Question

[trinityvixen]

I was thinking about my earlier post (in which I objectified at least two men and hinted at a history of doing so to many, many others) and the oncoming onslaught of superhero movies (our taste for which is surprisingly still rapacious). Marvel has no less than a dozen movies already assumed: Iron Man 2 and, very probably, 3; Thor (with Thor 2 less likely but not impossible); Captain America (its sequel potential somewhere between that of Iron Man 3 and Thor 2); The Avengers; Wolverine 2; Deadpool; and some variety of X-Men-related films--the long idle Magneto movie and the more active X-Men: First Class.

DC has, to its credit, tried to step up production of the next Christopher Nolan Batman film and is making noise about another Superman film (though they won't film anything until the lawsuits are settled, I'm sure). And, while they do that, Green Lantern is already filming. (Seriously, someone took a shitty quality photo of Ryan Reynolds on set with what looked like a smudge on one of his fingers and the Lantern fans exploded with paroxysms of glee that he was wearing the ring.) The Flash may be getting another script treatment. Don't ask about Wonder Woman, though.

But, no, wait, let's ask about Wonder Woman for a second. Or, rather, since I don't want to hear the bullshit about how they can't figure out how to make Wonder Woman interesting enough to justify a movie, let's focus on what really bugged me as I looked at the Marvel line-up. Forget DC for a moment. I need comics fans to answer (riddle) me this: Who is Marvel's Wonder Woman?

I'm not trying to pick at wounds here, though it is a sore subject for me, personally. I really just could not think of any grand dame of the Marvel universe who stands on the sort of equal footing with her male colleagues that Wonder Woman does in the DC universe. The best I could come up with were the obviously-derivative-versions-of-male-characters, sometimes-members of the Avengers, like Spider-Woman or She-Hulk. Thinking about female Marvel characters, I immediately thought of X-Men, but they're hardly any of them anything like Wonder Woman. You can think of the iconic Marvel characters without ever touching on any X-Man or X-Woman. So the X-Women cannot be said to be iconic enough to Wonder Woman, for all that they are, by far, the most interesting women in the Marvel universe.

So, comics nerds better versed than I: am I wrong? Is there an iconic Marvel character who is on par with DC's Wonder Woman and I'm just not thinking of her?

Comments

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

There's a good point about DC icons versus Marvel ones here. The DC characters are very, well, Freudian, with the Super(ego)man, the Batman(id), etc. Marvel characters, tending to be much more grounded and human might not have that same intrinsically understood appeal. But they do still have icons, as others have pointed out. Captain America is a good one, too. It's one people recognize pretty readily and who has his own pop-culture idiom. I mean, we think of moral crusader, we may think of him in some fashion sooner than we do Superman. (Superman is invoked by those who seek to do the impossible. Captain America is more about what is right and accessibly so.)

[neo-leviathan.livejournal.com]

Wow, must be a cultural difference there :)
Superman for me is "Big, dumb, useless brute who can't solve anything that doesn't involve the 'hit it, then hit it again' strategy"
Cap America is "Out of his time zealot who wins far more fights than he should do thanks to the "AMERICA!! FUCKYEAH!!" factor"

Of course, I'm also the person who gets most of their 'mainstream' comic knowledge from the JLU cartoons, vauge memories of 80s cartoons, live action movies, tvtropes & wikipedia pages since I can rarely manage to actually pry comics away from people.
Watchmen, Authority, Identity Crisis, yep, read them. Superman? Err.. yeah, I read one comic about him back when I was about ten, and that's about it.

Perhaps I'm just too cynical for my own good =)

[arcane-the-sage.livejournal.com]

You estimate of Superman is right on IMO ^_^

Cap..... well so-so. A lot of his big baddies are more the megalomaniacs with 1/2 a brain so the lack of brawn in Cap (as compared to say the Hulk or Thor) is ok. Cartoons of him rarely do him proper justice. But one reason to really like him..... his main combat moves involve a very good working knowledge of trig and material science ^_^ Seriously, he bounces that shield off a dozen or so surfaces to strike a structural weak point in some vehicle or giant robot. I would so want Cap as a partner in various games of pool ^_^

[arcane-the-sage.livejournal.com]

That should read "your estimate of Superman is right on IMO"


PS: Cap playing Ultimate Frisbee.... That must have helped pay for the Avengers equipment more than once with the PPV rights ^_^

[neo-leviathan.livejournal.com]

Ahh, and here lies the difference in our experiences :)
Your knowledge of Cap comes from watching his cartoons etc, and thus getting the 'day to day' cap.
I have vague memories of some cartoons, and wikipedia/tvtropes readings, which gives me his.. larger accomplishments rather than the norm. Such as him taking out the Hulk in hand to hand combat. I'm sorry, but that should not be possible ><

Re: Sups, I did like seeing one of the JLA "alternate universe" episodes where the alternate JL's Flash was killed, and they.. went off the "Hero" track a little, and started actually using permanent methods against Supervillains.

Current reality Sups spent the first section of the episode destroying a dozen city blocks while in a fight against.. can't remember who, some massive blob like guy who was almost as strong and invulnerable to physical harm as Sups himself.
He's eventually captured.

Alternate JL wanders in, captures the current ones (even Batman can't escape, because alternate Batman had already thought of everything Batman might do), and takes over, without the citizens knowing (other than noting on the costume changes).
Super strong blob guy breaks free of prison.
Alternate Sups shows up.
"So Superman! Time for round two?!"
"Hrm.. not this time" *Lobotomises villain with heat vision*

Sups really is only fun when he's evil.. oh, or when he has a "World of Cardboard" speech, that's occasionally fun too.