Meredith & David Finch Go "More Mainstream" with "Wonder Woman"

[toastedbread]

And yet the panel you provide has women who were prisoners being freed. Marston's Amazons enjoyed tying each other up and spanking, or just plain frolicking — when not making preachy statements.

A far better comparison of what Wonder Woman can be is the Jiminez era (minus the Lois Lane issue, where Diana basically spells out her philosophy) or the 60s non-costume era where she was working to help women from things like human trafficking. Diana is a principled fighter, the real question is how to use the principles in a way that doesn't come off as preachy.


First, DC wants to attract all readers. They already have a number of titles aimed at women — in the Vertigo line for sure — and Wonder Woman is a broad-appeal character.
Second, mentioning The Hunger Games is nice, but for every success there is a failure.

What makes me think Mrs. Meredith has a chance is that the Zenoscope books have the closest setting to what Wonder Woman has to deal with (literary vs real world).
If putting women on books about women were really the solution, Catwoman by Nocenti would be a success, Birds Of Prey by Christie Marx would be a success… heck Devi Greyson would have been a blowout success on Wonder Woman a few years back. Comics are a far more complicated medium.

Just noting an attribution error - this was said by Blacksun, not me.

[toastedbread]

And I hope you can understand why, as someone who is a long term reader of the characters, why I find the rapid rise of criticism that everything must fit what has become a loud (and somewhat angry) agenda, I am getting increasingly frustrated over the drowning out of those who just want to enjoy something as it once was and should be again.

(Personally, I am also finding increased frustration with the "you're a man, you can't do x" imbalance in my profession too, but I try very hard to separate that from my hobbies.)

Okay, sadly I don't think there's any point discussing this further. You're still trying to explain why it's permissible to associate the term feminism with a caricature of itself in order to make men more comfortable and feel less attacked. The bottom line is that you seem to think that feminism is genuinely some sort of bogeyman in the industry right now. I previously assumed when you spoke of a minority you meant a minority more broadly. But it now sounds like you are referring to the general tenor of feminist criticism in the comic book world, and that you believe this represents an aggressively misandrist stance that should be ignored.

I cannot express how strongly I object to that. Or how frustrating it is to have to combat that perception every time I want to talk about something to do with the representation of women. And believe me, I have been on the other sides of some of those issues (N52 Catwoman #1 springs to mind - I liked that; heck I often think people over react to situations regarding Wonder Woman. I just don't think "please don't actively disclaim feminism," should be a controversial statement). But now we're at the point where I feel I'm wafting around my credentials so I can be taken seriously.

You frame your final statement "as a long time reader," in response to my statement, "as a woman." I do not know if it was your intention, so I will assume it was not, but it's easy to read that as an intentional contrast. An implicit assertion that I am not a long time reader. That would be incorrect. The thing you enjoyed "as it once was," was a thing that was not always very welcoming to me.

I think we are just coming at this from drastically different perspectives with regards to the current state of the comics industry and online community. I'm not sure they're reconcilable.

I suppose, the only thing I would ask before bowing out of this, is that you take a moment to consider the fact that if very large numbers of people who are actually affected by these issues are attempting to tell you that it upsets them, perhaps there is something to that.

[Batzarro]

I suppose, the only thing I would ask before bowing out of this, is that you take a moment to consider the fact that if very large numbers of people who are actually affected by these issues are attempting to tell you that it upsets them, perhaps there is something to that.

Point well taken. But remember that there is another side, and it's not necessarily the side of people who want to hold women down. Alot of folks think that the basic ideas of feminism are worthy goals, but have a problem with the current crop of leaders in the movement. Every philosophy created is capable of overreach.

[Brian from Canada]

But it now sounds like you are referring to the general tenor of feminist criticism in the comic book world, and that you believe this represents an aggressively misandrist stance that should be ignored.

Not ignored as much acknowledged that it doesn't represent the full extent of what feminism actually stands for.

Viewed another way: D. Finch is sending a warning that just because the writer of Wonder Woman is a woman doesn't automatically mean she'll be pushing stories about women's issues through the character. There are going to be times where it will be adventure for adventure's sake, and that runs contrary to the demands of a more proactive stance on how comics should deal with women's issues.

There is no way Wonder Woman shouldn't stand for equality — that would be dismissal of a key component of the character.

I cannot express how strongly I object to that. Or how frustrating it is to have to combat that perception every time I want to talk about something to do with the representation of women.

I sympathize. Greatly. There are some very valid discussions that need to be done out there.

For example, I think that the criticism of Cassie's chest size made two huge mistakes in limiting its focus. One, it automatically dismissed any mention that there are young women out there who are similar in body shape or chest size as being ignorant and misogynist. Two, more importantly, when I made the suggestion that this be used proactively by sending a letter to DC and urging them to think about the body image messages being sent to young female readers about body, it was treated like an afterthought: outrage was more important.

The outrage against the bombshell covers also refused to accept the historical roots, and the column at CBR refused a definition of context because it wasn't in their dictionary. This could have been used to open a discussion about what is and what is inspirational of these images, or how we have changed by adding the beefcake image to follow it, but instead it was all about how wrong DC was. Limiting discussion is wrong.

