WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN??

[brooms]

Tom Brevoort has a Formspring and he's actually pretty good at answering questions.

In his most recent batch of replies, he tackled things like the recent CATWOMAN/STARFIRE controversy and why Gambit isn't invited to more poker games.














(If you don't remember her, go here.)

Comments

[abriel]

"Marvel does a better job of avoiding it..."? What Marvel books has that person read? What about Dark Avengers where Moonstone was being passed around by all the guys on the team? What about how Tigra was treated much, much earlier in West Coast Avengers? And what about Emma Frost and her various clothes (and lack of) throughout the years?

[salinea]

Cammi!!! How are you going on the cosmos alone without your pet homicidal badass guy! I worry for you.

[crabby_lioness]

No Avengers title is good for women.

'Nuff said.

[kd_the_movie]

I didn't find the Moonstone thing so bad because you really understood that not only does moonstone enjoy sex but she had no qualms about using sex as a manipulation tool (which is sooo in her character).

I never got the "oversexualized objectification" vibe from her.

In regards to Cammi...I was hoping she'd show up in Thanos Imperative. But Drax is dead anyway :( *im still mad about Marvel scuttling away the Post Annihilation Cosmic!Marvel*

[abriel]

Aw now, I wouldn't go that far. I mean the Avengers books have been pretty good to women so far. Just look at what they've done with one of the founding members the Wasp...

...

Well, not the best example. Well, there's Ms. Marvel! They never screwed her over! Well, except for that time she was raped....

......

Well, what about Scarlet...Witch...




I'm just gonna go sulk in my corner now.

[q99]

"I don't think our industry puts it's best foot forward when it comes to the depiction of women" - You can say that again :)

[abriel]

I wouldn't have found it to be so bad either if Bendis hadn't decided to try to justify it by saying that she was just doing it to fuck with everyone's minds. I don't know about anyone else but I didn't see her fucking with anyone's minds...just fucking. There's nothing wrong with that, and I don't put it past Moonstone to use sex as a weapon but sheesh...don't say she's screwing around to mess with brains when she's clearly just going around enjoying herself.

Mod Note

[salinea]

This thread is under discussion by the mod team.

[salinea]

What Marvel books has that person read? What about Dark Avengers where Moonstone was being passed around by all the guys on the team?

That's not what was happening. That was Moonstone passing all the guys on her team to her. Agency: it matters.

[terrykun]

She's traveling with Thanos' former pet chaos sprite. I'd say she's set. :D

Mod Warning

[salinea]

scans_daily is a feminist community, with an anti-oppression ethos. I'll invite you to re-read our profile if you're confused about what that means.

Among other things, we do not welcome slut-shaming language. That includes calling a female character "slut", "loose", "whore", or "skank". Please, don't do it again.

This is your FIRST OFFICIAL WARNING. Please note that if you receive two further warnings you will lose the ability to post on this community.

[abriel]

Okay, okay, point. I worded it wrong. I should have said when Moonstone was working her way through the team. Which, even though it's a bit more empowering, is still sexualized cheesecake. Or at least some might see it that way.

Not saying that I had a problem with it. But I know many people did.

[salinea]

It was definitely...



well I'm not gonna lie, I love Moonstone, and Dark Avengers is the first thing I read with her; so obviously I don't have a huge issue with it :p

but it's certainly a negative stereotype in many ways (and only made a modicum amount of sense) though the reasons it's a negative stereotype are also rooted in the sexist way culture views female sexuality etc.

[akodo_rokku]

To be fair, it was Moonstone passing herself around.

I mean that's not really *better*, but...

[abriel]

Well Bendis's crappy writing and his horrible characterization of her didn't help. He took away her intelligence, her craftiness, her signature sarcasm, and everything good about her character and all that was left was the woman of the team who served as eye candy for the book, and all there was to her character was the fact that she was sleeping around. Thankfully she's getting better under Parker's pen--much better--but under Bendis, eegad. And I forget who it was that was writing Ms. Marvel during "War of the Marvels" but Karla's characterization there was just awful. When you forget about one major power that features heavily in the set that your character has (in Karla's case, intangibility), you fail as a comic writer.


