Women in Marvel Films 9781474448840

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Women in Marvel Films

Women in Marvel Films Miriam Kent

Edinburgh University Press is one of the leading university presses in the UK. We publish academic books and journals in our selected subject areas across the humanities and social sciences, combining cutting-­edge scholarship with high editorial and production values to produce academic works of lasting importance. For more information visit our website: edinburghuniversitypress.com © Miriam Kent, 2021 Edinburgh University Press Ltd The Tun­– H ­ olyrood Road 12(2f) Jackson’s Entry Edinburgh EH8 8PJ Typeset in Monotype Ehrhardt by Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Stockport, Cheshire, and printed and bound in Great Britain A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978 1 4744 4882 6 (hardback) ISBN 978 1 4744 4884 0 (webready PDF) ISBN 978 1 4744 4885 7 (epub) The right of Miriam Kent to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, and the Copyright and Related Rights Regulations 2003 (SI No. 2498).

Contents

List of Figures xxx Acknowledgements xxx

  1.

  2.

  3.

 4.

  5.

  6.

Introducing . . . The Mighty Women of Marvel! 1 Comics on Screen: What is at Stake in Representing Marvel Women? 10 The (Super)Power of Feminist Film Studies 15 We’re In This Together Now: Mediating Womanhood through Postfeminist Culture 21 ‘You Have a Knack for Saving My Life!’: Wives, Girlfriends and Women in Refrigerators in Marvel Films 29 Damsels in Distress and Women in Refrigerators across Media 30 Women in Refrigerators in Marvel Film Adaptations 34 Pepper Potts and Gwen Stacy: Recuperating the Superhero Girlfriend47 Iron (Wo)Man 48 The Amazing Gwen Stacy 58 With Great Power Comes Great Frustration? Configurations of Hero(ine)ism in Marvel Films 68 Superheroines and Postfeminist Media Culture 68 With Great Power Comes Great Frustration 75 Playing Superheroine: Feminine Subjectivity and (Postfeminist) Masquerade 93 ‘I Want You to Be the Best Version of Yourself’: Postfeminist Masquerade and Subjectivity in Captain Marvel 101 Marvel Legacy: Girl Heroism and Intergenerationality in Marvel Films 119 Interconnected Womanhood in Elektra 120 All-­New, All-­Different: The Legacy of Wolverine in Logan 123 Mad With Power: Female Villainy in Marvel Films 145 Wicked Witches and Poisonous Women 150

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wo me n in ma r v e l f i l m s Disease, Toxicity and Poison in Marvel’s Evil Women 156 Make Asgard Great Again: Villainy and the Feminine Spectre of White Supremacy in Thor: Ragnarok 161 Mutants, Cyborgs and Femininity Unfixed? Addressing the Gendered Bodies of Mystique and Nebula 171 Fluid Gender and the Politics of the X-­Men Films 173 The Strangest Superhero of All: Nebula’s Cyborg Subjectivity 184 Disrupting the Rainbow Bridge: Dysfunctional Heterosexuality and Reinforcing Gender Difference in Marvel Adaptations 193 Dysfunctional Heterosexuality in Marvel Films 199 Black Skin, Blue Skin: Race and Femininity in Marvel Films 210 The Politics of ‘Diversity’ in Marvel Properties 214 The (Afro)Future of a Diverse Marvel: Gender, Race and Empire in Thor: Ragnarok and Black Panther 233 Asgard as a People:­Racial Ambiguity in Thor: Ragnarok’s Heroines 236 Wakanda Forever: Black Femininity and the (Afro)Future 241 Afterword: Some Concluding Remarks on Marvel Women . . . Thus Far! 260

Filmography 264 Bibliography 267 Index307

Figures

1.1

Frank Castle’s fist alongside the photograph of his wife and son signifies his call to action in The Punisher (2004) 36 1.2 Peter Parker’s clenched fist signifies his commitment to being Spider-­Man after Mary Jane Watson is kidnapped in Spider-­Man 2 40 1.3 Mary Jane Watson falls in Spider-­Man 42 1.4 Gwen Stacy falls in Spider-­Man 3 42 2.1 Iron Man’s signature landing stance as demonstrated in Iron Man 2 57 2.2 Pepper Potts emulating the Iron Man landing while infected by Extremis in Iron Man 3 57 2.3 Mary Jane Watson poses for Peter Parker’s camera in a point-­of-­view shot in Spider-­Man 59 2.4 Gwen Stacy is photographed in Spider-­Man 3 60 2.5 Peter Parker secretly photographs Gwen Stacy from afar in The Amazing Spider-­Man 60 2.6 Gwen Stacy falls to her death in The Amazing Spider-­Man 2 64 3.1 ‘That’s messed up’: Elektra discusses her job as an assassin with Abby Miller in Elektra 79 3.2 ‘I’m the best there is at what I do, but what I do best isn’t very nice’: Logan explains himself to Kayla Silverfox in X-­Men Origins: Wolverine 79 4.1 Princess Sparklefists: Brie Larson as Carol Danvers in Captain Marvel 109 5.1 Laura faces Donald Pierce and his militaristic Reavers in Logan’s western-­inspired wasteland 139 5.2 Laura heralds a new generation of mutants by turning Logan’s grave-­marking cross into an ‘X’ in Logan 142 6.1 The darkening of Jean Grey’s eyes and her veiny complexion marks her as abject in X-­Men: The Last Stand 153 6.2 Viper sheds her skin in The Wolverine 161 6.3 Demonic femininity in Thor: Ragnarok’s Hela 163 7.1 Rebecca Romijn as Mystique in X2  176

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Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique in X-­Men: Days of Future Past 177 7.3 Nebula’s distorted cyborg body reconfigures itself after she has been in an explosion in Guardians of the Galaxy 188 9.1 Rila Fukushima as Yukio in The Wolverine 229 10.1 Asgard as a people: Thor and his multicultural and multispecies subjects in Thor: Ragnarok 241 10.2 Black Panther’s Dora Milaje Ayo, Queen Mother Ramonda and Shuri 251 10.3 Inventor-­scientist Shuri alongside T’Challa in Black Panther 255

Acknowledgements

This book would not have been possible without the support of the Arts and Humanities Research Council, who generously provided funding for my doctoral research, which forms the basis of this work. To them, I express my gratitude, as well as to the University of East Anglia, for allowing me to carry out my project. My sincere thanks go to my former colleagues in the Department of Film, Television and Media Studies at UEA and the Feminist Media Studies Research Group. I could not have done without their intellectual insights, words of encouragement and reviews of drafts. I am also indebted to Gillian Leslie of Edinburgh University Press for making this a smoother writing and publication experience than I could have wished for. Many thanks also to my super PhD supervisors Eylem Atakav and Melanie Williams. I particularly thank Eylem for supporting me for over a decade and mentoring me along each step of the way throughout my undergraduate, postgraduate and postdoctoral activities. I am immensely grateful to scholars of all levels who have provided insight and expertise, including: Su Holmes, Yvonne Tasker, Rayna Denison, Christine Cornea, Sanna Inthorn, Hannah Hamad, Peter Krämer, Richard Farmer, Carolyn Cocca, members of the Comics Studies Society and anyone who attended the talks and presentations I gave to try out my ideas throughout this time. For sharing their experiences with me and supporting my research, I thank my PhD friends. And Tony, for being Tony. Many thanks to my family, loved ones and cats. This book is for all superwomen, both fictional and real.

Introducing . . . The Mighty Women of Marvel!

Marvel’s Kamala Khan, the teenage Pakistani-­American Muslim superheroine whose uniform is a refashioned burkini, was characterised by both the popular and comic book press as a watershed moment for Marvel Comics. The introduction of a new incarnation of the Ms. Marvel superheroine as a young, Pakistani-­American Muslim girl made headlines in US and UK media outlets before the first issue of the book by G. Willow Wilson and Adrian Alphona (2014) had even been released (see Gustines 2013; Janmohamed 2013; Jebreal 2013; Robinson 2013; Wheeler 2013). Marvel had recast the previously blonde bombshell heroine Ms. Marvel as a racial and religious minority and a teenage girl, apparently normalising the possibility for marginalised people to embody both heroism and the mundanity of American teen life as encompassing conceptions of difference that map onto the lived experiences of subjectivities not included in traditional representations of white, masculine heroism. In 2015, Kamala Khan became a symbol for political activism against racism and Islamophobia on the sides of San Francisco city buses (Letamendi 2015). By the end of the year, a fanmade homage (Stefani 2015) to Captain America’s 1941 comic book debut, in which the superhero punches Adolf Hitler in the face, gained wide exposure in the popular media. The image portrayed Ms. Marvel similarly punching the then-­Republican presidential front runner Donald Trump after he called for a ‘total and complete shutdown’ of all Muslims entering the US (Baker-­Whitelaw 2015). Within two years Kamala Khan embodied these shifting discourses of heroism, nationality and identity, representing politics beyond a mere fictional superhero. Far be it from my intentions to characterise Ms. Marvel as the epitome of marginalised intersectional subjectivities represented within popular culture, the comic book, and its reception, indicates the issues that exist in representations of female superheroes in mainstream popular culture. The book focuses on questions of identity­ – ­of growing up ‘different’. This difference is not only marked by Kamala’s eventual possession of

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superpowers but by the fact that she, as a Muslim, a Pakistani-­American, a girl, is different to what Western media have promoted as heroic since the dawn of the superhero. As noted by Jeffrey A. Brown, the most recognisable superheroes are, by default, ‘white males who have existed since the start of superhero comics’ (Brown 2017: 115). What does it then mean for a woman or girl to be heroic? What sorts of women have been portrayed as heroes, villains or sidekicks? And what does this say about the culture from which they stem? These questions are at the heart of this book. While comic books themselves remain a niche medium, superheroes are truly cemented within the global cultural consciousness due to the booming popularity of superhero movie adaptations. At the forefront of this trend have been films based on Marvel comic books. These films, and the women presented within them, are the focus of this book. Marvel Comics is most famous for introducing to the world the likes of Spider-­Man, Iron Man and Captain America. The white, heterosexual, masculine hero remains a staple of Marvel superhero narratives, as well as those of its competitor DC. However, one should not undermine the role of women in these stories. From heroines such as the matriarchal Invisible Woman or super-­spy Black Widow, to morally ambiguous characters such as Elektra and Mystique, and civilian women such as Pepper Potts and Gwen Stacy, this book acknowledges the mark such figures have left upon popular culture. In the early 2000s, Marvel recognised the commercial potential of superhero film adaptations, and along with Spider-­Man went Mary Jane. Films based on Marvel properties currently have the upper hand over films based on DC comics. While at the time of writing there exist over fifty films based on Marvel characters, there are fewer based on DC properties over a wider time span. Given the cultural significance of films based on Marvel comics­– ­they have made billions of dollars at the domestic US box office since 2010 alone­ – ­they are a rich subject of discussion. The issues raised in my brief outline of Ms. Marvel are undoubtedly feminist­– ­notions of identity, gender, sexuality and race are foregrounded, both in the comic itself and in surrounding media discussions. Yet the cultural moment in which superhero narratives have taken hold can be characterised as postfeminist, evoking a complex set of discourses concerning mainstreamed feminine subjectivities that incorporate feminist goals while simultaneously positioning these goals as contentious or even obsolete. Indeed, Ms. Marvel as a superhero comic book narrative trades on notions of difference which themselves are absorbed into a network of commercial representation and ‘economies of visibility’ (Banet-­Weiser 2018: 21). This paradox is central to my arguments about the complex

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positioning of women in superhero films, which in many ways draw from and reject political feminisms. Feminist issues have become an increasingly hot topic in mainstream media in the last few decades. 2010 was the year of Marvel Women, a programme through which female creators and characters were showcased in individual comic book issues and series under the ‘Women of Marvel’ brand. Comic book conventions increasingly host panels under the theme of women in comics, many of which focus specifically on Marvel comics, allowing fans and readers to discuss with female creators the challenges women in comics continue to face (see Winstead 2012; Morris 2014; Frevele 2018; Ricchiuto 2018). However, this is not to suggest that equal representation in mainstream comics has been achieved, or is even approaching. Perhaps symptomatic of the often meandering path towards equality is the fact that the women in comics panel at a recent comic convention in Denver featured no women at all (Marcotte 2015), or the suggestion by Marvel executive staff that Marvel’s comics sales slumped in recent years because ‘people didn’t want any more diversity’ (David Gabriel quoted in Terror 2017), or the (publicised as) highly strenuous relationship between Marvel’s creative staff and the mysterious, seldom-­ seen, and famously conservative Chairman of Marvel Entertainment, Ike Perlmutter (Knoop 2019). Meanwhile, in Hollywood, issues of women’s representation and exploitation resurface at a consistent frequency, referring to the lack of opportunities presented to women filmmakers and the gender pay gap, and issues such as race and sexuality representation. These discussions peaked in late 2017, when sexual abuse allegations were made against Hollywood film producer Harvey Weinstein, a story that was widely discussed in the media and online platforms, contributing to the formation of the #MeToo movement/­moment on social media. While ‘Me Too’ was devised in 2006 by African American civil rights activist Tarana Burke to promote an empathetic space for survivors of sexual assault to share their stories via social media, it was Hollywood actress Alyssa Milano who rekindled the term via Twitter following the Weinstein allegations, resulting in widespread digital feminist activism and a willingness by the public to ‘engage with resistance and challenges to sexism, patriarchy and other forms of oppression via feminist uptake of digital communication’ (Mendes et al. 2018: 236–7, original emphasis). Needless to say, feminist activists have been drawing attention to the abuse of women in myriad industries for decades. However, it is telling that it took a widespread interest in allegations of abuse specifically taking place in Hollywood to propel, or in the words of Aileen O’Driscoll ‘spill over’ into public

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­ iscussions around gender equality in society more widely (O’Driscoll d 2019: 2). Still, responses to, and the seeming mainstreaming of, political feminism(s) within this particular context is far from clear cut and parallels the discursive strategies that accompanied previous postfeminist mediascapes, as I discuss later on in this Introduction. For now, I want to draw attention to the pervasiveness of feminist issues in both mainstream film and comic books and how this is indicative of both media’s position within popular culture. Pre-­Wonder Woman (Patty Jenkins, 2017), the lack of female-­led superhero films was a topic of much discussion and remained so in the run-­up to Captain Marvel (Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, 2019). With these two films maintaining women’s representation for­– ­it seems­– ­the entire superhero film genre with successful box office returns, now is a crucial time in the discussion of women’s representations in both comics and film, prompting this theoretical intervention in which portrayals of women in Marvel superhero film adaptations are examined in one place. The purpose of this project was to address such questions as: How is power negotiated in Marvel superheroines? How does an emphasis on sex appeal relate to feminist and postfeminist politics? How do these representations intersect with wider issues such as sexuality and race? And, importantly, in what ways do these representations tie into modes of female empowerment and women’s roles in society at the periods during which they were made and released? This book thus incorporates theoretical approaches including film studies, feminist film theory, cultural studies, comics studies, queer theory and postcolonial studies. I offer a textual and discursive analysis of films based on Marvel comics spanning back to the late 1980s. Through this, I draw in ideological and contextual elements and highlight assumptions around femininity present in these films. The book accounts for how women of different backgrounds are realised through superheroic narratives and questions how womanhood is discursively constructed within these texts. As indicated by Annette Kuhn, a textual approach is beneficial for feminist film criticism, as it highlights ‘the ways in which woman has been constituted as a set of meanings through processes of cinematic signification’ (Kuhn 1994: 67). Following the tradition of feminist film theorists examining the presentation of woman as constructed sign in film ‘in a complex textual system that supports and even naturalizes patriarchal ideology by defining women as other to men’ (Hollinger 2012: 10), this book interrogates both visual and narrative cinematic signifiers in Marvel films, showing how they are

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in trod u ci ng .  .  . the mighty wo m e n o f m a r v e l ! 5 symptomatic of broader cultural issues around gender equality. Hence, I examine films with regards to women’s characterisation, referring to formal film elements such as mise en scène, cinematography, editing and narrative, questioning how these elements collectively engage with gendered discourses. This is not to say that texts external to the films will not be utilised, although this is not a reception study. It does not suggest what audiences do with media texts as this would be beyond the scope of this particular project and there have been ample efforts made by other scholars to pull discussions in this direction. To paraphrase Angela McRobbie, there has been a marked interest in reception studies based on the apparent ability of audiences to subvert dominant readings of media texts (McRobbie 2009: 3). I agree with McRobbie in stressing the possibility that a focus on audience studies draws attention away from popular texts and removes responsibility for representational inclusion from those who create them (for example, Western, global-­reaching media corporations). A focus on audience responses could have an unintended side effect of limiting the significance of media representations, for if the power to subvert lies with audiences, the need for media producers to attend to issues of representation is reduced. The focus on subversion does not address the fact that the very need to subvert stems from the notion that representations can be limiting, that they are created within particular industrial and cultural parameters with specific audiences in mind, and that people outside of those audiences must, in McRobbie’s terms, make do. Contrarily to other scholars thinking about women’s representations in superhero films, comic books form a crucial contextual backdrop to my analysis. Likewise, statements from film­makers and comic book creators are included to provide insight into some of the representational decisions made in the production of these films. Such texts offer some indication of (gendered) aspects of film production, including choices regarding the selection of source material and representations of female physicality. My approach enables the tracing of a Marvel film’s journey from comic to film production to the end product itself, providing cultural context to offer an overview of the gendered issues informing film production, but also allowing a focused and rigorous study into the specificities of the films. Indeed, popular discourses around superhero films, even before their release, have become more prominent with the rise of online arenas such as blogging, social media and movie discussion sites. As such, there has been more material in terms of paratexts surrounding a film such as Deadpool (Tim Miller, 2016) than there was for X-­Men (Bryan Singer, 2000). The interpretation of Marvel films presented in this book is thus fostered

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by approaches that allow the connections between film and culture to be drawn, considering films as constructs that are the result of complex industrial, social and cultural mechanisms. This approach highlights that media texts generate discourse, which is affected by, as well as informs, ideologies that hold cultural power. Allowing sufficient focus on Marvel’s more formative films, such as The Punisher (Mark Goldblatt, 1989) and Blade (Stephen Norrington, 1998), the project spans several decades. This said, there is not enough space in this book to exhaustively discuss every Marvel film adaptation released between 1989 and the present day. Thus, particular films have been selected as being emblematic of specific issues related to women’s representation. Likewise, it may be difficult to offer definitive explanations of emerging trends. Sources in the popular media often announce that popular culture is entering a new era of gender inclusivity, as evidenced within regular pieces referring to the opportunities offered to women in superhero narratives (Andersen 2014; Cain 2015; Tremeer 2015; Landsbaum 2015; Gould 2015; Child 2016; Shaw 2018). Such sentiments should be approached with scepticism, especially because we seem to be perpetually on the verge of the new era rather than in it. However, it is useful to consider the notion that political and economic developments have moved towards a culture that may be something beyond postfeminism (see Negra and Tasker 2014; Gill 2016). Since the study of postfeminist culture forms the backbone of this project, it might be hasty to include very recent releases within the postfeminist bracket, and it may be more beneficial to closely assess such films retrospectively in the future, given the discursive complexities at hand within both the postfeminist and so-­called post-­Weinstein moments. Indeed, while feminist academics have been welcoming of the widespread and popular engagement with #MeToo, Rosalind Gill and Shani Orgad approach the subject with caution, arguing that Notwithstanding the shift from moral panic to political engagement, it seems that many of the fundamental problems identified in relation to the sexualization debate persist in the context of #MeToo, and are manifest in old as well as new and troubling ways. (Gill and Orgad 2018: 1318–19)

These limitations include the privileging of exclusive (white, respectable) femininities in representing the movement and reinforcing binaristic understandings of gendered violence (Gill and Orgad 2018: 1319). Still, a discussion of postfeminism(s) and feminist critiques thereof remain pertinent to the analysis of popular culture due to postfeminism’s adaptability in catering to ideals of social progress (Gill 2016). Thus, much of the discussion in this book is focused on films released between 2000 and 2016,

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years that can be situated within postfeminist modes of representation (as well as predating the presidential election of Donald Trump and the global turn to the conservative right). I refer interchangeably to the films analysed as ‘films based on Marvel comics’, ‘Marvel films’ or ‘Marvel adaptations’. My focus is live-­action theatrical films based on Marvel comic books partaking of the Marvel Universe, not merely the recent films produced by Marvel Studios, now a subsidiary of Walt Disney Studios, comprising the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). MCU films begin with Iron Man (Jon Favreau, 2008) and move on to the ultimate superhero team-­up, Marvel’s The Avengers (Joss Whedon, 2012), and continue to Captain America: Civil War (Anthony and Joe Russo, 2016), Black Panther (Ryan Coogler, 2018) and beyond. These films form the basis of Marvel’s multimedia franchise-­ based approach, establishing one overarching narrative and remaining encapsulated within its own continuity, in contrast to films featuring the X-­Men, Fantastic Four or Hulk. Marvel had previously sold the rights to these characters to other studios­– ­20th Century Fox, Universal and Sony.1 However, it would be highly ignorant for a study of women in Marvel properties to only consider MCU films merely because they appear to come straight from Marvel. A flexible approach is taken by Matthew J. McEniry, Robert Moses Peaslee and Robert G. Weiner, who suggest that even obscure productions based on Marvel properties released before the MCU era are historically significant in having shaped recent output by Marvel Studios and thus must have a cultural relationship to it that should not be downplayed (McEniry et al. 2016). Since I hope to enable a dialogue between comics and the films, there must also be a discursive continuity between films based on Marvel characters, regardless of which Hollywood studio produced them. As noted, Marvel comic books play a contextual role in this discussion. Comics have increasingly become an object of academic interest, forming the burgeoning field of comics studies. Works such as those by Paul Lopes (2009), Randy Duncan and Matthew J. Smith (2009) and Jean-­Paul Gabillet (2010) chronicle the history of comic books and interrogate the formal specificity of the medium, as well as its role in (predominantly American) society. Amongst these works is also Scott McCloud’s seminal text, Understanding Comics (McCloud 1993), which itself takes the form of a comic book. While some scholars have been reluctant to embrace ‘representation of’ studies within the field, Ellen Kirkpatrick and Suzanne Scott argue that such endeavours remain vital to the study of comics (Kirkpatrick and Scott 2015: 120–1). Most relevant to this

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project have been text-­based works examining the ideological constructs to be found within comic book narratives. These include the work of Alex S. Romagnoli and Gian S. Pagniucci (2013), which focuses on how comics relate to sociocultural issues in different time periods, Bradford Wright’s study of comics as youth culture (Wright 2003), Jason Dittmer’s in-­depth exploration of Captain America as national hero (Dittmer 2012) and Ramzi Fawaz’s work addressing the monstrous fantasy figure in superhero comics (Fawaz 2016). Amongst such discussions, examinations of women in comics have remained largely limited to the figure of the superheroine. Being the most exposed superheroine, Wonder Woman has consistently been the most popular subject of academic interest.2 However, since this project focuses on Marvel women, I have opted to draw less from existing studies of DC character Wonder Woman. While this may seem counter-­intuitive, the inclusion of discussions around Wonder Woman would over-­complicate the project. It would be foolish to suggest that all superhero comics are the same and for this reason, I have opted not to include DC properties in my analysis. Marvel and DC follow very different historical and cultural trajectories. Marvel has traditionally been marked by a focus on the ‘psychological complexity of its characters’ and the ‘realism of its problem-­ ridden characters’, while DC followed an approach based on archetypal mythology (Wainer 2014: 8). Marvel’s stories have often been likened to soap opera (Daniels 1991: 208; Raphael and Spurgeon 2004; Dittmer 2009: 137), perhaps ironically, given that these comics and their adaptations have been culturally positioned as masculine, despite the feminine connotations of the soap format. Entrenched in continuity and multi-­issue storytelling, Marvel heralded narratives highlighting the development of character and the showcasing of social issues. Charles Hatfield notes the significance of this approach in prioritising the development of characters over time (Hatfield 2013: 139). This temporal specificity of Marvel characters is particularly relevant to this project since it more explicitly draws attention to the implications of history and cultural contexts. The narrativised history of superhero comics themselves is likewise intricately linked to the concept of revisionism. Revision is considered a defining characteristic or ‘dominant narrative strategy’ of the superhero comics genre, as argued by David Hyman (2017: 5). Plenty of superheroes throughout history have been reinvented and repurposed by comic book publishers and producers across media. Terrence R. Wandtke notes that ‘it must be acknowledged that as long as the superhero has been in existence, the superhero has been “in the making,” working through a series of revisions’ (Wandtke

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2007: 5). Perhaps unexpectedly, the outcome of superhero revision is not consistency or a definitive ‘canon’ but rather a ‘production of multiple versions that wear their inconsistencies openly, and reject the pressure to resolve their multiplicities into the synthetic continuity of a polished final text’ (Hyman 2017: 5). It is the complex ‘negotiation between consistency and rupture’ that makes these superhero narratives so enduring and compelling, suggests Hyman (Hyman 2017: 5–6). This revision of Marvel’s characters over time and across media is crucial to my discussions of the reinvention of female characters and feminisms in Marvel adaptations, which are synchronous with specific cultural and historical shifts that take place between and within iterations. It is likewise significant that Marvel pioneered a comics production method characterised as specific to the company. The so-­called ‘Marvel Method’ of making comics was the result of time constraints placed upon Stan Lee in the 1960s. Writing several titles at a time meant that Lee was unable to produce complete scripts within the limited time there was to publish them. Lee instead provided the comic artist with a general overview of an issue’s plot and narrative. The artist (frequently Jack Kirby or Steve Ditko) would then storyboard the comic according to Lee’s overview and the dialogue and captions were added afterwards. That what became the dominant mode of superhero comics storytelling is termed the Marvel Method indicates Marvel’s centrality in the development of the superhero genre. It also epitomises the undeniable intertwining of production contexts with social and historical implications of those contexts. The centrality of Marvel has been replicated with the rise of Marvel films to both a position of dominance over those based on DC comics and setting a standard in terms of world-­building and intertextuality. Of the two companies, Marvel was the first to experiment with the idea of a superhero universe inhabited by characters spanning multiple film and television properties. Only recently have heavyweight DC characters appeared in films together, such as in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (Zack Snyder, 2016) and Justice League (Zack Snyder, 2017). Similarly, and following on from this, Marvel and DC superhero films differ both structurally and tonally (Massey and Cogan 2016). DC films have adopted a darker tone for their characters and visuals, while Marvel films maintain an approach characterised by comedy and sympathetic heroes. Incorporating films based on DC comics would enrich this study but would also, given the marked differences noted above, shift the emphasis away from detailed textual work and towards a more comparative analysis. Moreover, given the privileging of Wonder Woman and DC texts within

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scholarly studies, it is worth drawing the focus specifically to Marvel, whose female characters have had comparatively low exposure, both in academia and popular culture.

Comics on Screen: What is at Stake in Representing Marvel Women? Mike Madrid has provided a detailed analysis of the cultural factors influencing representations of superheroines in comics since the 1940s, describing the rationale behind his analysis as such: Superhero comic books are about maximizing human potential for the betterment of all society. . . . [F]emale superheroes are often not allowed to reach their potential; they are given powers that are weaker than their male compatriots, and positions of lesser importance. (Madrid 2009: vi)

Indeed, much of Madrid’s discussion centres on the idea of feminine power and how it has been discursively limited within superhero texts, while also noting the cultural resonance of these portrayals with their historical contexts, as well as the issue of society’s gendered definitions of heroism. A similar sentiment is echoed by Jennifer K. Stuller: Because stories about superheroes can teach us about our socially appropriate roles . . . how we fit into communities, and about our human potential, both terrible and great, it is the overwhelming focus on the male experience of heroism­– a­ nd mostly white, heterosexual male heroism at that­– ­that inspires my investigation of the female hero. (Stuller 2010: 20)

The overarching view behind these statements resonates with my own as expressed at the beginning of this Introduction. The addition of Kamala Khan to Marvel’s superhero roster has been a welcome contrast to the white masculinity usually offered by the company, and due critical attention must be given to the heroines of comics (including those who create them). However, the overwhelming focus on superheroines in comics studies, as well as film studies, is unsurprising but disappointing. Though the superheroine is doubtless culturally significant for her occupation of a position traditionally reserved for men, there is much more at stake in discussions of women in superhero narratives. The presence of non-­ heroic characters such as superhero girlfriends or villainesses should not be neglected. Given that this project is not immediately a comics study, a few qualifications must be made. Relevant here are the acute issues relating to adaptation and transmedia properties. Marvel’s films as they appear today

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in trod u ci ng .  .  . the mighty wo m e n o f m a r v e l ! 11 are emblematic of what Henry Jenkins once characterised as ‘convergence culture’ (Jenkins 2008), with filmmakers and media producers creating cinematic worlds for established characters to occupy, in turn reaching back into comics and other media such as television. James N. Gilmore and Matthias Stork note that Jenkin’s model of ‘convergence aesthetics . . . has rightfully gained major currency in the critical and academic discourse’, not least due to Marvel’s The Avengers (Gilmore and Stork 2014: 1). Prioritising storyworld has been part of Marvel’s distinctive qualities since the comic books. Likewise, transmedia modes of Hollywood film production became symptomatic of filmmaking of the early 2000s (Rehak 2012: 103), with the trend having been expanded in recent years. In fact, Liam Burke argues that it is Marvel’s emphasis on storyworlds that has normalised these industrial practices among leading studios that are now ‘lining up to give their intellectual property the transmedia treatment’ (Burke 2018: 46). Marvel superhero films are primarily adaptations of comic books, but Marvel itself is a multimedia entertainment enterprise. As such, the films discussed here contribute to the ‘palimpsestic’ web of texts that is formed when non-­filmic texts are adapted to screen (Hutcheon 2006: 9). Within this web (presumably spun by Spider-­Man) are, of course, also issues of brand identity, such as those argued by both Burke (Burke 2018: 45) and Derek Johnson, who suggests that Marvel has historically struggled to present ‘coherent’ images of its characters across media (Johnson 2007). Characters are frequently altered in the comics to account for the more widely familiar cinematic versions, for instance. But what exactly does ‘coherent’ constitute? Do the characters and narratives of Marvel adaptations precisely ‘match’ those of the comics? If so, how can contemporary adaptations of Marvel comics be reconciled with the historical contexts attached to the characters (which often date back to the 1960s and 1970s)? Here, ideological and discursive issues collide with adaptation. Adaptation studies can provide insight into how these might be negotiated. The notion of ‘fidelity’ or how faithful a film is towards its source text as a marker of its quality or cultural value surfaces frequently in the field. In his foundational introduction to poststructuralist adaptation studies, Robert Stam outlines several fallacies that have classically accompanied discussions of adaptation and subsequently offers ideas towards a flexible adaptation approach (Stam 2005). Noting that film adaptations of literature are culturally devalued due to a number of factors including the authority lent to ‘original’ literary works and their authors, reverence for the written word, the supposed superiority of literature over film and the idea that films require less intellect to watch, Stam argues in favour of moving away

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from fidelity arguments. He notes that ­highlighting ­intertextuality is a more fruitful approach to ‘account for the mutation of forms across media’ (Stam 2005: 41), concluding that adaptations are ‘hypertexts derived from pre-­existing hypotexts which have been transformed by operations of selection, amplification, concretization, and actualization’ (Stam 2005: 31) and suggesting that formal aspects of film adaptations should not necessarily take centre stage in such discussions (Stam 2005: 41). Yet, examinations of comic book adaptations remain focused both on fidelity and on formal elements. Thomas Leitch, for instance, devotes the majority of his chapter on comics adaptation in Film Adaptation and its Discontents to the adaptation of the formal elements of comic book visuals to screen, maintaining that privileging visuals in such a discussion is most useful (Leitch 2009: 194–201). While Leitch agrees with Stam that an emphasis on fidelity in adaptation studies is not worthwhile, Liam Burke takes a contrasting stance in his reception study of comic book adaptations. Burke argues that criticisms aimed at fidelity discourses are ‘at odds with the field’s wider calls for audience-­centric research’, ultimately claiming that fidelity is a marker of quality for audiences (Burke 2015: 18). Granted that Burke’s field is reception studies, his approach is merited as addressing a gap in the literature. However, this does indicate the somewhat tense relationship comics have to adaptation studies in general. Since comic books and adaptation have a patchy­ – ­and at times uncharted­– ­history, a wholly adaptational approach to this study is not particularly useful and is beyond the scope of the issues at hand. Indeed, it has not been possible to consider every single comic book incarnation of every single Marvel film character discussed (additionally, Marvel adaptations quite often focus on content not previously found in comics). One problem with applying many of the adaptation approaches in use today (including but not limited to that of Stam) regards questions of whether or not comics should be considered through the same methods as literary adaptation, not to mention that comic books might not speak to notions of authorial authority since so many creators work on them (writers, pencillers, inkers, editors, ­publishers, etc.). Nonetheless, thinking of comics in terms of their status as hypotexts, which have been reassembled in correspondence with cultural factors, is beneficial. Indeed, Stam notes that ‘many of the changes between novelistic sources have to do with ideology and social discourses’, noting, for example, the ways in which an adaptation’s politics can be made more or less politically radical than the text on which it is based (Stam 2005: 42–3). This directly relates to the representations I discuss here since gender representation is shaped by political discourses. Francesco Casetti’s

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characterisation of both (literary) source text and film adaptation as ‘sites of production and the circulation of discourses’ (Casetti 2004: 80, original emphasis) is particularly relevant here. In Casetti’s terms, film adaptations constitute ‘the reappearance, in another discursive field, of an element (a plot, a theme, a character, etc.) that has previously appeared elsewhere’ (Casetti 2004: 82, original emphasis), a ‘recontextualization of the text’ (Casetti 2004: 83, original emphasis). Casetti’s approach therefore foregrounds the contextual surroundings of both source and adaptation. Marvel comics and their filmic adaptations are therefore positioned here as twin sites of discourse, both of which are inextricably linked to the culture in which they were created and both of which feed into each other while remaining separate. This allows for an approach that is not merely making comparisons between different media iterations of the same character, story or theme, and does not make value judgements over which version is of more merit. Following Casetti’s terms, the Marvel adaptation and Marvel comic are ‘social discourses to be connected to a broader network of other discourses’ (Casetti 2004: 89). To add to these discussions is Marvel’s frequent return in media discourse to comics. Comic writer and Vice President of Television and Animation of Marvel Entertainment Jeph Loeb has stated that despite Marvel’s investment in multimedia, it is in the company’s interest for ‘everyone to realize that it all starts with publishing. It all starts with comic books’ (Loeb quoted in Phegley 2013). Clearly, this speaks to the notion of the supposed authority of the original over the ‘copy’, but it is also significant that comics are being pushed forward within these discourses, especially considering their niche positioning within the Marvel enterprise. It attests to the idea that comics themselves, despite arguably being the ‘originator’, should also be considered intertexts, ‘designed . . . to be looked into and through as well as at’ (Leitch 2009: 17, original emphasis). Such an approach is also supported by Karen Hollinger, who argues in her discussion of gender in adaptations of nineteenth-­century literature that ‘a literary adaptation’s relationship to its source is an essential issue, but we [should] consider it only in terms of what it tells us about the remarkable attraction of these films’ (Hollinger 2012: 152–3). To address these issues there must be a continuity between these media in discussions of gender representation. Remarkably, few scholarly investigations of women in superhero films account for the historical discourses at work in these representations that carry with them what might be characterised as the textual baggage of comics. It is thus not my intention to cast value judgements upon either media, nor is it to suggest that r­ epresentations of women in comics are more progressive and therefore better.

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Another important facet of representations of superheroines in the media regards the role of television as part of a transmedia industry in shaping conceptualisations of heroic femininity. Marvel’s success with television series such as Agent Carter (ABC, 2015–16) and Jessica Jones (Netflix, 2015–19), alongside heroines appearing in The Runaways (Hulu, 2017–19) and Cloak & Dagger (Freeform, 2018–19) is sure to stimulate discussions regarding the configurations of femininity presented therein. Indeed, scholarly explorations of Jessica Jones have already proved insightful, addressing the series in terms of genre, gender and ideology (see Rayborn and Keyes 2018). CarrieLynn D. Reinhard and Christopher J. Olson in particular note that Jessica Jones ‘functions as a counterpoint to the larger MCU, which has thus far focused on telling male-­based stories of redemption and revenge . . . concerned with saving the world’ (Reinhard and Olson 2018: 97–8). This, the authors suggest, is enabled by the opportunities offered by Netflix as a platform and producer operating outside mainstream industrial practices, echoing previous discussions referring to HBO’s ‘quality’ programming and production strategies that engaged with issues of gender, sexuality, race and class in distinctive­– ­often characterised as feminist­– ­ways (Lagerwey et al. 2016). The significance of these series notwithstanding, it remains to be seen what the implications of Disney’s own streaming platform, Disney+, might be in terms of ‘quality’ and representation. Both Jessica Jones and Agent Carter were notably framed within the popular media as feminist and lauded for their handling of feminist issues. This contributes to the widespread characterisation of television as being a more hospitable medium for women’s representation (see Tally 2016). Sherrie Inness has likewise argued: Television is willing to take more risks with female gender roles than mainstream films. With television, it is easier for producers to experiment with different roles for women, although these roles are still limited. It is less costly to experiment with one episode of a series rather than experiment with a major film. Also, because of television’s omnipresence, its tough women have a major impact on the American cultural imagination. (Inness 2004: 10)

When combined with the associations of television with femininity (and domesticity and intimacy in particular) (see Brunsdon 1986; Spigel 1992; Smit 2015), this conclusion may not be surprising. One must, however, query, then, the implications of superheroines on television marking an embrace of multifaceted femininities by popular culture while further relegating women to a medium which has so often been positioned as domestic or feminised. Undoubtedly, Marvel has been making significant advances in terms of women’s representation in television. However, for

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in trod u ci ng .  .  . the mighty wo m e n o f m a r v e l ! 15 the purposes of this book, a detailed examination of television is not warranted due to the need for limitation (though I do offer some remarks about television throughout). I therefore maintain the specific focus of theatrical live-­action films based on Marvel characters, with comic books acting as a useful backdrop to the discussion. The discursive and cultural moments in which representations of Marvel women occur, in comics as well as in film, are highly significant. However, I consider representations of women in both media as sites of struggle, symptomatic of anxieties regarding women’s empowerment, as well as racial and sexual identity.

The (Super)Power of Feminist Film Studies As mentioned, there is a marked duality between debates about women in film and those about women in comics. Indeed, comic books have been characterised as male-­dominated in terms of production, content and consumption. Matthew J. Pustz previously argued that ‘many female readers feel marginalised by an industry they see as generally sexist’ (Pustz 2000: 101). Scholars have been combating this perception more recently, suggesting that the reality of women’s comic book reading habits is somewhat more complex (Healey 2009: Scott 2013). However, I would argue that the perception that superheroes are for boys is ingrained in Western cultural consciousness. Male superheroes have much more exposure within the media. These sentiments are also taken for granted by industry professionals, many of whom continuously choose to adhere to them (Healey 2009: 145). Theorists have drawn attention not only to the lack of representation of women in comics but also to the often oppressive storylines that accompanied them. Karen Healey, for instance, notes that ‘Glorified ­violence . . . is central to the power fantasies of the superhero comic’ (Healey 2009: 145). Likewise, glorified violence is frequently afflicted upon female characters by male characters in comic book texts often created by men, as has been discussed by Marc DiPaolo (2011: 119), Trina Robbins (1999: 216) and Anita K. McDaniel (2008: 88). For these reasons, comics continue to be considered male-­dominated, despite recent developments suggesting otherwise. The trajectory of mainstream comic books in relation to feminist issues often parallels that of the Hollywood film industry. Hollywood’s relation to women is complex: it is thought that pre-­1960s Hollywood cinema actively catered to female audiences, in contrast to the period since the late 1960s, which has been dominated by films aimed at young men, the most valuable Hollywood demographic (King 2002: 39; Chapman 2004: 190–1). How the industry decided what counts as a men’s or women’s film

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is based on the narrative, thematic and visual content of the film. Industry research determined that men prefer films containing action and violence, whereas women seek those that focus more on character and emotion (or romance) (see Krämer 1998; Grant 2007: 80). Additionally, Hollywood’s approach since the late 1970s has taken for granted that women cinemagoers are more likely to compromise, settling more easily for men’s films than men do for women’s films (Krämer 1999: 104). These trends are self-­perpetuating since women are forced to adapt their tastes due to the lack of films made for them. It is clear that Hollywood employs a generalist logic. To clarify, a social constructionist approach to gender, such as that which I employ throughout this book, would take issue with the notion that some films are fundamentally for men or women. However, noting that these gendered phenomena are social constructs perpetuated by discourse does not lessen their cultural significance. There is nothing inherently masculine about action films, but such is the way in which these films have become associated with men in Western culture. Indeed, the association of action and violence with masculinity is precisely what has made the action heroine in film such a fascinating topic.3 Considering the yearly box office lists of popular films in the United States then (all of which feature Marvel adaptations since 2008), this logic is demonstrably at work, since the presence of what might be defined as women’s films is markedly lacking (though this may be in the process of changing, as I discuss later). These trends are accompanied by production factors, such as there being fewer lead roles available to women, women receiving fewer speaking parts in films, there being fewer women directing films than men and a reluctance to put women’s stories onto film. As with Marvel Comics, which before the superhero as a narrative figure had even been conceived of made its profits by producing romance comics for girls (written by Marvel figurehead Stan Lee himself) (Robbins 1999: 67), there was a time when Hollywood took seriously the power of female audiences. Contemporary trends, however, appear comparatively unwelcoming in terms of women-­centric content, particularly within the time frame covered by this project. This is in part due to modes of filmmaking pertaining to the ‘Millennial Hollywood’ style. Thomas Schatz notes that since the new millennium, a number of industry trends have developed which enforce on films certain requirements to aid in their financial success: the film industry’s development in the early twenty-­first century has been fundamentally wed to a new breed of blockbusters whose narrative, stylistic, technological,

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in trod u ci ng .  .  . the mighty wo m e n o f m a r v e l ! 17 and industrial conventions have coalesced into a veritable set of rules governing the creation and marketing of Hollywood’s ‘major motion pictures’. (Schatz 2009: 32)

These rules largely involve encouraging studios to produce works that function within a transmedia environment­– ­the convergence culture mentioned earlier­– a­ s well as exploit or expand established franchises, take advantage of intellectual properties and incorporate a serial quality (Schatz 2009: 32). These conventions clearly resonate with Marvel films, but it is also conspicuous that, as Schatz suggests is the case, the protagonist of these films ‘should be male’ (Schatz 2009: 32), rendering women within these narratives peripheral at best and, as I argue in Chapter 1, disposable at worst. Indeed, Marvel superhero films can be seen as emblematic of these issues. As will be clear from my discussions in the proceeding chapters, Marvel superhero films do incorporate romance as a ‘way to integrate women into action narratives’ (Gallagher 2006: 77) but this carries with it its own drawbacks in terms of women’s representation. As big, action-­ based blockbusters, they remain firmly within the male-­centric trends outlined above. Again, this is ironic given the reliance of Marvel texts on soap opera dynamics described previously. Referring to the generic properties of the superhero film, Eric Lichtenfeld suggests that the superhero narrative has been ‘co-­opted by the fantastical form of the action genre’ (Lichtenfeld 2004: 254). He essentially argues that the action format is conveniently matched to contemporary comic book aesthetics (Lichtenfeld 2004: 254). A similar approach has been taken by Yvonne Tasker (2015). The action genre is thus a useful framework through which to view female characters with a feminist lens, although these films increasingly emphasise their potential for fantasy and science fiction spectacle, particularly in the later MCU. The action genre is most prominently used as a framework for the first half of this book, which assesses specific character types associated with the superhero-­ action-­fantasy genre whereas subsequent chapters address more generalised themes (such as sexuality and race). Feminist critics have taken issue with dominant modes of representation in Hollywood since at least the 1970s. During this time, North American writers such as Marjorie Rosen (1973), Joan Mellen (1974) and Molly Haskell (1975) interrogated the role of women in mainstream cinema utilising quasi-­sociological approaches. Meanwhile, in the UK, feminist approaches to film based on structuralism, semiotics and psychoanalysis gained momentum (Kuhn 1994: 77). Claire Johnston’s edited Notes on Women’s Cinema (Johnston 1973) and Laura Mulvey’s ‘Visual Pleasure

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and Narrative Cinema’, originally published in 1975 (Mulvey 2004), became key texts assessing how films provide a construction of women as signs informed by and contributing to patriarchal ideology. Alongside this developed a theoretical framework that united the twin strands of critique and practice, a ‘dual composition’ which remains a defining characteristic of feminist film theory (Hollinger 2012: 8). Subsequent thinkers became interested in the specificities of female spectators, as well as women’s genres (see, for instance, Doane 1984, Doane 1987; Gledhill 1987; Thornham 1997: xiv). It would be nigh impossible to conduct a study of women’s representation in blockbuster action films without reference to the work of Mulvey. Indeed, Mulvey’s essay remains the starting point for much contemporary feminist film criticism. I develop Mulvey’s theories throughout the study, but a specific focus on them occurs within the first chapters of this book. It is worth briefly outlining Mulvey’s ideas here to provide an idea of key concepts that have arisen from feminist film studies. From a psychoanalytic perspective, Mulvey holds that Hollywood films act under a binary logic of active/­male and passive/­female in their gender representations (Mulvey 2004: 841). This is motivated by scopophilia or the pleasure of looking. For Mulvey, women in mainstream films enact ‘to-­be-­looked-­at-­ness,’ an expression of the male gaze and fetishisation of the female body (Mulvey 2004: 841). As such, the male character is the active figure within the film’s narrative, while the woman remains a passive object to be looked at (Mulvey 2004: 842). Mulvey’s sentiments are in line with second-­wave feminist thought, in which the popular was not considered a viable vehicle for feminist representation, giving rise to alternative modes of production such as avant-­garde feminist film­making (Hollows and Moseley 2006: 4). During later decades, feminist film theory underwent several developments, experimenting with various methods of analysis. Sue Thornham notes that the psychoanalytic approach fell out of favour with many feminist film theorists as it was concluded to be in many ways limiting (Thornham 1997: xv). Indeed, many scholars note the limitations of the theories of Mulvey herself, which, they argue, rely too heavily on an absolute binary between genders (Tasker 1993: 114–15; Hills 1999; Brown 2011a: 21). Similarly, many authors expressed concern over the lack of attention devoted to the issues of race, sexuality and class, all of which should be considered relevant in discussions of gender (Gaines 1986; Thornham 1997: xvi). These discussions have developed exponentially throughout the 1990s and 2000s (Kaplan 2000: 10; Hollinger 2012: 17). As the field expanded, increasingly drawing from postcolonial

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in trod u ci ng .  .  . the mighty wo m e n o f m a r v e l ! 19 and LGBTQ perspectives, so did theorists’ interests. As such, genre-­ specific criticism moved on from examining women’s roles in women’s genres to discussions of women’s representations in genres considered more masculine. Amongst these are scholars interested in gender and the action genre­– ­in which I situate most Marvel adaptations. Writers such as Tasker (1993; 1998; 2004), Inness (1998; 2004), Hills (1999), Purse (2011), Brown (2011a; 2015a; 2017) and many others provide useful points of discussion. Likewise, recent feminist film studies have been marked by a turn towards an inclusive cultural and media studies approach that reflects the contemporary transmedia landscape. Similarly, gender studies, as a field highlighting the benefits of interdisciplinary approaches to the study of subjectivities and social inequalities, has offered new perspectives. These approaches have foregrounded the polysemy of film and other media texts and their negotiation of cultural discourses through the formal construction of narratives and characters (Hollinger 2012: 18). It is such approaches that have offered the most rewarding examinations of postfeminist culture, which penetrates both people’s lived experiences and highly mediated forms of feminist rhetoric. New media platforms have also become the focus of feminist theorising, especially in consideration with emerging new waves of feminism and the democratisation of the filmmaking process. As will become clear, it is not my intention to draw from one singular theoretical approach to the study of gender in film. Feminist film theory, and the theories that arose from it, are the most relevant to this project. However, as I discuss in the next section, perspectives from scholars working in the social sciences, media studies and gender studies have been of exponential use, particularly with regards to postfeminist culture. At the risk of emulating the ‘new era’ rhetoric I lambasted earlier, it is worth highlighting that the issues facing women in Hollywood (as well as comics) are developing. While it is true that the key trends identified by Hollywood insiders were firmly in place during the early years of the Marvel boom, recent tendencies seem to suggest that there is some malleability. That said, suggesting that change is on the horizon would be remarkably similar to the predictions made by Peter Krämer shortly after Titanic (James Cameron, 1997) dominated the box office. Titanic, Krämer suggested, marked a possible shift in Hollywood box office trends by ‘returning female characters and romantic love to the centre of the industry’s big releases and also by returning female audiences to the central place in Hollywood’s thinking that they had once occupied in its golden age’ (Krämer 1998: 600). However, Krämer’s predictions did not come

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to fruition as the box office has remained decidedly male-­dominated. As concluded by Kristin Lené Hole et al., It nevertheless remains true that the struggle for equality is far from over, since women remain a minority when it comes to most film industries­– ­both as filmmakers and as subjects whose stories are represented on the screen beyond mere clichés and stereotyping. This is particularly true for women of color, and queer and trans* filmmakers. (Hole et al. 2016: 5)

Still, profits made by recent films and franchises centring on women have been increasingly competitive with those featuring men, in part thanks to the Twilight series (2008–12) and The Hunger Games (2012–15). The recent re-­emergence of the Bechdel test may also be some indication of increased cultural awareness of issues regarding the representation of women in Hollywood blockbusters. Created in 1985 by cartoonist Alison Bechdel in her comic strip Dykes to Watch Out For (1987–2008) (collected in Bechdel 2008) as a means through which to address the representation of queer women in film, it is used to quantitatively produce some measure of gender bias in narrative cinema. It also demonstrates the interconnectedness between film and comics as discursive media. To discern whether a film passes this test, the viewer asks the following: (1) does the film contain two or more named female characters? (2) Do these characters talk to each other? (3) Do they discuss topics other than men? Films that do not satisfy these criteria fail the test and illustrate that the lack of female characters and storylines in films is a problem that functions on an industrial, as well as cultural, level. Not surprisingly, the majority of Hollywood films, including those discussed here, do not pass the test. Despite the simplistic nature of the Bechdel test, it has gained traction within popular media, indicating mainstream appropriation of audience consumption practices rejecting standards set by the Hollywood film industry. Indeed, it has been argued that films passing the Bechdel test make more money than those that do not, although conceiving of women’s representation in purely financial terms is potentially as limiting as the metric nature of the test itself. Catherine Driscoll has stressed the danger for feminist media critics to prioritise sentiments downplaying the progress that has been made in favour of discussing the many ways in which gender oppression still exists (Driscoll 2015). Doubtless, it is important not to lose track of the history of patriarchal representations of women in film and other media, but it is also important to note the changes that are in the process of occurring, and how they can illuminate new issues surrounding feminine subjectivities in film.

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We’re In This Together Now: Mediating Womanhood through Postfeminist Culture An elusive and polysemic concept, there is little unity within scholarly circles over the precise meaning of ‘postfeminist’ (Genz and Brabon 2009: 2; Vered and Humphreys 2014: 156). It is thus essential that my use of the term is clarified here. The ‘post-­’ of postfeminism potentially signifies a movement ‘after’ feminism in a chronological sense. In the words of Rosalind Gill and Christina Scharff, when used in this sense, it might mark an ‘epistemological break within feminism’, which ‘implies transformation and change within feminism that challenges “hegemonic” Anglo-­ American feminism’ (Gill and Scharff 2011: 3, original emphasis). When considered in such a way, a postfeminist approach might address the theoretical gaps of second-­wave feminism, which has often been criticised for its white, middle-­class, Anglo-­American stance towards women’s oppression (Dicker and Piepmeier 2003: 9). Postfeminist culture has also been made sense of as a backlash towards ideas or goals that are (thought to be) feminist. As such, postfeminism can be seen to mark a cultural moment characterised by a nostalgia for gender traditionalism, or a time before ‘political correctness’ (Gill and Scharff 2011: 3). Use of the term ‘postfeminist’ dates back as far as the 1980s and beyond, when popular media searched for a ‘milder’ form of feminism away from the ‘angry’ feminist voices that gained traction with the second wave (McRobbie 2009: 31). However, the idea of postfeminism as purely a backlash has been complexified, since postfeminism relies on (an idea of) feminism in order to function as a series of discourses (Tasker and Negra 2007: 1; Gill and Scharff 2011: 4). McRobbie remains the pioneering commentator on the complex relationship between feminism and postfeminism. Her oft-­cited comment regarding this relationship is as follows: postfeminism [refers to] an active process by which feminist gains of the 1970s and 1980s come to be undermined. It proposes that, through an array of machinations, elements of contemporary popular culture are perniciously effective in regard to this undoing of feminism while simultaneously appearing to be engaging in a well-­ informed and even well-­intended response to ‘feminism’. (McRobbie 2007: 27)

Thus, postfeminist culture promotes a sentiment in which feminism is regarded as no longer needed because (all) women have achieved gender equality. At the same time, though, a celebration of supposedly empowered womanhood is often present. Therefore, the ‘post-­’ of postfeminism frequently connotes the pastness of feminism, which may be interchangeably ‘noted, mourned, or celebrated’ (Tasker and Negra 2007: 1), but

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postfeminism (and the femininities it celebrates) is positioned as a markedly contemporary phenomenon (Gill and Scharff 2011: 4). McRobbie describes postfeminism as invoking ‘feminism as that which can be taken into account, to suggest that equality is achieved, in order to install a whole repertoire of new meanings’ (McRobbie 2007: 28). Women, it is suggested, live in an era of freedom­– ­sexual, professional, personal­– ­and no longer need to attend to the politics of institutionalised gender oppression. And yet McRobbie notes the prevalence of cultural narratives focusing on the ‘coming forward’ of women in terms of personal and professional empowerment (McRobbie 2009: 9), an occurrence suggesting some sort of embrace of a discursive form of feminism. Gill makes the case for positioning postfeminism as a ‘sensibility that characterizes . . . media products’ (Gill 2007: 148), rather than a physical timeframe or simple backlash. This sensibility rests on the endorsement of dominant themes­– ­characterised as ‘master narratives’ by Diane Negra (2009b: 5)­– ­pertaining to an idealised feminine subjectivity. Gill summarises these key themes as including: the notion that femininity is a bodily property; the shift from objectification to subjectification; an emphasis upon self-­surveillance, monitoring and self-­discipline; a focus on individualism, choice and empowerment; the dominance of a makeover paradigm; and a resurgence of ideas about natural sexual difference. (Gill 2007: 147)

As noted, postfeminist culture is positioned as a contemporary phenomenon, even while it relies on notions of the pastness of feminism. This modernity of postfeminism is linked to neoliberal culture. Diane Richardson and Victoria Robinson describe how neoliberalism is thought of as a policy framework privileging a free market economy and the withdrawal of the state in issues such as social welfare (Richardson and Robinson 2015: xxi). They also argue that it is useful to think of neoliberalism ‘as a form of regulation or governmentality and an ideological framework of ideas and values that emphasise commodification and consumerism, professionalization and managerialism, and individualism and freedom of “choice” ’ (Richardson and Robinson 2015: xxi). The neoliberal focus on consumerism and individualism corresponds with postfeminist culture, in which every empowered woman is responsible for her own, individual choices­– c­ hoices usually boiling down to the consumption of products. Indeed, choice rhetoric is one of the main focuses of feminist criticism of postfeminist culture. As Tasker and Negra outline, postfeminist culture emphasizes educational and professional opportunities for women and girls; freedom of choice with respect to work, domesticity, and parent-

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in trod u ci ng .  .  . the mighty wo m e n o f m a r v e l ! 23 ing; and physical and particularly sexual empowerment. Assuming full economic freedom for women, postfeminist culture also (even insistently) enacts the possibility that women might choose to retreat from the public world of work. (Tasker and Negra 2007: 2, original emphasis)

Women’s ‘choices’ then become divorced from political implications that might accompany them. A woman is empowered because she can choose, postfeminist rhetoric would suggest, as opposed to a time in the supposedly very distant past where she may have been forced to live a certain life (as a mother, as a wife, as a housewife, and so on). As mentioned earlier, postfeminist culture has become even more complex due to developments with #MeToo and other forms of social media activism and contemporary feminism. Nonetheless, the theoretical concept of postfeminism remains useful. This was noted by Gill in 2016, when she argued for its continued use as an ‘analytical category to capture a distinctive contradictory-­but-­patterned sensibility intimately connected to neoliberalism’ (Gill 2016: 610), a ‘complicated but realistic understanding of the way that multiple and contradictory ideas can co-­exist at the same moment’ (Gill 2016: 622). Indeed, #MeToo’s widespread embrace (and its shortcomings) can be made sense of through postfeminist culture, in particular because of its reliance on white female celebrity endorsement, its positioning as a movement/­moment that has penetrated commercial venues and its dependence on binaristic notions of gendered violence, not to mention the fact that gender inequalities (especially faced by women of colour, queer, trans and disabled women) continue to exist on a structural level, as well as in people’s lived experiences. Furthermore, #MeToo has the propensity for reinforcing an emphasis on the individualist qualities of character encouraged within neoliberal frameworks, or what Gill refers to as ‘the “right” kinds of dispositions for surviving in neoliberal society: confidence, resilience and positive mental attitude’ (Gill 2017: 10), the need for which is itself symptomatic of structural inequalities. Still, the overarching choices the postfeminist woman makes aid the ‘production of the self’, with special attention paid to notions of the ‘authentic’ self (Tasker and Negra 2007: 2; Banet-­Weiser 2012). As will become clear in subsequent chapters, the sentiment that times have changed, that ‘things are not like that’ any more­– ­with ‘that’ signifying gender inequality­ – ­possesses considerable currency in postfeminist culture. In the light of individualised womanhood, collective political activism becomes decentralised just as instances of sexism become the responsibility of careless individuals rather than hierarchical institutions limiting opportunities for certain marginalised people. In the words of Joel Gwynne and Nadine Müller, ‘this celebration of the power of the

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i­ndividual is part of a more insidious process whereby the social constraints placed upon contemporary girls and women are deemed inconsequential’ (Gwynne and Müller 2013: 2). But precisely who are these women addressed by postfeminist culture? The idealised postfeminist subject may have all the choices in the world available to her, but she still pertains to specific criteria. Tasker and Negra note that ‘postfeminism is white and middle class by default’ (Tasker and Negra 2007: 2), but the racial element of postfeminist culture digs deeper into the history of the marginalisation and systematic disempowerment of women of colour. The woman of colour in postfeminist culture occupies her own place within discourses that are reluctant to scrutinise the structural privilege granted whiteness. While women of colour do appear in postfeminist media texts, the focus is overwhelmingly on assimilation as well as respectability. Still, postfeminist rhetoric endorses a notion of universalised empowered womanhood whereby all women have access to the same opportunities. The specificity of racialised feminine identity is therefore disregarded within postfeminist discourses, while women of colour (particularly in the US) are still disproportionately affected by social issues such as rape, incarceration and access to education and healthcare. Likewise, the idealised postfeminist subject embodies a heterosexuality that reinforces gender difference. As Gill argues, postfeminist media culture heralds a sexualisation of femininity both through ‘an extraordinary proliferation of discourses about sex and sexuality’ and ‘the increasingly frequent erotic presentation of girls’, women’s and (to a lesser extent) men’s bodies in public spaces’ (Gill 2007: 150). This serves the purpose of reinforcing traditional notions of heterosexuality based on binaristic ideals of masculinity and femininity. Additionally, women are encouraged to engage in self-­objectification and are in this sense empowered through their (hetero)sexuality. As I discuss in subsequent chapters, there is little room for non-­normative sexuality within postfeminist narratives despite the increased liberalisation of state attitudes towards LGBTQ people and the phenomenon of ‘gaystreaming’, itself linked to neoliberal capitalistic practices in which difference may be commodified. This is part of the ‘double entanglement’ described by McRobbie, in which neoconservative and liberal sentiments appear to coexist in increasingly contradictory ways (McRobbie 2007: 28). Nonetheless, women’s quest for heterosexual love is centred within postfeminist discourses and remains a crucial element in maintaining rigid structures of gender (Negra 2009a: 173). While I have discussed the key elements informing postfeminist culture, this account should in no way be taken as exhaustive. Postfeminist culture

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in trod u ci ng .  .  . the mighty wo m e n o f m a r v e l ! 25 continues to shift with regards to its projection of empowered femininities. This has been discussed in literature addressing the role of the recent economic recession in explorations of postfeminist subjectivities, which so often rely on the ideal of the financially empowered woman (DeCarvalho 2013; Bose and Lyons 2013; Negra and Tasker 2014). Likewise, the burgeoning alt-­right movement, which gained momentum during Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and involves a mobilisation of poor, white masculinities perceived to have been left behind by neoliberalism, has prompted a further shift in the manifestations of acceptable femininities in contemporary US culture. Gill states that ‘[a]rguments about postfeminism are debates about nothing less than the transformations in feminisms and transformations in media culture­– a­ nd their mutual relationship’ (Gill 2007: 147). For sure, all films discussed within this book fall within the postfeminist moment. Dan Hassler-­Forest has already examined how superheroes are emblematic of the age of neoliberalism in the US (Hassler-­Forest 2012). However, interestingly, the superheroine also has undeniable ties to postfeminist discourses dating back to the 1970s, when feminist activists Gloria Steinem and Dorothy Pitman Hughes put Wonder Woman on the cover of their new popular feminist publication Ms. Rebecca Munford and Melanie Waters discuss the use of Wonder Woman in this context, which they characterise as ‘an attempt to mobilize the commercial marketplace for political ends’ (Munford and Waters 2014: 2), signifying the popularisation­– o­ r taking into account­– o­ f feminism in the media. They nonetheless argue that Wonder Woman can be seen as symptomatic of shifts in discourses of femininity and women’s empowerment (Munford and Waters 2014: 3). Here we can see the inextricable link between the superheroine, feminism and postfeminism. The empowered women in films based on Marvel comics are largely alike: white, slim, middle-­class, heterosexual, youthful, as well as often professionally and economically empowered. As noted earlier, some films may fall more into this mode of discourse than others, but on the whole, Marvel adaptations can be seen to engage in some way with postfeminist rhetoric, and indeed feminist issues. Many of the films, for instance, contain representations of women who are suggested to be ‘empowered’, be this physically, sexually or professionally. This is not to say that my analysis is a simple task of weeding out the postfeminism in the texts: as Tasker and Negra argue, postfeminism is ‘inherently contradictory’ (Tasker and Negra 2007: 8). Marvel films’ relationship to feminism is as complex as postfeminism itself. As films that in many ways attempt to present women as strong, capable and independent, they are, for all intents and purposes,

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feminist. And yet the meaning of strong, ­independent and capable is not a straightforward definition. Rather, these concepts are negotiated through these characters, who remain sites of discursive struggle. To follow Tasker and Negra, it is in my interests to create a discussion with, rather than a rejection of, postfeminism in Marvel films. The authors support a feminist approach towards postfeminism that is ‘not engaged in interrogating or understanding postfeminist culture simply as a forerunner to rejecting it’, continuing that ‘[t]he images and icons of postfeminism are compelling’ (Tasker and Negra 2007: 21, original emphasis). Further, the authors highlight that ‘Postfeminist culture does not allow us to make straightforward distinctions between progressive and regressive texts’ (Tasker and Negra 2007: 22), a sentiment that remains crucial to my characterisation of Marvel women as complex. Noting the paradoxes of postfeminist culture offers the opportunity for pluralistic meanings that are nonetheless still anchored to a feminist critique of patriarchal structures. To address Gwynne and Muller’s point regarding the ‘critically saturated’ status of academic inquiry into women in action-­based films, this can be said: feminist discussions of these texts are not slowing down because superheroines are continuously being produced and reproduced by major studios. Nowhere is postfeminist culture more clearly summoned than in statements from Marvel Studios’ President, Kevin Feige, in 2015. When questioned why Marvel was yet to release a superhero film led by a woman, he responded: There have been strong, powerful, intelligent women in the comics for decades . . . And if you go back to look at our movies­– ­whether it’s Natalie Portman in the Thor films, Gwyneth Paltrow in Iron Man or Scarlett Johansson in The Avengers­ – ­our films have been full of smart, intelligent, powerful women. (Feige in de Souza 2015)

It is clear, here, how feminist sentiments are taken into account in Feige’s noting the history of women in Marvel comics, in his insistence on the inspirational qualities offered by the characters he mentions. He continues that Marvel has always ‘gone for the powerful woman versus the damsel in distress’ (Feige in de Souza 2015), invoking a feminist critique of characters who are victimised, positioned as damsels and assuring readers that Marvel exists in contrast to this, even though he does not actually address the issue of why, up to that point, there had been no female-­led films from Marvel Studios. However, the issue of women’s empowerment is not as simple as Feige suggests, as many factors contribute to the representation of women in such films, for instance, race and sexuality. In light of my findings, it should also be noted that there is still much

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in trod u ci ng .  .  . the mighty wo m e n o f m a r v e l ! 27 work to be done. Since I only consider representations of women in Marvel adaptations, I must also draw attention to the crucial work that is being carried out in both film and comics studies regarding masculinity and superheroes (Adamou 2011; Brown 2013; Brown 2015b; Stevens 2015; McGrath 2016). Since women’s subjectivities are marginalised in a genre characterised as male-­dominated both in filmic and comic book terms, the representation of women in these films took priority in this particular project. Above all, I hope that this book speaks to some of the issues of women’s representation that have been circulating for years both in the media and in people’s lives. I, as a researcher and critic (as well as a fan), do not get to tell people what they should feel empowered by. Indeed, this sort of fan activity would certainly be worth investigating in the future. Nevertheless, a rigorous discussion of the Marvel film adaptations should be prioritised, because change has to start somewhere.

Notes 1. Spider-­ Man, despite having still been under Sony’s ownership, recently appeared as part of the MCU within the Spider-­Man: Homecoming (Jon Watts, 2017) and Spider-­Man: Far From Home (Jon Watts, 2019), a corporate collaboration that broke down in relation to a third Sony/­Marvel but was subsequently revived (Lang 2019). The dispute occurred amid rumours of the impending debut of Disney’s online streaming platform, Disney+, the cancelling of Netflix’s Marvel-­based series and the merging of Disney and 20th Century Fox (which previously produced X-­Men films). The ambiguity of corporate ownership and intellectual property here is symptomatic of the ongoing consolidation activities and franchising business models that inform contemporary media production, inextricably bound up in social contexts and consumption practices. 2. This includes Julie D. O’Reilly’s article regarding specific connections that can be drawn between Wonder Woman and female heroic narrative (O’Reilly 2005), Joseph J. Darowski’s edited volume exploring representations of Wonder Woman through seven decades (Darowski 2013), Tim Hanley’s analysis considering the character’s discursive construction at various historical milestones through a feminist lens (Hanley 2014), Jill Lepore’s historical perspective examining the creation of Wonder Woman and her creator (Lepore 2014), a queer-­inflected reading of the 1940s comics regarding their themes of bondage, sexuality, lesbianism and taboo subjects by Noah Berlatsky (2015), Annessa Ann Babic’s discussion of Wonder Woman as a cultural phenomenon through which issues of nationality and femininity can be explored (Babic 2015) and Joan Ormrod’s recent analysis that centres the symbolic role of the female body in iterations of Wonder Woman (Ormrod 2020).

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3. See Tasker (1993); Neroni (2005); Brown (2011a). These authors all remark on the significance of the female action hero as based on the cultural assumption that action heroes are traditionally thought of as masculine.

