I think comics on the whole could use more diversity, because the world is a diverse place. While I do think new characters should be created I think that “coded” characters should be confirmed whatever they are coded as, the first example coming to my mind being Nightwing being bisexual or Batman being autistic. I know that as a trans man, I would love to see more trans characters, or see the few trans characters we have get more screen time, so to speak.
I think that’s what it really comes down to, not just making a character, but fully fleshing out a character and letting them shine and be fully three dimensional- like Jessica Cruz and Simon Baz in Green Lanterns.
I think writers going back to change an existing character is what some readers might find annoying. There’s really no need for that sort of thing, when better stories could be written by creating a new character intentionally made with their own unique identity. Bisexuality is common in the real world but rarely truly represented in a fully fleshed-out manner. There’s more to the world that straight or gay, some people are asexual or demisexual. Those classifications shouldn’t be the character’s entire story, but just a part of who they are.
Even in my own writing, as I’m learning more things in my old age from a diversifying group of online friends, I’m starting to see more of that writing characters in my own stories. I’m dealing with a lovely demisexual character that has to be emotionally attached to someone to feel an inkling of attraction. I didn’t have a name for that sort of thing to put on it until a short while ago.
As for race, it’s never once been a factor in whether or not I like a particular character…
Give me backstory…give me a great long-term plot and a character with more depth than a potato…those are the things that hook me.
What if those changes work well though? (Ie Alan Scott or Negative Man). Also, if something is never explicitly stated for a character, but would work well for character development (ie Autism for Batman).
It’s one thing to bring a new dimension to a character, with a part of them that’s never been quite “touched on” before. Characters can evolve, and people can discover new things about themselves over time, that’s part of life. Some of those things may be parts of themselves they weren’t free to explore in the past. I think the way they portrayed that with Negative Man in the Doom Patrol series was brilliant. As for Alan Scott I think it would have made more sense to keep the character’s history the same, and acknowledge that’s he’s always been attracted to men also. He just might have become more comfortable having known relationships with other men as it became more socially accepted. (hope this makes sense?)
Thanks for clearing that up. So, as long as, the character has so grey area or something has now become more socially acceptable, it’s okay to allow those characters to change to a social norms.
I mean Alan Scott, as he was in JSA had been married to at least two women, both of which it’s been shown he was actually in love with, but that doesn’t mean he couldn’t have also had feelings for other men along the way. It’s just that until the recent past it hasn’t always been ‘safe’ or accepted for people to be open about it. Alan finally exploring that part of himself could have made for a quite interesting story, without changing much if anything in his back story.
Right, that’s what I was trying to say. For example, there could be a character that “always felt” gender non-conforming, but never felt safe to explore it. Now they can. The only other thing I ask is: are you okay with new people taking up an old mantle? For example, what if we had another Batman death. Would you be okay with a black man taking up the mantle (ie Luke Fox)?
Absolutely no problem with it, if he was the best person for the job, or someone Bats wanted to carry the mantle in his place. Then again I’m not nearly as invested in Batman as most people seem to be around here.
I’m in truth much more of a JSA person. I keep my little fanfic ideas to myself though, as far as what a 3rd generation might look like nowadays. I’ve showed a couple of people, but it’s not like I ever look for DC to hire me to write something like that. (amazing as that would be)
Oh, I’m not trying to force my fan choices on anyone haha. Sorry if it came off that way. I was just trying to understand your perspective, and I figured examples were the best way to do that
Nah, I’m not upset by the questions at all. Everyone sees each character just a little bit differently. The way I see them, might be a bit different than someone else sees them, even if we’re reading the exact same story. I admit, though sometimes I do get annoyed when I run into someone, who believes that their perspectives and opinions are the only ‘correct’ ones, especially when they are rude or condescending to other people for theirs. Unfortunately being female I deal with that sort of stuff a lot. There are a small but really vocal minority of male comic fans out there that seem convinced there are no ‘real’ female comic fans. I’ve been reading comics since the late 70s, apparently, I didn’t get that memo.
I’d definitely be interested in this. I mean, I can’t think of a single sexual relationship the character has had. Only romantic ones. It would actually be a really great character trait too. Having a character who is over-sexualized (in my opinion) have absolutely no interest in sex. On top of that, it would be good to have that representation on a character who is so well known.
It could be that’s she’s asexual or even someone who’s demisexual and hasn’t met the right person yet. Supergirl is also sometimes portrayed as rather young, so she might not even be to the stage of having those sorts of feelings yet. Not all teenage girls are boy crazy, some outgrow the ‘boys are gross’ stage later than others.
Yeah, I think portraying any of this would be good. I think we were specifically talking about asexuality as that’s what HubCity brought up earlier in the thread.
This is a little off topic, maybe, but speaking of LGBT issues, and character coding, what are some other characters you guys think are coded as LGBT or coded as something else?Would you want these characters to be what they are coded in canon? For example, I wrote my final paper in Sociology of Pop Culture on how Guy Gardner is very coded as transgender. (If anyone is interested I can post it to fan creations.) However, I’m pretty sure this coding was all accidental so I wouldn’t want it to be canon without being written by an LGBT+, preferably transgender or nonbinary, writer. On the other hand… Cassandra Cain is coded as a lesbian, and I would love for that to be canon. I guess I’m rambling a bit. How do you guys feel?
-C
I would love to read that paper, please DM it to me if you get the chance. With LGBT representation, it’s all about the way it is handled. I always fear it’ll result in a Harley x Ivy relationship that feels fetishized rather than true representation. That’s just my view of it though.
I think exploring diverse cultures can be very interesting and can cover a lot of topics that typically get brought up in diversity discussions. Exploring a character from a cultural standpoint can open doors for stories that both explore cultural similarities as well as differences (depending on the reader’s and character’s backgrounds as well as potentially the character and other characters). Other character traits can be explored in this context.
I strongly disagree with altering existing characters in the context of defined racial/sexual/gender/etc. characteristics. If a characteristic isn’t defined, then exploring that characteristic is welcome, since I think the more facets a character has, the more human they are, and thus the more relatable. I also think that adding new characters is generally better than replacing existing characters, since additions result in more possible stories being available (such as interacting with the existing character and expanding supporting casts). For clarification, I don’t mean passing a mantle, when I say replacing a character. I definitely think that mantles can be passed to new characters with good stories. In an example above, someone mentioned Luke Fox picking up the Batman mantle. If the supporting story makes sense, then I’d be fine with the change. This story would come with some obvious story points to explore: Why isn’t Dick Batman? (maybe he’s still Ric… gah) Why don’t the other, closer Bat-family members become Batman? What type of Batman will Luke be? (tech suit vs traditional kevlar) Why did he take up the mantle instead of continuing as Batwing? In this case pretending Batman was the same person as before likely isn’t an option. Does this create new trials to overcome with the rogues gallery?
Also, I’d just like to point out that we should all be careful how we discuss defining various people. For example, while some Greek Americans consider themselves non-white, others consider themselves white, so making a statement that they’re not could be defining them in a way they don’t appreciate.
On the topic of Wonder Woman, I think the most ‘Greek’ I’ve seen her in a while is in Year One with the heavier eyebrows and more prominent nose. Those features really stood out to me as familiar.
