Cheetah might be the next female Supervillain to be de-villified

[mathew101281]

It’s been pretty clear for a while now, that any female villain that gets over with the fans gets reformed or at least becomes less villainous. Male villains can gain popularity but remain villains. It doesn’t seem to be the case with female villains. It’s why most people’s top ten villains list is pretty low on females. I see the way that they are marketing Cheetah prior to the new movie and it has me concerned.

[king81992]

The strange part is that the villains(female or otherwise) who should be reformed never get reformed or the reformation never stick

[Digifiend]

Uh, isn't Cheetah currently in the Legion of Doom? She's not turning good any time soon.

[Jody Garland]

She had a period of pseudo-anti-villainny around Final Crisis. It didn't take then and i don't think it'll take now, especially with the long shadow of Superfriends.

[Noodle]

Male villains get the same treatment. There was just an entire movie humanizing Joker. They've done it a ton with Deathstroke in his various series over the years. They never outright reform them but then they don't really do that with the female ones either. The only one I can think of that they did that with was Harley.

Besides, how Cheetah is portrayed going forward is entirely dependent on how she ends up get portrayed in the new Wonder Woman film. People rip on Marvel for movie synergy (and rightfully so) but DC does it just as much.

She had a period of pseudo-anti-villainny around Final Crisis. It didn't take then and i don't think it'll take now, especially with the long shadow of Superfriends.

The Super Friends stigma will fade when WW84 comes out. The same way the Aquaman movie mostly washed the SF stigma from him. The show isn't really played that often on TV anymore and the current generation is too young to remember it, so they base their opinions on the movies.

[Adekis]

I'm in favor of making villains more sympathetic, or even reforming them, a lot of the time.

My "Sympathize But Don't Reform" Pile Includes:

• Cheetah
  
• Sinestro
  
• Poison Ivy
  
• Black Manta
  
• Dr Poison

My "Sympathize and Reform" Pile Includes:

• Lex Luthor
  
• Live Wire
  
• New 52 Metallo
  
• Harley Quinn
  
• Harvey "Two-Face" Dent

My "Neither Sympathize nor Reform" Pile Includes:

• Brainiac
  
• Darkseid
  
• Joker

So I hope they don't reform Cheetah, but I'm not worried if they make her sympathetic.

[marhawkman]

Male villains get the same treatment. There was just an entire movie humanizing Joker.

when they did it with Teth Adam it was an incredibly sad story. ;-; Teth Adam was so heart broken by the end of the story that he gave away his powers to Mary Batson even though he knew he might turn to dust as a result. When he went back to being Black Adam you knew he was gonna rip someone a new one...

The Super Friends stigma will fade when WW84 comes out. The same way the Aquaman movie mostly washed the SF stigma from him. The show isn't really played that often on TV anymore and the current generation is too young to remember it, so they base their opinions on the movies.

or DCAU

I'm in favor of making villains more sympathetic, or even reforming them, a lot of the time.

My "Sympathize But Don't Reform" Pile Includes:

• Cheetah
  
• Sinestro
  
• Poison Ivy
  
• Black Manta
  
• Dr Poison

My "Sympathize and Reform" Pile Includes:

• Lex Luthor
  
• Live Wire
  
• New 52 Metallo
  
• Harley Quinn
  
• Harvey "Two-Face" Dent

So I hope they don't reform Cheetah, but I'm not worried if they make her sympathetic.

Wait.. Garth Ranzz (Live Wire) or Leslie Willis(Livewire)?

Poison Ivy has one character trait that doesn't come up in stories often, but is something a lot of people would sympathize with and on it's own is almost enough to make her an anti-hero. She likes children. In the No Man's Land story Ivy took over protecting Gotham's orphans. Also in Batman: TAS there's a recurring theme with her. She keeps calling her plant creations "children" and gets super pissed when Batman destroys them. Why? Well in one episode she mentions that's she's physically incapable of giving birth to children the old fashioned way. And some of her creations ARE actual people! Such as Bruce Wayne's wife: https://batman.fandom.com/wiki/Susan_Maguire (Batman totally murdered her.)

While Diana is known for reforming her villains with Cheetah I don't think so, mainly because she started out as a friend and was already reformed once but it didn't stick. She's also too high on Wonder Woman's list of adversaries. What can be done with someone like Mayfly doesn't really work for her because Cheetah recurs too often.

I like Barbara Minerva as a conflicted character who has desires she can't have because her desires conflict with each other.

Well they were among the earliest examples of female super villains so they have the grandfather clause on their side.

And I don't think it's a coincidence that Selina and Ivy (to a lesser extent) has been written as less and less villainous over time. Whatever mistakes have been made with female heroes (and a lot of mistakes have been made) they at least have more diverse roles and personalities.