C H A PT E R 1

‘You Have a Knack for Saving My Life!’: Wives, Girlfriends and Women in Refrigerators in Marvel Films

At the time of Spider-­Man 3’s (Sam Raimi, 2007) release, director Sam Raimi was asked whether he considered women to be ‘the real Achilles’ heel for superheroes’, to which he answered ‘absolutely’ (Raimi quoted in Germain 2007). Raimi’s statement indicates the crucial role that superhero girlfriends play within the narratives of many Marvel comics and films. Simultaneously, the question, as well as Raimi’s answer, draws the focus from these women to the male heroes, a phenomenon repeated time and again in narratives involving superhero girlfriends. It draws on the notion that women in superhero narratives are positioned as victims, and that the saving of these characters by the male hero provides the substance furthering his story. The women in question are invariably love interests of the heroes, who, as part of heteronormativity in mainstream cinema, enact a heterosexual protectiveness over these women. These gendered traits of heroism and victimhood are likewise enabled through postfeminist culture. The superhero girlfriend has a consistent presence in Marvel comic books and their filmic counterparts. Often, she provides the motivation for the hero’s actions through her victimisation by a villain. Occasionally, she fights back, though usually unsuccessfully, and frequently appears unexpectedly when the hero is overwhelmed by the villain, providing a momentary distraction during which the hero can recover. Following this, she reclaims her place as victim. Other times, as in Iron Man 3 (Shane Black, 2013) and Thor: The Dark World (Alan Taylor, 2013), superhero girlfriend characters are infected by some powerful supernatural substance, allowing them to momentarily traverse the heroic zone. However, the narratives ensure that the substance is presented as a serious threat to the girlfriend­– ­it is then the hero’s job to help the girlfriend by removing the substance. The role of superhero girlfriends within these narratives and the series of complex discourses regarding gender roles they encompass are criti-

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cally compelling and illuminate the complicated gender dynamics informing contemporary culture. These women, while integral cogs within the mechanics of superhero narratives, are often pushed aside, with films privileging the stories of the central male heroes. In complex ways, the superhero girlfriend is emblematic of gendered discourses regarding the empowerment of women in popular culture and broader society. An authorial signature of Raimi’s within his trilogy of Spider-­Man films was identified in popular discourses as ‘putting a sexy girl in a tight-­fitting outfit, hanging from something’ (Ziskin quoted in Germain 2007), while the film­makers behind Iron Man 3 supposedly opted for more subversive modes of representation (Feige quoted in Bryson 2013). Throughout this chapter, I consider how particular Marvel film adaptations (re)configure superhero girlfriends to reproduce narrative conventions carried over from comics into filmic contexts. These characters carry with them a fascinating history and offer rich points of discussion, which for long have been ignored. I ultimately interrogate the cultural implications of the proliferation of these characters, arguing that these films position superhero girlfriends as in need of saving, a subjectivity incorporating what I refer to as active passivity.

Damsels in Distress and Women in Refrigerators across Media The notion that a female character in a narrative focusing on a male protagonist acts as a ‘sought-­for-­person’ (A. A. Berger 2005: 22) who consequently enters into a heterosexual union with the hero was identified by formalists such as Vladimir Propp in his Morphology of the Folktale (Propp 2010). The presence of such characters has therefore persevered in a vast number of texts not limited to comics. However, the persistent use of the girlfriend in superhero comic books, whose kidnap, murder, rape or any other tragic life event serves the narrative purpose of rousing the hero into action against the villain, has become a particularly acute narrative device of which some scholars, and comic writers, have become increasingly aware. These authors express frustration with the continuing violence against women in superhero books and the misogynistic implications of such narrative turns. In 1999, comic book writer Gail Simone coined the term ‘women in refrigerators’ after a particularly gruesome occurrence in an issue of DC’s Green Lantern series in which the titular hero discovers that his enemy murdered his girlfriend and hid her body in his refrigerator (Robbins 2010: 216). Simone subsequently created an ongoing list chronicling

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‘y ou hav e a kna c k f o r s a v ing m y l i f e ! ’ 31 every female superhero comic book character who had been ‘killed, raped, depowered, crippled, turned evil, maimed, tortured, contracted a disease or had other life-­derailing tragedies befall her’ (Simone 1999). ‘Women in refrigerators’ has since been used to refer to tragedies that occur to women in superhero comics ‘in service of male superhero narratives’ (Mandville 2014: 206), for example, deaths or injuries that serve ‘as a plot device to stir the male hero into action’ (Robbins 2010: 216). Perhaps the quintessential woman in the refrigerator is Peter Parker’s girlfriend Gwen Stacy, whose death by the Green Goblin in The Amazing Spider-­Man (Conway and Kane 1973a) is said to have marked a turning point in comics. Heralding darker storylines symbolising the ‘shifting tide of history’ in America (Blumberg 2003), it resulted in an industrial turn in the history of comics referred to as the Modern Age of Comics, signalling the incorporation of ‘adult’ comic narratives such as Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’s Watchmen (1987) and Frank Miller and Klaus Janson’s The Dark Knight Returns (1986) into the discursive realm of ‘quality’ literature and contributing to a widely accepted canon of ‘great’ comics (Beaty and Woo 2016: 56–7). Interestingly, though, Stacy’s death in The Amazing Spider-­Man #121 is not held to such high critical esteem, despite catalysing a major shift in the narrative of comics history. It nonetheless contains dark thematic overtones in its incorporation of death, drugs and abuse of power. In the comic, Peter Parker’s best friend Harry Osborn undergoes treatment for drug addiction. Because of the trauma of his son’s drug use, Harry’s father Norman Osborn, who had previously been the villain Green Goblin, suffers a breakdown and takes up his Goblin persona again. Knowing geeky teen Parker is the superheroic Spider-­Man, Osborn abducts Parker’s girlfriend Gwen Stacy to taunt and coax him into action. Spider-­Man tracks down Osborn in a dramatic scene taking place on the George Washington Bridge. As Spider-­Man reaches to save Stacy, Osborn pushes her over the ledge, but Spider-­Man is not able to save her. The story was made doubly tragic by the implication that the force caused by Spider-­Man’s web shooter (with which he attempted to catch her) broke Stacy’s neck, resulting in her death. Enraged at Osborn’s actions and his ensuing jeers, Spider-­Man declares, dramatically shaking his fist while cradling Stacy’s dead body, I’m going to get you, Goblin! I’m going to destroy you slowly­– ­and when you start begging for me to end it­– I­ ’m going to remind you of one thing­– ­you killed the woman I love­– ­and for that you’re going to die!

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Here, Stacy’s death propels Spider-­Man’s narrative, causing him to seek revenge on Osborn. Subsequently, Spider-­Man realises the error of his ways, deciding that he does not want to be a murderer, but justice is served when Osborn is impaled by his own flying device, the Goblin Glider (Conway and Kane 1973b). Throughout comics history, more superhero girlfriends would become victims at the hands of villains. These occurrences became emblematic of writing that ‘devalues female characters but also sexualizes their existence and demise’, suggests Anita K. McDaniel (2008: 88). On further inspection, the editorial reasoning behind Stacy’s death provides insight into the creative practices motivating Marvel’s output at the time, suggested that the only alternative would have been marriage, for which Parker was not ready (Blumberg 2003). Still, ‘women in refrigerators’ was not conceived of as applying solely to wives and girlfriends of male superheroes. Simone’s list contains superheroines as well as civilian women who fall victim to the acts of villains. However, in the context of the films considered here, it is worth contemplating how the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative is apparent within the narratives of superhero girlfriends. As will be discussed in later chapters, superheroines cause myriad ideological anxieties that are dealt with through cinematic means. However, non-­powered women are approached with equal ideological uncertainty. Superhero films carry the dual burden of being adapted from material that has been often limiting towards women as well as functioning within the mainstream Hollywood film industry, traditionally geared more towards young male audiences. Thus, several factors make these films a challenging environment in which to arrange female characters. As mentioned previously, Marvel films fall within the practices of Millennial Hollywood, incorporating transmedia narratives, exploiting pre-­existing properties and, indeed, centring on a male protagonist. Schatz also notes that these films must ‘include a “love story” as a secondary plot line’ (Schatz 2009: 33). These qualifications also bear parallels to Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey in The Hero with a Thousand Faces (2012). Originally published in 1949, Campbell’s work interrogated the fundamental structures within mythology and storytelling, chronicling the steps of the journey undertaken by the central hero throughout a narrative. Such narratives informed a vast number of Hollywood films (post-­New Hollywood) and the Hero’s Journey is ultimately male-­centric, so much so that Campbell claimed that women do not need to make the journey because ‘in the whole mythological tradition the woman is there. All she has to do is to realize that she’s the place that people are trying to get to’ (Campbell quoted in Murdock 1990: 1, original emphasis). This denial of

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‘y ou hav e a kna c k f o r s a v ing m y l i f e ! ’ 33 women’s development of character (disguised as a compliment) prompted Maureen Murdock to produce The Heroine’s Journey (1990) although Campbell’s work remained the most commonly referred to template for popular narratives. It is noteworthy that the sort of supposedly masculine film outlined above and in the Introduction is often accompanied by a version of the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative, a narrative mode informed by superhero films’ invocation of action cinema more widely. However, authors who have observed the widespread presence of these characters in films have devoted little more than a passing reference to them. In her discussion of the place of the female character within the male-­focused action film, Tasker writes: An hysterical figure who needs to be rescued or protected, the heroine is often played for comedy. Sometimes she is simply written out of the more intense action narrative altogether . . . More often female characters are either raped or killed, or both, in order to provide a motivation for the hero’s revenge. (Tasker 1993: 16)

Tasker cites films such as Dirty Harry (Don Siegel, 1971) and Lethal Weapon (Richard Donner, 1987) as exemplifying such narratives, although Mad Max (George Miller, 1979) and Death Wish (Michael Winner, 1974) can also be considered. The parallels between Tasker’s observations and the use of women as similar plot devices in superhero narratives are evident. Moreover, Tasker suggests, it is because the action film is perceived as such an exclusively male space that there has historically been little room for heroic women. She continues, the heroines of the Hollywood action cinema have not tended to be action heroines. They tend to be fought over rather than fighting, avenged rather than avenging. In the role of threatened object they are significant, if passive, narrative figures. (Tasker 1993: 16)

This notion of significant passivity on the part of women in action films is striking. As Tasker proposes, these narratives evoke the sentiments expressed by Mulvey of the active/­passive divide between men and women in film (Tasker 1993: 17). However, the superhero girlfriend’s presence crucially propels the narrative of the central male hero. A broader way in which such victimised female characters have been imagined is as part of the revenge narrative. In his investigation of the cultural significance of revenge, Thane Rosenbaum attends to the propagation of revenge narratives in popular culture and wider social contexts. He refers to Gladiator (Ridley Scott, 2000), The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972) and A Time to Kill (Joel Schumacher, 1996) as offering

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audiences the satisfaction of witnessing payback exacted on morally reprehensible individuals (Rosenbaum 2013: 71). Rosenbaum maintains that the presence of such texts can be traced to ‘the human longing for revenge that has been found wanting in the actual delivery of justice’ (Rosenbaum 2013: 68). He refers to ‘a subgenre of revenge narratives about men whose wives and daughters have been murdered, raped, or both, whose families have been taken away or their children killed’ (Rosenbaum 2013: 72), stating that the death of a child or the rape and murder of a spouse supplies the avenger with his marching orders, especially if justice cannot be found any other way . . . The avenger must do what is morally necessary because tolerating an injustice is viscerally unbearable. It is not only the avenger who won’t be able to sleep until justice is obtained. The same is true of the audience. (Rosenbaum 2013: 73)

Thus, he claims, there is a cultural need­– ­implied to be universal­– ­to observe villains being punished within these narratives. In this context, it is clear that the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative may feed into this social desire for revenge (though Rosenbaum’s homogenising analysis of audiences is problematic since he does not actually offer an audience study). Though the heroes in many Marvel stories eventually turn away from revenge, this is usually followed by a chain of events in which the villain is killed by accident (as the Green Goblin was in the comics). Thus, ideologically, many of these narratives maintain the spirit of a revenge narrative without sullying the moral compass of their central heroes­– t­o have their cake and eat it too, so to speak­– w ­ ith the heroes having grown emotionally and morally, while their loved ones have still been avenged. The significance of Rosenbaum’s discussion notwithstanding, it does draw attention back to the male heroes and neglects the gendered implications of such narratives. The connotations of who carries out revenge, on whom and why, should play a larger role in such discussions, and it is thus my intention to bring the focus back onto the characters who ultimately make these narratives possible­– ­the superhero girlfriends.

Women in Refrigerators in Marvel Film Adaptations Gwen Stacy’s death is seen as marking the beginning of an age signalling the arrival of ‘a darker hero’ in comics (Blumberg 2003). One such hero is Frank Castle, known as the Punisher, who seeks revenge on the mobsters who killed his wife and children while they were out on a picnic (Conway and DeZuniga 1975). Castle’s characterisation as an Italian-­American, as well as a Vietnam veteran, facilitated the inclusion

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of themes of marginalised masculinity and loss of faith in a defective justice system, as well as the brutality of the murders by the mafia. The needless act of this killing motivates Castle to kill the perpetrators; then, becoming a vigilante, utilise brutal military methods to fight criminals. The women-­in-­refrigerators’ narrative is evident, even in an origin story that bears parallels between Peter Parker’s Uncle Ben’s death in Spider-­ Man’s origin story, or the death of blind hero Daredevil’s father in his origin story. The differences between these stories are undoubtedly gendered; the additions of a dead female child and the wife are noteworthy. The elimination of the two female entities as well as his son positions Castle as a last man standing, binding him to an exaggerated lone heroic masculine sensibility. Given the significance of the revenge narrative, the Punisher’s origin has been returned to twice in film, in 1989 and 2004 respectively, as well as across media in the Netflix series Daredevil and The Punisher (Netflix 2017–19) (see Kent 2021), not to mention countless retellings in comic books. The Punisher (1989) devotes a flashback to the deaths of Castle’s loved ones. During one scene, in which Castle (Dolph Lundgren), nude, prays in his sewer dwellings, it flashes back to the suburbs, where his wife and two daughters are shown walking towards their car. The scene cuts back to Castle in the sewers before flashing back to the suburbs. The car explodes and Castle runs towards it, shouting. He is unable to open the car in which his family is now trapped and it explodes again. The addition of another vulnerable daughter heightens the sense of masculine heroism and the use of intercut scenes in which Frank is naked and praying draws attention to his muscular, masculine frame, while also externalising his emotional vulnerability. The brevity of the death scene in the film showcases the ephemeral nature of the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative. The wife and child were present for those scenes, but the rest of the action focuses on Castle. The importance of the wife and daughters is fleeting: these characters have now provided the hero’s motivation. The Punisher (Jonathan Hensleigh, 2004) adopts a more saccharine approach, where the focus is nonetheless the tragedy of the deaths and their effect on Castle. In this film, Castle (Thomas Jane) has a son, contributing to scenes of male bonding. Castle is shown going home to his wife, Maria, and son, Will, and comforts Will, who is upset that they are moving to another city. A soft musical score accompanies these scenes, emphasising Frank’s romanticised family life. The family theme is extended when Frank, Maria and Will attend a family reunion on the Puerto Rico coast. The following scenes feature Castle and his wife romantically gazing into each other’s eyes, as well as an exchange between

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Figure 1.1  Frank Castle’s fist alongside the photograph of his wife and son signifies his call to action in The Punisher (2004).

the two on the beach where his wife declares ‘You and I­– w ­ e’re not lucky, we’re blessed.’ Frank’s paternalism is again showcased in another scene where he expresses his wish to have another child, which is followed by a father-­son bonding scene where his son shows him his new skull-­ emblazoned T-­shirt (which becomes the Punisher’s superhero uniform). The emphasis on family in the film links to the resurgence of what Sarah Godfrey and Hannah Hamad refer to as ‘protective paternalism’ in films within a post-­9/­11 culture, stemming from and speaking to postfeminist discourses (Godfrey and Hamad 2012). Frank barely survives the attack by mobsters at the family reunion, during which Will and Maria are killed. On his return to the house, sentimental music accompanies a close-­up of this hand holding a picture of Maria and Will. His other hand is a fist (Figure 1.1), indicating that his wife and son’s deaths are his call to action. He then finds his son’s skull T-­shirt, which he takes with him: even Frank’s T-­shirt has been imbued with familial sentiment alongside the heightened emotional aspect of Maria and Will’s deaths. The real victims in this story are the members of Frank’s family but attention is on Frank, privileging male suffering from the fallout of the tragedy. The women-­in-­refrigerators narrative also features in Raimi’s three Spider-­Man films, which focus on Peter Parker’s (Tobey Maguire) struggles to balance his superhero life with his personal life. A major feature of his personal life is Mary Jane ‘MJ’ Watson (Kirsten Dunst), with whom he is in love, but the relationship is unstable. The Mary Jane of the comics did not become Parker’s girlfriend until after Stacy’s death, but she maintained a presence throughout the comics nonetheless. Indeed, even before her first on-­panel appearance, repeated references to Watson

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became a running gag in which readers would never see her face. This was taken to extremes, for instance when Watson’s face is obscured by a comically large flower (Lee and Ditko 1965). Here, emphasis is superficially placed on Mary Jane’s appearance, even if it is in reference to what is not shown. When Watson is finally revealed in the final panel of The Amazing Spider-­Man #42 (Lee and Ditko 1966), she is stunning, voluptuous and feisty. Early issues of the comic had been noticeably devoid of women, save Peter’s frail Aunt May and newspaper secretary Betty Brant. The women in Peter’s life largely provided complications, often through their obsessive behaviour. In one issue, Peter even declares that ‘Females must have originally been intended for another planet!!’ (Lee and Ditko 1964). Despite featuring in each of the Raimi Spider-­Man films, Watson’s presence overwhelmingly complicates Parker’s narrative and forces him to take action. In fact, Watson is the first character to be introduced in Spider-­Man (Sam Raimi, 2002), which tells the origin story of how Parker acquired his powers. The first shot of the film is Watson’s face in close-­up when she is riding the school bus, but it is not Watson’s story that is posited to be significant. While Parker’s voice-­over narrates that ‘This, like any story worth telling, is all about a girl­– t­ hat girl’, this is not Watson’s story but Parker’s. The scene additionally provides the crucial first impression of the character, immediately positioning her as an object of desire. There are moments in Spider-­Man that confirm the Mulvey’s assertion that men in films are positioned as active and women passive (to quell the anxiety of castration posed by the presence of the woman). Parker acquires his powers after he is bitten by a spider during a field trip to a genetics laboratory while taking pictures of Watson (allegedly for the school paper). During the scene, attention is drawn to Watson’s face, for example when she tells him not to make her ‘look ugly’. Much of the scene is presented through Parker’s camera’s point of view, the crosshairs of the  camera’s viewfinder laid over these shots, begging identification with the male protagonist marvelling at the beauty of the passive woman. Indeed, these scenes are reminiscent of the use of point-­of-­view shots in Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window (1954), a film Mulvey defines as working within the confines of the gendered active/­passive dichotomy, and that features a male protagonist who views passively positioned women through his telephoto lens (Mulvey 2004: 845). Notably, it is Watson’s passivity while being photographed that causes Parker to become distracted and fail to notice the supernatural spider biting his hand, foreshadowing future events in which Watson causes the action in Parker’s life without actually doing anything.

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Watson becomes infatuated with Spider-­Man after he rescues her from the villain, Norman Osborn (Willem Dafoe), who suffers from a split personality and terrorises New York as the Green Goblin. A rescue scene features Watson helpless on a crumbling balcony while Parker, as Spider-­ Man, fights Osborn. After he saves her, Spider-­Man carries her in his arms, swinging on a web through the streets. The scene incorporates close-­ups of Watson clinging to him and gasping in wonder, again highlighting the power dynamics in the portrayal of the relationship­– W ­ atson remains in a position of considerable physical weakness and demonstrates admiration for and attraction towards Spider-­Man. She is later saved by Spider-­Man from thugs in a dark alley. A shot of one thug blowing kisses at her indicates Watson’s inextricably gendered sexual vulnerability. When the men touch her, she attempts to fight but is unable to, until, from off-­camera, webs are slung at the men, pulling them back. A medium close-­up shows Watson looking with reverence at Spider-­Man fighting the thugs off-­camera. Due to torrential rain, her dress is soaking wet, sticking and drawing attention to her body, highlighted by street lights illuminating the dark alley. The objectified Watson thus propels the narrative with her inactivity. Spider-­Man tells her ‘you have a knack for getting in trouble’ and she replies ‘you have a knack for saving my life’ and the scene ends with a kiss in which Spider-­Man hangs upside down from a wall. The discourse here naturalises the dominant/­submissive dynamic between the two, characterising both characters’ actions as a talent that occurs naturally. The most explicit moment in which Watson’s trauma propels Parker’s narrative results in the climactic final battle between Spider-­Man and Osborn. Prior to the scene, Osborn is enraged after he discovers Parker is Spider-­Man and converses with his Goblin alter-­ego over what action to take. Osborn’s own voice, channelling the Goblin, accompanies these shots, telling Osborn that Parker must suffer, and to do that he must ‘attack his heart’. Parker then discovers that Osborn has taken Watson. An out-­of-­focus close-­up of Watson sideways comes gradually into focus as the camera turns and zooms out, revealing her isolation on an elevated platform outside at night. After she nearly falls off the ledge, the camera zooms out above her, revealing that she is standing on a bridge, a tiny, vulnerable figure. Spider-­Man approaches and Osborn holds Watson screaming by the scruff, echoing the build-­up to Stacy’s death in the comics. Watson is infantilised through her costume of pink pyjamas, and her pink fluffy slippers are shown in an aerial shot falling from her feet, drawing attention to the height at which she is held. Spider-­Man is eventually able to save Watson, alongside a tramcar full of innocent children,

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but Osborn overpowers him and takes him to the ruins of an abandoned building, where the final fight ensues. Here, Osborn proves too strong for Spider-­Man, with Spider-­Man’s mask ripping and revealing his bloodied face in a way that fosters an understanding of him as a masculine hero. As outlined by Purse, the male body in action films signals the extent of physical exertion that heroes undergo through sweat, blood, grunting and facial contortion, while female action bodies are less likely to do so (Purse 2011: 81). As slow-­motion shots show Osborn punching Spider-­Man, blood and saliva emanate from his body. Osborn tells Spider-­Man that ‘I’m going to finish her nice and slow . . . MJ and I, we’re gonna have a hell of a time.’ Importantly, this declaration prompts Spider-­Man to put all of his efforts into defeating Osborn, as he grabs hold of Osborn’s weapon, a trident pointed at him, slowly rising upwards through the shot as the musical score becomes more rousing, and his face contorts. Osborn’s eyes widen and Spider-­Man finally overpowers him (though Osborn accidentally impales himself on his Glider, leading to his final demise). Crucially, the threat to Watson prompted Spider-­Man’s ultimate physical exertion, which he needed to defeat Osborn, a narrative turn that is replicated in Spider-­Man 2 (Sam Raimi, 2004). Despite Watson finally declaring her love for Parker at the end of Spider-­Man, Parker walks away from the relationship because of the danger it would supposedly pose Watson. In Spider-­Man 2, Watson causes anxiety for Parker as her presence causes him to lose his powers, resulting in an identity crisis. After quitting being Spider-­Man, Parker starts wearing glasses again (which he hadn’t needed due to his spider powers), succeeds at his studies and works his way back into Watson’s good books. However, he reaches an epiphany after Aunt May tells him about the importance of heroism. In a scene pre-­empting film’s action climax, an extensive battle between Spider-­Man and the film’s villain on top of a moving train, Parker and Watson meet in a café, where Watson apologises and suggests that she does want to pursue a relationship with him, which Parker is shown rejecting because he has decided that he must be Spider-­Man. However, the fact that Parker is still wearing his glasses signifies that he has not entirely committed to being Spider-­Man once again, as the following scenes also suggest, with the character occupying a narrative limbo that is resolved through Watson’s eventual victimisation. Just as Watson moves in to kiss Parker (so that she can decide whether he is lying about not loving her), the mise en scène indicates that Parker’s precognitive spider-­sense is tingling due to imminent danger nearby. Watson puckers her lips in close-­up towards the camera, then the camera erratically zooms out of Parker’s eye

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to reveal a car smashing through the window behind him, demonstrating his attention being diverted. The juxtaposition of Watson’s kiss with the destruction of the car and window externalises Parker’s assertion that she cannot be with him for her own safety. The two are attacked by Otto Octavius (Alfred Molina), or Doctor Octopus, whose mind has been possessed by four sentient robotic arms fused to his back. Octavius targets Parker because he wants Parker to tell Spider-­Man, whom Octavius believes to be a contact of Parker, to meet him. A close-­up of Octavius saying ‘Find him ...’ is followed by a shot of Watson, screaming, with Octavius’s mechanical arms flailing behind her as he states ‘or I’ll peel the flesh from her bones.’ Octavius throws Parker into a wall, grabs Watson and carries her away, screaming. In the following shot, Parker bursts out of the rubble, a close-­up of his face showcasing his angry determination. When he runs out, he cannot see through his glasses. He takes them off and can see clearly, as demonstrated by point-­of-­view shots that emphasise the difference in Parker’s eyesight when he is committed to heroism. Watson’s kidnap, and the need for him to come to her rescue, have caused his powers to return. This event is marked by a close­up of his glasses hitting the ground after he purposefully drops them and the lens falling out, followed by a close-­up of his fist aggressively clenching (Figure 1.2), as mirrored by the shot of Castle’s fist in 2004’s The Punisher. Here, Watson is again the force that drives Parker’s narrative of self-­actualisation. Significantly, it was Watson’s actions that are portrayed as causing Parker to lose his powers in the first place (through her engagement to another man). Meanwhile, it is her lack of action, or her passivity as Octavius’s victim, that stimulates his return to being Spider-­Man. At the end of Spider-­Man 2, Watson is represented with some autonomy

Figure 1.2  Peter Parker’s clenched fist signifies his commitment to being Spider-Man after Mary Jane Watson is kidnapped in Spider-Man 2.

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when she argues that she has as much choice about the relationship as Parker does. She angrily asks him, ‘Can’t you respect me enough to make my own decisions?’ and Parker complies, swinging on his web out of the window as Watson mildly looks on. The rhetoric of choice resonates with contemporary postfeminist sentiment and resurfaces in The Amazing Spider-­Man 2 (Marc Webb, 2014), discussed in the following chapter. However, the autonomy Watson gains throughout this scene and in the next film proves to be yet another source of problems for Parker. Spider-­Man 3 focuses on Parker’s exploits as he attempts to marry Watson, and introduces the villains Sandman and Venom. Additionally, Osborn’s son and Parker’s former best friend, Harry (James Franco), has taken up the Goblin mantle to avenge his father. Watson’s newfound autonomy, for instance in her efforts to become an actress, increases to the extent that she is portrayed as needy and unreasonable, shouting at Parker when the play in which she had a role receives a bad review. Watson’s autonomy is an obstacle to Parker­– s­ he has become too emotionally demanding, even jealous of Spider-­Man’s popularity and when he neglects her in favour of crime-­fighting, echoing traditional cultural configurations of women’s emotional needs being neglected within heterosexual relationships (Jackson 1993: 192). These anxieties are quelled in the narrative when Watson is replaced by a new love interest: Gwen Stacy. In a key scene, Stacy (Bryce Dallas Howard) is shown modelling for a photographer in an office skyscraper. Much like when Parker shot photos of Watson in Spider-­Man, Stacy is presented through the point of view of the photographer’s camera, marking her again as an object of male desire. Villain Sandman then wreaks havoc on the city, destroying the skyscraper and causing her to fall through a window. Spider-­Man swings to the rescue, dodging some debris that flies towards him in a great feat of action before the shot cuts to Stacy falling, echoing shots of Watson falling in Spider-­Man (Figures 1.3 and 1.4). He catches her before she is crushed by the wreckage and she clings to him. Evidently, Watson is being replaced by another actress in her play, but she is also being replaced as Spider-­Man’s damsel, a narrative turn supported by Parker and Stacy’s re-­enactment of the iconic upside-­down kiss he previously shared with Watson. When Parker is subsequently infected by the alien symbiote, Venom, he becomes stronger but also more aggressive. Spider-­Man’s suit turns from red and blue to black, signifying his darkened morals. Parker is shown actively pursuing Stacy in a way that he never was able to with Watson, more clearly partaking of the hegemonic masculine pursuit of women. Simultaneously, Parker also becomes more feminised, appearing to wear eyeliner and having longer hair. In this way, the film potentially vilifies Parker’s femininity by

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Figure 1.3  Mary Jane Watson falls in Spider-Man.

Figure 1.4  Gwen Stacy falls in Spider-Man 3.

associating his bad attitude with his transgression of gender boundaries, conflating the two, while also representing his relentless pursuit of Stacy as problematic. Similarly, he performs some strutting dances in the street in a parody of Saturday Night Fever (John Badham, 1977), a film that portrays complex feminised masculinity within the generic conventions of the Hollywood musical (Neale 1993: 18), adding further ambiguity to Parker’s (anti)heroism. Parker only snaps out of this phase after he accidentally hits Watson in a bar fight, by which point Stacy has lost interest and Watson reverts to being his damsel, renewing the status quo. Thus, Watson is kidnapped by the villains in the final confrontation. Disgraced photographer Eddie Brock (Topher Grace), infected by Venom, takes Watson and suspends her in a taxi above the city with Sandman

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Some Marvel films make attempts at self-­awareness when carrying out this narrative. For example, in X-­Men Origins: Wolverine (Gavin Hood, 2009), central hero Logan’s (Hugh Jackman) girlfriend Kayla Silverfox (Lynn Collins) is apparently killed by Logan’s rival Victor Creed (Liev Schreiber), who is working for the main villain Colonel Stryker (Danny Huston). Logan, having taken to hiding his superpowered mutant ability of self-­healing and retractable bone-­claws that grow from his hands, agrees to undergo Stryker’s treatment to bond the unbreakable metal adamantium to his bones so that he can seek revenge on Creed, becoming the Wolverine. However, Creed was working for Stryker, and upon realising this, Logan laments that ‘They killed her so I’d let them put adamantium in me. They killed her for a goddamn experiment’, thus indicating Silverfox’s use as a narrative mechanism to propel Logan’s actions. However, it turns out that Silverfox had made a deal with Stryker to release her sister from captivity provided she manipulate Logan into agreeing to the treatment by allowing Creed to pretend to kill her, rendering Silverfox’s sister a narrative device herself. As such, Origins presents a chain of women in refrigerators who each play an integral role in propelling the narrative via passive means. Crucially, Origins does not question such narratives but acknowledges them while reinforcing them. Likewise, the recent turn towards self-­aware superhero parody in Deadpool had the potential to transgress such narratives, although the film’s dramatic climax involves the kidnap by the central villain of Deadpool’s love interest Vanessa (Morena Baccarin). Vanessa’s portrayal as a victim is potentially offset in a way that takes account of feminist criticisms of her being a damsel by portraying her as, literally, ball-­busting and willful. Indeed, Deadpool makes use of superhero genre conventions for comic effect and presents itself in many ways as reactionary through its use of irreverent humour and reference to taboo subjects. However, exactly what it is reacting against becomes obscured by the film’s ultimate reinforcement of the very cinematic mechanisms it purports to be against. It is also significant that Vanessa is killed at the start of Deadpool 2 (David Leitch, 2018), leaving these generic structures intact. While women-in-refrigerator narratives have existed since before the boom in comic book adaptations, the frequent return to these narratives is indicative of more pressing matters referring to gender roles. Strikingly, these narratives mark a favouring of chivalry as a trait of masculine heroism, as well as presenting women who actively receive these acts of chivalry. Dating back to medieval conceptions of knighthood, chivalry is an ethical system enforcing the correct behaviour of the knightly class (Wollock 2011: 93). Further, the concept of chivalry is linked to that of

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courtly love (Wollock 2011: 1), which sheds some light on the emphasis of both of these elements in many superhero narratives. Coupled with the frequent use of anti-­feminist rhetoric in mainstream press since the new millennium that chivalry is dead, it becomes clear that media that engage with women-in-refrigerator narratives propagate a nostalgia for a lost time when men were required (or permitted) to carry out chivalrous acts of heroism for women. In 1970’s Sexual Politics, Kate Millett describes the patriarchal nature of chivalry, suggesting that ‘while a palliative to the injustice of woman’s social position, chivalry is also a technique for disguising it’ (Millett 2000: 37). She continues that chivalry combined with romantic notions of love ‘in their general tendency to attribute impossible virtues to women, have ended by confining them in a narrow and often remarkably conscribing sphere of behaviour’ (Millett 2000: 38). In films such as those discussed in this chapter, that ‘conscribing sphere of behaviour’ becomes manifest when superhero girlfriends play the role of the villain’s victim, stirring the hero into action. The uncritical stance that many of these films possess towards such ideals indicates their functioning within postfeminist discourses, for if women are now empowered, or even if feminism has gone too far in its rejection of chivalry, as popular discourses might suggest (Jones 2011; Picciuto 2013; De Lacey 2013; York 2013), then it is acceptable for characters to enact these traditional gender roles. Kristin J. Anderson characterises acts such as chivalry as ‘benevolent sexism’, acts that seem to have positive motivations and effects but in fact reinscribe gender inequality (Anderson 2014: 108). Anderson concludes that reinvigorated emphasis on the benefits of chivalrous attitudes from men towards women plays a role in restricting women’s liberation from restrictive, submissive positions, concluding that ‘Whereas benevolent sexism seems harmless and even positive, the way chivalry seems, it makes women feel incompetent, it makes others think that women are incompetent, and when women resist benevolent sexism, they are disliked’ (Anderson 2014: 111; original emphasis). Chivalry is then an admirable trait of the masculine hero, since postfeminist culture functions to reinforce binaristic notions of gender, a topic I discuss in more detail in later chapters. Likewise, as Godfrey and Hamad note, discourses of protective paternalism proliferate in postfeminist culture, which ‘simultaneously privileges and celebrates the return of formerly outmoded masculine traits of protectionism and violent vigilantism’, and in cases such as The Punisher (2004), in which family themes are foregrounded, ‘negotiat[e] this return through recourse to the disingenuously ideological neutral filter of fatherhood’ (Godfrey and Hamad 2011: 158).

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The superhero girlfriend often encompasses active passivity in relation to the male hero in these films, in which it is difficult to make concrete distinctions between women’s activity and passivity. The purpose of this chapter has been to draw attention to some of the multiplicities present in a character type that has been neglected from critical accounts of superhero narratives, showing how the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative has been, and continues to be, applied to on-­screen reimaginings of Marvel girlfriends. The films doubly function within comic book traditions and action cinema traditions, featuring women whose peril acts as the motivator for the male hero’s action. These characters are therefore shaped by modes of active passivity. Evidently, all of the films discussed portray a brand of white, middle-­class, heterosexual femininity that ultimately skews portrayals of gender, sexuality, class and race. These aspects of female representation are considered in more detail later on in this book. Despite this, it is imperative not to write these characters off as ‘poor representation’. While many of these representations are indeed limiting, an interrogation into their cultural history and deeper analysis of their cinematic construction can provide valuable insights into notions of gender within a cultural consciousness.

C H A PT E R 2

Pepper Potts and Gwen Stacy: Recuperating the Superhero Girlfriend

Through Pepper Potts of the Iron Man films and Gwen Stacy in the Amazing Spider-­Man films, the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative outlined in the previous chapter is further addressed and experimented with, demonstrating how character mobility can function across films within franchises, and indicating that the superhero girlfriend character can embody a number of multifaceted and paradoxical feminine subjectivities linked to the culture that produces them. These films highlight the characters’ resourcefulness and bravery, while simultaneously valuing their roles as superhero girlfriends. However, these films also engage with postfeminist discourses, projecting a paradoxical and elusive image of feminine subjectivity, and actively drawing from feminist notions of agency within the broad rhetoric of ‘choice’. The representations of these characters offer insight into how the films make attempts to account for possible feminist critique, whilst simultaneously restoring the status quo. Both Pepper Potts and Gwen Stacy in The Amazing Spider-­ Man possess a quick wit and make sassy comments that resonate with postfeminist models of hip, snappy, confident feminine subjectivities present in 2000s popular culture texts such as Veronica Mars (UPN, 2004–6; The CW, 2006–7) and Buffy the Vampire Slayer (The WB, 1997–2001; UPN, 2001–3) (Berridge 2013: 479). Gill suggests that contemporary constructions of women in the media favour ‘a modernized version of heterosexual femininity as feisty, sassy and sexually agentic’ (Gill 2008: 438), and indeed both Potts and Stacy fit this mould. These films likewise trade on the star personae of these actresses. The casting of these characters therefore also feeds into discourses of desirable contemporary womanhood. Interestingly, numerous superhero girlfriends in film have undergone changes in terms of profession adapted from comics to film, usually becoming scientifically inclined in their on-­screen forms. Jane Foster went from being a nurse to being an astrophysicist, while Betty Ross, who was an army general’s daughter, became a scientist both in Hulk (Ang Lee,

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2003) and the rebooted The Incredible Hulk (Louis Leterrier, 2008). Gwen Stacy similarly went from being a high school student to being top of the class at a science school, while Susan Storm (who is both a girlfriend and a heroine) of the Fantastic Four is similarly presented as a scientist in 2015’s rebooted FANT4STIC (Josh Trank, 2015). Pepper Potts became Stark’s personal assistant (then CEO), rather than being a secretary. Further, those girlfriends who are scientifically inclined are more likely to feature in the action of the final showdowns between the heroes and the villains as their scientific skills and intelligence can be of use (others are permitted to help while under the strict order of the hero). The change of professions may be some attempt by filmmakers to integrate these traditionally helpless characters into the action of the central narrative. The character of the woman scientist also harks back to 1950s science fiction B-­ movies (Noonan 2005), complicating the temporal qualities of postfeminist representations of women. Likewise, the coming forward of scientifically minded characters is interesting during a time in which women are still underrepresented in STEM fields (Usdansky and Gordon 2016; Pomerantz and Raby 2017: 15). This is a symptom of the ‘luminosity’ or visibility of women in high-­ranking professional positions in the popular media that McRobbie describes in her discussion of postfeminist culture (McRobbie 2009). This visibility of young, successful women is part of the theatrics of postfeminist culture that, in McRobbie’s terms, further serves to regulate feminine subjects through their increased luminosity, which is ‘created by the light itself’: ‘They are clouds of light which give young women a shimmering presence, and in so doing they also mark out the terrain of the consummately and reassuringly feminine’ (McRobbie 2009: 60).

Iron (Wo)Man Pepper Potts of the Iron Man (and eventually Avengers) franchise offers a useful example of the ways in which the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative is not necessarily a straightforward plot mechanism. Virginia ‘Pepper’ Potts first appeared in comics as a secretary of Tony Stark, the playboy billionaire and owner of weapons manufacturer Stark Industries, who is also the hero Iron Man (Lee and Heck 1963). Potts’s temperament is introduced before Potts even appears on-­panel, as Stark tells his new chauffeur, Happy Hogan, ‘You can fight all you want to with her! I do regularly!’ (Lee and Heck 1963). Potts is subsequently shown as whiny and demanding; the first panel in which she appears features her vocally complaining about the appearance of Happy Hogan, comparing him unfavourably to

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Universal horror film actor Bela Lugosi. With her hand almost completely covering her face, save for the horrified look in her eye, she exclaims ‘With eligible bachelors as scarce around here as dinosaurs, you hire a battle-­ scarred ex-­pug! It couldn’t be a Rock Hudson! No, he has to look like Bela Lugosi!’ before Hogan jokingly makes a sexual pass at her (Lee and Heck 1963). Potts’s introduction paints her as shallow and irritating, not to mention a viable candidate for the male characters’ affections. Throughout her publication history, Potts played a larger role in Stark and Hogan’s lives, eventually marrying Hogan despite having previously been interested in Stark (Lee and Colan 1967), while occasionally being kidnapped by a villain (O’Neil and Trimpe 1985). More recently, Potts has been portrayed as more powerful, both professionally and heroically, having been made CEO of Stark Industries (Fraction and Larroca 2009), as well as donning her own version of the Iron Man armour and becoming the heroine of her own one-­shot comic (DeConnick and Mutti 2010). Potts was incorporated as Rescue sporadically in more recent Marvel comic story arcs (Bendis and Caselli 2017b; Spencer et al. 2017). These developments in Potts’s storylines arguably correspond with the release of the first Iron Man film in 2008 and were perhaps designed to anticipate the vital, yet often impeded, role that Potts occupies in the films. Iron Man chronicles the origin story of the hero as the head of Stark Industries who has a change of heart regarding weapons manufacture after he is kidnapped by terrorists in Afghanistan. Due to an injury sustained during his escape, Stark installs an arc reactor in his chest to prevent shrapnel from piercing his heart, technology he later develops to create the armour-­like Iron Man suit he uses to carry out heroics. Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) is introduced in the film as Tony Stark’s (Robert Downey Jr) personal assistant. Even though Potts and Stark are not in a romantic relationship in the film, Potts is clearly devoted to Stark in a professional capacity. Indeed, in Iron Man, Potts’s role is largely to assist Stark and follow his orders. Even when she disagrees with Stark’s actions regarding his Iron Man activities, Stark’s story arc requires her to concede. Emphasis in one scene is placed on the fact that Stark has changed from being an irresponsible, shallow bachelor to a caring individual. After asking Potts for help in his mission to stop the villain, Stark Industries’ manager Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges), Potts immediately refuses. However, she then discovers that Stark has changed when he tells her ‘I just finally know what I have to do. And I know in my heart that it’s right.’ This scene signifies that he has become a morally good man­– ­a hero­– ­and she agrees to retrieve information from Stane’s office at Stark Industries. It is noteworthy, here, that Stark is portrayed sending Potts into a dangerous

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situation. It is not, as representations of superhero girlfriends discussed in this book thus far, a case of the villainous character threatening Potts to coax Stark’s action. The scene in which Potts retrieves the information (and discovers that Stane paid to have Stark killed in Afghanistan) is constructed to accentuate the threat to Potts; however, Potts is shown using her cunning to escape unscathed. Stane walks in on Potts sitting in front of the computer from which she copies relevant documents onto a USB drive. As he pours a drink, she moves a nearby newspaper to cover the USB drive plugged into the computer. Stane sits on the desk at which she is seated, positioned above her within the frame, looking down on her. He states ‘You are a very rare woman’ in a predatory fashion, ‘Tony doesn’t know how lucky he is.’ She replies, ‘Thank you. Thanks,’ smiling at him in a way reminiscent of that which is culturally expected of women who are harassed by sexually predatory men, particularly within professional settings (Clair 1998: 58; Woodzicka and LaFrance 2005: 150). In this way, Potts is marked as vulnerable while she is attempting to prevent Stane from discovering what she is really doing. Potts ultimately outwits Stane as she picks up the paper and the USB drive in one go and heads out of the office before Stane stops her and asks if he can read that very paper. Luckily Potts has already put the drive in her pocket and is able to escape. As she walks down the stairs she seeks refuge in the company of Phil Coulson, an agent for the espionage law-­enforcement agency S.H.I.E.L.D., to prevent Stane from following her, seeking the safety of male accompaniment, again evoking connotations of sexual harassment. The scene illustrates the ways in which Potts is established as a character who at times can carry out acts of considerable bravery, while concurrently reaching back to notions of female vulnerability. Moreover, after paralysing Stark and removing the arc reactor out of his chest, Stane tells him, ‘Too bad that you involved Pepper in this. I would’ve preferred that she lived’, again invoking the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative. It is later revealed that Stane has built his own Iron Man suit, the Iron Monger, which is located in the building to which Potts is making her way, accompanied by five S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, who turn out to be somewhat useless in protecting her, suggesting that traditional structures of law enforcement have failed in this context. After entering the building, Potts is depicted exploring by herself. The halls are darkened as she enters an area surrounded by chains hanging from the ceiling. The shot shows her from above looking up, making her appear small and vulnerable, as is, by now, expected of damsels presented in peril. A medium close-­up of her looking through the chains is followed

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by a view from behind her as a mechanic sound emits alongside the Iron Monger’s glowing eyes on the other side of the chains. They rise as the camera pulls out and it switches to a point-­of-­view shot from Stane in the suit looking through its interface at Potts’s horrified face, which is marked with a target as she runs out of the shot, screaming. This foregrounds Potts’s victimisation. She runs into the corridor where the agents are; the action continues in the background as the camera follows Potts fleeing. Here, Potts is once again coded as victimised, calling for Stark to rescue her, which he does in a subsequent scene. This scene thus follows a somewhat traditional trajectory of masculine action aiding the victimised damsel. The aforementioned scene in which Potts must carry out a dangerous action for Stark is replicated on a larger scale later in the film, as Stark tells her she must overload an arc reactor inside the building to stop Stane. While Stane is busy attacking Stark outside, Potts prepares the machine. Stark then remotely orders her to push the button that will cause Stane’s suit to break down and a large explosion ensues. As noted, it is Potts’s role to carry out Stark’s orders and this is extended to any acts of heroism that she may perform. Thus, while Potts may have been the one to push the button during the final battle, she was acting explicitly under Stark’s instructions. This is reminiscent of the first scene in which Potts is introduced, when she tells Stark’s one-­night-­stand ‘I do anything and everything that Mr Stark requires . . . including, occasionally, taking out the trash’, while showing her the door. The scene also establishes Stark’s initially relentless womanising, which Potts has no choice but to implicitly endorse, as her secretarial duties appear to extend well beyond the office setting. Indeed, Potts’s actions, though they seem to offer her a considerable level of authority, are usually carried out because Stark asked her to, rendering Potts maid-­like, particularly in the domestic setting in which she is introduced. The fact that these actions can be traced back to Stark potentially undermines Potts’s autonomy, but even so, there is a distinct contrast between her character and the other superhero girlfriends referred to in the previous chapter. While Mary Jane Watson, for example, was quite often portrayed as a nuisance to Peter Parker in Raimi’s Spider-­Man films, causing disruptions in his personal life as well as his superhero life, Potts is portrayed as needed by Stark for assistance. This in itself may not appear particularly problematic but coupled with Potts’s job as his designated personal assistant, and the servile acts she carries out beyond her job, it carries with it connotations of female subservience and further reinforces Stark’s masculine dominance.

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In Iron Man 2 (Jon Favreau, 2010) Potts’s narrative is mainly localised on the stress she experiences after Stark appoints her CEO of Stark Industries. Through this role, Potts occupies a place within conceptions of postfeminist neoliberal feminine empowerment, having worked her way up through the company. This resonates with the phenomenon of capitalism-­friendly feminism popularised by autobiographical and advice literature published by successful businesswomen, such as Facebook CEO Sheryl Sandberg, after the Great Recession (Negra 2014). These narratives, according to Negra, are essentially ‘[e]fforts to recruit feminism to consolidate normative definitions of success’ (Negra 2014: 283), thereby reinforcing exploitative patriarchal business practices and leaving the status quo untouched. The pressure exerted upon Potts by her new professional role clearly takes its toll on her relationship with Stark. The bickering that is characteristic of the couple is extended in a number of scenes, and Potts’s nagging, which was present for some of Iron Man, is amplified. Burdened by the task of planning and administrating Stark’s life, Potts is portrayed as preparing for when things go wrong for Stark, or he behaves irresponsibly, partaking of an extensive form of affective labour typical for contemporary professional women in which the boundaries of personal and professional life are blurred (Negra 2014: 281), in which there are few, if any, distinctions between Potts’s management of Stark’s domestic life and professional life. For example, when Stark decides to take part in a race at the Circuit de Monaco but is attacked by the villain Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke) Potts must rush to fetch Stark’s briefcase (which conceals a compacted version of his Iron Man armour). She and Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau) drive Stark’s car onto the racecourse to do so, knocking out Vanko in the process. In this scene, Potts’s nagging reaches its peak as she screams at Stark, ‘Are you out of your mind?!’ while the shot confines her to the frame of the car window, ‘Get in the car right now!’ Potts’s nagging is a constant in Iron Man 2, and, importantly, the more recklessly Stark behaves, the stronger the nagging becomes, peaking in the aforementioned scene, in which Potts for the first time raises her voice at him. Unlike the demands that Mary Jane Watson makes of Peter Parker in Spider-­Man 3, Potts’s pestering is not necessarily portrayed as irrational but is rather an externalisation of Stark’s story arc in which he becomes increasingly unhinged and erratic. Though this brings the focus back to Stark, the sympathy that the narrative grants Potts’s outbursts is a relative rarity in mainstream films, as well as in broader cultural contexts. This is the point at which Potts’s irritation with Stark’s antics bubbles over into anger, an emotion that has inextricable links to masculinity. As Dana Crowley Jack

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pe p p e r p o t t s a nd gwe n s t a c y 53 notes, ‘following the hierarchy of gender in our society, men have much more permission than women to show anger’, rendering the expression of such anger as challenging and socially discouraged (Jack 2001: 141). That Potts is portrayed as unabashedly emotional during this scene could potentially disrupt such a hierarchy. Unfortunately, the stress pushes Potts too far after she is nearly killed by an armoured drone that villain Vanko detonates after his final fight with Stark. Notably, Vanko did not target Potts; rather, the fact that Potts was standing near the drone when it was set to explode is positioned as a coincidence that allows the narrative to position Potts as needing rescuing while having discarded of the traditional women-­in-­refrigerators mechanism. Stark obviously arrives just in time to save Potts and carries her to a nearby rooftop where she once again assertively expresses her feelings regarding the current situation. She exclaims: Oh my God! I can’t take this anymore . . . I can’t take this . . . My body literally cannot handle the stress. I never know if you’re gonna kill yourself or wreck the whole company . . . I quit. I’m resigning.

Here, Potts’s lamentations about being CEO are equally applicable to her status as Stark’s girlfriend. It is noteworthy that Potts’s monologue draws attention to her body as being incapable of managing the stresses posed by being both a worker for Stark’s company and his romantic partner. Negra has discussed how the post-­Recession accounts of successful businesswomen refer to the state of their feminine bodies in their quests for professional success within the masculine world of entrepreneurial business. The successful businesswoman, Negra notes, is ‘someone who in her quest to womanhood learns to prevail over her challenging biology’, leading to ‘[s]trong elements of biological essentialism, body consciousness and physically oriented personal disclosure’ playing a large role in discursive conceptualisations of these women (Negra 2014: 282). It is therefore significant that what follows is a physical embrace. The two then bicker in between kissing, symbolically restoring the status quo, and ultimately granting Stark the absolute authority when he jokingly remarks, ‘How are you gonna resign if I don’t accept?’ The scene thus renders Potts once again under the power of Stark. It also positions Potts as a character who must bear the burden of what life as a superhero girlfriend/­CEO of her boyfriend’s company throws at her, which is packaged within postfeminist rhetoric that naturalises a normative heterosexual dynamic, a topic I return to in Chapter 8 of this book. Furthermore, when considering Pepper Potts, further gendered discourses around working women surface. Potts’s representation as

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a working woman differs from many contemporary representations of similar characters. Potts is indeed coded as a ‘corporate being’ (Brewis 1998: 91), if only through the act of omission, as Potts is never shown doing anything privately, by herself or with friends, and never refers to wider family ties. But unlike other working woman characters discussed by Joanna Brewis, who are often vilified both narratively and cinematically, Potts’s devotion to and professionalism at her job do not morally align her with malevolence. She is neither a power-­hungry ‘career bitch’ nor a manipulative competitor to the men who work at Stark Industries. This is indicative of a cultural shift that is more embracing towards particular modes of female professional conduct. The fact that Potts is never shown having a private life and is only ever concerned with work immediately evokes discourses surrounding the choice that women must, according to mainstream media, make between having a job and having a family (the impossible task of ‘having it all’). This is a dilemma that, according to Miriam B. Peskowitz, has been articulated in the media so many times that ‘these phrases seem passé, yesterday’s news’ (Peskowitz 2005: 67). Indeed, the topic is circumnavigated in the films by the fact that Stark becomes both Potts’s lover and her work. Potts does not need to choose because the options are the same. In this sense, Potts embodies the postfeminist endeavour of ‘having it all’ (Negra 2009b: 29)­– ­a job, financial security and a man­– ­while also presenting a situation in which a working woman has literally nothing apart from her job/­boss/­lover. The affective labour Potts invests into these activities blurs the boundaries between the personal and professional. When Potts returns in Iron Man 3, she no longer nags Stark about the company and seems to have adjusted to life as a CEO, a change that is marked in her clothing as she now wears a bright white power suit with shoulder pads, as opposed to the black or grey she wore as an employee. Before the release of the film, Potts’s role was highlighted by President of Marvel Studios, Kevin Feige, as offering a subversion of traditional representations of women in superhero films. He stated that in Iron Man 3: We play with the convention of the damsel in distress. We are bored by the damsel in distress. But, sometimes we need our hero to be desperate enough in fighting for something other than just his own life. So, there is fun to be had with ‘Is Pepper in danger or is Pepper the savior?’ over the course of this movie. (Feige in Bryson 2013)

Feige’s comments draw attention to particular issues, the most obvious of which is the seeming embrace of an anticipated feminist critique of damsel roles, as is emblematic of postfeminist culture. Further, his reference to the supposed role reversal dynamics in the film is simplistic, ignoring

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pe p p e r p o t t s a nd gwe n s t a c y 55 the subtleties and myriad discourses surrounding the topic of women in superhero films. There is the danger that, when engaging with narratives that simply reverse the traditional roles of men and women, gender norms are reinforced rather than transgressed, a topic I return to in Chapter 7 when considering representations of gender fluidity and transgression in non-­human superheroic Marvel characters. Furthermore, as the following discussion of Iron Man 3 suggests, there is much more at stake than merely the question ‘Is Pepper in danger or is Pepper the savior?’ In Iron Man 3, Potts is once again positioned as needing protecting, a claim that is explicitly made by Stark when he states ‘Threat is imminent and I have to protect the one thing that I can’t live without . . . That’s you’, referring to Potts. Stark, who is having a crisis brought on by traumatic events he experienced in The Avengers, neglects Potts in favour of experimenting with his Iron Man suits throughout the film, to the frustration of Potts. This is indicated by several scenes, for example when Stark sets his remote-­controlled suit up to greet her when she returns home from work, and when he purchases a tasteless twelve-­foot plush rabbit as a Christmas present for her. Stark’s crisis is localised onto Potts, and his sense of protectiveness is illustrated by a scene in which Stark’s mansion is attacked by a terrorist, the Mandarin (Ben Kingsley), who was working under instruction of Killian Aldrich (Guy Peirce), a scientist who wants to use Stark for his knowledge to perfect his flawed regenerative treatment procedure, Extremis. As the house explodes, there is a slow-­motion shot of Stark being blown through the air, gesturing for the remote armour to come forth, followed by slow-­motion shots of Potts as the armour envelops her body. The slow motion here highlights the quick reflex response that Stark has to protect Potts from harm. On the other hand, Stark provides Potts with the tools to protect herself, as well as Stark. The following scene features Stark on the ground as the ceiling above him crumbles. A medium-­long shot shows Potts leaning over Stark, protecting him from the falling debris. Potts’s Iron (Wo)Man mask slides up and she says ‘I got you’, to which he responds ‘I got you first’, again drawing the focus back to Stark. The brief scene in which Potts wears the Iron Man armour represents the role reversal referred to by Feige. The brevity of the scene indicates that this was a temporary fix for a drastic situation, a phenomenon that returns in the final act of the film. The shots that follow are of the armour returning to Stark, a momentous occasion similar to Peter Parker’s reclaiming of the Spider-­Man suit in Spider-­Man 3, discussed in the previous chapter. An ostentatious show is made of the various parts of the suit attaching themselves to Stark, for example, a close-­up of his arm

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receiving the armour followed by a close-­up of his face looking directly into the camera as the faceplate glides into place, all accompanied by a familiar heroic musical score. A medium-­long shot of the suit from below shows him rising through the dust and rubble, his eyes and the reactor on his chest glowing. These shots, juxtaposed with Potts’s haphazard exit from the suit moments before, suggest that Potts was borrowing the suit, that it was forced upon her by Stark so that she could use it as a defensive tool, rather than in its intended way­ – ­the way in which Stark uses it in the following shots. When Potts is kidnapped by Aldrich, the film seems to be playing the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative again, with Aldrich portrayed as a sadist who wants to harm Stark via Potts. With Stark shackled in a makeshift laboratory to an upturned bedframe, Aldrich states, ‘I wanted to repay you the self-­same gift that you so graciously imparted to me . . . desperation.’ This is accompanied by his conjuring of a hologram showing Potts being forced to receive the Extremis treatment, which, as Aldrich notes, could cause her to spontaneously combust. During the climactic battle scene, which takes place at a dockyard, Potts, much like Watson, is suspended from a moving platform upside down, while Stark chases after her without any armour. Unable to reach Potts, Stark shouts ‘You gotta let go! I’ll catch you, I promise!’ but the platform jerks forward and Potts is pushed off, falling into the burning structure below. Again, like Watson and Gwen Stacy had been shown in previous Spider-­Man films (and, as will be discussed, Stacy in The Amazing Spider-­Man 2), Potts is shot from above, falling backwards down into the flames, screaming. But unlike Spider-­Man, Stark is unable to catch her, without his armour. After Stark seemingly defeats Aldrich by summoning a number of Iron Man suits, Aldrich re-­emerges out of the flames. He is then knocked out of the shot by a long object, the camera panning to the left to reveal a perhaps unexpected sight­– ­Potts, glowing from the Extremis treatment and holding a metal beam in her arms, another instance of the superhero girlfriend appearing with an improvised weapon in a nick of time to help the hero out of a tight spot. As Killian gets up, another Iron Man suit approaches, which has been programmed to target people infected with Extremis, including Potts. Potts is shown jumping in the air and elaborately kicking the suit to pieces, landing in a crouching stance similar to that used by Stark when using the Iron Man suit (for example, when he lands at a weapons exhibition in Iron Man 2; see Figures 2.1 and 2.2). The dutch angle indicates that the situation is off-­balance; her arm impales the suit and she looks fiercely, almost inhumanly, at Stark off-­camera, who

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Figure 2.1  Iron Man’s signature landing stance as demonstrated in Iron Man 2.

Figure 2.2  Pepper Potts emulating the Iron Man landing while infected by Extremis in Iron Man 3.

is then shown speechless in close-­up. Potts then forcefully removes her arm from the suit, places the suit’s gauntlet on her hand, spins around and kicks Killian, finally defeating him by using the gauntlet’s repulsor ray. Still wearing the black sports bra and leggings she wore during the Extremis treatment, as well as being drenched in sweat, Potts appears to be objectified during these scenes. However, the vulnerability that her lack of clothing may signify corresponds with Stark’s powerlessness without his Iron Man suit. Like Potts, Stark is naked without the armour, and once again the film presents Stark’s problems as localised onto Potts’s body. Additionally, the narrative of the film offered Potts a personal reason as to why she defeats Aldrich. During an earlier scene, Aldrich speaks to Potts about his motivations, telling her that her kidnap was not merely to entice Stark to agree to work with him. Potts is strapped into the machine as Aldrich steps closer to her in a long shot, encroaching on her space.

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He laughs in close-­up, ‘You’re here as my, um ...’ It cuts to a close-­up of Potts finishing his sentence, ‘Trophy.’ He grins and nods while Potts bites her lip and turns her head away from him, signalling the threat of the situation. Aldrich is a different kind of villain who, instead of merely using the superhero girlfriend as bait for the hero, gains pleasure out of owning her. This works in conjunction with the final showdown of the film, in which Potts is the one to defeat Aldrich. Rather than fighting him on behalf of Stark, Aldrich’s villainous behaviour makes Potts’s fight personal. However, it is noteworthy that Potts is never shown actively using her new Extremis powers, unlike the Extremis soldiers that Aldrich employs, who have heat-­and fire-­based abilities. It is also implied that Potts is depowered by the end of the film, with Stark’s voice-­over narration informing us that he ‘got Potts sorted out, took some tinkering’, signalling the ephemeral qualities of the superhero girlfriend imbued with unnatural power. With regards to Potts’s characterisation and the relationship depicted between the character and Tony Stark, postfeminist sentiments again resurface. Similarly, as my discussion of Iron Man 3 suggests, there are many intricate discourses at work in films that supposedly enforce role reversal upon their male and female characters. Indeed, superhero girlfriends and heroics are thematically at odds with each other, as is also the case in the Spider-­Man films discussed, while there is also the contentious issue of whether or not such characters should have to either be girlfriends or have powers. As mentioned, Feige’s allusions to role reversal in Iron Man 3 still function within discourses that dictate that it is impossible for a non-­powered girlfriend character to be particularly powerful.

The Amazing Gwen Stacy The Amazing Spider-­Man rebooted the Spider-­Man franchise, retelling the origin of the titular hero, and drawing from a series of books taking place in an alternate Marvel universe (the ‘Ultimate Universe’) while maintaining the core elements of the much-­loved character. The film focuses on hero Peter Parker’s teenage angst and feelings of paternal abandonment while he deals with the acquisition of spider-­powers, the death of Uncle Ben (caused by his own irresponsible actions), stopping Dr Curt Connors (a scientist who turns into a giant lizard) and his feelings for Gwen Stacy, whose significance in Marvel history I discussed in Chapter 1. During the film, Stacy is portrayed as smart and resourceful, while her status as Parker’s girlfriend does not necessarily diminish these quali-

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pe p p e r p o t t s a nd gwe n s t a c y 59 ties, a phenomenon that contradicts representations of some of the other superhero girlfriends examined in this book. Similarly, Stacy’s cunning and cleverness are not influenced by Parker giving her orders, nor does she work for him, as is the case of Pepper Potts in Iron Man. Most importantly, the torment of Parker’s romantic struggle is not the core focus of the film, as is the case in the previous Spider-­Man films, in which Parker’s romantic conquests were the source of a great deal of trouble, both personally and heroically. Rather, Stacy becomes a confidante to Parker after he awkwardly tells her that he is Spider-­Man and she arguably becomes the backbone of the film itself. Stacy is introduced in a similar way to Watson’s early scenes in Spider-­ Man. Parker (Andrew Garfield) sees Stacy (Emma Stone) from afar outside school, sitting on a bench and reading Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle (1998). The cut to Parker’s camera’s point-­of-­view shot gazing at her is instantly recognisable from the earlier films (see Figures 2.3, 2.4 and 2.5), with subtle differences that help to distinguish the characters. In Spider-­Man, Watson embodied the passive object of the heterosexual male gaze through being offered as a model, posing for the camera. Stacy, on the other hand, is oblivious to Parker’s ethically questionable photoshoot thereby making her the voyeuristic object of Parker’s gaze. In comparison to Watson’s posing and concerns about appearing ugly, there is an understated quality to Stacy’s to-­be-­looked-­at-­ness that corresponds more to Stone’s down-­to-­earth star qualities. The scene nonetheless simultaneously draws attention to Stacy and Watson’s similarities in being Parker’s

Figure 2.3  Mary Jane Watson poses for Peter Parker’s camera in a point-of-view shot in Spider-Man.

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Figure 2.4  Gwen Stacy is photographed in Spider-Man 3.

Figure 2.5  Peter Parker secretly photographs Gwen Stacy from afar in The Amazing Spider-Man.

girlfriends, albeit in some ways misleading for Stacy, given the more active role she inhabits in the film. Indeed, Stacy’s intelligence is a central feature of the character­– i­t is quite often mentioned that she is the top of her class at Midtown Science High School and head intern for esteemed genetic biologist Dr Connors­– ­and provides her with the ability to play a large role in helping defeat the Lizard without superpowers or, indeed, supervision. Stacy is also never directly targeted by the Lizard, instead is represented as involving herself in the action of her own accord. Her admiration for Spider-­Man, which in this case is not distinct from her admiration for Parker, is rendered less ostentatiously than Watson’s in Raimi’s Spider-­Man. This is not to say that Stacy’s feelings for Parker are never shown on screen. Indeed, when the couple shares several tender moments, the film signifies these emotions, utilising close-­ups of facial expressions and soft classical non-­ diegetic music. Regarding Stacy’s doomed fate, the film often hints that

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pe p p e r p o t t s a nd gwe n s t a c y 61 Stacy will die but instead offers deliberately misleading moments. Thus, the film is ironically deceptive in showing Stacy telling herself ‘I’m in trouble’ after having discovered that Parker is Spider-­Man. The most relevant scene in the film for this discussion is the showdown between Spider-­Man and the Lizard, which also features significant self-­ reflexive moments invoking Stacy’s death. When the Lizard searches for Spider-­Man at the high school, Parker must take him on while ensuring that Stacy is safe. The process of this is, however, more balanced than in previous representations. Spider-­Man is at one point made powerless when the Lizard, who is more than double the size of Parker, smashes him against a window and begins squeezing his head in his hand. The shot cuts to Stacy, who was previously told by Parker to leave the school, swinging a large trophy, then cuts to the trophy hitting the Lizard over the head. This is followed by a medium-­long shot of Stacy holding the trophy up, signifying her victory, as the Lizard turns around to face her. She walks backwards and the camera rises to the height of the Lizard, stooping over her, showcasing the Lizard’s size and highlighting the boldness of Stacy’s intervention. Spider-­Man then has the opportunity to cocoon the Lizard in his web. The scene incorporates the by-­now-­familiar motif of the unexpected physical aid of the superhero girlfriend in a moment when the hero has become incapacitated. The scene is also coupled with a misleading moment that seems to forecast Stacy’s death as Parker takes her in his arms and warns her that he is going to throw her out of the window. An exterior shot shows Stacy flying backwards through the air before a shot of web is slung at her, preventing her from falling and causing her to spring back forcefully. An aerial shot shows her terrified face but confirms that Parker’s web-­ slinging did not actually kill her (at least for now). She swings back and forth underneath the suspended part of the building (reminiscent of a bridge), smiling. Had the film featured Stacy’s death in the web-­slinging scene instead of a light-­hearted moment in which Parker gets her to safety through rather ruthless means, it could well have been read as a narrative punishment for her agency. However, the web-­slinging scene defies such expectations and the juxtaposition of one much-­used narrative moment (girlfriend arrives in a nick of time to momentarily aid the hero) with another, which is then subverted (Stacy’s death-­by-­webbing) makes for a unique dynamic that is perhaps symptomatic of Stacy’s distinctiveness as a whole. After the Lizard escapes the school through the sewers, Spider-­Man follows him while phoning Stacy for aid, asking whether she could go to Connors’s workplace and produce a serum that will cure Connors.

