I began writing this when I was somewhat agitated, and it turned into more than just an angry rant, but I will warn that some writing may not be the most perfect, tactful, intelligent feminist writing on the internet. In fact there may be some snark in this piece. I am not apoloizing for how I feel about this issue, but you have been warned.
So I heard the new Superman movie was good. I'm actually pretty happy about that, but it got me thinking. We have a SuperMAN movie, and a SuperMAN TV show. We have a huge BatMAN franchise, and the Avengers movie (featuring a total of one female superhero) was great, and tangentially related are the movies about the men of the Avengers. We're even seeing sequels to Iron MAN, Captain America, and Thor. Great movies of course, but it would be nice if Natasha had her own movie rather than just appear in movies that center around the men of the Avengers.
But we really haven't seen any movies about female superheroes since the early 2000's, and we haven't really seen any good movies about female superheroes since . . . ever. We've heard murmurings about Joss Whedon directing a Wonder Woman movie, but then Marvel scooped him up and they're never letting him go, so there goes that dream. Yes, she had a brief TV show in the 70's, but that's about it. The attempt at a more modern show on the CW recently failed.
So we're clear, I get that she appears in some animated TV shows that almost no normal person over the age of 10 watches. I know she's going to be in the Justice League movie that may or may not happen - that should be a given, she's one of the most iconic comic book characters in history.
But all that is not enough. You can bring it up to make me feel better all you want, you can condescend to me and tell me again and again that she appears here or there or she'll be in this or that movie about someone else or that centers around a male dominated group of superheroes, but it's not enough. We need a Wonder Woman movie aleady!
Why her? Well, a movie about any female superhero would be great. A Zatanna movie would be awesome, and a Black Widow movie would be a great addition to the Avengers franchise, but Wonder Woman is, as I've said, one of the most iconic superheroes we have, and probably the most popular female superhero out there. Go to the comic book section of Barnes and Noble - yeah yeah I know, I'm not gonna make you buy anything, but I do want you to get a sense of what's popular. Look for the books about female superheroes. Ignore the Avengers and Justice League books, they have women in them but that's not the same as being about women. You probably see Wonder Woman books, one or two Batgirl books and . . . well if you can find books about any other woman you're lucky, because like I mentioned months ago, I could only find books about those two ladies. I loved both of them, but I that's not the point, I wanted more options. More choices. More variety. But even that's not the point here, I'm trying to illustrate that if there's one woman that's even remotely comparable to Superman or Batman in terms of popularity, it's Wonder Woman.
And it's time. She's been around since WWII, the fact that there are zero movies about her, let alone good movies, is not okay.
Don't tell me it won't sell tickets. The myth that movies about women won't have a wide appeal has been debunked thanks in large part to The Hunger Games, Bridesmaids, Brave, and if you wanna get nerdy, ALL the Hayo Miyazaki films. They do still need to be good, of course. Do we hold movies about female superheroes, or women in general, to a higher standard? Yes, absolutely. People are quick to bring up the fact that pretty much all movies about female superheroes have sucked. And that's true. But there have been just as many movies about male superheroes that have sucked, but we can ignore them, and not use them to dismiss all male superhero movies, because there have been so many good ones as well. The Batman movies, at least Michael Uslan's movies, are pretty much all great, especially the last trilogy (last as in the last made, not final). The Iron Man movies have been wonderful (or at least the first and third). Thor was good and Captain America is one of my favorites. So we can easily forget about awful Green Lantern Green Hornet movies, or the mediocre Spider Man trilogy.
We wouldn't feel the need to hold female characters, and movies about women, to a higher standard if we had more of them. But since there are so few out there, we expect the ones that do exist to work extra hard.
These movies being good goes beyond the mere fact that they're about men, but the fact that they're about men did play a part in their success. People believed these movies would do well, so the best of the best were willing to work on it, and the powers that be were willing to pay for the talent to make these movies successful. They were also willing to invest in quality special effects and the time to make the movie awesome. I don't think the same time, money, or effort has gone into any movie about a female superhero, and that's one of the reasons why those movies had so much tits and ass - sex sells, but it's a cheap sell. It's what producers rely on when they want lots of men to see and appreciate their movie without really trying to make the movie actually good.
So I will acknowledge that a Wonder Woman movie would need to be spectacular, and a disappointment may be better than no movie at all. But enough people have taken the risk with Superman, Batman, Spider Man, and almost all of the male Avengers, and while in hindsight not all of those movies were amazing, someone took the risk and they all had a great turnout at the box office. I have complete faith that we would see the same success with a Wonder Woman movie, we just need someone to take the plunge.
And again, I'd rather people not take it upon themselves to tell me where Wonder Woman does show up on TV and/or film. I know people do it to make me feel better, but don't. I don't think it's greedy to want a movie about her specifically when we have so many movies about her many male counterparts.
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