New Unstoppable Wasp Series.

[Tiamatty]

In the 60's girls had comics that girls as a whole at the time were interested in. Girls had comics that where geared for them titles like Patsy Wlaker, Archie, Sheena and so on.

It should also be noted that by enlarge superhero comics as a whole were items look upon for boys under the age of ten and those boys who did not grow out of that "habit" were often times considered immature, nerds, and/or weird.

I know it's popular to pull out the violin when talking about gender inequality but I have to admit that it gets annoying to read pages of arguments that omit the fact that the popular vibe "back in the day" of men reading comics were those who weren't dating women.(IE. not getting laid) Therefore, weren't popular and uncool for anyone over the age of ten. But now that the Super Hero comic genre is "popular" it has all these purposely outrages errors that needs to be fixed. When it truth Super Hero comic companies , for the most part, did the best that the could with inclusion while also trying to appeal to the only people buying their comics. (IE. The nerdy white boys who were probably not getting laid.)

In the present Marvel is trying to push out all of these characters for more inclusion but the truth of the matter is they are doing it in a fashion that is "Cutting off their nose to spite their face" and as much as some would like to get around that it's the truth.

There has never been a time when comics were only read by losers. Comics were hugely popular, back in the day, when they could be bought at the local corner store. They were read by lonely nerds and married men in equal measure. And, yeah, they were read by women, too, and there's letters from back then of women criticizing the handling of female characters. Superhero comics were more popular in the '60s than they are now. I will grant that Marvel and DC were better about putting out comics actually aimed at girls. They virtually abandoned that in the '90s, to focus pretty much exclusively on superhero comics, and they've never really recovered. They're both trying now - DC's Superhero Girls particularly stands out on that front - but given they spent 20 years cultivating an image of not being girl-friendly, it's an uphill battle.

And you're telling me, a woman, that it's harder to be a woman? Clearly you can't know this first-hand... There is not a single thing in my entire life that would have played out differently had I been a man. I can guarantee you this.

I mean, I'm just going by what I've seen a lot of women say.

As for the timeline, her wearing a Spider-Man t-shirt when she's at some indeterminate age (probably 12 or 13, based on the art), and Cyclops being drawn in an anachronistic costume, are very minor complaints. They're about as petty as it gets. And hell, not even that tough to No-Prize: Unreliable Narrator. She forgot what Cyclops wore in the '60s, and she thought she was younger when Spider-Man came on the scene. Boom, done, easy. Also: That is how a true fan deals with what they see as mistakes in a Marvel comic.

[mreddie]

People who want Janet to get the attention she deserves and people you describe are different groups and there really aren't many fans that fall into both categories.

I totally know how to fix this. Have 2 Wasp books going on at the same time. Problem solved. Thank you for coming to my TED talk guys, we can end the arguments in the thread now.

I'm hoping Janet will be the breakout in the film enough to get her a mini or maxi. I honestly hated Nadia back when the Wasp Sting thing was revealed and I thought "After all this, and here comes this random girl to take her spotlight!" Waid wrote her a lot more likable and Unstoppable followed up on it. Plus Janet was still with the Unity Squad and my anger and jealously turned to optimism and once Unstoppable was confirmed, I was into it but kept hoping Janet would get involved, luckily she did but the series was canned before otherwise.

Now with the new movie, I hope Janet solidifies herself as the one Avenger who never got the spotlight as much as her counterparts until now and I hope her and Nadia will share the same great dynamic the Hawkeyes share where both are equals with their strengths and weaknesses.

[ed2962]

There has never been a time when comics were only read by losers. Comics were hugely popular, back in the day, when they could be bought at the local corner store. They were read by lonely nerds and married men in equal measure. And, yeah, they were read by women, too, and there's letters from back then of women criticizing the handling of female characters. Superhero comics were more popular in the '60s than they are now. I will grant that Marvel and DC were better about putting out comics actually aimed at girls. They virtually abandoned that in the '90s, to focus pretty much exclusively on superhero comics, and they've never really recovered. They're both trying now - DC's Superhero Girls particularly stands out on that front - but given they spent 20 years cultivating an image of not being girl-friendly, it's an uphill battle.


I mean, I'm just going by what I've seen a lot of women say.