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Following a scene in which the Lizard releases a gas that also turns innocent bystanders into lizards, the scene cuts to Stacy in Connors’s laboratory, privileging her action over any further scenes involving Spider-­Man and the Lizard. Parker, having discovered that the Lizard is on his way to the building to retrieve a machine that he will use to release a cloud of lizard chemical above the city, phones Stacy in the lab and warns her that the Lizard is on his way. Stacy tells Parker that the antidote is not yet ready, but Parker tells her to get out of the building anyway. A shot of the antidote timer indicates that eight minutes are remaining as the sense of tension and danger for Stacy mounts. Parker even says to her, ‘You leave right now. That’s an order, okay?’ but Stacy actively denies his request. The Lizard eventually breaks through the emergency barriers Stacy had put into motion. Following this, the film offers more misdirection, as Stacy hides in a storage cupboard when the Lizard is approaching, protectively holding the canister that contains the lizard chemical. The scene uses close-­ups of Stacy’s terrified face in the dark cupboard intercut with the lizard sniffing her out to build tension, tilting up her frozen body, shadows of the blinds adding a Gothic horror atmosphere to the scene. Her head is raised and her eyes closed in fear, a shot accompanied by the sounds of the Lizard’s frenzied efforts to find her. The camera zooms into her face, her lips quivering, highlighting her terror. It cuts to a shot of the Lizard appearing behind the blind, and Stacy screaming in close-­up as he rips through the blind with his hand. By all means, this could be the end for Stacy, whose horror is illustrated throughout the scene. But Stacy is next shown using a spray can filled with a flammable liquid combined with a lighter as a blowtorch, firing towards him. The reverse shot shows the lizard shielding himself from the flame with this hand and, with the other, reaching over to Stacy and merely grabbing the canister before backing off. Stacy emits a sigh of relief before edging out of the cupboard as the antidote machine signals that the antidote is complete. Once again, the film appeared to be fruitlessly gesturing towards Stacy’s death. Stacy’s character history calls for an analysis framed by discourses of death and the imperilment of victimised women. Indeed, throughout this discussion, it has been difficult to make sense of the character through other terms. In The Amazing Spider-­Man, Stacy’s character effectively combines heroic traits such as resourcefulness with the character type of the superhero girlfriend in a way that provides the character significantly more flexibility than do previous iterations. While the film does incorporate frequently used elements that are associated with the superhero girlfriend, such as the unexpected battle intervention, the film refers to and then subverts Stacy’s famous death storyline. Though Stacy does not

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pe p p e r p o t t s a nd gwe n s t a c y 63 occupy as much screen space as Parker, her presence in the film is arguably vital and, importantly, the scenes in which she appears to go beyond emotional moments with Parker and scenes of victimisation. The heightened sense of tenderness in emotional scenes suggests that the film was more geared towards women, particularly in the light of the power of female audiences demonstrated by the Twilight series. Indeed, Sony Pictures’ Chairman of Marketing and Distribution stated that the promotions tied to the film were, per default, targeted at men and boys, as well as ‘younger women and moms’ (Graser 2012), while the President of Worldwide Distribution for Sony claimed that ‘This is a film that has something for women’ (Grover and Richwine 2012). Arguably these developments correspond with Stacy’s transgressive representation, although it must be noted that the manifestation of this increased awareness of the female audience by distribution and marketing staff may not have been as pronounced as these sources suggest. Indeed, it was reported that the film’s ‘core audience is still men’, despite the various feminine product tie-­ins such as make-­up (Graser 2012). Indeed, there is little difference in terms of the sheer volume of romance scenes between The Amazing Spider-­ Man and Raimi’s Spider-­Man films. Spider-­Man as a character has always depended on a heightened emotional sensibility. What is different in The Amazing Spider-­Man is not the amount of emotional content present, but how the film utilises that emotional content: namely, while Raimi’s films use the hero’s romantic interest as a supplementary plot device, while The Amazing Spider-­Man presents the relationship as its own subplot. Thus, The Amazing Spider-­Man is not necessarily particularly groundbreaking in its audience address or consideration of female audiences, although it is noteworthy that it was characterised in the popular media as such; it does, however, offer a more malleable understanding of what a superhero girlfriend can do within a narrative, while still including a character who is a staple of the genre. Further to her portrayal in the 2012 film, Gwen Stacy’s death was included in The Amazing Spider-­Man 2. The scene is initiated after a showdown between the new Green Goblin, Harry Osborn (Dane DeHaan), and Spider-­Man on the rooftop of Oscorp, the company owned by Norman Osborn. As Harry levitates on his Glider, he faces Spider-­Man, then turns to look at Stacy, who had been at the scene due to her involvement in dealing with the film’s other villain, Electro (Jamie Foxx), by once again utilising her scientific expertise. Her death is foreshadowed through costuming­– s­ he is dressed in a nigh-­exact replica of the clothing drawn upon the character in the comic books. Harry cackles and says to Spider-­ Man, ‘You don’t give people hope­– y­ ou take it away. I’m gonna take away

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yours’, as he turns on his Glider and swoops over to Stacy, carrying her into the night. The scene is predictable in its adherence to the women-­in-­ refrigerators narrative, and in particular through its characterisation of Stacy as being symbolic of more than merely a character type­– h ­ ere, she is symbolic of hope, heralding a darker narrative tone. The forceful removal of this symbol thus has ideological ramifications for the film. Spider-­Man pursues Harry Osborn to a clock tower, in which a dramatic fight and Stacy’s ultimate death occur. Stacy, having temporarily reached safety, is pushed from her perch on a large cog and suspended by one arm with a strand of Spider-­Man’s web. The tension of the scene is marked by the complex configuration of characters within the inner workings of the clock, indicating that time is running out for Stacy. Spider-­Man lies on one cog on his back, with one fist clenched around the web suspending Stacy, while Osborn is over Spider-­Man, though he has been bound around the neck by webbing. Meanwhile, Spider-­Man must prevent the cogs from turning or else the strand of web on which Stacy hangs will snap. This he is unable to do, as the intercut shots of the individual parts of the clock moving­– ­cogs and the minute hand­– ­indicate, followed by the snapping of the web in slow motion, and Stacy gasping as she begins to fall (Figure 2.6). Osborn is knocked over by the collapse of the cogs, while Spider-­Man jumps after Stacy. The slow motion of the scene showcases the workings of Spider-­Man’s web fluid, which he shoots towards Stacy, although the technological ingenuity of Spider-­Man’s webs is insufficient to bring her to safety. In a close-­up the strands of web expand, reaching out like a hand. The film reverts to normal speed and cuts to the web hitting Stacy’s abdomen, followed by a shot of Spider-­Man clinging to a beam, then by a shot of the web strand becoming taut, and finally, a shot of Stacy forcefully

Figure 2.6  Gwen Stacy falls to her death in The Amazing Spider-Man 2.

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pe p p e r p o t t s a nd gwe n s t a c y 65 recoiling. Her head appears to hit the ground, an action supported by a loud, diegetic thump, suggesting that she died from the impact. This is interesting since it lessens Parker’s role in causing her death with his web; instead, he is more indirectly responsible through not responding quickly enough and shooting the web earlier. Indeed, Marvel Studios founder, Avi Arad, is quoted stating that: The cause of death here is love, commitment, personal choice. It wouldn’t be fair to put it all on him and for a lifetime have him think ‘If I didn’t try to save her, maybe she would have survived?’ (Arad quoted in Madison 2014)

This statement is revealing in the light of scenes occurring before Stacy’s death, in which Stacy, much like Watson at the end of Spider-­Man 2, asserts her personal freedom regarding her involvement in Parker’s heroics. Before the battle with Electro (and her subsequent kidnapping by Harry), Stacy had aided Parker by again offering her scientific expertise when he realised that his web-­shooters were useless against Electro, who has the power to control electricity. Stacy created a magnetised web shooter for Parker and was ready to join him in battle, but Parker disallows this and sticks her hand to a nearby car with his web. Stacy appears before the battle, having driven in a police car to the power station where Parker located Electro and again helping the hero by crashing the car into Electro, buying Parker some time. Incensed that Stacy would follow him, Parker, as Spider-­Man, yells at Stacy while Stacy laments to him that she can be of help. This culminates in Stacy forcefully stating, ‘Okay, guess what? Nobody makes my decisions for me! Alright? Nobody! This is my choice, okay? My choice. Mine.’ Spider-­Man groans as Stacy asks how they could stop Electro, finally giving in to Stacy’s ‘choice’. Taking into consideration Arad’s statement, as well as the scene’s foregrounding of Stacy’s choice, alongside issues of postfeminist culture’s choice rhetoric outlined previously in this book, the film’s inclusion of the famous death is further problematised. The Amazing Spider-­Man celebrates the rhetoric of choice that allows Stacy to actively place herself in narrative danger (in turn overcoming it while complexifying the existing tropes that place women in such roles). The Amazing Spider-­Man 2, however, indicates how notions of choice, though celebrated, carry with them the burden of essentially choosing to die. Postfeminist individualism therefore places the responsibility of Stacy’s death on Stacy herself, particularly when considering Arad’s insistence that ‘personal choice’ is the cause of death here. In a sense then, the very machinations of ‘women in refrigerators’ become ensconced by the discourses of choice present in The Amazing Spider-­Man 2, which stress the individual decision made by the

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superhero girlfriend to become involved in the fight, rather than having her be kidnapped or held against her will. Reference is made to notions of agency, while gender hierarchies remain in place. As such, Stacy’s death can be read as punishment for her previous transgressions, while also having a complex relationship with postfeminist discourses of choice and women’s self-­fulfilment. Equally of note is the scene’s discursive framing as ‘inevitable’. The film’s executive producer Matt Tomalch stated that Stacy’s victimisation was necessary in order to raise the stakes for Parker’s character, claiming, ‘That’s what makes for a great story . . . What’s real tragedy? It’s not when something happens to somebody you don’t care about. So you have to step up to the challenge and be comfortable with the risk’ (Tomalch quoted in Wigler 2014). He continues that: When you decide that you’re going to tell the Gwen Stacy story, you know you’re going to end up there. You just try to put it off for a little while, because you don’t want to lose Emma [Stone]. You don’t want to lose Gwen. You don’t want to lose that dynamic . . . But these movies are all about Peter Parker and his journey in life and as Spider-­Man. (Tomalch quoted in Wigler 2014)

Spider-­Man actor Andrew Garfield similarly claimed that it ‘would have been strange’ not to include Stacy’s death within her narrative (Garfield quoted in Wigler 2014). As discussed in the previous chapter, the focus is brought back onto the tragedy of the male hero in these discourses, while the cultural implications of these women’s narrative deaths are not invoked. There is nothing about Stacy’s death that is intrinsically necessary or unavoidable within this narrative­– ­it is, of course, constructed in particular ways, written and created by people who make creative choices with regards to how the film portrays these scenes. And yet, Stacy’s death was included in The Amazing Spider-­Man 2 supposedly as a narrative necessity. It is noteworthy that both the Iron Man and The Amazing Spider-­Man films demonstrably capitalise on the star qualities of the actresses cast in these particular girlfriend roles in ways that clearly depend on their place within postfeminist culture. Gwyneth Paltrow has been defined as a ‘twenty-­first century “It Girl” ’ who combines elements of traditional Hollywood glamour with a dedication to honing her acting skill (Hollinger 2006: 218), again unifying elements of hegemonic femininity with professional success, and, crucially, idealised whiteness (Graefer 2014: 110–13). As Anne Graefer notes, Paltrow has been the subject of media ridicule due to her attempts to distance herself from the privileges afforded her through her race/­class status (Graefer 2014: 110–13). Similar ridicule

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pe p p e r p o t t s a nd gwe n s t a c y 67 has been directed at Paltrow’s women’s lifestyle brand, goop.com, which recently redressed its focus from postfeminist self-­monitoring practices of dieting and beauty regimes to practices more broadly encompassed by terms such as ‘wellness’ and ‘self-­care’. Through the selling of women’s bodily maintenance products through goop.com, Paltrow can be seen to ‘further intertwine her celebrity image with health-­conscious embodiment’ (Kjær 2019: 705). Meanwhile, Emma Stone is characterised through her ‘relatable’, down-­ to-­earth image, wit and classical physical appeal. As Betty Kaklamanidou notes in her exploration of Stone’s celebrity, ‘Stone initially established the persona of a funny, capable and quick-­witted young woman’ (Kaklamanidou 2018: 11) before embodying an ‘idealized 21st century Hollywood star: clean-­cut, talented, humble, environmentally and socially conscious, funny, appealing and . . . bankable’ (Kaklamanidou 2018: 13). Both actresses’ star personae resonate with the demands of contemporary postfeminist celebrity, particularly concerning practices of self-­monitoring and affectation. Paradoxically, though, this type of sharp-­minded female character also harks back to screwball and romantic comedies of the 1930s and 1940s. Maria DiBattista defines the ‘fast-­talking dame’ as an American phenomenon that existed as a result of the introduction of sound to cinema (DiBattista 2001: 6–7). She continues that these romantic and screwball comedies ‘rejoice in the giddy energy of human speech, in invective, in repartee, in drop-­dead one-­liners, and reserve their highest delights­– ­and kudos­– ­for those most adept at verbal sparring’ (DiBattista 2001: 16). The on-­screen display of Potts and Stark’s relationship relies heavily on comical bickering, reaching back to these classical representations of heterosexual union. Potts is therefore at once vintage and undeniably modern, which is symptomatic of the very inconsistency of postfeminist culture itself. This bickering is likewise a presence in The Amazing Spider-­Man 2, particularly when Parker and Stacy disagree about her involvement in his crime-­fighting. It is imperative, however, not to write these characters off as merely poor representation. While many of these portrayals are indeed limiting, an interrogation into their cultural history and deeper analysis of their cinematic construction can provide valuable insights into notions of gender within a cultural consciousness.

C HA PT E R 3

With Great Power Comes Great Frustration? Configurations of Hero(ine)ism in Marvel Films

An analysis of superheroic Marvel women in film reveals a complex negotiation of physical power is often at work in these films. A major element in the representation of tough female characters in contemporary action cinema is the incorporation of postfeminist discourses. Likewise, scholars have noted the confining nature of representations of female action heroism, claiming that these films frequently limit the power of heroines as compensation for their toughness (Tasker 1993: 19; Inness 1998: 19; Purse 2011: 79–82). There has been a widespread increase in female heroes in contemporary Hollywood films, due in part to the coming forward of supposedly empowered women in the media, and ‘the economic advances of women and a revised view of “womanhood” in recent decades’ (Waites 2008: 207), as well as Hollywood trends reinvigorating action and fantasy adventure conventions through the superhero genre. These characters do not exist in a vacuum, and postfeminist culture has implications when considering its particular conceptualisations of ‘womanhood’. Many representations of filmic Marvel women reach to frustration tactics brought on by anxieties regarding female empowerment in a patriarchal culture. Notably, these Marvel films offer a vision of feminine heroism infused with sexualisation, frustration and irony, which takes the shape of a distinctively white, heterosexual female subjectivity apparently liberated from political struggles or the need to consider the social ramifications of her actions.

Superheroines and Postfeminist Media Culture With a history that spans over fifty years, challenges arise when considering which aspects of Marvel characters are adaptable in the postfeminist era. Madrid notes that in the past superheroines were portrayed as weaker than their male counterparts (Madrid 2009: 57). This is demonstrated, for example, by the cover of X-­Men #1, published in 1963, which features

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with g rea t p o we r c o me s gr e a t f r u s t r a t i o n ? 69 four superpowered mutants facing off against Magneto, ‘earth’s most powerful super villain!!’ who has powers of magnetism (Lee and Kirby 1963). The only character not joining in the fight is a lone young woman lingering in the background. Jean Grey was the only female character on the team of X-­‘Men’ and her introduction on this cover is indicative of the limitations faced by women in a patriarchal society at the time­– ­men carried out protective labour while women cowered in the background. Another heavily relied-­on characteristic of superheroines in comics is the notion that they cannot adequately control their powers (Madrid 2009: 232) and that they are likely to lose their sanity and become evil (Madrid 2009: 231–2). These themes are discussed in more detail in Chapter 6 of this book. Both superheroes and superheroines wear skin-­tight costumes and bear enhanced signifiers of gendered physicality, such as muscles or breasts. Indeed, Scott Bukatman maintains that comic books relish a distinctive form of unapologetic objectification of its subjects (Bukatman 2003: 65). A crucial distinction lies in the differences between the sexualisation of male and female bodies and what kinds of sexualisation are considered culturally acceptable in different contexts. As Richard Dyer notes in his assessment of the male pin-­up, the emphasis on muscles on the objectified male body draws attention to the cultural idea of ‘the body’s potential for action’, underpinned by hegemonic masculinity (Dyer 2002: 129). This is not necessarily present in female pin-­ups; indeed, female pin-­ups occupy a distinctive discursive space in relation to their subjugated positioning within a patriarchal society. This is arguably another incarnation of Mulvey’s active/­passive divide, with masculine signifiers negating the feminising potential of objectification in the sexualised man. Superhero costuming remains a contentious issue within both film and comics. However, there is also the risk of overemphasising questions around sex appeal and power when considering these characters­ – ­some comics have knowingly addressed the potential of costumes for the exploration of erotic and fetish themes via superhero narratives (see, for example, DC’s Watchmen). As noted throughout this book, singular readings of superheroes (and their costuming) are rarely helpful. Yet, superhero costumes are invariably bound to the identity of the superhero­ – ­signifying a character’s powers and moral alignment, for instance­– ­and are, hence, gendered. Reynolds notes that in the 1960s comics, Janet Van Dyne (The Wasp) was constructed and represented in ways that signified the character’s status as a socialite and fashion designer through the use of myriad fashion ensembles, and since Janet did not have a secret identity, ‘the frequent changes of costume successfully blur the boundaries

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between fashion designer and superheroine’ (Reynolds 1992: 29). This marks an early attempt at reconciling the heroic and the feminine via fashion iconography. More recent Marvel comics that received criticism from media commentators opposing gratuitous objectification of women in comics include Milo Manara’s variant cover for Spider-­Woman #1 (Hopeless and Land 2014), which featured the character sprawled out on top of a building, her backside the focus of the image. Likewise, J. Scott Campbell’s variant cover of Invincible Iron Man #1 (Bendis and Caselli 2017a), which featured a newly launched heroine, RiRi Williams, was eventually pulled from circulation due to what critics characterised as inappropriate sexualisation of a teenager. Debates around Williams’s portrayal underlined the critical tensions in women’s sexualisation and race representation, as Williams is one of Marvel’s more recent black superheroines. These covers were singled out by Michael Goodrum, Tara Prescott and Philip Smith as indicative of the convoluted political terrain occupied by Marvel’s superheroes and coincided with the overt insertion of feminist commentary by female comic book writers in their publications, such as Mockingbird #1, which featured its central character in a T-­shirt reading ‘ask me about my feminist agenda’ (Goodrum at al. 2018: 9). Despite this, it appears that what is overwhelmingly showcased on contemporary Marvel comic book covers more recently is power, violence and physicality, regardless of the characters’ gender. The gendered differences in these representations became so undeniable that an online project sought to draw attention to these differences by encouraging users to submit their own drawings of Marvel hero Clint Barton (Hawkeye) in poses usually used to represent female characters, with jolting results (Scott 2015). That comic books have been aimed at heterosexual men has explained the prevalence of objectified women within these texts (Pustz 2000: 101), another parallel between comics and mainstream film. Indeed, the sexualisation of women in comics reached its peak with the so-­called ‘Bad Girl’ art style that was hugely popular in the 1990s and took the already exaggerated comic book art styles to ridiculous extremes. Brown recalls that ‘in a blatant attempt to attract the attention of the mostly male adolescent comics consumer, publishers flooded the shelves with titles featuring leggy and buxom superheroines in revealing, skin-­tight costumes’ (Brown 2011a: 53). However, echoing Gill and Orgad’s recent comments over developments in postfeminist culture, it is perhaps simplistic to dedicate too much attention to sexualisation in portrayals of women in superhero comics. Rather, Gill and Orgad suggest, critical focus should turn to the role of power and inequality within media (and society), emphasising:

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with g rea t p o we r c o me s gr e a t f r u s t r a t i o n ? 71 the need to challenge sexism (and racism, classism, disablism, heterosexism, etc.) rather than ‘sexualization’ per se. This means having a political rather than a moral sensibility about sex. It is to be concerned with power, consent and justice rather than exposure of flesh. (Gill and Orgad 2018: 1317)

Postfeminist discourses have penetrated comic books just as they have other media. As Madrid puts it, ‘Compared to men, comic book superheroines may have been shortchanged in the power department, but these women had a secret weapon that has kept them in the game for the past sixty years­– ­sex appeal’ (Madrid 2009: 299). What Madrid fails to note is that this focus on sex appeal as power makes use of postfeminist sentiments taking for granted that women are empowered in accordance with patriarchal ideals, and ignore the struggles of women who are yet to reach that level, especially those often rendered invisible by postfeminist culture (queer women, women of colour, disabled women, working-class women, etc.). Thus, the celebration of sex appeal as a source of power can be read as removed from political implications regarding the power dynamics behind the objectification of women in Western culture. Further related to the topic of the feminised body and modes of gender signification in visual media are existing debates about the supposed cross-­ dressing of heroic women represented in the generically masculine domain of action-­based cinema. Since at least the debut of the masculinised action heroine Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) in Alien (Ridley Scott, 1979) and its sequel Aliens (James Cameron, 1986), scholarly and popular discourse has framed the character in terms of her portrayal as being ‘like a man’. This is in part due to her very presence at the centre of a narrative that calls for action heroism, but also because of her gender-­neutral name, and overwhelmingly, because of her muscular appearance in the latter film. This was summarised by Harvey R. Greenberg: Aliens infers that to become a competent woman one must learn to manipulate the tangible or verbal instruments of aggression, which patriarchal society formerly reserved for men alone. One must never ‘take shit’ from anyone, of any stripe. One must practice eternal vigilance against the threat of the alien ‘other’, whether to one’s prestige, possessions, or progeny. One must be ready to ‘get it on’, anywhere, anytime, against the despicable enemy. (Greenberg 1988: 171)

For critics such as Greenberg, action heroines are semiotically coded as masculine, which, in essence, makes them men, or figurative males (Hills 1999). Similar opinions have been put forward by Richard Reynolds in his brief consideration of superheroines in comics. This time, however, he imagines a hypothetical feminist criticism of these characters:

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Any feminist critic could demonstrate that most of these characters fail to inscribe specifically female qualities: they behave in battle like male heroes with thin waists and silicone breasts, and in repose are either smugly domestic . . . or brooding and remote­– ­a slightly threatening male fantasy. (Reynolds 1992: 79–80)

Given that Reynolds is not necessarily presenting his own argument but that of an imaginary feminist critic, this statement reveals more about cultural perceptions of feminists rather than action women. However, it invokes the same ideas as Greenberg­– ­that action women are not really women. This approach has subsequently been criticised by Tasker (1993: 149–50), Hills (1999) and others. Indeed, Tasker proposes the term ‘musculinity’ as a way of making sense of these characters. She argues: ‘Musculinity’ indicates the way in which the signifiers of strength are not limited to male characters. These action heroines though, are still marked as women, despite the arguments advanced by some critics that figures like Ripley are merely men in drag. (Tasker 1993: 150)

Hills likewise notes that arguments suggesting that action women are figurative males are testament to the binaristic notions of gender through which they are analysed. She continues, ‘From this perspective, active and aggressive women in the cinema can only be seen as phallic, unnatural or “figuratively male” ’ (Hills 1999: 45). Hills ultimately draws attention to the ways in which Ripley adapts to her surroundings, often using technology to modify her body, essentially questioning binaristic notions of gender. She concludes that: active heroines . . . are becoming something other than the essentialized concept of Woman held in a mutually exclusive relation to Man. Furthermore, if action heroines become empowered and even violent through their use of technology, this is not to say that they are somehow no longer ‘really’ women, but that they are intelligent and necessarily aggressive females in the context of their role as the central figures of action genre films. (Hills 1999: 46)

Indeed, from a constructionist perspective, it is not the critic’s business to declare whether anyone is really a woman or man. Further, in framing these representations in terms of drag, these authors do a disservice to drag studies, in which general arguments over the transgressiveness of cross-­dressing are discouraged (Halberstam 2005: 404). As Tasker suggests, cross-­dressing women are discursively constructed (and socially positioned) differently to cross-­dressing men. Whereas women are often considered to dress like men in order to obtain equal status, men’s dressing as women is considered more transformational and transgressive (Tasker 1998: 35). Yet, the action heroine remains fascinating because she appears

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within texts heavily associated with masculinity­ – ­these debates indicate the complex relationship they have with their cultural contexts. As such, I advocate an approach that steers away from assertions about whether or not these women can really be women, instead focusing on how postfeminist culture informs and shapes the ways in which action women are represented (related issues of gender performativity are more explicitly discussed in later Chapter 7). As noted, a large element of presenting contemporary superheroines is the apparent necessity that they appear conventionally sexually attractive while fighting crime. Richard J. Gray argues that for female superheroes, power (specifically, control over it) correlates to their levels of ‘hotness’ (Gray 2011: 83). The more control that Jean Grey wields over her powers in the X-­Men films, for example, the hotter and more sexually alluring she becomes. With regards to postfeminist culture, the women presented in such a way in these films are empowered through their sex appeal, since supposedly natural sexual differences between men and women are emphasised in postfeminist culture, while women are encouraged to monitor their own adherence to these ideals of femininity (Gill 2007). There is a vast difference, for instance, between the slender-­bodied Marvel women and the muscular, masculine action women of earlier decades. Indeed the representation of women as being powerfully sexy is part and parcel of postfeminist culture, although, in the words of Gray, these films offer male viewers ‘a “best of both worlds” scenario: they possess both the physical ass-­kicking strength and strong sex appeal that men need in order to satisfy their “scopophilic drive” ’ (Gray 2011: 81). Marc O’Day coined the term ‘action babes’, referring to action heroines who offer a ‘simultaneous re-­inscription and questioning of the binary oppositions which structure common-­sense understandings of gender in patriarchal consumer culture’ (O’Day 2004: 202). He further states that action cinema ‘doubles up’ Mulvey’s to-­be-­looked-­at-­ness, that the action heroine ‘can be seen to function simultaneously as the action subject of narrative and the erotic object of visual spectacle’ (O’Day 2004: 203). What is clear, though, is that representations that highlight feminine beauty in superheroines incorporate feminist discourses of women’s empowerment while only privileging specific configurations of that empowerment (e.g. slim, white, feminine beauty). Importantly, neither O’Day nor Gray mention the implications of the combination of white feminine beauty, sex appeal and physical power in the context of contemporary postfeminist discourses. While it may be true that these heroines are portrayed as empowered, an emphasis on sex appeal as constituting power is a factor that is generally specific to female characters. Due to the differences in

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the ways in which men and women are sexualised in Western culture, it is difficult to imagine, for example, Wolverine using his sexuality in an ‘empowering’ way. Further, it is rare for a heroic woman to actually be shown as actively sexual in conjunction with being heroic (as I discuss in the Chapter 6, women in these films who actively pursue a sexual partner or are presented as sexual aggressors tend to be evil). The sex appeal discussed by Gray and O’Day is thus sexualisation applied extradiegetically to the characters, rather than an unproblematic representation of women indulging in their sexuality as sexual agents. Thus, while postfeminist culture is interested in encouraging the self-­ objectification of women (Gill 2007: 158), it has a somewhat uncomfortable relationship with these images. It is also noteworthy that Gray shifts the focus back to what ‘men need’, recentring men (but not specifying which men) within debates about feminine subjectivities on screen. Rather, the feminine characters are caught in a bind between being the passive bearers of the look, and being active within the narrative, as is pointed out by O’Day. Still, in a culture in which representations of female empowerment are so exclusionary, these portrayals should be approached with care. The contradictions inherent in postfeminist texts in many cases result in the systematic limitation of superheroines, often through the very mechanisms that inform postfeminist culture. Tasker has, for example, suggested that ‘images of women seem to need to compensate for the figure of the active heroine by emphasising her sexuality, her availability within traditional feminine terms’ (Tasker 1993: 19). Similarly, Inness has traced the action women of a range of media throughout several decades, from the ‘pseudo-­tough’ women of Charlie’s Angels (ABC, 1976–81) to the paradoxically tough characters such as Ripley, who despite bearing signifiers of masculinity are also narratively and visually feminised (Inness 1998: 31–49, 102–19). Inness’s overarching argument is that heroism in these characters is negotiated alongside reinscriptions of traditional femininity. This bears suspicious resemblance to the idea that action women are simply pretending to be men­– ­in the sense that they are too masculine to be ideologically unthreatening, and so need to be made feminine again. However, the reliance of popular representations on these mechanisms is clear and indicative of the unease with which cultural formations of heroic femininity are accompanied. Importantly, my claims are not intended to devalue femininity itself, but rather indicate the gendered imbalance within Hollywood traditions. Indeed, this reinforcing of the traditionally feminine is itself a symptom of postfeminist discourses, as Negra suggests that

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with g rea t p o we r c o me s gr e a t f r u s t r a t i o n ? 75 postfeminism entails an aggressive (re)codification of female types. In gestures that often tout the ‘freedom’ from political correctness, postfeminist culture revives the ‘truths’ about femininity that circulated in earlier eras . . . The postfeminist twist here is that women are to apply these characterizations to others and sometimes to themselves in a display of their political and rhetorical ‘freedom’. (Negra 2009b: 10)

Furthermore, Purse posits that action films enforce ‘containment strategies’ on their female characters that limit the power of action heroines and ‘work to contain the threat embodied by the presence of the physically powerful women’ (Purse 2011: 81). Films based on Marvel comics likewise incorporate cinematic, narrative and visual mechanisms that prevent certain characters from carrying out heroic actions, while also drawing from comic book discourses of superheroic femininity, as well as providing a venue for continuous debate over sexuality and power in these representations. I use the term ‘frustration tactics’ here, though this is not to discredit Purse’s revealing analysis (which borrows the term ‘containment strategies’ from Ed Guerrero’s discussions around black masculinities; see Guerrerro 1993). The term ‘frustration tactics’ speaks to the specificities of the postfeminist mode of female superheroic representation. The word ‘frustration’ is particularly fitting, implying the prevention of a progression (in this case, female empowerment as shaped by feminist politics). However, for a progression to be prevented in the first place, ‘frustration’ connotes, the possibilities for progression must be considered legitimate. Like postfeminist culture, then, frustration tactics involve an embrace of feminist politics before quashing them, preventing them from being fulfilled or casting them off as unnecessary. This can be further differentiated from the term ‘containment strategies’ since containment, here, is suggestive of restriction or limitation. However, this alone does not fully express postfeminist culture’s reliance on the simultaneous embrace of that which it holds back. The particular postfeminist mode of gender representation is, therefore, more usefully made sense of through the metaphor of frustration. Frustration tactics form an intricate network of gendered discursive constructs, exemplifying how power is not a straightforward feature of superheroines, and that quite often the films utilise postfeminist discourses as a way to displace the difficulties that accompany portraying such characters.

With Great Power Comes Great Frustration Blade: Trinity (David S. Goyer, 2004), the third instalment of the Blade series­– ­which follows the human-­vampire hybrid vampire hunter Blade

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(Wesley Snipes)­– f­eatures a sassy female vampire hunter named Abby Whistler (Jessica Biel). Whistler fights alongside Hannibal King (Ryan Reynolds), flushing out vampires in the city, eventually joining forces with Blade to stop a contemporary re-­imagination of Dracula called Drake (Dominic Purcell). After being introduced within a conventionally postfeminist framework of masquerade (discussed in the following chapter), Whistler’s role in the film is downplayed throughout the rest of the film, limiting the threat she may pose towards binaristic notions of female weakness and male power. This is further problematised by the marginalisation of Blade in comparison to his previous films wherein Blade, a black action hero, is jettisoned in favour of two white characters, Whistler and King; and Whistler, a white woman, is in turn narratively frustrated. Indeed, Rikke Schubart suggests Whistler’s function within the film is to rework notions of femininity against the respective constructions of masculinity offered by Blade and Hannibal­– h ­ egemonic masculinity and metrosexual masculinity, contemporary at the time of the film’s release, which incorporates feminine sensitivity (and additionally involves an overt rejection of homosexuality through misogynistic and homophobic discourses) (Schubart 2007: 236). Whistler, according to Schubart, represents acceptable or ‘natural’ femininity in contrast to the villainess, Danica Talos, an aggressive vampire businesswoman (Schubart 2007: 236). These valid points notwithstanding, there is more to say about Whistler in terms of narrative and how she is cinematically constructed. While engaging in comparatively fewer action sequences than the heroes, the most striking instance of Whistler’s narrative frustration takes place in the final few scenes of the film, in which Drake is finally killed. Whistler, having overpowered one of Drake’s vampire henchman at Drake’s headquarters, looks down from a mezzanine area at Drake and Blade’s final confrontation. Whistler’s task had been to shoot Drake with a lethal poisonous arrow, but, despite her apparent skills evidenced in the rest of the film, missed. She eventually manages to hit Drake with an ordinary arrow, but it is Blade who ultimately kills him with the discarded poisonous arrow. In the context of the scene, Whistler’s moment of failure is a denial of her completing the narrative arc that ended with Drake’s death. Another means of narrative frustration occurs in Elektra, a spin-­off of Daredevil (Mark Steven Johnson, 2003), which centres on the eponymous assassin-­ turned-­ antiheroine (Jennifer Garner). As mentioned earlier, writers such as O’Day posit that action texts such as this one take for granted the fantastical skills and abilities that these heroines possess: ‘they assume that women are powerful’ (O’Day 2004: 216, original emphasis).

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with g rea t p o we r c o me s gr e a t f r u s t r a t i o n ? 77 This is mostly true, especially when powers come from uncontrollable sources or, as with the X-­Men, they are born with them. However, Purse puts forth the notion that this is not always the case, and that a point is made of Elektra having learned how to fight through her ‘fatherly mentor’ (Purse 2011: 83), providing a patriarchal authority to her abilities. In this sense, postfeminist action films enact a tension between the supposed natural, commonsensical quality of these heroines’ abilities and the need to qualify them. Taking this a step further, Elektra contains an almost obsessive necessity to justify Elektra’s abilities. Having died at the end of Daredevil, Elektra is revived and trains in an ancient martial art that offers her precognitive abilities and physical prowess. However, Elektra chooses to continue her immoral activities as an assassin. Great emphasis is placed on the ruthlessness of Elektra’s character, though only one of her jobs is ever actually portrayed on screen (this takes place in the dark, as I later unpack). After Elektra is tasked with killing a young girl and her father, she decides to help them instead. However, Elektra occupies the space of an antihero, an archetypal character type dating back to the classical era (Santas 2008: 158). Antiheroes lack qualities traditionally valued as heroic, and with such central male characters appearing in films such as American Psycho (Mary Harron, 2000), Wall Street (Oliver Stone, 1987) and Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976), as well as figures such as Rambo, Hannibal Lecter, and Marvel’s Wolverine and the Punisher, it becomes clear that the antihero is an unmistakably masculine phenomenon. Indeed, Margaret Tally argues that the antihero as a cultural phenomenon became particularly attached to American quality television, ‘understood to represent the damaged American male in the post-­Vietnam period of American history’ (Tally 2016: 5). Subsequently, the actions of the antihero were framed as justified, no matter how morally suspect, due to the need of these characters to navigate a corrupt world hostile to men (Tally 2016: 5). Tally notes that the female antihero became more widely exposed in the late 2000s to the 2010s, albeit she focuses specifically on the role of television as a medium that facilitated these portrayals. Because she is a woman, Elektra represents a culturally marginalised and rarely portrayed variety of antihero at the time of the film’s production. Therefore, anxiety regarding her power occurs, potentially due to a lack of an established cultural language for the representation of female antiheroes. A means of thwarting this anxiety involves the relentless use of flashback to justify her complex, often cynical existence. Indeed, the film contains five flashback sequences, all concerned with Elektra’s childhood: her father cruelly forcing her to swim in a pool too deep for her

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(shown twice), and the instance where she discovers her dead mother lying on her bed (shown three times). These flashback sequences offer a constant reminder that Elektra is troubled because of her childhood. They narratively justify Elektra’s character, frustrating her abilities to function within the narrative without being hampered by flashbacks. Another scene in Elektra that demonstrates the discrepancies in representations between female and male antiheroes directly parallels a scene in X-­Men Origins: Wolverine. In Origins, Logan, who is yet to become known as X-Man Wolverine, is shown driving through the Canadian countryside with his girlfriend Kayla Silverfox, describing his encounter with the villainous Colonel Stryker, who wants to recruit Logan (see Figure 3.2). With Logan sharing history with Stryker, Silverfox asks him why he appears agitated and Logan tells her of his meeting with Stryker. Silverfox asks, ‘Why is he bothering you after all these years?’ to which Logan quotes a famous phrase used repeatedly in the 1980s Wolverine comics (Claremont and Miller 1982), ‘Because I’m the best there is at what I do, but what I do best isn’t very nice.’ Silverfox responds to this by pointing out that his powers are a ‘gift’, which Logan refutes and the scene cuts at this point, highlighting the character’s ambiguity. Knowing that Stryker has malevolent intentions, Silverfox’s question serves to explain why he would find Logan appealing for a morally questionable task. But Logan’s answer is simple, requiring no further explanation­– ­he is simply good at doing not very nice things. This is in contrast to the scene in Elektra, which bears striking resemblance to that in Origins, despite having been made some years earlier. Fleeing from the predatory ninja outfit the Hand, Elektra drives Abby Miller (Kristen Prout), the teenage girl who was originally her target, to safety while Miller sits on the backseat popping bubble gum. Elektra irately turns around and glares at Miller for her annoying behaviour while Miller snarkily smiles back at her (Figure 3.1). The next shot shows Elektra unimpressed, sarcastically stating ‘I’m a soccer mom’ (a similar scene occurs in 2017’s Logan, this time with Logan driving the car and his young clone Laura irritating him). Herein the film acknowledges that the chaperoning of a young girl is a foreign experience for Elektra, the irony of which is driven home when Miller asks ‘So you really kill people for a living?’ When Miller asks why, Elektra answers ‘It’s what I’m good at’, echoing Logan’s famous line. However, this is undercut when Miller states ‘That’s messed up’, asserting once again that Elektra is troubled. Elektra cannot embrace this existence without a struggle, while Wolverine’s being good at not very nice things is narratively ambiguous yet unquestioned. As evidenced in comics such as the 1980s series Elektra: Assassin (Miller

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Figure 3.1  ‘That’s messed up’: Elektra discusses her job as an assassin with Abby Miller in Elektra.

Figure 3.2  ‘I’m the best there is at what I do, but what I do best isn’t very nice’: Logan explains himself to Kayla Silverfox in X-Men Origins: Wolverine.

and Sienkiewicz 2012), Elektra embodies a mode of hyperviolence absent from Marvel film adaptations, since these films are most often created with PG or PG-­13 ratings in mind (Dupont 2012: 5). Thus, though much is spoken about the bloodshed caused by Elektra and her ruthless attitude, such occasions are never shown. Further, Elektra’s violent nature is rarely, if ever, explained or justified within these comic book narratives. The antiheroine figure has recently gained more prominence, as mentioned, largely within particular TV formats that Milly Buonanno suggests is characteristic of the medium’s potential for exploration of complex femininities (Buonanno 2017). Though Buonanno specifically avoids asking why these characters have gained exposure recently, her discussion does draw attention to the variables of historical and social context as well as medium-­specificity. Elektra was released in 2005 as the first superheroine

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film to be based on a Marvel character. As noted, the film carried particular burdens in relation to its subject matter. Likewise, the film’s promotional strategies and critical reception highlighted the sexualisation of the film’s star, Jennifer Garner (Kent 2016), suggesting that these discourses were the dominant way in which such a media product was culturally made sense of. The differences between Garner’s Elektra and the ‘complex’ antiheroines of contemporary quality TV clearly tie into the formal differences between Marvel’s mid-­2000s mainstream film adaptations and quality TV outputs originating from cable and streaming platforms. Indeed, Netflix’s Daredevil has been among several recent Marvel adaptations deemed critically worthy due to its dark atmosphere and complex characters, including Jessica Jones and Luke Cage. This said, the version of Elektra presented in the Netflix series falls more into the character type of ambiguous villainess, with central character Matt Murdock’s spiritual and moral intricacy as a central focus. Still, 2005’s Elektra must be acknowledged as a foundational Marvel film, indeed a spiritual predecessor to Captain Marvel, whose contexts and discourses inevitably bear relation to subsequent forays into live-­action female superheroes. To return, then, to the topic of narrative frustration, the occurrence of superheroines unable to control their power is one of the clearest instances of this formal and generic mechanism. It is particularly acute in the cinematic representations of X-­Men Rogue and Jean Grey. Indeed, the X-­Men films have been described by Betty Kaklamanidou as enforcing a ‘mythos of patriarchy’ in which female characters are subordinate despite appearing empowered (Kaklamanidou 2011). Indeed, the X-­Men films are male-­centric and focus largely on the exploits of Logan/­Wolverine, as noted by Mark Gallagher, who states that the films ‘showcase physically powerful male heroes, renegotiating but continuing patriarchal tradition’ (Gallagher 2006: 195). X-­Men (2000) introduces a young girl, Marie (Anna Paquin), experiencing the manifestation of her powers for the first time. Marie, who adopts the name Rogue, is in her bedroom with her boyfriend when her ability to absorb people’s energy through touch occurs. However, Rogue’s powers surface when she kisses her boyfriend, putting him into a three-­month coma. This conflation of sexual activity and threat indicates the strenuous nature of female power in these films, as Rogue’s power not only makes her dangerous­– ­it makes her dangerous specifically to men. Furthermore, throughout the films, Rogue’s powers are shown to limit her ability to have romantic relationships specifically. In X2 (Bryan Singer, 2003) she is unable to kiss her new boyfriend Bobby Drake (Shawn Ashmore), as she

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with g rea t p o we r c o me s gr e a t f r u s t r a t i o n ? 81 might hurt him, which leads to feelings of jealousy in X-­Men: The Last Stand (Brett Rattner, 2006), when Bobby spends more time with another young female mutant, Kitty Pryde (Ellen Page). It is perhaps because of the threat that Rogue poses to hegemonic masculinity that she is frustrated, despite having superpowers. Originally a villain to the X-­Men, Rogue in the comics became one of the strongest characters after absorbing the Superman-­like powers of Ms. Marvel (Carol Danvers) in the 1980s (Claremont and Byrne 1980a). Indeed, according to Anthony Michael D’Agostino, Rogue, through her ability to absorb the powers and personalities of others via flesh-­to-­flesh contact, offers queer potentialities as well as ‘dramatizes the psychological isolation and emotional intensity of marginalized difference in superhero form’ (D’Agostino 2018: 252), indicating the character’s receptiveness to queer feminist discourse. The cinematic Rogue’s naivety, fostered by the character’s age and lack of experience, means she is led through the narrative by male characters. Having run away from home, Rogue encounters Logan and is taken to Xavier’s school for mutants, where she is guided by Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), and then misled by the villain Magneto (Ian McKellen) and his Brotherhood of Mutants. Rogue also has no control over her powers, for accidentally touching someone could mean ending their life. Unable to use her powers productively, Rogue must keep her skin covered at all times. Her power is literally contained by gloves and other garments, a cocooning that also functions on a visual level and harks back to her comic book costume. The most notable aspect of Rogue’s filmic characterisation is its incorporation of the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative discussed in the previous chapters within a heroic subjectivity. Despite possessing superpowers, Rogue requires saving by the other (mostly male) heroes, but this only occurs because of the power she possesses. Here, Magneto seeks to use her as a tool in his plan to turn humans into mutants using a machine that requires Rogue’s unique abilities to operate. The film’s discourses signal anxieties over a young girl possessing this much power as she cannot possibly control it, but also because it inevitably leads to her capture and exploitation by Magneto. Her power is frustrated before she is portrayed as having had a chance to use it heroically (in X-­Men: The Last Stand, Rogue is portrayed as one of the first mutants to embrace the new mutant cure, evoking the postfeminist rhetoric of choice, despite Logan’s paternalistic concerns, and is ultimately depowered). X-­Man Jean Grey (Famke Janssen) is also portrayed as having great difficulty controlling her powers in X-­Men and X2. A powerful telepathic and telekinetic mutant, Grey is introduced as a medical doctor giving a

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speech to the Senate to vote against the ominous Mutant Registration Act, which would restrict mutant rights, having been reimagined as a scientist like many Marvel women. Still, despite the authority Grey clearly possesses in issues of mutant rights, the character’s role in the narrative is primarily as a love interest to Logan and Scott Summers/­Cyclops (James Marsden) in the central love triangle. After noticing Logan’s advances, Summers warns him to ‘stay away from my girl’, positioning her as Summers’s possession. Further, the frustration tactic enforced upon Grey is similar to Rogue’s in that Grey is unable to control her power; indeed, this is stated time and again in X-­Men. For instance, Grey is shown saying that she cannot operate Xavier’s mutant tracking device, Cerebro, because ‘it takes a degree of control to use it’ and that it would be ‘dangerous’ for her to do so (despite this, Grey eventually uses Cerebro successfully). At the end of the film, the X-­Men work together to save Rogue, but Grey is left with permanent damage to her powers. In X2, Grey is even less able to control her powers, at times uncontrollably hearing everybody’s thoughts at once, before being eliminated from the narrative via self-­sacrifice to save her teammates. Similar narrative attributes have applied to Susan Storm throughout her character’s history. In the Fantastic Four comic books, which like Spider-­Man and X-­Men debuted in the 1960s, four ordinary people are imbued with superpowers after being exposed to cosmic rays during a space mission, becoming the superhero team the Fantastic Four. Sue was positioned as the girlfriend of the leader, Reed Richards, a hyper-­ intelligent scientist who gained the ability to stretch his body almost infinitely. She gained the powers of invisibility as the Invisible Girl, which, in a fight, did little other than hide her away from the action. Often, plans she had to make productive use of her powers are thwarted. For example, when attempting to alert her teammates to the presence of the villainous Miracle Man, a dog appears from nowhere, catching her scent and barking at Sue, allowing the Miracle Man to locate her (Lee and Kirby 1962a). In the 1980s, Sue was a central character, becoming the Invisible Woman, as well as gaining the formidable power of creating force fields (Byrne 1985b), arguably becoming the strongest member of the team (DiPaolo 2011: 212). However, the two Fantastic Four films of the 2000s clearly position Sue (Jessica Alba) as physically weak, frustrating her powers and limiting her availability in action sequences within the films’ respective narratives. In Fantastic Four (Tim Story, 2005), unlike her male teammates, who can control their powers after the initial surprise of discovering them, Sue has problems controlling her powers. When Reed Richards (Ioan Gruffudd) carries out some tests, he determines that

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Sue’s emotions prevent her from controlling them. This functions within discourses regarding the supposed destructive nature of emotions­– ­and Sue’s emotion is specifically characterised as anger­– ­while also positioning emotions as a (feminine) weakness. The scene here also contains an ironic element, which further reinforces the film’s influence under postfeminist sentiments, as the tension between Richards and Sue contributes to the resolution of their narrative arc, in which they become a couple. When Sue is finally portrayed as controlling her powers, they prove useless against the villain Victor von Doom (Julian McMahon) and he easily overpowers her. It is Ben Grimm, the rock-­skinned Thing (Michael Chiklis), who ultimately has the physical strength to fight Doom, and eventually, the team works together to stop him. Sue’s brother Johnny Storm (Chris Evans), who has fire powers, engulfs Doom in a supernova-­like ball of fire in the streets of New York. Sue makes a great effort to contain the fire­– s­ o great that she receives an unprecedented nosebleed, requiring a disproportionate amount of effort to engage in essentially the same levels of activity as Johnny. Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (Tim Story, 2007) offers more overt narrative frustration, as evidenced by the inclusion of Sue and Reed’s wedding. Indeed, Purse suggests that a relentless focus on a heroine’s marriage can act as a ‘strategy that gives the lie to the independence these powerful women appear to embody’ (Purse 2011: 84). Further, the aggressive centring of the heterosexual couple is also informed by postfeminist rhetoric, a theme I return to in Chapter 8. Throughout Rise of the Silver Surfer, Sue’s obsession with the marriage is unwavering; she is presented as demanding and unreasonable towards the emotionally unavailable Richards, preventing him from helping the US military from studying the alien invader the Silver Surfer. During the climactic final battle with Doom, who has stolen the Silver Surfer’s powerful surfboard, Sue is eliminated from the film’s action climax through a tense scene. After a succession of shots building dramatic tension, Sue gasps, in a close-­up, and is knocked backwards. She looks down and the camera tilts, revealing Doom’s spear in her chest, her force field having been useless against the power granted by the Surfer’s board. She collapses and apparently dies in Richards’s arms. With the Surfer’s master, Galactus, the devourer of worlds, arriving shortly, the remaining members of the team transfer all of their powers to Johnny, who defeats Doom so that the Surfer can regain control of his board and deal with Galactus. Throughout the action, Sue is absent, having died. Yet, after the Surfer regains his powers, he is able to revive Sue, and she and Richards can finally marry. Sue’s power was once again

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frustrated as she could not protect herself from Doom’s weapon; she is, in turn, rendered incapacitated (through the occurrence of death) during the final battle. Such representations have been discussed by Brown as symptomatic of action films of the 1980s, in which ‘women were often removed from the narrative entirely . . . or at least from the bulk of the screen time’ (Brown 2011a: 26). Susan Storm was revamped in FANT4STIC, again as a scientist (played by Kate Mara) alongside Richards (Miles Teller), though her role in the film is even smaller than in previous iterations of the property. Visual frustration functions through cinematography, editing and mise en scène, as well as costuming and appearance. A kind of formal disembodiment, or decorporealisation, can also function as a visual frustration tactic. This effectively disembodies and depersonalises a female character through that which is not shown, personable features that make her visually recognisable. Most obviously, this is the nature of Sue Storm’s powers in the comics and films, as she literally becomes invisible. However, Elektra also utilises such tactics in its representation of the central heroine. Although this could be narratively justified by Elektra’s status as a skilled assassin who creeps around unseen, as is argued by Daniel Binns (2016: 46), in a film in which she is the central heroine this is problematic. Elektra’s presence in the film is thus marked by conspicuous absence. In the first sequence in the film, Elektra approaches her target, DeMarco, taking out his associates on her way. The sequence is set at night, and so she is invisible in the dark scenes outdoors. This is narrated by DeMarco in his dimly lit office, telling his associate, Bauer, of the deadly Elektra, whom he is expecting. Shown first is a poorly lit shot of a man falling off a roof, presumably having been thrown off by Elektra. This is indicated by DeMarco’s declaration that ‘Her name is Elektra’, and yet, there is no visible Elektra to speak of. While DeMarco speaks of Elektra’s skill, she is shown (but not shown) climbing the stairs, still invisible, then making her way across beams under a ceiling. Finally, DeMarco says ‘They say Elektra whispers in your ear before she kills you.’ At that moment, Elektra speaks to them over Bauer’s radio, though she still is not shown. Bauer then enters the dark corridor. A medium close-­up of Bauer is followed by a shot of Elektra’s sai, her traditional Japanese fork-­like weapon, on the back of his neck. The film thus shows Elektra’s weapon before it shows Elektra, highlighting the character’s association with violence through her grasp of a phallic, penetrating object. She then says, off-­camera, ‘You can’t fight a ghost, Bauer’, a statement that again disembodies her by characterising her as a spirit back from the dead. Elektra then counter-­strikes Bauer’s blow. In the next shot,

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with g rea t p o we r c o me s gr e a t f r u s t r a t i o n ? 85 Bauer is in focus at the front, while Elektra is out of focus behind him, again blurring her physicality. The fight continues and all that is shown is Elektra’s blacked-­out silhouette and billowing hair, plus the occasional flash of red from her costume. When her face is finally revealed, it is half in shadow, emerging from strands of hair blowing in the wind. As such, Elektra is visually frustrated through disembodiment. This tactic is repeated on numerous occasions throughout the film, for instance when Elektra takes out a rival assassin in a forest by sending a tree falling on him, her victory is obscured by the green fog his body transforms into when he dies. Similarly, Elektra is visually obscured by wafting sheets that are sent flying around the room by the assassin Kirigi in the final battle of the film. Disembodiment indicates an anxiety in portraying active female physicality in these films. Furthermore, cinematography can also function to limit the space that a superheroine occupies during a fight, such as that between Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) and a security guard in Iron Man 2. After infiltrating the factory where villain Ivan Vanko is located, Romanoff, accompanied by Happy Hogan, fights a guard by leaping over a cart and flipping over in the air to kick the guard in the face. This ostentatious fighting style takes place within the confines of a narrow corridor, which is nonetheless brightly lit with a white floor and walls, unlike the fight scenes in Elektra. Still, the filming is claustrophobic, boxing in on Romanoff while she performs these stunts, with her body and that of her target filling the shots. The use of an aerial shot also draws attention to the presence of yet another narrowly placed wall that was unnoticeable in other shots. It is therefore apparent that Romanoff is spatially frustrated through the scene’s cinematography. Such cinematographic visual frustration also occurs when Abby Whistler fights a vampire during the final scenes of Blade: Trinity. As mentioned, both comic books and contemporary action cinema have been focused on women’s sexual appearance as it is symptomatic of postfeminist culture. This is also the case in some adaptations of Marvel comics. For instance, in the first two Fantastic Four films, an emphasis is placed on Sue’s physical beauty. In Fantastic Four, before embarking on their experiments in space, Ben contemplates the uniforms provided for them and, disappointed, questions ‘Who the hell came up with these?’ Sue’s disembodied voice is heard (‘Victor did.’) and she is shown strutting through the doorway, a long shot revealing her half-­opened suit showing off her pushed up cleavage. Her objectification is further enhanced on an extradiegetic level. After Sue explains that ‘The synthetics act as a second skin’, Richards remarks, ‘Wow, fantastic ...’ supposedly at the brilliance of the science behind the suits, though he is clearly also referring to what

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lurks beneath Sue’s ‘second skin’. In another shot later on in the film, all members of the team are shown in the living room area, wearing their suits. However, both Johnny and Richards’s suits are zipped to the top, while Sue’s is still half-­open (Ben, whose skin has turned to rock, goes shirtless). Sue is thus marked as sexually other through the gratuitous focus on her cleavage. Elektra is similarly presented in Elektra: the final shot of the initial assassination sequence outlined above is a close-­up of her backside. Daredevil, which also features Elektra as a supporting character, likewise centres her beauty. Given that Matt Murdock (Ben Affleck), who fights crime as Daredevil, is blind, this is notable. However, when almost every scene in which the two characters appear together makes a reference to her beauty, particularly in an emotional scene in which Murdock uses his radar sense, which functions similarly to echolocation, to ‘see’ her during a rain shower, Elektra becomes reduced to an image. Abby Whistler in Blade: Trinity likewise inhabits a postfeminist mode of visual representation as the portrayal of her fighting skills draws from fitness and sports culture. Women’s unequal access to sport is, as defined by Katharina Lindner in her analysis of contemporary sport films, ‘an important aspect of larger socio-­cultural gender inequalities’ (Lindner 2013: 240). The increase in exposure of female athletes in Western culture offers the possibility for the disruption of traditional gender relations in sport (Lindner 2013: 239). However, it has simultaneously led to the marginalisation, stigmatisation and sexualisation of such women in cultural discourses, and has been co-­opted and commodified as part of postfeminist culture. Femininity thus functions within sports culture as ‘a bodily property that needs to be continually “worked on”, monitored and controlled’ (Lindner 2013: 244), aligning with the wider interests of postfeminist culture. Markers of fit femininity become ingrained with the exclusionary rhetoric of postfeminist culture. Regarding this, Negra elaborates that ‘As the achievement of health/­fitness becomes a marker of middle-­class femininity and a sign of virtue, inequalities are magnified’ (Negra 2009b: 127). Throughout the film, Abby Whistler is the only character of the three central heroes shown to engage with vampire hunting as a means of fitness. A point is, for example, made of the fact that she listens to music through her iPod while fighting, an impracticality that would otherwise disrupt the vital sense of hearing that might be needed in a fight. Indeed, in a scene taking place before an elaborate fighting montage in which the heroic trio pursue several evil henchmen, Whistler is shown meticulously crafting a music playlist using her Apple laptop and iPod. Whistler’s use

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with g rea t p o we r c o me s gr e a t f r u s t r a t i o n ? 87 of music in her fighting/­fitness regime thus reaches to the commodification of Power Music in the fitness industry (Hentges 2014: 227). This trait is shown as an idiosyncrasy that marks the character as distinct from the others, and Whistler thus embodies a specific mode of female fitness, expressed visually and reaching to discourses of consumerism by showcasing the distinctive white iPod headphones throughout the film. The inclusion of the postfeminist femininity that an often ironic attention to visual sex appeal brings forth is particularly noteworthy in X-­Men: First Class (Matthew Vaughn, 2011). Set in the 1960s, but containing little of the institutional gender inequality of the time, the world portrayed in the film is postfeminist while showcasing a pre-­feminist environment. The only oppression ever experienced by any of the mutant characters is caused by the fact that they are mutants, naturally born with incredible, but often unsightly, powers. The film, as do the other X-­Men films, thus takes for granted that the female characters are empowered and have little use for explicitly feminist politics. This promotes a well-­intentioned but problematic message that factors such as gender should have no influence over a person’s capabilities. However, X-­Men is perceived as a property in both comics and film that allegorises the disempowerment of marginalised peoples, ‘a parable of the alienation of any minority’ (Reynolds 1992: 79). Purse similarly characterises the films as commentaries regarding gay rights and homosexual subjectivities (Purse 2011: 144), while Darowski discusses the X-­Men as ‘mutant metaphor’ (Darowski 2014). For a narrative framed as ingrained in social issues, the lack of overt engagement with political feminist concerns is noteworthy. It also allows for one character, Moira MacTaggert (Rose Byrne), to be a CIA agent in a time when women in the CIA were largely limited to secretarial jobs. Certainly, this may not be a huge stretch of imagination considering the film centres on superpowered mutants; but, again, the links that have been forged between X-­Men and world in which people are systematically oppressed for factors that are outside of their control draw attention to how the films elaborate such a stance. This is amplified by a scene in which MacTaggert uses her sex appeal to infiltrate a meeting held by the evil Hellfire Club, portrayed as taking place in a strip club. MacTaggert must pose as a stripper to infiltrate the club, speaking to issues of feminine masquerade discussed in more detail in the next chapter. The film contains two overt references of sexism aimed at a female character, which serve more to differentiate the attitudes of that era from those of today in a way that further separates the film from its contemporary context. This offers a win-­win situation in that blatant misogyny is narratively justified, while a depoliticised ideal of powerfully

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sexy women is promoted, thus avoiding overt engagement with feminist politics. In Inness’s terms, ‘The media make women . . . sexually alluring to men by weakening their toughness, emphasizing their sexuality, and transforming them into sex objects for the male gaze’ (Inness 1998: 40), though in a postfeminist culture, this may be an oversimplification. A common postfeminist-­inflected detraction of such a statement would be that these texts are merely a celebration or reclamation of femininity (Stasia 2007: 234). This takes for granted that femininity is in a position to be reclaimed in the first place, begging the question ‘reclaimed from whom?’ to which the answer may be ‘the feminists’, suggesting more about how feminism is conceived of culturally. Suggesting that an emphasis on sex appeal and appearance functions as a frustration tactic could infer a devaluing or discrediting of femininity itself. This is not the aim of this analysis. On one hand, popular films have provided images of heroic women who are distanced from characteristics generally considered to constitute femininity in order to appear strong, at least on a visual level (e.g. Ripley and Connor). On the other hand, films informed by postfeminist ideals offer a portrayal of women who are physically strong while embracing a sexualised femininity, a line of argument similar to that of Madrid when he refers to comic books. With this in mind, it is rare to see men presented in films as being powerful because of their sex appeal, as I argued earlier, or even men who are emotional and caring yet still framed by the text as masculine. Both configurations of feminine strength function within the gender binary on account of their policing of women’s appearance, as well as adopting an either/­or approach to gender. This is coupled with a general lack of variety in terms of femininities presented in mainstream cinema, and especially the films analysed here, which privilege white, slim, heterosexual, able-­bodied femininity. These postfeminist representations are thus the result of frustration­– n ­ ot only the visual frustration as discussed here, but cultural frustration­– ­this is, more times than not, the only type of representation that is offered. Indeed, Goodrum, Prescott and Smith similarly argue for superhero narratives that ‘give men and women access to those characteristics . . . that have traditionally been viewed as feminine by removing the stigma attached to them as well as challenging the reductive assumption that women are inherently caring and peaceful’ (Goodrum et al. 2018: 5). A final frustration tactic involves comedy derived from or aimed at the female hero. Herein the ‘display of female super-­powers is contained within situations that also manage to subject the action heroines to varying levels of humiliation’ (Purse 2011: 80). Purse specifically points towards

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moments in both Fantastic Four films, when Sue ends up in a state of public nudity while attempting to use her powers. But these films also engage in postfeminist ironic humour intended to offset any discomfort caused by these portrayals. Irony is a prominent feature of postfeminist discourses. Here, positions characterised as existing in opposition to the demands of second-­wave feminism are adopted playfully (Gill 2007: 160). Postfeminist irony taken to extremes results in phenomena such as ironic sexism or hipster sexism, which evokes sexist discourses to highlight the supposed notion that real sexism is of the past (Richardson and Robinson 2015: xxv). Whatever context, though, postfeminist irony arguably ensures that a socially sanctioned form of gender relations is maintained. One such instance is the comedy duo of Natasha Romanoff and Happy Hogan in Iron Man 2. Romanoff is introduced as Tony Stark’s new notary while he is working out, boxing with Hogan. The encounter is framed within comedic and ironic discourses. After telling Hogan that she has boxed before, Hogan asks Romanoff, ‘What, like, the Tae Bo? Booty Boot Camp? Crunch?’ listing a variety of feminised sporting activities. The irony, here, is that Romanoff’s exercise regimes extend far further than Booty Boot Camp­– ­she is highly skilled at martial arts. Before Hogan can begin sparring, Romanoff catches his wrist and swings it downwards in a long shot, spinning over and throttling him with her legs. When Stark and Pepper Potts rush over, Hogan tells them that he slipped and Romanoff coolly steps out of the ring, her secret, and integrity, intact. Within this context it is acceptable for Hogan to be presented as behaving in condescending ways towards Romanoff; viewers have already been led to believe that, in reality, she is a highly skilled fighter. Similarly, postfeminist irony relies on the knowledge taken for granted that, in reality, women are empowered. This irony is extended when Hogan and Romanoff team up to infiltrate the villain’s lair. It is clear that Romanoff is displeased with Hogan’s presence, the two embodying a binary opposition of a serious spy versus a goofy wannabe, with Hogan still oblivious to Romanoff’s abilities. When they enter, Romanoff and Hogan combat different guards, with Hogan clumsily struggling despite his boxing training. This is comically intercut with Romanoff shown fighting numerous guards in the corridor. After having defeated all the guards using her fighting skills and gadgets, she walks past another guard while looking squarely into the camera and spraying pepper spray in his eyes. The act of looking at the camera encourages a bond of knowing between Romanoff and viewers, again highlighting ironic elements of the scene: the casual nature of this endeavour is accompanied by irony. But the comedic payoff occurs when it cuts back to Hogan

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finally knocking out his one guard, exclaiming ‘I got him!’ The shot cuts back to the other guards Romanoff incapacitated, some on the floor, one hanging from a cord on the ceiling, Romanoff’s efficiency a clear contrast to Hogan’s bumbling. Similar moments are present in Daredevil, when Matt Murdock meets Elektra for the first time. After he follows her from the café where they met, she stops in a playground where children are playing, again framing Elektra’s skills within the parameters of play. Unwilling to stop following her, Murdock’s presence is a clear encroachment on Elektra’s personal space, but excusing Murdock’s behaviour, the scene is light-­hearted and flirtatious. This is solidified when Elektra yanks away Murdock’s cane and tries to kick him. The ridiculous nature of the situation, in which a non-­disabled woman is portrayed taking away a blind man’s cane and trying to assault him, offers a comedic element through which Elektra must enact her skills. Unfortunately, her kick misses and Murdock moves out of the way, and further playful quips are exchanged. A long shot showcases both characters taking off their jackets, drawing attention to the binaristic differences between their costuming­– ­Murdock’s suit and Elektra’s camisole­– ­and the cane drops back into his hand. A shot shows her in a defensive position, and a reverse shot shows him gesturing for her to bring on the fight with his hand. She then runs up a see-­saw, jumps, and lands in his arms, the use of the children’s playground equipment adding further playfulness to these acrobatics. The confrontation is heavily choreographed comedy sparring, framed within the problematic confines of a man’s romantic pursuit of a seemingly unwilling woman, as Murdock jokes, ‘Does every guy have to go through this just to find out your name?’ and she jokes back, ‘Try asking for my number!’ while the children in the background start chanting for them to fight. After more attempts at hitting each other, Elektra ends up the victor, aiming her foot at his neck. She calmly smiles in close-­up, stating ‘My name’s Elektra Natchios’ and smiling again, a playful victory over Murdock. The overarching irony serves the postfeminist playfulness and configurations of toughness, frustrating the heroine’s potential. The Marvel superheroine on screen is a complex amalgamation of contemporary action discourses, comic book conventions and postfeminist sensibilities. These portrayals provide often limited portrayals of women wielding power over situations but suggest that such occurrences can still be empowering if they reach to notions of choice, physical appeal and ironic humour. Escaping such modes of representation is an improbably large task due to the subtle nature of these tactics and the way in which they engage with elusive postfeminist discourses. These tactics reflect

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with g rea t p o we r c o me s gr e a t f r u s t r a t i o n ? 91 back to and draw from one another, creating a seamless mode of representation that implicitly functions to support patriarchal standards of femininity, while offering a depoliticised presentation of empowered white, heterosexual femininity. These adaptations thus draw from the comics, while conveniently feeding into established discourses of postfeminism and women’s empowerment through sex appeal. Women in Marvel film adaptations remain marginalised. Janet Van Dyne’s daughter, Hope (Evangeline Lilly), was adapted to modern postfeminist sensibilities through her portrayal as a businesswoman who holds a high-­ranking job at her father’s company in MCU film Ant-­Man (Peyton Reed, 2015). Nonetheless, it is petty thief Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) whom Hope’s father Hank recruits to take his place as the next Ant-­Man (Pym had previously invented a suit which enabled the wearer to shrink and communicate with ants). Notably, at the end of the film, Pym shows Hope a new suit which he will bestow upon her to become the new Wasp, foreshadowing the sequel Ant-­Man and the Wasp (Peyton Reed, 2018). It remains a mystery why Scott was chosen to be the next Ant-­Man if the possibility existed for Hope to take up the mantle all along. Hope Van Dyne’s inclusion in Ant-­Man and the Wasp was framed in popular discourses as a remedy to the lack of representation of women in the MCU; however, the film significantly relied on established conventions of an imperilled woman­– ­in this case, Hope’s mother Janet­– ­who required rescuing after a heroic mission with the previous Ant-­Man went wrong. Interestingly, director Peyton Reed suggested that the inclusion of Hope ‘just happened to be organic for the characters of Ant-­Man and Wasp, [so] it worked . . . We’re going to have a fully realized, very, very complicated hero in the next movie who happens to be a woman’ (Reed quoted in Truitt 2015). Like the discourses of common sense around the death of Gwen Stacy in The Amazing Spider-­Man 2, Hope’s inclusion in the film was articulated as a natural, or ‘organic’, occurrence that just had to happen, flipping this particular discourse relating to adaptation to invoke a feminist response. Likewise, reports suggested that Ant-­Man and the Wasp would attempt to capitalise more on Wasp merchandise after Marvel received criticism for its lack of Black Widow merchandise (Wickman 2015), highlighting the commodified elements of these properties concerning popular feminisms. The next chapter, which hones in on the superheroic postfeminist masquerade, considers Marvel’s watershed superheroine adaptation Captain Marvel alongside more traditional postfeminist Marvel adaptations of the 2000s. The Marvel superheroine has received more exposure in contemporary comics, with Marvel releasing a slew of books featuring central

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female characters, in which Captain Marvel is undoubtedly included. Others include The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl (North and Henderson 2015), Elektra (Blackman and Del Mundo 2014), Black Widow (Waid and Samnee 2016), Mockingbird (Cain and Niemczyk 2016) and an all-­ female Avengers team book (Wilson and Molina 2016). These books sold relatively well, though not as well as the top-­selling books containing the Avengers and Spider-­Man and have been subjected to multiple revamps and reboots. However, their presence is noteworthy in the overall trajectory of Marvel’s superheroines and their complex relationships with political feminisms.

