Controversial Statement: Wonderwoman needs more male readers.

[kjn]

What Robanker said.

[Aahz]

Most of the greatest women of the Marvel Universe (Storm, Jean Grey, Psylocke, Rogue, Emma Frost, Susan StormÂ…) are became great thank to the men who have created and written them. A character doesn't need a writer of the same sex, race, sexuality to be great, he needs a writer able to write him well.

Thats the same with DCs female characters.
And the current trend to put female writers on female characters has sofar rarely resulted in really iconic runs.

[Jim Kelly]

If DC wants Wonder Woman to appeal to males, then DC should lean into that and adjust her more to appeal to males. For example, they could raise the sexual appeal of the character and the book in general. It sounds crass, and I'm sure there would be objections from people, but characters like Vampirella, Bayonetta, Devil Hunter Yohko, Angela, Red Sonja, Dawn, Lady Death, and several others are the way they are for a reason, and they aren't meant to appeal to girls.

Yet, there is a clear conflict here, because if you're also trying to brand Wonder Woman for girls, this type of content wouldn't work.

Have you met the William Messner-Loebs and Mike Deodato run? If not let me introduce you--it's collected in TPB form and Loebs could use the royalty money.

[Gotham citizen]

If DC wants Wonder Woman to appeal to males, then DC should lean into that and adjust her more to appeal to males.
[…]

Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems to me that every time the creators tried to increase the sales of a female character, raising her sexual appeal, it didn't work: the various She-hulk, Lara Croft, Vampirella, Lady Death, Lady Rawhide did never have good sales.

[SiegePerilous02]

If DC wants Wonder Woman to appeal to males, then DC should lean into that and adjust her more to appeal to males. For example, they could raise the sexual appeal of the character and the book in general. It sounds crass, and I'm sure there would be objections from people, but characters like Vampirella, Bayonetta, Devil Hunter Yohko, Angela, Red Sonja, Dawn, Lady Death, and several others are the way they are for a reason, and they aren't meant to appeal to girls.

Yet, there is a clear conflict here, because if you're also trying to brand Wonder Woman for girls, this type of content wouldn't work.

Do any of these actually consistently sell well for a bigger publisher like DC to be satisfied?

[iron chimp]

Do any of these actually consistently sell well for a bigger publisher like DC to be satisfied?

Someone sent me the top 10 comic kickstarters of the week. 48pg lady death comic - 300k pledged with 19 days left....i was very surprised. The catch is that 300k came from 3000 people so it grossed the same as a very successful black label book but had 1/20th of the readers.

[skyvolt2000]

Do any of these actually consistently sell well for a bigger publisher like DC to be satisfied?

Vampi does well enough that one of her trades does very well on Amazon and better than a LOT of DC books including Wonder Woman and at times Batman.

Sonia does well enough that she's beyond 100+ issues and her runs just restart under new writers.

We also got Elvira with a book.

The difference between the companies who do them and DC is most stores won't brush them off. If they were at Dc you might with the right team sniff 12 issues and if it's good maybe more. I would say if you could get 25 issues out of them-it was worth it.

A character doesn't need a writer of the same sex, race, sexuality to be great, he needs a writer able to write him well.

Well part of the issue is if you put those POC and women on books like Batman or Superman-the line starts down the street with manbabies going off left and right.

For many doing that character that is the same as them is the only way someone will see their work with hopes of more shots.

And the current trend to put female writers on female characters has sofar rarely resulted in really iconic runs.

Right now no one gives a damn about icon runs. What many want to see are books out there written by folks who have times have be passed over based on gender or race or teh classic "we got McDuffie & Priest-we don't need anymore black writers."

An Icon run is not the reason Ms Marvel is popular. Static's icon run is not even in trade but he got a tv show. What icon run does Blade have? Hal fans would toss away icon runs for him to have 3 movies like Blade.

[skyvolt2000]

Someone sent me the top 10 comic kickstarters of the week. 48pg lady death comic - 300k pledged with 19 days left....i was very surprised. The catch is that 300k came from 3000 people so it grossed the same as a very successful black label book but had 1/20th of the readers.

But those are still confirmed purchases and folks putting their money where their mouth is. That is not a book getting 33K orders and half that is sitting on shelves in comic book stores.

[Robanker]

Do any of these actually consistently sell well for a bigger publisher like DC to be satisfied?

