DC Movies

Not just Cass. Didio also hates Stephanie and he really loathes Wally West above all. Then there's the time he kept insisting on killing Dick Grayson off.

Wtf is wrong with Dan Didio?

He considers legacy characters completely redundant and unnecessary.

Comparatively the Robins maintain some leeway by virtue of being Batman characters......... which the Batgirls don’t share so let’s just beat around the bush and call it for what it is, sexism.

Edited by slimcoder on Apr 12th 2021 at 12:25:36 PM

DiDio seems to prefer some legacy characters over others seeing as how he fought for Jaime Reyes and was presumably one of the driving forces in Ted Kord (the second Blue Beetle) being killed off. Damian Wayne was also heavily pushed during his tenure and brought back to life even though his creator Grant Morrison was the one who wanted to kill him off.

Cass's marginalization is especially frustrating when you consider she was the first Batgirl to have a solo ongoing. Barbara might be the more iconic Batgirl but Cass was the one who proved Batgirl could be a solo lead.

Edited by windleopard on Apr 12th 2021 at 3:33:16 AM

Plus Cass has an interesting ability and is very distinctive. It could be fun having a character who talks a lot in sign language, too.

Granted this is a character you have to be very careful in how you depict her. One of the defenses against movie Cass being In Name Only was because some people felt the comic incarnation was an Asian stereotype.

On the “adapting problematic characters of color” spectrum of “Tilda Swinton as Ancient One” to “Winston Duke as M’Baku” I thought it was a fair approach, though not necessarily the best one.

As Arrowverse, Doom Patrol and Joker proved and as what Crisis and possibly The Flash movie is trying to point out, you don't need every single live-action DC property to be a single continuity. A DC Cinematic Multiverse works just as fine if not better than trying to copy the MCU. In this case you could make a more accurate Cassandra Cain adaptation, just in a different universe.

In that regard, DC has arguably the better multiverse structure than Marvel.

Edited by KRider on Apr 12th 2021 at 8:04:54 AM

Lucy Liu has been cast in the Shazam sequel as one of the villains.

Looks like they'll be versions of the Hesperides. I'm interested to see how this film deals with the Death of the Old Gods.

Any ideas m

I can't,think of many female shazam villains ?

The article says she will be playing Kalypso, the sister to Helen Mirren's Hespera and daughter of Atlas ("strength of Atlas"). Both may be Canon Foreigners, drawing directly from the myths.

Edited by Synchronicity on Apr 12th 2021 at 12:44:32 PM

@windleopard Eh those are just people with bad takes on the characters because of a lack of understanding or knowledge.

I don’t pay them any heed, plenty of characters get those.

Edited by slimcoder on Apr 12th 2021 at 11:26:46 AM

So I guess when Ares said he killed the gods he just got the main few and called it a day.

May be he meant the Olympians rather then the titans.

Black Adam Star Seemingly Confirms Their DC Hero Role

As great as she is, Cass ticking many Orientalist stereotype boxes is a very valid concern, and saying this is just due to "a lack of understanding" rubs me the wrong way. The silent Asian trope got called out recently for one, and that's not getting into the whole Asian assassin thing. I'm not saying the In Name Only route was the best idea, but it was a fair idea, and better than Marvel Tilda Swinton'ing the Ancient One or Madripoor.

I'd say Cass really only ticks Orientalist tropes in that she subverts/deconstructs them. For one thing, she isn't an assassin because she hates killing.

Edited by windleopard on Apr 14th 2021 at 8:36:05 AM

In the hands of a good writer — or at least one who consciously works to avoid stereotypes — she subverts/deconstructs them. In the hands of writers that don't she can get very dragonlady-y. Which is why I understand the approach of swerving to avoid the stereotypes entirely.

Edited by Synchronicity on Apr 14th 2021 at 10:46:05 AM

DC and Marvel unfortunately have a long history with Asian stereotypes. A look through the comic section of the Dragon Lady trope page shows that the majority of examples are overwhelmingly from the Big 2.

If Cass is considered too problematic why even bother using her at all then and making a character who's In Name Only? I understand wanting to avoid stereotypes, but that's just going to disappoint people who like the character because they read the good stories she was featured in.

Edited by Draghinazzo on Apr 14th 2021 at 12:57:28 PM

On the other hand, judging the character solely by the work of writers who didn't adequately handle her to the exclusion of the work of the writers who did - especially given that the work of writers who did are generally regarded as the default of the character - is something of a reductive way to look at the character's history.

Saying "someone once depicted this character as a stereotypical Dragon Lady, ergo we can't adapt this character at all" immediately tuns into the problem of people saying "but the character isn't actually like that," which would be an accurate criticism.

For comparison, it would be like if Marvel Studios decided not to adapt Sam Wilson / Falcon, and/or adapted him as an entirely unrelated character, because of the pimp storyline.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 14th 2021 at 9:03:07 AM

I agree. I am just saying it was an understandable decision but not the best for comics fans. The best approach would have been to take her at baseline and spin those stereotypes to be positive/empowering (I cited M'baku as an example of this). I don't know how I would have done it but I'm sure a competent writer could figure something out.

Anyway, it's funny that you cite Falcon because in the same episode they made the pimp joke they de-Asianed Madripoor. I find that an apples to oranges comparison, because the pimp storyline was never a part of Falcon's concept originally. Being a quiet Asian martial artist is a big basis of Cass's concept. It takes more work to disentangle from the harmful implications when adapting her. More like "they adapt Shang-Chi but he's just some guy who works in accounting".

Edited by Synchronicity on Apr 14th 2021 at 11:10:09 AM

It's one of those things that are sort of Fair for Its Day meets Positive Discrimination. Cassandra Cain earned her place as Batgirl by being a distinct character even if leaning into some Asian stereotypes (Middle East and Asian cultures get more than their fair share of secret assassin cults in fiction). The Birds of Prey Cassandra leans so far away from racial stereotypes that she also loses any real remarkable qualities of her own, subject to the actions of everyone else.

It reminds me too how some black actresses are annoyed they are always asked to be the Sassy Black Woman.

Then again, some have argued that Birds of Prey Cass was also a stereotype by being an Asian sidekick to a white woman. They've also criticized the movie for disability erasure.

It's all very, very complicated to say the least.