What stories are you looking for to get into minority characters?

[charliehustle415]

Oh, now that I've talked about the culture that attracted me, I wanna talk about when it doesn't.

New Super-Man. He's Chinese, I'm Chinese, but he started out as a bully, and continue to be kinda arrogant early on, so even though I love, love all the covers and variants that show them eating Chinese food or hanging out in Chinese old town, and I squealed when Chinese Wonder Woman was revealed to be Green Snake from White Snake Legend, the initial characterization is a turn-off. So characterization matters. Once he humbled down, I like him more.

Cassandra Cain, and Damian Wayne. Despite them having a Chinese descent, they're not as drenched in the culture as New Superman or Kamala, but I like and interested in them more than the previous two because of two words:

Ninja. Assassin.

So this time it's more about the pop culture I already like since I was a kid. Ninjas are just cool. I love Snake Eyes, Storm Shadow, Kill Bill, Basilisk Ninja Scroll... No, I actually don't like Naruto that much. They are more like sorcerers than ninjas (a fun fact the author actually wanted to make a wizard story at first, which makes so much sense).

Anyway! It's both the coolness that appeals to me and their attempt to be normal children. Lots of angst and adorableness to be found, by themselves and their interaction with others.

I guess redemption story while still being cool and badass (and sometimes cuteness), like what Cassandra, Damian, Storm Shadow, Kill Bill, and Samurai X have (oh and Xena!) really appeals to me

I believe Damian is of middle eastern descent i.e. from the Al Ghul family line.

Nevertheless, it would definitely be looking at different cultures.

DC has explored more alien cultures in comics than Asian.

I would love for them to explore East Asian or South Asian like Hindu mythology or Buddhist mythology.

Marvel has started recently with Greg Pak at the forefront with Agents of Atlas, I love to see a DC hero who was of Indian descent, especially since DC loves rebooting why not explore the concept of rebooting with the concept of reincarnation?

That would give a awesome in story reason as to what is happening with the different Crisis.

[Marvell2100]

I think the primary reason some newer characters fail is because they're not attached to stories that have any consequence, and aren't given a truly great story that fleshes them out. The best way to establish a new character is to make them an important part of a memorable project with effort and originality behind it. I don't have the time now but I'm sure if we made a list of successful and unpopular new characters, whether or not they were introduced in a dramatic meaningful story would be a big factor. The character being a minority is small in comparison IMO.

I'd agree. The character would have to have some kind of meaningful impact across the DCU and it would have to be sustained. In all of DC's events how many minority characters have actually been the hero of the story? Minority characters have to be made a major, vital and memorable part of the DC universe.

John Stewart and Black Lightning(please change his name to The Bolt)come to mind.

[Vampire Savior]

Well, yeah, the issue is not a complicated one. You just need to tell truly great stories with minority characters consistently and they will get fans from various different backgrounds. DC just doesn't have enough stories that highlight minority characters in major roles, and what stories they do have are few and far between, sometimes bad, and often fleeting, meaning they don't last long. Therefore, the minority characters often don't develop strong fanbases. Also, it would help a lot if the characters had strong concepts behind them. A lot of the ideas for these characters are just...not particularly good, but that's my opinion. Like, Black Lightning isn't going to interest me. Neither is Cyborg. Neither is a Chinese Superman. Vibe probably wouldn't, either...the character would need to interest me just as much as Superman would, and usially people at DC don't put that much effort into minority characters (like Todd McFarlane did with Spawn), and they usually don't get lucky and stumble upon hits by accident.

[Aahz]

I think the primary reason some newer characters fail is because they're not attached to stories that have any consequence, and aren't given a truly great story that fleshes them out. The best way to establish a new character is to make them an important part of a memorable project with effort and originality behind it. I don't have the time now but I'm sure if we made a list of successful and unpopular new characters, whether or not they were introduced in a dramatic meaningful story would be a big factor. The character being a minority is small in comparison IMO.

Honestly I think a good number of the new characters that were kind of successful were more a lucky accident, on the other hand if you put a new character directly in the center of some big event, fans often feel like they try to push this character down their throat.

The only ones I can think of where it kind of worked (Batwoman and Jessica Cruz) had iirc relatively small roles in the events were they were introduced.

But of course it help to some degree if the character introduced in a story that is read by many peoples. If a new character directly introduced in his new solo it is of course harder to get interested in the character.

[Restingvoice]

So... do you feel the same way about Hispanic culture books? African-American based culture books? Aboriginal, based culture books? I'm not making an accusation here. So please don't take it that way.

