The Hellfire Gala

[juan678]

https://twitter.com/ValerioSchiti/st...43411410210818

[LordAllMIghty]

https://twitter.com/ValerioSchiti/st...43411410210818

Black Girl Magik...

[GeneTitan]

It is maybe the first "event" not aimed at male comic fans as the primary audience. This one of the first events I would say that Women and the LGBTQ community are primary targets for this "event". Obviously, some of the straight male community that has everything cater to them in the comic world does not know how to react to the event. When you are use to all of the toys being yours you have problems sharing them. The funny thing is we have had stuff like this before in the past the Marvel swimsuit issues but unlike in the past but this isn't completely catered to straight Male view, some people can't see the purpose for it because it is not aimed directly at pleasing them.

It is just FUN party that is going to take over the books for a month. If you like action there is going to be that in some books, If you like stuff being announced they are going to be stuff that changes the status quo BUT it mostly a FUN event where X-men get to dress up and party, If you like high fashion and seeing X-men doing non-combat stuff this is for you. Anyways women make up 46% of comic book buyers, I believe I saw a number where women are primary buyers of sci-fi and video games now. Only Catering to males alone not trying to capitalize on your female audience is committing suicide in the market.

-In thinking about the have been a couple of wedding issues in the past might qualify for my main point but this might first non-wedding big event not aimed at dudes. If I was trying to get my wife to read X-men this would be the type of thing I would use to ease her into reading it.

You know what...you're right. This post is so true. A lot of the complaints about the fashion and the Gala reek of homophobia. I'm gay and when I was 13 and picked up my first issue of Uncanny the mutant allegory spoke to me on a deep level.
I don't understand how a comic book that has been such a huge metaphor for the LGBTQ+ community is getting so much hate when they embrace something like fashion!
Again, I can't wait for The Hellfire Gala!

[Odd Rödney]

You know what...you're right. This post is so true. A lot of the complaints about the fashion and the Gala reek of homophobia. I'm gay and when I was 13 and picked up my first issue of Uncanny the mutant allegory spoke to me on a deep level.
I don't understand how a comic book that has been such a huge metaphor for the LGBTQ+ community is getting so much hate when they embrace something like fashion!
Again, I can't wait for The Hellfire Gala!

I'm with ya! I'm a straight white dude and I'm super excited for the Gala! I'm digging the different styles on display!

[GeneTitan]

I'm with ya! I'm a straight white dude and I'm super excited for the Gala! I'm digging the different styles on display!

I'm loving the creativity. It's like an issue where we get new costumes!

[Ra-El]

You know what...you're right. This post is so true. A lot of the complaints about the fashion and the Gala reek of homophobia. I'm gay and when I was 13 and picked up my first issue of Uncanny the mutant allegory spoke to me on a deep level.
I don't understand how a comic book that has been such a huge metaphor for the LGBTQ+ community is getting so much hate when they embrace something like fashion!
Again, I can't wait for The Hellfire Gala!

My only problem with the Gala is that Cyclops looks horrible! I wish he have been dressed by Lucas Werneck because his designs are amazing and I would love to see it become some sort of new uniform, while Cyclop's I hope is forgotten as soon as the Hellfire Gala is over.

[the illustrious mr. kenway]

I'm with ya! I'm a straight white dude and I'm super excited for the Gala! I'm digging the different styles on display!

Same here. I'm looking forward to picking up the SWORD and Way of X tie ins.

[Rang10]

You know what...you're right. This post is so true. A lot of the complaints about the fashion and the Gala reek of homophobia. I'm gay and when I was 13 and picked up my first issue of Uncanny the mutant allegory spoke to me on a deep level.
I don't understand how a comic book that has been such a huge metaphor for the LGBTQ+ community is getting so much hate when they embrace something like fashion!
Again, I can't wait for The Hellfire Gala!

I don't find anything hmophobic on criticizing Hellfide Gala. People are criticizing how much atention fashion is getting while the story suffer. High fashion has very little wide appeal.