C H A PT E R 4

Playing Superheroine: Feminine Subjectivity and (Postfeminist) Masquerade

In Blade: Trinity, Abby Whistler is introduced in a way typical for Marvel heroines: when she is undercover. Disguised as an unremarkable woman with a child in the subway, she is pursued by a group of vampires making predatory comments (‘Hey, pretty lady!’). As with Natasha Romanoff in Marvel’s The Avengers, Whistler’s male enemies’ representation hinges on their commentary over her appearance. Whistler is coded as a vulnerable woman, alone with a child at night, carrying groceries. However, Whistler, like Romanoff, defies cultural expectations when she physically confronts the vampires. She removes her coat and it is revealed that she carries a compound bow mounted with a glowing bowstring of UV light to which the vampires are vulnerable. When there is only one vampire left, she aggressively tells him to ‘Scream if it hurts, chica!’ flipping the situation back on itself and ironically feminising her target. The situation functions within postfeminist discourses through irony and toying with established notions of feminine weakness. Like Romanoff in Iron Man 2, who is originally introduced as Tony Stark’s new notary, Whistler’s introduction involves her undercover as an ‘ordinary’ civilian (whose ordinariness is explicitly constructed). This also occurs in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, when S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Sharon Carter at first appears to be a nurse who is Steve Roger’s/­Captain America’s neighbour. Even Elektra’s Abby Miller is introduced as an ‘ordinary’ teenage girl before being revealed as superheroic. These narrative phenomena have the effect of gradually introducing female action characters, while drawing from ironic postfeminist discourses as well as notions of female masquerade. Indeed, masquerade occupies a distinctive space within the generic boundaries of superhero adaptations, further complexifying issues to do with gender and heroism. This chapter outlines the significance of postfeminist masquerade in representations of Marvel superheroines first in films of the 2000s and early 2010s and culminates in a discussion of postfeminist masquerade and subjectivity in Captain Marvel, which, I

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argue, responds to some of the critiques that can be aimed at superheroines portrayed through modes of masquerade, while also being contextualised within discourses of self-­empowerment and popular feminism. The concept of feminine masquerade was initially developed by psychoanalyst Joan Riviere (1929). In her study, Riviere argues that ‘womanliness’ is indistinguishable from masquerade, which is adopted by women who desire to occupy masculine spaces in order to allay the cultural anxiety brought on when women supposedly encroach upon masculine roles. She writes: Womanliness . . . could be assumed and worn as a mask, both to hide the possession of masculinity and to avert the reprisals expected if she was found to possess it . . . The reader may now ask how I define womanliness or where I draw the line between genuine womanliness and the ‘masquerade’. My suggestion is not, however, that there is any such difference; whether radical or superficial, they are the same thing. (Riviere 1929: 306)

Like the paradoxically tough heroines discussed in the previous chapter, overt femininity is arguably employed here to offset anxieties around the adoption of ‘masculine’ traits by women. Since femininity is masquerade, there is thus no essential feminine essence to be found beneath the mask, although scholars such as Judith Butler have noted that it is unclear in Riviere’s analysis what, specifically, the mask is actually hiding (Butler 1990: 64). Significantly, though, Vicky Lebeau argues that a crucial component of feminine masquerade is the circular quality of ‘the link between the masquerade and the woman’s more or less guilty representation of masculinity’, that the woman ‘wants to know both that she has performed appropriately for the masculinity she has usurped . . . and that her successful display is not going to provoke reprisals from these men’ (Lebeau 1995: 93). The success of the masquerade therefore relies on the very phenomenon it seeks to undermine and assume. Similar qualities can be observed in the relationship between feminisms and postfeminist culture, the latter of which depends on the former to discredit that with which it purports to agree (i.e. feminist goals). The theme of femininity as a mask was expanded on by philosophers and psychoanalytical theorists such as Jacques Lacan (1982), Luce Irigaray (1985), Stephen Heath (1986) and Judith Butler (1990), whose influential theories of gender performativity I return to later in this book. Meanwhile, scholars such as Doane (1981; 1982; 1992), LeBeau (1995: 91–94; 2001: 93–117) and Stella Bruzzi (1997: 128–32) discuss femininity as masquerade in relation to the study of film and femininity (meanwhile others have addressed masculinity and male spectacle in cinema as masquerade­– s­ ee,

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pl a ying s upe r he ro ine 95 for example, Holmlund 1993). For now, though, it is worth considering feminine masquerade within the superhero context in terms of postfeminist conceptions of femininity to illustrate how Marvel adaptations have responded to ongoing cultural discourses that account for the notion of the feminine self as a construct or work-­in-­progress. The significance of masquerade concerning the figure of the superhero carries particular pertinence when combined with gender representation. The corporeal qualities of superheroes and their settings have been noted by Bukatman, who sees superheroes as extensions of social anxiety made flesh, drawing from anthropologist Mary Douglas’s notions of the bodily symbolic: ‘Mask, costume, and logo are marks that guarantee the superhero body passage into the field of the symbolic’ (Bukatman 2003: 54). Beyond the practicalities of superhero masks­– ­their function as a disguise to protect the wearer from harm and identification­– ­Bukatman is inspired by Terry Castle’s influential work on eighteenth-­century masquerade in his discussion of the moral ambiguity of masks and the formation of the superhero’s secret identity by which superhero costumes come to signify ‘a morally indeterminate “superness” ’ (Bukatman 2013: 190). Friedrich Weltzien picks up on similar issues in his discussion of superhero masculinities, or ‘masque-­ulinities’, viewing the symbolic constitution of male superheroes as made up of split personalities whereby ‘It is not possible to call either of the two personalities the real one and the other the disguised one, there is no one “true identity” and its “alias.” Each persona is closely dependent upon its counterpart’ (Weltzien 2005: 241). This is epitomised by the iconic imagery of DC superhero Superman ripping open his shirt to reveal not the naked chest of a man, but the S-­shaped symbol of ‘Superman’, ‘the icon of performing masculinity by the changing of dress’ (Weltzien 2005: 235, original emphasis). Accordingly, the mask is used there as a mode of analysis to ‘study the very moment of change: the dynamic process of masking’ (Weltzien 2005: 229–30). However, the implications of these phenomena are gendered and, as I have already noted, there have been ongoing wider discussions around femininity/­ies as mask/­s. Clearly, masks rely in many ways on the idea of the self as fully formed and unique to grant significance to the notion of disguise or appearing as something other than the self (see Castle quoted in Bukatman 2013: 189). Yet, it is the duality of Riviere’s feminine-­ masculine subject­– ­the fact that both the performance within the masculine symbolic is accompanied by another performance within the feminine symbolic­– ­that is often curtailed in critical accounts of her ideas. Susan Feldman, for instance, argues that:

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Riviere clearly located femininity not in the masquerade . . . but rather in the impasse that confronts her analysand­– ­the fact that she can only ever partially represent herself in any one performance (she can’t be recognized as an equal to men and a desirable woman simultaneously)­– a­ nd in the ‘extraordinary incongruity’ of her two performances. (Feldman 2011: 69)

Riviere’s theory of female masquerade, as women taking on masks of femininity to compensate for a sense of illicitly assumed masculinity, is complexified when considered in a postfeminist context, which itself takes account of the constructedness, the self-­madeness, of gender, even in its reinscription of sexual difference. Like Riviere’s paradoxical feminine-­ masculine subject, it is the spaces in between the masquerades of the postfeminist superheroine that are contentious and encompass extraordinary incongruity: the reliance of postfeminist culture on women’s active curation of their ‘true’ selves that co-­exists with the embrace of (specific) feminine identities as a mode of acceptable feminine existence that is in accordance with prescriptive models of feminine agency. Theories of womanliness as masquerade clearly gain considerable significance in a time characterised as postmodern, in which identity is considered less a static core of an individual and more an ongoing process of self-­formation by the empowered neoliberal consuming subject. Drawing from the work of Doane, McRobbie suggests that postfeminist culture’s indulgence in traditional modes of femininity stems from the ways in which the patriarchal symbolic has become reconfigured as part of the fashion-­beauty complex (McRobbie 2009: 61). The reduced dependence contemporary women have towards men in terms of finance, as well as their increased visibility in the workforce, means that the need for traditional male approval is now void (McRobbie 2009: 63). Instead, this authority has been transferred to the fashion-­beauty complex, which encourages women to self-­monitor and sculpt their femininity under its guidance, activities framed by choice rhetoric (McRobbie 2009: 63). Interestingly, these themes are directly incorporated into the recent narrative of Captain Marvel, which I discuss later on in this chapter. Femininity, characterised as a literal, rigid embodiment of ‘womanhood’ is, within postfeminist culture, considered to occupy ‘unbearable proximity’ to women, and thus distance towards this is achieved through overemphasis and ironic reclamation (McRobbie 2009: 64). It is a ‘licensed, ironic, quasi-­feminist inhabiting of femininity as excess, which is now openly acknowledged as fictive’ (McRobbie 2009: 64). Postfeminist masquerade takes into account constructionist accounts of gender, which hold that notions of any ‘true’ essence of gender are social constructs, drawing attention to femininity’s artifice, only to reframe these activities

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pl a ying s upe r he ro ine 97 within a consumerist-­capitalist system, ultimately reinstating the patriarchal symbolic (McRobbie 2009: 64). Such ironic femininity in Marvel film adaptations has already been discussed in the previous chapter, however a closer examination of the literal disguises of superheroines offers another point of intrigue. That Abby Whistler, Natasha Romanoff and Sharon Carter are all introduced as ‘ordinary’ women before being revealed as heroines is significant. These characters are eased into these narratives through a mechanism based on disguise, or, indeed, feminine masks. They demonstrably present various configurations of empowered contemporary femininity­ – ­ the caring mother, the professional notary, the humble nurse. The films therefore present women’s subjectivities that hinge on the notion of femininities that can be readily exchanged for one another, but are nonetheless encompassed by the criteria of the idealised postfeminist subject. Thus, these heroines move between different versions of culturally sanctioned femininity enabled by postfeminist discourses in order to be integrated into the heroic narrative. This resonates with Julie D. O’Reilly’s discussion of supernaturally powered televisual heroines that came to prominence in the 2000s as being represented through visual and narrative modes hinging on the feminine mask of selflessness being periodically exchanged for another guise (O’Reilly 2013: 81). In these portrayals, the guise of ‘normal girl’ becomes ‘yet another masquerade of femininity’ (O’Reilly 2013: 83). Likewise, this echoes Aaron Taylor’s supposition around superheroines, in that ‘[O]ne might say that a superheroine’s femininity is just as “put on”, and thus, “revealing’” as her skimpy costume’ (Taylor 2007: 353). The casual disguises adopted by these heroines are not without further implications. Specifically, the masquerade as discussed here involves a taking into account of the superficiality of gender categories, whereas performativity in a Butlerian sense (discussed in Chapter 7) encompasses naturalised practices of gender. Arguably, these women discussed in this chapter are presented as engaging with feminine masquerade in the classic Rivieran sense­– t­o allay the anxiety which tough women produce in a culture where toughness is considered masculine. The topic of feminine masquerade in popular depictions of action heroines has likewise been discussed by Inness in her analysis of the Charlie’s Angels television series. Noting the frequent use of storylines in which the Angels must go undercover (i.e. wear disguises) in order to solve a crime, Inness argues that these narratives illustrate ‘the constructed nature of identity’ (Inness 2004: 43). However, this has a side effect: The constructed nature of the Angels’ identities is highlighted; they are not what they seem to be. Their toughness is brought into question because masquerade

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forces its audience to question the nature of identity . . . Toughness, the show hints, is perhaps as artificial as the Angels’ roles as hookers, nurses, or roller derby queens. (Inness 1998: 43)

Similar issues surface in the portrayal of Black Widow in The Avengers, a case study I argue is emblematic of the highly complex presentations of feminine heroism in Marvel films. When Natasha Romanoff is re-­introduced in The Avengers, she appears to be a classically feminine victim of violence. The first shot in which she features is a close-­up of Romanoff being hit in the face. She is shown in an industrial warehouse, bound to a chair, dressed in a little black dress and no shoes, looking up at her captors, two Russian mobsters and their boss. One mobster threatens her in Russian and tips the chair back, suspending her over the edge of the platform on which the scene takes place: a close-­up dwells on her black nylon-­sheathed foot. The boss tells her, ‘The famous Black Widow . . . And she turns out to be simply another pretty face’, to which she ironically replies in close-­up, ‘You think I’m pretty?’ Romanoff’s answer angers the Russians, and one restrains her head, holding her mouth open, while the leader contemplates his collection of pliers. At that moment a phone rings and Romanoff is informed that it is for her. The phone is wedged on her shoulder, and S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Coulson tells her she is needed to be a member of the Avengers. Her irate reply is ‘Are you kidding? I’m working . . . I’m in the middle of the interrogation. This moron is giving me everything.’ For Black Widow, this is presented as just another day on the job. Her sassy remarks portray her as taking control of a highly threatening situation. In a potential reversal of the women-­in-­refrigerators narrative, Coulson informs her that her previous work partner and friend, Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner), has been ‘compromised’ by the villain, Loki (Tom Hiddleston). This prompts Romanoff to single-­handedly overpower the Russians (while tied to the chair) in a dramatic feat of action. This is interspersed with shots of Coulson humorously waiting on the other end of the phone, listening to the sounds of Romanoff fighting the Russians. A close-­up of her black high heels being picked up off the floor by Romanoff finalises the sequence and she walks out of the building. The scene arguably defies cultural expectations of weak femininity in that Romanoff is represented as a physically adept super spy who can escape from threatening situations. However, it also incorporates postfeminist sentiments in that her apparent victimisation is merely another ironic postfeminist feminine persona (or mask). As mentioned, irony plays a large role in this scene, as Romanoff is cinematically coded as feminine through her

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dress and victimised position, but these factors ultimately have no impact on her ability because deadly combat is configured as being merely part of her job. She picks up the heels while asking Coulson where Barton is, combining a postfeminist focus on fashion with classically masculine heroism. Cristina Lucia Stasia highlights the importance of women’s appearance and fashion within postfeminist discourses, stating that images of girls ‘kicking ass’ proliferate in magazines and marketers have exploited the market potential of postfeminist girls who think it is cool that girls can kick ass­– ­but are more interested in purchasing the designer stiletto the girl is kicking ass in. (Stasia 2007: 237)

Whether wearing heels or her Avengers uniform, rest assured that Romanoff ‘kicks ass’, a sentiment which clearly speaks to notions of masquerade, as does the villain’s focus on her ‘pretty face’. Both configurations of Romanoff are different sides of the same postfeminist mask. This particular portrayal of Romanoff can be attributed to writer/­ director Joss Whedon, whose works, particularly Buffy and Firefly (Fox, 2002), have been discussed extensively in terms of their occupation within postfeminist frameworks (Owen 1999; Amy-­Chinn 2006; Genz and Brabon 2009: 162–5). Having been established as an action heroine at the beginning of the film, Romanoff becomes a member of the Avengers, whose task it is to stop the villainous Norse trickster god Loki from wreaking havoc on the world. With the team unaware of the specificities of his plan, they lock Loki in a glass prison. In one particular scene, Romanoff is portrayed approaching Loki in his prison with the intention to gain information from him by exploiting his expectations of her femininity. Loki is shown as having suspected that Romanoff would go to him, stating, ‘After whatever tortures [Nick] Fury can concoct, you would appear as a friend, as a balm. And I would cooperate’, perceiving her as the caring member of the team because of her gender. Romanoff subsequently describes how she, in the past, worked for morally reprehensible employers and that Barton had been sent to kill her, but spared her life instead, marking her investment in saving him. She concludes, ‘I got red in my ledger, and I’d like to wipe it out’, walking towards him defensively with her arms folded. The statement appears to please Loki, and he embarks on a speech with the aim of emotionally unsettling Romanoff, standing up and stepping towards the glass. His reflection in the glass is juxtaposed with her horrified expression as he continues, ‘This is the basest sentimentality. This is a child at prayer. Pathetic!’ later slamming his fist on the glass, causing Romanoff to jump back in fright. A close-­up of Romanoff’s terrified face follows his statement that

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he will make Barton kill her and then awaken him to witness what he has done. Following an outburst of misogynistic insults by Loki, she is shown from behind, the sound of her sniffing audible. She states, ‘You’re a monster’, and there is a shot of Loki evilly laughing, answering, ‘Oh no, you brought the monster.’ In the reverse shot, Romanoff’s head tilts up with a dramatic crescendo of music, which is abruptly silenced. She turns, not a tear in her eye, and reveals to the baffled Loki that she worked out his plan to unleash the Hulk on the Avengers. During this scene, Romanoff effectively deduces that Loki planned to set the Hulk loose to cause destruction and break up the team. She is portrayed as doing this by playing with Loki’s schema of appropriate femininity, pretending to be terrified. Just as the opening scene presented Romanoff through the mask of victimisation, a mask of sentimentality is employed here. Romanoff’s greatest asset is therefore portrayed as dominant notions of femininity that she uses to her advantage. However, the role-­reversal plot point resulting in victory over the antagonist heavily relies on the projection of a particular femininity upon the character, which in Inness’s view would suggest a deconstruction of subjectivity altogether. This includes the ‘tough’ identities of these heroines, which, according to Inness, is simultaneously questioned as a result of this deconstruction. Echoing Riviere, there is no genuine womanliness to speak of underneath the mask. This results in a sort of feminine identity crisis in which the heroic persona may be yet another mask of femininity. Heroic feminine subjectivity thus becomes elusive and intangible, begging the question of where and who these heroines ‘actually’ are (which is further complicated by their status as constructed fictional beings). The benefits of such an approach to subversive representation thus remain questionable since it continues to rely on the very notion of a gender binary and expectations of how men and women behave. That Romanoff’s portrayal is transgressive is dependent on a conception of femininity that is unchanging in its association with weakness and sentimentality, arguably reinforcing the binary it deconstructs. In this sense, representations such as that of Natasha Romanoff indicate the further complexities present in gendered discourses of power and heroism and how they relate to wider conceptions of gender. Likewise, the postfeminist masquerade ensures that only sanctioned forms of acceptable femininity come to the fore. While Brown notes that ‘The conscious manipulation of traditional perceptions of female characters as weak has become a standard convention in action heroine films’ (Brown 2011a: 36), he does not develop this notion to account for the role of a specifically postfeminist mas-

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pl a ying s upe r he ro ine 101 querade (Brown’s ideas are, however, helpful when making sense of the gender presentations enacted by X-­Men character Mystique, discussed in Chapter 7). In Avengers: Age of Ultron (Joss Whedon, 2015), Romanoff’s role is seemingly limited to that of love interest to Bruce Banner in potentially another mask of femininity. Gender essentialism surfaces in the film as Romanoff describes herself as a ‘monster’ due to her inability to have children, having been forcibly sterilised as part of her super-­spy training. Such an approach to gender, in which men and women are defined in terms of body parts and gender roles (such as motherhood), acts following postfeminist interests in maintaining a binaristic gender order. With an ensemble cast such as that of The Avengers, Romanoff receives inadequate screen time for the film to further resolve these issues. It is also noteworthy that her moment of heroism during the final battle with aliens in New York, in which she closes the portal that allows evil aliens to pass into this dimension, is followed and potentially upstaged by Stark’s self-­ sacrifice when he must fly a nuclear bomb into the portal with minutes to spare before it closes. Romanoff similarly receives a good portion of screen time in Captain America: The Winter Soldier (Anthony and Joe Russo, 2014), although the focus in the film is still on the central male hero. Indeed, Feige suggested that it would be unwise to ever ‘pluck’ Romanoff out of a team dynamic and that a solo Black Widow film is not on the horizon (Feige in Faraci 2014), a statement which relies on the assumption that films centring female superheroes require a different approach to male heroes. Nonetheless, a Black Widow prequel film is set for release in 2020, a full decade after her debut in Iron Man 2.

‘I Want You to Be the Best Version of Yourself’: Postfeminist Masquerade and Subjectivity in Captain Marvel While the heroines discussed in the previous section all interact with various configurations of disguise in their respective films, there is an underlying assumption that they occupy some form of heroic subjectivity ‘underneath’ the feminine masquerade, even while this notion is discredited by the very act of postfeminist performance it entails. The specifics of their heroic subjectivities are little interrogated within these texts, while the masking functions as narrative misdirection, culminating in the revelation of heroism via a paradoxical mode of postfeminist masquerade. Still, the central themes and questions posed at the heart of 2019’s Captain Marvel­– ­hailed by commentators as a feminist intervention in Hollywood superhero filmmaking­– ­significantly complexify existing

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frameworks of postfeminist masquerade while similarly articulating anxieties to do with female superheroic subjectivity. Interestingly, with this film, the complexities around women’s subjectivities become interwoven with discourses relating to patriarchy, oppression and marginality that in turn can be linked to contemporary popular discourses around abuse and what can ostensibly be thought of as a loss of the feminine ‘self’ through patriarchal oppression. Therefore, there appears to be ideologically more at stake in terms of heroism, femininity and subjectivity in Captain Marvel for the materialisation of masquerade encompassed through the character responds to apparently cataclysmic questions of the feminine self in relation to an oppressive patriarch while engaging with (post)feminisms. At the core of the film is a narrative in which the central heroine is systematically manipulated by alien Kree military commander Yon-­Rogg (Jude Law) in service of the persecution and decimation of the shapeshifting alien species known as Skrulls. The resolution of the central conflict around Carol Danvers’s (Brie Larson) superheroic subjectivity is presented as the recovery of her memory and the discovery of her ‘true’ self, most certainly a postfeminist concern. However, in its portrayal of Yon-­ Rogg as patriarchal abuser, the character appropriates these very concerns to influence Danvers’s sense of self, marking a significant incorporation of a feminist critique of postfeminist concerns for women to cultivate ‘the best versions’ of themselves. Captain Marvel was the result of decades of discussion about the commercial viability of a Marvel film centring a female superhero. These discussions have roots in the early-­to-­mid-­2000s, amid the formative years of the superhero movie boom and around the negative critical reception of both DC’s Catwoman (Pitof, 2005) and Elektra, but span back to the production of DC property Supergirl (Jeannot Szwarc, 1984), which was marred by problems in production, marketing and reception (see Scivally 2007). This was despite the character’s links to the hugely successful Superman franchise established in the 1970s and led to the assumption that ‘very few films about superheroines had ever been a success’ (Scivally 2007: 102). Superheroine flops notwithstanding, Captain Marvel was arguably made possible by the intervention of Wonder Woman in 2017, which was discussed within popular discourses as demonstrating the commercial and critical viability of superheroine movies. With Captain Marvel primed as Marvel’s answer to Wonder Woman (Cavna 2017; Dicker 2018; Sommerlad 2018; A. White 2018; Knight 2019), the film subsequently engaged with similar thematic issues, many of which can be traced back to the increased visibility of popular feminisms characteristic of the post-

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pl a ying s upe r he ro ine 103 feminist and Trump eras. It was also lauded as the first MCU film to be (co-­)directed by a woman, Anna Boden. Captain Marvel’s civilian personal is Carol Danvers, a character created by Marvel as a response of some sort to second-­wave feminisms. Debuting in the late1960s and created by writer Roy Thomas and artist Gene Colan, she was initially portrayed as an officer and security chief in the United States Air Force who worked with alien Kree superhero Mar-­Vell (the then-Captain Marvel) (Thomas and Colan 1968). She became the heroine Ms. Marvel in her own title in the late 1970s (Conway and Romita 1977)­– ­a moniker that evoked a sense of feminist emancipation through the prefix ‘Ms.’­– ­and later appeared in team titles such as Avengers and Uncanny X-­Men (the Ms. Marvel moniker was since given to Kamala Khan). In contextualising the character within the burgeoning second-­wave feminist movements, Mel Gibson argues that Danvers’s Ms. Marvel (alongside DC title Supergirl) offer a negotiation with, and a range of perspectives on, feminism at that time, a feminism that was typically presented in these comics as singular, rather than as complex and multiple . . . [T]hese comics show creators responding to and reflecting change in society with regards to feminism in that period. (Gibson 2014: 135)

These complicated engagements of the character with political feminisms would continue throughout the character’s publication history (and filmic adaptation). Indeed, Carolyn Cocca notes in her extensive exploration of the production contexts of Ms. Marvel that the mediation of feminist politics of the 1970s was a concrete purpose of the character (Cocca 2016b: 183–91). As such, Danvers is a clear example of Marvel creatives representing (an interpretation of) feminist politics within their publications, as demonstrated by her positioning within the series as editor for a women’s magazine, references to equality in the workplace, and the cover of the first issue declaring that ‘this female fights back’ (Cocca 2016b: 184–7). This highlights the character’s long and complex relationship to (post)feminism, a tradition that was continued through her filmic incarnation. Nonetheless, Danvers has appeared in varying forms, narratives and media since her inception and epitomises the phenomenon of superhero revisionism, and the political implications thereof, perhaps more so than any other Marvel character (bar Wolverine, discussed in Chapter 5). Like the Carol Danvers of previous eras, then, the Carol Danvers who appears in Captain Marvel is symptomatic of cultural shifts linking questions of feminine subjectivity with political-­and postfeminisms. The 2012 ongoing Captain Marvel comic book series written by Kelly Sue DeConnick (DeConnick et al. 2012) marked a radical relaunch of the

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character. Among ongoing debates around the marginalisation of women in mainstream comics, in terms of both production and representation, the title was both traditional in its reliance on the familiar superhero comic convention of reinvention and revision and ambitious in its dedication to a projected progressive politics of gender. Returning the character to her roots as a military woman, Danvers was bestowed the mantle of Captain Marvel, the male hero whom she helped in her early comic book appearances in the 1970s. Indeed, the first arc of DeConnick’s Captain Marvel is preoccupied with the question of Danvers’s superhero alias and inserts the character into a complex time-­travel narrative in which she fights in the pre-­feminist setting of World War II alongside a band of female soldiers echoing the real-­life Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron (WAFS), civilian employees technically unaffiliated with the military, who contributed to the war effort. This version of Danvers, much like the subsequent film Captain Marvel, uses military themes as a vehicle to explore these issues of (masculine) femininity and the critical success and audience appeal of the series arguably cemented the character as a viable option for filmic adaptation within popular discussions, alongside the authorial presence of DeConnick, who drew from her own experiences as both a feminist and military brat in her conceptualisation of the character (see Parrish 2013; Abad-­Santos 2019; Smith 2019). Following my discussion of postfeminist masquerade in filmic adaptations of Marvel heroines, then, it is possible to frame the film Captain Marvel within similar networks of meaning as a text that relies on and exploits wider cultural discourses centring on women’s empowerment associated with popular feminisms. Like other Marvel superheroines appearing in films, Danvers’s representation toys with cultural expectations of acceptable femininity, particularly in its utilisation of discourses of self-­empowerment through the cultivation of the feminine self. The film is, much like Captain America: The First Avenger, a period piece, this time set in the 1990s, attesting like the former film to postfeminist culture’s indulgence in what Munford and Waters refer to as ‘temporal slippages’ (discussed further in Chapter 8). Likewise, it enables a representation of the military of the 1990s attuned to postfeminist media products ‘that nostalgically celebrate military traditions and military masculinity [while] the military woman is seen heroically confronting conservative institutions which require modernization’ (Tasker 2011: 233). In the film, Danvers is, apparently, a member of a team of warrior heroes originating from the alien Kree Empire led by Yon-­Rogg. However, this is revealed to have been a complex lie enabled by false memories and manipulation­– ­Danvers is later established to have been a human US

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pl a ying s upe r he ro ine 105 Air Force pilot who became involved in a complex war between the Kree and the Skrulls through her air force mentor, Dr Wendy Lawson (herself an undercover Kree, a recast Mar-­Vell, who was acting in defence of the oppressed Skrulls). After an encounter with Kree leader Yon-­Rogg, Danvers receives a non-­consensual blood transfusion, rendering her part-­ Kree and giving her superpowers, alongside a series of false memories that lead her to believe that she was always a Kree warrior. After a Kree military operation goes wrong, Danvers escapes to Earth, where she discovers the extent of the Kree’s lies and ultimately fights for the rights of the refugee Skrulls, overpowering the oppressive Kree. From the beginning of the film, Yon-­Rogg, as Danvers’s leader, is shown periodically sparring with Danvers, motivating her and honing her fighting skills. His admission that Danvers is too heavily influenced by her emotions, and that by using a stronger sense of logic she will be able to ‘be the best version’ of herself, establishes Yon-­Rogg as an overbearing, patriarchal taskmaster akin to paternal figures who have trained heroines in previous action films (such as Elektra). It also signifies an engagement with neoliberal, postfeminist practices of self-­monitoring and -­curation: the discourse presented through Yon-­Rogg signals that, since there are multiple ‘versions’ of the self, Danvers’s responsibility is to cultivate the ‘best’, marking an incorporation of poststructuralist understandings of subjectivity. However, the film queries the appropriation of these discourses by a figure who ultimately comes to represent patriarchal oppression, for while Yon-­Rogg appears to have Danvers’s best interests in mind, she has merely been a pawn in his own oppressive exploits of the conquest of the Skrulls, a shapeshifting alien species that is eventually characterised as occupying refugee status, in line with other more recent representations of aliens in MCU films (see Chapters 9 and 10). Yon-­Rogg’s representation as an exaggerated personification of patriarchal control­– ­and his eventual elimination­– ­is key to the film’s eventual restoration of Danvers to her ‘best’ self. Throughout the film, Yon-­Rogg is positioned as not only a military superior for Danvers but is central to how she understands the world and herself. A central tenet of the character in this film is thus an identity crisis, further complicating the postfeminist masquerade to take account of the self-­made subject. Having been extracted by the Kree from her involvement with Dr Lawson/­Mar-­Vell after the crash and explosion of Lawson’s Light-­Speed Engine, a piece of technology that would end the Kree-­Skrull conflict, which bestowed superpowers upon Danvers, the Kree remove Danvers’s memories unbeknownst to her, an act of violation that can be likened to the rape of a mind. Indeed, Danvers effectively becomes Kree through a blood-­infusion administered

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by the Kree, merging her blood with Yon-­Rogg’s in a ­physical exchanging of bodily fluids­– a­gain, an invasive and non-­consensual act. The Kree also install a Photon Inhibitor that grants them the capacity to suppress Danvers’s superpowers (revealed at the end of the film to be of cosmic proportions). From this point, Yon-­Rogg manipulates Danvers, as demonstrated in their introductory sparring scene, and through Danvers’s understanding of Skrulls as violent terrorists whom the Kree must stop. The representation of this dynamic is a response to ongoing discussions in the popular media, motivated by popular feminisms, of gaslighting. This was initially a psychological term referring to particular forms of domestic abuse, in which an abuser exerts control over a victim through undermining the victim’s self-­perception and -­confidence, thereby crafting a psychological reality for the victim that is determined by the abuser, and in which the victim ultimately questions their own sanity. The term became part of common parlance around the time of Trump’s election campaign (Shoos 2017: 39). As Diane L. Shoos summarises, ‘[T]he expression appeared repeatedly in the press in relation to Trump’s denial of verifiable public information, including his own documented statements’ (Shoos 2017: 39), epitomising what has come to be known as the ‘post-­truth’ era and resulting in a public discourse that characterised Trump as gaslighting America (see Duca 2016; Carpenter 2018; Lord 2019). It is therefore notable that, having made contact with Danvers after she escapes from the Skrulls who kidnap her when a Kree mission goes awry, the Kree refer to Earth as ‘a real shithole’, echoing reports of Trump denouncing the prospect of the US offering immigrant protections to people from ‘shithole countries’, specifically African countries, Haiti and El Salvador, in early 2018 (Dawsey 2018). The recasting in Captain Marvel of a homogenous ‘Earth’ as a ‘shithole’ derogated by a corrupt, warfaring group of aliens through racist language used in real life to refer to low-­income countries by a white, Republican president of the US notwithstanding, this moment hints towards the eventual revelation of the Kree as the film’s villains and does so by evoking politically charged rhetoric that aligns the Kree with the misogynist and xenophobic politics of Trump. Given the widespread use of the term in mainstream discourses, scholars outside the field of psychology have unpacked the sociological, cultural and philosophical implications of gaslighting, in particular its intersections with misogyny and racism (see Heston and Joseph 2018; Wozolek 2018; Cull 2019; Davis and Ernst 2019; Sweet 2019; Spear 2019; Stark 2019). As Paige L. Sweet notes, ‘Gaslighting is effective when it is rooted in social inequalities, especially gender and sexuality, and executed in power-­laden intimate relationships’ (Sweet 2019: 852) and it has thus

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been used to make sense of systemic inequalities. More relevant to this discussion, though, are the implications of representations of gaslighting, a topic of interest for feminist film theorists, particularly in relation to the classical Hollywood Gothic melodrama (Kaplan 1983; Walsh 1984; Doane 1987; Fletcher 1995; Hanson 2007; Shoos 2017). Perhaps it is, then, more than coincidental that Carol Danvers shares a name with the antagonistic Mrs Danvers of Manderley in Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca and its 1940 film adaptation (Alfred Hitchcock). The film Rebecca marked the beginning of a cycle Doane refers to as the ‘paranoid woman’s film’ (Doane 1987: 123), which also includes Gaslight (George Cukor, 1944), based on the stage play from which the psychological term derives. Doane and others have made sense of these films through a psychoanalytic focus on women’s sexuality, especially in relation to the films’ domestic settings (in which the central women can be thought of as incarcerated by their husbands) (Doane 1987: 134). While Carol Danvers can traverse the galaxy as part of a team of Kree warriors, she remains imprisoned by the reality of which Yon-­Rogg has convinced her. Gothic melodramas discussed by Doane pose the central question ‘Is the husband really what he appears to be?’(Doane 1987: 124) and this directly maps onto a key premise of Captain Marvel, which asks ‘Is Yon-­Rogg really what he appears to be?’ (or even ‘Is Carol Danvers really what she appears to be?’). And like Doane’s characterisation of the Gothic melodrama, Captain Marvel interrogates (and exploits) the cinematic medium in its reliance on the audiovisual to present its central thesis of woman’s paranoia (Doane 1987: 126), mechanisms that themselves hinge on looking, seeing, perceiving and, ultimately, querying what is presented to its audience. Linking these themes to masquerade, then, Captain Marvel is both visually and thematically obsessed with appearances: nothing in the film is as it initially appears to be. Danvers is not really a Kree warrior; Lawson is actually Mar-­Vell; Goose the cat is actually a many-­tentacled alien; Danvers comically beats up an elderly woman on a bus after sensing she is a Skrull; indeed, Skrulls can shapeshift into anyone and are not villains­– ­the Kree actually are villains; Samuel L. Jackson as Fury has been digitally de-­aged to fit the film’s setting; Fury’s eye injury (which results in his trademark eyepatch worn in his other MCU appearances) was sustained through an encounter with Goose the cat and not some heroic deed; and the Supreme Intelligence, the artificial intelligence that rules the Kree, appears in its dimension as a kind of hologram that takes the shape of different people depending on with whom it converses. In Danvers’s case the Supreme Intelligence, rather confusingly, appears as Lawson/ Mar-­ ­ Vell (albeit with a different hair colour), further corroborating

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the film’s central paranoia. The generic reliance of superhero films on visual effects is crucial to this element, as revelations, such as the Skrulls’ shapeshifting or Goose’s transformation into the alien Flerkin, are conveyed through the spectacular illusions of computer-­generated imageries. Having established Danvers as a character who has been psychologically broken down by a villainous patriarch, it is possible to conceptualise the rebuilding or reconstitution of the character through the postfeminist masquerade. Having misled both its heroine and its assumed audience through misdirection and Yon-­Rogg’s lies, Captain Marvel is concerned with its heroine’s search for her ‘true’ identity as her sense of self has been almost entirely informed by Yon-­Rogg’s controlling presence. Again chiming with Trump-­era political discourse, Danvers is denied knowledge of the wrong done to her in this cosmic-­level gaslighting exercise. Scenes externalising Danvers’s identity crisis after she learns the truth hinge on her rejection of what she explicitly refers to as Yon-­Rogg’s lies. The concept of the ‘truth’ at the core of the character, though, is particularly resonant with postfeminist culture, in which discourses of individuals’ quest to form and present their ‘authentic’ self is inextricably bound up with neoliberal practices of consumption and self-­monitoring (Banet-­Weiser 2012). It also ties into what Gill and Orgad refer to as the neoliberal postfeminist confidence (cult)ure, through which the ideological spectre of ‘confidence’ becomes a technology of the self for the cultivation of women and girls’ self-­labour and -­monitoring to maintain traditional power structures (Gill and Orgad 2015).1 These practices are, as the authors suggest, ‘profoundly gendered’ (Gill and Orgad 2015: 339). Importantly, Gill and Orgad stress that the confidence (cult)ure is ‘putatively feminist’ (Gill and Orgad 2015: 339). This explains how Captain Marvel’s ostensibly feminist politics against a generalised male oppression can exist symbiotically alongside its postfeminist conceptualisations of the authentic self. Questions of ‘truth’ or ‘authenticity’ tie into the ongoing debates in this chapter relating to femininity and masquerade, and, like the previous ‘versions’ of the character appearing in comics and other media, Danvers of the film Captain Marvel accounts for a distrust of these discourses of self-­fulfilment through authenticity, although these reconvene in a character that is culturally reconstituted as a commercial enterprise appealing to popular feminisms. McRobbie’s discussions of postfeminist luminosity are useful in making sense of Danvers’s portrayal as a heroine whose success has been enabled by her own self-­fulfilment coming to light. Indeed, a popular nickname for Danvers in comics since her reboot as Captain Marvel is ‘Princess Sparklefists’, referring to the distinctive glow enveloping her fists when her powers are activated, and marking

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Figure 4.1  Princess Sparklefists: Brie Larson as Carol Danvers in Captain Marvel.

a further ironic reclamation of girlifying terminology. As Mary Celeste Kearney argues, ‘Sparklefication . . . is overwhelmingly raced, classed, gendered and aged, with white middle-­class female youth its primary targets and proponents. Indeed, sparkle is so ubiquitous in mainstream girls’ culture­– ­and so absent in boys’­– i­ t vies with pink as the primary signifier of youthful femininity’ (Kearney 2015: 263). Indeed, when Danvers finally reclaims her power in the film and unleashes it on the villainous Supreme Intelligence at its climax, it is portrayed as an explosion of blue and yellow light, prompting Fury to comment ‘You know you’re glowing, right?’­– ­a statement that perhaps frames Danvers as being pregnant with electromagnetic radiation (Figure 4.1). Further, McRobbie’s more recent ideas around the ‘trope of the perfect’ (McRobbie 2015: 3) in contemporary postfeminist media culture aligns with the embrace of Danvers with her ‘true’ self, a self characterised in the film as motivated by Danvers’s competitive, stubborn qualities as exemplified in her military identity, or, as Danvers puts it, striving to be ‘higher, further, faster, baby’. And while Danvers’s quest to be the ‘best’ version of herself does, to an extent, incorporate feminist-­inflected ideals of interracial and intergenerational sisterhood and solidarity through the inclusion of female supporting characters, as well as a rejection of patriarchal control, the means through which this is carried out­– ­through a reassertion of Danvers’s identity as a military woman­– ­nonetheless relies on a kind of masculinised competitive streak that reaches to the amplified individualism McRobbie suggests is key to ‘the perfect’. As McRobbie further elaborates, ‘the perfect’ has the potential to succeed the postfeminist masquerade ‘in an era now marked by young women’s feminist activism’, while still centring an ongoing need for women’s corporealities to be monitored (McRobbie 2015: 9). She explains that

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the idea of ‘the perfect’ suggests a more hard-­edged version of masquerade, one where the awareness of female subjugation as described by Riviere is compounded, not by a repudiation of feminism but instead by its translation into an inner drive, a determination to meet a set of self-­directed goals. (McRobbie 2015: 12)

While Captain Marvel essentially rejects the patriarchal authority that requires Danvers to be what it characterises as the ‘best’ version of herself, the resolution of the film is nonetheless that she must restore herself to being her ‘best’ version (or even the perfect version), whatever that entails. The film’s 1990s setting likewise provides material that masks Danvers as she tries to uncover her ‘true’ self. After landing on Earth, Danvers obtains a new set of clothes encompassing the grunge style that became widespread in the 1990s: a leather biker jacket over a Nine Inch Nails T-­shirt (a band associated with disaffected youth and goth subcultures of the time), a checked flannel shirt tied around her waist, ripped blue jeans and boots. Grunge, it has been argued, was a relatively gender-­neutral subculture, with an unusually high proportion of female performers, the history of which they have since been written out of in popular accounts (Strong 2011), rendering the style significant in its relationship towards (acceptable) femininities. Notably, through this style, which was eventually and inevitably incorporated into mainstream fashions, Danvers seeks to blend in with her surroundings: an ironic mask of disaffection in the character. The signifiers of 1990s nostalgia provide another masquerade through which the character is made sense in Captain Marvel, the commitment to which is solidified through the film’s extensive use of 1990s American grunge and rock music (alongside some pop and R&B). Most prominent of these is when Nirvana’s ‘Come as You Are’, whose lyrics reference both appearances and memories, is knowingly included at the film’s climax when Danvers faces the Supreme Intelligence and confronts it about her lifetime of being lied to. Indeed, Fury is shown in a scene in which the two infiltrate S.H.I.E.L.D.’s databases providing Danvers with a hat to further disguise her, stating ‘You look like somebody’s disaffected niece.’ Central to the film’s conceptualisation of Danver’s ‘true’ self is a sense of militaristic competition and honour that became characteristic of DeConnick’s tenure writing the character. While in the film, Danvers is eventually revealed to not be a Kree warrior but a human Air Force pilot who became embroiled in the exploits of Dr Wendy Lawson/­Mar-­Vell. Like Elektra, Captain Marvel somewhat frustrates its heroine through persistent flashbacks, albeit their reliability is framed as questionable. A series of flashbacks that is the result of an involuntary Skrull memory probe evoke key moments in Danvers’s life. Realising the significance

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pl a ying s upe r he ro ine 111 of Danvers in the Kree-­Skrull conflict through her proximity to Mar-­ Vell (whose Light-­Speed Engine they require), Danvers is taken by the Skrulls after a Kree military operation goes awry. Skrull General Talos (Ben Mendelsohn) states ‘Let’s open her up’ off-­camera as the erratic flashbacks begin with a slow tilting interior shot of an aircraft hangar taken from beneath the aircraft, doors gradually opening and revealing Danvers’s silhouette walking in slow motion away from the craft. The following disjointed shots are outside the hangar, showing Danvers in Air Force uniform slinging a duffle bag with embroidered military patches over her shoulder, and cutting to a medium close-­up of her face lit by evening sunlight, against which she wears distinctive aviator sunglasses. Talos and his Skrull colleague ponder the content of these shots in voice-­overs as Danvers is joined by her best friend and fellow pilot Maria Rambeau (Lashana Lynch) and Danvers answers Rambeau’s call to flight with her statement of ‘higher, further, faster, baby’. This evocation of unbridled competitive excess is symptomatic of Danvers’s commitment to the US Air Force in her pre-­Kree life, the line having been adapted from the title of DeConnick’s Captain Marvel comic book story arc, ‘Higher, Further, Faster, More’ (DeConnick and López 2014) and was also the film’s marketing tag line. The next memories shown, still under the invasive observation of the Skrulls, go further into her past, showing her competitively go-­cart racing as a child, being told by a boy racer ‘You’re going too fast’, crashing and being chastised by an authoritative man (later revealed to have been her father) who tells her ‘You don’t belong out here.’ In the next memory, she hangs in a close-­up shot from a thick rope, wearing military training uniform, while a male voice off-­camera yells ‘You’re not strong enough’, resulting in her falling from the rope. In a point-­of-­view shot from Danvers’s perspective on the ground, a man in military uniform says to the camera ‘They’ll never let you fly.’ The next flashback sequence involves Carol drinking in a bar while enduring further snide remarks from male colleagues (‘You do know why they call it a cockpit, don’t you?’). Her portrayal in these flashbacks (and subsequently when she recovers her sense of self later in the film) corroborates the stubborn, defiant qualities of the character­– s­ he is portrayed as having been repeatedly told she cannot participate in competitive male environments. Moreover, it is a military that is, as Tasker argues postfeminist texts are prone to present, in need of modernisation through its portrayal of military men with regressive gender politics (the film is set only two years after women were permitted to become fighter pilots in 1993). In this, the film evokes a distinctive mode of female masculinity associated with women in the military, which intersects with its intertextual commonalities with Top

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Gun (Tony Scott, 1986), among them the naming of Lawson’s cat Goose. In Top Gun, Navy pilot hero Maverick (Tom Cruise) displays a similar penchant to Danvers for the adrenaline rush offered by flying through his declaration of ‘I feel the need­– t­he need for speed.’ Both Danvers and Maverick occupy homosocial military settings, which ultimately result in manifold gendered implications.2 The film also bears a passing resemblance and contains references to The Right Stuff (Philip Kaufman, 1983), a historical action drama that centres on the true story of military pilots who were selected for the first crewed US space flight, again drawing from discourses of military masculinity to assert the heroic qualities of Danvers’s character. Yet, Danvers’s explicit representation as a military woman­– ­a facet of her identity that is present both in her life as a Kree fighter at the whim of Yon-­Rogg and as a human prior, and subsequent, to this­– ­resonates with ongoing feminist questions regarding men and women’s roles in wider media, following a complex tradition of military women’s representations in film and media as discussed extensively by Tasker (2010; 2011). Indeed, Tasker highlights that ‘The military woman is both conformist and challenging. In film and television narratives she signals transgression (in stepping outside the bounds of femininity) and conformity (in her desire to belong to a conservative, military community) in equal measure’ (Tasker 2011: 12), stressing that these characters cannot ‘be understood in any straightforward way as “transgressive” ’ (Tasker 2010: 209). As was the case in DeConnick’s comics, the film uses Danvers’s identity as a military woman as a key constituent of her essential ‘self’. The use of the military as a framing device alongside postfeminist discourses of authenticity here is likewise significant due to the complex relationship between political feminisms and a potentially oppressive state that manages military activity and imperialistic wars. This further signifies the film’s status as a complex site of negotiation about what it means to be feminist, feminine and a hero and relies on the superhero figure as a specifically American, patriotic cultural phenomenon. It is through Danvers’s identification with Maria Rambeau and her daughter Monica that she is portrayed as being able to reclaim her female subjectivity, with both characters having borne witness to Danvers’s life as an Air Force pilot. After she and Fury realise that Rambeau might hold more information about the mysterious Lawson, they visit the Rambeaus in rural New Orleans, where Maria is initially depicted in her Air Force overalls carrying out maintenance on her plane with Monica by her side. A cross-­racial familial bond is established between the Rambeaus and Danvers through Monica’s exclamation of ‘Auntie Carol’ on Danvers

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arrival at the residence,3 highlighting the film’s embrace of feminist notions of sisterhood that, through the Rambeaus’ presence as black women (and, possibly, Fury’s inclusion as a black man) transgresses racial barriers, gesturing towards an intersectional feminism that nonetheless centres the preservation of Danvers’s white femininity at its core. This is supported by the film’s emphasis on luminosity, continuing traditional modes of representation that ‘via a racist epistemology of light, have long idealized and promoted white women’s ‘glow” ’ (Kearney 2015: 264). Interestingly, it is through Monica’s testimony and the retrieval of artefacts pertaining to Danvers’s past that Danvers is portrayed as reclaiming her past life as an Air Force pilot (and Rambeau’s best friend). Danvers’s fragmented memories uncovered by the Skrulls are corroborated through an extended sequence in which the Rambeaus show Danvers photographs and objects from her past. This scene takes place at the Rambeaus’ dining room table in a reclamation of a domestic space in which Danvers is surrounded by trustworthy friends. The camera, sympathising with Danvers, emulates her footsteps through tracking into the room towards the table, at which Fury inspects a framed photograph alongside Monica. The camera tracks further towards the table, revealing a series of photographs Monica arranges on the table beside a cardboard box. Fury steps out of the shot, which then cuts to the other end of the table, centring Monica showing Danvers a photograph while stating ‘This is me and you on Halloween.’ Cutting to a close-­up of the photograph in question, it shows Monica, younger than she appears in the film, dressed in a leather flight jacket, aviator helmet and goggles and holding a pumpkin, reaching over to Danvers, who is dressed in a pink feather boa, wide-­brimmed hat, headscarf and pink-­tinted sunglasses, smiling. Evoking similar imagery from 2004’s The Punisher, in which Frank Castle is signified as vowing vengeance for this family’s murder through a close-­up of his clenched fist by a photo of his wife and son, the shot in Captain Marvel marks the character’s identification with previously lost loved ones whose enduring presence sets the character apart from the isolated masculine qualities of the male superhero. Monica says to Danvers in a voice-­over that accompanies the shot ‘I’m Amelia Earhart and you’re Janis Joplin’, and the presence of masquerade here is, again, significant in the context of the film’s ostensibly feminist themes. Amelia Earhart was an aviation pioneer, the first woman to fly solo across the North American continent in 1928 and the Atlantic Ocean in 1932, epitomising the phenomenon of the ‘lady pilot’, whose stereotype ironically became ‘advertisements for the ease of piloting and the safety of piloting’ around this time due to the general perception of women as less

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capable than men (Corn 1983: 76). She mysteriously disappeared over the Pacific Ocean in 1937 while attempting an around-­the-­world flight. Earhart nonetheless became a celebrity and feminist icon of sorts (see Ware 1994) and feminist readings of Earhart were reinvigorated in popular culture in 2018 after bones recovered from a Pacific island in 1941 were confirmed by forensic analysis to have belonged to her (Eltagouri 2018). Earhart’s presence can be felt throughout Captain Marvel, as well as DeConnick’s comics (especially through their inclusion of the WAFS), which both trade on the woman-­pilot-­as-­feminist discourse. The Halloween photograph of Monica as Earhart and Danvers as Joplin (who also gained exposure in a pre-­feminist time frame but has since been reframed through a feminist lens; see Rodnitzky 1999: 20–7) asserts this sentiment within the context of Danvers’s search for her ‘best self’. Similarly, much like the individualism at the heart of Danvers’s empowerment, Earhart’s feminism has been made sense of as speaking to ‘the American tradition of self-­help, individualism, and self-­reliance’ (Ware 1994: 75). Monica continues to show Danvers photographs: one featuring Danvers as a girl with her father (the go-­cart track from the previous flashback visible); one shows the Rambeaus and Danvers by a Christmas tree dressed in matching pyjamas; and in another picture a girl in an Earhart costume­– t­his time identified as Danvers. The close-­ups of the photographs cut between each other in a staccato manner while Monica’s vocal descriptions of each of the photographs reverberate and eventually blend into each other and fade out into the soft non-­diegetic score accompanied by a close-­up of Danvers pensively looking down at the pictures and followed by a panning shot across the display on the table. The disjointed qualities of the sequence align with Danvers’s disjointed sense of identity, with the sequence culminating in Monica remembering that she forgot to retrieve Danvers’s flying jacket, another relic of Danvers’s past life that attests to her true identity. A close-­up of Danvers’s military dog tag, of which only half remains with the letters spelling ‘CAROL DAN’, finalises the sequence, and Maria’s voice explains off-­camera, ‘That was all that survived the crash.’ This sequence is fundamental in the reconstitution of Danvers’s subjectivity in the film, as she literally pieces together moments from her past. Indeed, the uncovering of Danvers’s memories with the help of her friends tends to Marvel’s ongoing tensions around legacy and revisionism (in all forms of media), and Danvers bears more than passing resemblance to Marvel’s arch-­legacy character Wolverine, whose intricacies I discuss in relation to Logan in the following chapter. Both characters are portrayed as suffering from amnesia, struggling to piece together their past

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pl a ying s upe r he ro ine 115 selves. However Captain Marvel’s focus on memory in these crucial revelatory scenes is significant as it corresponds to the larger political project of feminist memory as a self-­reflexive and productive mode of activism that addresses gaps in conventional historical analysis through feminist memory work (see Hirsch and Smith 2002; Kuhn 2002; Reading 2014; Chidgey 2019). These scenes portray the women engaging in a memory work, an interpretative activity with ethical implications that reconstitutes Danvers’s past in relation to her interactions with different institutions (the military, the family, national holidays) and the presence of specific items of clothing depicted in these images. Having noted this, however, it is still interesting that the film frames Maria Rambeau’s historical accounts and photographs as what really happened, as unquestioningly factual. The materiality of Danvers’s identity is expressed through these photographs. Clothing, or costume, plays a crucial role here and corresponds equally to the importance of masquerade outlined in this chapter. Likewise, in a subsequent scene, after Danvers decides that she will confront the Kree alongside the Skrulls, Fury and Maria (and Goose the cat), Danvers must decide on a new superhero uniform as the green Kree-­coded costume she wore throughout the film no longer applies. Further attesting to postfeminist modes of feminine fashion consumption by women and girls, Danvers asks Monica for assistance as she is ‘obviously the only person around here with any sense of style’. The scene takes place at night, with the two at Maria’s front porch, accentuating the flashing and glowing visual effects that flaunt Danvers’s luminosity towards the end of the film. Using a keypad on her wristband, Danvers can change the appearance of her uniform on demand (it initially turns blue with gold accents). She is shown offering the keypad to Monica in a medium shot as Monica exerts her astonishment towards the technology. Monica taps the keypad and the shot cuts back to a medium-­long shot of the pair, Danvers centred to showcase the change in uniform, brought on by a glowing light that scans over her body to reveal the uniform’s new colour scheme. Monica’s first selection appears red and gold, a homage, perhaps, to Iron Man’s armour (or, indeed, DC’s rival character, also known as Captain Marvel or Shazam, who also appeared in a film adaptation in 2019). The second variant emulates the colours of Danvers’s Ms. Marvel-­ era ‘swimsuit’ costume through black base colouring with gold accents; the following variant is illuminated by rainbow neon colours harking back to the psychedelic colour scheme of Thor: Ragnarok. The next colour scheme reaches back to the white and green costume worn by Mar-­Vell in the comics. The characters pause to laugh between each uniform change, while Danvers finally points at Monica in the reverse medium shot, stating

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‘Since we’re on the same team’, specifically referring to Monica’s US Air Force T-­shirt. Throughout Danvers’s stay at the Rambeaus’, Monica is dressed in the red oversized shirt that bears a large blue vintage USAF insignia containing the gold Hap Arnold Wings motif introduced during World War II, and ‘U.S. AIR FORCE’ printed in white underneath. The T-­shirt previously belonged to Carol and appeared during the bar flashback uncovered by the Skrulls, indicating that the heritage of the character reaches both back to previous generations and forwards to the future via Monica. It also showcases Danvers’s reclamation of her ‘best’ self through the embrace of the US military. Monica is shown looking up at Danvers, shrugging and swiping the keypad, a moment of bonding that is finalised in the following revelatory shot­– ­showing the uniform’s colours now as red, blue and gold in accordance with the USAF T-­shirt­– ­that zooms out from Danvers’s face in close-­up as she asks Monica ‘How do I look?’ and is accompanied by a familiar heroic musical score. Monica answers ‘fresh’ (a remark that draws from a previous scene in which Monica is established as an avid viewer of The Fresh Prince of Bel-­Air (NBC, 1990–6)) and the pair give each other a victorious high-­five. In this triumphant moment that evokes both sisterly bonding and patriotism, Danvers is portrayed as having re-­formed her identity, yet in keeping with the tradition of superhero masquerade, it showcases ‘an ongoing metamorphosis . . . a transformation that must remain active to retain its significance’ (Weltzien 2005: 243). The scene is explicit in its use of masquerade as being central to the (re)constitution of the character­– ­Danvers is shown trying on different versions of the same costume­– ­and it is significant that the facet of militarism is settled on as an essential quality. Danvers’s reclamation of her subjectivity culminates in Danvers’s rejection of Yon-­Rogg’s lies in a scene that further evokes the threatening language of domestic abuse. On encountering Danvers in a scene in which the Kree capture the Skrulls alongside Danvers, Yon-­Rogg immediately asks her ‘What did you do to your uniform?’ indicating a sense of ownership over Danvers’s choice in dress. When she confronts him over his previous lies to her, he answers ‘I made you a better version of yourself’, before remotely activating the Photon Inhibitor, suppressing Danvers’s powers completely, and stating ‘What’s given can be taken away.’ Temporarily robbed of her luminosity, Danvers engages in hand-­to-­hand combat with Yon-­Rogg, and the film here gestures towards an empowerment that does not require sparklefication. It is therefore significant that Danvers restores her electromagnetic power after facing the Supreme Intelligence (again appearing as Lawson/­Mar-­Vell) and defeats the Kree glowing (as noted by Fury).

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pl a ying s upe r he ro ine 117 The film, then, offers a somewhat polarised representation of female superheroism: Carol journeys from one extreme­– a­ Gothic heroine who has been gaslit into a former shadow of herself, under the false impression that she has been moulded into the best version of herself by a benevolent ruler­– ­to another­– ­an omnipotent superbeing who absorbs energy and radiates it back out, destroying anything in her path. She sheds one extreme mask of femininity in exchange for one that is higher, further, faster. Throughout, the emphasis is on Danvers being the ‘best version’ of herself; although the film ultimately draws a distinction between the shaping of acceptable femininities by a patriarchal oppressor (now redundant according to postfeminist sensibility), and the shaping of individual feminine subjectivities by way of choice. Enveloped within these discourses are ideals around postfeminist authenticity and luminosity. This hinges on ideas of women’s superheroic empowerment, like the p ­ ostfeminist heroines of the 2000s, but there is additional resonance here when considered in terms of reclamations of the ‘truth’ and identity. Doubtless, Danvers’s reclaiming of her past self via an identification with militarism is noteworthy in a wider cultural context in which the film was discursively framed as feminist. Significantly, the film was accompanied in US theatres with a USAF recruitment advertisement emulating the film’s aesthetics and accompanied by the question ‘What will your origin story be?’ aimed at and featuring women specifically (U.S. Air Force Recruiting 2019). Likewise, the film­makers worked closely with the US Air Force Public Affairs Entertainment Liaison office, which provided ‘direct access to resources including personnel, aircraft and equipment, technical assistance and military advice and locations’ and ‘ensured the portrayal of the Airmen and missions were plausible and realistic’ (McRae 2019). Incidentally, Captain Marvel is dedicated to the memory of Major Stephen ‘Cajun’ Del Bagno, the Thunderbird pilot who acted as a key military consultant during the film’s production but was killed during a test flight less than a year before its release. The Air Force Thunderbird flyover formation carried out over Los Angeles to mark the film’s premiere was therefore also reframed as a tribute to Del Bagno, further emphasising the authenticity of this mutual relationship (Atkeison 2019). Indeed, the authenticity of Captain Marvel’s portrayal within USAF settings was centred in promotional content and interviews with cast and crew. In a short edited clip tweeted by Marvel Entertainment, Larson is shown stating ‘The core of her is the Air Force’ while wearing Danvers’s Air Force fatigues, while directors Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck note that ‘The Air Force was welcoming and amazing’ (Marvel Entertainment 2019). These clips are intercut with dramatic footage of fighter planes taking off,

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Larson as Danvers posing heroically while in uniform, meeting with real-­ life military women and participating in a flight herself. The centralising of Danvers’s military identity within and around the film alongside the USAF’s involvement in its production echo the production and marketing context of Top Gun, which David L. Robb defines as ‘The most successful collaboration between Hollywood and the military of all time’ in his study of US military involvement in Hollywood cinema (Robb 2004: 154). While the postfeminist discourses around women’s self-­identity and empowerment in Captain Marvel clearly resonated with the specific cultural landscape in which it premiered, its focus on female military subjectivity as a remedy to oppressive patriarchal regimes, like previous iterations of military women in popular culture, remains contradictory. Discourses of women’s empowerment in the film are embroiled with both a rejection of masculine oppression and an embrace of US militarism. The ‘authentic’ self uncovered in the film reads as another mask of femininity, functioning within ongoing discourses of self-­monitoring exemplified in a seeming rejection of the patriarchal monitoring of women’s bodies. It is this specific shape that Captain Marvel’s feminism takes, which is yet another reformulation of the postfeminist masquerade.

Notes 1. It is important, here, not to discredit the validity of women who have been at the receiving end of psychological abuse to rebuild their self-­confidence­– ­it is, in part, a systematic breakdown of victims’ self-­confidence by abusers that enables abuse to be an effective means of control in the first place. The concern here is the appropriation of self-­help and wellbeing discourses by neoliberal systems and institutions as a gesture towards achieving gender equality throughout society but that nonetheless maintain an unequal status quo that specifically targets women as a form of self-­monitoring labour. Indeed, Gill and Orgad (following Long and Woodward 2015) problematise the emergence of well­ being and intervention groups that reframe responses to violence against women within the terms of confidence (cult)ure (Gill and Orgad 2015: 327). 2. See, for example, Tania Modleski’s discussion of masculinity and the equation of sex and war in Top Gun (Modleski 1991: 62–4). 3. The lack of a romantic love interest for Danvers in Captain Marvel is significant here, as her positioning among Maria and Monica Rambeau offers opportunity for a queer reading and capitalises on the success of Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2’s reconceptualisation of a ‘queer’ family, which I discuss briefly in Chapter 7. Nonetheless, a more detailed queer reading of Captain Marvel is beyond the scope of this particular discussion.

C H A PT E R 5

Marvel Legacy: Girl Heroism and Intergenerationality in Marvel Films

Though the women featured in adaptations of Marvel comics are largely adult, particular occasions where girls are also aligned with heroism are worth examining, for, as Brown suggests, these characters possess ‘exceptional abilities at fighting, intelligence, beauty­ – ­and a sense of humor’ (Brown 2011a: 142), further responding to postfeminist culture’s emphasis on women’s self-­sufficiency and wit. Likewise, Sarah Projansky ­suggests that the ‘proliferation of discourse about girls literally coincides chronologically with the proliferation of discourse about postfeminism’ (Projansky 2007: 42). Brown similarly suggests that these heroines function particularly fruitfully in a postfeminist culture, as they present feminine strength and agency, while the threat to masculine power could be alleviated by the fact that these characters are children (Brown 2011a: 166). They also function as part of discourses that posit that young girls are already empowered, discourses that were commercialised as part of the Girl Power trend of the 1990s (Brown 2011a: 147–8). Indeed, Driscoll argues that postfeminism in relation to the girl hero is ‘an historically determined conceptual apparatus that brings the girl into view in particular ways, and is now inseparable from her’ (Driscoll 2015). Nonetheless, girl heroines offer a unique insight into feminine subjectivity in popular culture and should be carefully assessed. Television series such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer suggest that the teen girl heroine may have been more widely accepted on the small screen. However, fantasy franchises such as the Twilight Saga have indicated the profitability of films focusing on teenage heroines and aimed at female audiences, although this is yet to transfer into the superhero genre. Aside from postfeminist issues to do with race and class, representations of girl heroines posit questions around identity and (re)generation in superhero narratives. These issues are invariably gendered, especially when considering the older-­generation characters that accompany them. Thus, this chapter uses two such representations­– ­Abby Miller in Elektra and Laura/­X-­23 in

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Logan­– ­to identify how they address issues of legacy and regeneration in gendered terms. Postfeminist discourses of Girl Power are congruous with the character of Abby in Elektra, which was released in 2005, pre-­ empting the trend towards girl heroines in later science-­fiction/­fantasy ­blockbusters. Laura in Logan, however, is a much bleaker representation of what is at stake for later generations of superheroines in a post-­apocalyptic dystopia released post-­Trump. Both films foster discussion about the relationships formed between young heroines and their s­ uperheroic (or, indeed, antiheroic in both of these cases) elders; both Elektra and Logan/­ Wolverine are positioned as parental figures to younger versions of themselves, but the portrayals of these relationships and the manifestation of ideas of girls’ empowerment are gendered.

Interconnected Womanhood in Elektra The teenage girl subjectivity offered through Abby Miller in Elektra incorporates several elements pertaining to discourses of postfeminist femininity across generations of women and girls. Abby is presented as attempting to navigate the adult world of superheroics while also maintaining her integrity as a teenage girl, learning who she is. ‘Authenticity’ and ‘the self’ are concepts that resonate within postfeminist culture (Banet-­Weiser 2012). But further to this are such discourses deployed by postfeminist culture concerning the teenage girl. Femininity is here marked as an essential truth of womanhood. As a result, Driscoll argues, ‘the difficulties with which girls negotiate adolescence have mostly been interpreted as the struggle for proper femininity, or the struggle to retain a sense of self in the face of expected femininity’ (Driscoll 2002: 58). However, in the case of Miller, who is positioned within Elektra as a combined surrogate daughter/­mirror image of the central heroine, issues of the self and authentic femininity are intertwined with the issue of feminine heroism. Miller’s negotiation of ‘authentic’ femininity thus takes on many conflicting meanings. Introduced as Elektra’s assassination target, alongside her father Mark, Abby Miller follows in the footsteps of women who are initially presented as ordinary, rather than heroic. She is merely Elektra’s neighbour after Elektra is asked to move to a secluded island and await further instructions about her next assassination job. After Miller and Elektra meet, the two form a familial bond, engaging in chat and gentle teasing. Indeed, Elektra is positioned as a mother figure throughout the film, taking a seat at the family dining table when Miller invites her over for Christmas. This narrative turn could be seen as shoehorning the character back into

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traditionally feminine, maternal terms. Inness, for example, suggests that both Sarah Connor and Ripley’s positioning as mothers in their respective films limits those characters (Inness 1998: 111, 125). Further to this reading, though, is the notion that Elektra’s engagement with the family offers the opportunity for female bonding. Hence, Elektra’s embodiment of maternal protectiveness towards Miller might actually offer a kind of meditation on intergenerational feminine bonding, which is nonetheless shaped by postfeminist culture’s centring of white, affluent femininity. Indeed, much of the discourse in Elektra (like that of Captain Marvel) focuses on the notion of the self in terms of womanhood and the possibility that Miller, a girl, is ‘like’ Elektra, the woman. Not only is the film the first adaptation of a Marvel comic to privilege a woman’s point of view (indicated throughout the film through the persistent use of point-­of-­view shots), it also engages in a dialogue referring to womanhood: what it means for (white) women to be ‘like’ each other. The discourse of likeness between generations is also a key component of the portrayal of girlhood in Logan, although it becomes apparent that Laura represents a better, more hopeful version of Wolverine. Nonetheless, like the titular character in Logan, Elektra decides she must protect Miller, and she and Miller are in turn frequently shown in terms of their similarities. It is implied that Elektra takes Miller under her wing because she sees herself in Miller. Both Miller and Elektra’s mothers died as a result of their embroilment with unsavoury forces and so Elektra identifies with the motherless child. When Miller dyes her hair brown in an effort to disguise herself, Elektra hallucinates herself as a child when Miller approaches. Miller later wants Elektra to show her how to use her weapons. ‘I want to learn to defend myself’, Miller says. Elektra responds that they are ‘offensive weapons. For killing’, exemplifying the complexities of the bond that is the result of Elektra’s (masculine-­coded) antiheroism, but culminates in the union of two feminine subjectivities. Further, Miller justifies herself by pointing out that Elektra uses the sais, her fork-­like weapons, to which Elektra answers, ‘I don’t want you to be like me’, again articulating questions over female subjectivity as separate from, yet bound to, other women. Instead, Elektra leads Miller to the dining room, makes her sit on the floor, and shows her how to meditate. The two sit opposite each other in a medium-­long shot, a mirror image signifying that the two characters are linked rather than unified. An action sequence in which Miller and her father are chased through a forest by villains, the Hand, reveals that Miller actually possesses great power. In the sequence, they are captured by a member of the Hand, his arm around Miller’s throat with a knife held out. Elektra runs to Miller

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but stops upon seeing the knife, a close-­up of her worried face showcasing the danger of the moment. Miller is positioned as helpless, but a close-­up shows her looking down, followed by a close-­up of the warrior beads she wears (over which she and Elektra had previously bonded) tumbling out of her hand. Ultimately, Miller fights the assassin­– ­the utilisation of slow motion indicates the force of her kicks­– ­while Mark throws a knife at another. Miller then uses her beads to thwart the remaining assassin. The revelation of Miller’s hidden power plays into the scenes in which she expresses interest in Elektra, signalling that her innate abilities offer her a link to Elektra, whom she recognises as being like herself. The power thus offers a gateway to further their bonding practices, which thus far has been denied by Elektra, though this changes after she discovers that Miller is ‘the Treasure’, a child prodigy with extraordinary abilities who is sought by the Hand. The subjectivities of action heroine and teenage girl that the two characters respectively encompass coalesce in the final confrontation with Hand member Kirigi. The two characters’ arcs culminate into a personification of female bonding through the spectacle of physical activity. After Elektra is overpowered by Kirigi, who controls a series of wafting sheets to limit her movement, Miller enters the scene, which takes place in Elektra’s childhood home, adding yet more credence to the interlinking of these characters as their narrative arcs climax in a place of childhood trauma and disrupted family. Miller approaches Kirigi, whirling her beads, but he dodges them. This is intercut with shots of Elektra moving under the sheets and suddenly breaking free of them, running towards the camera. Instead of attacking Kirigi, she runs up the stairs next to him, holding out her hand for Miller. Elektra pulls Miller up and the two women escape, Elektra comically commenting, ‘You’re a pain in the ass!’ to which Miller answers, ‘So are you!’ They both count to three and simultaneously jump out of the window together, completely synchronised at last. The characters have been reconciled through the action in this unifying moment; both women hit the ground at the same time and a medium-­long shot shows them both crouching next to each other. The shot switches to one behind them on the floor as they both get up and run at the same time. However, Elektra is unable to stop another Hand member from killing Miller. After defeating the remaining assassins, Elektra carries Miller to the room in which Elektra discovered her dead mother as a child, laying her on the bed, again emphasising the likenesses between the characters. A flashback reminds Elektra of her mentor Stick telling her that her heart is pure, meaning that she has gained the ability to reawaken the dead

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mar v e l l e gac y 123 through her training. She attempts to use her powers on Miller but seemingly fails. Elektra then rests her head on Miller, just as she rested her head on her mother as a child. Finally, Miller awakens and the two are united once more. At the end of the film, Elektra leaves Mark and Abby, although she tells Abby, ‘We’ll find each other.’ Outside, she mutters to herself, ‘Please don’t let her be like me’, and Stick answers from behind her, ‘Why not? You didn’t turn out so bad’, signalling a narrative of self-­acceptance that parallels Miller’s narrative of self-­actualisation. Importantly, Miller undergoes the process of self-­actualisation through her interactions with Elektra. However, it is not only her potential as a heroine that is realised but that of being a teenage girl on the cusp of womanhood. At the end of the film, these subjectivities have been reconciled, and the characters unite in a manner that plays into a notion of interconnected womanhood, in opposition to more masculine, individualist ideals associated with male heroism. This narrative is an anomaly among Marvel films, and while the film also engages with frustration tactics such as those I discussed in Chapter 3, it offers a distinct picture of feminine solidarity that is informed by postfeminist discourses of authenticity, acceptance and universal womanhood. As Projansky notes, many of the ways in which contemporary popular culture represents girls can be understood to be working through questions about the effects of postfeminism­– ­on mothers, daughters, and the gendered organization of society­– ­just as representations of postfeminist women can be understood to be working through questions about the effects of feminism. (Projansky 2007: 46)

Projansky’s description of the anxieties postfeminist culture negotiates regarding the intergenerational effects of feminism can be seen within Elektra. Though it offers no concrete answers, the film engages in discourses involving the effects of the empowerment of teenage girls with specific reference to older female role models and the womanhood they represent.

