The Most Egrious Misrepresentation of a Character I Ever Saw Was...

[responsarbre]

Most misrepresentations of characters set a precedent, which makes the creators following a portrayal to continue to screw them up But here’s my top 22:

...
4. Post-Cain Mockingbird
...
13. Post-Gillen America Chavez

Well that's quite a list for the "most egregious misrepresentation", isn't it?
Still, I can't exactly tell where you're coming from with those two:
Cain's characterization of Mockingbird throughout her one-shot and her ongoing was pretty consistent for Bobbi; Cain's actually a huge Mockingbird fan and referenced a lot of her deep continuity that other people didn't. Only thing she really did that people disliked was the Phantom Rider thing, but that's not really a misrepresentation of her character is it? Just an awkward retcon, that I don't think really stuck anyways. You can make a bigger argument for Nick Spencer's Secret Avengers and the Battle Scars crew having mishandled Mockingbird.
As for America Chavez, was she really even a defined character under Joe Casey so as to be misrepresented? Vengeance was decidedly mediocre, and America didn't make much of an impression in that besides her cheesecake costume. Even then, Gillen actually kept a lot of things about her personality consistent; she's not the type to willingly stick herself on a big superteam, she's pretty cocky, and she's hotheaded. Even Ewing's America was right along those same lines. Only misinterpretation so far has been Rivera (which I actually do think is bad enough to include in this thread).

[Alan2099]

No votes for Captain America in Civil War yet?

[KurtW95]

Dude, Cain royally screwed up Mockingbird. By far the most egregious thing was changing it from Mockingbird getting raped by Phantom Rider and her killing him to her having a consensual affair with him (cheating on Hawkeye) and murdring him. Then there was the glaring nonsense and botched continuity when it came to the part with her complaining that there were no female superheroes to identify with while showing kid her with a Spider-Man lunchbox (she is older than Peter Parker) and a picture of X-Factor Cyclops (she was already married to Hawkeye at that point in the comics and Scott was still a teen in the original uniforms when she had been introduced as a doctor a SHIELD agent), and Johnny Storm (who she is also older than). I honestly don’t think Chelsea Cain had read a Marvel comic book before starting her run. Then with America, Casey and Dragotta intended her to be a legacy version of the WWII character who was a Hispanic human from the main Marvel Universe with similar powers to the original. Then Gillen made it so she had nothing to do with the WWII character and came from a dimension made by Wiccan, where she has lesbian parents. Then Rivera made her a complete moron and an alien from a planet of all women that are lesbians literally named Strong Woman in Spanish. It’s really too bad Casey and Dragotta never got to publish their idea of where the character would go in what was announced from Image, but I think it’s as good a guess as any that Marvel sent them a cease and desist.

[responsarbre]

Dude, Cain royally screwed up Mockingbird. By far the most egregious thing was changing it from Mockingbird getting raped by Phantom Rider and her killing him to her having a consensual affair with him (cheating on Hawkeye) and murdring him. Then there was the glaring nonsense and botched continuity when it came to the part with her complaining that there were no female superheroes to identify with while showing kid her with a Spider-Man lunchbox (she is older than Peter Parker) and a picture of X-Factor Cyclops (she was already married to Hawkeye at that point in the comics and Scott was still a teen in the original uniforms when she had been introduced as a doctor a SHIELD agent), and Johnny Storm (who she is also older than). I honestly don’t think Chelsea Cain had read a Marvel comic book before starting her run. Then with America, Casey and Dragotta intended her to be a legacy version of the WWII character who was a Hispanic human from the main Marvel Universe with similar powers to the original. Then Gillen made it so she had nothing to do with the WWII character and came from a dimension made by Wiccan, where she has lesbian parents. Then Rivera made her a complete moron and an alien from a planet of all women that are lesbians literally named Strong Woman in Spanish. It’s really too bad Casey and Dragotta never got to publish their idea of where the character would go in what was announced from Image, but I think it’s as good a guess as any that Marvel sent them a cease and desist.

I think you're reading wayyyyy too hard into that female superhero thing. It was a single comment. I also don't think it's particularly OOC for Bobbi to complain about sexism; it's pretty consistent among a lot of the lady spies at SHIELD that sexism in the workplace is a thing and I think she definitely has examples of being treated badly because of her sex in her past. I also think you're reading in too hard into that illustration -- first off, that Human Torch is obviously Jim Hammond since he's next to Captain America and Namor, and I also don't think you're supposed to literally think Spider-Man merch existed when Bobbi was a kid. (Or ever.) All of those panels are just illustrative, not meant to be taken literally.

The way the Phantom Rider thing was handled was shitty, but the Phantom Rider story itself was shitty in the first place. Really shitty! Bobbi was brainwashed and kidnapped and raped, and then treated awfully by everyone around her, even her husband. Cain was attempting to get rid of an awful misogynistic part of Bobbi's history, but it didn't really work, and for that matter, I don't think it even really read as a full retcon, since Cain didn't do that much to revisit the story.

