Secret Six #16

[gargoylekitty]

With a two more for the 'Many Looks of Black Alice' and, as noted on Twitter...


First up, Black Alice stops Catman and Deadshot from ditching her.

Meh. Not too creative, just like your typical female version of the character with a lower/more angular dip in the front of the outfit.
Anyhow, she obviously succeeds so they head to a strip club, another attempt to ditch her.

Obviously, again, that fails.


With Scandal & co. there, they try to address the issue of 'Black Alice is definitely not joining them'(reason for her wanting to in the issue, go read!)

And they continue on the path of failing to get rid of her.

Not the biggest fan of Black Alice but it was an alright issue, only wish Scott had been on the art for it. :\

Comments

[raygunjill]

Really, people challenge the fact you've created another super powerful white teenager like the dozens already overrunning the DCU and all you can do it complain about people aptly calling Mary Sue on a lj clone community? That's really embarrassing and I expected more class from you.

[schmevil]

Except she hasn't been challenged over creating "another super powerful white teenager like the dozens already overrunning the DCU." She's been accused of writing a Mary Sue.

Her response was to complain about the term. And hey, she's complained about the term being applied to other people's characters as well. I would hardly categorize her response as embarrassing.

[raygunjill]

A Mary Sue is an overpowered character with an angsty past that comes in and jobs the preexisting characters and gets to stick around despite not being qualified. Alice in this issue is a Mary Sue.

[zegim]

But a Mary Sue is also a self-insert character that we are supposed to love. A very important characteristic that a lot of people forget when use Mary Sue as shorthand for "character I don't like"

[galateus]

No, that isn't what a Mary Sue is. That's just the most common kind in fanfic, and those traits you mentioned don't *automatically* make a character a Sue.

Alice'd have to be written way worse and be almost nothing but clichés to be a Mary Sue.

[gailsimone]

But there's nothing 'apt' about it. That's not what a Mary Sue is, it's just one of those meaningless phrases people use for no good reason. The other posters are right, EVERY new character gets called a Mary Sue at some point and it's so egregiously goofy. I always say it's okay to be condescending and it's okay to be wrong, but but one should never be both if it's all avoidable.

Yes, she's a super-powerful character, but the effect has never been to make people fall at her feet with how cool it is that she can beat up Superman, the point has always been, "Geez, having a disturbed young girl with this kind of power seems like a train wreck waiting to happen."

An important difference.

Could not care less that someone doesn't like her character, am not the least bit offended, that's all fair game.

But I hate that idiotic "Mary Sue" term, especially when it's applied completely incorrectly.

Are pet peeves not allowed at Scans_Daily anymore?

I'm not the least bit mad about the thread, I always enjoy SD. But I think I have the right to loathe hearing that term misapplied for the millionth time, as well, that's all.

[raygunjill]

Angsty and misunderstood is right in the definition of Mary Sue, so I believe the term still applies. But the argument about terminology ignores the biggest problem with Black Alice. DC has hundreds of underused characters of color and instead we just get new white characters whining about their lives. Cassandra Cain got pushed aside, Jaime Reyes and Renee Montoya got reduced to second features, Vixen is getting sidelined again from the Justice League, etc. Then in Secret Six we have a Hispanic woman losing her authority and having a white man take over to fix things. Black Alice is symptomatic of the larger problem and some of us have had enough of it.

[scottyquick]

Raygunjill, I see your concern, but I think Simone is one of the few creators out there who actively pushes and supports and creates awesome characters of color. Frex, she invented:

- Scandal Savage, leader of Secret Six
- Ryan Choi, star of the All-New Atom
- Thomasina Lindo, star of Welcome to Tranquility

She also made pitches for Cass Cain OYL, and had Vixen star in a BOP story arc. I think the problem is, if Simone had loaded up the only villainous team in the DCU with COC, that would have had a ton of unfortunate implications. I think it's pretty safe to say that Scandal's not really leaving the team anyway, she's one of the core four.

[raygunjill]

And yet, her most well known title, Birds of Prey, was overwhelmingly white. It fell into the standard comic book model of being all pretty white people, with an Asian when you need martial arts, oh and we'll use some hot black chick for one arc so we'll show how diverse we are. Nevermind that there's the Super Young Team and the Great Ten, whose miniseries show how you can use characters of color on both sides of the law and have them be non-stereotypical. If I was to give kudos to DC writers right now, that is where I would go.

