Wonder Woman And Harley Quinn

Tyson explains the basic concepts of feminist theory, and the ways in which readers can use the theory as a lens to examine the social pressures and gender roles within a literary work. To examine through a feminist lens, theorists need to first look at the different characters’ genders to determine whether their roles and responsibilities “conform to traditional (patriarchal) gender roles” (Tyson 84). “According to [patriarchal] gender roles, men are naturally rational, strong, protective, and decisive,” but “women [are] naturally emotional…, weak, nurturing, and submissive” (87). Moreover, “anyone who violates traditional gender roles is [looked upon as] unnatural, unhealthy, or…immoral” (86). Therefore, due to the “oppression of women” in

Throughout comic book series publication the recurring theme of female suppression is prevalent in the Wonder Woman comic book series, there are several panels of wonder woman straining against the bindings of society. The Golden Age (1930’s -1940’s) women were portrayed as damsels in distress, in almost every comic book cover a lady is tied up with a man trying to save her. Facebook’s group created a page which focuses on the portrayal of women in comics, the site summarizes women in the Golden Age as career-oriented girls. Comic book characters as Nellie the

Christopher Nolan has directed some of the best movies in the past decade. Interstellar, The Dark Knight, and Inception, are just a few examples of his success as a director. However, while watching his films through a feminist lense, I found that the female characters were not well sketched and did not have any depth. In this film, Rachel Dawse, the driving female part, has more impact by dying than actually doing something herself to change the plot and perpetuates the helpless “female role”. Her part as the love interest for both Bruce Wayne and Harvey Dent is what defines her character and gives her purpose. Her demise is what fuels Harvey and batman's anger and pushes them to seek revenge so she only serves as motive. I believe that the message Christopher Nolan is trying to convey is that a woman, or rather one’s love for a woman, often results in more pain and sadness than in happiness.

The tension found inside and between Rose Almond and other characters in V for Vendetta develops her character development and is significant not only to the long-debated differences between a graphic novel and a comic but also to the portrayal of women in this graphic novel. This is significant because V for Vendetta portrays women as submissive, incapable of providing for themselves without a man, and driven by their own emotions which shows that the content in graphic novels (i.e. tension and character development) that makes them different from comic books is not given the same attention or thought for women as it is for

It also is trying to break through equal representation. Andrea Romano said ”DC Comics isn’t just scratching the surface on equal representation, but breaking new grounds.” As women were generally charged with the responsibility of morality. In the 19th Century many women wanted a stronger voice. ( Romano Andrea, Catwoman is bisexual.)

The episode “Harley and Ivy” from Batman the Animated Series is full of interesting ideas and exciting calls to action for its audience. Poison Ivy and her adventures with Harley Quinn not only explore what it means to be a virtuous character but also question what it means to be and independent and strong woman. Ivy specifically acts as the main example of female empowerment and throughout the entire. While the author of the episode, Paul Dini, and the director of the episode, Boyd Kirkland, do not tackle the feminist goals of this episode in totally flawless ways, they still do a good job of using Poison Ivy’s character to asks the audience, specifically the female audience, to encourage female friendship, fight sexism, and questions gender roles and what it means to be a virtuous and empowered woman.

There’s no point in creating a leading role model for young girls, if it’s overshadowed by the constant over-sexualization of her image. The result of over-sexualizing women can bring dangers to them especially when integrated in current culture. Throughout the history of comics, it is evident that they slowly came to have a huge influence on the youth since they come with the power to morph boys' and girls' minds, they present a huge difference between how men and women are portrayed and tend to be very sexist at times and problematic.

In this day and age when superheroes are everywhere you look it is still impossible to find a good female role model. Why is it that when you ask a child who their favourite superhero is they give the same generic answers: Superman, Batman or Iron Man. This observation seems very dated for people in 2015 and questions whether female superheroes have the same exposure as males. Now with superhero shows becoming mainstream it seems that female superheroes finally have a chance to show their potential. After watching Marvels’ Jessica Jones, I realize now that this genre of adult superheroes is severely underrepresented. But who is Jessica Jones, after a tragic end to her brief superhero career, Jessica Jones tries to rebuild her life as a private investigator, dealing with cases involving people with remarkable abilities in New York City (Jessica Jones [TV Series], 2015). What is interesting that this series isn’t an origin story but afterlife on the not so glamorous life a recovering superhero. This is opposite of the “normal” superhero type we see in movies like “Marvel’s The Avengers”, the comic relief and light hearted family movie. Therefore I believe Jessica Jones manages to challenge and fight the gender norms that are in place for female superheroes. I will elaborate on how this is achieved through: the objectification of women, gender roles & crime genre “film noir”.

“It’s not about ‘deserve’. It’s about what you believe. And I believe in love.” These words said by Diana of Themyscira are relevant in every aspect of our current society. The movie “Wonder Woman” takes stereotypically feminine or weak values like love and empathy and makes them a source of power.

To some, wonder woman is regarded as a feminist icon. However, O’Reilly does not believe so because of the submissive themes that her creator included in the comics.

Author and civil rights activist Maya Angelou once said, “How important it is for us to recognize and celebrate our heroes and she-roes!”. When one thinks of comic books, it is very likely that the subjects that come to mind are Marvel’s Spiderman or DC’s Batman. Although comic books are stereotypically thought to be mainly about super heroes, there are a wide variety of subject matter they could be written about, such as romance. In the 1950s – 1960s, it was common for these romance comics to exploit the social norms of that time and emphasized the subject of gender roles. While the men in comic books were usually illustrated in a brave heroic manner, the women would be portrayed to be what would now be considered a stereotypical “trophy wife”. As a young child reading these comics and taking in these images, they are slowly molding their ideals to believe that what they are reading and seeing is what is accepted and normal in their society. By coding gender norms into the texts, authors are helping mold the ideology of its readers to believe that it is acceptable for both genders to follow specific rules that accommodate to the believed social norms of the time.

Whilst it would seem at face value that the portrayal of a strong female heroine is empowering for all women in a society of unequal gendered stereotypes, the explanations as to why the female heroine is so strong, seems only to be justified through motivation instead of ‘natural’ strength. To many theorists this motivation can only be explained through a woman’s maternal instincts, or a female link to the power and dominance projected by men which is portrayed through a female’s identification with herself and the ‘lack’, leading to a sense of heightened power through the phallic. In this essay I will be analysing whether a heroine is personally empowered through self-determination as a strong women, or instead motivated by external situations such as maternal instincts, or problems associated with gender differences.

In Issue #8 of DC's All Star Comics (cover date: Jan. '42) there's an eight page story in-

When taking into account these two characters, one might be inclined to consider that they put across a rebellious attitude that is relatively irresponsible. Surely, if they were actually interested in promoting feminist thinking, they would have adopted different attitudes. Even with this, one needs to understand that times were different at the time when the stories were written and that such behavior was very feminist in character.

With the recent release of Wonder Woman, directed by Patty Jenkins, many people have called into question how well Wonder Woman—otherwise known as Diana in the movie—can be related to feminism, and how she represents a positive image or inspirational figure for women and young girls in today’s society. One of these people is Zoe Heller, who in turn wrote the article “God’s Gift to Men”, which talks not only about the movie, but also took an extremely deep look at how well they made Diana into an inspirational figure. While I don’t believe this was meant to be an inspiring feminist movie, I think it does bring about other issues that may have been overlooked when it comes to a normal feminist movie. I believe that Heller over-analyzed this movie, and tried to make it into something it’s not.