Also, it's pretty patronizing to act like Cain didn't read comics before Mockingbird. She published a whole book about superheroes 12 years ago. The reason she pitched for Mockingbird is because she's a lifelong Bobbi fan, and Bendis knew this and literally begged her to pitch a Mockingbird comic. Cain referenced characters from her introductory issues that no one has touched since in the 50th Anniversary one-shot she wrote, Cain was literally the only writer to do anything with the aftermath of what happened to Bobbi in Battle Scars, and she was the first writer to significantly reconcile her original depiction as a scientist with the spy/superhero stuff she's been doing.

[XPac]

Messiah series. What those "writers" did with Bishop was a racist atrocity.

That was the first thing that popped up in my head too.

They never really gave Bishop much of a bad door to really "fix" him either. Usually this sort of thing was due to mind control or whatever.

[KurtW95]

I think it was meant to be literal andthat looked much more like Johnny than Jim. And even if it was Jim, that doesn’t explain X-Factor Cyclops. I stand by my position that Chelsea Cain didn’t do any research and read come Wikipedia articles while turning Bobbi into a nasty self-insert. Also, if we biy the premise that it wasn’t literal, the same time those other characters existed, there were plenty of female superheroes like Jean, Janet, and Sue. And if not, there were plenty of female superheroes in WWII as well, like Miss America, Spitfire, Blonde Phantom, Golden Girl etc. But I wouldn’t expect Cain to know who any of them are. (Also, Jim McCann wrote her very well with good spy and science stuff.) And with regard to the Phantom Rider thing, I think it would be far more empowering for a woman to kill her rapist than be an adulteress murderer. It’s hard not to say that doesn’t make her a bad person.

[KurtW95]

That was the first thing that popped up in my head too.

They never really gave Bishop much of a bad door to really "fix" him either. Usually this sort of thing was due to mind control or whatever.

They had a really easy out with the Demon Bear stuff too, but they weirdly chose to make that take place afterwards and let it all be him up to that point.

[ed2962]

Dude, Cain royally screwed up Mockingbird. By far the most egregious thing was changing it from Mockingbird getting raped by Phantom Rider and her killing him to her having a consensual affair with him (cheating on Hawkeye) and murdring him. Then there was the glaring nonsense and botched continuity when it came to the part with her complaining that there were no female superheroes to identify with while showing kid her with a Spider-Man lunchbox (she is older than Peter Parker) and a picture of X-Factor Cyclops (she was already married to Hawkeye at that point in the comics and Scott was still a teen in the original uniforms when she had been introduced as a doctor a SHIELD agent), and Johnny Storm (who she is also older than). I honestly don’t think Chelsea Cain had read a Marvel comic book before starting her run. Then with America, Casey and Dragotta intended her to be a legacy version of the WWII character who was a Hispanic human from the main Marvel Universe with similar powers to the original. Then Gillen made it so she had nothing to do with the WWII character and came from a dimension made by Wiccan, where she has lesbian parents. Then Rivera made her a complete moron and an alien from a planet of all women that are lesbians literally named Strong Woman in Spanish. t’s really too bad Casey and Dragotta never got to publish their idea of where the character would go in what was announced from Image, but I think it’s as good a guess as any that Marvel sent them a cease and desist.

I was actually really looking forward to that. I'm disappointed that it seems like it's not coming out.

[KC]

Having read Tamaki's run, she wasn't at all a Hulk clone. She wasn't the She-Hulk we knew, I agree (although I don't think a new thing because of specific events in her life is the same thing as misrepresenting a character - was David Michelinie misrepresenting Iron Man when he started suffering from alcoholism?). I hope she recovers and reverts to status quo (I'm sure she will), but that's not the same thing.

My Hulk Clone comment was more of a critique of how Aaron writes her. I disagree, Tamaki misrepresented what the character should act like and what makes her such a fun and enduring character.

[MaximoffTrash]

Although the seeds were planted in earlier stories for her becoming a bit unstable by Byrne and Micheline. It's not pleasant but having these powers come at a price for some of these characters.

Bendis basically just ignored everything post-Byrne and think he is basing his work on something solid.

[Skedatz]

So a writer is on your favourite comic.

And he mis-writes your favourite character. We all know that happens!

One issue, two issues...

At one point do you stop buying??

We don't stop. Because as avid comic fans there's something wrong with us on the inside and compels us to continually buy things we hate. Because we secretly hate ourselves.

Although the seeds were planted in earlier stories for her becoming a bit unstable by Byrne and Micheline. It's not pleasant but having these powers come at a price for some of these characters.

Yeah, there were hints. But for me it was really more how Bendis brought it about and tied it to seemingly "womanly issues," of motherhood. The guy really just can't write women that well.

[LifeIsILL]

[Frontier]

Really milking Kraven's revival for all it's worth .

[Mike_Murdock]

He was successful there, wasn't he?

[KurtW95]

What is this from? I know they’ve treated him like a joke in Squirrel Girl, but the art here is not terrible, so it must be from somewhere else.