It’s unlike me to stand on a soapbox but I felt addressing this was important. Tonight I was approached by Elliott Brown who has started a petition to persuade DC Comics to add more women to their dwindling company roster. Let me preface this by saying I am all for girl power and taking down sexist conglomerates of evil like any gal who fancies herself a hero, but is a lack of ladies really the problem? I think it goes a lot deeper than that.
American comics is a dying industry. It’s the same rehashed superhero genre that holds nostalgia for some and no interest for others. The desire to recapture our childhood keeps our feet firmly in the past leaving no room for new characters because we already have so much emotional investment in existing ones. No one can top [insert your favorite superhero here]. No fresh face is going to bring something new to the group. Use whatever minority you think is big right now, hire whoever you think can write it best, it’s still going to follow the tried and true formula of superhero tropes. The only difference is you’ll be targeting a demographic you haven’t squeezed enough money out of yet.
I don’t care who’s writing the comic I’m reading, I care about what they’ve put in it. Superman is 73 years old and has a movie coming out in 2013; I think we know him well enough by now, but as long as he keeps making DC money they’re going to keep rehashing his story. Stories are supposed to have a beginning, middle and end. Stories come in a lot of different genres. There are so many of them that exciting and original things are created by men and women alike every day. Do you think there’s anything new and exciting waiting for us in next week’s superhero installment? Do you think you can hand it to a teenage girl and make her a consumer because a woman wrote it? Most women just don’t want to read them. Most men don’t want to read them. I think this is strongly demonstrated by the fact the petition’s fan suggested list has a majority of authors writing genres outside of super fantasy.
The people who do read superhero comics read lots of other things, too. Just because they like superheros doesn’t mean they don’t like other comics. If DC continues its be all, end all mantra their days are numbered. As soon as people get bored enough and stop filling seats in the theater it will be too late to change. The company’s preparation towards digital distribution is a huge step in the right direction to reach a wider audience, the next is to unlock all of the amazing work out there they won’t consider because none of the characters are shooting lasers from their eyes.
If DC Comics were to approach me for a job in its current shape I would decline. I want to work on something new.