Ivy and Selina are not even the same kind of "femme fatale". Ivy doesn't seduce men in the same way Selina does or for the same reason.

[Celgress]

The strange part is that the villains(female or otherwise) who should be reformed never get reformed or the reformation never stick

Ain't that the truth. If you become popular you get turned good, I guess....

[Ulysses]

It’s been pretty clear for a while now, that any female villain that gets over with the fans gets reformed or at least becomes less villainous. Male villains can gain popularity but remain villains. It doesn’t seem to be the case with female villains. It’s why most people’s top ten villains list is pretty low on females. I see the way that they are marketing Cheetah prior to the new movie and it has me concerned.

The thought had not occurred to me, but it does seem like she is not a villain in the Dead Earth book. I would hope she stays a villain.

I want Harley and Ivy to stay straight Villains too. I have no interest in Harley as an anti-hero.

[Uncanny Mutie]

I want Harley and Ivy to stay straight Villains too. I have no interest in Harley as an anti-hero.

The, "I want Harley to stay a straight villain and not become an anti-hero" ship sailed a long time ago. In fact, I think it sailed way back when DC made a conscious decision to take her out of the Joker's shadow and keep the two of them separated. She's eventually going to end up like Catwoman; just being fully viewed and accepted as an anti-hero rather than a villain.

[marhawkman]

The, "I want Harley to stay a straight villain and not become an anti-hero" ship sailed a long time ago. In fact, I think it sailed way back when DC made a conscious decision to take her out of the Joker's shadow and keep the two of them separated. She's eventually going to end up like Catwoman; just being fulled viewed and accepted as an anti-hero rather than a villain.

Which... didn't they start that in Batman: TAS... IE the original story arc for Harley?

[king81992]

The, "I want Harley to stay a straight villain and not become an anti-hero" ship sailed a long time ago. In fact, I think it sailed way back when DC made a conscious decision to take her out of the Joker's shadow and keep the two of them separated. She's eventually going to end up like Catwoman; just being fully viewed and accepted as an anti-hero rather than a villain.

The problem is that Harley's redemption didn't actually change her character.She's the same person as before but the other characters give her a free pass whenever she crosses the line because of she"s 'LOL crazy and randumb'.

[Vordan]

The problem is that Harley's redemption didn't actually change her character.She's the same person as before but the other characters give her a free pass whenever she crosses the line because of she"s 'LOL crazy and randumb'.

Yeah it’s not like Harley has tried to make amends for what she did during her super villain career. We’re just supposed to pretend that Harley was never really that bad and now she’s a hero.

[Agent 86]

A genuine redemption storyline for Barbara / Cheetah would be interesting to see. And I'd love to see Diana genuinely and openly seek to rehabilitate former enemies and potentially even include one of them as part of her regularly recurring group of allies.

I am intrigued about how Barbara would seek to atone for her past sins. Would Barbara be able to free herself of the "Cheetah" forever and return to an ordinary human form? Would Barbara use her archaeological know-how to help the Amazons on Themyscira in some way? Would "Cheetah" join a team of heroes to battle villains?

But, I think a lot of the ... tragedy and interest of Cheetah's storyline (when written well) is that she's essentially "too far gone", either due to Barbara's own emotional and mental issues or because of the influence of the "Cheetah" / Urzkartaga (or other god / being). It's appealing to have a villain who is ... understandable / sympathetic to a degree, but who remains a villain. It allows for more meaningful "conflict" between the hero and the villain because it's not limited to a physical battle, but there is an emotional turmoil there as well.

[Agent Z]

It’s been pretty clear for a while now, that any female villain that gets over with the fans gets reformed or at least becomes less villainous. Male villains can gain popularity but remain villains. It doesn’t seem to be the case with female villains. It’s why most people’s top ten villains list is pretty low on females. I see the way that they are marketing Cheetah prior to the new movie and it has me concerned.

How many of these villainesses stayed reformed? Hell, between Cassandra Cain, Donna Troy, the Amazons, Raven, Jean Loring, Vanessa Kapatelis, Linda Danvers and others, DC has probably turned more female heroes evil than they've turned female villains good. I hardly saw any complaints when Luthor and Lobo were Justice League members and those two are far worse than any version of Cheetah.

And the reason why top ten lists are so low on female villains is because the majority of them are terrible. They're either femme fatales, women scorned, misandrists or lackeys to a male villain.

I don't know, I think there are other avenues to explore. The reason she took the Cheetah powers back in the first place was to save Etta, but she hasn't mentioned her since. If any of Diana's big bads were to be reformed I'd rather it be Ares or Circe. Ares works best as an antagonist and Circe has been inching closer to anti-hero ever since she became Diana's friend as Donna Milton.

Circe being anti-hero was very shortlived and was undone by the writer who introduced it. She hasn't been an anti-hero since and certainly isn't one now.