All-­New, All-­Different: The Legacy of Wolverine in Logan Intergenerational links, specifically in relation to the idea of a heroic legacy, is a key theme of X-­Men franchise entry Logan, which, as is expected of Fox’s X-­Men films, centres on the titular Logan/­Wolverine. The film knowingly plays into superhero themes related to (re)generation and revisionism through the character of Logan’s daughter-­surrogate and clone, Laura, codenamed X-­23 (Dafne Keen). Approximately eleven years old,

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Laura is not quite a teenager and in this sense falls somewhat outside the bounds of the postfeminist teen heroine outlined earlier. Nonetheless, Laura’s presence as a younger, female ‘version’ of Wolverine, who in many ways mirrors, parallels or even imitates him, likewise addresses issues of the regeneration of Marvel characters not only across media formats but also across genders. Wolverine, the character, is an intertext, which, as Derek Johnson argues, highlights, ‘the ways in which [Marvel’s] reorganization of characters into brands and subbrands has erased and rebuilt the boundaries among and between comic book and comic book-­derived texts’ (Johnson 2007: 67). Indeed, Logan itself is a film that exploits the character’s potential for boundary-­breaking, reconfiguring understandings of the character in terms of legacy and regeneration. True to poststructuralist readings of identity, it is meaningless to think of the character of Wolverine as having a stable and fixed origin. Logan’s use of the X-­23 storyline thus has the potential to expand understandings of superheroes (or, at the very least, of the ‘Wolverine’ brand) beyond the white masculine ideal, beyond boundaries of age and nation-­states. Indeed, Logan’s status as a superhero-­ western pastiche, and its (re)negotiation of the masculinist discourses that feed into both genres, is in part what makes possible the combination of the two Wolverine narratives­– ­in which the older Wolverine coincides with the new Wolverine, who is simultaneously identical yet radically different to the former. Logan was the cumulative result of a number of converging cultural and industrial factors­– ­the then-­state of US politics in the latter half of the 2010s; the supposed senescence of the superhero blockbuster; the ageing of the first X-­Men cast; the trend towards geri-­action cinema; and the film’s reliance on two popular, thematically linked Marvel comics storylines. Much of the film draws from Marvel’s alternate-­universe comics series titled ‘Old Man Logan’ (Millar and McNiven 2009), which portrayed a dystopian future America in which Logan had retired from superheroing after a particularly traumatic event, and in which the villains of the Marvel Universe take over the country. In the book, Logan has become a humble farmer and has a wife and daughter, who are inevitably murdered by villains, their deaths (yet again) acting as the motivation for Logan’s action narrative. The storyline, much like its adaptation, borrows elements of classic westerns, especially Unforgiven (Clint Eastwood, 1992), in which Clint Eastwood plays retired gunslinger-­turned-­pig-­farmer who is called upon to carry out one last job (and in which Morgan Freeman, coincidentally, plays a character called Ned Logan). The story of Laura, though, stems from Marvel comics’ ‘X-­ 23:

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mar v e l l e gac y 125 Innocence Lost’ arc (Kyle et al. 2006), in which Laura’s origins as a genetically enhanced Wolverine clone are put forward. Here, Laura’s story is told from the perspective of Dr Sarah Kinney, a researcher working for a facility on cloning technology, who discovers that Wolverine clones have been unsuccessful due to a corrupted Y-­chromosome in the DNA sample. Replicating the X-­chromosome makes the clone viable­– ­but also female­ – ­and remedies this problem. Through a series of unpleasant events that hinge on scientist Dr Zander Rice’s corruption and aggrieved sense of vengeance (his father had been killed by an escaped Wolverine during the Weapon X programme as perhaps a somewhat warped variation of ‘women in refrigerators’), Kinney is forced to carry the clone-­embryo to term herself and after bonding with the child embarks on a mission to free her. However, Laura’s training as a weapon entailed the development of a trigger scent that, when smelled by Laura, causes her to engage in frenzied violence and kill the person from whom the scent emanates. In a tragic twist, Laura murders her own mother, who was tainted with the trigger scent. This is a turn of events that Brown asserts ‘makes it clear that while she [Laura] may have been bred, trained and exploited by a corrupt component of the military industrial complex, the real tragedy of her creation is that she was really nothing more than a science experiment for her mother’ (Brown 2011b: 84). Indeed, Marvel comics’ frequent reliance on clone narratives to either reboot or revise established characters is noteworthy and also feeds into discourses present in the representation of cloning, which, unsurprisingly, are gendered and raced (see Weinbaum 2019 for a detailed discussion of what is referred to as ‘reproductive slavery’, in which the legacy of slavery lives on in the reproductive labour performed by poor women of colour). Cloning itself has a complex media history that is beyond the scope of this chapter; however, it is worth noting the significance of Logan, whose story relies heavily on the unfulfilled cultural promises of biocapitalism, also known as the ‘tissue economy’, ‘bioeconomy’ and ‘lively capital’ (Weinbaum 2019), to these discussions. Logan’s blending of (versions of) the ‘Old Man Logan’ and ‘X-­23’ storylines­– ­one about an elderly Logan who reclaims the Wolverine identity and one about a young girl who is assigned the Wolverine identity as the saviour of mutantkind­– ­is noteworthy. Both narratives hinge on violence, and much like the forms of heroism explored in Elektra, questions of intergenerational heroism are centred in Logan. However, Logan’s focus on genetic likeness as a frame of reference for intergenerational solidarity takes on new meaning when combined with the mutant metaphor characteristic of X-­Men narratives. Indeed, while the discourses around

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mother-­daughter relationships are complexly negotiated in Elektra, it would be rash to assume that the father-­daughter pairing in Logan is identical to this. Indeed, the absence of Laura’s mother further corresponds to ongoing discourses in the popular media around cloning. In Logan, artificial life-­making processes are entwined with the corruption of the state, and while ‘Mexican girls’ are the victims in this portrayal of the tissue economy, those Mexican girls are a glaring absence in the film­– ­which explicitly clarifies that the nurse who smuggled Laura out of the gene technology facility and calls on Logan for help is not Laura’s mother. Concerning wider gendered discourses about artificial reproductive technologies, Laura’s conception indicates a straightforward exchange of (female) body parts, in which bodily matter is a disposable resource and women’s bodies are mobilised for other women’s motherhood (see Leve 2013). On the other hand, it is Logan’s paternal genetic links that are heralded as significant in the film. Beyond being a simplistic stand-­in for patriarchy though, it is useful to think about how, as Yaeger and Kowaleski-­Wallace suggest, ‘the father’s authority can be subverted, disembodied, or dissipated in a variety of fictional and political tropes’ (Yaeger and Kowaleski-­Wallace 1989: xx), and while Brown argues that comics featuring paternalistic figures and young sidekicks ‘valorize and validate the hegemonic order’ (Brown 2011b: 85) it is also noteworthy that Logan exploits the flexibility of the ‘Wolverine’ phenomenon to put forward a narrative in which the paternal figure perishes for the rights of the marginalised. This occurs through the film’s experimentation with genre and self-­aware pastiche; through its bringing together of an old male and young female Wolverine; and through its reliance on violence. Interwoven through this is a discursive dusting away of the cobwebs of a corrupt, masculinist, neoliberal capitalism, and a heralding of a new generation of a superhero subjectivities that nonetheless remain informed by prior understandings of both Wolverine and girl heroines. The film effectively makes use of the transgressive potential and boundary-­breaking of girl-­inflicted violence, which blends seamlessly with the emergence of a new-­old version of Wolverine. Disengaged from the fight for mutant rights, Logan is portrayed in the film as disconnected from the legacy of Xavier’s struggle to be ‘mutant and proud’. In a postmutant world whose political economy is dictated by a particularly brutal form of neoliberal capitalism, the struggle for mutant rights seems almost trivial. Nonetheless, hope is restored through the figure of Laura and her mutant peers. A product of the turn towards R-­rated ‘adult’ superhero adaptations such as Deadpool, Logan was praised by critics for its gritty realism and reworking of the superhero genre, as

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well as its depiction of violence. While drawing on visceral geri-­action conventions in its portrayal of Logan, the film also builds on a previous cycle of killer-­girl films that gained popularity in the late 2000s and early 2010s, such as Hard Candy (David Slade, 2005), Kick-­Ass (Matthew Vaughn, 2010), Sucker Punch (Zack Snyder, 2011), Hanna (Joe Wright, 2011), Kick-­Ass 2 (Jeff Wadlow, 2013) and Violet and Daisy (Geoffrey S. Fletcher, 2013). Logan also makes distinctive use of the X-­Men’s mutant metaphor to explore themes of exploitation and marginalisation, expressed via the maladjusted father-­daughter dynamic. Set in a dystopian 2029, where mutants are all but extinct, the film follows Logan as he attempts to protect Laura and her guardian Gabriela (Elizabeth Rodriguez) from a sinister scientific research group known as Alkali-­Transigen, led by Dr Zander Rice (Richard E. Grant). Alkali-­Transigen’s scientists were able to eradicate naturally occurring mutantism in the general population by inserting chemicals into genetically modified foods. Subsequently, the group produced genetically engineered mutants who were trained to be used as weapons. Using Logan’s DNA (obtained by the members of the Alkali Lake project­– ­the source of Logan’s suffering throughout the X-­Men film series), Alkali-­Transigen created Laura, the female Wolverine clone, through the ‘X-­23 Project’, as well as a near-­exact copy of Logan himself, code named ‘X-­24’. The film also features an ageing and neurologically debilitated Charles Xavier, who is cared for by Logan and the albino mutant Caliban (Stephen Merchant), whose dress is styled to resemble Eastwood’s iconic Man with No Name. The three of them represent the excess of marginalisation that mutantkind has undergone in this dystopian setting, and the film therefore, according to Asif et al., ‘moves the issues of race and social justice from troubling allegorical interpretation to the forefront of the narrative’ (Asif et al. 2019: 158). Moreover, Logan was released mere months after the election of Donald Trump and so its theme of capitalist exploitation of marginalised people was synchronous with contemporary discourses that led to his presidency. Also alarmingly apt was the film’s plot of the liberation of undocumented children of Mexican descent via asylum in Canada. Much of the action focuses on Logan’s paternalistic protectiveness of Laura, by then such a staple of the post-­9/­11 superhero action film that it necessitated, here, a self-­reflexive meditation on the role of ageing men more widely. Effectively being slowly poisoned by the adamantium laced through his bones due to the Weapon X procedure he endured in X-­Men Origins, Logan’s healing factor gradually fails him throughout the film, leaving him physically weak and often immobilised. Nonetheless,

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Logan heroically sacrifices himself in the final act of the film, protecting Laura and her fellow undocumented child-­mutants en route to North Dakota, where they gain safe passage over the border to Canada. The social resonance of Logan in the early days of the Trump era is clear. On a rudimentary level, the parallels between the film’s portrayal of Latinx peoples exploited for the purposes of American neoliberal capitalist gain crossing national and political borders is apparent. While issues around undocumented (specifically Latinx) immigrants predate the Trump administration, the rhetoric of Trump’s election campaign and subsequent presidency amplified the urgency, and inequality, of a situation in which the legal protections of undocumented immigrant children in the US were becoming increasingly diminished. In the film, Logan is called upon by Gabriela Lopez (Elizabeth Rodriguez), a former nurse who worked at the Alkali-­Transigen facility while the mutant cloning project was taking place. Introducing Laura as Logan’s daughter based on the determining factor of his DNA (though he is initially unaware of this), Gabriela smuggled Laura out of the facility and needs Logan’s help to accompany her to North Dakota while pursued by the villainous Reavers, a cybernetically enhanced task force led by Donald Pierce (Boyd Holbrook) under the authority of Dr Rice. Gabriela’s description of abuse at the heart of the X-­23 Project was aptly timed towards the impending Trump era. Depicted in a series of video diary entries Gabriela secretly recorded on her phone at the facility, she describes how the children ‘have no birth certificates, no names . . . They were raised in the bellies of Mexican girls . . . Their fathers were semillas genética, special seeds in bottles.’ The video diary entries often feature Gabriela’s direct-­address to the characters watching (Logan and Xavier), granting her a degree of authority and agency in relation to the oppressive setting and reproductive exploitation she witnessed. The specially bred mutant children, test-­tube clones trained to be weapons, are therefore characterised in terms of their illegitimacy, part of which intersects with gender and race; and Alkali-­Transigen is positioned as the American capitalist prison-­industrial complex, exploiting, in Gabriela’s words, Mexican girls. Indeed Asif et al. argue that Alkali-­Transigen’s reach into Mexico and extraction of Mexican women as foreign capital is another way in which Logan explores the role of literal and figurative boundaries in contemporary American society (Asif et al. 2019: 153). The casting of Dafne Keen, a British-­Spanish actress of Galician descent, to portray Laura, a character who, in previous media outings was white and English-­speaking, and the recasting of Laura’s narrative in (post)racial terms is also significant. Arguably, though the film clearly

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mar v e l l e gac y 129 critiques the boundless cruelty of white colonial masculinities, the casting and narrative choices related to race and ethnicity were, at least partially, enabled by a postracial, multicultural Hollywood in which racial ambiguity was commodified (see Chapter 9). Laura’s race becomes a key site of the negotiation of power, which was not the case with other postfeminist girl heroines, whose empowerment depended on whiteness as much as it did relative affluence. Indeed, ambiguity unintentionally factored into Keen’s casting: director James Mangold was quoted as wanting to cast a ‘Latina kid’ but nonetheless ended up with a racially, and nationally, malleable actress (Mangold quoted in Fletcher 2017). Gabriela is eventually killed by Pierce and his taskforce and Logan, resentfully and reluctantly, takes care of Laura. Much like Elektra’s forceful assignment of being a mother figure to Abby, Logan is resistant to adopting a protective role towards Laura, despite both Xavier and Gabriela referring to her as his daughter. However, Logan transforms throughout the film, warming to Laura and later answering the question ‘Is that your daughter?’ with ‘Yeah, that’s Laura.’ The wayward family of Xavier, Logan and Laura are later taken in by the Munsons,1 whose portrayal as a modest family headed by farmer Will bears some resemblance to the rural qualities of Wolverine’s retirement in ‘Old Man Logan’ as well as displaying parallels to Elektra’s occupation of the family dinner table in Elektra. Indeed, the three likewise appear in a scene set around the Munson’s dinner table, with son Nate asked by his mother to say grace. The scene represents a reminiscence for a wholesome past that has clearly been disrupted by this future dystopia in which the characters now function, a normalcy that Laura could not possibly have a recollection of due to her exemption from society all her life. It also sets the Munsons up for tragedy, as they are subsequently slaughtered by X-­24, another stronger and younger version of Wolverine. Before Laura arrives in his life, Logan is depicted participating in the daily grind, making a living as a limousine driver whose clientele are portrayed through the excesses of young, white masculinity and accompanying nationalism. This strongly resonates with the politics of a recessionary culture that both upholds and critiques the ideals of neoliberal capitalism. Through Logan’s repositioning as a father figure to Laura, faith in the mutant cause is restored­– ­albeit outside the US. Regarding the gendered aspects of Logan’s portrayal specifically, Danijela Petković argues that while his ailing body is feminised due to its unruliness (conveyed through shots in which it bleeds or is in other ways ‘disobedient’), Logan is in turn narratively rewarded through his heroic martyrdom as a means of coping with the cultural anxieties his decaying body provokes (Petković

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2018: 124). The respective articles by Asif et al. and Petković both point towards the film’s self-­reflexivity as a means of elaborating nuanced representations of ageing masculinities and this reflexivity partly stems from the film’s reading as a superhero western. The western is itself a genre that, at its peak, was financially successful but eventually dwindled and died, like Logan and, possibly (although unlikely in the age of transmedia franchises), like superhero films themselves. Further, like superhero films, the Hollywood western was a highly gendered and racially charged Hollywood film genre, often centring on heroic figures of white masculinity taming the harsh frontier of the West. Logan reworks the cultural assumption of the frontier as a ‘virginal Eden’ which was ‘to be forcibly possessed by dispossessing its native inhabitants and exploiting its natural resources’ (Wildermuth 2018: 131). Unlike the frontiers of the West, though, Logan’s Eden is free from the clutch of the corrupting force of American hegemony and represents the liberation of the marginalised. Amid widespread discourses of right-­wing populism taking back control of national sovereignty and borders, Logan’s use and critique of western frontier mythology are indeed significant. It is in North Dakota close to the Canadian border where Logan’s mutant haven­ – ­specifically referred to as ‘Eden’­– ­is located. Asif et al. note the significance of the film’s use of western conventions to further highlight Logan’s demystifying of the white, masculine frontier myth, as exemplified by its strategic references to the western Shane (George Stevens, 1953) (see Petković 2018; Asif et al. 2019). Logan was also released well into the established cycle of what has been referred to as ‘geri-­action cinema’, films starring actors who in previous decades embodied the hard-­body masculine aesthetics of the action genre, ‘exploring the continuing efficacy of ageing male action bodies’ (Meeuf 2017: 120). That said, Logan is somewhat reflexive even in its evocation of geri-­action cinema, for despite having at that point played the character for seventeen years, media reports still highlighted the film’s extensive use of make-­up and prosthetics to age Jackman, as well as his acting strategies (adjusting his stance and gait, for example) (Anderson 2017; Galas 2017). Asif et al. have pointed out the film’s redefinition of the superhero genre through its representation of ageing mutant bodies as allegory for geopolitical borders. They argue that ‘[w]ith its portrayal of the ailing mutant body and the permeability of geopolitical borders, Logan, builds upon traditional superhero tropes that deal with separation, division, and borders’, engaging with disability and mortality discourses, as well as gender and ethnicity (Asif et al. 2019: 142–3). Central to this, they suggest, is the film’s portrayal of deteriorating mutant bodies in the char-

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acters of Logan and Xavier. Indeed, Xavier’s trajectory involves a reliance on the notion of ageing as a process of infantilisation, as he is cared for by Logan and Caliban, who occupy respective paternal and maternal roles,2 and forced to take medication to reduce the effects of his telepathy, now dangerously out of control in a way that harks back to his own diagnosis of Jean Grey’s dysfunctional powers (Asif et al. 2019: 143). Logan’s suffering, on the other hand, is prolonged and exaggerated through his now self-­defeating powers, with the film’s cinematography periodically lingering on his wounded and bleeding body (Asif et al. 2019: 147). This is much like the suffering male bodies of heroes encountered in previous discussions in this book­– w ­ ith the caveat that Logan is old and the end of his narrative mercifully approaches. As Nathan Miczo maintains, superheroes’ struggles to reconcile two competing qualities within themselves are at the heart of comics representing ageing superheroes, portraying ‘an internal struggle over who they are and what their role is in a changed world’ now that they are older (Miczo 2015: 144). In the ‘Old Man Logan’ comics, Logan must essentially reclaim his superhero identity after having given it up, eventually unsheathing his claws and violently taking on the villains, thereby cementing his (anti)heroism. The struggle over superhero identity is not novel, though, and takes on gendered dimensions when considering heroes and heroines, although Miczo effectively draws attention to the additional factor of age and its effect on (masculine) heroism in his analysis. Nonetheless, elements of these themes recur throughout Logan, again taking on a self-­reflexive quality: once representative of being the next step in human evolution, mutants have become redundant in this version of the future (or so it seems until Logan’s final moment of sacrifice). Logan’s portrayal, therefore, is reminiscent of a particular version of masculinity that was characterised as overly aggrieved by the financial recession and austerity of the late 2000s (often referred to as the ‘he-­cession’ or ‘mancession’ in popular venues). Like the breadwinners undergoing a crisis of masculinity during this time (Negra and Tasker 2014: 2), Logan, and the superheroism he once represented, has, through genetic meddling­ – s­ cientists playing God and intervening in the natural, essential course of species progression­– b­ een made redundant in this dystopian future. However, Logan partly departs from staid discourses evoking the plight of men who are no longer permitted to fulfil their natural masculine duties as breadwinners and protectors (because of widespread unemployment and/­or the immigrant workforce and/­or women’s over-­representation in the workplace due to feminism). In Logan, the by-­now mythologised ‘end-­ of-­men’ crisis (Gilligan 2011) is transposed onto an end-­of-­mutants crisis

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which, though hinging on the centrality of Logan as a Marvel legacy hero, is ultimately resolved through the cultivation and mobilisation of young non-­white children spearheaded by Laura, who presumably would be able to reinvigorate the legacy of Wolverine. Laura’s genetic heritage extends beyond having Logan’s DNA, though, and becomes a spiritual affinity that is reworked through the character. What it means for these characters to be ‘like’ each other is transcendental, whereas in Elektra, the link between the heroine and the daughter-­figure inevitably pertains to the materiality of femininity. The merits of mutant solidarity are discussed at length in the scene that precedes the Munson family dinner, in which Logan drives himself, Xavier and Laura via a highway towards North Dakota. Much like scenes in both Elektra and X-­Men Origins: Wolverine, the car discussion takes place at a moment of reflective transition, in which the hero(ine) queries their identity in relation to those in their protection. In this scene, Xavier remarks from the back seat at Logan’s indifference towards the mutant cause. Laura, in the passenger seat, irritates Logan by playing with the car door lock, much like Abby annoys Elektra with her bubble gum. Increasingly irate, Logan passes Laura Xavier’s pills and asks her to administer them. Xavier complies, reluctantly, and Logan turns his head to face Xavier, asking to see him taking the pills. The reverse shot showcases Xavier’s childish demeanour as he opens his mouth and sticks out his tongue, taunting Logan. Later, Xavier, now pacified and returned partially to his role as sage patriarch, berates Logan when he swears at a truck carrying horses (Will Munson is at the wheel of the truck). The shot follows Laura’s perspective out of the passenger window as they pass the caged horses on the highway, establishing a symbolic rapport between the mutants on the run and the imprisoned horses. Logan’s response to Xavier accompanies the view: referring to the distinctive claws that extend from between Laura’s toes, he states ‘She can gut a man with her feet, but she can’t hear a few naughty words?’ Over the same shot of the caged horses, Xavier’s voice answers ‘She can learn to be better’ and a profile shot of Logan follows. He responds ‘You mean better than me.’ Xavier in the next shot states ‘Actually, yes’, perhaps the result of his childish oppositionality to Logan, but nonetheless asserting the notion that Logan’s cynical existence could be supplanted by Laura’s and, indeed, improved on, again signifying Logan’s redundancy. There remains much to be said about the likening of Laura to Logan and the parallels Logan bears to a similar, though not identical, dynamic between the characters in Elektra. While Elektra’s meditation of the self in relation to female heroism reaches to notions of collective woman-

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mar v e l l e gac y 133 hood, Laura’s likeness to Logan takes a different form due to the gender these characters. Most obviously, the discursive likening of a little girl to an angry, violent man takes on some radical qualities, and while Elektra transgresses certain gendered boundaries to do with violence­– ­sometimes successfully, though often not­– t­he application of Logan’s qualities and abilities to a young girl, and how Logan deals with these, is noteworthy. Like Wolverine, Laura herself has taken on different forms throughout Marvel’s history. Unlike many other Marvel characters, her first appearance was in the animated TV series X-­Men: Evolution (Kids’ WB, 2000–3), which centred on recognisable X-­Men as teenagers at Xavier’s school. Laura herself is therefore yet another form of mutated offspring of convergence culture. She debuted in comics months later as an underage sex worker in a short-­lived series about teenaged mutants on the run (Quesada and Middleton 2004). Though the series ostensibly appeared to be pitched towards teen readers, it was notable for its overt portrayals of violence, taking place in a deprived area of New York inhabited by gangs, drug dealers and pimps. While the sexual overtones of the character were eventually dropped by the time Marvel released a comic focusing on her origins, Laura’s narrative remained marred by violence, a quality that is exploited in Logan due to its R-­rating. The marrying of the ‘Old Man Logan’ storyline with a comic titled ‘Innocence Lost’, about Laura’s origins as a genetically engineered mutant child is significant in its facilitation of discourses of heroic legacy. Indeed, the questioning of the cultural idea of the innate innocence of children and their vulnerability to corrupting factors is part of what Brown argues makes representations of violent little girls so compelling. The Hollywood trend of ‘pretty little killers’, as Brown states, clearly factored into the shape that Logan ultimately took. Violent girl heroines call forth questions about gender, violence and sexualisation in relation to teen or tween girls (Brown 2015a: 197). While previous teen heroines (among them, I argue, being Miller in Elektra) are ‘an expression of the cultural shift from second to third wave feminism and the media’s embrace of, and capitalizing on, popular notions of girl power as a literalization of postfeminist ideology’ (Brown 2015a: 198), Brown argues that action cinema’s killer girls rely on the spectacle of violence to promote a blurring of boundaries concerned with childhood innocence and adulthood and therefore have the potential for cultural transgression (Brown 2015a: 203). Like Brown, Eva Lupold (2014) also draws attention to these films’ reliance on depicting young girls in adult situations that are in many ways considered socially and culturally inappropriate, for instance uttering profanity, using firearms or engaging in physical fights resulting in bloodshed.

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Both authors trace the origins of the violent girl heroine back to ongoing feminist debates about the objectification of young girls, citing the novel Lolita (Nabokov 1955), in which a grown man becomes sexually involved with his twelve-­year-­old stepdaughter, as a key cultural touchstone. In these discourses, the corruption of sexualisation is conflated with the corruption of violence, as both factors result in diminished innocence of girls, which is to be upheld at all costs. Pointing towards the shifting meaning of the nuclear family throughout the past few decades, Lupold argues that violent girl heroine narratives draw from a problematic ideology that holds girls responsible for upholding moral order (either due to the absence of parental figures or because conventional law-­enforcing structures have failed). These girls are presented as using violence to do so, or risk the corrosion of traditional values (for instance, that of the nuclear family). However, moral order in Logan is scant and the values for which Laura fights are related to her marginality­ – ­as a mutant; as a girl; as a Latina. While the film is ambiguous about what kind of life Laura will have in Canada, it is a possible incorporation of the politics of difference into an all-­encompassing, but ultimately vague, ‘better life’. With this in mind, Logan appears to be a critique, albeit an ambiguous one, of the dominant structures informing ideas of family values and essential gender roles (as well as how these intersect within a military-­industrial complex). The story of Laura’s liberation also banks on the essential nature of Laura as the ‘female version’ of Wolverine. Here, the biological differences of X-­and Y-­chromosomes accumulate as an inherent marker of sexual difference, which is conceived as biological and natural. On the road to North Dakota, Xavier explains the significance of Laura’s gender in relation to her deadliness: ‘Laura’s foot claws are an obvious result of her gender, you know.’ That said, Xavier does not elaborate further on why foot claws were an ‘obvious’ result of her femaleness; rather, this takes on a commonsensical connotation­– ­the unquestioned assertion that the presence of the X-­chromosome facilitated this particular mutation of Logan’s signature weapons. The expertise conveyed by Xavier in the same scene also further cements Laura’s animalistic qualities, which had been established throughout the film through Laura’s violent dispatch of the Reavers, her insatiable appetite for food and her lack of verbal communication. Indeed, it is the perambulation of animal-­human qualities that Larrie Dudenhoeffer suggests ‘defines Wolverine as a character’ (Dudenhoeffer 2017: 237) and this dynamic is intensified in its articulation through the child Laura. In the same scene, after noting the gendered significance of her foot claws, Xavier likens Laura to a lioness, noting that ‘in a pride of lions,

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mar v e l l e gac y 135 the female is both hunter and caregiver . . . She uses her front claws for hunting and the back claws defensively, thus ensuring their survival’, although Laura bears few, if any, caregiving attributes. Alongside the tracking shots of the caged horses, the scene ensures that there is little ambiguity regarding Laura’s innate, animalistic qualities that inevitably surface through violence throughout the film. This is balanced by the simultaneous positioning of Laura as a marginalised victim of corporate greed and physical abuse in a way that resonates with constructions of girlhood violence as culturally legitimated if the result of victimhood. As Christine Alder and Anne Worrall detail in their wide-­ranging discussion of cultural and legal definitions of violent girls, victimhood discourses give such girls ‘permission to be “damaged” and even to “retaliate” within circumscribed limits’ (Alder and Worrall 2004: 11). Laura’s representation as a violent girl is also facilitated by Logan’s pastiche-­ like qualities. Martin Zeller-­ Jacques, like Brown, discusses violent girl heroine films in terms of parody and pastiche, citing Kick-­Ass as a definitive text of the cycle. Based on Mark Millar and John Romita Jr’s limited comic book series of the same name (Millar and Romita Jr 2008),3 Kick-­Ass gained both acclaim and criticism for its depiction of Mindy McCready (Chloë Grace Moretz), whose superhero alter-­ego is Hit-­Girl and who, under the guidance of her father, superhero Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage), violently dispatches gang members and criminals, choreographed within the film in parodic, over-­the-­top ways. Zeller-­Jacques argues that the film’s comedy elements serve to draw attention to ‘the incongruity of a little girl beating up adult criminals (or perhaps to the adolescent absurdity of the whole superhero conceit)’ (Zeller-­Jacques 2016: 200). However, despite transgressing cultural taboos about children and violence, Zeller-­ Jacques ultimately suggests that Hit-­Girl remains contained within the confines of normative femininity and patriarchal rule via her father or father-­figures (this is especially the case in Kick-­Ass 2, Zeller-­Jacques argues). Moreover, Zeller-­Jacques maintains that the normative ideal of girlhood to which Mindy at times succumbs at the cost of relinquishing her superheroic lifestyle is ‘constructed as natural through the discourse of biological essentialism’, and while her identity as Hit-­Girl is implied to be who she ‘really’ is, this is portrayed through the discourse of individualism as a transitional stage towards Mindy’s self-­fulfilment (Zeller-­Jacques 2016: 203). Aside from questions of identity­ – ­the same questions faced by Miller in Elektra­– ­Brown argues that age was at the centre of most media discussions about the character of Hit-­Girl, which prompted responses akin to moral panic from some critics (of which Roger Ebert was one of the

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most outspoken). Indeed, Brown uncovers the cultural assumptions about the corruption of children’s innate innocence behind such responses, confirming that ‘Hit-­Girl may be a shocking character but that is the case only because she presents such a challenge to deep-­seated presumptions about appropriate behavior for young girls’ (Brown 2015a: 203–4). Thus, like Nabokov’s Lolita, the cultural resonance of characters such as Hit-­ Girl depends on inflexible social norms maintaining that children should remain innocent until they are old enough to engage with so-­called adult behaviours, often characterised as sexual. That the origin of Laura in comics was titled ‘Innocence Lost’ also ties into these discourses: it is through the loss of Laura’s innocence that she is irreparably scarred emotionally and, indeed, physically as she is depicted self-­harming throughout the comic series. The sexuality of young girls in such films is relevant throughout these discussions of girl killers, in part due to the tricky distinction between discourses of sexual objectification and sexual empowerment. Regarding violent girl heroines, this takes on the additional question of age, for while it is evident that adult heroines’ empowerment is often sexualised, applying the same conventions of sexualisation to young girls remains problematic, as many thought was the case in Zack Synder’s Sucker Punch (Brown 2015a: 200–4). Indeed, the pairing of Logan and Laura in Logan continues a decades-­old Marvel tradition for the character of Wolverine to team up with teenage girls, acting as a mentor and surrogate father. In the character’s publication history, Logan has formed a superhero duo with characters such as Rogue, Armor, Kitty Pryde, Jubilee and X-­23, that is, Logan’s Laura. A classic X-­Men issue titled ‘Wounded Wolf’ sees Logan assist Katie Power, a member of X-­Men spin-­off kids team the Power Pack, through a snowstorm, virtually nude and in a feral state, having just escaped from the issue’s villains (Claremont and Windsor-­Smith 1986). Indeed, a promotional poster for Logan, depicting a desaturated close-­up image of Logan’s hand, claws extended, held by that of a child, emulates the penultimate panel of the issue, which similarly features in close-­up Logan’s hand in Katie’s. Stories such as ‘Wounded Wolf’ use juxtaposed elements of violent, animalistic, masculine aggression and mutual tenderness between child and adult to elaborate a complex transgression of intergenerational and gendered boundaries. The problematics posed by such narratives are occasionally susceptible to bleeding into accusations of paedophilia and ensuing moral panics, although examples of these narratives do maintain a degree of ambiguity in terms of their sexual politics. This ambiguity has been characterised as problematically sexual by some scholars, for instance in Léon: The

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mar v e l l e gac y 137 Professional (Luc Besson, 1995) (Dawson 2009: 64; Goode 2011: 65–6). While Logan possibly eschews accusations of paedophilia by expressly and repeatedly characterising Laura as his daughter, Laura’s behaviour is nonetheless portrayed as horrifically violent even in addition to her childish demeanour. This is a character who, as Logan states, can kill people single-­handedly (or, literally, by foot); however, the also uses her status as a child to illustrate the tensions within the character, for instance when she entertains herself with a storefront coin-­operated kiddie-­ride horse­– ­in another typically reflexive western fashion playing a stripped-­down synthetic version of Rossini’s ‘William Tell Overture’ (1829)­– ­while Logan and Xavier converse in his limousine, or later inside the store, when she selects a pair of pink flowery sunglasses, which she ends up wearing throughout the rest of the film. This traversing of the violence-­innocence binary is a key component of Laura. As noted, Laura’s animalistic appetite corresponds with her tendency toward violence. In a scene early on in the film, Laura clandestinely hitches a ride in the boot of Logan’s limousine. Laura’s presence is not known to him when he returns to the abandoned and dilapidated smelting plant in which he dwells alongside Caliban and Xavier. Caliban, whose mutant power is to sense the presence of other mutants, detects that there had been a stowaway by sniffing the contents of the car­– ­a backpack and a small rubber ball with which Laura had previously been depicted playing. However, the limousine’s boot is empty of passengers, a moment that is interrupted by the arrival of Pierce, who asks Logan for the whereabouts of ‘the girl . . . that goes along with that ball you’re holding’. Pierce’s stance towards Laura here likens her to a dog, a quality that is punctuated at the end of this encounter when an angry yelp is heard off-­screen, followed by a metal pipe entering the shot and knocking out Pierce. Another pipe is hurled at Logan, although he catches it in his hand, the following shot showing Laura as the source. Wearing a red coat, the character bears a visual comparison to Little Red Riding Hood, whose fairy tale ‘is a story about appetite in all shadings of the term, from primal hunger to sexual desire, both tainted by the threat of desire turning dark and deadly’ (Tatar 2017: 3), qualities embedded in this version of Laura. However, in this case, the wolf, or Wolverine, is a trustworthy figure and the hunter is the threat. Logan, Xavier and Caliban take Laura in, aware that Pierce’s associates will be looking for them, but for the time being Laura sits at their dining table, eating a bowl of cereal while communicating telepathically with Xavier, who answers in Spanish. Laura’s dog-­like qualities are once again emphasised when Logan attempts to take her backpack from her but she

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refuses to let it go, and Logan is forced to yield. When the Reavers eventually arrive, Laura becomes alert and Logan escorts Xavier to relative safety in the back of his limousine, referring to Laura as ‘not our problem’. Logan’s indifference facilitates the representation of Laura’s violence, though, as Pierce’s men quite easily overpower Logan and are ordered to fetch Laura. At this point, the scene cuts back to the makeshift kitchen area of the smelting plant, where Laura continues to eat large mouthfuls of Corn Flakes while keeping a curious eye on the security camera feed on the television, an ironic form of kid’s entertainment. Upon hearing the sound of Pierce’s men forcefully entering the building, presented through an audio lead paralleling Laura’s sensitive hearing before being depicted, Laura stops eating for one moment. Cutting back and forth between Laura and the men, equipped with body armour and guns, Laura’s animalistic awareness of the trespassers is signified by her glances off-­camera as she continues eating. A cut back to one of Pierce’s men preparing a pair of heavy-­duty handcuffs is followed by his perspective, a shot of Laura from behind at the dining table. Here, the juxtaposition between the large man with a comically disproportionate mechanical restraint and a little girl, isolated, eating cereal, is apparent. The cut to a shot of Laura at the table behind her bowl showcases her listening intently, still not fleeing, as the men approach out of focus behind her. The camera tilts up as the man with the handcuffs enters the frame in focus, although remaining zoomed in on Laura, but nonetheless indicating the difference in physicality between these characters. Tension builds here, as the soundtrack is eerily sparse, while the scene ends with a close-­up of Laura glancing upward at the armed man off-­ camera. At this point, the scene cuts back to the outside of the plant, a ramshackle arrangement of rusted corrugated metal and wooden crates in a dry and dusty landscape, reminiscent of a saloon in the Old West. Pierce is shown pacing impatiently, while the Reavers remain on guard around the limousine and Logan, who is lying in the background, immobilised by a guard. The sounds of guns shooting and people screaming accompany medium shots of the Reavers turning their heads towards the building, concerned, and lining up beside Pierce. Emulating classic western cinematography, a low shot from behind the Reavers’ legs at eye-­height to Laura portrays her exiting the building, carrying something under her arm. Logan and Xavier are shown becoming alert in respective shots and the sequence cuts to a long shot of Laura approaching the Reavers from the right side of the shot (Figure 5.1), the dusty wasteland and decaying overturned water tank harking back to the opening gunfight scene of spaghetti western Once Upon a Time in the West (Sergio Leone, 1968),

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Figure 5.1  Laura faces Donald Pierce and his militaristic Reavers in Logan’s western-inspired wasteland.

signalling the violence to come, and accompanied by a minimalistic but foreboding soundtrack. Notably, the true extent of Laura’s dealings inside the building still remains a mystery until a medium shot of Laura isolated reveals that it is the severed head of a Reaver that she carries: she hurls it towards the camera, blood sprinkling as it bounces out of the frame. The head is gratuitously displayed in the next low-­angle shot from Pierce’s side of the encounter. Pierce attempts to talk Laura down from what is signalled to become a violent outburst, cutting back to the low-­angle shot as Laura approaches Pierce, angrily yet childishly throwing down the handcuffs she also carries. Using a patronising tone and language­– ­‘Honey, you want to stay where you are’­– ­Pierce is unable to prevent Laura from striding closer towards him. Tension continues to build here, as the shots switch between Pierce and Laura at an increasing pace; Laura finally takes off her backpack as the sound of guns cocking chime off-­screen. Pierce repeatedly says Laura’s name, wagging his finger as if an infuriated parental figure. As he firmly says ‘no’, the low-­angle shot becomes fixed on Laura’s side, with Pierce now literally within her target range. Laura continues to approach him, her arm within the shot, slightly out of focus, but clear enough to showcase the two claws emerging through her bloody knuckles accompanied by what should by now be the familiar ‘snikt’ sound effect associated with Wolverine. The film here uses the sounds of slashing and claws unsheathing in an attempt to further highlight Laura’s likeness to Logan, as well as present a juxtaposition in which masculine violence and innocent girlhood collide. A medium shot of Logan follows, his attention having been commanded by the reveal of Laura’s powers­– ­and thus their shared DNA.

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What follows is a fast-­paced action sequence with Laura at the heart of the violence, shots cutting in quick succession as she slaughters one of the Reavers and effortlessly climbs on top of the building and runs back inside it, narrowly missing the Reavers’ bullets. Inside the building, the cinematography weaves in and out of dark corridors and shafts as the armed men become disoriented and panicky. Laura’s animalism is again in the foreground, as it becomes clear that she lured the Reavers into the building in order to ambush them, having now been revealed as the predator of this dynamic, ultimately slashing, stabbing and growling her way through her enemies. Laura’s nimble physicality, which corresponds with the frenetic editing of the sequence, distinguishes her somewhat from Logan as she is presented as using her slight size to her advantage, flipping and spinning her body around the Reavers in a chaotic yet contained way. Ultimately, she is filmed in medium close-­up as she is stabbed from behind by a harpoon-­like arrow, although she remains unphased by this, emitting an animalistic roar and struggling as the men attempt to constrain her. Her point of view from the ground centres on a Reaver above her, who is promptly skewered by Logan’s claws­– ­at this point a floating signifier that is no longer in exclusive ownership of Logan. While Logan ultimately overpowers several Reavers, Laura is portrayed as using her abilities to slash and slice her way out of her restraints with an innovative addition to Wolverine’s powers­– t­ he claw that extends out of her foot­– a­ nd the three escape in Logan’s limousine. The showdown at the smelting plant is essentially set up much like an Old West gunfight, which indicates that Laura’s ingenuity remains tethered to the legacy of classic narratives, or indeed to the legacy of Wolverine. The scene therefore exemplifies the ongoing mode of representation in which the old man Logan fights alongside his younger female clone. This ultimately marks an attempt to rejuvenate the Wolverine legacy through Laura­– ­and part of this legacy is of violence, which is coded as feral, inhuman animalism. This is bookended by Xavier’s comment at the end of the sequence: ‘I told you, Logan. She is a mutant like you, . . . Very much like you.’ Interestingly, media discourses in Logan’s paratexts dwelled on the affective draw of the end scene in which Laura bids a dying Logan farewell. Speaking few words throughout the film­– ­with most of those that are spoken being Spanish­– ­Laura’s muteness is congruent with her lack of human socialisation and having spent her early childhood in the presence of Spanish speakers. When Laura, earlier in the film, yells at Logan in English, then, Logan is surprised, although the film is ambiguous in its critique of his colonial attitude towards language

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acquisition. It is nonetheless significant that in the final scene between Logan and Laura, Laura recites a key monologue from Shane that had been depicted diegetically earlier in Logan while Laura watched television with Xavier in a hotel room. In Shane, the eponymous hero arrives at a homestead in Wyoming, having renounced his gunslinging ways and befriending local rancher Joe Starrett, his wife Marian and son Joey. After being coaxed back to his former violence in a climactic duel with the film’s villain, cattle baron Rufus Ryker, Shane eliminates Ryker but is wounded in the process. Foreshadowing his implied demise, Shane turns to Joey, who had witnessed the gunfight, and says his goodbye, telling a weeping Joey to reassure his mother that ‘There aren’t any more guns in the valley’, that this was, so to speak, the gunfight to end all gunfights and that the homestead will be safe on his departure. This line’s significance reaches back to a key moment in Shane in which Marian chastises Shane when he teaches Joey how to shoot (‘We’d all be better off if there wasn’t a single gun in this valley’). Despite Joey’s protests, and his noting that Shane is wounded, Shane turns away and rides into the distance, presumably to die, surrounded by mountains, as Joey calls for him to come back. Logan’s narrative parallels the trajectory of Shane’s central hero, who, like Logan, is burdened by the fact that death accompanies him wherever he goes. Like Logan, Shane also depends on ideas of the essential nature of masculine violence and the possibility that death is the logical resolution of this. Referring to Shane, Matthew Carter argues that the film presents an impossible bind for its male characters, for despite Marian’s objections to Joey’s fascination with Shane and his gun, ‘the hard fact is that, from the very outset, the child is being culturally indoctrinated, as it were, for a masculine social trajectory with violence at its core’ (Carter 2015: 58). This is reflected by the deterministic discourses in Shane’s (and Logan’s) final monologue, that ‘There’s no living with a killing. There’s no going back from it. Right or wrong, it’s a brand, a brand that sticks, there’s no going back.’ Like Shane, Logan makes use of the legacy of the Western to assert the trajectory of violence on which its hero is set. Parallel to the myth of the American frontier as progressing by way of what Richard Slotkin refers to as ‘regeneration through violence’ (Slotkin 2000), the heroic identity of ‘Wolverine’ is regenerated in the film through Logan’s violent death and Laura’s violent conception. Still, Logan’s ending is interesting in its placing of the Shane monologue as an expression of Laura’s grief at the departure of Logan, rather than as the tragic hero’s resignation to his predetermined demise. Surrounded by a mountainous landscape, filmed from a low angle and

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panning to display the vista, not unlike that in Shane, Laura recites Shane’s monologue by Logan’s grave in a woodland area near the Canadian border. Unlike the western hero, though, she is surrounded by her young mutant peers, one of whom clutches a Wolverine action figure to his chest (which is diegetically justified due to the film’s self-­aware use of the X-Men as bygone comic book heroes throughout). This is a symbolic departure from the lone gunslinger archetype, and unlike Joey, Laura carries Logan’s legacy with her when she finally walks off camera into the mountainous distance because, in many ways, she is Logan (at least genetically). Laura is marked here as the hero who ultimately walks away from violence, albeit still an essential aspect of her genetic make-­ up, whereas Shane walks towards death caused by violence. Laura’s exit, then, gains additional meaning in the light of the hope for mutantkind she represents, but it is nonetheless marked by the legacy of the institutional evils that were enacted on Logan to begin with. This legacy is accentuated in the final scene of the film, in which, on her way out of the shot, Laura picks up the makeshift tree branches that have been fashioned into a cross at Logan’s grave (he is, after all, the martyred hero) and turns them so that they form an ‘X’, ultimately signalling the potential for Wolverine’s regeneration through the legacy of the X-­gene in the mutant children (Figure 5.2). The camera remains fixed at the graveside as Laura leaves, slowly zooming in to the ‘X’ in a shot accompanied by a typically western-­style harmonica tune, for though the film implies a rejuvenation of mutants in their newfound haven beyond the mountains of North Dakota, it is with Logan where this story ends, thereby granting him the ultimate authority in the closing of this narrative. Nowhere is Marvel superheroes’ dependence on legacy and revision

Figure 5.2  Laura heralds a new generation of mutants by turning Logan’s gravemarking cross into an ‘X’ in Logan.

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mar v e l l e gac y 143 more apparent in the 2016 comic series All-­New Wolverine (Taylor and López 2016), which rebranded the X-­23 character as the new Wolverine as part of Marvel’s ‘All-­New, All-­Different’ relaunch (this was subsequently followed by Marvel’s ‘Legacy’ titles in a soft reboot in 2017 and ‘Marvel Fresh Start’ in 2018). In this series, Laura takes on the Wolverine mantle­ – ­including yellow spandex costume­– ­and encounters yet more female Wolverine clones. This was released after the 2014 storyline ‘The Death of Wolverine’ (Soule and McNiven 2015) which may have primed certain readers for Logan’s filmic demise. He was subsequently returned to life in 2019 (Soule et al. 2019), although even during the time between his death and resurrection, versions of the character appeared in subsequent series featuring the version of Wolverine from the ‘Old Man Logan’ universe (Bendis and Sorrentino 2015; Lemire and Sorrentino 2016) as well as one-­page sequences titled ‘Where is Wolverine?’, which were scattered throughout different Marvel comics (Waid and Yu 2018; Aaron and Yu 2018; Slott and Yu 2018; Zdarsky and Pacheco 2018; Ewing et al. 2018; Coates and Kirk 2018; Pak and Stegman 2018; Taylor and Stegman 2018; Bendis and Stegman 2018). Meanwhile, Laura is taken back in time to team up with past-­Logan in Generations: Wolverine & All-­New Wolverine (Taylor and Rosanas 2017). It is noteworthy that both the representations of Elektra and Wolverine’s respective relationships with their young protégés bring to light similar conceptual themes to do with (re)generation and gender. Moreover, the regeneration at the heart of these narratives exists well beyond into the intertextual webs formed by all texts based on Marvel properties.

Notes 1. The interactions of Logan, Xavier and Laura with the Munsons occur as a result of a near-­fatal road accident, which is prevented by Xavier and Logan. Munson, his wife and children are black and the film establishes their resistance to the dystopia’s corporatisation of locally produced goods and land. Purveyors of all-­American Christian family values and individualist freedom, the Munson family appear, in a postracial sense, to have assimilated to the situation of white working-­class people characterised as marginalised and aggrieved through right-­wing populist politics. Nonetheless, it is because of Logan that the Munsons are all eventually killed by Alkali-­Transigen’s Logan clone, X-­24, in a sequence that Asif et al. suggest functions in service of Logan’s demystification of the frontier myth (Asif et al. 2019: 154). 2. A key introductory scene in which Caliban appears involves him ironing one of Logan’s shirts while berating him (see Petković 2018: 142). 3. The series was initially released via Marvel’s creator-­oriented Icon imprint, the

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story and characters in Kick-­Ass do not take place within the Marvel Universe and their film adaptations were not considered within the corpus of films that are the subject of this book as a whole (indeed, subsequent entries in the Kick-­ Ass line were published by Image Comics).

C H A PT E R 6

Mad With Power: Female Villainy in Marvel Films

That evil features prominently in films featuring Marvel heroes goes without saying; heroism is gauged against a darker force. As Schatz points out, blockbusters of the 2000s present a Manichean universe in which good fights evil (Schatz 2009: 32), and while the hero must in some way mirror his enemy and enact an external battle with his own dark side (Schatz 2009: 32), every Marvel hero is portrayed alongside an opponent. In most Marvel films, the villain, like the hero, is usually male. Magneto, the Red Skull, the Green Goblin, Kingpin and the Lizard all exemplify the antithesis to the masculine hero in masculine terms. The villainess is somewhat of a rarity in the Marvel film adaptation, however this does not diminish her significance in cultural terms. The villainesses discussed here represent a study into the ways in which the discourses regarding women and evil within these films endorse patriarchal notions of gendered morality. These notions ultimately serve to reaffirm control upon women, a noteworthy occurrence in a postfeminist age. Several key themes are presented in this chapter: the perpetuation of a tradition that connects women and evil, the discourses regarding acceptable femininity which are in the process evoked, the varying manifestations of this tradition in film and comic books, and the place of this tradition within postfeminist culture. My subsequent discussion of the intersections of female villainy with discourses of white supremacy in Thor: Ragnarok highlights distinctive cultural shifts that have taken place in postfeminist culture post-­ Trump election. Evil is hard to define, as noted by Hannah Priest, and yet cultural representations of evil are frequently offered in the media (Priest 2013a: vii). Social psychologist Philip Zimbardo notes that ‘we fear evil, but are fascinated by it’ (Zimbardo 2007: 4). In Zimbardo’s terms, evil is characterised as Other; it is rejected because it is ‘different and dangerous’ (Zimbardo 2007: 4). Such a statement is significant when considered in a feminist context, which Zimbardo neglects to do in his accounts of evil.1 It

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has been suggested that woman stands as the Other in a male-­dominated culture, as exemplified by Simone de Beauvoir (de Beauvoir 1952). This aids the formation of the feminine myth, which is, as Janet McCabe notes, ‘nothing more than a patriarchal construction, representing both everything and nothing, ideal and monstrous’ (McCabe 2005: 4). Thus, the positioning of evil in Western culture bears parallels to the positioning of women. Zimbardo continues that the process through which certain people are coded as evil begins with creating stereotyped conceptions of the other, dehumanized perceptions of the other, the other as worthless, the other as all-­powerful, the other as demonic, the other as an abstract monster, the other as a fundamental threat to our cherished values and beliefs. (Zimbardo 2007: 11)

Indeed, these qualifications apply equally to the ways in which women are othered in a patriarchal society. A criticism of Zimbardo’s approach, then, is that he does not take into account the gendered dimensions of evil. There forms a cyclical pattern in which evil is othered, women are othered, and women are perceived as evil. Maria Barrett similarly maintains that the connection between the feminine and evil is a manifestation of women being positioned as Other (Barrett 2010b: vii). Philosopher Nel Noddings offers the most detailed account of feminine evil to describe evil from the perspective of women’s experiences (Noddings 1989). Noddings concludes that the dichotomy of the ‘good’ woman and the ‘evil’ woman has been used as a means of controlling women (Noddings 1989: 3). She, much like McCabe, remarks upon the paradox that accompanies such a dichotomy: while being ‘branded as evil’, women are also ‘exalted as possessing a special and natural form of goodness’ (Noddings 1989: 3). Noddings subsequently outlines how women have been associated with evil as a form of social oppression. Reaching back to religious discourses, it was claimed that demonic forces are present in the feminine unconscious, that women are ‘fundamentally deprived of moral sense’ (Noddings 1989: 50) and also ‘more sensitive to the supernatural’ (Noddings 1989: 45). Noddings continues, ‘This sensitivity, coupled with materiality and sensuality, made it likely that more women than men would receive and entertain devils and demons’ (Noddings 1989: 45). Combined with women’s fundamental lack of moral sense, women would be considered inherently receptive to evil voices (Noddings 1989: 45). This assignment of evil to the female body and mind has had significant ramifications. Noddings, for example, characterises the Christian myth of the Fall of Man as an expression of these sentiments, in which God creates Adam and Eve, only to exile them from Paradise when Eve is

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ma d with po we r 147 tempted to eat the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge, in turn leading Adam astray (Noddings 1989: 65). Humanity’s exile from Paradise and the Fall of Man were therefore caused by the weak spirit of a woman. Noddings likewise notes that ‘the aspect of the Fall story that attributes the introduction of evil into the world to women resounds in the myths of many cultures’ (Noddings 1989: 56), indicating the proliferation of such discourses. Women continue to be characterised as evil in ways that perpetuate the traditions outlined above. In turn, these representations have a complex relationship to postfeminist discourses in contemporary culture. Recently, academic interest in media representations of evil women has increased, particularly in how different media construct such subjectivities (Barrett 2010a; Priest 2013b; Ruthven and Mádlo 2012). Barrett suggests that evil women are given so much attention in the media because of their social deviance, while also stating that media are quick to exploit the spectacle of such deviance (Barrett 2010b: vii). Similarly, Priest points out that ‘the construction of evil relies on particular modes of language and (re)presentation’, highlighting the importance of deconstructing media portrayals of feminine evil (Priest 2013a: ix). Another sign of the cultural malaise that has traditionally accommodated the sexually assertive woman is the virgin/­whore dichotomy. Though sexually active women had been excluded and marginalised in earlier periods, this dichotomy was a significant element of Victorian culture. As Harry M. Benshoff and Sean Griffin suggest, Victorian culture divided women into categories of ‘good’ and ‘bad’, partaking of a ‘cultural construct defining women on the basis of their sexuality’ (Benshoff and Griffin 2009: 459). Likewise, the virgin/­whore dichotomy has been discussed in relation to early cinema by E. Ann Kaplan (1983). Benshoff and Griffin subsequently state that the dichotomy ‘continues to linger within the representational codes of classical and even contemporary Hollywood cinema’ (Benshoff and Griffin 2009: 459–60). Outside narrative cinema, women who transgress the boundaries of acceptable, ‘good’ femininity are subjected to media discourses in which they are constructed as irredeemably evil. Female serial killers such as Myra Hindley, Rosemary West and Aileen Wuornos have been characterised as evil or monstrous in the press, often scrutinised for their ‘deviant’ sexualities (Birch 1994; Storrs 2004; Rogers 2012; Campbell 2013). These scapegoated women serve as a ‘warning to all women’ (Campbell 2013: 146), ‘a valuable lesson for the rest of femininity’ (Rogers 2012: 109) about what happens when good women turn evil. A quintessential ‘bad’ woman is the femme fatale in 1940s film noir, a dangerously sensual woman. Far from tangible, Elizabeth Cowie suggests

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that the term ‘is simply a catchphrase for the danger of sexual difference and the demands and risks desire poses for men’ (Cowie 1997: 125). In any case, Hilary Neroni notes consistencies present in femme fatale characters: ‘a self-­centred nature, an overt sexuality, and an ability to seduce and control almost any man who crosses her path’ (Neroni 2005: 22). This highly sexual trait combined with her violent nature offers an explanation of ‘why she is so unacceptable to society’ (Neroni 2005: 22), and the femme fatale, like so many other evil women, is often eradicated through a violent death (Neroni 2005: 22). Indeed, death is more often than not the only viable narrative outcome for villainesses. Sherrie Inness, in her discussion of ‘killer women’ films such as Basic Instinct (Paul Verhoeven, 1992), examines how violent, ‘evil’ women are narratively punished for their transgressions. She notes that such films perpetuate a convention that dictates that ‘if women insist on being too tough and aggressive . . . the transgressors will be punished. This emphasis on punishment is one way that killer-­women films help perpetuate gender norms’ (Inness 1998: 81). Inness also maintains that sexual allure plays a large role in establishing the lack of morals possessed by villainesses. She elaborates that ‘by making women sexually desirable and stressing that they are attracted to men, the films assure viewers that women are sexual objects’ (Inness 1998: 69). These characters were also often portrayed as mentally distressed or insane, further elevating the notion that a powerful woman could not plausibly cope with the psychological pressures that accompany such power (Inness 1998: 69). In a sense, the emphasis on the sexualised female body bears resemblance to the visual frustration tactics put forward in Chapter 3. The key difference, though, between sexual evil women and sexualised heroines is the agency that they are presented as enacting, especially concerning the moral leanings of their ultimate goal (heroic or villainous). Most of the evil women in many of these narratives are portrayed as actively engaging in the sexual­– ­they are sexual aggressors. Attention is drawn to the sexualised heroine, on the other hand, through her ‘natural’ feminine beauty. These characteristics appear to be in a safe zone of sexual assertion­– ­the heroines may be sexualised but are not portrayed as choosing to be sexual. Villainesses, on the other hand, actively pursue men they desire (or women, if the villainess is particularly evil), as motivated by manipulative intents or an overly sexual appetite. Further, their powers may be shown as dangerous while they are engaging in a sexual encounter­– a­ poison kiss, for example­– ­drawing attention to the danger of sexually assertive women. Images and narratives of the sexualised evil woman are driven by social discourses that forbid women from being sexually assertive in the

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ma d with po we r 149 same way that men are. However, in a postfeminist culture that trades on discourses of sexual liberation, and female empowerment through expressive (hetero)sexuality, these sexually evil women present a paradox. Here, the notion of postfeminist culture as an inconsistent phenomenon constantly in flux resurfaces. The evil woman has held a steady presence in Marvel comic books. Danny Fingeroth writes that ‘If a woman was powerful­– ­really powerful­ – ­she was either evil, or made evil by the power’ (Fingeroth 2004: 80). Likewise, in his guide to writing comics, author Peter David outlines the ways in which a hero’s internal conflicts can be externalised in a narrative: ‘In order to fulfill his destiny, the hero can find himself struggling against seductive evil, seductive women, or­– ­worst of all­– ­seductive evil women’ (David 2006: 72). David does not elaborate more on these ‘seductive evil women’, perhaps indicating how such characters are taken for granted within superhero narratives, but needless to say, one rarely hears of ‘seductive good women’ in media discourses. Sexual appetite, evil and femininity triangulate within these discourses. Madrid likewise notes that The message in comic books about women and sex was this: powerful and intriguing women might be sexual, but it also meant they were bad. Once a woman began to behave herself, it meant a suppression of her sexual identity. (Madrid 2009: 249)

It is not unusual for the heroines in comic books to turn evil. Even wholesome matriarch Susan Storm was driven to the dark side when she became corrupted by the evil Psycho-­Man after her second child was stillborn, becoming the villainess Malice (Byrne 1984; 1985a). At this point, Sue’s powers were amplified and she began using them in much more aggressive ways. This also reinforces the notion of frustration tactics, for a heroine whose powers are frustrated avoids the risk of being evil, or at least associated with evil. Sue’s contravention is also indicated by her costume, which becomes considerably more revealing and sexualised­– a­ tiny black dress with exposed cleavage, midriff and thighs, and a spiked collar and mask reminiscent of BDSM styles. Madrid refers to heroines who turn evil in Marvel comics, stating that power intoxicated these women and made them cruel, maniacal menaces who cast aside loyalties to friends and lovers. Even when possessed by an evil entity, the implication was that a suppressed part of the heroine’s soul was reveling in the rush of devilry. (Madrid 2009: 231)

This corresponds with the belief described by Noddings, wherein the female unconscious is inherently corrupt and that women are more

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v­ ulnerable to possession from evil spirits. Thus, despite the evil woman appearing in various media, it is clear that she is the result of a culture uncomfortable with the notion of powerful women. Her presence is at once shocking and predictable.

Wicked Witches and Poisonous Women The idea of women being physically repulsive and highly toxic (and therefore evil) resonates with notions of the abject, elaborated by Julia Kristeva (1982) and specifically used with regards to feminine evil by Barbara Creed (1993). A psychoanalytical concept, the abject represents that which ‘disturbs identity, system, order’ and ‘does not respect borders, positions, rules’ (Kristeva 1982: 4). It is that which is cast off, expelled; which threatens to break down the border between subject and object, though it nonetheless maintains a link between the two (Kristeva 1982: 1–2). Examples of the abject could be ‘decay, filth, and excrement’ (Kutzbach and Mueller 2007: 9). However, the abject extends to more cultural and societal levels, wherein marginalised members of society are cast off, defined as ‘ugly or fearsome’ (Kutzbach and Mueller 2007: 9). This likewise resonates with Zimbardo’s consideration of accused witches, whom he suggests were usually marginalised or considered threatening in some way: ‘widowed, poor, ugly, deformed, or in some cases considered too proud and powerful’ (Zimbardo 2007: 9).2 In this sense it is possible to conceive of women as society’s abject. In her psychoanalytic analysis, Creed effectively applies Kristeva’s notion of the abject to the feminine monster in the horror film. She offers the term ‘monstrous-­feminine’ as an insight to how women are portrayed as ‘shocking, terrifying, horrific, abject’ (Creed 1993: 1), noting the importance of recognising ‘gendered monsters’ (Creed 1993: 2). Creed subsequently deduces that in horror films, woman is represented as monstrous ‘in relation to her mothering and reproductive functions’ (Creed 1993: 7), cementing the connection between the female body and evil. These discourses of the feminine abject resurface when considering the vilification of women in Marvel films. Here, issues of genre hybridity come to the fore, as the films appear to actively draw from body horror traditions associated with monstrous femininity. That these genre issues are elaborated through the vessel of feminine subjectivity is noteworthy and indicates the extensive nature of the monstrous feminine, which is not necessarily confined to one medium or mode of storytelling. One of the most ruthless vilifications of a woman in both comics and films is found in the representation of Jean Grey in X-­Men: The Last

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ma d with po we r 151 Stand. Despite her powers often being frustrated due to her inability to control them, Grey’s final scenes in X2, in which she opts to sacrifice herself so that she can use her powers to grant safety to her teammates in danger of being struck in their plane by a tidal wave, are highly complex. Agency is highlighted in her choice to save her teammates, while also appropriating the traditionally masculine act of self-­sacrifice and speaking to postfeminist notions of choice. However, Grey’s narrative takes a turn for the worse in the film’s sequel when she returns with an evil persona, the Dark Phoenix. Grey’s portrayal in The Last Stand largely epitomises the ultimate embodiment of feminine evil, a conflation of corrupt morality, aberrant sexuality, mental instability, and abject femininity. The Last Stand takes as its inspiration the ‘Dark Phoenix Saga’ comic storyline from 1980. In the comic, Grey becomes exposed to radiation whilst rescuing her team in space, causing her powers to reach their ultimate potential. She rebrands herself as Phoenix, becoming far more powerful and dressing in more provocative costumes, much like Susan Storm while she was possessed by Malice. Grey soon falls victim to the evil Hellfire Club, which recruits her via mind control. She eventually regains control over her thoughts and seeks revenge over the mutant who took over her mind. In the process she becomes power-­crazed and devours a star, killing all of the inhabitants of a nearby planet. With the X-­Men in pursuit, the story culminates in Grey making the choice to end her own life for the good of humanity in a brief moment of clarity (Claremont and Byrne 1980b). Madrid interprets this story as emblematic of the time of publishing, indicating a sense of punishment for the hedonism of the 1970s, which for many led to addiction and death (Madrid 2009: 174), and its repetition in cinematic form in 2006 continues the traditions set out by the comics, and in many ways exaggerates them. Recent adaptation Dark Phoenix (Simon Kinberg, 2019) revisits this narrative yet again, this time following on from the events in X-­Men: Apocalypse (Bryan Singer, 2016). The Last Stand begins with a flashback of Professor Xavier and Magneto as friends visiting a teenage Grey at her parents’ house. They explain to her that she has extremely potent mutant powers. The central theme of power, control and responsibility is introduced when Xavier asks her, ‘Will you control that power or let it control you?’ Significantly, this theme is localised on the single character of Jean Grey, rather than being explored via other characters. It is noteworthy, for example, that Scott Summers is unable to control his optic force blasts­– r­ ed beams of energy that burst out of his eyes­– b­ ut this rarely, if ever, poses a problem in the narrative; he simply wears a visor that allows him to control his power, or, as in Apocalypse, he

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is actively encouraged by his teammates to unleash his power in battle. This is a crucial indicator of how power is constructed as a gendered phenomenon in these films. Grey’s resurrection scene offers some insight into this situation. Summers visits the lake where she died in X2 and hears a voice whispering his name. A whirlwind occurs in the lake and he falls. When he turns around, Grey is before him, still wearing her X-­Men uniform and surrounded in a heavenly light that was present during her death. The light, however, is misleading, as this is not the heroic Jean Grey from the previous films, but a malevolent, dark Jean Grey. When they unite, Grey demonstrates how she now has absolute control over her powers by removing Summers’s glasses and preventing his use of his optic blasts. However, the scene becomes tragic as Grey changes during their kiss­– ­her eyes turning black in a close-­up­– ­and cuts to Xavier telepathically witnessing Grey murdering Summers. That her evil tendencies are first demonstrated while she kisses Summers is significant and is a plot point that occurs frequently throughout representations of villainesses. Much like when Rogue accidentally sucks the life out of her unsuspecting boyfriend through kissing him, these scenes reinforce the sexual undertones present in narratives of out-­of-­control women, who, in these heteronormative narratives, are constructed as being dangerous to men (with one exception, discussed later, in the Elektra villain Typhoid). Such sentiments have been the fuel for femicidal activities such as the witch-­hunting craze, which reached its peak in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. An obsession with the female body persisted, as it was implied that witches ‘give themselves to the devil’ (Muchembled 2003: 79), even having intercourse with him (Gardenour 2012: 178). In the undercurrents of the witch craze were discourses involving women’s bodies, their sexual conduct and appearance. According to Robert Muchembled, witches were said to be physically ugly due to their devotion to the devil (Muchembled 2003: 79). However, in her discussion of the construction of the feminine evil in the later Middle Ages, Brenda Gardenour traces the stereotype of the witch as an old, green hag to pseudo-­scientific reasoning propagated by European universities in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries (Gardenour 2012: 181). Due to the ‘natural’ toxicity of women’s bodies, the theory went, witches had an ugly appearance.3 Gardenour notes: the witch body was a sickly green, its skin having a yellowish hue, perhaps from its occasional overheating and the rising of choleric yellow bile . . . A further sign of the bubbling toxins within, she was covered with blemishes such as warts and moles. (Gardenour 2012: 181)

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Figure 6.1  The darkening of Jean Grey’s eyes and her veiny complexion marks her as abject in X-Men: The Last Stand.