As for the timeline, her wearing a Spider-Man t-shirt when she's at some indeterminate age (probably 12 or 13, based on the art), and Cyclops being drawn in an anachronistic costume, are very minor complaints. They're about as petty as it gets. And hell, not even that tough to No-Prize: Unreliable Narrator. She forgot what Cyclops wore in the '60s, and she thought she was younger when Spider-Man came on the scene. Boom, done, easy. Also: That is how a true fan deals with what they see as mistakes in a Marvel comic.

I'd even argue that when comics were distributed to newstands and drug stores etc, comics had a wider variety on genres and tried harder to reach different kinds of fans. It was when the direct market became the main outlet that the industry and fandom became more insular.

[Tiamatty]

I'd even argue that when comics were distributed to newstands and drug stores etc, comics had a wider variety on genres and tried harder to reach different kinds of fans. It was when the direct market became the main outlet that the industry and fandom became more insular.

Yep. The direct market's never been all that friendly towards non-superhero comics. Which is why those other genres are now instead making killings online and in bookstores. Raina Telgemeier wouldn't have sold anything in the direct market, but absolutely slaughtered Marvel and DC alike by getting distributed through a YA book publisher.

[Kintor]

Yep. The direct market's never been all that friendly towards non-superhero comics. Which is why those other genres are now instead making killings online and in bookstores. Raina Telgemeier wouldn't have sold anything in the direct market, but absolutely slaughtered Marvel and DC alike by getting distributed through a YA book publisher.

You've really got it backwards, the succes of super hero comics as a genre is not grounds to condemn readers for not choosing alternatives you consider more worthy of support. Compared to everything else super hero comics suceeded precisely because they are what readers across all demographics wanted to read. Young and old, man and women; everyone put their money towards super hero comics and the rest naturally disappeared from the marketplace. This all happened well before the 90s collapse and the consolidation of the direct market, so don't an unfair playing feild either.

[Drops Of Venus]

That's what I think too. And with Hank's daughter being Nadia rather than movie Hope, Marvel gets to own the character outright rather than having to share whatever legal rights with the movie people.

I don't think that's a problem at all, because Marvel Comics created Hope. If anything, they are the ones who have the original rights over the character, and the movies borrowed from them like most of the other characters. I think the biggest thing they had against Hope in the comics is that she was a straight-up villain in that universe and they wanted a hero, so they took a different approach and decided to create something that resembled her in some form, but it was still their own thing. I actually think that's way less annoying than completely changing everything about the original character out of the blue just for synergy, like they did with Star-Lord.

[PyroTwilight]

I imagine we'll have gotten a bit of time passing, so GIRL will probably be pretty well-established by now.

Black Widow doesn't seem to have very strong opinions on Nadia, from what we saw in that one Secret Empire mini. Presumably, Nat's pleased that Nadia was able to keep her sense of joy through everything that's happened to her.

Ah wasn't aware the two met. I pretty much avoided the whole Secret Empire thing.

[KurtW95]

Except, like I said, Cyclops wasn’t even on the scene when Bobbi was a kid. None of the Silver Age heroes would’ve been active yet. Or at least in the public eye. And I don’t think it makes you a bigger fan of a property if you justify everything that’s being done and have complete and total faith that everybody is honest and knows what they’re doing. It’s the same situarion with Star Wars. People hate what is being done with the franchise because they love the franchise.

[Tiamatty]

You've really got it backwards, the succes of super hero comics as a genre is not grounds to condemn readers for not choosing alternatives you consider more worthy of support. Compared to everything else super hero comics suceeded precisely because they are what readers across all demographics wanted to read. Young and old, man and women; everyone put their money towards super hero comics and the rest naturally disappeared from the marketplace. This all happened well before the 90s collapse and the consolidation of the direct market, so don't an unfair playing feild either.

I'd argue it's more complicated than that. Books for girls were able to survive pretty well for decades. With the rise of the direct market, those books had a harder time surviving. Fairly safe to assume some sort of correlation there. Also, if there wasn't a market for books for girls, Raina Telgemeier wouldn't be eating the lunch of every comic publisher. And she's not alone in that. There are more and more female cartoonists all the time who are finding success outside the direct market.