[LordAllMIghty]

I'm actually wondering if we're going to have a villain pop up to ruin the Gala.

[Grunty]

I have the feeling, people will still discuss these outfits after the gala is over and when they run out of having something to say about the shown outfits, it will be about what absent characters should or would have worn.

So even if sales are miserable, at least some will have fun for weeks.

I'm actually wondering if we're going to have a villain pop up to ruin the Gala.

Judging by the solicitations for the issues after it, nothing really problematic or shocking by outsiders seems to happen, since everyone either goes back to business or just handles their hangovers (Way of X).

So if villains show up, they would likely be someone unimportant or comparable harmless, like the usual bunch of anti-mutant radicals shooting the place up and being taken down quickly, because of walking into a party filled with super powered veterans of many battles to save the world or try to destroy it.

[Lady Midnight]

I'm actually wondering if we're going to have a villain pop up to ruin the Gala.

Of course, we are!

[superjosh]

I think one issue with this assessment is that for all we know the actual buying readership of X-men comics might still be 80% straight male and 15% straight woman. Which would reflect the accounts given by various comicbook shop owners around the US and their experience with actualy selling these comics to people (most sales data is about comics sold to the shops not to the customer).

Of course these are only anecdotal informations and not hard emperic data, so i can't with good conscious say that this is fact or back this claim up with said data. But i would like to use it as basis for an argument.

Because while 46% of all comic readers these days might be woman, it doesn't mean that 46% of all X-men comic buyers are in this percentage aswell. Because one sad fact that has been confirmed over and over, is that the entry level for getting into the actual super hero comics like X-men, Spiderman, Avengers, etc. is quite high.
Resulting in a static to dwindeling readership of the "old guard", while most newcommers, especialy the growing number of female comic readers are gathering around books and genres with much lower entry level. Especialy manga who have a straight and easy to follow continuity (buy book #1 and read it till the newest volume and you get the whole overall story), or indie-comics which are often short self contained works, with the occasional sequel.

There is for example the problem of finding comic shops at all, because they are becomming a rarity and often live from an established habitual buyership (again traditionaly straight male), with only the occasional newcommer either finding them by accident or via impulses from the established buyers "You gotta give this store a chance, you can find all kinds of cool stuff there, not just comics.".
However these shops are important for the classic super hero comics, because the owners can often give a basic guidance on what the newcommer might want to try out for their first entry book.
Because long continuity and in recent decades the notorious number 1 relaunches are making it near impossible to get into them without a certain mindset or long pre-research on the internet.

There is a reason why some are refering to number 1 relaunch issues as "Perfect jumping OFF points" . Because they ruin the chance of actualy attracting readers with an easy to follow straight 1->100 coninuity.

Something not as easily provided by digital shops which are often just as difficult to find or identitfy as reliable and since there are no (as far as i know) "streaming" type sites either, where someone pays a monthly fee and can get access to 60+ years of Marvel comics. So digital is often still very unattractive because of the high prices for the books, which you can lose at any time if the site goes bankrupt and no clue where to start.

And even buying physical copies online like on Amazon has the old problem of people having no clue what to buy because all these books have become notoriously complicated to track. Making self contained short works the much easier to follow books to try out, the more desired item than classic super hero comics.

There is also the known culture which has formed itself around the traditional super hero comics of the big two, which can greatly vary in supporting or rejecting "newcommers". With rejection being often the result of a protective attitude born from feeling "their thing" being invaded by the kind of people who in the past have ridiculed them for liking these books "before they became cool".
While there are of course also those who try to get people into these works with great enthusiam, they are often overshadowed by the louder group rejecting them. Giving the whole genre a bad rap and once again pushing new readers to genres and works not "tained" by bad rep.

And let's not kid around, the current status quo of the X-men comics is seriously difficult to get into, both because of how continuity heavy it is and how much it differs from the traditional depictions of the X-men in cartoons, comics and video games.

