Annoying stereotypes in comicbooks

Started by SamZED2 pages

Annoying stereotypes in comicbooks

Every time a character has a flashback or is sent into the past writers tend to avoid all the embarrassing moments of country's history. Most of the time they act like racism, slavery, genocide of native americans etc etc never happened because its a ticklish subject noone wants to read about. There are few exceptions ofcourse but they are rare and usually intended to show that this particular hero was never racist even when racism was a common thing. I know comicbooks are mostly written by americans and for americans so that's understandable. But every time they write about other countries those "embarassing moments" are the only things they rememember and rub them in our faces. If its Russia we always get a communist dressed into a red jumpsuit trying to take over the world, if its Germany we get a Hitler wannabe who tries to spread facism, if its France we get "Batroc zee Leeper" etc etc I wanna know if someone else finds it annoying or maybe thinks that im just looking too much into it.

They don't always completely forget racism...
http://forums.comicbookresources.com/showthread.php?t=221902

Batroc is awesome!

We french all look and act like him 😱

I don't like how Hulkling refers to Wiccan as his "stupid boyfriend" in Children's Crusade. Just... use his name. We get it. Stop letting your sexuality be your only memorable character trait.

lol True. "Look! We're gay teenagers and we're ok with it! So you dont have to hide it if you're too!" Only thing he talks about.

You're right Sam, they really crossed the line with Batroc vin

Seriously though, I agree. Remember the Morlun arc?

Morlun (after offing the guy): "Who has ever heard of a german superhero?!"

Originally posted by Konton
I don't like how Hulkling refers to Wiccan as his "stupid boyfriend" in Children's Crusade. Just... use his name. We get it. Stop letting your sexuality be your only memorable character trait.

That's natural though. You never hear people complain when characters refer to their heterosexual partnerships - my gf/bf, my husband, my wife, my fiance.

I'm not saying you're a homophobe, just that holding different standards for gay/straight characters (and people) is a form of prejudice.

Originally posted by Konton
I don't like how Hulkling refers to Wiccan as his "stupid boyfriend" in Children's Crusade. Just... use his name. We get it. Stop letting your sexuality be your only memorable character trait.
Yeah, that one is really grating, because he does it not once but several times. It's like the writer is just trying waaay too hard there but it kind of backfires and just accentuates them as being different.

Originally posted by Scoobless
That's natural though. You never hear people complain when characters refer to their heterosexual partnerships - my gf/bf, my husband, my wife, my fiance.

I'm not saying you're a homophobe, just that holding different standards for gay/straight characters (and people) is a form of prejudice.


I think you completely miss the point Konton was making.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
I think you completely miss the point Konton was making.

Just seemed like he didn't like people being openly gay.

What other point was there?

Originally posted by Scoobless
Just seemed like he didn't like people being openly gay.

What other point was there?

You're trolling right?

Nope, just asking questions.

Konton, like many of us, dislikes sexual orientation used as a substitute for character depth. It sells the character short just to be the "gay guy" rather than have an actual personality.

I doubt anyone in the thread has a problem with openly gay characters though.

Originally posted by Konton
I don't like how Hulkling refers to Wiccan as his "stupid boyfriend" in Children's Crusade. Just... use his name. We get it. Stop letting your sexuality be your only memorable character trait.

👆

I got that impression several times. I think writers sometimes try too hard to remind readers that ________ is gay/bi/lesbian and make it a defining quality about them to the point that's all their known for.

I mean, I have a couple of friends who are gay, but I don't define who they are as being gay.

The portrayal of Hulking is accurate, IMO -- Homosexuality is such an all-consuming sin that it leaves little room for other aspects of the personality; that's why French communists invented it, so they could weaken America by having minorities smuggle it in like a virus. All of this, according to my dog, was engineered by the evil genius Michel Foucault:

One form of discrimination in comic books that doesn't seem to come up is the fact that, despite having a much, much larger population than the west, south and east asia seem relatively incapable of producing superheroes. You have a very small number of Chinese and Japanese supers, but on a per capita basis China has less than most small American towns. And what about India? You'd think Marvel and DC would have some cool Indian superheroes, like Nagraj...

Originally posted by Simbon
One form of discrimination in comic books that doesn't seem to come up is the fact that, despite having a much, much larger population than the west, south and east asia seem relatively incapable of producing superheroes. You have a very small number of Chinese and Japanese supers, but on a per capita basis China has less than most small American towns. And what about India? You'd think Marvel and DC would have some cool Indian superheroes, like Nagraj...

I think the view is that they exist, we just aren't seeing stories about their adventures. In Ellis' Astonishing run, the X-Men discovered a massive hidden base of Chinese mutants. It was a much larger and impressive institute then the X Mansion or even Utopia.

Originally posted by srankmissingnin
I think the view is that they exist, we just aren't seeing stories about their adventures. In Ellis' Astonishing run, the X-Men discovered a massive hidden base of Chinese mutants. It was a much larger and impressive institute then the X Mansion or even Utopia.

Well I wish they'd explore some of those adventures; Marvel needs new characters (I mean real characters, not disposable teenage mutants), items/technologies, and locations very badly.

There's also DC's The Great Ten. Though I think they could have been much cooler than they were.

I agree on The Great Ten -- could have been much better, especially considering the material there is to draw on.

It's a matter of numbers, though. There should be four times as many Chinese heroes as American heroes.