Appearance, therefore, plays a crucial role in the identification of feminine evil. Grey’s appearance during the reunion scene and others in the film seem innocuous, but on closer inspection, she bears significant similarities to the stereotypical witch of Western thought. The connection between Grey’s telepathic/­telekinetic powers and witchcraft is obvious, especially coupled with her gesticulation when using these powers. She tends to float upright through the shot, as if she were, like a witch, ‘hoisted aloft by demons’ (Gardenour 2012: 181). This demonic element is further present in the unnatural blackening of her eyes whenever she is performing particular acts of evil (Figure 6.1). Additionally, Grey’s hair is unkempt and sprawling, having grown to below her hips, her complexion is veiny and pallid, reminiscent of the witch as an old hag who gives insufficient attention to bodily hygiene and maintenance. Most telling is Grey’s attire, which changes throughout the course of the film from her X-­Men uniform to various deep red ensembles. When she reaches her power’s full capacity, she wears a long, black, cloak-­like coat, underneath which is a floating red dress that often billows in the wind, especially when she engages in evil acts while using her powers. This choice of attire both indicates Grey’s positioning as an evil witch-­like entity and utilises the colour red to signify a sensual kind of danger (which is directly reminiscent of her Dark Phoenix costume in the comics). The film’s adherence to archaic notions of feminine evil is thus exposed in the characterisation of Grey as witch. After becoming evil, Grey is essentially a lifeless, catatonic vessel who is then used by Magneto in his fight against humans and their mutant cure. During the film, Xavier exposits that Grey’s personality has split in two and that she is being

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­controlled by her instinctual (sensual) side: ‘a purely instinctual creature, all desire and joy, and rage’. This clearly endorses beliefs about women being more receptive to ‘evil voices’ because ‘women’s bodies propelled them to an interest in the sensual’ (Noddings 1989: 45). Grey is a carnal creature, bolstering the association between women’s physical bodies alongside their amoral minds with evil. She is further unable to be a moral agent because her moral sense (or lack thereof) is presented as entirely unconscious. Witches were likewise thought of as dangerously sexual; Muchembled articulates that the witch craze ‘formed a tightly structured theory, focused on the demonic Sabbath and with an increasing emphasis on women and on an unnatural sexuality which was imputed to them in particular’ (Muchembled 2003: 60). So, too, is Grey marked as overtly sexual, for instance in a scene in which she is examined at Xavier’s school after being found by Logan. At this point it is unclear whether she is enacting her good or evil persona; she lies unconscious on an examination table with electrodes monitoring her body. Here, Grey is positioned as an object of Logan’s desire. Logan stands above her as she removes the electrodes from her exposed chest. This cuts to a shot of Logan looking, followed by a close-­up of her chest as she removes the electrodes, the outline of her breasts clearly visible. This is acknowledged within the scene when she jokingly states, ‘Logan, you’re making me blush.’ Grey then aggressively initiates a kiss, which escalates to her removing his belt telekinetically and sensually scraping his back with her fingernails. The scene specifies that something is wrong with Grey as she engages in a sexually assertive act. Sexual assertion is therefore emblematic of female evil and power, which must be punished. The factor of mental distress also plays a significant role in the portrayal of Grey’s evil persona. As noted above, it is not unusual for evil women in the media to be presented as mentally ill, reaching to widespread ideas around female hysteria. Inness also agrees that this kind of representation is problematic, stating that such a character is ‘shown to be insane, suggesting that her tough attributes are not “normal” for women but signs of a pathological condition’ (Inness 1998: 72). Grey’s mental instability is evident not only when she kills Summers, but also during her sexual encounter with Logan, in which, after Logan tells her Xavier will be able to ‘fix’ her condition, she screams, crazed and in close-­up, ‘I don’t wanna fix it!’ Here, her eyes have again turned black, signifying that she is indeed evil and has become mentally unhinged. Still, Grey’s most shocking act happens during a showdown with the X-­Men and Magneto’s Brotherhood of Mutants when she visits her child-

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ma d with po we r 155 hood home. Both Xavier and Magneto attempt to reason with Grey, but she snaps when Xavier tells her that her uncontrollable power resulted in Summers’s death. This sends Grey into a raging fury, where she hysterically cries and screams, causing the house and everything inside it­ – ­including the other mutants­– ­to levitate. The climax of the sequence features Grey disintegrating Xavier with her powers. Here, Grey is shown as having been corrupted by her power, driven insane, and ultimately harming her loved ones, including the X-­Men’s patriarchal leader. Typically, Grey is punished by death. After a dramatic stand-­ off between the mutants and the human military (armed with plastic guns and the mutant cure), Grey completely loses control, destroying buildings around her and evaporating humans and mutants alike. Logan is the only one who can stop Grey, it is implied, because of his stamina, but also because of his romantic devotion to Grey, framing the sequence in heterosexual terms. Grey’s power is visually marked by her position on a mound of debris far above Logan, who attempts to talk sense into Grey as he struggles against her telekinetic forces. Grey is so strong, that her powers remove most of Logan’s clothes, as well as some of his skin, exposing his bulging muscles. Logan, here, has been constructed as an essential image of strong, white, heterosexual masculinity, the only one who can stop Grey. Her good side finally resurfaces when Logan tells her he would die for her, and Grey frantically begs him to kill her. Logan carries out the act with his retractable metal claws, professing his love for her. Thus, the cinematic Grey is eliminated by a patriarchal figure, her final punishment. Interestingly, editorial conflicts led to Grey’s death in the comics that prove insightful. Writer Chris Claremont intended to depower Grey as punishment for essentially carrying out the genocide of an entire planet. This would have removed her powers, frustrating them. However, Marvel’s editor at the time was unhappy with this decision and decided that Grey deserved more severe punishment. Although it remains unclear exactly who ruled the death sentence for Grey (see Daniels 1991: 90–1; Madrid 2009: 174–5; Ryall and Tipton 2009: 30 for contradictory accounts), the story caused a fan furore and became one of Marvel’s most controversial stories as Grey was portrayed taking her own life (Fingeroth 2004: 90–1). The film amplifies the patriarchal mechanisms that contain Grey­ – ­dominated, powerless and dead. It was not enough for Grey to be punished by a depowering in the comics; death was deemed a more suitable punishment. Similarly, Grey’s death at her own hands was insufficient in the film adaptation; she was to be killed by a patriarchal figure. Each incarnation of this narrative, which has recurred in various media, oppressed Grey’s power more than the last.

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Grey’s death clearly acts as a frustration tactic to limit her power, but there is one more factor that complicates Grey’s agency. During her examination at Xavier’s school, it is revealed by Xavier that he has been limiting her power since her childhood. He tells Logan that due to her power, he ‘created a series of psychic barriers to isolate her powers from her conscious mind and as a result, Jean developed a dual personality’. Thus, Grey’s power had been contained by Xavier throughout all of the films. Indeed, it is unclear whether Grey’s heroics were ever truly of her doing, or whether Xavier was behind them the entire time. The Last Stand characterises Grey as an insane witch-­like murderess who clearly has no control over her powers or her actions and the ethical implications thereof. The film then establishes that it is possible that Grey may not even be held accountable for the good acts she carried out in the past, as she was under the influence of the X-­Men’s resident patriarch the entire time. Indeed, Dark Phoenix potentially takes account of this criticism by portraying Xavier as somewhat remorseful for having violated Jean’s mind, although the overall narrative outcome of Jean’s death remains.

Disease, Toxicity and Poison in Marvel’s Evil Women Ideas of women being toxic or poisonous frequently resurface, coinciding with those of dangerous feminine sexuality and also informing the medieval thinking behind the witch hunts. As Gardenour notes ‘The witch’s unique anatomy and physiology, with its fundamental humoral imbalance, drove her sexual rapacity which, in turn, intensified the toxicity of her flesh, breath, and very glance’ (Gardenour 2012: 179). The idea of the poison woman is persistent in Western cultures, which Dominique Mainon and James Ursini refer to as ‘a throwback from the fifties when scare tactics were utilized to discourage sexual contact between ­teenagers’ (Mainon and Ursini 2006: 67). However, the association between women and poison goes back much further. By the sixteenth century, it was suggested that women corroded the innate warmth of men and transmitted a ‘malevolent moistness’ during sex (Muchembled 2003: 77). This belief was later extended to the air exhaled by women, which was deemed poisonous (Muchembled 2003: 77). Later on, in the nineteenth century, women were similarly typified as toxic due to their sexual appetites. Here, prostitutes were blamed for the spread of venereal disease such as syphilis (Ehrlich 2013). The sexualised female body was considered inherently diseased, prompting US physicians to call for a system of regulating prostitutes, policing their bodies and further controlling women’s sexuality (Ehrlich 2013: 121, 127).

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ma d with po we r 157 This association dates back at least to ancient Greek times, in which, as discussed by Alison Innes, women were not trusted to be healers due to the idea that they lacked the self-­control needed to administer medicine (Innes 2013: 3). Innes notes that ‘the repeated telling of these myths reinforced the association of women with poisonous pharmaka [medicines] in the minds of Greek listeners’ (Innes 2013: 14). Equally of note is the sexual element of this association, which resulted in the scapegoating of women during epidemics of sexually transmitted diseases (Ehrlich 2013). Interestingly, the infections spread by poison women in Marvel films bear remarkable similarity to sexually transmitted infections, especially when considering that these women use their powers against men during sexual acts. Typhoid Mary is a Marvel comic book character named after an Irish immigrant cook living in America in the early to mid-­1900s, ‘Typhoid Mary’ Mallon. Mallon was a carrier of typhoid fever, bearing no symptoms herself, and infected dozens of other people. Typhoid Mary of the comics acquired a split-­personality after Daredevil caused an accident in the brothel in which she worked, imbuing her tragic narrative with sexual undertones (Kelly and Chang 1997). Her ‘original’ Mary persona constantly ran a fever while her Typhoid persona gained telekinetic and telepathic powers, becoming a foe of Daredevil. In her introductory comic, Typhoid is accompanied by discourses pertaining to poison: ‘Invisible poisons. They walk among us. Poison lives, all it touches . . . dies. Poison doesn’t know it’s poison. It simply has to do what it has to to survive’ (Nocenti and Romita Jr 1988). However, these references to poison seem to be merely illustrative, as there are no further references to actual poison in the issue. Typhoid Mary appears in the film Elektra, credited simply as ‘Typhoid’. Only her name, and possibly the description introducing the character in the comic book, serves as inspiration for the character’s poison powers. Typhoid (Natassia Malthe) appears heavily made up with distinctive long, electric blue talon-­like fingernails that are the focus of several close-­up shots. She is coded as villainous through her black clothing, but also through her powers, which she uses in a sexually predatory manner. Typhoid is introduced early in the film as a member of the Hand organisation, which seeks to end Elektra’s life. During a Council of the Hand meeting, which is conducted by Japanese Master Roshi and his businessman-­like associates, she is shown slowly and sensually blowing a kiss to one of the council members. In a medium close-­up, the man’s face becomes pallid, with darkened veins indicating blood poisoning on his cheeks, his eyes bloodshot, as he raises his arm towards his nose in a bid

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to shield himself from Typhoid’s breath. He coughs, and the shot cuts to Roshi carelessly glancing down at him and then at Typhoid as she turns and leaves. Like the toxic witches described by Gardenour, Typhoid’s very breath is diseased and she is capable of killing people with a mere kiss. Additionally, like Grey’s, Typhoid’s eyes frequently turn black when she is perpetrating a particularly malicious act, again cementing her evil status. Elektra faces Typhoid during the same forest showdown in which Abby Miller reveals her powers. While tracking Elektra, Mark and Abby with her fellow Hand member, Tattoo, an aerial shot shows Typhoid walking through grass and shrubbery. As she walks, she leaves a trail of blackened, dead leaves she caused to die while brushing her outstretched hands over them. After defeating the villain Stone, the three stand in a clearing. A flare of dramatic music marks the peril in which they now find themselves, as Elektra turns in surprise and the camera zooms into her astonished face. Her point-­of-­view shot shows Typhoid approaching, looking into the camera with her hands outstretched. This immediately cuts to a shot of Typhoid kissing Elektra, wrapping her face in her hands. Clearly, this kiss, the only same-­sex kiss in the entire Marvel film adaptation corpus sampled, aligns this sexually infused act with evil. That Typhoid uses her powers while forcibly kissing a heroic woman doubles up the deviance of the already transgressive, sexually assertive act. In the shot, Elektra’s skin begins to appear burned from Typhoid’s powers. In a long shot from behind Typhoid, dead leaves fall around the pair. The kiss is lengthy and shot in slow motion, exploiting the sexual connotations of the scene. Typhoid then lowers herself and Elektra to the ground so that she is lying on top of Elektra. The falling leaves turn black, externalising the poisoning effect of Typhoid’s powers. When Typhoid lets go of her, Elektra’s face is blue and black leaves surround her. Though Elektra obviously recovers from Typhoid’s attack­– a­ nd later kills her by throwing her sai at her face, causing Typhoid to explode in a puff of smoke­– ­the classic characteristics of the evil, poisonous woman have clearly been taken advantage of within this scene. Further, in using an established character such as Typhoid Mary, the character’s name aids in the construction of a villainess who matches existing conceptions of women as poisonous. The Wolverine also makes use of the notion of the poisonous woman in its representation of the central female villain Viper (Svetlana Khodchenkova). Viper is a snake-­like mutant who excels in the creation of toxins with her mutant powers. Like Typhoid, she is capable of poisoning people with a mere breath but is also immune to toxins herself. Viper is based on the character also known as Madame Hydra in the comics.

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ma d with po we r 159 A lethal assassin, Viper’s connection to snakes goes as far as immunity to certain poisons in the comics, though she has been known to utilise snakes as weapons, for example when she contaminated Washington DC’s water supply with a snake mutagen, turning President Reagan into a snake (Gruenwald and Dwyer 1988). Nonetheless, Viper’s snake-­like attributes are heightened in the film as she causes disruption with her poison powers. Her portrayal conveniently combines the aforementioned discourses of toxic witches with classical representations of snake-­women, such as Medusa, who had snakes for hair and could turn men to stone with her gaze, and the half-­woman, half-­snake Echidna. Viper is introduced as Dr Green, the oncologist of Yashida (Hiroyuki Sanada), an ailing Japanese businessman whose life was saved by Logan in World War II. Yashida has called on Logan so that he may repay him for saving his life, although his motives are not benevolent. Dr Green is revealed to be evil through a scene in which she kisses Logan. As Logan dreams of kissing Jean Grey, a medium close-­up shows Logan in bed. Suddenly, Grey is revealed to be Viper, and her kiss is gagging him, her eyes glowing green and her pupils slits. She pulls back and flees, and a close-­up lingers on the green mist escaping from Logan’s mouth as he gags (this kiss serves the purpose of Viper implanting a device inside Logan that disables his healing powers, a part of Yashida’s plan against Logan). As with both Typhoid and Grey, Viper’s powers are established as being particularly dangerous in conjunction with a sexual act, which itself is crossing the boundary of appropriate femininity. The emphasis on Viper’s sexuality is further drawn when, in the streets of Tokyo at night, she is pursuing a now powerless Logan and his sidekick, Yukio (Rila Fukushima). Viper is approached by a man, who, mistaking her for a sex worker, asks ‘How much?’ Without hesitating, Viper kisses him and he drops dead to the ground as she walks away. The effects of her powers on her victims are syphilitic, being visible on the skin as a kind of infection, rash and boils, in addition to the veiny blood poisoning that was also present in Typhoid’s victims. Viper’s representation thereby draws on discourses regarding women as the toxic transmitters of venereal disease. Throughout the film, Viper is almost exclusively dressed in green, but this is often emphasised through outfits that entirely consist of leather and other slippery, shiny fabrics reminiscent of snakeskin. As the film progresses, Viper is presented as using her poison powers in increasingly imaginative ways, such as licking a pen or her fingernails with her poison in shots that showcase her forked snake tongue and the hissing sound that accompanies it and using them to stab people. Likewise, The Wolverine does not shy away from visually signifying the abject as manifest in the character

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of Viper. Her appearance gradually becomes more infused with repulsive qualities, characterising her as that which must be cast off, eradicated. Notably, the association of women with poisonous snakes has been established and repurposed depending on historical context. Noddings suggests that snakes came to be associated with women due to their connotations of wisdom, immortality and fertility (Noddings 1989: 53). This changed since the myth of the Fall in which the serpent instigated Eve’s temptation (Noddings 1989: 53). However, women have been associated with snakes despite this, perhaps precisely because the devious, slithering snake matches the notion of the evil, toxic woman. In any case, Viper’s status as a snake-­ woman reifies this association, especially when considering the film’s visual portrayal of the character. The most notable instance of the abjection of Viper is during the film’s climactic scenes in a facility in which Yashida’s associates are creating a giant weaponised Silver Samurai robot with which to fight Logan. Viper is once again positioned as antithetical and dangerous to men when she tells Logan the reasons why she was employed by Yashida: ‘Of course, it helps to be genetically immune to every poison known to man, as I am. And immune to the toxin that is man himself . . . as I am.’ Like the femme fatales of the 1940s, Viper sexually manipulates men for personal gain. But Viper’s previously palatable appearance is corroded in the scenes that follow, matching her external appearance to her evil morality. After being shot with a poison, Viper demonstrates how her powers of immunity function. When she awakens on the floor in the facility, her skin has become green-­tinted scales, matching her scaly leather outfit. Her eyes are once again green, her pupils snake-­like. She rips off her halter-­neck top in a medium close-­up, and in a moment of body horror, she lifts a fingernail to the centre of her forehead and scores her face to the bottom of her neck, cutting the flesh. The camera slowly zooms in as she points her head upwards, places her hands upon it and, lowering her head again, peels the skin away from her face with a maniacal grin (Figure 6.2). At this moment, Viper is represented as visually repulsive, an embodiment of the abject woman, with a later shot showing her shed skin as an explicit reference to the waste material produced by her abject body. Post-­shedding, Viper appears bald, a marker of un-­femininity (though remarkably her make-­up withstood the shedding of skin). The final fight between Viper and Yukio once again highlights Viper’s snake-­features, her tongue flicking out between punches and kicks, spitting acid and hissing. Finally, Yukio wraps a chord around Viper’s neck and pulls her into a lift shaft, hanging her, a death not quite the beheading of Medusa, but still symbolically separating the head from the body.

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Figure 6.2  Viper sheds her skin in The Wolverine.

Make Asgard Great Again: Villainy and the Feminine Spectre of White Supremacy in Thor: Ragnarok (2017) Due to the political shifts in American culture that culminated in the presidential election of Donald Trump, it is useful to consider how modes of feminine villainy have shifted from the representations discussed above. Thor: Ragnarok puts forward interesting political debates through its reworking of Marvel characters (that are themselves based on Norse mythology). One of the central villains of the film is Goddess of Death, Hela (Cate Blanchett), whose representation hinges on her power-­hungry plans of restoring the glory of Asgard’s empire­– i­n other words, to make Asgard great again. This runs alongside the film’s overarching statements concerning Asgardian identity, explored through the (traditional, masculine) figure of Thor and the people of Asgard. Hela was the first central villainess to be included in the MCU. With the comic book character being based on Norse mythology (which itself has connotations of occult paganism), her adaptation to film was compatible with the magical world of the Thor films due to the established cultural association between women and dark magic. Ragnarok likewise adapts her comic book appearance and powers. Introduced in Marvel comics in 1964 (Lee and Kirby 1964), the character has a long and convoluted history within the Marvel Universe, key elements of which have been extracted and expanded on in the film. Hela was initially established as a personification of death itself (which a teenaged Thor had to defeat before he was deemed worthy to wield legendary hammer Mjolnir and become a hero) (Lee and Kirby 1964). Her key appearances throughout her publication history indicate that she has magical powers paralleling those of Thor, as is typical of an

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Asgardian. She has power over dead Asgardians as ruler of the Realms of Hel and Niflheim, where souls of the dead dwell. As ruler of these realms, Hela has dominated the souls of Asgardians and being a villainess, she constantly seeks to expand her powers and obtain as many Asgardian souls as possible, especially those of Thor and Odin (Lee and Buscema 1971a; 1971b; 1971c). It is this desire to expand her power that is augmented in Ragnarok and is largely what contributes to her characterisation as an unhinged, power-hungry, god-­like superbeing. It is particularly noteworthy that the character’s power in the comics is defined as a deadly touch to both Asgardians and humans, who age rapidly and die when coming into contact with her (Lee and Buscema 1971b). This parallels the poison touches of previous villainesses. Hela’s femininity is likewise a crucial component of her villainy. In Thor #190 (Lee and Buscema 1971c), Hela’s plans to take Thor’s soul are thwarted by appeals to her feminine side­– s­ he releases Thor after witnessing Lady Sif’s love for Thor. Her moral development is particularly gendered since she finally claims to have ‘learned what it means to be a woman’ (Lee and Buscema 1971c) above all else. Within her cultural context, cinematic Hela represents more than the abject feminine encompassed by Jean Grey, Typhoid and Viper. Her characterisation is a direct engagement with the problematics of Asgardian politics as represented in previous films featuring Thor. In Ragnarok, Thor discovers he has an estranged older sister in Hela, who is therefore the rightful heir to Asgard’s throne. It is also revealed that their father Odin, rather than being the benevolent, peaceful ruler of the Nine Realms he was thought to be, actually achieved his status through forceful domination, violence and oppression­– ­with Hela leading Asgard’s armies by his side. This calls forth colonial discourses and offers a potential critique of imperial ideologies. Realising the error of his and Hela’s destructive colonial practices, Odin imprisoned Hela and wrote her out of history, literally painting over the mural depicting their conquests with a new, more politically palatable account. Again, like previous Marvel villainesses, Hela’s power is constructed in the film as that which must be contained to avert disaster. Before his death, Odin warns Thor and Loki of Ragnarok, a cataclysmic event characterised as Asgard’s apocalypse, and the impending return of Hela, who seeks once more to dominate the Nine Realms and beyond. Hela’s hunger for power draws from similar discourses to the representations of villainesses mentioned previously in this chapter. Like Jean Grey, Hela bears the signifiers of abject femininity though her pallid and witch-­like complexion, long black and unkempt hair and extreme eye make-­up. She also displays familiar green markers of toxicity in both her

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Figure 6.3  Demonic femininity in Thor: Ragnarok’s Hela.

costuming and her powers, which are often accompanied by a green glow. Her ripped green lizard-­skin-­like bodysuit at times exposes her white and veiny shoulders and other parts of her body. Like other Marvel villainesses, Hela’s touch is deadly, as demonstrated by her effortless destruction of Thor’s hammer, Mjolnir. She also changes the appearance of her hair to that of a multi-­pronged antler-­like headdress that recurs throughout Ragnarok at times during which she is presented as being particularly nefarious; her embodiment of evil thus appears almost demonic (Figure 6.3); indeed, she is referred to as a ‘demoness’ later on in the film. These are persistent images of female villainy that have endured Marvel’s (and Western society’s) history. It is, however, interesting that Hela’s villainy factors into the film’s overarching critique of imperialist ideologies akin to white supremacy. White supremacist discourses became more visible in the lead-­up to and duration of the Trump era, as well as in the global move towards right-­wing populism. Norse and Viking mythologies and symbols have long been associated with radical far-­right and white supremacist politics, for instance through the use of Germanic neopagan religious ideologies (von Schnurbein 2016: 2). Such ideologies ‘merged nationalism, cultural pessimism, racism, anti-­Semitism, anti-­materialism, anti-­liberalism and an enthusiasm for all things “Nordic” or “Germanic” ’ (von Schnurbein 2016: 2) and represent a romanticisation, or fetishisation, of a unified white identity based on an ‘envisioned renewal or rebirth of the German people living in unity’ (von Schnurbein 2016: 3). These are also the identity politics at the heart of Odinism, a set of religious beliefs and practices often attributed to appealing to white supremacists (Kaplan 2015: 123). These beliefs are deeply racial in positing the supremacy of a white bloodline and gendered in their centring of Norse god Odin as masculine warrior

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ideal. Further, Norse iconography is widely prevalent in the visuals of far-­right politics, circulating online and offline (Miller-­Idriss 2019: 125).4 The use of these ideologies, and iconographies, by these groups serves to strengthen an ‘imagined continuity of cultural ethnicity from the past to the present’ according to Andrew B. R. Elliott (2018: 4), functioning to add credibility to the ethnic distinctions on which far-­right separatism relies within a social context characterised as multicultural, and offer a unified white (national) identity. Dating back to the 1960s, Marvel’s Norse-­inspired characters predate a time in which right-­wing extremism was highly visible within mainstream media and so adaptations of these characters within the Trump era context in which right-­wing politics have arguably been emboldened runs the risk of romanticising or glorifying imagery and ideologies that have become associated with white supremacy. This is at odds with the (post) feminist politics that inspire moves towards diversity and inclusivity of marginalised groups within mainstream Hollywood (and, in particular, the Marvel brand). To offset the associations between Norse mythology and right-­wing extremism, Thor: Ragnarok renegotiates the potential for heroism in these characters through discourses of social marginalisation (Asgardians as ‘a people’) as well as through the villainous figure of Hela. In this, the Norse identity of the characters is reconfigured to better accommodate more liberal-­leaning politics. However, in doing so, the film relies on established tropes and discourses associated with the institutional vilification of (white) women, while also reinstating the patriarchal rule of Asgard by Thor at the end of the film. Odin is likewise removed from the narrative, a move that queries both his patriarchal rule and the political connotations of a figure associated with white supremacy. In the character of Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson), the film attempts to reconcile its Norse heritage with notions of racial inclusivity (discussed in detail in Chapter 9). These developments mark a distinct ambiguity characteristic of contemporary postfeminist media texts. Hela is a crucial component in the film’s negotiation of its Norse-­ inflected characters. During her introductory scene, Hela emerges from a green glowing portal to a clifftop in Norway, where Thor and his half-­ brother (and occasional villain) Loki had witnessed Odin die. In a medium close-­up, her blue-­green eyes are accentuated in the portal’s glow. In the same medium close-­up her tangled hair wafts in the wind and she smiles deviously before saying huskily to Thor and Loki, whose shocked reactions have been intercut throughout her emergence, ‘So, he’s [Odin] gone . . . That’s a shame, I would have liked to have seen that.’ She addresses family likenesses, pointing out that Thor does not look like Odin but that

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ma d with po we r 165 Loki sounds like Odin before uttering a familiar line previously associated with Loki (from his appearance in The Avengers): ‘Kneel . . . before your queen.’ Hela’s villainy is established along familial lines here. Discourses of nuclear family are reconfigured throughout Ragnarok, with particular focus on royal lineage and racially superior bloodlines. These themes are established in Hela’s introduction and returned to later on through the film’s proposal of an Asgardian diaspora. While I examine this fully in Chapter 10, it nonetheless confirms Hela’s character as deeply entrenched in the maintenance of an ethnic heritage encompassed in her investment in restoring Asgard’s empire. Hela’s villainy is therefore steeped in her insistence on racial supremacy and rule over the Nine Realms, which she considers her birthright. This is noteworthy within the context of Trump-­ era politics, which are said to have bolstered white supremacist discourses more widely. Hela’s supremacist politics are particularly clear when she returns to Asgard. In a scene in which Hela asserts her dominance over Asgard’s army, she stands before and above the soldiers, a shot from behind that tilts to reveal the vast scope of her newly reclaimed kingdom. A medium shot framed by Asgard’s decorative gold structures (a reminder of its riches, obtained through the domination of the Realms) isolates the character with only the sky behind her. She stands powerfully with her hands on her hips and introduces herself to the soldiers as the Goddess of Death. A shot from within the crowd of soldiers showcases their uniform movement into a defensive stance with their shields and cuts back to behind Hela, highlighting her towering dominance over the army. She declares that ‘We were once the seat of absolute power in the cosmos. Our supremacy was unchallenged. Yet Odin stopped at Nine Realms.’ The editing, here, makes attempts to position Hela against the army as the camera tracks a path through the many soldiers from behind as she continues, ‘Our destiny is to rule over all others. And I am here to restore that power’, discourses that bear resemblance to far-­right, even Nazi, ideology. Despite this, Hela is unable to take charge of the army, as Hogun (Tadanobu Asano), friend of Thor and one of the Warriors Three, orders them to attack. A frenetic fight sequence follows as Hela is shown single-­handedly fighting the Asgardian army. She does not flinch while being stabbed and shot at by the Asgardians. After showcasing her fighting prowess, the film cuts to the resolution of the battle: a close-­up of a slain soldier that tilts up to reveal he is one of many, as the boots of mercenary Skurge (Karl Urban), whom Hela designates her executioner, enter the shot. The sequence ends with Hela’s brutal impaling of Hogun

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before quipping ‘Let’s go see my palace’, finally able to take what she believes to be rightfully hers. Both the dialogue and cinematic execution of this scene are significant in their framing of Hela within terms associated with far-­right politics as Hela specifically refers to the (racial) supremacy of the Asgardians and their rule over all ‘others’. This can be seen as a response to the ongoing white supremacist, anti-­feminist and American nationalist rhetoric that gained wide visibility during the election campaign and subsequent presidential election of Trump. For the time being, though, it is useful to consider Hela’s femininity as part of her characterisation as the harbinger of a totalitarian Asgardian empire. Indeed, Ragnarok’s use of Hela as a central villainess is key to its use of postcolonial discourses and (gendered) critique of colonialism. Hela’s reassertion of her existence within Asgard’s history reaches to the idea of women’s history that seeks to rework historical accounts that traditionally exclude women or, as it were, write them out of history (Bennett 2006: 7). The scene featuring Hela’s destruction of Odin’s mural is key here. Upon approaching her throne with Skurge, in long shots once again showcasing the bodies of dead Asgardian soldiers scattered in the throne room, Hela laments the fact that the Asgardians could not remember her, asking ‘Has no one been taught our history?’ An aerial shot of Hela and Skurge looking upwards is followed by a close­up of the ceiling mural, a circular painting depicting Asgard’s palace at the centre surrounded by six smaller panels portraying various events in Asgard’s history. The mural is reminiscent of Renaissance art through its use of colour and composition, an indication of its status within Asgardian culture and history. The camera slowly zooms even closer to one panel in particular, which shows the Asgardian royal family with Odin and wife Frigga at the centre and Thor and Loki on either side of them. All members of the family are painted with a golden circle around their head, an appropriation of the Christian signifier of a halo that jars with the Norse elements of the storyworld. Hela’s voice accompanies a short montage of the remaining panels of the mural, none of which include her: ‘Look at these lies. Goblets and garden parties! Peace treaties!’ A close-­up of Odin’s portrait as Hela explains that he was ‘proud to have it [the empire]’ is followed by a medium shot of Hela and Skurge as she gestures to conjure her swords and sends them shooting up out of the shot. She half grunts the line ‘ashamed of how he got it’ and a close-­up of the mural shows it cracking under the impact of the swords. It crumbles and falls to the floor of the throne room; Hela stands among the rubble of the mural, signifying her destruction of an unwarranted patriarchal rule, and her upward gaze is

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ma d with po we r 167 mimicked by the close-­up shot of what was revealed by the collapsed mural­– ­a painting that portrays a more menacing Odin at the centre of the circle with the surrounding panels depicting various configurations of bloody battles and Hela riding a vicious, oversized wolf. A new montage of the painting is accompanied by her voice describing ‘the conquest that built Asgard’s empire’ before Odin called a halt to the endeavour because Hela’s ‘ambition outgrew his’. And so, he locked her away and the mural was subsequently painted over. Hela’s uncovering of Asgard’s imperial past and reinsertion of herself into Asgard’s history are somewhat contradictory when considered alongside the film’s overarching postcolonial discourses. Far from critiquing the oppressive institution of the monarchy itself, Hela disrupts the accepted account of Odin’s patriarchal rule based on colonial domination­– ­which she herself seeks to reclaim. For all intents and purposes, Hela’s feminist reclamation of history is symptomatic of a politic of white supremacy. In a postfeminist sense, Hela’s gender is displaced within the film’s critique of white colonialism. It is, however, possible to make sense of Hela’s portrayal as being representative of white women’s benefiting from, or upholding of, oppressive white Western capitalist social structures­– ­ideas that have been put forward in feminist critiques of neoliberal (post)feminisms (hooks 1984: 76; Rottenberg 2018). Hela feasibly represents the mystique of the ‘right-­wing woman’, a paradoxical marker of political alliances that has long been problematised by scholars and critics due to the assumption of the ‘often anti-­woman leanings of US right-­wing politics, with its religious prohibitions, attempts to control reproductive freedoms and disapproval of women in leadership roles’ (Downing 2018: 368). Again, this resonates within Trump-­era politics due to what was suggested to be the surprising turnout of white women who voted for Trump (Tien 2017; Jaffe 2018). Still, it is noteworthy that Hela’s revelations about Odin’s reign make clear to Thor and his fellow Asgardians the horrors on which Asgard’s dominance over the Nine Realms rests, and that it is this particular form of vilified femininity that is used to make this case. It is an ostensibly problematic representation, as the reclaiming of history has been justifiably carried out by feminists (specifically women of colour and/­or queer women) to address historical narratives skewed towards the achievements of white men. In Ragnarok’s terms, though, it is a marginalised person’s rewriting of history that ultimately leads to a reassertion of cultural dominance (alarmingly characterised through discourses of ethnic supremacy). It is crucial, then, that Thor and Hela represent different responses to the uncovering of Asgard’s colonial past­– ­Hela seeks to reclaim and restore

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the oppressive empire, while Thor ultimately reinvents and renegotiates its meaning, as evidenced through the repeated line that ‘Asgard is not a place­– ­it’s a people.’ Still, that liberal politics of the Asgardian diaspora are represented by Thor, a white, privileged god-­man who, while heroic, benefits from his royal heritage, which is reinstated, at the end of the film, limits Ragnarok’s radical potential. Indeed, the overarching unaddressed issue in Ragnarok is that Thor ultimately reclaims the throne of Asgard for himself. The structure of monarchy therefore remains unquestioned (it is subsequently offered to Valkyrie in Avengers: Endgame (Anthony and Joe Russo, 2019)). While Hela’s representation is decidedly unsexual, in contrast to previous Marvel villainesses on screen, it is the adherence to discourses of witchcraft and toxicity that remain significant, especially in how they foster the film’s ideological rejection of white supremacist discourses. While Hela’s death is only implied in the film, Ragnarok ensures that there is little moral ambiguity to be read into her characterisation, with Thor reclaiming the throne of Asgard, which has been redefined as a nomadic tribe (‘a people’), having evacuated and destroyed Asgard (the physical place) in the process of defeating Hela. As discussed, portrayals of villainous women frequently draw from patriarchal discourses that subjugate women. While Jean Grey’s representation more broadly draws on discourses of women as evil witches, as well as perpetuating notions of powerful women becoming mentally unhinged and literally insane, Typhoid and Viper’s portrayals have more directly to do with rhetoric associating women with poison and toxicity. Meanwhile, demonstrating an adaptation of sorts of the established discourses of female villainy to the Trump era, Hela’s representation in Ragnarok remains embedded within occult-­inflected ideas of demonic femininity, while aiding the film’s rejection of Western imperialism. A common denominator for these women­– s­ave Hela­– i­s sexuality. Each villainess is shown aggressively utilising her powers while engaging in sexual behaviour. The sexual acts in which these villainesses engage are aggressive­ – ­they are using their powers aggressively while being sexually assertive, causing physical harm to the receiver. In behaving in this kind of sexually aggressive manner combined with an exhibition of their powers­ – ­which is specific to the fantastical nature of the genre­– ­they effectively act out ‘an appropriation of the male sphere’ (Aguiar 2001: 5), while simultaneously drawing attention to the fact they are physically powerful beings, thereby fortifying the association between powerful women and evil. At the same time, the emphasis on the sexual villainess runs parallel

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ma d with po we r 169 to the sexualised heroine­– ­both are defined through a moral gauge of sex. While heroines are sexualised­– t­ hey wear revealing costumes, make suggestive comments, are objectified and so on­– ­villainesses are themselves represented as sexual. The evil woman is presented as acting in sexually assertive ways because she can, but she is also marked as evil because of this sexually assertive behaviour. The heroine, on the other hand, can be erotically contemplated, both from within and outside of the narrative, but she rarely, if ever initiates a sexual encounter. This is symptomatic of postfeminist culture’s persistent policing of women’s sexuality while capitalising on particular commodified versions of it. The representations discussed here leave room for reading such as that carried out by Deborah Jermyn upon the so-­called ‘women from hell’ thriller subgenre (Jermyn 1996). Jermyn reappropriates psychopathic female characters such as those that appear in Fatal Attraction (Adrian Lyne, 1987), The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (Curtis Hanson, 1992) and Single White Female (Barbet Shroeder, 1992), concluding that such portrayals offer a ‘symbiotic representation of the conflicts of womanhood’ through its inclusion of an evil woman and her direct counterpart (Jermyn 1996: 253, 258). It is demonstrable that representations of evil women can be shaped by interpretation, and the villainesses described here doubtless offer potential as projections of transgressive femininities shamelessly acting to obliterate patriarchal limitations placed upon women’s sexuality and morals. However, that these representations draw from patriarchal discourses of feminine evil similarly results in women who are constructed as the ultimate, irredeemable evil who must be eradicated diegetically. The villainesses discussed here all exemplify the gendered dynamics at work when considering notions of power as the status quo is restored when these women die.

Notes 1. Indeed, Zimbardo’s later works regarding the diminishing role of men in society and the detrimental effects of the so-­called feminisation of schooling on young boys (Zimbardo and Coulombe 2015; 2016) can be considered heterosexist and in many ways antifeminist. 2. Here, Zimbardo’s scarce attention to the fact that those accused by the Catholic church of being witches were women (and hence the victims of institutional misogyny) most obviously reveals the weaknesses of his analysis but his overarching statements regarding the evil as abject remain theoretically useful. 3. The link between medieval witch imagery and anti-­Semitism has also been established. Sara Lipton argues that the stigmatisation of witches was informed

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by the stereotyping of Jews, concluding that ‘[w]hen the visual attributes associated with Jewish men­– h ­ ooked nose, dark hair, pointed hats, even beards and cats­– ­appeared on or with women in postmedieval art, the women were as liable to be witches as Jewish’ (Lipton 2014: 369). These intersecting groups were both positioned in opposition to state-­mandated Christian ideologies. 4. Other imagery associated with far-­right politics includes that of the Nazi and colonial eras and Christian crusades, as well as ‘other contemporary and historical anti-­immigrant and Islamophobic references’ (Miller-­Idriss 2019: 125).

C H A PT E R 7

Mutants, Cyborgs and Femininity Unfixed? Addressing the Gendered Bodies of Mystique and Nebula

Though Marvel superhero films often display a need to maintain gender rigidity, two interesting cases are the mutant shapeshifter Mystique, who appears in the X-­Men films, and the female cyborg Nebula (Karen Gillen) of the Guardians of the Galaxy films. In this chapter, I address the potential for queer readings of these characters, while also examining how they are placed within postfeminist boundaries. The simultaneous queering and de-­queering of Mystique (as Cocca (2016a) puts it) that occurs throughout the X-­Men films is a notable paradox. Meanwhile, Nebula can be read in terms of the radical politics of the gendered cyborg, especially concerning subjectivity and family. These characters can be read in terms of both their denial or subversion of gendered bodies and their existence beyond traditional frameworks of humanness. This chapter therefore draws from work in both constructionist accounts of gender, such as Judith Butler’s, as well as utilising ideas that hinge on posthumanist feminism. These characters pose excellent case studies for the subject of the posthuman (but still gendered) body due to the representation of their bodies as explicitly pliable and questioning hegemonic gender norms. Both characters have an alien appearance, harnessing the generic potential of the science fiction-­superhero hybrid genre that more recent superhero films make use of since the initial success of 2014’s Guardians of the Galaxy. Ideas of gender potentially implode through the figure of shapeshifting mutant Mystique. Her circumvention of gender fixity also reaches to discourses of posthumanism, especially in relation to notions of (gendered) embodiment. Due to her plasticity, it is possible to think of Mystique as, to borrow a term from the philosophical critiques of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, a ‘body without organs’ (Deleuze and Guattari 1983; 2014), a network of potentials that can be drawn from and realised. Like the allegorical posthuman body the authors refer to (which they characterise, not unproblematically, as schizophrenic), Mystique’s is a body

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of constant potentiality, the product of a machinic unconscious fuelled by the schizophrenic process they refer to as ‘desiring-­production’. The potential for Mystique to be anything or anyone is represented through the texts she appears in and her body ostensibly resists categorisation or organisation within traditional structures and discourses; it ‘scrambles all the [social] codes’ (Deleuze and Guattari 1983: 15). Her body is therefore defined by what it has the potential to become. Mystique is perhaps the best example of Scott Jeffery’s superhuman posthuman, which, he argues, has been articulated within superhero comic books since their inception (Jeffery 2016). While Jeffery does argue that the comic book posthuman offers ‘an unbroken chain of posthuman representations put to very different uses and given different meanings at certain times’ (Jeffery 2016: 17), he neglects to discuss the character of Mystique, whose materiality clearly bears relevance to his topic of discussion. Meanwhile, according to Dijana Jelača, the very definition of posthuman ‘is a continually shape-­shifting discourse, and much like that of the body itself’ (Jelača 2018: 279), much like Mystique. While it is beyond the scope of this chapter to delve deeply into the foundational philosophies of theorists such as Deleuze and Guattari, it should be noted that these theories (perhaps implicitly) inform the foundations of accounts of posthuman aliens and cyborgs. Indeed, Scott Jeffrey’s work on the posthuman in superhero comics is a thorough account of the shifts in representations of superheroes that can be uncovered through posthuman, specifically Deleuzoguattarian, philosophies. This chapter is nonetheless concerned with identifying how Mystique and Nebula’s representations resonate with questions of gender performativity, assemblage and hybridity and, subsequently, how these questions are dealt with through the films in which they appear. An overarching aim of Deleuze and Guattari was to deconstruct the notion of the ideal liberalised human subject, an endeavour that likewise resonates with anti-­capitalist feminist goals that query the universality of so-­called personhood (which is mostly characterised as white, male and European). These models of universal humanity rely on Enlightenment-­era dualisms that place the mind as separate from the body and the body as being in some way limiting to the capacity of the mind to transcend. As N. Katherine Hayles suggests, the concept of hybridity and fluid subjectivity is key to Deleuze and Guattari’s understanding of ‘a dispersed subjectivity distributed among diverse desiring machines they call “body without organs” ’ (Hayles 1999: 4). Both Mystique and Nebula, in their flexibility, offer the potential to be bodies without organs­– ­Mystique because she is portrayed as being able to shift her form into that of another human (with or without organs) and

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mu tan ts , cybo r gs and f e minin i t y u n f i x e d? 173 Nebula due to her representation as a cyborg who has been assembled piece by piece by a tyrannical patriarch. While gesturing towards a radical intervention into humanist frameworks through a reconsideration of what it means to have a gendered body, both Mystique and Nebula nonetheless function within the boundaries of mainstream Hollywood representations, often implicitly reinforcing the gender binaries they have the potential to disrupt. According to Jeffery, ‘the common threads that link together work on bodies (both human and posthuman) are concerned with social construction and, most often linked to this, control and regulation of bodies’ (Jeffery 2016: 24). The control and regulation of bodies is a central concern of both the X-­Men films and the MCU films in which Nebula appears.

Fluid Gender and the Politics of the X-­Men Films It is possible to read Mystique as embodying gender fluidity through Judith Butler’s theories of gender performativity. Butler rejects the notion that gender is determined by biological sex, also arguing that biological sex is socially constructed. Butler elaborates that there is no ‘interior “truth” to gender identity’ (1990: 44), but rather that gender is a process that ‘congeals’ over time (Butler 1990: 43). This has the effect of making gender seem to be a naturally occurring, commonsensical phenomenon, but Butler maintains that gender is actually a ‘doing’ and not a ‘being’ (Butler 1990: 33). Gender is thus independent of biological sex, a ‘free-­floating artifice’ (Butler 1990: 10). Thus, the terms ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’ do not constitute the respective identities of ‘man’ and ‘woman’, but rather these categories are constructed through discourse and language within the heterosexual matrix (Butler 1990: 9). Following this, Butler argues, bodies are automatically gendered from the moment in which they come into being, as it is impossible to exist outside of discourse (Butler 1990: 9). Butler subsequently makes a case for gender as being performative, ‘a stylized repetition of acts’ (Butler 1990: 179). Like heterosexuality, gender must be repeated in order to maintain itself. Gender is not, however, a performance as there is no ‘actor’ who is theatrically performing gender. Rather, certain behaviours make up particular genders­– ­one may be a woman because one exerts ‘feminine’ behaviours; one does not carry out ‘feminine’ behaviours because one is a woman. Further, gender is not an ‘expression’ of an underlying, pre-­existing gender because ‘there is no gender identity behind the expressions of gender; that identity is performatively constituted by the very “expressions” that are said to be its results’ (Butler 1990: 33). Herein lies the key difference between performativity as

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encompassing normalised acts and masquerade as a disguise or persona. Nonetheless, despite the potential for subversion being offered by transgressions such as drag, the subject is always limited by the system itself and is only ever able to act within the discourse. Butler continues, ‘There is only a taking up of the tools where they lie, where the very “taking up” is enabled by the tool lying there’ (1990: 185). In comics, Mystique appears as a blue woman with yellow eyes and red hair, though her mutant powers allow her to change into any shape, and is usually a villain. She is able to shapeshift and there seem, at a glance, to be few limitations to how she can model her appearance. The character is at least tenuously related to conceptualisations of femininity, as her name calls forth Betty Friedan’s notion of the feminine mystique, the idea that women’s place in Western society is within domestic and caregiving contexts (Friedan 1979: 37). Friedan’s groundbreaking text of the same title interrogated the dominant essentialist notions that women’s fulfilment is reached when they submit to their ‘natural’ feminine roles as wives and caregivers and is often credited as sparking the second wave of Western feminism. As Mystique is a character with potential to question essentialist ideas of gender and sexuality, this link is significant. Furthermore, Mystique is canonically queer (specifically bisexual) in the X-­Men comics. Her relationship with her lover, a precognitive blind mutant named Destiny was hinted at throughout the comics with increasing visibility, largely in the 1980s. In an issue of Uncanny X-­Men, Destiny addresses Mystique as ‘my Raven’ (Raven is Mystique’s given name) (Claremont and Romita Jr 1984). In a later issue, Mystique and Destiny dance after a heartfelt exchange in which Mystique refers to Destiny as ‘my love’, although Mystique’s shapeshifting powers conveniently allow her to appear as a man during this scene, further adding to the elusive quality of her sexuality (Claremont and Hamilton 1988). The most obvious reference, though, occurs in Uncanny X-­Men #265, in which Destiny is referred to as Mystique’s ‘leman’ by the story’s antagonist (Claremont and Jaaska 1990). ‘Leman’ is an archaic term referring to a lover or sweetheart. Such representations, though small, are noteworthy. Furthermore, it is worth noting that writer Chris Claremont intended to have Mystique, by temporarily changing herself into a man, ‘father’ a child (the demon-­like X-­Man, Nightcrawler) with Destiny, however this was reportedly deemed too controversial by Marvel (Cronin 2005). However, there is also a risk of assigning too much significance to Mystique’s relationships with women, considering her frequent relationships with men. Ross Murray, for instance, reads Mystique as a lesbian, inferring that through her relationship with Destiny, Mystique is marked

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‘meaningfully as lesbian’ (Murray 2011: 57, original emphasis). Murray uses this ‘meaningful’ lesbianism in support of his overarching argument that Mystique thereby refuses to take a place in the heterosexual hierarchy (Murray 2011: 60). This, however, ignores the oppositional potential of bisexuality, in that, according to Maria San Filippo, ‘It is precisely bisexuality’s epistemological and textual polysemy that generates its subversive potential to lay bare the mutability, contingency, and inherent transgressiveness of desire’ (Filippo 2013: 16). ‘Mutability’ is a key term, here, as Mystique’s potential to interrupt heterosexual power structures is fostered by her very mutantness but also by her bisexual desire. Additionally, Mystique’s inclusion in the X-­Men universe runs parallel to the property’s use of metaphor to refer to the oppression of marginalised peoples. This mutant metaphor in the X-­Men comics has been examined from a historical point of view by Joseph Darowski, who argues that ‘The X-­Men are mutants, people who develop special powers because they were born different from normal humans. Besides the expected comic book supervillains, the X-­Men battle prejudice and are hated and feared by normal humans’ (Darowski 2014: 2). Darowski notes that the metaphor has shifted somewhat from being symbolic of race to referring more to sexuality (Darowski 2014: 26, 120). Still, it is also possible to interpret the metaphor as being about people who are generally marked as ‘different’: ‘The power of the metaphor is in the ability of any reader to find some way to relate to it’ (Darowski 2014: 7). While the use of a metaphor as an argument for minority rights may be beneficial, it also offers opportunity for audiences not to interpret it as such. Jason Zingsheim, for example, proposes that ‘this interpretation erases marginalized subject positions in favor of a neoliberal homogenization’ (Zingsheim 2011: 244). It is also noteworthy, as Darowski mentions, that despite the X-­Men comics’ concern with minority rights, the actual shape that these politics take within the franchise has been complicated, with the majority of the central cast being white, heterosexual men throughout their publication history (Darowski 2014: 140). Likewise, the emphasis on the mutant metaphor implies a necessity for metaphor to begin with, perhaps an inability to directly address these varying human rights issues. Likewise, it is striking that the vast majority of prejudice that seems to exist within the X-­Men film universe (and to some extent, the comics) is that targeted at mutants. Rather than claiming that the films do not match up to their proposed politics, it might be more useful to consider the ways in which these politics have taken shape within the films. A recurring reading of the mutant metaphor has been related to sexuality issues. The film adaptations have similarly been framed as gay allegory in the press, in combination with openly gay director Bryan

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Figure 7.1  Rebecca Romijn as Mystique in X2.

Singer and cast members Ian McKellen and Ellen Page (Boucher 2010; Rosenberg 2011; Schrodt 2011). Purse also notes X2’s inclusion of a ‘coming out’ scene in the form of Bobby Drake/­Iceman telling his parents he has mutant powers, to which they respond ‘Have you tried not being a mutant?’ (Purse 2011: 144–6). These readings signal an expectation that the film in some way engages with issues related to sexuality and gender, and thus Mystique’s inclusion in the films is thought-­provoking, considering her representation. In the films, Mystique appears blue and is often completely nude, with reptilian scales placed to obscure the character’s breasts and genitals (see Figures 7.1 and 7.2). There has been no unified reason presented in extratexual materials that explains Mystique’s lack of clothing. Rebecca Romijn, who plays Mystique in X-­Men, X2 and X-­Men: The Last Stand, suggested that it would be impractical for her to wear clothes because they would ‘get in the way if you’re trying to morph’ (Romijn quoted in Giltz

Figure 7.2  Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique in X-Men: Days of Future Past.

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mu tan ts , cybo r gs and f e minin i t y u n f i x e d? 177 2003: 54). On the other hand, Jennifer Lawrence, who took over the role in X-­Men: First Class and subsequent sequels, reads Mystique’s nudity as representative of her being ‘mutant and proud’, relating the character directly to the mutant metaphor (Lawrence quoted in Tyley 2013). Meanwhile, Betty Kaklamanidou reads Mystique’s nudity as limiting, focusing on the objectifying effect that she believes it has: Mystique’s extraordinary shape-­shifting may help her change into every male or female form she wishes, but nothing can deter the audience from understanding that the curvaceous and luscious creature they see on the screen is definitely a woman, no matter how easily she can change into a man. (Kaklamanidou 2011: 70)

However, this perspective rather oversimplifies Mystique’s portrayal, adopting a binaristic approach to a character who is at the very least multiplicitous. A knee-­jerk reaction may lead to the conclusion that Mystique’s portrayal is the product of a discourse that empowers the character by overtly sexualising her. This may be the case, and postfeminist discourses indulging in the overt sexualisation of women should be accounted for, but Kaklamanidou’s statement also suggests that Mystique’s coding as female is inherently limiting, ignoring the character’s potential for gender fluidity. Instead, Mystique’s nudity plays a direct role in the representation of a potentially queered, although complex, gender identity. The character as a whole offers considerable insight into the notion of gender identity, even beyond conceptualisations of humanness. This likewise contrasts the postfeminist masquerade embodied by the heroines discussed in Chapter 4, since the masks of femininity they enact function on a symbolic level. Rather, Mystique’s transformations of gender involve a literal seizing of gendered signifiers. This links back to ideas around posthuman subjectivity and the Deleuzoguattarian concept of assemblage. Because of the flexibility of the body without organs, it can merge and make connections with any manner of beings, species and objects through assemblage, gaining meaning in relation to other assemblages. Mystique’s doing of a gendered body is formed of assemblages relating to pre-­existing gender schemata, whose ‘components can play different roles in diverse assemblages’ themselves (Jeffery 2016: 30). However, it is Butler’s ideas of parody and gender performativity that are especially useful when considering Mystique’s representation. Viewing the X-­Men films in their narrative order, First Class is the first to feature Mystique, telling the story of how the X-­Men formed in the 1960s, an instance of postfeminism’s interest in revisiting and reworking the past. Mystique, who is revealed to be Charles Xavier’s (James McAvoy) adoptive sister, is referred to as Raven in the film and is portrayed as

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­considerably weaker, both in terms of character and physical strength, than in the three core films of the franchise. She also opts to use her powers to appear ‘normal’ in her everyday life and is cynical of Charles’s belief that they should be ‘mutant and proud’. This discrepancy has much to do with Mystique’s moral alignment in the film. First Class complicates the rivalry between Xavier and Magneto (Michael Fassbender), initially portraying them as friends before Magneto forms his own group of mutants, adopting a more aggressive stance towards the fight for mutant rights. Mystique breaks off from Xavier’s group and joins Magneto’s morally questionable team. Before this, though, she is clearly coded as a hero, albeit physically weak. This changes when Magneto encourages her to stop expending so much effort just to appear normal, and instead allow her ‘true’ blue self to show. In this sense, Mystique’s ‘normal’, human appearance functions as a visual and narrative frustration tactic such as those discussed in Chapter 3, limiting her overall power­– ­she can only be strong if she is blue due to the effort exerted when she maintains an acceptable feminine appearance. However, she can only be blue if she is morally aligned with evil. In Days of Future Past, which is set in 1973, Mystique’s morality takes centre stage as the driving force that is at stake in the main narrative. The regulation of a specific mutant body is foregrounded. Mystique’s bodily potentiality is therefore coded within the film’s narrative as problematic. After the events of First Class, the mutants have disbanded: Xavier is depressed and paralysed after Magneto accidentally sends a bullet into his spine at the end of the previous film; Magneto is imprisoned after being accused of assassinating President Kennedy; and Mystique has become a lone freedom fighter for mutant liberation. In the film, Logan is sent from the future to prevent Mystique from shooting Bolivar Trask (Peter Dinklage), a weapons designer who creates the Sentinels (giant robots programmed to exterminate mutants). Following the assassination, Mystique’s DNA is used to make the Sentinels adaptable and nigh invincible. It is therefore imperative that the X-­Men of the 1970s band together to stop Mystique, although this is coded in the film as their reluctance to allow Mystique to become irreversibly corrupted from the act of taking a man’s life, for example through the repeated stressing of the fact that ‘It was the first time she killed.’ The policing of Mystique’s morality occurs alongside her newly naked appearance, as well as the corporate extraction and use of her DNA, her very genetic make-­up being the cause of disruption. In X-­Men, X2 and The Last Stand Mystique again appears naked and blue as her moral alliance is entirely with Magneto (who is also positioned against Xavier and his mutants). Mystique is at her strongest, intellectu-

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mu tan ts , cybo r gs and f e minin i t y u n f i x e d? 179 ally and physically. Her corrupted persona thus functions as a safe zone in which she is permitted to be powerful, but it also offers itself up to fostering a queered representation of gender. Turning attention back to the role of her nudity, the work of both Brown and Butler can shed some light onto what is occurring in the undercurrents of this representation. In Dangerous Curves, Brown discusses Pamela Anderson’s character in the action/­sci-­fi film Barb Wire (David Hogan, 1996), based on the comic of the same name. Anderson plays Barb Wire, the bounty hunter in a dystopian future. Barb is represented as physically strong, clever and extremely sexy. Brown dismisses the idea that Wire is merely an object of heterosexual male desire. Instead, he argues that that the ‘over-­fetishization of her sexuality and violent abilities . . . facilitates an understanding of all modern action heroines as questioning the naturalness of gender roles by enacting both femininity and masculinity simultaneously’ (Brown 2011a: 51). Brown continues that the overtly sexualised feminine signifiers within such characters are combined with signifiers of traditionally masculine toughness (Brown 2011a: 55). This results in a combination of both ‘hysterical’ masculinity and femininity, thereby ‘ridiculing the notion of a stable gender’ (Brown 2011a: 51). To Brown, these gendered bodies are arbitrary symbols, suggesting that toughness does not necessarily equal male. Most notably, Brown’s ideas speak to Butler’s theories regarding the subversion of gender through parody. Parody, according to Butler, draws attention to the constructedness of gender. Mystique’s nudity functions in a similar way, as it is ridiculous, impractical (contrary to Romijn’s beliefs) and unabashedly blatant. The fact that, for example, Mystique walks naked and barefoot through a snowy mountain in X2 is ludicrous. Further, Mystique is often seen enacting cutesy caricatures of femininity in a parodic way while taking the form of a man, which happens on two separate occasions. In X-­Men, when Mystique adopts the form of Logan, she blows the real Wolverine a kiss. This scene draws on notions of gender rigidity outlined at the start of this chapter by comedically assigning feminine behaviour to a masculine body as a source of humour. However, despite this, it showcases the constructed nature of gender by drawing from Mystique’s embodiment of Wolverine, who behaves in ways outside of the masculine codes the real Wolverine embodies. A similar scene occurs in X2, when Mystique shifts into the villain Colonel Stryker and blows him a kiss, again an uncharacteristic (gendered) act for that character. Both of these situations point toward the idea that gendered actions are socially constructed. Likewise, and much like the transgressive posthuman, Mystique’s potential for fluidity offers myriad responses to the narrative scenarios in which she is placed.

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Mystique’s gender fluidity can also be made sense of through Tasker’s concept of ‘musculinity’ (Tasker 1993). In her work, Tasker suggests that strong heroines of the 1980s and 1990s transgressed traditional gendered signifiers through their muscular physiques. In these films, she argues, muscles are not merely signifiers of male strength but are arbitrary, available to be utilised by anyone, regardless of gender (Tasker 1993: 149). In this sense, Mystique is represented as picking and choosing which form she takes, which signifiers she adopts, but importantly, her skills and intellect remain throughout. For example, in X-­Men Mystique fights with Wolverine while in the form of Wolverine. She is clearly shown to be a match for Wolverine, carrying out impressive fighting moves, and is resourceful in using objects from her surroundings as weapons (a chain; a metal gate). However, the film does not suggest that she is only capable of these feats because she has taken on the form of Wolverine, as she transforms back into her blue, feminine form mid-­kick and continues fighting. Furthermore, Brown describes how characters can adopt gendered signifiers to fulfil their own purposes. He uses the French film La Femme Nikita (Luc Besson, 1990) and its English-­language remake Point of No Return (John Badham, 1993) as examples of films in which the central action heroine ‘reemploys feminine masquerade to further emphasize the performative nature of gender roles’ (Brown 2011a: 22). Brown elaborates that, much like Barb Wire, these heroines embody masculinised personae through, for example, being excellent fighters, while simultaneously ‘remaining garbed in obvious signifiers of femininity’ (Brown 2011a: 33). Maggie possesses a vast amount of physical (coded as masculine) power, but there are times in which she also adopts the signifiers of a weak woman. Brown continues: Maggie refigures gender-­appropriate behavior by demonstrating that masculinity and femininity are not mutually exclusive identities. At the same time, Maggie destroys the audience’s perceptions of biologically determined identity and role as determining biology. In other words­– ­just because she looks like a woman does not mean she is one, and just because she acts like a man does not mean she is one. (Brown 2011a: 36)

Like Maggie, Mystique often ‘masquerades’ as people of different genders and ages­– m ­ ore accurately, she becomes those people­– a­ nd also uses people’s perceptions of gender to manipulate them, in ways not unlike those adopted by heroines such as Natasha Romanoff, discussed in Chapter 4. However, Mystique’s embodiment of gender functions on a different level to the masks of femininity utilised by the heroines discussed previously in this book, who narratively adopt these masks as a means of

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enabling their heroism, while these machinations potentially eclipse the identities of these characters. Significantly, Mystique is shown to appropriate signifiers of varying genders and the process is entirely immersive since she can physically alter her form. However, referring to Mystique’s representation as pure masquerade is not necessarily appropriate here. Indeed, Brown’s analysis implicitly conflates performativity and performance, which Butler states are different occurrences. Mystique’s gender play does not constitute acting or playing a role because she physically becomes the people she shifts into, further complicating notions of gender rigidity in the process. The use of the word ‘becomes’ is key here because it reaches both Butler’s idea that ‘gender is itself a becoming’ (Butler 1990: 112). During a key scene in X2, Mystique goes to a bar to seduce a security guard who works for Stryker. In an elaborate plan to free Magneto from Stryker’s plastic prison, Mystique appears at the bar in the ‘natural’ form of Romijn. She is provocatively dressed in a short blue snakeskin PVC dress reminiscent of her blue skin and a leather jacket. Introducing herself with a fake name, she buys the guard a drink and sits down. Mystique drugs the guard and the scene cuts to the characters stumbling into the bathroom while kissing. The guard remarks that she is aggressive and she replies ‘Yes, I am’, the irony again reinforcing the constructedness of her current persona, while also drawing from postfeminist discourses of playful irony. As the guard becomes unconscious, Mystique injects him with liquid iron, allowing Magneto to later extract the metal through his pores and escape his prison. Mystique thus grasps these signifiers to reach her own ends. Through such a scene, the character questions the nature of gender and what it means to act in a gendered way; moreover, it queries what it means to be or become gendered through her use of a phrase asserting identity: ‘I am.’ These instances involve more than simple role reversals, since the focus here is on the interaction of the gendered body and behaviour in an action context, how the character manipulates her body to adapt to a situation. Additionally, whereas the heroic forms of postfeminist masquerade discussed previously allow for varying modes of feminine subjectivity, these modes are ultimately limiting due to their dependence on discourses of gender promoted and encouraged by the patriarchal symbolic (which now takes the form of the fashion-­beauty complex) noted by McRobbie (2009). While the postfeminist masquerade outlined in Chapter 4 envisioned types of femininity sanctioned by postfeminist culture (and ultimately relying on white, heterosexual empowered femininity), the approach to gender encompassed in Mystique’s representation can be conceptualised as broadly queer, or at least non-­normative,

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in its fluidity and physical manipulation of the body across genders, which also suggests qualities of posthuman flexibility. Another instance in which transgressive gender irony is adopted to showcase Mystique’s gender fluidity is in Days of Future Past. In the scene, Mystique yet again seduces a man to meet her ends. This time it is a North Vietnamese general whom she aims to appear as during the Paris Peace Accords. Dressed in glamorous 1970s clothing and once again adopting a ‘normal’ human appearance (this time as Lawrence), she allows the general to take her back to his hotel room. Once there, he walks around her, speaking in heavily accented English, ‘Show me more, baby. Clothes off.’ A medium shot shows Mystique looking down at herself. The camera tilts down as she opens her coat and her black hotpant bodysuit begins transforming into her blue skin. This is followed by a shot of the general’s face changing to terror before reverting to the shot of Mystique’s transforming body and a medium shot of her head: ‘What’s the matter, baby? You don’t think I look pretty like this?’ The knowing irony that she is playing into male fantasy while appearing as her blue self further adds to the constructedness of her seductress persona, while she additionally employs the cutesy feminine signifiers referred to earlier in her use of the words ‘baby’ and ‘pretty’. Mystique’s parodic gender fluidity is likewise highlighted in an earlier scene in Days of Future Past when she infiltrates an army base to liberate the drafted mutants, who were about to be shipped to a medical facility. Halfway through the scene, it is revealed that Mystique has been the (male) army official who wants to send the mutants home the whole time. She comes into conflict with a young Major Stryker who wants the mutants to stay. Eventually, Mystique’s transformation takes place as a fight breaks loose. The other mutants join in, causing mayhem. In the scene, the masculine environment of the army is juxtaposed with Mystique’s very nakedness. The army, carrying connotations of masculine protection and defence, has been infiltrated by a naked blue woman, who in turn is the protectress of the mutants. Her vulnerability, signified by her feminine nudity, becomes parodic in that it is actually meaningless or irrelevant in the context of the scene. Unlike the ironic sexism discussed in previous chapters, the irony deployed as part of Mystique’s character takes on a parodic form, ridiculing the very notion of fixed gender. Despite Mystique’s appearances in X-­Men and X2, Mystique is subjected to depowering in The Last Stand, as she takes a dart laced with the mutant cure to save Magneto from it. She then reverts to her human form before his eyes. Magneto then abandons Mystique as she is no longer of use to him, remarking ‘She was so beautiful.’ Kaklamanidou reads this

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scene as drawing the focus back onto her feminine beauty (Kaklamanidou 2011, 70). Mystique’s depowering functions to frustrate her strength and removes her from the core of the film’s narrative. Throughout, I have referred to Mystique as ‘she’, even though, technically, she may be neither male nor female, or indeed both. If gender ‘congeals’ over time, can the gender of someone who has no gender be conceived of? Mystique is in many ways one of the most subversive characters that Marvel has to offer, but she must still be portrayed in terms of a gender binary. As Butler describes, it is possible to subvert gender identities, but subjects will always be limited to the system as it is impossible to exist outside of language and discourse (which is what shapes gender). Similarly, Mystique is only ever portrayed as enacting either male-­or female-­bodiedness, rather than a combination of both (or, indeed, neither), despite the potential her body offers. Likewise, Zingsheim argues that Mystique’s gender performative characterisation privileges the need for gender to be recognised by others in order to be ‘successful’ (Zingsheim 2016). Zingsheim’s argument follows similar reasoning to mine in that he suggests that Mystique’s gender identity functions within symbolic systems that remain static (Zingsheim 2016: 94–5). Nonetheless, Zingsheim ultimately argues that the occasions in which Mystique’s disguise is uncovered by her opponents illustrate how ‘in terms of identity, to occupy a subject position requires that one be recognized by others as said subject’ (a point also made by Butler) (Zingsheim 2016: 101). Some confusion may arise here from Zingsheim’s characterisation of Mystique as imitating other people, whereas I have argued that she effectively becomes them. When framed within the discourse of imitation, or, indeed, ‘passing’, it is quite reasonable that Zingsheim’s discussion would focus on whether or not Mystique’s performance is successful or a failure (from which he then makes the argument that Mystique’s agency is limited). However, a more flexible approach foregrounds gender over configurations of agency, the use of which automatically discredits any representation that does not correspond with a pre-­existing framework of what might be considered agentic. Another noteworthy aspect of the films’ representations of Mystique is her sexuality. Bisexuality is not referred to, instead exclusively positioning her in relationships with men. While Todd Ramlow argues X2 presents Magneto and Mystique’s relationship as a queer comradeship ‘between a queer man and his best straight girl pal’ (Ramlow 2009: 141), the films severely lack in joining the dots between Mystique’s queered representation of gender and her sexuality. Due to the wide-­ranging forms that the linkage between sexual identity and gender identity can take alongside the

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complex relationship between gender and sexuality I outline in the following chapter, fluid sexuality would complement a fluid gender. Given that Mystique’s representation may fall beyond the rigid portrayals of hegemonic femininity, the erasure of her bisexuality is significant. As such, Mystique becomes an (un)queer character through the process of representation which, while offering a more fluid portrayal of gender that questions dominant norms, still insists on the character’s assumed compulsory heterosexuality. Such a paradox hinges on postfeminism in its inconsistency. Mystique’s disavowal of traditional elements of heterosexual femininity in terms of romantic and sexual desire speaks to the necessity for postfeminist culture to renegotiate these components in media texts, while the films also present a character who embodies a fluid gender identity that somewhat complicates the gender binary.