I'm trying to wrap my mind around what people are looking for/interested in/willing to spend money on, but sometimes it confusing, because... honestly Comic book heroes are supposed to represent
Universal Ideals. I really liked Kenan Kong, at first I rolled my eyes like "Asian superman, wtf dc, Do you even Great 10 anymore" but I tried it, not cause it was familiar or Oooh those are my people!
Not for voyeurism either, I wanted to see how they were tackling the subject: China wants/needs/has its own superman "GO".
Turned out brilliant. Kenan Turned out to be understandable. Reckless youth gaining responsibility was a big part of his journey. Thats real and universal. Thats what mattered most to me, and why identified and empathized with
him even thought he was culturally different.

Yes and no. There has to be some familiarity to it. I mentioned that the reason Kamala speaks to me so much is that her culture is what I see around me daily, same with Kenan. That's why they jump to me immediately when I see it when compared to black or Hispanic characters. They're still interesting, but not that interested because it's not a culture I know.

About Jamie, I actually wanna talk about him next. He's a character I have a median interest. Neither hype nor disinterest. I'm interested because he looks like a cute kid, and I mentioned I like elements of adorableness, and he's really popular among the Teen Titans/Young Justice generation.

The Hispanic culture I'm still not familiar enough to be interested, but that's not a problem, the problem is I don't like sci-fi, tech and alien as much as a detective, martial arts, fantasy, and horror, so in comparison to Cassandra and Damian, I'm not that interested in Blue Beetle premise in general.

(Ted Kord I'm only interested in him when paired with Booster and be a comedy duo.)

Same with Cyborg, Batwing and Green Lantern by the way. To me, they're handicapped because they're sci-fi.

John Stewart, in particular, is handicapped even further because he's a quiet, good, serious person who doesn't have an explosive, expressive personality. DC is vast. Green Lantern Corps is vast, and among them are loud personalities like Hal and Guy, then relatable dorks like Kyle and Jessica. John's just... fade to the background to me. Simon has the benefit of being Lebanese. Muslim again, rare but familiar to me personally. So even he stands out more than John.

The African American character I'm most interested in us Duke Thomas. Aside from close proximity to the detective world of Batman, he's young and suffered so much, he's been on the streets and faces the cops during the time where I became aware of Black Lives Matter. That attracts a lot of sympathy points, and he's also likable.

Then Vixen. I'm actually more interested in her being a model than her powers because to me animal powers are standard but the fashion model is not, and I LOVE how her clothes are drawn. It's so rare to have a superhero comic that talks about fashion, being straight male predominantly, so gimme that glam.

If we're talking about what part of African American culture attracts me, it would be what I already heard from the news or online. The difference of attitude towards cops between black and white people based on their experience is the stand out one. Another is people's attitude towards white girls vs black girls. How some media seems to ignore innovation if black girls do it vs when white girls do it. The underlying racism.

Although... if what I want to know is culture, then I prefer to watch youtube videos filmed by people directly connected to that culture, so I have a more accurate, but still casual and fun, information.

I don't know an aboriginal example at the top of my head...

[Restingvoice]

I believe Damian is of middle eastern descent i.e. from the Al Ghul family line.

Nevertheless, it would definitely be looking at different cultures.

DC has explored more alien cultures in comics than Asian.

I would love for them to explore East Asian or South Asian like Hindu mythology or Buddhist mythology.

Marvel has started recently with Greg Pak at the forefront with Agents of Atlas, I love to see a DC hero who was of Indian descent, especially since DC loves rebooting why not explore the concept of rebooting with the concept of reincarnation?

That would give a awesome in story reason as to what is happening with the different Crisis.

Damian, is part Chinese from his mother's side, but yeah the Al Ghuls are predominantly Arabic.

Solstice is Indian, but I'm not familiar yet with the real Solstice, because of how atrocious Scott Lobdell handled her character. First by making her all-black smoke mutant so at first I didn't even know where she's from, next by making her fall heads over heels to *ugh* Bar Tor, Lobdell's version of Bart, that she decided to commit a crime and go to a prison planet to stay with him... but then Bart is brought back rejoin Tim's Titans without much explanation and left Solstice in prison planet, and then Rebirth happens, so who knows what's the status these days.

I hate New 52 Teen Titans so much.

[charliehustle415]

Damian, is part Chinese from his mother's side, but yeah the Al Ghuls are predominantly Arabic.

Solstice is Indian, but I'm not familiar yet with the real Solstice, because of how atrocious Scott Lobdell handled her character. First by making her all-black smoke mutant so at first I didn't even know where she's from, next by making her fall heads over heels to *ugh* Bar Tor, Lobdell's version of Bart, that she decided to commit a crime and go to a prison planet to stay with him... but then Bart is brought back rejoin Tim's Titans without much explanation and left Solstice in prison planet, and then Rebirth happens, so who knows what's the status these days.

