This special exhibit at the National Gallery was enlightening. I benefited from seeing a collection of Lichtenstein’s work in person; context is quite meaningful in the case of his work – it is, in fact, the point of his work.
It’s one thing to see digital representations of his comic-inspired works and to compare the to some of the comic originals, (a number of critiques complain that the comic originals are “better” than his reproductions – “Lichtenstein made amateurish renditions of art made by better people and better artists than him.”) but the physical size of many of his pieces is impressive and means something in the comparison; Lichtenstein is not just reproducing comic panels, but is also enlarging them to outsized proportions and divorcing them from the rest of their comic story to make commentary on social issues.
The size of his works emphasize the messages and alter their meanings beyond the intent of the comic panels, and the impact of that commentary is not something as easily dismissed when you’re standing in front of a collection of his works. Looking at his works in person, it becomes clear that comparing a 2-inch comic panel and a 10-foot-tall painting that is grouped with other paintings of the same subject matter is a silly and willfully obtuse exercise.
And though Lichtenstein was often influenced by comics, he also took inspiration from MANY other sources and, and his execution of those works is superb; he wasn’t just a painter but produced bold and interesting works in other mediums as well.
In viewing his work, I came away with a dozen creative ideas of my own and a new found respect for an artist I hadn’t understood previously, and for that I’m very glad.
Entertainment Weekly reveals that in an upcoming issue of the Justice League, Wonder Woman and Superman will start knocking boots.
Yup. From the reaction I saw on Facebook and the comments at DC Women Kicking Ass, fans don’t seem to be into it, and it doesn’t break down across male/female gender lines the way discussions often do when it comes to the topic of female super heroes.
DC Women has some great points in their article; they’ve basically devalued Lois Lane, who used to be a prominent female character at DC. They’ve made Wonder Woman subordinate in ways that are out of character, and it’s especially a problem for Wonder Woman given that they’ve already trashed her origin story.
I’m not really a fan of it. I don’t think he’s good enough for her, and think she belongs with Steve Trevor. It really depends on how serious this whole thing is – are they just macking on each other for one issue as a stunt, or are they really going to be together? But at the same time, I ignore the Justice League anyway, because I really don’t care that much about hanging out with the boys. I only care about her main title, such as it is. I added it to my pull list in the beginning because – it’s Wonder Woman. She’s the original, the coolest, the girl I fell in love with on the television. I’ve pretty much disliked the entire 52 reboot of Wonder Woman, though; it’s crappy Greek mythology, crappy feminism and where the hell are the bad guys? Could we fight some crime, please?
But I’ve had serious second thoughts about dropping Diana from my pull list. It almost feels sacrilegious to say so, but I’m thinking the guys in charge at DC really don’t get it, and may never get it.
I added my first Marvel Comics title to my comic book pull list today – Captain Marvel. The “new” Captain Marvel is the former “Ms. Marvel” — Carol Danvers the female adjunct to Captain Marvel from the old comics, before he died. She’s had a comic for years, but Marvel has reworked her costume and has her taking over the title of “Captain” in this new series.
The story is not too bad; a little heavy on the overt “girl power!” charge at the beginning of the book; with the villain taunting Danvers with sexist remarks while she and Captain America battle him, and of course she wins the day, because “girls are awesome! I thought none of that really needed to be said, but the rest of the story was great, with Danvers working through her reluctance to take on the title of “Captain” from her old friend and mentor.
It seems that Azzarello has been granted free reign by the flakkers to reinterpret anything at all except for those aspects which serve to perpetuate misogyny. The supposed vileness of Queen Hippolyta and her brutally emasculating sex-killers ought to be forever respected, it seems, but everything else is apparently up for grabs. And so, there’s been not a murmur of discontent – let alone any spittle-flecked raging – about the innovative if hyper-real rendition of the Greek underworld and its ruler in this month’s Chasing Shadows. It’s something which really does leave the suspicion that all that rage and indignation about the sanctity of those old myths, about the necessary rightness of portraying the Amazons as despicable man-murderers, was nothing more than a desperate attempt to shout down anyone who might have pointed out how unpleasantly sexist, and indeed profoundly stupid, Wonder Woman #7 was.
Or: it was never about the sexist myths of times gone by and everything about the sexist myths of 2012.
I drafted Wonder Woman #7 for my CBR reviews last week not knowing what the issue was about, and it resulted in the toughest review I’ve had to write for CBR yet. To CBR’s credit, though the review skewed a bit editorial, they ran it. However, we have strict word counts over there and I have many thoughts and feelings…so here we are on She Has No Head! five days later.
I have loved and supported the new Wonder Woman under Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang. I supported this book vehemently even when I did not agree with all the choices they made — like Wonder Woman being Zeus’ daughter and thus a demi-god — because I understand that writers have to do things that are unpopular sometimes in order to tell the best story. And in fact, doing something unpopular can often be the right thing to do. In addition to that, I also understand that stories are not tailor made FOR ME, and I don’t expect them to be. So I accepted the changes as many fans did and continued to read, and frankly to love, so much of what Azzarello and Chiang were doing.