Ah wasn't aware the two met. I pretty much avoided the whole Secret Empire thing.

Fair.

Except, like I said, Cyclops wasn’t even on the scene when Bobbi was a kid. None of the Silver Age heroes would’ve been active yet. Or at least in the public eye. And I don’t think it makes you a bigger fan of a property if you justify everything that’s being done and have complete and total faith that everybody is honest and knows what they’re doing. It’s the same situarion with Star Wars. People hate what is being done with the franchise because they love the franchise.

The "true fan" thing is mostly a joke. Like I said, in the old days, Marvel used No-Prizes to award readers who wrote in with explanations for why mistakes weren't mistakes. I was just referencing that.

And my No-Prize explanation stands: Bobbi just got mixed up about who was active when.

[Kintor]

I'd argue it's more complicated than that. Books for girls were able to survive pretty well for decades. With the rise of the direct market, those books had a harder time surviving. Fairly safe to assume some sort of correlation there. Also, if there wasn't a market for books for girls, Raina Telgemeier wouldn't be eating the lunch of every comic publisher. And she's not alone in that. There are more and more female cartoonists all the time who are finding success outside the direct market.

You need to remember - correlation does not equal causation. The decline of the a particular type of girl-centric book may have coincided with the rise of super hero books but that doesn't mean that super hero comics are to blame. If anything, the changing tastes of female readers over the decades seems the more likely culprit. Those 'girl stories' failed to adapt to a changing marketplace, while super heroes did adapt, no foul play here only natural selection.

[KurtW95]

The "true fan" thing is mostly a joke. Like I said, in the old days, Marvel used No-Prizes to award readers who wrote in with explanations for why mistakes weren't mistakes. I was just referencing that.

And my No-Prize explanation stands: Bobbi just got mixed up about who was active when.

I don’t understand how she could get mixed up to that extent. She knows most of them personally. You don’t just misremember when superheroes started showing up again either.

[Digifiend]

I think that's it. With Nadia's backstory, you'd expect a book heavy with psychological development, spying adventures and a more mature and serious tone. Her book just doesn't fit with her background.

Maybe Champions could tackle that issue? She always looks happy and optimistic, but underneath that cheerful image, there must be some trauma. It could also pick up the plot point about Riri and Miles in Iron Man 600 - they got recruited to what's basically a new version of SHIELD.

As long as Nadia is around with her series, Janet will obviously not get one.

Why? Spider-Man proves that you can't assume that - and just a couple of weeks ago there was two Ant-Man and the Wasp comics out - both starring Scott Lang, but one paired him with Janet and the other paired him with Nadia.

[The_Greatest_Username]

Why? Spider-Man proves that you can't assume that - and just a couple of weeks ago there was two Ant-Man and the Wasp comics out - both starring Scott Lang, but one paired him with Janet and the other paired him with Nadia.

Those Ant-Man/Wasp books weren’t ongoing series—just one shots. Also, Spider-Man is a different situation, Miles got to build his audience in a separate universe before joining the 616-universe while Peter has had his own book (and often multiple titles) for practically his entire existence.

[Digifiend]

Spider-Man's not the only example. Captain America, Wolverine, Green Lantern come to mind.

[Skedatz]

In the 60's girls had comics that girls as a whole at the time were interested in. Girls had comics that where geared for them titles like Patsy Wlaker, Archie, Sheena and so on.

It should also be noted that by enlarge superhero comics as a whole were items look upon for boys under the age of ten and those boys who did not grow out of that "habit" were often times considered immature, nerds, and/or weird.

I know it's popular to pull out the violin when talking about gender inequality but I have to admit that it gets annoying to read pages of arguments that omit the fact that the popular vibe "back in the day" of men reading comics were those who weren't dating women.(IE. not getting laid) Therefore, weren't popular and uncool for anyone over the age of ten. But now that the Super Hero comic genre is "popular" it has all these purposely outrages errors that needs to be fixed. When it truth Super Hero comic companies , for the most part, did the best that the could with inclusion while also trying to appeal to the only people buying their comics. (IE. The nerdy white boys who were probably not getting laid.)

In the present Marvel is trying to push out all of these characters for more inclusion but the truth of the matter is they are doing it in a fashion that is "Cutting off their nose to spite their face" and as much as some would like to get around that it's the truth.