I hate New 52 Teen Titans so much.

Oh snap, I didn't realize he was part Chinese. It shows how much DC goes into their tier 1 character's background.

You would think the world's #1 superhero having a bi-racial son would make headlines.

We have so many people of color in prominent positions, but they never explore it.

[Restingvoice]

Oh snap, I didn't realize he was part Chinese. It shows how much DC goes into their tier 1 character's background.

You would think the world's #1 superhero having a bi-racial son would make headlines.

We have so many people of color in prominent positions, but they never explore it.

lol me neither at first. I only know because Talia and Damian fans who read them before me told me.

To be honest, just Batman having a biological son is already a massive headline and a controversy, then after that, they're too busy villainizing the mom (more than usual), and the granddad is already a villain, so there's a lot of baggage there...

[charliehustle415]

lol me neither at first. I only know because Talia and Damian fans who read them before me told me.

To be honest, just Batman having a biological son is already a massive headline and a controversy, then after that, they're too busy villainizing the mom (more than usual), and the granddad is already a villain, so there's a lot of baggage there...

Which I think makes all the more amazing. I feel like Morrison & Tomasi are the ones who took that ball and ran with it.

I mean the daughter of your biggest enemy is your son's mother. There is so much story telling that can happen here.

[Aahz]

Damian, is part Chinese from his mother's side, but yeah the Al Ghuls are predominantly Arabic.

According to "Batman: Birth of the Demon" Ras isn't arabic. He is the last living member of some wired nomadic tribe (that was iirc said to be something between arabic and chinese), whose existence he has completely purged from history.

[ed2962]

Well, despite what some of us say, "It's easy! Just do good stories with interesting characters!" That's not the exact market we have now. We don't have 10 Batman books and 15 Avengers titles because they are all great works of art supported by an audience that's open to new concepts. I'm not bashing any particular title, but Marvel/DC figured out a while back that they can sell a certain amount of units just based on events and gimmicks and big franchises. I think we can all think of examples of titles that got critical acclaim, but got lost in the shuffle or weren't promoted right or fans ignored because it wasn't in continuity.

[skyvolt2000]

Batman gets 15 books because no mater how bad they might be they are assured of SHELF space.

Batman will be on shelves at comic book stores with PLENTY of copies.
It will be at Barnes & Nobles with plenty of copies.
Amazon will have it in stock.
Ebay will have it in stock.
The Library will have copies of it that will collect dust over time.
Same with Batman & The Outsiders and even Signal will be on shelves because of that BATMAN name.

Most books with POC as leads don't have that luxury. It's tends to be a lack of physical copies with them. If you don't have copies on hand-you are going to lose business. Because books are impulse buys. Something I saw with Static. The demand could not match the supply and that is why at least in my city books with him are not CHEAP. New 52 Static trade will set you back $60. Static in Teen Titans can set you back anywhere from $15 to $100.

Oh snap, I didn't realize he was part Chinese. It shows how much DC goes into their tier 1 character's background.

The thing is it never plays into a story like it would with Ms Marvel. Ms Marvel goes home to a Muslim practicing family. So you are going to see her culture.
Miles Morales-most folks don't know he's half Hispanic because it never plays into the story. I mean I think issue#11 Miles used his Spanish after a villain spoke to another on in Spanish.
Static aside from ONE issue that had him go to church-you don't see his religion.
For Damian where would it play in a story?

In all of DC's events how many minority characters have actually been the hero of the story? Minority characters have to be made a major, vital and memorable part of the DC universe.

None in DC's major events.
Milestone/Superman, Steel & Superboy-Static.
Dogwelder 2 in Section 8 All Star mini series book.

If you really want to get a big picture-

Eclipse Comics had an event and the (Strike) black guy died saving the day. Strike was the book by Chuck Dixon and the LATE Tom Lyle. This is the book Chuck went off on because comic book stores would not stock the book because a black guy was the lead.

Cases can be made for Black Panther & Miles-but this is it overall of black guys saving the day in an major event. 1 guy.


And if you want to see a company try to make POC memorable-Vault Comics is doing it. They go out of their way to make sure the lead in their books are diverse.
It's not color over story or character like a certain troll LOVES to scream. Race is NEVER bought up.

Cult Classic Creature Features a HORROR story-the lead is a black guy.
Two apocalyptic books-Resonant & The Mall-leads are black guys.
Syfy-Heist How to Steal a Planet. Morgan Freenman looking guy trying to steal a planet.