Male Roles Vs. Female Roles in Fiction: Discussion/Analysis/Troperwank

I consider Superman x Wonder Woman a poor matchup precisely because they're too similar. Wonder Woman/Batman at least had good chemistry between the characters themselves for the way they interacted and not their external attributes.

I find Batman / Wonder Woman Unresolved Sexual Tension to be the most compelling.

I dont know if similar is the right word, since Clark is kinda shy and usually dosent speak is mind most of the time while Diana is very direct and kind of agresive most of the time.

But yeah I feel WW and Bat in justice league works better because diana usually stright fowardness cut all batman broding and defense he rise up to not get close to people, I feel she is a refreshing change from Talia and Catwoman who usually play along with him.

I dislike WW with either Superman or Batman. Aside from Diana, it’s almost impossible to name a female superhero with a civilian male love interest. Even harder to name one that is still around. Male superheroes get to date civilians. Female superheroes get to date male superheroes.

On the other hand, most of the time civilian female interest feel a sort of grandfather clause, Supes get to stay with lois because he always stay around with her as well with reed richard being Susan husband, even when he display dickery that make Hank pym look like a saint.

If anything paring Superman with WW feel writer are kinda sick of it and it also show a change of superhero stories were they got from crimebuster to a world of is own.

These days, civilian love interests (male and female) are practically non-existent. Or if they are used, they clearly aren't viewed as the Endgame.

Wally West has been paired with Jesse Quick in CW's The Flash, Jinx in Teen Titans: TAS and Artemis Crock in Greg Weisman's Young Justice. Tellingly, the latter two are villains in the comics. Wally's relationship with Linda has never been adapted. The most acknowledgement it got in outside media was an episode of JLU where Linda had a crush on the Flash (which is not how she was written in the comics). And currently, their relationship has been erased in the comics.

Edited by windleopard on Sep 23rd 2019 at 10:59:01 AM

Or if they exist is only because grandfather clause.

is clear superhero is becoming oless about them saving the day and more about....them, that it.

Comic adaptations have a tendency of ignoring anything after the Silver Age. Babsgirl is the default, bar none, with Cass and Stephanie only now getting adapted after 20+ years.

Linda and Wally were such a cute couple. As much as I love Flinx, it's a shame that they've been ignored by adaptations.

Yet MCU give Tony stark a couple who have being with it until is death, which is far cry of the comic were he sleep with everything that breath and maybe more

Wasn't Tony mostly a one-woman type of guy in the original comics? I think him being a playboy came from the Ultimate line and the MCU.

I've only read a few Silver Age Iron Man comics, but one thing that stood out was his deep unrequited love for Pepper. Not the kind of love where I'd expect him to go chasing others.

Also, Venom was introduced in the very late Bronze Age, right on the cusp of the Dark Age in '84.

Edited by GoldenKaos on Sep 24th 2019 at 8:34:54 PM

Ta-Nehisi Coates, renowned journalist and author and current writer for Black Panther, has a new novel called The Water Dancer coming out which revolves around the son of a slave boy who develops mystical powers. During an interview about the book, which also contains the novel's synopsis, Coates spoke on something about violence in media and how it relates to gender and race.

Edited by windleopard on Sep 25th 2019 at 12:25:11 PM

So I recently re-read the Spider-Man miniseries, The Evil That Men Do by Kevin Smith.

My original view on this story was that it was a passable but fun story about how Felicia and Peter's relationship had evolved but the rape retcon ruins it. Now I feel the reverse.

The case story is rather dull and some of the humor can be grating. But the topic of rape is actually handled much better than I remember. Felicia's rape is very much about her and while it can be argued to be an unnecessary retcon, I think it's still a pretty well handled one. And the way the story delves into Francis Klum's pain and trauma as a sexual abuse victim as well as the fear of how people will react to him as a rape survivor.

The story is still not without it's flaws. As said, the humor isn't that great, there's some sketchiness in regards to how the story treats Klum raping the prostitute and the contrivance of Peter showing up and going into a frenzy because he thinks Klum wanted to throw Felicia off the bridge like Norman did to Gwen. And of course, the sexualised art of Felicia which would be bad enough, if it weren't in a story like this one.

But I do think the rape was handled much better than it was given credit for. Though I can understand if people feel it wasn't needed at all.

So recently, there have been reports that Jeffrey Wright might be playing James Gordon in the upcoming Matt Reeves Batman movie. Despite the documented history of fandom hostitlity towards racebending (or even the possibility of racebending as seen with the Netflix Witcher fiasco), these reports don't seem to be getting much pushback.

Well, a blog I follow called Stitch's Media Mix had a take that might explain that

I couldn’t agree more with this. There was some slight backlash to Deadshot, but it wasn’t massive.

But meanwhile, any picture of Black Canary (who is being played by a mixed race actress) and you get smug men going “she’s not the REAL Black Canary” and posting comic panels. And a lot of the comments also talk about her being ugly, or not resembling the character enough...

But nobody got pissy over how much Enchantress didn’t resemble her comic counterpart. Or Captain Boomerang. Or Steppenwolf. Or Whiplash or Justin Hammer or any other character who looks super different from their comic self.

It’s only when the character is made a Black woman that they get upset.

And something similar happened with Mortal Kombat recently too. Kitana’s character model has, until now, always been based on white women. But then for the 11th game, they changed her design and depicted her as being east asian.