Patsy was a creation of the 70's and Sheena was discontinued in the 50's, not even to see reprint until the 80's. Most girl comics around this time usually featured girls doing "girl" things like gymnastics or being on a social scene. A female centric superhero tale wouldn't really be in play until later on. Females in superhero comics at this time tended to play love interest or general supporting cast.

It's also arguable about comic demographics in the 60's. They were undoubtedly still "childish," but were starting to quickly mature for a growing older audience. But it should also be noted that a lot of adults were reading comics in the following decades. So it's not like adult readers just popped up on the scene ten years ago.

So it's not really a "Cutting off their nose," so much as it's, "We're uncomfortable with this." You could argue it's one and the same, but it's something comics have needed for a while.

Every single female hero in the 60s, 70s, and 80s was written better than a vast majority of female (and male) superheroes today.

That's a pretty untrue thing to say. I mean, you'd -really- have to put some explanation into that.

I get what you're saying, and those are facts that can hardly be disputed. However, trying to pass that message through a comic book by having Bobbi Morse say that when she was a girl, there were only male superheroes like Johnny Storm or Spider-Man, that's a straight-up lie and a twist from the timeline.

I agree with the paragraph you wrote and that I quoted. But one can not alter the time line of the Marvel Universe to make a point. That point becomes invalid because it's not based on facts (the facts being the superheroes present when Bobbi Morse was a little girl). Those are two separate things.

And you're telling me, a woman, that it's harder to be a woman? Clearly you can't know this first-hand... There is not a single thing in my entire life that would have played out differently had I been a man. I can guarantee you this.

Since Marvel operates on a pretty slippery timescale that never seems to hold fast (Civil War tried to put the Marvel perspective at 10 years since the FF first emerged), writers have dealt with Marvel history a little differently from time to time. The problem is WE do it too to fit the narrative we enjoy best. However, as Marvel grew female characters started off as rare, then moved to uncommon, then became sort of common, and are now more common. From a condensed or decompressed history, this would be the view most residents of the MU would see. From a teenager Spider-Man swinging through the streets with an equally teenaged Torch, to a group of teens in the X-Men, to pretty much only having the Invisible Woman and Jean Grey being the only females who would've emerged at the time. Then a few years (or months) later, they'd start to see the Scarlet Witch and a couple others. However, during this time they'd see an explosion of male characters.

Also, I don't think he's trying to say, "Look, lady. You got it hard," so much as, "Societal statistics and representation historically have been extremely difficult for women." I'd add it's also important to note that some women do have an "easier" life, but doesn't negate the difficulty many others find in their lives. Several reasons exist such as environment, upbringing, any challenges, resilience, misunderstanding, etc. Because we can't know everybody's experiences first hand, we can only understand what trends, statistics, lawsuits, and history teaches us.

I'd even argue that when comics were distributed to newstands and drug stores etc, comics had a wider variety on genres and tried harder to reach different kinds of fans. It was when the direct market became the main outlet that the industry and fandom became more insular.

They did. Especially during the 50's, early 60's, and a good chunk of the 80's. There were options for horror, supernatural, social life, and then "counter culture" comics. The DM had a narrowing effect by trying to maximize sales of a more popular product. Superhero comics sell a little better, stock more superhero comics. Since space was limited and stores relied on numbers they'd feature alternate comics less often, and since that was all some people had to learn about comic trends they became less and less popular.

You've really got it backwards, the succes of super hero comics as a genre is not grounds to condemn readers for not choosing alternatives you consider more worthy of support. Compared to everything else super hero comics suceeded precisely because they are what readers across all demographics wanted to read. Young and old, man and women; everyone put their money towards super hero comics and the rest naturally disappeared from the marketplace. This all happened well before the 90s collapse and the consolidation of the direct market, so don't an unfair playing feild either.

There's no condemnation of superhero comics or their success, nor call for people to embrace a "more worthy" comic. His point was in reference to the narrowing of the DM and how an "expanded bookshelf" with digital sales has allowed alternative comics to boom and how those comics would've floundered on a LCS shelf because of inattention and super small focus. He's not even trying to say alternate comics would outsell superhero comics, just that the DM didn't present a chance for greater success like today's markets allow.