*shakes head*

I hope DC sues them.

*points to the icon*

That's really about it.

Up to this point I have been looking at this from the perspective of: it's Playboy. I expect this kind of thing from Playboy. I have no interest in Playboy for exactly that reason.

But I get the impression you're coming at this from another angle, one I'm missing- what exactly is "Tsunami Tuesday"? I've never heard of such a thing. Is it something US specific (I'm in the UK)?

Y'know, I've been watching that damned thing explode for a couple of days and the same people keep popping up with "It's just Playboy!" and "Wonder Woman is a fetish character anyway!" and such.

I might be stepping over the line asking you this (and, fair warning, I'd take your answer to other blogs), but you've written this character so I have to ask. Does DC have any idea how much stuff like that hurts her credibility in her true target audience? That whole idea that she's a plaything for male readers and was created that way just makes it so hard to get women interested in her.

And do they realize that if her originally intended target audience took her seriously, she'd sell a lot better?

Hear, hear.

I saw that and...I got that aching, hollow sense of futility you feel when you realize that no matter how far women have come, no matter how hard you work to communicate effectively with the males of the species, no matter how much effort you put into written and spoken words trying to explain how something like this is really, really indicative of so much that's wrong with modern American society...

...it's pointless. Because it happened.

I'm a pro-porn feminist. I don't mind sexualization up to a point in comics. I never complained about Moondragon's costume back in the day when Jim Starlin was drawing her as wearing nothing but green dental floss.

But to take a feminist icon like Diana in an election year and sex her up?

FUCK YOU, PLAYBOY.

Do you really think it's a coincidence that Playboy chose this year, the issue for the month containing "Tsunami Tuesday," to run this particular pictorial? Do you really?

Yes.

Hey, you asked.

You know, the first time I heard/read feminists from an older generation than I saying, "Sometimes, I get the impression that we're going backwards, not forwards," I thought, "Well, I'm sad that they feel that way, but how silly!"

More and more, I wonder if they're right. Goddamnit.

What irks me is the present testosterone-driven upper management at Warner Bros (particularly Robinov) who have an overwhelming anti-women attitude right now...this probably meets with their full approval.

Arrgh. I don't have time to properly think about this right now, which means I don't have time for a rant (or I'd be rabbiting on in my own LJ.)

I swear there are active elements in this country that want to put us back to the Dark Ages or worse, though. Another rant for another time, gotta get back to Shakespeare....

It's depressing, really it is.

On one hand, you have a comic and character whose natural, inbuilt fanbase are women and men who like to see strong, intelligent women - who happen to be beautiful - kicking ass and taking names. On the other, you have all the marketing of the comic and character, which focuses on the fact that she's gorgeous. Advertise a sexpot and you attract people who want to see a sex-pot. The words' self-fulfilling prophecy' spring to mind.

Wonder Woman has the potential to be one of DC's biggest advantages when competing with Marvel for market share. Ask any layman on the street to name a male superhero and they'll list ones from both stables - Batman, Spiderman, Superman, Wolverine, maybe the Flash and the Hulk. But ask for a female superhero and what you get is Wonder Woman. There is no Marvel equivilant, no hero as deeply embedded in the public conciousness. The closest they have is Jean Grey, and she's not even the most famous of the X-Men.

Wonder Woman is a touchstone and a gateway for getting more people - more women - into comics. DC comics. She's a way to enlarge the pie, but that will only work if they stop trying to persuade the public at large that the title and character are all about catering to horny fanboys.

*sighs* I'm mortally afraid of what Warner Brothers will do to Wonder Woman in any big-screen appearances. Mortally. I keep having visions of 'Catwoman'.

Yikes, that isn't the wonder woman image I remember you writing!

Chris Y

"...how many of those people would burst a vessel, if not a vital organ, if Playgirl ran a similar cover/pictorial with a male, semi-erect model painted up as Batman?"

Wait... those were the Schumacher movies, right?

I saw the cover :(, and I am a big Wonder Woman fan. I love the Greek Myth/history intertwined with the character, I love the character of Diana herself and like the fact that she is more than a one dimensional character (which Bats and Supes often are). I do agree however, that DC doesn't know who she is, who her target market is or how to sell her, which is why every few years there is a new writer coming on with their "take" on the character and series. DC can't seem to figure out that one of their characters can me multi-dimensional much like us humans are (for the most part). Which also possibly factors in why this character only has one series instead of 2 or 3 like her "trinity" counterparts. They can't get two writers to agree as to the character, since the writers would look at her in completely different lights. And the editors don't seem to have a true understanding either.

This by the way is in know reflection of Greg, who in my opinion "gets" Diana and showed her brilliantly as multi-dimensional. (Can't wait for your return sometime in the future!)

If WB/DC did say o.k. to this, very sad. By saying yes, some knuckle-head got his jones off by seeing his "fantasy". Which shows how one-dimentional he is.

Ahhh, I'll just reflect back onto Hiketeia.

Vic

The most difficult time I'm having is trying to explain to the members of Geoffjohns.com why this is problematic. It appears that they can't see past their erections.

And I guess I've got to learn to stop banging my head against them.

uh..so what does this have to do with Hillary Clinton?
You really think it's about her..and not perhaps all the casting rumors about Wonder Woman or if the "actress" has actually been compared to Linda Carter.

Aren't there a few dots you're missing in your connections there?

So, General Rucka, this whole thing got me thinking again about who could possibly embody Diana in a live action film role.

Nadia Bjorlin, perhaps? I've no idea if she has the required outrageous charisma and dazzling intelligence that Diana has, but Nadia's spoken freely about how much she loves Diana as a character. I think that's the most important thing in casting her.

Wonder Woman has always, already been a highly ambivalent figure, right back to the character's genesis. Marston designed her as an embodiment of his utopian, progressive and patriotic ideals and his fetishistic sexual fantasies. There is no separating the two, any more than you can ever completely excise the homoerotic subtext of the Batman/Robin relationship.

Wonder Woman as signifier can signify nearly anything: sexual fantasy, feminism, patriotism, a way to make a quick buck, etc. Read Robert Rodi's novel "What they did to Princess Paragon" and see how a group of men struggle for control of an image of perfect woman.

So, I can't get terribly worked up about this. The fact that Wonder Woman does not mean any one thing, that she is not uniformly a feminist icon or modern day Spirit of Liberty or a sex object or what have you, speaks to the power of the archetype of the "unruly woman", who is greater than the sum of all her depictions and parodies and defies reductionism.

I think Wonder Woman creator William Moulton Marston....Mr. Alternative Lifestyle....would be proud. And for God's sake, everyone lay off of Tiffany Fallon. She's being burned in effigy because she's not Linda Carter. What awful thing has she done to everyone to deserve the abuse over this?