The Strangest Superhero of All: Nebula’s Cyborg Subjectivity Having established Mystique as a body of potential without organs, it is worthwhile to discuss a character whose representation specifically resonates with transcendental philosophies of posthumanism via her portrayal as an alien cyborg. The character Nebula in Guardians of the Galaxy (James Gunn, 2014) and its related MCU sequels, like Mystique, is a body of potential but, unlike Mystique, Nebula’s body is framed in terms of its posthumanity (or inhumanity) due to its fusion with specifically mechanical components. In Guardians of the Galaxy, Nebula, who works for the film’s villain Ronan the Accuser (Lee Pace) and is the daughter of the evil Thanos (Josh Brolin). Not unlike Mystique, her skin is blue, highlighting the character’s alienness, and seems to comprise metallic segments that have been fused together; metal plates are attached to her bald head and her left arm is entirely mechanical. When Nebula speaks, her voice is low with a tinny clang. Thus Nebula has left behind organic substances in her physicality (for example hair, which is itself a gendered marker). Nebula represents a clear contender for the claims of cyberfeminism, which frequently hinge on the work of Donna Haraway. Though Haraway’s ‘Cyborg Manifesto’ (2004) does not explicitly refer to Deleuze and Guattari, it seems indebted to their conceptualisations of a posthuman subjectivity that confounds binaristic dualisms. Querying the rationalism of feminist philosophers who argue for women’s rights as human rights in that they hold that women’s personhood should make them eligible for human rights, posthuman feminists have taken as their point of interrogation the very notion of humanness as a source of intrinsic value

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mu tan ts , cybo r gs and f e minin i t y u n f i x e d? 185 over other organisms. As mentioned, Enlightenment-­era ideas of rationalism and humanity have privileged white, European male subjectivities. Posthuman feminism (or anti-­humanism) therefore critiques the idea of ‘ “Man” as the alleged “measure of all things,” for being androcentric, exclusionary, hierarchical, and Eurocentric’ (Braidotti 2016: 674). Rosi Braidotti notes that the humanist implications of second-­wave feminism (i.e. women’s rights as human rights) ran the risk of reinforcing a paradigm of ‘Man’ that itself rests on dualisms­– ­namely that ‘others’ are marginalised (Braidotti 2016: 675). Haraway’s Cyborg Manifesto, first published in 1985, was informed by the increasing reliance of humans on technologies to the extent that they reconfigured understandings of what it means to be human. In her work, Haraway provided a utopian vision of a world in which a rejection of dualisms is articulated through the then-­novel figure of the cybernetic organism, or cyborg, a being that comprises both flesh and machine and is thus hybrid and beyond categorisation (Haraway 2004: 158). The cyborg functions as a metaphor to illustrate a rejection of rigid boundaries, such as human/­animal; human-­animal/­machine; physical/­ non-­physical. According to Haraway, the cyborg is inorganic, so rejects organic boundaries and categorisation based on organic qualities (such as body parts) (Haraway 2004: 167). Like Mystique’s characterisation, the cyborg is capable of being ‘post-­gender’ (Haraway 2004: 159). Addressing the problematics of second-­ wave feminisms, Haraway called for an embrace of a ‘monstrous world without gender’ (Haraway 2004: 178) and communities encompassing ‘fractured identities’ (Haraway 2004: 161). In this speculative utopia, the cyborg is capable of unifying disparate political coalitions according to affinity rather than identity (Haraway 2004: 161), lending to itself a quality of flexibility and fluidity. Subsequent feminist thinkers have considered in detail the relationship between women and technology, especially in the light of the discursive coupling of men to technology, and its implications regarding political feminisms (see Wajcman 1991; Balsamo 1996; Springer 1996; Plant 1997; Toffoletti 2007). Areas of particular interest to these scholars include the impact of reproductive technologies on women’s lives, but others have examined technology’s presence in areas as diverse as drug therapy and bioengineering. Since its publication, much has been discussed about the uses and limitations of Haraway’s ideas and while the purpose of this chapter is not necessarily to position the cyborg character of Nebula as symptomatic of the collapse of patriarchal structures that inform representation in Marvel superhero films, it is worth noting the proliferation of scholarly texts that have examined fictional cyborgs and position Nebula accordingly. In particular, the recent generic shift of superhero films from

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action to be oriented more towards science fiction seems to have played a key role in facilitating the development of this character, who had only a small role in Guardians of the Galaxy but played a crucial role in the narrative of Avengers: Endgame. While female cyborgs occur somewhat frequently in popular culture, there has been more scholarly interest in meanings generated by the male cyborg and its implications regarding a masculinity in crisis. As Sue Short argues, ‘The cyborg has served as an apt metaphor by which to interrogate key concerns within contemporary feminist discourse, inspiring renewed debate about female subjectivity and influencing a reassessment of women’s relationship to technology’ (Short 2005: 81), highlighting the multiplicity of meaning that such figures represent. However, Short’s examination of specific female cyborgs is perhaps overly cynical, if simplistic, in her conclusions that: Science fiction cinema has presented a number of female cyborgs over the years that similarly challenge Haraway’s conception of the cyborg as a ‘post gender’ creature, with each displaying instead how gender identity is firmly inscribed upon this figure. These representations play upon familiar stereotypes of either approved or reproved female behaviour and may consequently be evaluated as ‘feminist cyborg stories’ also­– ­foregrounding as they do a dichotomous and inherently patriarchal view of femininity. (Short 2005: 83)

For Short, the inclusion of female cyborgs within popular science fiction texts1 is ultimately unfulfilling due to the frequent reliance by these figures on hegemonic modes of femininity. While Short does note that these representations, such as that of replicant Rachael in Blade Runner (Ridley Scott, 1982), call for ambiguous readings, her analysis risks the danger of writing off explicitly gendered cyborgs as limiting despite their reliance on parodic femininity, which is often portrayed as expressly constructed. While her argument does beg for an inclusion of postfeminist culture, which, as I mention throughout this book, actively utilises feminine masquerade in ways that pre-­emptively account for feminist criticisms, Short’s highlighting of the unabashed femininity of these cyborgs is not unfounded. Indeed, more recent examinations of SF films such as Under the Skin (Jonathan Glazer, 2013) and Ex Machina (Alex Garland, 2014) have provided slightly more nuanced accounts of the contrivances of cyborg and alien subjectivities (see Jelača 2018). Indeed, Nebula differs from her science fiction cyborg contemporaries specifically because she bears relatively few gendered markers. As mentioned, she has no hair, her skin is blue, rendering the use of beauty-­enhancing cosmetics redundant, her voice is inhuman (therefore

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potentially ungendered), and her costuming is wearable by individuals of any gender. The only explicit marker of gender within the confines of human distinctions of gender itself (although more akin to biological sex, which itself is arguably, as Butler claims, arbitrary) is her body shape, which remains that of actress Karen Gillen, albeit covered in prosthetics and special effects, which are themselves technologies that were used to augment Gillen’s performance. Nebula is an alien with a humanoid form whose body parts were systematically removed and replaced with machinery by her adoptive father, Thanos. There is a question of whether or not Nebula can be posthuman, given that she was not human to begin with. Nonetheless, her appearance does reach to forms of radical posthumanist thought, in particular that of the alien cyborg put forward by Jelača, who explores recent versions of the cinematic alien ‘who is decidedly female in an ever-­recalibrating mix of organic and inorganic parts (a shape-­shifting cyborg, as it were) . . . to probe the question of what is alien about being female and what is female about being an alien’ (Jelača 2018: 380). An additional question posed by Nebula’s representation, though, is about humanity: what is gendered about being human and what is human about being gendered? Crucially, Nebula is positioned opposite her adoptive sister, the green-­ skinned Gamora (Zoë Saldaña), whose organicness is emphasised: for example when Nebula zaps her with an electric weapon in a fight at the end of the film, Gamora’s skeleton is ostentatiously visible for a short time, drawing attention to the fact that she consists of flesh and bone, whereas Nebula does not. In one instance, Nebula is on the receiving end of a blast from an explosive weapon, seemingly defeated. However, when Nebula next appears, lingering shots show her crumpled tin-­can body unfolding, accompanied by suitable metallic crunches as she rectifies her physicality, her dislocated jaw relocating itself (Figure 7.3). The dualisms implicit in the featuring of these two women as part of an inter-­species family is noteworthy and runs counter to the boundary-­crossing sentiments of cyberfeminism. At the centre of the Guardians films, as well as the final instalments in the Avengers series, are concerns about family and what lies beyond familial bonds based on organic biological markers. While Nebula and Gamora compete in the first Guardians of the Galaxy film, Vol. 2 delves deeper into previously established themes of found family, particularly in relation to Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), the film’s hero. Due to his intergalactic kidnapping as a child in the 1980s, Guardians of the Galaxy characterises Quill as a man out of time through his awkward references to popular culture texts that circulated at the time of his abduction. This, according to Terence McSweeney, places Quill as a margin-

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Figure 7.3  Nebula’s distorted cyborg body reconfigures itself after she has been in an explosion in Guardians of the Galaxy.

alised individual alongside a roster of aliens, while also recentring white masculinity (McSweeney 2018: 175). Indeed, it is significant that the Guardians films hinge so heavily on notions of family despite (or because) of its literally posthuman cast. In Vol. 2, Quill encounters his biological father, the Celestial god-­like being Ego (Kurt Russel), whose comic book origins as Ego the Living Planet set the scene for the character’s ruthless quest to find meaning in the universe. This is articulated through the film as Ego’s desire to conquer the universe by planting seeds of himself within other species (in Quill’s case impregnating his human mother) on different planets and subsequently terraforming those planets with his self-­extensions. This makes Quill a half-­god, capable of transcending the limitations of his human self, a humanist discourse that the film negotiates alongside its mediation of posthuman subjectivities. A conflicted critique of the cultural concept of male ego and the hubris that accompanies it, this portrayal of Ego is doubtless a response to anticolonial perspectives condemning the historical tendencies of white men to insert themselves into and overrun foreign territories. Taking account of constructionist ideas about gender, a point is made about Ego’s styling of himself as a man. During an introductory scene, a holographic animation accompanies Ego’s explanatory monologue about how he came to create what he imagined biological life to be like. This is importantly signified as human life through the holographic animation. Quill subsequently asks Ego whether he made himself a penis, to which Ego responds, ‘I wanted to experience what it truly meant to be human.’ Crucially, Ego’s envisioning of ‘human’ is realised on-­ screen as a white Anglo-­European man, reaching to the Enlightenment era humanist discourses that centre white masculine subjectivity as a universal position, a discourse disregarded by cyberfeminists.

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Quill faces a dilemma when he realises that Ego is acting in his own interests and that having god-­like powers comes at the cost of reduced humanity. In a sense, all Guardians characters fight for a humanity that is constantly at risk of being corroded. Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista) seeks revenge on those who murdered his wife and daughter, breaking apart their family in a familiar turn of events for superhero narratives. Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper) is a raccoon-­like genetically engineered being who endured years of abuse and is, to his knowledge, the only one of his kind. Groot (voiced by Vin Diesel) is a tree-­like humanoid whose isolation is signified by his limited vocabulary of the line ‘I am Groot’ and Gamora, as mentioned, was adopted by Thanos after he obliterated half the population of her home planet. It is therefore significant that Quill’s bloodline is the focus of several discussions and is described by Ego as ‘a very special heritage’. Towards Gamora’s suspicions that Ego may not have the universe’s best interests at mind in his quest to conquer by forcible rule, Quill responds that ‘This is real. I’m only half-­human, remember?’ to which Gamora responds ‘That’s the half I’m worried about.’ It is Quill’s humanity, and his romanticisation of the ideas of biological lineage, that is problematised through these kinds of sequences, and through this Vol. 2 endeavours to paradoxically reaffirm humanity as a core source of audience identification for these otherwise alien characters.2 This means reworking traditional conceptualisations of family into that of more explicitly found family, a key narrative strand in Nebula and Gamora’s representations. As mentioned, Nebula is an adoptive daughter of Thanos alongside Gamora. Vol. 2 details her torturous process of becoming a cyborg under the tyrannical rule of Thanos. Forced to train to be warriors by fighting each other as youths, Nebula’s body parts were removed by Thanos whenever she lost a fight with Gamora, with Thanos’s intent being to reconstitute her as Gamora’s equal. This was ultimately unsuccessful, and Nebula was never to win a fight with Gamora, being cast into an eternal process of being taken apart and put back together with additional components. Importantly, these narrative points are not mentioned through flashback, though Gamora’s kidnapping and adoption by Thanos are detailed in this way. Unlike Gamora, Nebula lacks a distinct origin, as is typical for a transgressive cyborg that confounds the need for biological conceptualisations of reproduction. Like Haraway’s cyborg, Nebula is positioned as ‘the illegitimate offspring of militarism’ (Haraway 2004: 159) as is represented through the aggressive patriarch of Thanos. And like Haraway’s cyborg, Nebula ultimately rebels in order to reconstitute her own subjectivity outside his constraints when she pledges to kill him.

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In a climactic fight between the sisters in Vol. 2, Nebula’s humanity is nonetheless reconfigured through familial discourse. The setting of Ego’s home planet, which itself seems to be made from the decaying remains of Ego’s illegitimate offspring­– ­the results of his failed couplings with other species, the children who did not inherit his godly superpowers­– ­is telling in the rampant destruction it undergoes during the course of the fight. Intending to finally beat Gamora, Nebula attacks with various firearms and automated weapons, falling into old, destructive habits cultivated for so long by Thanos. Trapped in a spaceship she hunted Gamora down with, Nebula endures more violence as Gamora retaliates with an oversized machine gun perched on her shoulder, her vocal war cries highlighted in several close-­ups of her face. The ship explodes and crashes through the fragile ground into a chasm; Gamora is filmed from below, casually looking down at the victimised Nebula, who is unable to escape the now-alight ship. Unexpectedly, the debris moves out of the shot, revealing Gamora, who is able to extract Nebula just before an explosion takes place. The two are shot from afar, sent across the cavernous space by the force of the explosion. This cuts to Gamora on her back, visibly in pain as the shot tracks across to Nebula, who is once again in her crumpled state and piecing herself together. The contrast in the materiality of these characters is once again evident and Nebula continues her attack. Fast-­paced frenetic editing highlights the desperation in these characters’ drive for survival, at times the camera zooms in violently onto the women’s faces, an attempt to assign emotive qualities to an otherwise inhuman(e) scenario. Nebula, knife raised, her other hand around Gamora’s neck, shakes at the centre of a lengthy shot before emitting a roar of frustration and letting her sister go. Both breathless and on their knees, the two of them argue over who won the fight, culminating in a close-­up of Nebula, distressed, shouting ‘You are the one who wanted to win and I just wanted a sister.’ This is a pivotal moment for these characters, whereby Nebula’s posthumanity intersects with notions of familial bonding, as she continues ‘Thanos pulled my eye from my head and my brain from my skull. And my arm from my body. Because of you.’ The lingering close-­up of the two cuts to a long shot of them both kneeling in front of the wreckage of the ship, a physical indication of the destruction they both endured under Thanos. Nebula’s identity is, via her narrative trajectory, shaped by Thanos. She is forcibly plugged into his will via eternal competition with Gamora. Essentially, though, the arguably human concept of sisterhood (which has additional feminist connotations) is presented as the absence behind the destruction. Indeed, towards the end of the film, the two reconcile alongside the other Guardians, albeit reluctantly. Before the team embark on the mission of

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defeating Ego, Nebula remarks ‘All any of you do is yell at each other. You’re not friends.’ To this, Drax­– i­ n a mode of abstract thinking uncharacteristic for the character, whose species is presented as understanding words only literally­ – ­remarks ‘You’re right. We’re family.’ This highlights the importance of the notion of found family in the Guardians films. As noted earlier, this is somewhat of a paradox, in that the films’ rejection of literal human characters appears to result in a narrative reinsertion of the idea of humanity as signalling the value of these characters. This point also made by McSweeney, who notes the significance of Groot’s uttering of the line ‘We are Groot’ as ‘he elects to give his life to save his new family’ in the first Guardians film (McSweeney 2018: 177). However, for all intents and purposes, these characters are not human in their materiality, with Nebula being a key signifier for this. In her gendered cyborgian state, she represents a version of the posthuman condition that is nonetheless returned to familial discourse, albeit a reconfigured non-­traditional, even queer, family. A key moment that denotes Nebula’s ultimate humanity is when she expresses her yearning for a sister, a specifically female sibling. It is Nebula’s initial rejection of herself that articulates how the ‘tension between the human and technological . . . disrupts traditional understandings of selfhood, identity, the body and reality’ (Toffoletti 2007: 4). It is important to note that Nebula is not represented as actively engaging with her cyborg self until later MCU instalments; it is quite clear through narrative exposition that Nebula’s cybernetic body parts were forced upon her by Thanos. Nonetheless, as a cyborg, Nebula confounds the dualisms critiqued by Haraway and other posthuman feminists. The process of Nebula reconfiguring herself as a heroic figure culminates in the plotline of Endgame in which she literally confronts her past self, who hopes to thwart the Avengers’ plans to change history after Thanos becomes too powerful. Able to exist within two timelines, Nebula’s subjectivity is atemporal. To quote Kim Toffoletti, ‘The posthuman inhabits a space beyond the real where time and history defy linear progression’ (Toffoletti 2007: 5), a concept clearly articulated through Nebula’s narrative in Endgame. In Toffoletti’s terms, posthuman subjectivity ‘is the bodily transformations and augmentations that come about through our engagements with technology that complicate the idea of a “human essence” ’ (Toffoletti 2007: 13). Importantly, the idea of human essence is central to Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. There is a concerted effort in the film’s form and narrative to reinsert humanity into alien characters. This does not, however, query the problematic centrality of ‘humanity’ to justify an entity’s existence (or promote sympathy with it). It does however emphasise the

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concept of kinship between species in a way that gestures towards destabilising the anthropocentrism that counters much anti-­humanist feminist thought. Indeed, Haraway maintained in her Manifesto that technological advances would ultimately destabilise traditional family structures as the public-­domestic dualism is corroded and the patriarchal nuclear family is made irrelevant (Haraway 2004: 169). The Guardians films depend on the very notions of humanity and family they ultimately revoke and rework in what is perhaps another complexity of postfeminist culture. Like Mystique, Nebula’s body offers the potential to adapt to whatever the situation requires (at one point in Vol. 1, she cuts off her own mechanical hand to escape from the heroes). These characters elaborate the flexibility of transgressive subjectivities. Through her immortality and cyborgian presence, Nebula embodies the malleability of a post-­human/­ post-­woman subjectivity. This opens up filmic dialogues that offer flexibility in terms of gendered characters. In the words of J. Jack Halberstam and Ira Livingston, ‘The posthuman does not necessitate the obsolescence of the human: it does not represent an evolution or devolution of the human. Rather it participates in re-­distribution of difference and identity’ (Halberstam and Livingston 1995: 10). While the mutants of X-­Men are (often disparagingly) described as the next stage in human evolution, making them post-­human in a literal sense, it is the humanity of the Guardians that is foregrounded. This is inevitably gendered, as demonstrated by Nebula’s longing for a sister, although Nebula also displays few, if any, gendered markers. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 can be seen as questioning social and cultural binaries in its use of hybrid characters, but equally has a need to consider what it means to be human in doing so. In summary, if anything, the characters of Mystique and Nebula demonstrate the persistence of the body as a site of contestation in tandem with wider gendered concerns to do with queerness and family.

Notes 1. These she characterises, perhaps unconsciously, specifically as popular, invoking a familiar hierarchy between literary/­progressive science fiction texts versus filmic/­conservative ones. 2. Captain Marvel makes similar attempts to recuperate Danvers’s humanity at the film’s climax when Yon-­Rogg briefly removes her powers.

C H A PT E R 8

Disrupting the Rainbow Bridge: Dysfunctional Heterosexuality and Reinforcing Gender Difference in Marvel Adaptations As the previous chapters illustrate, there is some scope for transgressive gender representation through the figure of the superheroine, but such representations remain scarce and undeniably informed by postfeminist power structures. This chapter expands on this by focusing on the particular representations of heterosexual romance that Marvel film adaptations offer, and drawing out how these relate to the preservation of hegemonic modes of femininity (and masculinity). In Western cultures, the categories ‘men’ and ‘women’ must be distinct and difference between them is harnessed. Indeed, Judith Lorber argues that the gender binary is one of the foundational elements of society, in which biological sex and other factors such as race are used as ‘crude markers’ of ‘ascribed social statuses’ (Lorber 2000: 56). The gender binary thus functions within political hierarchical terms, maintaining the gender order. Disputes over the relationship between gender­– ­that is, a ‘system of social practices’ shaping individuals’ identification as man or woman (as opposed to biological sex) (Wharton 2012: 8)­– ­and sexuality­ – ­which refers ‘to all erotically significant aspects of social life and social being’ (Jackson 2005: 17)­– h ­ ave been expressed throughout the last several decades and are challenging to navigate. Nonetheless, I provide here a summary of the contextual discourses involving sexuality and gender, and why it is beneficial to consider them as twinned occurrences. As Chris Beasley notes, the majority of gender theorists ‘continue to perceive gender and sexuality as strongly linked’ but ‘queer theorists, in particular, dismiss any assertions that gender and sexuality are inevitably joined’ (Beasley 2005: 4). Further, Richardson has identified at least five different ways of conceiving of the linkage between gender and sexuality, from naturalist approaches in which the dual binaries of male/­female, heterosexual/­homosexual and masculine/­feminine are considered part of a ‘natural order’ (Richardson 2007: 460) to sociological perspectives which, for example, see gender as an effect of sexuality (Richardson 2007: 462). Richardson stresses the

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importance of considering historical context in seeking the interconnections between gender and sexuality (Richardson 2007: 465). Her opinion is that two qualifying questions must be asked: ‘Can we think about gender without invoking sexuality?’ and ‘Is sexuality intelligible to us outside of a gendered discourse or subject?’ (Richardson 2007: 466). When invoking the notion of a heterosexual man, it may seem impossible to conceive of him as anything outside the definition of a gendered person, who is a man, who is sexually attracted to the ‘other’ gender, namely women. However, it is queer theory’s role to aid in the deconstruction of such questions. Thus, Richardson argues that ‘gender’s link to sexuality is not determinate or unidirectional, but complex, dynamic, contingent, fluid and unstable’ (Richardson 2007: 464). Stevi Jackson offers equally enlightening theories, arguing that sexuality and gender are empirically interrelated, but analytically distinct. Without an analytical distinction between them, we cannot effectively explore the ways in which they intersect; if we conflate them, we are in danger of deciding the form of their interrelationship in advance. (Jackson 2005: 17)

It is thus preferable to consider the interrelations of sexuality and gender, for example the question of why, when we refer to one, we also think of the other, whilst also maintaining the analytical differences between them. Like Richardson and other theorists such as Beasley (2010), Calvin Thomas (2009), Nancy L. Fischer (2013) and others, Jackson is interested in heterosexuality as a social institution which shapes individuals’ lives and behaviour as well as social hierarchies. Indeed, she states that ‘Heterosexuality is the key site of intersection between gender and sexuality, and one that reveals the interconnections between sexual and nonsexual aspects of social life’ (Jackson 2005: 17). Jackson traces the varying accounts of gender and sexuality throughout history, leading to the resurfacing of attitudes inflected by ‘New Darwinism’ in recent times (Jackson 2005: 15). Such rhetoric privileges the idea that heterosexuality is most ‘useful’ in evolutionary terms as it is driven by ‘the “need” to find a mate and pass on our genes to the next generation’ (Jackson 2005: 15). Much like in the naturalist approaches outlined by Richardson, heterosexuality thus becomes part of ‘human nature’. In light of this, Jackson stresses that it is ‘crucial to reassert the political relevance of social constructionist analyses of gender and sexuality and to challenge the taken-­for-­granted view of heterosexuality as a natural, uncontestable fact of human nature’ (Jackson 2005: 16). Views of heterosexuality as ‘natural’ drive heteronormative discourses in Western culture. Following this, Lauren Berlant and Michael Warner

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d i s r upt ing the ra inb o w b r i dg e 195 define heteronormativity as ‘the institutions, structures of understanding, and practical orientations that make heterosexuality seem not only coherent­ – ­that is, organized as a sexuality­ – ­but also privileged’ (Berlant and Warner 1998: 548). Therefore, heteronormativity, as a dominant discourse, crops up in all areas of Western culture. Berlant and Warner continue that: Contexts that have little visible relation to sex practice, such as life narrative and generational identity, can be heteronormative in this sense, while in other contexts forms of sex between men and women might not be heteronormative. (Berlant and Warner 1998: 548)

It is also important to note that heteronormativity serves the purpose of marginalising and stigmatising any sexualities which are not heterosexual. Furthermore, ‘Heteronormativity extends beyond the normalization of heterosexuality to encompass the normalization of a certain type of heterosexuality that involves marriage and monogamy while single, nonmonogamous, or voluntarily celibate individuals are viewed as deviant’ (Charlebois 2011: 15). Thus, though gender may not cause an individual’s sexuality or vice versa, heteronormativity dictates that certain genders are aligned to certain sexualities. Heteronormative sentiments are expressed and reinforced by media representations, particularly mainstream Hollywood films, including Marvel adaptations. It would be careless to presuppose that there is no connection between gender and sexuality, and even if there is not one, these texts ensure that there is a message that there is a connection. The institution of heterosexuality has been evident in the previous chapters, for example in my discussion of villainesses, who embody the ‘wrong sort’ of heterosexual femininity (too sexual; too strong) to be ideologically stable. It therefore is desirable for the ‘good’ woman to embody socially desirable aspects of heterofemininity, such as fear and victimisation, to allow for no sexual/­gender (and hence moral) ambiguity. Such sentiments also fuel the aforementioned women-in-refrigerator narratives, although the purpose of this chapter is to navigate the arena of heterosexuality and its relationship to femininity specifically. Marvel films display an insistence on heterosexual displays of romance, and this is partly achieved through their reliance on a gender binary and its supposed rigidity. That said, a discussion of gender requires a discussion of sexuality, even if their exact relationship is ambiguous. Feminist writers have assessed what it means for women to be sexual in films (Mellen 1974; Kaplan 1983; Kuhn 1994), but few have actively investigated the role of heterosexuality within the films and the female characters’ narratives in great detail. While such texts prove enlightening

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to the issue of women’s representations in films, they do not specify what it means for these women to be represented as heterosexual. Another issue is the lack of studies about heteronormative and hegemonic representations of heterosexuality. Theorists have tackled heteronormativity from an angle that does not speak directly to the purpose of this chapter but still offers some contextual background. Importantly, they have been interested in queering the notion of heterosexuality. That is, in Beasley’s terms, they intend to break away from notions of heterosexuality as the antithesis of queer, and rather offer readings of heterosexuality against the grain of heteronormativity, to ‘upset accounts of heterosexuality as uninteresting’ (Beasley 2010: 204). Such contemplations have brought about new configurations of what heterosexuality incorporates, such as that of the ‘queer straight’ or ‘queer heterosexual’ (Mock 2003; Schlichter 2004), or even ‘nonnormative heterosex’ (Gregory 2018), which open up new opportunities for how individuals consider their own sexual identities. Further, writers have applied this perspective to Western mainstream cultural products such as film, thereby ‘queering’ representations of heterosexuality on screen. Wheeler Winston Dixon, in his work Straight (2003), is thus only interested in films which he perceives as offering eccentric representations of heterosexuality, while Sean Griffin’s edited collection Hetero (2009b) offers queered readings of mainstream representations of heterosexuality that defy the notion that heterosexuality is ‘bland, white bread, vanilla, missionary position, monogamous, married, patriarchal’ (Griffin 2009a: 4). An issue with these readings is not that they are not useful, but rather that they do not address the issues raised by representations that are very much in the mainstream. Further, they do not account for the mainstream blending of the ‘queer’ and ‘hetero’ categories that has occurred in recent decades. While I agree that representations of heterosexuality should be read as incorporating dysfunction, I also argue that this dysfunction is presented as a crucial component of normative heterosexual relationships in Marvel texts, complicating the notion of a queered reading of heterosexuality. When a reading that is against the grain is already contained within the grain, these kinds of analyses become less insightful. Finally, there has also been notable compartmentalisation of much queer theory in relation to its actual application, for example writers such as Berlant and Warner have been more invested in cultivating a queer counterculture than they have been with analysing the existing structures of power found within mainstream cultural spaces. As noted, there have been certain theoretical approaches that have maintained that gender occurs as part of a natural order based on binaris-

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d i s r upt ing the ra inb o w b r i dg e 197 tic frameworks. Attitudes that preserve essentialist notions of gender are likewise present in cultural products. Kimmel notes that an ‘interplanetary’ approach to gender is widespread in the media and other parts of everyday life (Kimmel 2000: 1). This interplanetary point of view, which became increasingly popular with the release of pop psychology self-­help guides such as John Grey’s Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus (1995), perpetuates the notion that men and women are so inherently different that they may as well be from different planets (Kimmel 2000: 1). The theory reinforces not only gender difference but gender inequality, offering an essentialist, rigid reading of gender difference. That is to say that this approach ‘assumes, whether through biology or socialization, that women act like women, no matter where they are, and that men act like men, no matter where they are’ (Kimmel 2000: 12). This perspective is limiting and ignores the myriad similarities between genders. The maintenance of this gender order, the essentialist notion that men must always act like men and that women always act like women, informs Judith Butler’s idea of the ‘heterosexual matrix’ (Butler 1990: 9). To summarise Butler’s dense theories, she notes the gender hierarchy, by which men are dominant in society and women submissive, is a political instrument. Drawing from the work of Monique Wittig, she states, ‘Gender not only designates persons, “qualifies” them, as it were, but constitutes a conceptual episteme by which binary gender is universalized’ (Butler 1990: 29). Much like Adrienne Rich, an early theoriser of heterosexuality as a ‘compulsory’ sexuality to which all people must adhere (Rich 1980), Butler maintains that dominance is fostered through ‘the culturally intelligible grids of an idealized and compulsory heterosexuality’ (Butler 1990: 185). This grid is the heterosexual matrix, which thus creates meaning out of the combined efforts of sex, gender and sexuality. Here, the interlocking notions of sexuality and gender culminate to maintain the gender order. Furthermore, Butler argues that heterosexuality must be constantly repeated and emphasised to perpetuate the heterosexual matrix. Heteronormative structures present heterosexuality as the ‘original’ sexuality, while homosexuality is merely a copy. However, Butler argues, this only occurs as a result of heterosexuality’s compulsory nature, and that heterosexuality will only ever be a copy of itself (Butler 1993: 313). This is because heterosexuality is constantly reproducing copies of itself to allay the anxiety that it could be questioned and rendered optional instead of compulsory (Butler 1993). Butler argues: heterosexuality is always in the process of imitating and approximating its own phantasmatic idealization of itself­– a­ nd failing. Precisely because it is bound to fail,

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and yet endeavors to succeed, the project of heterosexual identity is propelled into an endless repetition of itself. (Butler 1993: 313)

Media representations actively contribute to this heterosexual matrix. Indeed, Griffin has noted the importance of analysing heterosexuality in film, and other texts, but stresses that heterosexuality occupies an ‘unspoken invisible centrality’ (Griffin 2009b: 13). Further, Berlant and Warner argue for an inclusive perspective of the ways in which heteronormativity informs individuals’ daily lives in ways that are not solely related to sexual acts: This utopia of social belonging is also supported and extended by acts less commonly recognized as part of sexual culture: paying taxes, being disgusted, philandering, bequeathing, celebrating a holiday, investing for the future, teaching, disposing of a corpse, carrying wallet photos, buying economy size, being nepotistic, running for president, divorcing, or owning anything ‘His’ and ‘Hers’. (Berlant and Warner 1998: 555)

These factors make heterosexuality difficult to see as it is the default or norm against which other sexualities are measured. As outlined by Negra, heterosexual marriage has prominently resurfaced in postfeminist media products as a highlight of a woman’s life cycle (Negra 2009a: 175). She argues that such portrayals consistently and insistently display and perform femininity as heterosexual, white, affluent, and family-­focused, and those women who cannot be recuperated into one of these life stage paradigms generally lose representability within a landscape dominated by these categories. (Negra 2009a: 173)

Thus, despite the advances made in terms of gender equality fostered by feminist activity, there has been a significant call for traditional femininity within contemporary media. Evidently, this also ties into notions of heteronormativity, as ‘the distinct overvaluing of female heterosexuality and maternity’ that can be seen as a reaction to increasing instances of ‘alternative concepts of sexual identity and family’ in the media (Negra 2009a: 175), including but not limited to the foregrounding of ‘same-­sex’ marriage as being the crux of LGBTQ human rights in recent years. The furore over marriage can be seen in Marvel comic books when beloved characters get married. In Fantastic Four Annual #3, ‘Possibly the greatest annual of all time!’ and deemed ‘The most sensational super-­ spectacular ever witnessed by human eyes!!’ (Lee and Kirby 1965), Reed Richards and Susan Storm finally tie the knot. In the issue, the wedding is such a phenomenon that it occupies the front page of the newspaper

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d i s r upt ing the ra inb o w b r i dg e 199 that is being begrudgingly read by a furious Doctor Doom, who aims to seek revenge on Richards for defeating him previously. Similarly, Spider-­ Man’s wedding to Mary Jane Watson in The Amazing Spider-­Man Annual #21 is prominently displayed on the cover of the issue, with the happy couple beaming in front of the heart-­shaped Spider-­Man emblem and the wedding attendees (an alternate cover shows Parker in his Spider-­Man costume and replaces the wedding guests with an assortment of Marvel heroes and villains in confrontational poses, exemplifying the collision between superheroics and heterosexual union) (Michelinie et al. 1987). Representations of heterosexuality, while seeming difficult to make sense of due to their implicit invisibility, have been theoretically complexified. In her analysis of heterosexuality in the sci-­fi television series Star Trek: The Next Generation (CBS, 1987–94), Lee Heller argues that heterosexuality is presented as both utopic and unfulfilling. She suggests that the series ‘tries to imagine utopian romantic configurations and ideal sexual others, only to tell us, first, that such relationships are necessarily heterosexual, and second, that heterosexuality is inherently unable to fulfill the desire it is supposed to serve’ (Heller 1997: 226). This paradox is based dually on the idea that men and women are complementary (Hunter 2011: 311) but also draws from the interplanetary perspective of gender. In this sense, Heller notes, postfeminist texts offer a view of men and women as made for each other because they are different, and yet totally incompatible­– a­lso because they are different. She continues that ‘in popular media accounts of heterosexual gender trouble, the key term is not just difference, but difference that divides’ (Heller 1997: 227). This dividing difference is a foundational element of Marvel’s representations of heterosexual romance and is interestingly intertwined with the superheroic narratives.

Dysfunctional Heterosexuality in Marvel Films Numerous Marvel films draw on the idea that the central characters­– ­the romantic couple­– ­are meant to be together. In Thor, this occurs as part of Jane Foster’s (Natalie Portman) main narrative arc. Throughout the film, Foster, an astrophysicist who discovers god-like superhero Thor in the desert after he is expelled from Asgard, changes how she perceives Thor. To begin with, Foster views Thor as an interesting object that can support her scientific research, since he seemingly fell from space. This is evidenced by her outrage when her research is confiscated by S.H.I.E.L.D.­ – ­she states ‘I just lost my most important piece of evidence. Typical!’ This cold and clinical attitude towards Thor is remedied during her narrative

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arc. A major turning point for Foster is an outdoor scene by a campfire in which Thor describes the machinations of his magical world to her. The close-­up of the burning fire zooms out to show them sitting behind it, accompanied by soft, romantic music (occurring extradiegetically). Thor then takes some of Foster’s notes (which he heroically retrieved from the S.H.I.E.L.D. facility) and draws the planets. A medium close-­up shows how he looks at her and says ‘Your ancestors called it magic, and you call it science. Well, I come from a place where they’re one and the same thing’ and Foster is shown smiling at him in the reverse shot. The scene is framed by romance through the music, the warm glow of the fire at night and camerawork. After he has finished explaining, it cuts to a shot of the moon and the music becomes even softer, further contributing to the scene’s heartfelt romance. This is followed by a shot of Thor looking up at the sky, panning round to show Foster has fallen asleep. He says ‘Thank you, Jane’­– ­he thanks her for finally accepting him as an individual, rather than a science project. Thus, Foster and Thor are shown as destined to unite since Foster has undergone this dramatic transformation in her attitude. Meanwhile, Thor is shown after a dramatic battle with a giant fire-­breathing robot (the Destroyer) to be relieved that Foster is unscathed when he says to her ‘It’s over . . . I mean, you’re safe, it’s over.’ In this sense, the heterosexual union was imperilled through the threat of the Destroyer. Once the Destroyer is defeated, the two can finally be together. The Destroyer thus is a contradictory figure that both reinforces the institution of heterosexual romance at the same time as poses a threat towards it. In such ways, Thor entangles the film’s heterosexuality with its superheroic narrative. After Thor departs to stop his brother Loki, who has allowed the evil Frost Giants access to Asgard, Foster utters ‘Oh. My. God’, a line that ironically acknowledges Thor’s place as her man, while also playing with the fact that he is a Norse god. However, this bliss is momentary. Since heterosexuality must also imply dysfunction, it therefore follows that Thor and Foster can, in fact, never be together. The final confrontation between Loki and Thor takes place in Asgard, on the Bifrost, the rainbow bridge that connects Asgard to the other realms. Since Loki wants to annihilate humankind, Thor opts to destroy the Bifrost on which Loki is lying after the fight. When Thor reaches for his magical hammer Loki tells him, ‘If you destroy the bridge you’ll never see her again.’ Again, the main heroic narrative is conceived of in terms of the heterosexual union. Before Thor swings the hammer, he says ‘Forgive me, Jane’, cementing this point, as the bridge explodes. Thus, Foster and Thor, seemingly meant for each other, can never be together. The end lines of the film accentuate this, as

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d i s r upt ing the ra inb o w b r i dg e 201 they reinforce the distance between the characters alongside the sense of yearning, as Thor asks Heimdall (Idris Elba), the omniscient guardian of the Bifrost, what Foster is doing at that moment, and he responds ‘She searches for you.’ What Heller describes as the dysfunctional-­utopic nature of heterosexuality is similarly highlighted in both The Incredible Hulk and Captain America: The First Avenger, which similarly intermingle heterosexuality with the superheroic narratives. Bob Rehak has noted that in The Incredible Hulk’s predecessor, Hulk (2003), the authoritarian father figure is a source of threat to the happy union of the central romantic couple (Rehak 2012: 95–8). However, I would argue that both films wrestle with the need to include a heterosexual union while one half of the couple is also portrayed as a raging green monster. The Incredible Hulk (a remake more than a sequel) incorporates this as an element of dysfunction within its utopian heterosexuality. Bruce Banner (Edward Norton), who turns into the Hulk when he becomes angry after being infected by gamma radiation, lives in Brazil, desperately trying to find a cure for his condition: a rage so great that it causes him to turn into the Hulk, or ‘Hulk out’. The film indicates that Bruce is so eager to find a cure because he is in love with his former associate, Betty Ross (Liv Tyler), in the opening of the film during which Banner is concocting a potential cure. This is intercut with frequent shots of a newspaper clipping Banner keeps that includes a picture of Ross. Banner is therefore depicted as devoted to Ross. Meanwhile, Ross is also unconditionally devoted to Banner, as during their unexpected reunion, while Banner is on the run from the US Army (led by Betty’s father, General Ross), Ross invites Banner to stay with her, even though he is a wanted man. This reunion scene takes place at night, outside in the rain, with long shots showcasing the couple as they embrace. The characters’ yearning for each other is highlighted in a following scene, in which both characters lie in their beds in separate rooms. An aerial shot of Ross gradually zooms in as she is lying in her bed, looking concerned. It cuts to a similar shot of Banner, then back to Ross, who is close to crying, then back to Banner. The next shot is of Ross, touching her face and closing her eyes. The concern, here, is presented as the dilemma of the great danger they face­– ­Ross harbours a known fugitive; Banner is on the run­– ­but it is framed within the heterosexual conundrum, asking how their love can survive. This is achieved by the juxtaposition of both characters lying awake in bed, but separately. Thus, Ross and Banner are destined to be together as complimentary soul mates, but ultimately cannot be together because he is the Hulk. Banner’s status as the Hulk also contributes to this heterosexuality’s dysfunction, which is explicitly

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expressed during a would-­be sex scene: Banner and Ross are unable to have sex because it would increase his heart rate, which, in an awkward discursive conflation of aggression and arousal, would essentially cause him to Hulk out. At the end of the film, Banner must bid farewell to Ross to defeat the film’s villain, Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth), who has turned himself into the Abomination, a kind of mega-­Hulk. This takes place in a helicopter that is transporting the two to safety while Blonsky goes on a rampage in the city. Banner tells Ross he has to stop Blonsky, while Ross begs him not to go. The night sky with violent clouds is representative of both the peril in which the heterosexual union is placed and the danger that Banner is putting himself into as they finally kiss goodbye in close-­up. This is followed by a medium shot of Banner allowing himself to drop to the ground so that he can fight Blonsky. Again, the heterosexual union and danger of the narrative coagulate and become inseparable. Captain America: The First Avenger, set in 1942, is also a notable example of the way in which heterosexuality’s dysfunction is intertwined with the narrative alongside its utopic principles. The film’s romance narrative focuses on the potential love between Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell) and Steve Rogers/­Captain America (Chris Evans). Significantly, they are portrayed as complementary because they both, on separate occasions, explicitly state that they are looking for the ‘right partner’ to dance with. This first happens when Carter and Rogers discuss Rogers’s love life, or lack thereof (a scene I further examine later) and how Carter is going to go dancing with him, and then again in a subsequent scene in which Rogers’s friend Bucky (Sebastian Stan) makes a pass at Carter in a bar, only for him to be rejected because Carter is interested in Rogers. However, predictably, Rogers and Carter will never be united as Rogers, after becoming Captain America and defeating the villainous Nazi the Red Skull (Hugo Weaving), is portrayed alone on an aircraft carrying weapons of mass destruction over which he has lost control. With the plane heading to New York, he calls Carter over the radio and explains that he must land the plane in the sea, leaving a slim chance of his survival. Soft, romantic music is in the background of these shots, which cut between Carter at the army headquarters and Rogers in the plane. Rogers looks out of the plane in a medium shot, telling her ‘Peggy, this is my choice.’ This cuts to Carter, sad, with tears in her eyes. In the next shot, Rogers takes out a photograph of Carter and places it on the dashboard. Again, this showcases the intermingling of what Heller terms heterosexual dysfunctionality with the heroic narrative. Following this is an exchange that again refers to Carter and Rogers’s doomed dance that will never be: Rogers tells her

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d i s r upt ing the ra inb o w b r i dg e 203 ‘Peggy, I’m going to need a rain check on that dance.’ After Carter tells him where and when they will meet to dance, Rogers tells her he still doesn’t know how, and the final tragic exchange takes place. The scene stays with Carter, showing her in medium close up with her eyes closed and face strained, after Rogers has told her they will ask the band to play something slow, his voice on the radio says ‘I’d hate to step on your –’ before being cut off. Carter repeats Rogers’s name before being shown in a long shot, hunched over her desk, with sad diegetic music. These final scenes are a culmination of the inseparability of heterosexuality and the heroic narrative. Further, Carter and Rogers’s complementarity is again coupled with the unfulfilled union­– ­this time, Carter and Rogers will never be together as Carter will be an old woman by the time Rogers is thawed out of the ice that preserves his body after he crashes in the sea. The period in which The First Avenger is set is particularly convenient for postfeminist culture, as it functions as a distancing mechanism against what once was. Alongside its focus on a patriotic soldier-­hero who embodies hegemonic masculine American ideals through a white, heterosexual, body that is at peak physical condition, that the film also showcases scenes framed by Girl Power sentiment fostered by Carter’s introduction as a tough girl who does not allow unruly men to harass her is also significant. Carter’s appearance in the film as a high-­ranking military woman seems unexpected for its 1940s setting, however it was not entirely unlikely for women to have had such roles in the army (though officially it was deemed unacceptable in the US military for women to have combat roles). As a postfeminist period piece, The First Avenger speaks to the notion of ‘temporal slippages’, which Munford and Waters suggest are a defining trait of postfeminist culture (Munford and Waters 2014: 8), much like the 1990s setting of Captain Marvel. Within these modes of representation, the past, future and present collide as ‘images or ideas from the past might return to haunt us’ while helping to shape new feminisms, ‘the ghostly projection of a feminist future’ (Munford and Waters 2014: 8) that is nonetheless steeped in gender traditionalism. Heterosexuality is intertwined within these films’ fibres. Simultaneously, this functions both to showcase the utopic (they were meant for each other) yet dysfunctional (they can never be together) qualities of heterosexuality and to make it appear natural and invisible. Whereas the women-­ in-­refrigerators narratives discussed in Chapter 1 explicitly implicate the superhero girlfriends within the action by utilising them as plot points, the intermeshing of heterosexuality and narrative peril undertaken here is a more covert formation of dominant ideologies, drawing the women in as part of the overall representation of heterosexuality. The heterosexual

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matrix can thus be seen to function on the tangible level of the women-­in-­ refrigerators narrative but becomes even more naturalised when the perils of heroism and the dysfunction of heterosexuality are presented as one naturally occurring, commonsensical phenomenon. This bond between the heroic narrative and heterosexuality is so strong, that when male characters enter the world of superheroics (i.e. they acquire their powers), they actually enter the world of heterosexual dysfunction. The most notable example of this occurs in Captain America: The First Avenger. When Rogers is introduced in the film, he is portrayed as small, weak and sickly, and unable to fulfil his patriotic dream of joining the army. This is framed by heterosexual discourses in the aforementioned scene with Carter. Carter escorts Rogers to the secret lab where he will receive the Super Soldier Serum that turns him into Captain America. In the car on the way there, Rogers and Carter talk about women. At one point, Rogers tells Carter ‘I guess I just don’t know why you’d want to join the army if you were a beautiful dame. Or a . . . A Woman.’ Rogers is flustered by Carter’s facial expression, shown as a frown in the following medium shot, and further stumbles over his words: ‘An agent. Not a dame. You are beautiful, but . . .’ At that moment, Carter interjects, ‘You have no idea how to talk to a woman, do you?’ to which he replies, ‘I think this is the longest conversation I’ve had with one. Women aren’t exactly lining up to dance with a guy they might step on’, which leads to the exchange about dancing. Importantly, Rogers’s status as a puny, weak, powerless man is also presented as what makes him unattractive to women. He thus exists outside of heterosexual dysfunction, or even any sort of sexuality. It therefore follows that, after Rogers receives the Super Soldier treatment, he immediately becomes attractive to women, which is signalled by Carter clearly eyeing up his newly muscular body, touching his naked chest after he is removed from the machine that grants him his powers. Now taller, stronger and more conventionally attractive, Rogers has entered the world of superheroics, but he has simultaneously entered the world of heterosexual dysfunction. The women around him thus serve to reinforce his heterosexuality. The parallel introduction of male characters to the realm of heroism and heterosexuality has been present in Marvel comic book narratives. Joseph Willis, for example, notes that in Spider-­Man’s origin story in Amazing Fantasy #15 (Lee and Kirby 1962b), pre-­spider-­bite Peter Parker is shown as being specifically unattractive towards women, with his female classmates shown making unkind comments towards him (Willis 2014). In this sense, he has been barred from partaking of heterosexuality (and hence from any sexuality since heteronormativity negates the possibility of alternatives). After he acquires his powers, however, he becomes more integrated into the

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group of teens and is admired by women while in his Spider-­Man persona. Willis thus argues that after Parker acquires his powers and becomes a hero, he also realises his heterosexual potential. Willis argues, ‘With powers, comes a superhero identity, and a sexual identity. However, in the superhero narrative, this development of a sexual identity is framed in a specifically hetero-­normative construct and subject to patriarchal power structures of strict gendered performances’ (Willis 2014). This twinning of superheroic narratives with heterosexuality has thus been a staple of the superhero narrative throughout both film and comic book media. However, I would take this argument a step further by suggesting that these heroes not only enter the world of heterosexuality on receiving their powers but that it is a world in which heterosexuality is dually utopic and dysfunctional, thus indicating an adaptation of these discourses to contemporary postfeminist rhetoric, following the sentiments expressed by Heller. Such sentiments are further evident in contemporary Marvel comics, particularly a recent storyline centring on Peter Parker’s marriage to Mary Jane Watson. After the couple got married in 1987, Marvel subsequently decided to erase the story from existence in the late 2000’s storyline ‘One More Day’. In this, Parker makes a deal with the demon Mephisto to save Aunt May’s life. In return, Mephisto removes the marriage from living memory (Straczynski and Quesada 2008). ‘One More Day’ can be seen as disrupting the utopic constitution of Parker and Watson’s marriage. Further, statements leading up to the story’s publishing by Marvel’s then-­ Editor-­in-­Chief and artist of the storyline, Joe Quesada, are illuminating. Chronicling his loathing for the wedding since the story was told in the 1980s, Quesada expresses a duty towards the character to undo the marriage, stating ‘Are Peter and MJ okay as is, sure, but a lot of the drama and soap opera that was an integral part of the Spider-­Man mythos is gone’ (Quesada in Newsarama 2006). Hence, Quesada’s reasoning with regards to the marriage is that a married couple is too utopic, which results in a lack of drama, which he perceives as the main attraction of Parker’s ­storylines. On the other hand, Quesada continues: I always hated the portrayal of the marriage, and by that I mean that for years after they were married they were never really portrayed as truly happy, I don’t understand in a way why that was done. I believe it was an attempt by the creators back then to bring back a much-­needed tension to the relationship side of Peter’s world that was now missing because he was no longer single. It was an attempt to bring back the soap opera. (Quesada in Newsarama 2006)

Here, Quesada expresses what he perceives as an inconsistency in Parker’s marriage­– ­that marriages should be perfect, that there is no room for ‘soap

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opera’ in representations of marriage (this is also ironic given the frequent association of Marvel storytelling with soap opera). Here, incongruities of heterosexual romance resurface. Marriage, culturally positioned as the ultimate, perfect heterosexual union, was considered inappropriate for Peter Parker. It was preferred that he partake of the combined dysfunctional-­ utopic heterosexuality that accompanies single/­dating life. The heterosexual utopia must be fulfilled, but at the same time, it cannot flourish. Heller’s overarching argument is that characters in her discussion are prevented from fulfilling their heterosexual desires because men and women, despite being complimentary, are presented as being simply too different. Subsequently, Heller extends this argument in terms of postfeminist discourses, arguing that postfeminist rhetoric has resulted in a call for a return to traditional gender roles (Heller 1997: 229). On the other hand, it has also resulted in a resurgence of a demand for women to be accommodating of men’s flaws, to carry out additional emotional labour, and not prevent men from embodying their true ‘nature’ (Heller 1997: 230). Only then can the heterosexual relationship be made to ‘work’. Thus, she states, women are encouraged to ‘tolerate, rather than challenge, difference as an essential component of heterosexual relationships’ (Heller 1997: 228). Significantly, it is the different-­yet-­made-­for-­each-­other qualities of heterosexuality that are stressed as crucial elements of heterosexual romance. Thus, this reading of heterosexuality in Marvel films is not necessarily a queering of banal romance; rather, it is in postfeminist culture’s interest to present such relationships as desirable. Indeed, Heller determines that it is women who are left to deal with any challenging behaviour men may present in relationships, to ‘persuade women to preserve difference as an expression of male desire’ (Heller 1997: 229). Such discourses can also be seen in Marvel films as women are the ones who bear the brunt of the drama; all of the women discussed in this section are left behind by their respective heroic lovers. In Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Sue Storm is presented as needy and demanding towards Reed Richards, who is more interested in his job than their wedding. Rather than accommodating Richards’s needs, Sue effectively forces Richards to give up superheroing in favour of family life. However, at the end of the film, Sue is clearly shown to make the compromise for Richards, and they decide to remain superheroes after their wedding. Here, Sue accommodates Richards’s quirks without stifling his masculine nature in accordance with postfeminist discourses. Likewise, at the end of Iron Man 2, Pepper Potts is shown to make the compromise for Tony Stark. Even though she makes it clear that she cannot accommodate either Stark’s erratic actions or her highly demanding job as CEO of Stark

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Industries, Stark overrides her concerns and essentially forces her to remain in this position (which is portrayed in a light-­hearted manner). The film ends on this note, indicating the ultimate narrative closure for this heterosexual relationship. Heller is not the only writer to have made this link between heterosexual dysfunction and postfeminism. Debbie Epstein and Deborah Steinberg likewise argue that popular narratives promote ‘the idea that you have to work on your relationships and the idea that heterosexuality works if you work on it’ (Epstein and Steinberg 2003: 99). Typically, it is not men who are encouraged to carry out this work: ‘it is women who are expected to undertake the labour of making heterosexuality work, a conventional gender role if ever there was one’ (Epstein and Steinberg 2003: 99). Thus, while representations of heterosexuality persist, they combine utopic-­dysfunctional elements in accordance with postfeminist culture and a nostalgia for traditional gender roles, which call for women to respond in compromising ways towards men’s needs. This, in turn, contributes to the rigidity of the heterosexual matrix outlined earlier. Meanwhile, heterosexuality, though a challenging subject of analysis, takes on a form that is tied to the complexities of the superhero narrative. In this, women play a crucial role in upholding an image of idealised sexuality that nonetheless incorporates significant dysfunction. These representations heavily relate to postfeminist discourses. Likewise, the interrelations between gender and sexuality must be acknowledged as it is currently difficult to conceive of one without the other. Following this, the prevalence of gender rigidity combined with an emphasis on a dominant mode of heterosexuality leads to largely limiting representations. This is not to say that there have been no flexibilities in the films. Ironically, considering The First Avenger’s insistence on dysfunctional-­utopic heterosexuality, Rogers is left without a romantic partner in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, opening up a potential opportunity for queer readings. To add to this, Natasha Romanoff, who teams up with Rogers throughout the film, constantly attempts to set Rogers up with women, offering suggestions to him during critical fight scenes (‘Kristen from statistics’, ‘the nurse who lives across the hall from you’, ‘that girl from accounting’). Rogers’s answers to these suggestions are conspicuously vague; for instance that he’s ‘too busy’ or ‘I’m not ready for that’, opening a fissure in the institution of heterosexuality that has been promoted in Marvel films thus far. In early 2013, Marvel released the second volume of Young Avengers (Gillen and McKelvie 2013), featuring what is implied to be an all-­queer team. The comic’s success demonstrated the demand for inclusivity in comic books; the first issue quickly sold out and received a second printing. The inclusion of queer qualities in a Marvel character accompanied

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much of the discourse around Thor: Ragnarok’s Valkyrie. Similarly, it is significant that throughout the release schedule of Deadpool and beyond, the character was been referred to as pansexual1 (Myers 2015; O’Toole 2015; Setoodeh 2016). Deadpool was presented as non-­ normative in paratexts, although his pansexuality is merely hinted at within the film itself. Further, how his non-­normativity is connoted in the film hinges on gender markers, again indicating the ways in which gender and sexuality are conflated in such texts. Throughout the film, Deadpool is shown enacting ‘feminine’ behaviours, such as skipping after having carried out brutal killings, carrying a Hello Kitty backpack or having an affinity for Wham!’s music. Such cutesy behaviours are not unlike those carried out by Mystique when she is a man, as discussed in the previous chapter and draw attention to the constructedness of gender in a similar way. However, the function of these gender markers is somewhat different, since the film utilises them to indicate Deadpool’s sexual non-­normativity­ – ­the film articulates Deadpool’s pansexuality (as expressed outside of the film) by showing that he likes girly things. Further, the film uses these signifiers to illicit humour which itself mocks the very notion of gender-­nonconformity. As such, Deadpool’s gender and sexuality remain entrenched in dominant modes of femininity and masculinity. Likewise, the film hints at the character’s potential queerness while recentring the relationship between the male hero and female damsel (who, in a way which takes account of feminist criticisms of her being a damsel, is nonetheless suggested to be, literally, ‘ball-­busting’, strong and capable). Deadpool is perhaps one of the strongest examples of a film which is the product of a ‘post-­’ culture. The character’s queerness, as it is framed in the popular discourses, still makes way for traditionalist modes of gender. In such a way, LGBTQ politics are made use of, only for them to be ultimately cast off. This is evident in the numerous occasions when Deadpool jokes that strong women present in the film actually have penises and are thus men. For instance, while being forcefully strapped to a stretcher by the super strong Angel Dust (Gina Carrano) before undergoing treatment that eventually results in his superpowers, Deadpool says ‘Aren’t you a little strong for a lady? I’m calling wang’, a gag whose humour rests on the notion of the biological weakness of the female body, the transgression of which must stem from the possession of a penis, rendering the woman a man. The film therefore incorporates LGB notions of sexual equality (although with limitations), while the transgender issues invoked remain one of the cultural taboos that are made fun of for the sake of irreverence. Other ‘taboo’ topics mocked in the film include, on multiple occasions, ‘indecent’ sex acts, child abuse and, indeed, feminism. In one scene in

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d i s r upt ing the ra inb o w b r i dg e 209 which Deadpool goes on a rampage trying to track down the film’s villain, he is shown fretting over the moral conundrum of whether or not it is acceptable for him to beat women. Confronted by the two women, one of whom initially pretends to have been innocently injured, Deadpool apologises before the other woman jumps him from behind. Freeing himself from the woman, with the other on the ground in front of him, he laments, ‘This is confusing! Is it sexist to hit you? Is it more sexist to not hit you? I mean the line gets more blurry!’ During the final sentence, he draws his gun and points it at the woman on the ground, though the scene cuts before he shoots. This scene, and the moral bind stated by Deadpool, is further indicative of the incorporation of the imaginary feminist on which postfeminist culture relies. Derailing discussions of violence against women to focus on what actions by men are considered sexist or not, the scene presumably aims to relinquish any moral responsibility for the central (anti)hero shooting a woman in the face precisely because it has demonstrated an awareness of the implications of such a scene. Rather than criticising the patriarchal mechanisms which facilitate such instances of violence against women, though, the scene essentially casts these (imagined) feminist criticisms aside to (a) derive humour from the situation, and (b) leave the status quo intact. Perhaps more than any other film considered in this project, Deadpool incorporates the sentiments of political movements in order to reconfigure them within a masculinist humour framework that ultimately bolsters traditional cultural hierarchies. Indeed, Deadpool 2, while similarly discussed in the media through the strengths of the character’s non-­normativity (Delbyk 2016; Kyriazis 2016; Hawkes 2017; O’Connor 2017), nonetheless begins with the violent death of Wilson’s girlfriend Vanessa (after the two discuss the possibility of starting a family) in yet another self-­aware incorporation of established superhero conventions that nonetheless does little to resolve its underlying gender dynamics, as Deadpool immediately vows to avenge her. While it is notable that the film portrays disaffected teen mutant Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Brianna Hildebrand) in a relationship with another female mutant, the two occupy little screen time.

Note 1. Pansexuality denotes an attraction to all genders and sexualities, rejecting the supposedly binaristic connotations of gender in the term ‘bisexuality’.

C HA PT E R 9

Black Skin, Blue Skin: Race and Femininity in Marvel Films

Throughout this book, I have argued that representations of women in Marvel films are multiplicitous while often drawing from established tropes. However, the fact remains that these representations of women have been distinctly white. As is discussed in this chapter, this is partly facilitated by the machinations of both mainstream Hollywood and the postfeminist landscape within which it is situated. However, it is not enough to merely draw attention to the prevalence of whiteness within these films. This chapter thus interrogates issues of race within a postfeminist culture, specifically assessing the roles played by women of colour in these films. The particular characters and narratives examined in this chapter are mostly limited to those with black or East Asian (particularly Japanese) identities. That racial representations are limited to these two ethnicities is itself indicative of the lack of women of colour in Marvel films. I situate these films within a cultural moment that is both postfeminist and postracial and ultimately discuss portrayals of black women in Blade and the X-­Men series, and East Asian women in The Punisher (1989) and The Wolverine. Race representation has been a topical issue within disciplines invested in unpacking how the systemic oppression of marginalised peoples extends to popular media. Benshoff and Griffin, for instance, provide a detailed overview of how racial minorities have been portrayed in oppressive ways in Hollywood film (Benshoff and Griffin 2009: 127–324). Further, while the initial purveyors of feminist film criticism focused on gender as the locus of oppression for women, theorists moved on to consider the intersection between gendered and racial oppression (Gaines 1986). In her quali-­quantitative study surveying representations of both women and racial minorities (as well as overlapping identities), Maryann Erigha concludes that these identities have been consistently under-­represented both in front of and behind the camera (Erigha 2015). This contributes to the dominant power structures that foster racial and gender stereotypes within Western culture (Erigha 2015: 85).

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bl a c k s kin, bl ue s ki n 211 However, looking beyond this, it is necessary to discern further implications of these deductions with regards to how these images link to postfeminist culture, which, as I discussed in previous chapters, has been characterised as privileging an idealised white, heterosexual, affluent feminine subjectivity. While race has been a rich point of scholarly interest in film studies (and, to a certain degree, comics studies), scholars have not yet fully examined portrayals of women of colour in Marvel superhero narratives in a postfeminist context. Many contemporary portrayals of women of colour, particularly East Asian and African American women, still draw from the Orientalist discourses discussed by Edward Said (1988). Orientalist discourses promote the West’s supposed superiority over the East, ‘dividing the world into two unequal parts, the larger, “different” one called the Orient, the other, also known as “our” world, called the Occident or the West’ (Said 1981: 4). Within Orientalist representations, then, the East is positioned as ‘Other’ to the West, as a ‘monolithic thing’ (Said 1988: 4). This othering of the East often involves both sexualising and feminising discourses, again bringing to light the intersection of race and gender. Orientalist rhetoric, though it has shifted and adapted to postfeminist culture, still informs many portrayals of women of colour as exotic, mysterious, sensual and dangerous. Despite Said’s silence on feminism itself (Boehmer 2009), his theories have remained valuable within postcolonial feminist theory. Likewise, it is important to consider the wider visibility of people of colour within the Trump era, which, as mentioned throughout this book, is an era that has been culturally polarised across divisions of race, gender and class. To account for this, I end the book with a discussion of the racial politics at work in Thor: Ragnarok and Black Panther, both of which mark a distinct critique of Western colonial ideologies and a reification of racial difference, while also leaving deeply rooted structures of inequality unquestioned. Nonetheless, when surveying literature regarding race representation, it is clear that there has, in the past few decades, been an increased focus on the importance of whiteness as a social construct and the representation of white people in the media (Dyer 1988, 1997; Bernardi 1996, 2007; Negra 2001; Foster 2003; M. A. Berger 2005; Vera and Gordon 2006; Benshoff and Griffin 2009: 127–64). As such, there has been a trend within scholarly writing in which feminist authors critiquing postfeminist culture opt merely to state that postfeminism privileges whiteness. Springer, for example, states that ‘Studies of postfeminism have studiously noted that many of its icons are white and cited the absence of women of color, but the analysis seems to stop there’ (Springer 2008: 72), a point also addressed

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by Jess Butler (2013). Considering that postfeminism privileges the white, affluent, heterosexual female subject and that analyses ‘stop there’, an interrogation of specific representations of women of colour is not only necessary but crucial in understanding postfeminist culture more fully. Even so, there have been beneficial forays into the topic of race and postfeminism. McRobbie, for example, applies her concept of disarticulation in postfeminist culture to issues of race, in which solidarity between women across races is obstructed and familiar Orientalist discourses of the oppressed East versus the liberated West resurface (McRobbie 2009: 41–3). Feminist and anti-­racist discourses thus become disarticulated and considered unnecessary, a relic of the past, resulting in ‘a norm of nostalgic whiteness’ (McRobbie 2009: 43). Meanwhile, Projansky similarly notes postfeminism’s centralising of white women but holds that the occasional appearance of women of colour in some postfeminist texts results in the erasure of politicised racial identities and active discussion of race and gender since these women of colour are shown to have had the same opportunities as white women (Projansky 2001: 87). As such, women of colour appear within postfeminist texts when they have successfully assimilated to dominant postfeminist discourses of idealised white femininity, and racialised identity is disowned (McRobbie 2007: 43; Springer 2008: 88; Butler 2013: 50). While Dyer argues that ‘the colourless multi-­ colouredness of whiteness secures white power by making it hard . . . to “see” whiteness’ (Dyer 1988: 46), multiculturalism and the ‘colourblind’ attitudes promoted within has made it difficult to ‘see’ people of colour, since doing so is considered taboo, or racist, in itself (Lentin and Titley 2011: 3–4). Colourblindness, described by Tyrone Forman and Amanda Lewis as ‘racial apathy’ (Forman and Lewis 2006), is a form of racism that has proliferated in a supposed postracial society in which racial inequalities are presented as non-­existent. Individuals are encouraged not to ‘see’ race, or even acknowledge its existence, because of a predominant message that claims that ‘we are all the same’. It thus also becomes impossible to ‘see’ racial discrimination and prevent it from occurring. Any racial inequality, much like sexism, is perceived to be caused by individual prejudices, rather than systemic oppression on an institutional level, and thus race and gender are characterised as ‘personal, individual, and mutable traits and not structural, institutional, and historic forces’ (Joseph 2009: 237). This is the era in which the Marvel movie boom fully took hold. These films, as I discuss here, actively enforce postracial discourses alongside (or as part of) their postfeminism. Indeed, as noted by Ralina L. Joseph, ‘Twenty-­first-­century U.S. culture is replete with the idea that we are

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bl a c k s kin, bl ue s ki n 213 beyond, past, or “post-­” notions of race-­, gender-­, and sexuality-­based discrimination’ (Joseph 2009: 238). As Joseph illustrates, both postfeminism and postracialism­– a­s well as emerging postgay discourses (Ng 2013; Walters 2014; Hilton-­Morrow and Battles 2015)­– ­interlock within a multicultural, neoliberal, globalised society. Indeed, Julietta Hua suggests that multiculturalism, which seeks to reduce racial difference in favour of an assimilative postracial subjectivity, ‘makes possible’ postfeminism (Hua 2009: 64). This is in part caused by the increasing commodification of racialised feminine subjectivities (Kim and Chung 2005; Braidotti 2006: 55; Banet-­Weiser 2007; Hua 2009: 65; Joseph 2009: 241–4), as well as the marketability of what Caren Kaplan describes as ‘global feminism’ (Kaplan 1995: 48). In a postfeminist culture, as Sarah Banet-­Weiser suggests, race can be a viable commodity (sold largely to white audiences) because ‘racial difference and gender discrimination are no longer salient’ (Banet-­Weiser 2007: 204). Identities of people of colour in a postfeminist culture are therefore considered unique curios, features that make a text more interesting, while the real-­life implications of racial identity with regards to racial/­gendered/­sexual discrimination are rendered meaningless. This marks a continuation of bell hooks’s notion of ‘eating the Other’ in which ‘there is a pleasure to be found in the acknowledgement and enjoyment of racial difference’, where ‘ethnicity becomes spice, seasoning that can liven up the dull dish that is mainstream white culture’ (hooks 1992: 21). Most significantly for this chapter, though, is the postfeminist goal of ‘universal womanhood’ that is promoted in texts that incorporate women of colour. This false notion of ‘common oppression’ (hooks 2000: 43–4) leads to the erasure of the specificity of an oppression that is both gendered and racial, eliminating the complexity of racial experiences. As noted, global feminism has been a profitable neoliberal endeavour. Caren Kaplan argues that such a brand of global feminism (which functions as part of postfeminist culture) ‘homogenizes economic and cultural difference in favor of a universalizable female identity or set of sexual practices while simultaneously stressing cultural “difference” as a marker of value in an increasingly homogeneous world’ (Kaplan 1995: 50). Thus, postfeminist culture is interested in promoting a universal model of womanhood through which all women, everywhere, are united due to their experiences as women, while other identity factors such as race are disregarded. This ‘universality of racially or gender-­specific images’ harnesses an ambiguous media landscape that is markedly ‘diverse’, yet does not actively address issues of racial and gendered oppression (Banet-­Weiser 2007: 217). Indeed, Rosi Braidotti argues that diversity is a highly valuable

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commodity in a neoliberal era in which ‘globalization functions through the incorporation of otherness’ (Braidotti 2006: 55). Racial and gender identity thus become depoliticised, since ‘corporations are able to disassociate everyday Americans from the structural context of oppression and the historical context of struggle that define the post-­industrial world by laying claim to the bodies and cultures of the “Other” ’ (Kim and Chung 2005: 73).