And people lost their goddamn minds.

People are so obsessed with white womanhood as something that has to be “preserved” or “untainted”.

I remember playing MMO with some dudebros (I have since left that League this was one of many reasons) who were trashing on Anna in Titans with words like "Slut, Whore, Two Dollar Hooker" When I replied that some of her outfits were not that much different from what she wore in the comics and in some cases covered up WAY more skin then her 'comic uniforms' add to the fact that Kory was initially created (per a statement from Wolfman) to be an f-toy for Dick and had the rather skeevy 'cultural backstory' to prove it.

So what was the problem? They tried to hem and haw but it was rather obvious what the REAL problem was...

I personally was overjoyed at the casting since I couldn't name a white actress with the stature and presence that could do Kory justice.

I remember one particular comment asking if Smollett's Black Canary was supposed to be "undercover as a streetwalker". Yeah, the exact same language being used against Diop's Starfire.

For perspective, this was the outfit that prompted that comment.

And this◊ is how Black Canary tends to dress in the comics.

Edited by windleopard on Oct 11th 2019 at 10:16:36 AM

As for Mortal Kombat, I can't help but find all the recent "SJ Ws are ruining MK" ranting to be particularly hilarious when the series has always been one of the more progressive fighting game franchises out there compared to it's competition (not that MK didn't have it's own issues as seen with Nightwolf and the shenanigans with Jade's skin color).

Consider the history of the character Kurtis Stryker. Stryker originally was going to be in the first MK game and was to be given Sonya's role as Kano's pursuer but was scrapped because they figured a female character was needed. Stryker was then going to be in MK 2 but was dropped for Jax, the franchise's very first black character. Stryker finally made his debut in MK 3 where he was negatively received.

Think about that. Stryker, a white male character the creators wanted to use for his own sake spent two decades as one of the most hated MK characters. Meanwhile, Sonya and Jax, two characters created for representation purposes ended up as being one of the most beloved characters in the franchise.

Edited by windleopard on Oct 11th 2019 at 7:55:38 AM

In the New 52 Canary WAS a Rockstar performer and some of her outfits there are almost a dead on match for what Smollet is wearing there.

Something I have see is that the vitrol over racebending also depend of the importance of the chararter.

Like, NON complain about Jason momoa being Aquaman and people even make meme about how him being aquaman was better because he was huge and sexy, meanwhile Mar-vell was made women, kill off-screen and nobody really give a damn about them, the same about Perry(a very tretary chararter of superman) and maybe Gordon who role have wax and wane from very important(Nolan) to "who?"(Sydner or Burton).

I will saod most people who complain aboyt starfire dont care about the comic counterpart but the one from the series, it seen the more important the chararter, the more the nostalgia and the biggest the shitstorm.

Granted, nobody said black james gordon said a black barbara, one can also ask if that means killer joke and oracle, it add another tihng into ti.

About kitana...I blame M Kteam because for one fans as kinda right: Kitana have being show time an time again as white woman only to suddenly saying she look japanise? it is a bad move even if kitana was always being asian, MK team drop the ball there and is kinda their fault.

Meh I wont read much into it, Sonya and Jax lack big fandom before the whole MK 9-x-11 role into it, be behind the ninja brigated by far and Jax was kind of a filler chararter a very one-note "america fuck yeah" chararter, help look how they bring back stryker in MK 9 he was well recibed.

If anything, the fact MK manage to create a chararter who is a white male police cop today, which is a touchy subject said something.

As someone relatively new to the forums, I would like to throw in my two cents here (and I apologize if this has been addressed before): men and women have inherent differences, since humans are a sexually dimorphic species.

This is most obvious with physical characteristics: height, hip:waist ratio, breast size, upper body strength, etc. But this is also the case with psychology.

Men and women, on average, have differences in personality and in interest, regardless of culture. Now, culture/society of course plays a part, but there is undeniably a biological substrate to particular masculine and feminine behaviors.

I believe this is important in framing the issue of male roles and female roles in fiction, and how these may inform why particular tropes are the way there are.

Oh boy.

So, could you please tell the class what you mean by the below?

Clarify, if you could please. Sources would also be nice.

Edited by fredhot16 on Oct 11th 2019 at 10:14:58 AM

I don't recall any complaints when Kitana was played by an Asian American actress in Mortal Kombat Legacy and the franchise has been taking elements from adaptations since the first movie.

Meh I wont read much into it, Sonya and Jax lack big fandom before the whole MK 9-x-11 role into it, be behind the ninja brigated by far and Jax was kind of a filler chararter a very one-note "america fuck yeah" chararter, help look how they bring back stryker in MK 9 he was well recibed.

They may not have been as popular as Sub-Zero and Scorpion but they were still indisputably fan favorites. Yeah they were kind of one note until the reboot games but that didn't hinder their popularity.

If someone brings biology in a fighting game, I have to ask: Where I can find people that throw fire, can survive falls from multiple meters without lasting war and direct impact with dimension shattering events????????

If you're talking about the new person, I don't think they're talking about Mortal Kombat. They're just making a general statement for the forum's topic.

It's basis is one I, personally, detest because it strikes me as the same sort of "reasoning" for why dolls are marketed to girls and toy cars are marketed to boys.

Edited by fredhot16 on Oct 11th 2019 at 10:36:46 AM