(Yes I love Moonstone too, in case anyone can't tell :P)

[salinea]

it's just not the same when the pet isn't played by Vin Diesel!

[salinea]

didn't it start earlier with Ellis' Thunderbolt? Or did you like how she was characterised there?

[cyberghostface]

But it's alright for Spider-Man to have done...well, pretty much everything after OMD, Tom? (I was going to make a list, but then I realized that would take too long)

[arilou_skiff]

Which was, y'know. What he was saying. Not that Marvel was adequate but that it was mariginally better.

[abriel]

See I hear that accusation with Ellis's run a lot and I have read through that run multiple times and frankly I don't see where he messed up her character there. Really the only thing he messed up big on was making up the heated rivalry between her and Songbird, who happens to be another one of my favorites. Before Ellis Karla and Mel never really hated each other all that much...oh Karla would push Mel's buttons by jabbing at her "white trash" past and making snide remarks about how she would sleep with anyone and Mel didn't really trust Karla but the two of them weren't arch-rivals...they were just there. Ellis changed that.

But that was the only thing. Far as I can see Karla was still pretty crafty, manipulative, and smart under his pen. About the only thing I could see that his critics might be right on is the fact that Ellis basically pushed Karla over the fence into being pretty much pure villain, as opposed to before when she really was riding the fence.

Even before Ellis though Karla was a pretty sexual character. She did strip naked in front of Hawkeye in the training room and then seduced the Counter-Earth version of Lloyd Bloch. I believe both those times were under Nicieza's pen, the guy who is revered among the hardcore Thunderbolts fanboys as the only true Tbolts writer.

[filthysize]

I think it is most definitely better, much better even, if it's her own choice.

[icon_uk]

Karla is, first and foremost a manipulator, she'll use whatever technique she deems necessary to give herself the upper hand in any situation and has few scruples.

When she was a therapist, we saw her phone up a patient who was having suspicions about her husband, and using a fake voice, encouraged the very suspicions she was supposed to be treating, so she could keep the lucrative patient a while longer, and she DID manage to psyche the original Moonstone into actively rejecting the gemstone which gave him his powers, which she promptly grabbed and absorbed herself, giving her the Moonstone powers.

In the Busiek Thunderbolts run she could be seen playing characters off against each other ALL the time, and made sure that she became Jolt's best friend in the group before anyone else could, since she was a wild card, and if there was going to be a wild card, she wanted to be the one she'd turn to for guidance.

There's an awesome moment where she's trying to get the now biomechanical Techno (Fixer as was) to join her against Zemo. She tries reason and argument and then you can all but HEAR her shift gears as she poses suggestively and tries to play on his libido. It SHOULD be sexy (and perhaps it was to some), but it's such a calculated move that it's clear she's entirely in control.

Whilst I have no doubt she would use sex as a manipulation technique if it suited her*, it would be one she would only use in certain circumstances and she had no higher expectations of those she was attempting to influence. Perhaps with the Dark Avengers, who were hardly an intellectual bunch she decided to go for the most basic primal urges of the team, though I would have expected more... variety from her as she is a VERY smart woman.

* To contrast with her relationship with Hawkeye for example, which was very much "real" rather than a power game, which made it rather sweet.

Re: Mod Warning

[lonewolf23k]

My apologies, I intended no disrespect.

[icon_uk]

I believe both those times were under Nicieza's pen, the guy who is revered among the hardcore Thunderbolts fanboys as the only true Tbolts writer.

Really? Not Kurt Busiek, who CREATED the concept of the Thunderbolts? That's.... sad more than anything.

[abriel]

Yep, really. I almost never heard Busiek's name brought up in discussions of the 'Bolts. It's always Fabian's.