And more:
I spent the weekend trying to decide whether this story would have hit as painfully if not for the current state of women in the real world. In the U.S. alone we are in a fever of women’s reproductive rights being stripped away, women being denied a seat at the table for discussion of these rights, women who use birth control publicly being called ‘sluts’, and women being physically violated by things like transvaginal probes. Not to mention everything from continued victim blaming for rape, sexual harassment in the workplace, and women still (in 2012!) making approximately 80 cents on the dollar. And those things still ignore the far larger and more obviously dangerous problems that women must face in so many other countries – being forced to marry your rapist, being stoned to death for daring to be raped, to even archaic rules like women not being allowed to drive cars.
It’s hard to ignore that this is a society that increasingly hates and distrusts women, especially as they gain any ground or power for themselves. And so it’s doubly hard to see that reflected back in our fiction right now. To see powerful women – which The Amazons have unequivocally been – as THE example of a society of powerful women in DC Comics – stripped of everything that might be good and honorable so that we may see the broadest most hateful stereotypes of them presented. The erroneous and damaging stereotype reinforced yet again that women with power will become absolute monsters. I would never make an argument that a matriarchal society would be a utopia. I would argue that any society that has inequality can by its very nature NOT be a utopia. But I see the Amazons, time and time again turned (primarily by men I’m sorry to say) into horror stories. Wildly exaggerated speculation of man-hating, man-killing, war-like unreasonable monsters. The question in fiction seems to lately be – how could powerful women be anything but monsters? For me, it’s a bridge too far.
This is one of my current knitting projects – super hero capes for kids. I’m making at least three and possibly four of them; two red, (for Superman and Supergirl) one blue (Batgirl) and one white with gold trim (oh Mighty Isis), for some small folks I know. I started Saturday and made significant progress on one of them.
I’ve always been on the verge of being a comic book geek, without every quite arriving. As a kid I was a fan of the girl super heroes — I loved Wonder Woman, Isis and Batgirl on television, but my family wasn’t much into comic books and my lack of transport to a comics shop as a kid meant neither was I.
Wonder Woman Lynda Carter
I was so disappointed that my Wonder Woman halloween costume at six years old looked nothing like this!
The closest I came in my formative years was having a friend in college who had gobs of them that I read obsessively. But I was too poor to buy any myself at the time.
Oh look, me reading the Green Arrow in college. Nice hair!
As an adult, pop culture has kept me vaguely aware of the developments around my childhood superhero favorites. My first online fake identity was a Batgirl anonymous account. I have my own superhero nickname (obviously!) and logo – even t-shirts. Many years ago, I fantasized about being Batgirl. I wanted to kiss Wonder Woman (wow, that page needs an update). I even have an awesome college-era t-shirt of Batgirl performing oral sex on Wonder Woman over the handlebars of her motorcycle in my t-shirt archive. (I should post a photo of that, shouldn’t I?)
Bat Girl On Bat Cycle
Seriously, the TV show motorcycle had lace on it? I totes did not remember that at all.
But venturing into comic book stores always seemed like too steep of a time commitment/ learning curve for a hobby that seems to appeal mainly to teen boys. Too many titles, too many diverging story lines – how do I tell what I’ve read and what I haven’t? I vaguely knew that there was a Batwoman comic, and that the character was gay, but I didn’t go out of my way to research that much.
But things have changed… I started reading themarysue.com (A Guide to Girl Geek Culture) several months back – (how did I not know about this site before?!) and they cover female comic book heroes pretty extensively, which means I’ve jumped over a bit of the learning curve. And there are some major changes going on at DC Comics right now that make a difference. The company has been struggling financially with many of their titles for awhile, and so is doing a reboot of the every product they have – called the New 52 or DCNU, they’re streamlining their titles and hitting the reset button on story lines.
Beginning in September, all of their comic books will start with a new issue #1. There will be new Batgirl, new Batwoman, new Birds of Prey, and new Wonder Woman story lines among many others – and an easy way for me to jump in and wrap my head around the characters.
Unfortunately, there will be fewer female characters in the New 52, and fewer female writers. This was an issue that brought up by several female fans in panels at Comic Con recently [How Batgirl took on DC Comics: the anatomy of a PR crisis] – and DC reacted rather poorly to the challenge, with one co-publisher blaming women for not voting with their dollars. Not really a valid argument, but still, I can counter that by supporting my favorite super hero characters by setting up series subscriptions.
So I went into the local comic book shop (Downtown Comics – the Castleton Branch) on the recommendation of my friend Jason, who is an occasionally employee there, and I set up subscriptions to collect my favorite comic book characters:
Wonder WomanBat GirlSupergirlBatwomanBirds of Prey
While I was there, I picked up some of the graphic novels for recent story lines for each of the characters. All of the stories will get a reboot in September, but I’ve been catching up on many of the recent incarnations.
One comic book fan (Mario Pieda) suggested this alternative:
Who’s wearing the pants now?
In the question of “pants or no pants” I’d like to throw in my vote of (shockingly!!) “pants” because she looks more badass wearing them. Note that this would be the only situation that I will ever vote in favor of “pants” over “no pants.” It would be nice if Wonder Woman were to continue on without looking quite like such a hooker, frankly. Not to slut shame Wonder Woman or anything, but really, don’t those star-spangled underwear ride up your butt when you’re kicking ass, woman? How much fun could it be to save the planet with a Wonder Wedgie?
I’m aware that at 43 years old, a new comic book obsession is probably a mid-life crisis of sorts. But it’s cheaper than a sports car. I hope.