The Six are not the only villainous team, and furthermore saying that letting them be characters of color would be worst than having none at all is an excuse that's made all the time. For goodness sake, Suicide Squad is pretty much the definitive bad guy comic and Amanda Waller and Bronze Tiger are the backbone of the team. And the League of Assassins has been based in Asia and the Middle East for decades as well. We don't need more heroes of color, we need more well developed characters of color, period. Civilians, heroes, villains, gods, etc.

[scottyquick]

Really now? She couldn't exactly change the core characters anymore then the writer of Green Arrow can decide to replace him with , and I'm fairly certain Helena joining had a lot to do with editorial. Lady Shiva was brought in when they wanted to show Dinah having a complex relationship with an equal in an area of hers that no one else could understand, often saving Dinah's life and protecting her, giving her more complexity then the 90's "I kill you because I can!" Shiva. Vixen was brought in for the first time in 7 years by Simone, and it was because they needed her.

Let me clarify, the Six are the only villainous team with a title. I'm saying it'd be bad that your only team with multiple COC is your only regular, which is fair, imo. Do you disagree?

The Suicide Squad, have they been seen since their mini? And Amanda Waller is a hero, Bronze Tiger was trying to redeem himself. Not exactly the Six, who just kidnapped a man and helped someone torture him.

And what I'm saying is that what Gail's doing is developing a character. Scandal is being kicked off the team she created, by a man she thought was her closest friend, because he claims it's for her own good, and being replaced by a snotty psycho teenager. How do you think that's going to make her feel?

Gail Simone agrees with you, by the way.

[raygunjill]

My feeling is that bringing Zinda out of limbo to serve as the team's backup was an unfortunate choice when there was an opportunity to diversify the team. The Shiva arc, while good at first, was spoiled by having the little Asian girl rescued by the noble white woman, a plot I would love to see be banned from popular media for being overdone. And of course, Misfit and Black Alice.

The constant "protection" of people of color by only making them take the most noble rolls does more harm than good. IIRC, Misfit was from a poor family that died in a tenement fire and Black Alice was motivated by losing her mother to drugs. Both would have perfect places to make a nonwhite teenager. I know people will call stereotype, but they're realistic for a black or Hispanic teenager that isn't stuck being whitewashed to the suburbs, where the writers ignore that those are dominated by white flight.

I say Amanda Waller and Bronze Tiger because they have clear analogues in the Six. Catman is clearly taking cues from Tiger while the cut throat leadership with an underlying affection of Waller is seen in Bane. Of course, Deadshot was on both teams.

The first Villains United mini had both Scandal and Cheshire on the team and I don't believe anyone read it as being unfairly balanced. Nonwhite villains require a lighter hand to keep from being flat, but they're perfectly doable. Jeanette is a point of disappointment as well. The mythological world of DC is narrow and European focused, why couldn't we have a woman from non western folk lore instead of a banshee?

[scottyquick]

What I'm trying to get across is that it probably would have had some Unfortunate Implications. I'm not sure when Dinah saved Shiva, I mean, she saved her from the hand ropes, but Shiva risked her life multiple times for BC and saved Dinah countless times. Although, yeah, I agree that it would have made sense for Black Alice especially to be not white, and Charlie as well, but then the Batgirl story wouldn't have been the same since it was all "ZOMG THE ORIGINAL BATGIRL !!!!!!".

But what I'm saying is that Birds of Prey was a title she inherited. What you were saying is that Simone is giving us yet another white character whining about her life and pushing aside a Hispanic woman in favor of a white guy, but I think what's actually going to happen is that the relationship between Bane and Scandal is going to become more complex, and that Simone's invented and pushed several major characters of color, so it's not exactly fair to say that Simone's not trying to fix the problem.

And because then we couldn't have gotten Tudor!Bane, that's why!

[a_clericalerror]

pushing aside a Hispanic woman in favor of a white guy

While I know you're not the one who brought it up, unless I somehow missed a story making his mother into a white woman, Bane is Hispanic.

[raygunjill]

I'm referring to Dinah taking Sin to the United States. While noble in intention, it's a white woman taking Asian girl way from her corrupt Asian parents. International adoption is a sensitive issue, and the nature of comics is that she's almost immediately pushed to the side. Other writers were who wrote Sin out entirely, but the character was problematic from the very beginning.

While I see where people might frown on having the Six, or indeed and hero's rogue gallery, be more diverse, I still feel that worry comes from a fear of the writer being branded racist than any regard for the characters of color themselves. Ra's al Ghul is probably the most famous non-white villain around and the movies changed him to white. It's telling of a larger problem.

[gailsimone]

Ugh.