You frame your final statement "as a long time reader," in response to my statement, "as a woman." I do not know if it was your intention, so I will assume it was not, but it's easy to read that as an intentional contrast. An implicit assertion that I am not a long time reader. That would be incorrect. The thing you enjoyed "as it once was," was a thing that was not always very welcoming to me.

It wasn't my intention at all. I took "as a woman" as an identification of where you are coming from. Vanguard charged me previously with not being a Wonder Woman fan despite my being a follower of the character since the 70s and I similarly wanted you to understand where I was coming from.

If it wasn't always very welcoming, please tell me what parts you don't like. I'm really interested in that because I find Wonder Woman's huge shifts in framework fascinating. There is no single character in the DCU who has gone from happy adventurer to romance-addled super heroine to Emma Peel super agent to modern superheroing to living embodiment of Greek mythology, and so on. There are parts which are not appealing to me either, but in the end I still think that a Wonder Woman who — at the heart of it all — is a super heroine that had great adventures standing against injustice while not solely going out to find gender imbalances is the type of adventure that is the core of what remains appealing generation after generation.

That's what M. Finch says in the interview. She wants to go back to the Lynda Carter interpretation of the character. D. Finch adds that she is strong, she is beautiful… but he's hesitant to use the term "feminist" because he doesn't want to give Wonder Woman a political agenda if they are trying to retrench her as a general hero after three years of being kept apart from that by the creative team in her solo book.

I think we are just coming at this from drastically different perspectives with regards to the current state of the comics industry and online community. I'm not sure they're reconcilable.

I don't expect every position to be reconcilable; I hope that each contributor can be willing to acknowledge each other's position and work to explore a greater appreciation of the material. Right now, the online community's handling of the industry seems at cross purposes with that, and it's not even a gradual change. Go back to just before New 52 started and there wasn't this hostility to a company in general or portions of the readership in specificity. Your opinion would only get dismissed if it wasn't defensible with some logic from the source text… and even then, it was done kindly with encouragement to try and find that evidence or come up with a different approach to the thesis.

I appreciate people having different opinions on the comics when they want to make their love of the medium known.

I suppose, the only thing I would ask before bowing out of this, is that you take a moment to consider the fact that if very large numbers of people who are actually affected by these issues are attempting to tell you that it upsets them, perhaps there is something to that.

You are the first person I've encountered in the online community who is attempting to articulate how the reaction to an… incompatible?… version of feminism, one that works to shame the other part of the community, is upsetting because you find it dismissal of the very real goals and needs of the movement. And I hope that you don't stop trying to articulate that because the community really does need that. It needs more people to explain that the continuous accusations are not meant to shame the male readership as much as a vocal minority are charging the industry with; there is a much larger base of feminists who want women to be treated with far greater respect.

It was a poor choice of words from Mr. Finch, but not one I think can be totally dismissed. I look at the upcoming television season and its desire to show women in roles of power (with very few men in those roles), I look at the way literature is trying desperately to cater to young women because of their commercial power over young men (who are stuck without development because they had "it" already), I see the criticism that men just aren't serving the needs of women in the entertainments or how they are misogynist in some of those male traditions, and I can foresee that there is going to be some sort of push back from creators who feel pressured to join the mob and not work on their own path.

Mr. Finch is, I think, trying to protect he and his wife from future criticism that their Wonder Woman isn't feminist enough. It happened to the character in the seventies — and by Gloria Steinham herself, one of the most important leaders in the movement. Can Wonder Woman be a positive female role model and not be considered a "feminist"? It's a very real question that needs to be asked and discussed, hopefully rationally.

[toastedbread]

Point well taken. But remember that there is another side, and it's not necessarily the side of people who want to hold women down. Alot of folks think that the basic ideas of feminism are worthy goals, but have a problem with the current crop of leaders in the movement. Every philosophy created is capable of overreach.

And just about every rights movement is hit with that same accusation when they start asking for things that require actual change. You've got nice ideas, but you're going too quick, you're being too rude, you're reaching too far... History usually takes the side of the leaders of those movements and we look back and think, how could people not see they were asking for something reasonable, because we are lucky enough to have grown up in a world a little more healed, a little less oppressive. Some people are giant jerks. Some people are just asking for reasonable things, but we live in a world that's trained us to be uncomfortable about them. It can be hard to tell which is which. Especially when some people ask for reasonable things but act like giant jerks because they're tired and frustrated, which can be hard to deal with on a personal level, but doesn't make them wrong about how important it is either.

It's a messed up world. Sadly there is no real Diana.

Brian - as I said, I'm not sure where the discussion would go from here, and certainly right now I need to go to bed (UK resident) and don't have the attention to engage with your substantial post due to tiredness, but thank you for the conversation.

[tabo61]

So no more mythical gods and babies on this new run?

[Batzarro]

So no more mythical gods and babies on this new run?

Magic eight-ball says....doubtful.

[Lasraik]

Why don't we reserve judgement until we actually read the book?

[Vanguard-01]

Why don't we reserve judgement until we actually read the book?

Because the Internet is where logic like this goes to die.

[gwangung]

And just about every rights movement is hit with that same accusation when they start asking for things that require actual change. You've got nice ideas, but you're going too quick, you're being too rude, you're reaching too far...

QFT.

Remember, this was said about Martin Luther King Jr. up until the day he died.