They do well enough for Dynamite (I pull Sonja pretty often because I just enjoy that character a lot), though that comes with aggressive multi-cover releases to boost numbers. It's not a fair comparison. Dynamite is selling genre, warts and all. They're not trying to get Red Sonja on a little girl's lunchbox or some teenage boy's t-shirt. I don't think they're actively trying to grow an audience so much as get more out of the one they have.

Red Sonja, Vampirella and the like are basically going to sell you on themselves alone and then the quality of the book will dictate if you come back. DC could adopt this concept, but that doesn't grow an audience and very likely doesn't lead to the kind of merchandising the parent company funds the IP for.

And I'm a vocal critic of pushing Wonder Woman further down that path.

DC needs to embrace her entirely, not just push the aggressive warrior side in some way that makes them look ashamed of her other qualities. It's like how they market Superman with glowing red eyes and a grimace; they're ashamed of the totality of his character and trying desperately to convince people the characters are totally badass.

Perhaps I'm just a jackass, but I adore that Wonder Woman punches a giant woman trampling a city on Monday, fights Circe on Tuesday, speaks at a college on Wednesday, hangs out with animals and kids in a park on Thursday before joining the JLA on Rann to fend off a Dominator attack on Friday and then shacking up with her love interest for a Saturday neither will soon forget. Probably catches up with Netflix on Sunday, I don't know. DC wants every day to be Tuesday and that's dreadful. If you want people to keep coming back, spice it up with variety. Until DC stops being ashamed that Diana has a robust character and universe, they're only ever going to get the small subsection of people who like the idea of superheroes filtered through mythology but don't want either done thoroughly; a half-hearted handshake between the genres because-- God forbid-- Diana be as cool as her fans know she is. It may dilute Bat sales!

Bring back a consistent supporting cast. Bring back her rogues. Put the damn sword down and-- PLEASE-- give the Greek gods a dirt nap. I'm of Greek descent and I'm so done with the endless parade of public domain baddies. At this point I'll take a maxi where Blue Snowman is the big bad.

[Menacer]

Likely the wonder woman books are already heavily dominated by men.


In 2014, men accounted for 68.18% and women were 28.64% of the DC population. Flash forward about a year, and men now account for 73.33% and women are now 27.50%. That continues a greater gender divide compared to last year, and it has widened over the past two

[Agent Z]

They do well enough for Dynamite (I pull Sonja pretty often because I just enjoy that character a lot), though that comes with aggressive multi-cover releases to boost numbers. It's not a fair comparison. Dynamite is selling genre, warts and all. They're not trying to get Red Sonja on a little girl's lunchbox or some teenage boy's t-shirt. I don't think they're actively trying to grow an audience so much as get more out of the one they have.

Red Sonja, Vampirella and the like are basically going to sell you on themselves alone and then the quality of the book will dictate if you come back. DC could adopt this concept, but that doesn't grow an audience and very likely doesn't lead to the kind of merchandising the parent company funds the IP for.

And I'm a vocal critic of pushing Wonder Woman further down that path.

DC needs to embrace her entirely, not just push the aggressive warrior side in some way that makes them look ashamed of her other qualities. It's like how they market Superman with glowing red eyes and a grimace; they're ashamed of the totality of his character and trying desperately to convince people the characters are totally badass.

Perhaps I'm just a jackass, but I adore that Wonder Woman punches a giant woman trampling a city on Monday, fights Circe on Tuesday, speaks at a college on Wednesday, hangs out with animals and kids in a park on Thursday before joining the JLA on Rann to fend off a Dominator attack on Friday and then shacking up with her love interest for a Saturday neither will soon forget. Probably catches up with Netflix on Sunday, I don't know. DC wants every day to be Tuesday and that's dreadful. If you want people to keep coming back, spice it up with variety. Until DC stops being ashamed that Diana has a robust character and universe, they're only ever going to get the small subsection of people who like the idea of superheroes filtered through mythology but don't want either done thoroughly; a half-hearted handshake between the genres because-- God forbid-- Diana be as cool as her fans know she is. It may dilute Bat sales!

Bring back a consistent supporting cast. Bring back her rogues. Put the damn sword down and-- PLEASE-- give the Greek gods a dirt nap. I'm of Greek descent and I'm so done with the endless parade of public domain baddies. At this point I'll take a maxi where Blue Snowman is the big bad.

