies attract who are expecting Nick Fury to be black. I think it becomes more prominent when the summer blockbuster action movie season starts.

[Michael P]

Two thoughts on that: One, you're aware that Latinos/Latinas are a minority too, right? And two, you're dead wrong on that last bit.

[cranger]

Characters change mantles all the time. This is comics--we know it's all temporary. EVERYTHING is temporary. But I didn't hear these types of complaints the last time someone else replaced Steve Rogers.

I do not disagree with the rest of that post but, really, this has more to do with a bunch of white males complaining about which white male is going to wear the costume is not meaty enough for bloggers looking for traffic. People are still fighting over who should be Green Lantern or Flash, or even that Dick should still be Batman while Bucky should never have stopped being Captain America. Only when someone can find an angle that lets them use words like racism or misogyny does it get noticed because people want it to be noticed at that point.

[ImBatman]

What Marvel is doing is comical.

I'm Dominican, I've been reading comics for 22 years. I don't like a character because he/she is the same color as me or has a name similar to mine. Do they think I'm that simple? I actually find that insulting, personally.

If they want to really appeal to minorities this is what you do. Create an original character with his/her own history and identity and make them just as powerful and interesting as your established characters. Give the character its own book and hire good artists and writers and to make a visually appealing book with good, interesting stories. Then grab that character and have him/her appear in your movie.

Do that, instead of dressing up a minority and giving them the identity of another character.

[Zeitgeist]

Like, if Marvel really cared about Falcon then probably we would have gotten Falcon series with big marketing push and top tier creative team. But no, we get him as replacement Cap because thats going to generate way more buzz and move more copies than actually good series with Falcon as the star.

Worst part is that we all know that Steve is going to be Cap again in a couple of years (if not sooner for next Avengers movie) and Falcon will move back to same spot that he currently occupies - supporting character of Captain America. So what is the goal here actually? To promote black character or just to create some hype in between movies? Wouldn't surprise me if 3-4 years later we are going to get another replacement story where Cap is replaced by some female.

Although it's a nice sentiment, it's not going to change much. Sooner or later, Falcon will become Falcon again and Steve Rogers will be Captain America, and Thor will be Thor. What Marvel's doing makes headlines and guarantees a few more sales, but they're not changing the status quo for long, so they're not changing anything at all. It's good that they're trying to make a difference, even if it's a small one. However, if they really want to be friendly to all minorities, they won't "replace" well-known characters with other well-known characters, they'd bring the the minorities forward and push them as the new holy trinity.

Falcon could have easily replaced Captain America and remained Falcon, but Marvel would have had to make a huge push in marketing to guarantee the popularity the book would get as if he was Captain America, so in the end, a lot of this feels like a marketing ploy.

If you guys really think this is all designed to reset Falcon to exactly the same position he was at beforehand, y'all obviously didn't pay attention to how they did this with Bucky.

Launching an "All New Falcon #1", even with an all star creative team (Bendis and Maleev on Moon Knight say hello) wouldn't be enough to either guarantee it's success or raise Falcon's profile as a character. People need more of a reason to care.
However, building Sam's profile up in Captain America and having him take the mantle of "All New Captain America" gives the character wider exposure, and thus potentially has more people invested in him.
Long term, this means that when Sam does become the Falcon again, he will be taking a larger reader base with him from Captain America to his own adventures than he ever would have had if they just launched a Falcon book straight up.

In television, what they call a "backdoor pilot" - designed to take a viewing audience over to a spin-off show - basically operates by the same principles.

[Trident]

If you guys really think this is all designed to reset Falcon to exactly the same position he was at beforehand, y'all obviously didn't pay attention to how they did this with Bucky.

Launching an "All New Falcon #1", even with an all star creative team (Bendis and Maleev on Moon Knight say hello) wouldn't be enough to either guarantee it's success or raise Falcon's profile as a character. People need more of a reason to care.
However, building Sam's profile up in Captain America and having him take the mantle of "All New Captain America" gives the character wider exposure, and thus potentially has more people invested in him.
Long term, this means that when Sam does become the Falcon again, he will be taking a larger reader base with him from Captain America to his own adventures than he ever would have had if they just launched a Falcon book straight up.

In television, what they call a "backdoor pilot" - designed to take a viewing audience over to a spin-off show - basically operates by the same principles.

This guy gets it!

Some of you should take notes.

Bring on Sam as Captain America please and thank you!

[afrocarter]

What Marvel is doing is comical.

I'm Dominican, I've been reading comics for 22 years. I don't like a character because he/she is the same color as me or has a name similar to mine. Do they think I'm that simple? I actually find that insulting, personally.

If they want to really appeal to minorities this is what you do. Create an original character with his/her own history and identity and make them just as powerful and interesting as your established characters. Give the character its own book and hire good artists and writers and to make a visually appealing book with good, interesting stories. Then grab that character and have him/her appear in your movie.

Do that, instead of dressing up a minority and giving them the identity of another character.

Again, this isn't about pandering to minorities; don't insult Marvel -- and worse, yourself -- like that. Captain America is such a poignant symbol; having Sam Wilson take up the mantle is Marvel making a statement about what America is/should be IMO.

I do agree that generating new characters from scratch would be ideal -- but this is Marvel, where the pantheon has pretty much been set in stone since the 70's. It's extremely difficult to create ANY new characters with staying power, period.

[Overhazard]

Just a FYI, they never did that with Black Panther. The picture posted was a *villain* and not T'challa. Fans didn't like the idea, only because T'challa is a Royal, former King and the crown prince of his own nation. There is no reason he should were the American flag.

This is different. Falcon is and has always been a big part of Cap. Not only that, but he is American.

Oh, didn't know that, whoops.

[ViewtifulJC]

why is it only pandering when its non-white/non-male/non-straight people

what do you call the status quo of having a vast, unchallenged majority of straight white dudes leading books if not pandering to straight white dudes?