Which brings us to the problem of suddently trying to make an established comic book series/franchise, that was traditional read primarily by male readers, more attractive for woman and LGBTQ readers, without actualy making these work more accessible, affordable or welcoming to them.
Which i would argue is still the case here, because all the buzz created around the Hellfire Gala (good or bad) might very likely not attract more new people to buy the books, as much is makes "outsider" talk ABOUT them more or comment on the drama currenly created by "love it" vs. "hate it" arguments on the internet because of these outfits.

And that's before we consider the whole subject of woman or people of LGBTQ nature potentialy being repulsed by attempts at trying to court them like this, feeling like someone is trying to pander to them, while they might actualy prefer the tradtional way X-men comics have operated.
Meaning they could actualy push not just the "straight white male" reader away but even those they had allready gained of the other groups, with this sudden focus.

Basicly while officialy catering to a new different audience with these things they might shoot entirely in the dark, because they aren't doing the work that might actualy be necessary to attract them correctly and instead just repulse the tradtional audience which is actualy maintaining these works of fictions.

Though on the opposite end. If my rough numbers mentioned above are correct. We still wouldn't actualy know what these readers might like.

Because for all we know half of these (asumed) 80% straight male readers might actualy enjoy an occasional dress up party with outlandish outfits once in a while, while the 15% of female readers might be mostly annoyed by it, because they don't want to be pandered to in works where they don't want them. Which would ironicaly mean that this whole thing could still end up in a positive increase in sales, but from the completly unintendet audience.

My personal opinion btw. Let the wallets decide what ever this has an audience or not.

I appreciate the analysis, but a few points I'd like to add:

1) Letting the wallets decide is not always a good thing. Maybe good for short term success, but not good for progress or blossoming work for the future. An example is politics. If you always go with the majority, it would be harder to overcome terrible institutional things like slavery, segregation, sexism, etc.

2) Even if the majority of the comic buyers is like 80% cis/straight/male there is nothing stopping a private company from deciding that they want to focus on ANY market they choose.

3) On the issue of pandering... I feel this is a little bit manipulative. Kind of like depriving someone of something they never had because you've convinced them they don't want it anyway. (I know there's a saying for this! Just can't think of it right now.) I don't feel pandered to by this event. I see it as an event that is interesting. Full stop.

4) The accessibility issue. This is a good point when pandering is very obvious and poorly thought out... situations where it's like "let's try to lure in this and that audience". I personally am not getting that from this event. The only kind of eye-rolly moment for me so far is the "they came to slay!" tagline. From reading comments, the only people who are making claims of pandering are the people that are having an extreme reaction to it... mainly straight cis males. As an BIPOC queer person, I'm not getting any of that and I don't like that being projected onto me.

[CellarDweller]

https://twitter.com/marvel/status/13...881415168?s=21

Bobby kinda looks sickening, i love the ice wings and the shoes ����

So, not only did Bobby come out of the closet, he came out of RuPaul's closet too!


No offense meant to anyone in the LGBT community, I'm a gay man, but that was the first thing that popped into my head when I saw that look.

[Big Joe]

I'm not the target audience for this, I suppose, but I am quite excited by it. I think that's possibly because I was an art student in the 80s and part of the course was fashion. I had a teacher who was a fashion designer and I really enjoyed watching her work and seeing her drawings.

I have liked seeing the designs here as well, and imagining the process. I saw some comments the other day about how little detail there was in the faces as compared to the costumes, and thought that was the point.

But anyway, if this makes women or gay men feel more included and empowered, then I'm all for it. The more diverse the readers are the more inclusive the comics must become, they have to represent their audience after all. Hopefully this kind of thing leads to more inclusive societies and more acceptance of difference, and where better to do it than the X-Men.

It's great to see in my view.

[Cane_danko]

It’s genius level marketing imo. And the story is not suffering. Far from it. Its arguably the best its ever been.