I can't believe people waste time with this. If someone thinks Dinah taking a young girl from a life of torture and abuse is bad because she's white, well, screw them. "Problematic," my ass. I've done more than my share of study about this and there are more Asian babies, mostly girl babies, available than Asian parents wanting to adopt them.
Ask those children if they would have preferred the state-run orphanages.

As for the Bane thing, you said, "Then in Secret Six we have a Hispanic woman losing her authority and having a white man take over to fix things"


This is what he was correcting. You got your facts wrong. Bane is not white. Bane is hispanic and always has been.

And trust me, I don't give a moment's worry about being called a racist. The Six are the Six because they are the characters that fit, regardless of mis-characterizations.

[raygunjill]

I'm not trying to call you racist, I simply feel the treatment of Asian children in comics is less than stellar. In mixed race children it's the white parent that is emphasize: Lian is raised by Roy with her mom as a distant menace; Iris and Jai have Wally emphasized more than Linda; Connor Hawke's mother is barely seen; Cassandra Cain was treated as a pawn of her father and Bruce for years.

I know the issues of the treatment of Asian girls personally. I have two family members who are adopted by China. And while they have a better chance in America, it doesn't change the fact that they've become divorced from their heritage. They're the only Asian children in a majority white town and their adoptive parents try their best but can't ultimately understand the true burden of racist bullying because of their white privileged.

The older girl in particular has no idea what country she's even from, since she was seized by the Chinese government from southern Tibet. In the short run their childhood is going to be great, but now she's old enough to start asking questions and dealing with the fact that China's not the only cause of her problems. The US and other western countries are accomplices in the Chinese abuse of human rights economically and politically.

The story of Sin hits home personally, and the harsh truth is as long as people like Dinah seek out Lady Shiva there's going to be a demand for the abusive training of girls. It's not a black and white, or rather Asian and white, issue and I feel the storyline glossed over the real life implications.

[gailsimone]

I DO agree that there are a lot of crappy representations of ethnicity in comics, and I agree that there should be a lot more diversity in comics inside and outside the panels. It is my main passion in the industry, in fact.

But I don't think tokenism and head counting is ever going to help.

And thanks for the kind words, Scotty. I think Six is a book that, oddly, is a lot more embracing of diversity than most superhero titles.

[gailsimone]

What the hell?

The way you reduce these characters is really very sad. Huntress doesn't think of herself as a white girl, for one thing. Shiva being thought of as some generic martial artist is just bizarre, and reducing Vixen, a delightful character I adore to "hot black chick" is just plain insulting. And for the record, I would have LOVED to use Vixen as a long time BOpper and did try to get her, but the best-selling new writer in comics wanted to use her instead as a featured player in DC's premiere book, JLA. I'm sure if you really try, you can try to find something racially insensitive in that, but you would be dead wrong. The real facts are two writers who love the character fought over her (with civility) and she ended up with a role in the biggest team book dc has and a very prestigious mini. In b-list character terms, in the real world? That's pretty much winning the lottery.

You're still missing the point. This team has two Latin characters (it's debatable whether Scandal is off the team or not), both of whom have been the team's only leaders of all the white characters on the team. It's sexually diverse, as well. That's one third the team and 100% of the team's leaders.

But whatever, this seems pretty tenuous.

[gailsimone]

???

[gailsimone]

I don't even know where to start with this.

First, I'm sorry, but every new character is not going to fit a particular agenda, even one I agree with. I create a ton of characters of color and happily insert them at every available opportunity. But I certainly think creating no Caucasian characters is a poor solution to the problem. It is, in fact, no solution at all.

But beyond that, what in the world do Cass and Jaime and Renee have to do with anything? Alice isn't taking their place, far from it, they HAVE slots to appear in, Alice does not, besides which, none of those characters fit in S6 even slightly, for reasons that are absolutely color-blind. How in the world is a character who may or may not be sticking around in a team book affecting characters whose own books failed, but were STILL given a second chance as back-up strips? Are you really trying to think there's something sinister there?

But perhaps most oddly, you're angry for something that makes no sense at all. Bane isn't white. Bane is a Latin male, 100%, and has been since his first appearance, something we've alluded to in Secret Six more than once. And Scandal's most certainly not going to accept Bane's orders, either. It's Act One of that arc.

I hate to keep this kind of ping pong going. My problem with the phrase is that it's a goofy and meaningless and misused term, not that you posted it in particular or with your problems with the issue. That's all perfectly fair. I just hate that term since it's one of those things that simply don't make any sense to use any more.