Diana has a lot of issues but I don't think the focus on mythology is one of them. It allows for to occupy a niche of her own that differentiates her from other superheroes. The way it is written may need to change but that in and of itself is not the problem.

[Manakel]

Perhaps I'm just a jackass, but I adore that Wonder Woman punches a giant woman trampling a city on Monday, fights Circe on Tuesday, speaks at a college on Wednesday, hangs out with animals and kids in a park on Thursday before joining the JLA on Rann to fend off a Dominator attack on Friday and then shacking up with her love interest for a Saturday neither will soon forget. Probably catches up with Netflix on Sunday, I don't know. DC wants every day to be Tuesday and that's dreadful. If you want people to keep coming back, spice it up with variety. Until DC stops being ashamed that Diana has a robust character and universe, they're only ever going to get the small subsection of people who like the idea of superheroes filtered through mythology but don't want either done thoroughly; a half-hearted handshake between the genres because-- God forbid-- Diana be as cool as her fans know she is. It may dilute Bat sales!

You just describe the perfect run of not just wonder woman, but a lot of superheroes. When do you start writing for DC ?

[Gotham citizen]

Vampi does well enough that one of her trades does very well on Amazon and better than a LOT of DC books including Wonder Woman and at times Batman.

Sonia does well enough that she's beyond 100+ issues and her runs just restart under new writers.

We also got Elvira with a book.

The difference between the companies who do them and DC is most stores won't brush them off. If they were at Dc you might with the right team sniff 12 issues and if it's good maybe more. I would say if you could get 25 issues out of them-it was worth it.

Actually Dynamite restarts Red Sonja every two/three years, Elvira sells less thann 10,000 copies monthly and Vampirella dropped from 58,000 to 31,000 copies in less than 6 issue, so I don't think we can say those are successful titles.

Well part of the issue is if you put those POC and women on books like Batman or Superman-the line starts down the street with manbabies going off left and right.

For many doing that character that is the same as them is the only way someone will see their work with hopes of more shots.
[…]

I have never seen those "manbabies" cry for the work of Luise Simonson, Ann Nocenti or Gail Simone, so I am inclined to think it is a problem of writers' skills not of writers' sex.

P.S. What does POC means?

Right now no one gives a damn about icon runs. What many want to see are books out there written by folks who have times have be passed over based on gender or race or teh classic "we got McDuffie & Priest-we don't need anymore black writers."

Actually it seems to me that almost everyone does "give a damn" about good stories, not about the sex, sexuality, race, religion, ideology of the writer.

An Icon run is not the reason Ms Marvel is popular. Static's icon run is not even in trade but he got a tv show. What icon run does Blade have? Hal fans would toss away icon runs for him to have 3 movies like Blade.

Since is Miss Marvel popular?

[kjn]

Diana has a lot of issues but I don't think the focus on mythology is one of them. It allows for to occupy a niche of her own that differentiates her from other superheroes. The way it is written may need to change but that in and of itself is not the problem.

I think you're misreading Robanker. The issue isn't that classic mythology is Wonder Woman's turf (it is, and in a post-Pérez world it pretty should be). It's that it has turned into her only turf, that her writers seldom leave.

But I also think that the complaints about the many mythology stories isn't the underlying problem here. Real-world mythology can and did support a huge variety of different types of stories. But too many writers treat mythology as a box where you can pick up a single piece and use it on its own. Rather fewer attempt to see and treat it as a context for stories, and even fewer manage to engage with and modernise the mythology in an effective way.

Even more fundamentally, I think the issue is that too many comics creators today working for DC (and possibly Marvel as well, though I follow them less) have too few tools in their creative and narrative toolbox. The only tool they have is action, and possibly beefcake and cheesecake (or princess cake, in the case of Hulk and She-hulk). They do not use drama, or romance, or convey emotions.

Why was Harleen so well-received and worked so well? Because Sejic had had to learn how to write drama by writing Sunstone—a romcom. Why did King feel like a breath of fresh air? Because he does write drama and character interaction (not that well, I think, but at least he does the attempt).

[Agent Z]

P.S. What does POC means?

People of color.

Since is Miss Marvel popular?

Since she became the breakout hit of Marvel in 2014 and has been featured in games and cartoons.