The Politics of ‘Diversity’ in Marvel Properties Representation of socially marginalised identities becomes an acute point in superhero stories featuring characters such as the X-­Men due to the allegorical potential of these storylines. However, these texts tend to engage with these issues of identity metaphorically while rarely overtly referring to them, in that homophobia, racism and sexism are never experienced by these characters diegetically even though they occupy a world in which gender and racial politics crystallise in a way that is at least tangentially related to the cultural contexts in which these films are made. As Darowski deduces: The X-­Men were created at the time when race and prejudice were among the most pressing issues in America. The mutants who made up the X-­Men were literally a separate race in this narrative, and the issue of prejudice has long been the prevalent theme in the series. (Darowski 2014: 30)

Yet race representation has been far on the side of whiteness. Further to this, that racial elements of the mutant metaphor have been abandoned in favour of a discourse of LGBT rights speaks further to the notion that these texts function within a postracial context. Here, attention to the political and social oppression of one group has been shunted in favour of another group, a dichotomy that does not consider the intersection of race, gender and sexuality. However, the X-­Men are not the only relevant characters when considering Marvel and race. Interestingly, most academic texts examining race representation in comics focus more on properties released by DC, with an overwhelming focus on black male superheroes (Brown 1999; Singer 2002; Nama 2011; Lackaff and Sales 2013; Gateward and Jennings 2015), although some consider wider racial issues (see contributions to Aldama 2010). Still, the conclusions made by these writers are valuable. Ronald Jackson and Sheena Howard, for instance, note that superhero comic books have classically promoted an ideal of ‘White patriarchal universalism’ which ‘leaves a concealed residue of minority inferiority’ (Jackson

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bl a c k s kin, bl ue s ki n 215 and Howard 2013: 2). Meanwhile, Derek Lackaff and Michael Sales argue that ‘comic books are a symbolic playground where we let our idealized versions romp; yet relatively few characters of color take part in the fun’ (Lackaff and Sales 2013: 67). In Superblack, Adilifu Nama carries out a detailed analysis of black superheroes as being representative of ‘America’s shifting political ethos and racial landscape’ (Nama 2011: 2). However, as mentioned, Nama mostly limits his discussion to DC comics and, disconcertingly, barely considers the importance of black female superheroes in comic books. While he does briefly refer to X-­Man Storm as fostering an idealised narrative of a poor Third World girl realising the American dream, she is positioned within his analysis against DC’s Nubia, the black Wonder Woman, a character Nama clearly prefers and whose lack of mainstream success he attributes to Storm’s popularity. Further, while I contest Marc Singer’s argument that superhero comics are particularly culpable of promoting racist stereotypes (Singer 2002: 107)­– ­they are not any more guilty of racism than other media­– ­Singer draws attention to the many ways in which comic books have promoted colourblind multiculturalism. He notes that the mainstream superhero comic is subject to championing the concept of diversity, ‘while actually obscuring any signs of racial difference’ (Singer 2002: 107). Singer discusses a particular issue of the DC series Legion of Super-­Heroes in which its multicoloured cast exclaims to a black character ‘We’re color-­blind! Blue skin, yellow skin, green skin . . . we’re brothers and sisters . . . united in the name of justice everywhere!’ (Singer 2002: 110). Indeed, Brown claims that ‘the presence of purple-­, orange-­, and green-­skinned characters allowed the comics industry to delude itself for decades that superheroes were beyond the real-­world concerns about skin color’ (Brown 2011a: 172). Singer ultimately concludes such instances show that comics are ‘[t]orn between sci-­fi fantasy and cultural reality . . . ultimately eras[ing] all racial and sexual differences with the very same characters that it claims analogize our world’s diversity’ (Singer 2002: 112). Alongside these comic book narratives in which race is analogised only to be erased are narratives that include the appropriation of race to, as hooks would have it, add spice to a story. Psylocke (Betsy Braddock) is an Asian X-­Woman who gained much attention in the 1990s due to her transformation from a white, British heroine into a deadly Japanese ninja (Claremont and Lee 1989). Due to a convoluted string of events, white Braddock’s mind is transferred to that of the Japanese assassin Kwannon, where she takes on Kwannon’s fighting abilities alongside her Asian body. Psylocke ultimately retains this body even after the storyline has been

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resolved. Madrid notes that the inclusion of Asian Psylocke added some racial diversity to Marvel comics on a visual level, however this was limited to appearances since ‘she only looked Asian on the outside’ (Madrid 2009: 275). Indeed, Madrid links this to a more general trend in comics in the 1990s: ‘Psylocke’s transformation from intellectual English lady to sexy ninja seductress represented the basic belief of the 90’s [sic] that image was all that mattered’ (Madrid 2009: 275). Psylocke’s Asianness therefore takes the form of a racial costume. On the other hand, it has been pointed out that many white comic artists struggle to signify racial difference, more often than not relying on white body shapes and markers such as hairstyle and colour, which are then coloured brown. David Taft Terry, for instance, notes that while the character appears broadly ‘exotic’, some readers perceived her to be ‘little more than “a white woman dipped in brown paint” ’ (Terry 2014: 183). Psylocke’s transformation was also accommodated by Orientalist discourses. As well as becoming a ninja, Asian Psylocke was portrayed as much more alluring and sexual than she ever had been in her white body, being portrayed wearing revealing swimsuit costumes typical of that era of comics. The Orientalist image of the mysteriously sexual, but deadly Asian woman was thus incorporated. Indeed, Brown remarks that Orientalism has consistently played a large part in the comic book representation of such characters, noting the frequent exoticisation of the racialised female Other (Brown 2011a: 168–9).1 Thus, superhero comic books, while not necessarily more susceptible to the promotion of racist discourses than other media, have provided ample material for adaptation in the contemporary postracial era of the Marvel boom, in which racialised identities are both commodified and framed by colourblind discourses. Indeed, Zingsheim argues that the X-­Men film series ‘capitalizes on shifting identity discourses to reconstruct White masculinity as the superior subject position’ (Zingsheim 2011: 225). Zingsheim, for example, points out that in X-­Men: The Last Stand, ‘the winners and heroes are constructed as largely White while the ranks of the villains are constructed as predominantly racially marginalized’ (Zingsheim 2011: 232), again presenting an imbalance in portrayals of people of colour. In X-­Men Origins: Wolverine, Logan’s girlfriend, Kayla Silverfox is suggested to descend from the indigenous peoples of Canada (and is portrayed as accordingly spiritual). She tells Logan a romantic tale about ‘why the Moon is lonely’, referring to the character Kuekuatsheu, the wolverine. This story was fabricated for the film, for while there exists a figure called Kuekuatsheu in Canadian Innu legend referred to as ‘the wolverine’ or ‘trickster’, the film’s legend contains conflicting accounts of various

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bl a c k s kin, bl ue s ki n 217 legendary characters. As such, indigenous folklore is co-­opted by the film to enhance its central romance. It should also be noted that Silverfox’s native identity is completely incidental, existing merely to serve within that scene. This becomes particularly obvious when Silverfox’s sister, whom Logan must rescue, is revealed to be a blonde, white young woman (credited as ‘Emma’ and bearing some resemblance to X-­Men: First Class’s Emma Frost). The inconsistency of Silverfox’s and her sister’s race illustrates how these films eschew the implications of racial identity. As a result, Marvel films often reach to stereotypical images­– ­such as the portrayal of Romani people as thieving criminals in Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, 2012)­– ­or erase characters of colour by casting white actors­– ­such as Maria Hill (Cobie Smulders) in The Avengers, who appears dark-­skinned in the comics; and the Maximoff Twins (Elizabeth Olsen and Aaron Taylor-­Johnson) in Age of Ultron, who have appeared in the comics as the children of Romani parents. Postracialism brought to its logical conclusion, though, has allowed for the casting of Jessica Alba (who is of Hispanic descent), in a blonde wig, as Susan Storm in the Fantastic Four films. At this point, it seems, race is so irrelevant that women of colour receive the same casting opportunities as white women do, but this is only enabled through assimilation. Similarly, Zoë Saldaña’s inclusion as a prominent character, Gamora, in Guardians of the Galaxy is noteworthy; however, Gamora has green skin. Saldaña is visually coded as a woman of a colour, but not as a woman of colour who resonates with real racial identities. Some have argued that a defining feature of the superhero genre is its conflicted presentation of political and racial issues (Singer 2002: 110), with Brown suggesting that ‘it is not a medium or a genre that lends itself well to mature and nuanced storytelling’ (Brown 2015a: 134), a radical, if reductionist, statement in its own right. William Svitavsky similarly argues that ironically . . . the imaginative freedom of the superhero genre has often enabled readers to empathize with the position of ‘the other’ without needing to consider genuine cultural differences or the actual experiences of real social minorities . . . [C]omic book readers can empathize with a feeling of ‘otherness’ wholly abstracted from genuine experience. (Svitavsky 2013: 160)

Blade is one of the few films based on Marvel comics released before the boom of the 2000s. It is also notable for its violent content and its focus on black central characters, the half-­vampire hero Blade and his female companion Karen Jenson (N’Bushe Wright). As part of Marvel adaptations’ experimental pre-­boom output, it is the first Marvel film to

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be led by a black superhero­– B ­ lack Panther would be the second in 2018. The character Blade first appeared in Marvel comics as a product of 1970s Blaxploitation aesthetics and form (Later 2016: 206). Blaxploitation films were exploitation films that gained popularity in the US in the 1970s, catering to urban black audiences, focusing on black action heroes and undeniably linked to the politics of race relations of the time. In the comics, Blade was born in 1929 to a prostitute who was bitten by a vampire while in labour, killing her but bestowing upon Blade semi-­vampiric abilities (Wolfman and Colan 1973). Bringing his character’s origin up to 1967, the era of the Civil Rights Movement, the film trades on the comic’s Blaxploitation atmosphere. According to Nama, the marriage of superheroes and Blaxploitation themes comes naturally, since they share ‘the same signifiers of a superhuman status and often comment on the tensions expressed between black self-­determination, racial authenticity, political fantasy, and economic independence’ (Nama 2011: 6). This was also the era that brought Marvel characters Luke Cage (Power Man) and Iron Fist (Danny Rand) to the fore, both of which drew from racialised exploitation cinema formats­– ­Luke Cage from Blaxploitation cinema and Iron Fist from kung fu films popularised in the 1970s. Black superhero Luke Cage would later be adapted into Netflix’s Marvel’s Luke Cage (2016–18), which transposed the character into a contemporary Harlem using imagery and themes tied to the Black Lives Matter movement. The series received critical acclaim for Mike Colter’s portrayal of the character, its exploration of race in American society and its update of the comics’ Blaxploitation traits. It is noteworthy that this acclaim frequently centred on the character’s relation to racial themes, especially because Netflix’s Iron Fist series was critically shunned due to the perceived appropriation of martial arts and East Asian iconography through the white character of Danny Rand (played by Finn Jones). What these racialised superhero media highlight, though, is the interconnectedness of the various cultural contexts involved (Civil Rights Movements, Blaxploitation cinema; Black Lives Matter; kung fu cinema, Orientalist mysticism; issues of ‘diversity’ and cultural appropriation discussed in popular venues) and the different media in which these characters would appear (comics, film, television series). Blade similarly deals with racial themes, although its inclusion of vampirism is significant. In the film, Blade rescues Dr Karen Jenson, a haematologist, from a vampire who is mistakenly brought to her hospital after being burned in an attack by Blade. Having been bitten, Jenson is determined to find a cure before she turns into a vampire herself, but after her encounter with Blade, she is thrust into the world of vampires and horror and helps Blade defeat the film’s villain Deacon Frost (Stephen Dorff),

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bl a c k s kin, bl ue s ki n 219 who wants to resurrect a vampire god and dominate the world. The relationship between vampire and victim is, ‘irreducibly sexual’, having often formed an analogy for sexuality (and the dangers thereof) (Tudor 1989: 163). Nama likewise argues for the analogous qualities of the film: The linkage in the film between blood, vampires, and world political power suggested that vampirism is a politically destabilizing pandemic and biological affliction more than it is a supernatural curse. In this sense, Blade is easily read as a film that reflects multiple anxieties concerning eugenics, HIV infection, genetics, and racial purity. (Nama 2011: 139, 141)

While there is merit to Nama’s claims, I would suggest that Blade’s conceptualisation of black sexuality is one that hinges almost entirely on the gendered power dynamics of rape. A vampire attack is presented as a physical violation of the (female) body by a (male) aggressor. Blaxploitation has been theorised as actively incorporating sex and violence (Benshoff and Griffin 2009: 204–5) and as such Blade relies on rape discourses for much of its dramatic effect. With this in mind, it should also be noted that Blaxploitation has been considered to have offered black women alternative roles in a time in which black female heroism was virtually non-­ existent in mainstream cinema (Sims 2006). Thus, Blade also attempts to highlight Jenson as a character who transforms a weak, sheltered woman to a heroic, aggressive vampire huntress. These factors carry further cultural implications regarding the portrayal of black femininity in relation to postfeminism. The rape discourses of the film are expressed largely through the character of Jenson, who effectively moves from the safe zone of economically empowered postfeminist security to one in which vampirism, or rape, is a real and current danger. When she meets Blade, she encounters the horrors of the real (vampire-­inhabited) world. Blade lectures Jenson about the harsh reality she now occupies: ‘You better wake up. The world you live in is just a sugar-­coated topping. There is another world beneath it­– ­the real world. And if you want to survive it, you better learn to pull the trigger.’ Through this scene, Blade effectively forces Jenson to toughen up. This is a world where the danger of being bitten by a vampire­– b­ y extension an act of gendered violence­– i­s very real indeed. Before this scene, Jenson occupied a space that was free from (sexual) violence and thus free from gendered oppression. This is largely achieved through her presentation as a ‘success story’ of black femininity, a term utilised by Springer to address how financially independent black women are presented as evidence that women of colour make use of the same professional opportunities as do white women (Springer 2008: 88). ­

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Jenson’s life as a successful scientist is part of a veneer that is stripped away when she discovers that vampires exist. Her life is radically altered­ – ­she is no longer a member of the empowered (black) middle class and her medical education is valueless on the streets when she has to physically combat vampires (which she does partially through carrying a mace-­like garlic spray similar to those marketed towards women to aid self-­defence). One scene in which rape discourses are particularly prevalent is Jenson’s encounter with Frost. Having been taken prisoner, she is seated in a living-­room area in Frost’s lair. Jenson is the focal point of the initial tracking shot, in which she occupies an armchair, to the left of which sits a blonde female vampire, and to the right, Frost, smoking a cigarette. The shot cuts to alternating reverse medium shots between Frost and Jenson. Frost tells her: You seem a bit . . . tense. A bit pent-­up maybe, like you need to release something. You know? Blade not givin’ it to you maybe. I dunno, I just . . . I see such a beautiful woman. Great skin. I’d like to see you happy, that’s all.

This predatory language is framed by Jenson’s reverse shots in which she remains stony-­faced. Still, the power dynamic presented is that of the white predatory male making lecherous comments to a victimised black woman. She asks him whether he will offer to turn her into a vampire, to which he answers in a similarly predatory way, ‘Well it’s either that or a body bag.’ Jenson replies, ‘Go ahead. Bite me. I’ll just cure myself. I did it before and I can do it again.’ This answer is significant, particularly in the ways it queries the rape discourses of the scene. In essence, she permits him to violate her body, questioning the power dynamic. The nature of her consent is ambiguous, though, and this resurfaces in the climactic final scenes of the film. With Frost having drained Blade’s blood as part of his ritual to summon the vampire god, Jenson offers herself to him to relieve his thirst and strengthen him. This is portrayed as an entirely sexual act, featuring a shirtless Blade panting and moaning throughout. Indeed, Jonathan Gayles wholly characterises this scene as a rape scene: Blade uses his physical strength to aggressively hold Jensen in place as he forces himself on her . . . Blade’s growling, snatching treatment of Jensen in combination with her subdued cries of ‘stop, please stop’ make it clear that the exchange that she initiates has culminated in an act over which she has no control. (Gayles 2012: 291)

While there are distinct rape elements in the scene (as there are throughout the film), I would complicate Gayles’s statement and argue that there is far more ambiguity in the scene than he implies. For instance, it is

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bl a c k s kin, bl ue s ki n 221 unclear whether Jenson is moaning ‘stop’ or ‘don’t stop’. However, the result, ultimately, is that Jenson sacrifices herself so that the masculine hero may continue his narrative, which Gayles suggests is emblematic of the oppressive, rather than transformative, gender and racial politics within the film (Gayles 2012: 297). Such ambiguities, though, are significant when considering the film in terms of broader discourses of race and gender, particularly with regards to rape. First, the ways in which Jenson is propelled into the sexually violent world of vampires speak to established discourses in the representation of black femininity. There is consensus that black femininity has been associated with overt sexuality (hooks 1992: 62, 73–4; Springer 2001: 175; Manatu 2003; 10). The association of black femininity with sexuality stems from the white supremacist notion that black people possess an animality that white people do not, also rendering them inherently violent ‘due to their “savage” ancestry’ (Springer 2001: 174). Blade’s reliance on violence and rape discourses therefore reaches back to such phenomena. It is, for instance, interesting that Jenson slips so easily into the role of female aggressor in a way not dissimilar to the black heroines portrayed in Blaxploitation cinema. This is evidenced when she tells Blade ‘I’m damn sure I’ll learn quickly’ when he asks her if she knows how to use a gun. In a scene in which she and Blade interrogate the vampiric record-­keeper Pearl, it is even suggested that Jenson has gone too far in her ruthlessness when she needlessly tortures Pearl with UV light. When Blade gives her a stern look, she answers, ‘He moved.’ As such, Jenson quickly realises her potential for violence to make her way in this violent world. And yet, Jenson’s status as fair game to the vampires also renders her a victim, or even, as Projansky would have it, a ‘hypervictim’ (Projansky 2001: 169). This is especially acute when considered in conjunction with the film’s rape discourses. Projansky (2001) outlines the role of rape narratives in postfeminist media and pays particular attention to the absence of black women from such rape discourses. Projansky theorises the concept of displacement, through which black women’s experiences of rape become erased or otherwise overlooked (Projansky 2001: 154–95). In part, this occurs due to the centring of black men in such discourses (Projansky 2001: 166). In Blade, it is the actual engagement with the rape of black women that becomes displaced due to its reliance on metaphor and the fact that the film speaks around the topic of rape rather than to it. It consistently characterises vampirism as sexual, for instance through referring to vampirism as a sexually transmitted disease or virus, but despite the obvious physical violations that seem to be focused on female victims, it is never explicitly likened to rape. Since black women are in much

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more danger of being raped than are white women, this displacement is discordant, particularly since the film projects these discourses through a black woman. The film’s ambiguity thus contributes to postfeminism’s displacement of black femininity in such rape discourses, providing a convoluted picture of empowered black femininity. These complex images of black femininity are likewise present in the X-­Men films. As mentioned earlier, the franchise’s seeming engagement with minority metaphor is often inconsistent, since the films ultimately focus on heterosexual white masculinity, marginalising ‘Other’ subjectivities. Notably, only a handful of black superheroines have appeared in the X-­Men films. Storm (Halle Berry) has consistently been a popular character of Marvel comics and likewise occupies a fairly prominent role in the first three films of the franchise, in particular X2. In the film, Storm showcases her weather-­controlling powers when she successfully conjures tornadoes to prevent missiles from hitting the X-­Men’s jet, as well as rescuing the imprisoned Xavier. However, Storm is effectively removed from combat in The Last Stand to take on the role of headmistress to Xavier’s school after his death. Notably, throughout the series, Storm is consistently portrayed as being concerned for the mutant students of the school (whom she refers to as ‘the children’) in a way that, according to Zingsheim, harks back to stereotypical ‘mammy’ figures of black femininity, through which black women are portrayed as nannies or housekeepers. He notes that ‘her identity is performed in service to White males and caretaking White children­– ­evoking a history of Black women specifically . . . forced into caring for privileged children of White masters’ (Zingsheim 2011: 235). The mammy, or Aunt Jemima, role presents an idealised black, asexual submissiveness. Indeed, Zingsheim also notes that Storm is portrayed as distinctly asexual, in contrast to the films’ white characters who are frequently shown expressing their romantic desire for one another (Zingsheim 2011: 235). This asexual blackness is also pointed out by Gayles with reference to Blade, in which Jenson and Blade are never portrayed as being romantic or sexual (Gayles 2012: 289) (save the paradoxical ‘rape’ scene). The fact that Storm is presented as asexual indicates the need for popular texts to quell anxieties stemming from empowered black womanhood, according to Tasker. Tasker also notes the tendency to present black action heroines as fundamentally aggressive and sexually assertive (Tasker 1993: 21). However, this too is accompanied by a paradox, in that the ‘macho’ aspects of the black action heroine­– ­her ability to fight, her self-­ confidence, even arrogance­– ­are bound up in an aggressive assertion of her sexual-

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bl a c k s kin, bl ue s ki n 223 ity. Simultaneously it is the same stereotypical attribution of sexuality to the black woman which generates anxiety around her representation. (Tasker 1993: 21–2)

The anxieties stemming from these portrayals are alleviated either by fetishising (sexualising) the black female body and, through this, exerting control over it, or through making it harmless and asexual (Tasker 1993: 33). In the 1980s comics, Storm underwent a dramatic makeover which incorporated a punk aesthetic with leather clothing and a partially shaved head. The so-­called ‘Mohawk Storm’ was not included in the films until the prequel X-­Men: Apocalypse, in which the character appears as a teenager (Alexandra Shipp) who is recruited by the film’s villain to carry out acts of evil, suggesting the emphasis placed on the character with regards to her outward appearance as oppositional in relation to her moral positioning in the films. Equally noteworthy is the character of Angel Salvadore (Zoë Kravitz), who features as a secondary character in X-­Men: First Class. Salvadore is introduced as a mutant who works as an exotic dancer and is tracked down by Xavier and Magneto assembling their team of mutant superheroes. Salvadore is young, slim and of indiscernible racial heritage. The strip club setting, and her position as a dancer reach to fetishising Orientalist discourses that present her as exotic and mysterious. In her introductory scene at the club, she is positioned at the front of the shot alongside other young women dancing, wearing black fringed underwear and knee-­high boots marking her out visually as sexualised. Xavier and Magneto purchase a private room with Salvadore in order to speak to her and she reveals that the dragonfly wing tattoos on her shoulders are real wings, allowing her to fly. She demonstrates her powers for the (white) men, as shot from behind, but to do so she removes her bra (which implausibly reappears in the subsequent shot). Here, Salvadore is narratively and visually positioned in a way that marks her as an exoticised, fetishised object who is racially Other to the central white male characters involved in the sequence. Being an exotic dancer, Salvadore occupies a space of postfeminist professional empowerment. Displaying her body allows her to earn money through commodified sexuality. Thus, following postfeminism’s logic of empowered sexuality, Salvadore has grasped the same commercial and sexual opportunities as white women. Bearing in mind that the film is set in the 1960s, amid the Civil Rights Movement, this is significant. In this way, the film’s postfeminism functions retrospectively. This is especially expressed in a subsequent scene in which Salvadore and the other mutants are harassed at the X-­Men’s training facility. Here, CIA agents make

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leering taunts at the young mutants through a window. These taunts are meant to analogise sexual harassment, meanwhile the film’s postfeminism suggests that this kind of harassment can be simply shrugged off. One agent shouts at Salvadore, ‘Hey, come on honey! Give us a little –’ and gestures flapping wings. Mystique tells Salvadore not to allow the agents to bother her because ‘They’re just guys being stupid.’ This disregard of men’s harassment of women is another factor that plays into the postfeminist goal of maintaining gender difference. Salvadore’s reply solidifies this goal when she says ‘Guys being stupid, I can handle, okay? I’ve handled that my whole life. But I’d rather a bunch of guys stare at me with my clothes off than the way these guys stare at me.’ Once again the mutant struggle takes precedence. The film thus evokes feminist issues by presenting men harassing women through mutantphobic acts coded as harassment, and yet engagement with these issues is written off since men are expected to behave in such ways. Crucially, though, Salvadore’s status as a woman of colour makes these discourses more complex due to the complicated relationship of black female sexuality with postfeminist notions of empowerment. As mentioned, the portrayal of the black woman as ‘oversexed Jezebel’ (Manatu 2003: 10) is well established within Western cultural discourses. However, since the idealised (white) postfeminist subject plays an active role in self-­monitoring and self-­objectification (Gill 2007: 151), Salvadore’s retort marks her seizing of postfeminist empowerment. The nuances of this occurrence, however, are lost. The (self-­)sexualised black feminine body in postfeminist culture occupies a distinctly different space than that of the idealised white feminine body, as has been noted by Aisha Durham (2012), Dayna Chatman (2015) and Jess Butler (2013). The celebration of sexualised black femininity is thus not as straightforward as the film suggests. Postfeminist texts seek to present racial ambiguity to appeal to broad audiences. It should therefore be noted that both Storm and Salvadore are portrayed by distinctly light-­skinned black actresses, appearing racially ambiguous, while still retaining ‘exotic’ traits. Both Storm and Salvadore thus fulfil the postfeminist task of occupying an ambiguous racial identity, which can be successfully commercialised as part of postfeminist/­ postracial culture. Norma Manatu also notes the significance of skin colour in portrayals of black women. She argues that colourism has had the effect of higher cultural value being placed on light-­skinned black women in Hollywood films (Manatu 2003: 89–94). This is a practice which dates back as far as The Birth of a Nation (D. W. Griffith, 1915), which featured ‘ “cinnamon-­colored gals” with Caucasian features’ as preferable

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bl a c k s kin, bl ue s ki n 225 to dark-­skinned black women (Bogle 2010: 15). Mia Mask similarly taps into the commercial implications of these casting decisions, discussing Halle Berry’s success as symptomatic of multiculturalism (Mask 2009: 185–232). Actors with mixed racial heritage are thus seen as more desirable in Hollywood films which ‘utilize bifurcated subjectivities to reach growing multiethnic populations’ (Mask 2009: 185). Regarding contemporary action cinema and using actresses Halle Berry, Zoë Saldaña and Jessica Alba (who have all appeared in Marvel adaptations) as case studies, Brown similarly argues that action cinema both challenges and reinforces genre conventions about ethnicity and sexuality, ultimately using racial indeterminacy as a means to capitalize on the shifting racial identities of viewers and to literally spice up the heroine’s image without sacrificing white womanhood as a cultural ideal. (Brown 2015a: 81)

Ultimately, these subjectivities feed into a US-­melting pot myth. However, there is still the issue that African American women represent the most marginalised group in mainstream Hollywood action cinema (Purse 2011: 116). Portrayals of East Asian, specifically Japanese, women in Marvel films have been similarly shaped by the discourses outlined above, though these manifest in slightly different ways. The Punisher (1989) exists on the cusp of the postfeminist era and is thus more prone to portraying East Asian women in more traditional ways. These portrayals do not necessarily seek to capitalise on the commercial potential of racialised feminine identities in the same way as do later postfeminist films. Rather, The Punisher vilifies the Asian woman through the twin strands of gendered and racial oppression, reaching back to the discourses of feminine evil outlined in previous chapters, but adding to it the additional dimension of Othered race. The central villains of The Punisher are the Yakuza, the Japanese mob. Importantly, they are positioned as villains to the Italian Mafia. With Frank Castle having weakened the Mafia due to his activities as the Punisher, the Yakuza seek to take the Mafia’s place as the prime crime syndicate. To do this, the Yakuza kidnap the children of the Italian Mafia bosses and hold them for ransom. Castle therefore begrudgingly saves the Mafia children. In the film, the Japanese are positioned as yet more villainous than the Italians. This is interesting and illustrates how Italians, despite having been marginalised as immigrants in the United States previously, were portrayed in increasingly sympathetic ways (despite still relying on mobster stereotypes) (Benshoff and Griffin 2009: 145–54). Most significantly, the leader of the Yakuza is a woman named Lady Tanaka (Kim Miyori) and introduced as the ‘first female ever to head the

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Yakuza’. Immediately, then, Tanaka’s gender is foregrounded, alongside her race. Tanaka is portrayed as overtly feminine with a slight build. She is considered powerful due to the resources being the leader of the Yakuza grants her. As such, Tanaka’s portrayal draws on the existing figure of the Dragon Lady, which characterises the Asian woman as ‘belligerent, cunning, and untrustworthy’ (Kim and Chung 2005: 79) and ‘a diabolical wielder of power’ (Hyde and Else-­Quest 2013: 100). Importantly, such women are also portrayed as ‘dangerously and exotically sexual’ (Holtzman and Sharpe 2014: 321), illustrating again how Orientalist discourses penetrate such portrayals, but also how discourses of evil feminine sexuality adapt when considered in conjunction with non-­white subjectivities. Indeed, Tanaka’s Asianness and her femininity act as a counterpoint to Frank’s European-­American white masculinity. Another noteworthy figure in the film is a character credited as ‘Tanaka’s daughter’ (Zoshka Mizak) though she is never referred by name on-­screen. Indeed, the character never even speaks, she merely accompanies Tanaka in several scenes, also drawing from the Dragon Lady image due to her impressive fighting skills. Though she is dressed in a traditional Japanese sailor fuku schoolgirl uniform, Tanaka’s daughter does not appear to be Japanese at all. Despite this, she is presented as the silent, subservient Asian assistant, in a role similar to that of Lady Deathstrike (Kelly Hu) in X2. Deathstrike is an Asian mutant who is being mind-­controlled by Stryker to do his bidding. Such a portrayal, Zingsheim argues, ‘retains the silence and dutiful obedience required to performatively (re)construct the model minority myth’ (Zingsheim 2011: 232). And yet, Tanaka’s daughter appears to be a continuation of the classical Hollywood tradition of yellowface, in which white actors portrayed Asian characters. The Wolverine offered a counterpoint as a film set almost entirely in Japan and featuring an Asian supporting cast, though villainous figures still appeared as members of the Yakuza. Key figures in the film are the Japanese women, Logan’s plucky sidekick Yukio (Rila Fukushima), and his love-­interest Mariko (Tao Okamoto). While Mariko follows in the vein of the submissive, delicate Asian woman, Yukio’s portrayal draws from complex multicultural and postfeminist discourses, particularly since the film offers a Western interpretation of empowered Asian femininity. The Wolverine’s uniqueness thus stems from the fact that it does not offer a representation of women of colour in the US; rather, the white male protagonist is inserted into the foreign environment of Japan, which is nonetheless informed by Western imaginary notions of Asia. In the film, Logan is called by Yukio on behalf of Ichirō Yashida, whose life Logan saved during the US bombing of Nagasaki. Yashida is dying of cancer and

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seeks to repay the debt he owes Logan for his life. Along the way, Yashida appears to die, making his granddaughter Mariko head of his successful business conglomerate. This, in turn, leaves Mariko vulnerable and she is attacked by the Yakuza at Yashida’s funeral. Logan must therefore protect Mariko, the film’s resident woman in the refrigerator, with the aid of Yukio. The Wolverine functions as a white saviour film, a narrative format discussed by Matthew W. Hughey in which people of colour are rescued by a ‘white messianic character’ (Hughey 2014: 1). Such films have gained success in a postracial era, in which blatant white supremacist discourses are avoided, but in which texts still ‘rely on an implicit message of white paternalism’ (Hughey 2014: 8). Such sentiments are evidenced in The Wolverine, in which Logan effectively learns the art of being a Japanese warrior, and through this can save Mariko from her grandfather (who, it turns out, planned to exploit Logan’s healing factor and build his Silver Samurai robot out of adamantium). The film’s portrayal of Japan uses distancing techniques to highlight the setting’s exotic qualities, for instance through the showcasing of Yashida’s traditional funeral or the inclusion of wacky themed hotel suites that Logan and Mariko flee to. And yet, it is imperative for Logan to learn the secrets of the Japanese warrior way of life to become a better fighter and realise his potential for heroism. At first, he fails miserably, for instance when Mariko teaches him Japanese table manners. When she reveals to Logan that her father has arranged a marriage for her, she refers to notions of ‘honour’. In this way, Mariko is positioned within the ‘backwards’ Eastern discourses that McRobbie argues function to disarticulate feminist solidarity between women across cultures (McRobbie 2009: 41–3). Mariko is juxtaposed against the role of Yukio in the film. Where Mariko is soft and delicate, Yukio is tough and fierce. In the scene introducing Yukio, she is shown to partake of heroic fighting practices in a seedy bar. There are other scenes in which Yukio is demonstrated to possess ample fighting skills, being capable of fending off villains and ultimately killing the evil Viper. Notably, there has been an increased interest in Asian fighting styles within Hollywood cinema in recent decades, a further symptom of globalisation (Funnell 2010). The Wolverine continues the tradition of Hollywood’s ‘Asian invasion’, a phenomenon noted by Minh-­Ha T. Pham. Situating the increasing visibility of Asian actors in Hollywood film within a postracial moment, Pham argues that these instances ‘re-­present and reactivate a particularly American drama of assimilation and socialisation at both the national and international levels’ (Pham 2004: 122). The film is also an example of the contemporary Orientalist buddy

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film, a trend identified by Brian Locke (2009). These films rework familiar pairings in which the white protagonist teams up with non-­white buddies. Locke traces the inclusion of the Japanese buddy to the shifting relationship of the US to the world in a post-­9/­11 global culture. Unlike in previous decades in which the Japanese were vilified in Hollywood films, due largely to the role the country played in World War II and Pearl Harbour, Japan became an ally of the US in the War on Terror (Locke 2009: 155). Locke remarks that the 9/­11 attacks ‘rendered it politically unfeasible for popular films to vilify Japan’ (Locke 2009: 157). Hence, though Yashida is a villain of the film, it is established at the beginning that their relationship began with a mutual trust when Logan saved his life in Nagasaki. The unity between the cultures is further enhanced by Logan’s teaming up with Yukio. However, David Oh characterises the film’s central villain as ‘techno-­Orientalist’, elaborating Western fears of Asian practices and technologies, which are similarly shown through a mystified lens (Oh 2016: 153). He notes that the film is ambivalent in its portrayal of Japan and ultimately normalises white male heroism while disguising this behind postracial discourses (Oh 2016: 152). As has been described by Hua, postfeminism is a distinctly Western phenomenon (Hua 2009: 69), but the multicultural notion of ‘universal womanhood’ has the effect that postfeminism is frequently inserted into non-­Western contexts, thereby universalising the postfeminist ideal (Hua 2009: 68). Hua focuses on the figure of the geisha in Western popular culture as a Japanese cultural phenomenon which has frequently been framed by postfeminist discourses of women’s empowerment. In a similar way, Yukio’s empowerment is universal; she is seen to partake of the same discourses of empowerment as the white postfeminist superheroine. She is tough, sassy and physically attractive. Thus, Western postfeminism is injected into this Japanese setting, becoming universal, while Yukio is presented as familiarised through postfeminist notions of empowerment. However, these representations are still complicit in upholding structural inequalities of race and gender, since the white male hero ultimately succeeds. Another mechanism through which Yukio’s portrayal is familiarised but exoticised is through her appearance. In the comics, Yukio appears as a stern, highly skilled martial artist, with cropped hair and practical (usually black) attire (Claremont and Miller 1982). In The Wolverine, Yukio has been revamped to incorporate an air of feisty youthfulness that resonates with existing Japanese texts that have gained global popularity (Figure 9.1). Yukio’s representation clearly draws on established tropes of Japanese manga and anime, such as those of shōjo. Shōjo is manga

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Figure 9.1  Rila Fukushima as Yukio in The Wolverine.

aimed at a young female audience and offers portrayals of heroic girlhood (Gwynne 2013: 331). Oh likewise suggests that Yukio’s style draws from Harajuku, a rebellious teen fashion (Oh 2016: 160). Anne Allison notes that the popularity of shōjo texts stems from their negotiation of gender roles. She claims that the character Sailor Moon, a magical girl who fights evil by transforming into fighting warrior princesses, ‘is something of a hybrid, embodying conventions both of boys’ culture­– ­fighting, warriorship, superheroes­– ­and shōjo (girls’) culture­– ­romance, friendship, and appearance’ (Allison 2000: 260). Yukio follows such trends that have been established as popular: she has a punk-­rock look, for instance wearing short culottes and striped socks, and having flaming red dyed hair. Her appearance is simultaneously cute and ferocious, much like that of Sailor Moon. As noted by Susan Napier, ‘shōjo seems to signify the girl who never grows up’ (Napier 2005: 94), it therefore follows that Yukio is ambiguously aged (her appearance seems to suggest she could be anywhere between sixteen and thirty-­five years old). She is also notably referred to in the film by Shingen as a ‘toy doll’, further infantilising her. Thus, since Yukio’s portrayal draws from already familiar generic conventions of Japanese popular culture, the exoticism of the narrative is contained within Japan while cultural signifiers that resonate with ‘universal’ notions of feminine empowerment are effectively commodified. Both Gwynne (2013: 331) and Allison (2000: 260), for instance, note the global appeal of characters such as Sailor Moon, who has received much popularity around the world. The potentially sexual appeal of the girls of shōjo is also worth noting. Napier argues that, as girls constitute the ‘liminal identity between child and adult’, there is an ‘innocent eroticism’ that accompanies such representations (Napier 2005: 148).

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In these ways, The Wolverine offers an image of exoticised, yet familiar, empowered Asian femininity that is commodified as part of the ‘Japanese experience’ sold within the film. As part of a global, multicultural media landscape, Japanese culture is, as Antonia Levi describes, ‘deodorized’ (Levi 2013: 9). Through this, distinctly Japanese characteristics are integrated into North American cultural products, such as Hollywood films, becoming naturalised, although the intrigue of consuming the Other remains. Regarding gender and race, this becomes increasingly problematic as the ‘universal’ womanhood promoted by globalised postfeminist discourses ultimately erases experiences of racial difference. Marvel adaptations rely on marginalising discourses with regards to race even though the majority of these films exist within an era which has been declared beyond racial difference. The lack of visibility for women of colour in these films supports the notion that Hollywood films are still dominated by white men. Indeed, X-­Men: Days of Future Past, presents a problematic image of race, continuing the tradition of the previous X-­Men films. As mentioned, the film focuses on a team of future X-­Men in their attempt to prevent a dystopian future where mutants are systematically exterminated by invincible killer robots known as Sentinels. Logan is sent to the 1970s to stop Mystique from assassinating Bolivar Trask, the action which sets in motion the series of events leading to the Sentinels’ creation. The opening scenes of the film showcase a cast that is more racially diverse than that of the average Marvel film, featuring Storm alongside black energy-­absorbing mutant Bishop (Omar Sy), Asian teleporter Blink (Fan Bingbing), solar-­powered Latino Sunspot (Adan Canto) and Native American superhuman Warpath (Booboo Stewart), as well as the central (largely white) cast of familiar X-­Men. However, throughout the film, it becomes clear that the future the X-­Men are fighting for is one which is distinctly white, as is evident through the climactic final moment in which scenes with the 1970s X-­Men are intercut with scenes with the future X-­Men in their respective battles. One after another, the future X-­Men are killed. Blink, in particular, is shown to undergo an especially gruesome death, being impaled by two Sentinels, as shown in an aerial shot, falling to her knees and crying towards the camera in following shots. However, at the end of the film, the X-­Men have successfully fixed the future, with Logan waking up safely at the Xavier school surrounded by his friends. Conspicuously absent from these new future scenes are any people of colour whatsoever, implicating that the dystopian future that needed to be eradicated was a markedly racialised one. The result is a similar vilification of racial subjectivities that has been present throughout the X-­Men series. Equally noteworthy

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bl a c k s kin, bl ue s ki n 231 is director Bryan Singer’s descriptions of the future mutants as ‘refugees that are living day to day in this hideously ruined world’ (Singer in Hewitt 2013), implicitly touching on contemporary issues of immigration and multiculturalism. According to Days of Future Past, such ‘refugees’ have no place in a utopian future. Women of colour represented in Marvel film adaptations must negotiate very particular discourses, adhering to the demands of both postfeminism and postracialism. Women of colour appear rarely in Marvel films, and their inclusion within these discourses renders them, in hooks’s terms, spice. Their racial identity is commodified in order to capitalise on culturally mandated notions of ‘diversity’. In this sense, the explicit racial identities of characters such as Storm and Angel Salvadore are eclipsed in favour of a more ambiguous ‘ethnic’ presence. On the other hand, The Wolverine presents a contemporary, globalised portrayal of the empowered Japanese woman, who simultaneously resonates with modern postfeminist culture. In these portrayals, all women are equally capable of being empowered, while multiculturalist sensibilities eliminate the need for explicitly feminist and anti-­racist discourses. These films thus inject a version of postfeminist femininity into cultures that may have had very different historical trajectories regarding women’s rights, offering an illusion of universal female empowerment that nonetheless remains Othered and exotic, a spice or flavouring of the Orient. As Braidotti argues, ‘post-­ feminist liberal individualism is simultaneously multicultural and profoundly ethnocentric. It celebrates differences, even in the racialized sense of the term, so long as they conform to and uphold the logic of Sameness’ (Braidotti 2006: 46). Through a consideration of postfeminist discourses, one can thus make sense of the limited inclusion of women of colour in Marvel films, which tend to support the notion of ‘diversity’, for instance through the use of the mutant metaphor, but remain noticeably homogenous when examined closely. It is also clear that there has been a push for racial ‘diversity’ in Marvel comics in recent years. In 2015 it was announced that Miles Morales, the black-­Latino Spider-­Man of Marvel’s Ultimate universe, would enter the mainstream Marvel universe (Hickman and Ribic 2016). Writer Brian Bendis expressed that the decision was made for the comics to better reflect their varied audiences, stating, ‘our message has to be it’s not Spider-­Man with an asterisk, it’s the real-­Spider-­Man for kids of color, for adults of color and everybody else’ (Bendis in Wyatt 2015). This resonates with the discursive framework of Kamala Khan around the apex of ‘relatability’, which, while accounting for the need for mainstream media to include more characters of colour, nonetheless dislocates the specificities of the

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lived experiences of marginalised peoples, creating a ­homogenous ‘difference’ that can be consumed by any (see Kent 2015). The recent success of animated Marvel feature Spider-­ Man: Into the Spider-­ Verse (Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey and Rodney Rothman, 2018) also attested to the widespread appeal of Miles Morales, albeit within the parameters of an animation, a form that culturally has less prestige than live-­action cinema due to its associations with children. Such sentiments (and the use of ‘diversity’ discourses in popular media more generally) similarly resonate with the commodification of difference, a dominant trait of the globalised, postfeminist, postracial context in which these texts exist. However, their presence is still noteworthy in a time in which the cinematic Spider-­ Man at one point was established specifically not to be permitted to be a person of colour (or gay) as a contractual obligation (Biddle 2015). Indeed, the success of books such as Ms. Marvel and Silk (Thompson and Lee 2015), which focuses on an Asian-­American Spider-­Woman, suggests that Marvel films have more than enough potential to broaden their racial representations. Indeed, these discussions finally culminated in the release of Black Panther, which I discuss in the following chapter.

Note 1. Notably, Psylocke has since been restored to her white body (Zub et al. 2018), posing a further problematic of representation in which whiteness is privileged in this character’s highly convoluted ongoing narrative.

C HA PT E R 10

The (Afro)Future of a Diverse Marvel: Gender, Race and Empire in Thor: Ragnarok and Black Panther

The post-­Trump, post-­Brexit cultural climate has resulted in political shifts that took form in Marvel film adaptations and wider media. It is useful to think of texts such as Luke Cage and Black Panther within a framework of Trump-­era politics, which have been characterised as reigniting and normalising a politic of white supremacy alongside an overblown neoliberal, capitalist conservatism. Arguably these developments put the lie to any modicum of the idea of a postracial goal having been achieved. Indeed, Alison Landsberg argues that the mystique of postrace ‘was firmly and finally extinguished’ with the election of Trump as the rhetoric of racial prejudice was alarmingly brazen throughout his campaign (Landsberg 2018: 199). Landsberg nonetheless maintains that ‘the racially depoliticized myth of the “postracial” ’ present in media texts should still be considered when evaluating such texts, as well as those that explicitly point to issues of race relations (Landsberg 2018: 198). This final chapter culminates in a meditation on the significance of Marvel’s Black Panther adaptation, alongside Thor: Ragnarok regarding wider social and political issues. Both films are concerned with similar themes of ethnic bloodlines, royalty and marginalisation. Jessica Gantt Schafer suggests that the normalisation of Trump’s rallies against ‘political incorrectness’ is ‘situated in a neoliberal belief that racial (and other) equality has been achieved in the United States’ (Shafer 2017: 3), signalling a continuation of the postracial discourses discussed in the previous chapter. The idea of political correctness in these discourses is an incorrect assumption that acknowledging systemic oppression marginalises white people and panders to people of colour (Shafer 2017: 8). The rhetoric of racial prejudice has become discursively refocused as ‘telling it like it is’, resting on language that previously carried connotations of racism (through being ‘politically correct’ within a postracial cultural landscape). Trump’s political incorrectness, and that of his voters as represented in the media, is thus ‘motivated by neoliberal arguments of

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achieved racial equality and finally speaking the “truth” about groups who do not make the cut. . . . In this neoliberal version of truth, individual and systemic racism are not included’ (Shafer 2017: 8). Thus, postracial discourses have adapted alongside the emboldening and reframing of racial prejudice in the Trump era, which should be considered when considering racial issues in recent Marvel films. Both Thor: Ragnarok and Black Panther attempt to delegitimise racism, but also reinstate particular forms of institutional oppression in their centring of monarchy. These representations have racial and gendered dimensions within a cultural context that mainstreamed white rage and misogyny, alongside which there has, paradoxically, been increased visibility of people of colour through media platforms and texts. Ragnarok and Black Panther represent case studies here as both rely on discourses of ‘diversity’ similar to those discussed in the previous chapter. Likewise, as we approach the end of this book, I want to draw attention to an intriguing, if problematic, theme that is present in both of these films and that bears racial, as well as gendered, implications: that of empire. Within the Marvel Universe spanning back to comics, the concept of empire is central to several major storylines and it is not unusual to encounter characters of varying alien origins who are part of a specific civilisation often characterised within imperial or militaristic frameworks. Neil Curtis has argued that the related theme of sovereignty is key to his understanding of superheroes as it illustrates ‘how these characters represent very complex and nuanced considerations of a range of other issues, such as legitimacy, authority, kinship and community, the enemy and emergency powers’ (Curtis 2015: 1). Discourses of sovereignty have also been central to political shifts in recent years, not only within Trump’s determination to put ‘America first’, but also in the rhetoric of Brexit that encouraged British voters to ‘take back control’, in what Paul Richardson has defined as the ‘sovereignty delusion’ characteristic of both contexts (Richardson 2019: 2006). On the subject of sovereignty, Curtis further elaborates that while superhero comics are imbued with the legitimacy assumed by democracy, there are numerous characters that are sovereign in a manner much more in keeping with monarchy. From the rulers of Atlantis, Marvel’s Prince Namor or DC’s Aquaman, to the king of Wakanda, T’Challa, these stories are packed full of sovereigns: Black Bolt is king of the Inhumans; Doctor Doom is the dictator who rules Latveria; Odin, the All-­Father, rules Asgard; the X-­Men’s one-­time leader, Storm, is an African goddess, who has been queen of Wakanda, Mole Man is the ruler of Subterranea; Wonder Woman is an Amazonian princess. (Curtis 2015: 4–5)

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th e (a f r o )f uture o f a div e r s e m a r v e l 235 Marvel’s back catalogue includes alien civilisations such as the Shi’ar Empire, the Kree Empire (policed by the militaristic Accuser Corp), the Nova Empire, the Inhumans (a group of superpowered beings who have their own Royal Family), the Rigellians and, more recently, the Intergalactic Empire of Wakanda. Some of these have appeared in Marvel films; these representations are both gendered and raced. The Guardians of the Galaxy films, providing intergalactic settings inhabited by myriad alien species, still rely on raced depictions of exotic female aliens that have fantastically coloured skin, much in the mode of what Elana Gomel terms ‘corporeal otherness’ (Gomel 2014: 118) and ‘interstellar Orientalism’ (Gomel 2014: 127). Likewise, Gomel argues against the postracial allegory I outlined in the previous chapter, for instance the use of fantastical skin colour to allegorise racial (in)tolerance (Gomel 2014: 119–20). Characters such as the green Gamora are clearly marked as racialised (i.e. they are non-white) but not within terms that exist extradiegetically. But being green still somehow has racial connotations, especially if audiences are aware of the actors playing them. Gamora’s green skin reads similarly to Mystique and Nebula’s blue skin, yet there are qualities of the latter characters that mark them as ethnically white beneath the blue. This is especially noticeable with the knowledge of Romijn and Lawrence’s whiteness when portraying Mystique, signalled when they shift into human form. Guardians of the Galaxy also features a pink-­skinned species of female-­ coded aliens who are slaves (evoking the green-­skinned Orions of the Star Trek franchise), while Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 features the bug-­like pink Mantis (played by French actress of Korean descent Pom Klementieff). That half the population of Gamora’s home planet was obliterated by Thanos via genocide is also striking, since it reaches to ongoing cultural memories of the Holocaust and recent occurrences of ethnic cleansing, such as the Armenian Genocide or the forced migration of the Rohingya from Myanmar. Meanwhile, Saldaña’s ethnicity, which, ordinarily would fall well within the conventions of postracial ambiguity, is further eclipsed by the rendering of her green skin. It is noteworthy that, while Thanos is one of the MCU’s most domineering villains, seeking to rule the universe literally with an iron fist (the Infinity Gauntlet), his form of patriarchal authority is not necessarily distinct. Recent Marvel films bear an ambivalence towards ideas of patriarchy and royalty, with cultural definitions of family and bloodline intersecting with the problematics of patriarchal rule. Contextualising these films, then, is beneficial in discerning how gender (specifically femininity) factors into these representations of otherworlds and empires but also points towards what may lie ahead for

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Marvel adaptations to come. In this final chapter, I take two recent Marvel films to examine the relevance of enduring imperial themes and their relation to gender, particularly within a complex era that is in many ways still postrace, but is also polarised.

Asgard as a People­– ­Racial Ambiguity in Thor: Ragnarok’s Heroines Thor: Ragnarok was the first MCU film to be directed by a non-­white person1 Taika Waititi. A New Zealander of Māori and Russian-Jewish descent, Waititi also voiced comedic alien character Korg. Waititi’s authorial presence was highlighted within media discourses, both pre-­ and post-­release, with emphasis on his indigenous heritage, the film’s use of indigenous actors and small references to indigenous Australian and New Zealand culture throughout (see Yamato 2016; Adlakha 2017; Brayson 2017; Connellan 2017; Jasper 2017; Klein-­Nixon and Kilgallon 2017; Robinson 2017; Sargeant 2017; Tracy 2017). Without lending too much significance to Waititi as Ragnarok’s auteur, it is still useful to think of Ragnarok within the scope of Marvel’s insistence on diversity and the racial discourses in the film­– ­both literal and analogous. As discussed in Chapter 6, Ragnarok articulates matters around Asgardian identity in the light of the white supremacist connotations potentially present in its focus on characters based on Norse mythology. Ragnarok offsets these anxieties and recuperates Asgardian identity through positioning its hero Thor against the villainess Hela, whose politics evoke white supremacy in her insistence on restoring Asgard’s empire. Before defeating Hela, though, Thor finds himself stranded on the garbage planet Sakaar, ruled by the authoritarian Grandmaster (Jeff Goldblum), who holds gladiatorial battles for entertainment. His champion gladiator happens to be the Hulk, who himself crash-­landed on Sakaar after escaping the events of Age of Ultron. Importantly, the Grandmaster enslaves his gladiators, who are captured by slave traders. It is through these events that Thor meets Scrapper 142 (later known as Valkyrie and played by mixed-­race actress Tessa Thompson), a slave trader who captures Thor for the Grandmaster, after which he must face the Hulk in a duel. Ragnarok is noteworthy for its postcolonial critiques of totalitarian dictatorship in both Hela and the Grandmaster. The planet Sakaar accommodates discourses that account for the construction of identities such as those of Valkyrie, who is revealed to have been an Asgardian warrior who previously faced Hela. Sakaar is presented as a patchwork dystopia exploiting the film’s exaggerated use of science fiction conventions

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th e (a f r o )f uture o f a div e r s e m a r v e l 237 and space-­age neon aesthetics also utilised in Thor’s iterations in comics. Sakaar is both futuristic and obsolete­– ­the Grandmaster’s announcements are projected holograms on the sides of buildings made of discarded rubbish and crammed together in shantytown-­like arrangements. Ironic and self-­aware humour is prevalent in Ragnarok, marking a departure from previous MCU fare that is perhaps the result of the critical acclaim of Deadpool. The tonal shift of the film to postmodern, dystopian futureworld is marked by its distinct electronic musical score that occurs in scenes that take place on Sakaar and deviates from the traditional classical orchestral sounds that feature in scenes on Asgard, a transition that presents the camera’s point of view drifting through space from Asgard towards Sakaar. Here, Thor is projected in a wide shot onto a far-­reaching landfill, where he is surrounded by Sakaaran scavengers, marked as native through their robe-­like dress, face paint and masks. Thor is subsequently captured by Valkyrie, who is introduced swaggering out of her ship and swigging a bottle of wine, which she listlessly tosses off-­screen before telling the Sakaarans ‘he’s mine’ and claiming Thor as her slave. It noteworthy that Valkyrie is a woman of colour who is represented as a slave trader. As such, Ragnarok is postracial in its proposal that, on Sakaar, anyone can be enslaved (and anyone can be the slavemaster). Slavery on Sakaar therefore exists outside the perimeters of the institutionalised racism associated with US history. The film is, in a sense, postracial in its egalitarian representations of enslaved peoples. Like Thor’s royalty, race is devoid of meaning in this setting. While strapped to a chair and forcibly transported to the Grandmaster’s headquarters, Thor is told by a paradoxically calming, robotic female voice ‘Sakaar lives on the edge of the known and unknown. It is the collection point for all lost and unloved things. Like you. But here on Sakaar, you are significant.’ He is carted into a holographic corridor showcasing Sakaar’s location in space, intercut with medium shots of Thor’s horrified, confused reactions. In a long profile shot, the Grandmaster appears in electric blue pixellated animations reminiscent of the 1982 science fiction film Tron and 8-­bit video games. The iconography here, alongside the disembodied female computer voice, situate the Sakaar portions of Ragnarok within the generic parameters of science fiction, providing a venue to explore postcolonial themes in advance of Black Panther while also disavowing racial specificity in relation to the film’s cultural context. The voice subsequently tells Thor: ‘You are the property of the Grandmaster’, cementing his slave status, no longer an autonomous, or sovereign, subject. A humorous figure in Ragnarok, often speaking in comic book hyperbole, the Grandmaster represents an outmoded residue of colonial rule

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and appeals to a critique of the prison-­industrial complex. His gladiatorial contests, suggestive of Roman games, are portrayed as brutal, senseless violence serving no purpose other than to pacify Sakaaran citizens and entertain himself. This is often represented through ironic humour: he at one point argues with his second in command that he dislikes the term ‘slave’ and prefers to refer to his gladiators as ‘prisoners with jobs’. In this, the film makes efforts towards a productive commentary on race relations and the oppressive nature of colonialism, which, alongside Waititi’s involvement, was seen as signifying progressivism on the part of Marvel and the Hollywood industry. However, these feats remain jarring in Ragnarok, which presents these phenomena in a seeming cultural vacuum, on a planet where racial oppression is not a component of slavery. Meanwhile, the film presents Hela’s attempts to rekindle Asgard’s empire, based on the racial distinction of Asgardian identity as a stand-­in for white supremacy, in a parallel narrative. The co-­existence of the two marks Ragnarok’s tonal dissonances, its postmodern, postracial melding of two seemingly opposing discourses, both based on race. Ragnarok essentially redefines Asgardian identity as diverse and inclusive­– ­or, indeed, postracial­– ­and rejects Hela’s white supremacist ideology, which is at risk of being associated with the franchise in a Trump-­era context. A key figure in this is Valkyrie, who, as a woman of colour implied to be queer,2 is extradiegetically marked as marginalised. Diegetically, Valkyrie’s race has few, if any, implications. Her race is ambiguous enough to be considered inclusive as part of a postracial media culture that trades on racial difference. However, a pivotal moment for the character is her reclaiming of Asgardian identity. When Thor ­discovers she was formerly part of the Asgardian warrior women known as the Valkyrior, he is portrayed as being in awe of her, stating ‘I used to want to be a Valkyrie when I was younger’, a statement framed humorously by the fact that the Valkyries were women. In this scene, Thor is imprisoned behind a laser-­beam fence with other slaves, awaiting his summoning to the Contest of Champions. Valkyrie is on the other side of the fence, drinking at a bar. Thor’s comments about women warriors are represented as patronising to Valkyrie and she turns from him; both characters are visible in the shot, with Valkyrie in focus in the foreground. Thor calls to her ‘You must be a traitor or a coward because the Valkyrie are sworn to protect the throne.’ It cuts to a split-­screen profile view of both characters on either side of the fence, in opposition, with Valkyrie telling Thor ‘This is Sakaar, not Asgard. And I’m a scrapper, not a Valkyrie.’ A medium close-­up of Valkyrie from behind Thor emphasises his presence in relation to hers but in a reverse shot, Thor falls to the ground, given

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th e (a f r o )f uture o f a div e r s e m a r v e l 239 an electric shock by guards, and is dragged away. The reverse shot shows Valkyrie now looking down at him as she says ‘No one escapes this place. So you’re gonna die anyway’, indicating her superior position to Thor here, and again highlighting the irrelevance of race on Sakaar. Indeed, racial identity is so elusive that Valkyrie has simply rejected her Asgardian roots, now considering herself a scrapper. Later, the extent of Valkyrie’s involvement with Hela’s conquests is revealed, as Odin sent the Valkyrior to battle Hela when she tried to seize the Asgardian throne. The medium close-­ups focusing on Valkyrie highlight her vulnerability in these moments and she is suggested to have taken up drinking as a result of her loss in the battle. Significantly, Valkyrie states that she no longer believes in the throne, a moment cutting to Thor’s wounded expression. Cutting back to her, she states ‘It cost me everything. That’s what’s wrong with Asgard. The throne, the secrets, the whole golden sham.’ This moment indicates a distinct critique of the inequities of Odin’s monarchic rule­– V ­ alkyrie contributed to protecting the throne as a soldier but was left disenfranchised and received little in return. When she steps past Thor in a medium shot, then, she rejects Thor’s attempts to console her and instead draws her knife, pointing it towards him defensively. Helping Thor beat Hela is discordant with Valkyrie’s stance against the throne. To this, Thor states ‘I agree, that’s why I turned down the throne. But this isn’t about the crown. This is about the people. They’re dying and they’re your people, too.’ This is delivered with severity in close-­up; Valkyrie is barely positioned within the shot at this point. Significantly, Thor’s discussion derails from the topic of the throne and whether or not the Asgardian monarchy is fair (indeed, Thor rejected the throne at the end of The Dark World, presumably to be with Jane Foster on Earth). Central to this discussion­– a­ nd Thor’s winning argument­– ­is the idea of Asgardian identity, suggested to be at risk under Hela’s authority. Hela’s ideology of empire to Thor, it seems, is incongruent with his own ideals of what it means to be Asgardian. His reminder to Valkyrie of her own investment and potential participation in shaping that Asgardian identity is in stark contrast to Hela’s totalitarian leanings and signifies Ragnarok’s overall redefinition of and reconciliation with Asgardian ethnicity in the light of the Trump era. Valkyrie, who has been adapted from the comic to be portrayed by an actress of colour in a gesture of colourblind casting, ends up reclaiming her Asgardian heritage. Yet, the racial difference celebrated in Ragnarok is not multiracial, but Asgardian­– ­presented as encompassing all kinds of people. The climax of the film sees the physical Asgard’s destruction, as Thor realises this is the only way to defeat Hela. In these final

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scenes, Asgard is reimagined as a diaspora through the repeated line that ‘Asgard’s not a place­– ­it’s a people.’ Thor realises this when Odin says this to him in a vision: ‘Asgard is where our people stand.’ Those people, having gone into hiding under the leadership of Heimdall, former protector of the Bifrost bridge between Realms, are led aboard a spaceship (stolen and repurposed from the Grandmaster) that will take them to safety. It is noteworthy, here, that Heimdall is presented as a revolutionary figure, given that colourblind production decisions were also functional in the casting of Idris Elba, since the character appeared white in the comics. His presence as a character of colour begs the question of the role of race in Asgardian culture; in the film, his race remains irrelevant, yet he is still paradoxically marked as racialised against the largely white crowd of Asgardians. This is particularly noticeable in wide, high-­angle shots of Heimdall leading the Asgardian people, who essentially become refugees, across the Bifrost. After his vision of Odin and epiphany about the Asgardian diaspora, Thor joins Valkyrie and the other Asgardians in a final battle to the familiar sound of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Immigrant Song’, reaching back to the film’s opening scene, which also featured the song and its lyrics referring to Norse mythology. It marks a reinstatement, but also reinvention, of the status quo within Ragnarok. The song is also apt in relation to the Asgardians, who are now forced to immigrate or at least relocate. Finally, looking out of the ship’s window and unified within the frame, the Asgardians, and Korg and the Hulk, watch as Asgard, the place, is destroyed. Korg’s statement that ‘We can rebuild this place. It will become a haven for all peoples and aliens of the universe’ humorously marks the film’s engagement with ideas of racial inclusivity; however, in an ironic twist Asgard explodes, obliterated into nothing, prompting Korg to apologise. The camera pans across the gathered Asgardians gazing mournfully at what used to be their home, presented in reverse shots as a ball of light and rubble in space. Heimdall again repeats that ‘Asgard is not a place­– ­but a people’ and the ship is shot from outside making its way through the debris. In the concluding scenes, Thor is shown in a long shot walking towards the captain’s chair in the foreground of the shot through the crowd of Asgardians, a makeshift throne, as his reign is finally instated (Figure 10.1). Valkyrie and Heimdall are positioned beside the throne; Heimdall addresses him as ‘King of Asgard’ and asks ‘Where to?’ To this, Thor eventually responds ‘Earth it is.’ This positioning of Asgardians as refugees is significant in a political context in which there has been widespread anxiety over immigration regulation (see Kellner 2016: 41–43; Shafer 2017; Abramowitz and McCoy 2019). The film’s ostensibly pro-­refugee

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Figure 10.1  Asgard as a people: Thor and his multicultural and multispecies subjects in Thor: Ragnarok.

stance, and especially Thor’s unquestioning assumption that ‘Earth’ will accept the Asgardians’ presence, speaks to ongoing issues of immigration that culminated in the rise of right-­wing sentiments and the election of Trump. Meanwhile, its redefinition of racial categories in the face of an emboldening of white supremacist discourses within this cultural landscape is also noteworthy. Through the figure of a superheroic woman of colour, the film reconfigures meanings of what constitutes Asgardian ethnicity, even through its overt lack of acknowledgement of Valkyrie’s race. The film also remains entrenched in traditionalist discourses of white, patriarchal dominance in Thor’s taking of the throne, as well as its problematic postracial ignorance of the implications of race on people’s lives. In effect, the film trades on exactly the discourses that it disavows­– ­namely, identity politics.

Wakanda Forever: Black Femininity and the (Afro)Future Announced in 2016 as featuring ‘a ninety per cent’ African or African American cast (Melrose 2016), Black Panther marked a watershed in Hollywood filmmaking, specifically superhero narratives. Black Panther and its paratexts indicated engagement anti-­ racist and anticolonialist politics in the popular media through mainstream exposure of terms such as ‘wokeness’ and ‘intersectionality’ as markers of ‘good’ or ‘bad’ feminism.3 Much like the discourses of revolution surrounding Wonder Woman a year earlier, the revolutionary potential of Black Panther was highlighted within popular culture through hyperbolic headlines such as ‘Daring, diverse “Black Panther” promises to be Hollywood’s latest “cultural touchstone” ’ (Truitt 2018), ‘Black Panther: does the Marvel

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epic solve Hollywood’s Africa problem?’ (Rose 2018), ‘More than a movie, “Black Panther” is a movement’ (France 2018), ‘The “Black Panther” Revolution: How Chadwick Boseman and Ryan Coogler created the most radical superhero movie of all time’ (Eels 2018) and ‘The Revolutionary Power Of Black Panther’ (Smith 2018). A teaser clip shown at San Diego Comic Con in 2017 reportedly received a standing ovation when Marvel occupied the packed venue with Black Panther’s cast and crew (Kelley 2017). Upon release, the film rapidly broke box office records, potentially confirming the prior hyperbole of critics in terms of purely financial gain. The film’s cultural impact remains yet to be demonstrated in radical ways but was nonetheless implied throughout the film’s release cycle. Black studies scholar Renée T. White remarked that the release of the film induced a ‘seismic reaction from black audiences around the globe . . . It is as if audiences are experiencing mass psychic relief’ (White 2018: 426). Further, in discussing Black Panther, Marvel Comics’ first black superhero, as a character, André Carrington has argued that ‘the Black Panther phenomenon is already situated in a dense network of desiring practices’ (Carrington 2018: 222). Black Panther thus rests on an intertextual net of corresponding contexts (including the comic book character on which it is based), all of them with racial dynamics. Afrofuturist aesthetics exploit the generic potential of science fiction to present a utopian image of technologically advanced African nations and individuals. Meanwhile, Ryan Coogler, the film’s director, previously made Fruitvale Station (2013), a biographical drama about the murder of 22-­year-­old African American Oscar Grant by way of police brutality, as well as Creed (2015), the seventh Rocky, which utilised the familiar boxing franchise to offer a meditation on black masculinity. Both films starred Michael B. Jordan, who was cast as the ambiguous villain of Black Panther, as their central character. Chadwick Boseman, the Black Panther, previously played biographical roles of Jackie Robinson in 42 (Brian Helgeland, 2013), James Brown in Get on Up (Tate Taylor, 2014) and Thurgood Marshall in Marshall (Reginald Hudlin, 2017; Hudlin previously had an acclaimed run on the Black Panther comics), among others. Kenyan actress Lupita Nyong’o starred in Black Panther as supporting character Nakia, having come to Hollywood prominence via slave memoir adaptation 12 Years a Slave (Steve McQueen, 2013) and her subsequent Oscar win. Black Panther’s Costume Designer, Ruth E. Carter, had likewise worked on historical slave drama Amistad (Steven Spielberg, 1997), as well as biopics Malcolm X (Spike Lee, 1992), What’s Love Got to Do with It (Brian Gibson, 1993), Selma (Ava DuVernay, 2014) and Marshall (she subsequently won an Academy Award for her work on Black Panther). The hair design of white

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dreadlocks for Black Panther’s mother, Ramonda, was inspired by writer Toni Morrison (Kai 2018), herself an Afro-­diasporic cultural icon (see Weheliye 2013: 216; Womack 2013: 103). The film’s soundtrack was curated and contributed to by hip hop artist Kendrick Lamar, whose output has included Afrocentrist themes and elaborations of contemporary black existence (see Love 2016; McLeod 2017). Much of the film’s promotion was carried by a presumed anticipation for a film that had both a narrative pertaining to black experiences and a majority black cast and crew. These apparent links highlight the forms of black and African narratives that, thus far, had been marketable in both Hollywood and wider institutions. That most of the films mentioned here centre on black experiences and are, by and large, couched in black history and/­or the collective trauma of slavery is illustrative of both the marginalisation of black identities in Hollywood but also how black representation is productive and collaborative. While not all of these links are inherently related to gender (specifically femininity), they aid in making sense of Black Panther’s complexities and contradictions, as what Isiah Lavender would refer to as to as the film’s ‘blackground’ or its ‘embedded perceptions of race and racism­ – ­intended or not’ (Lavender 2011: 6–7). The superhero Black Panther, T’Challa, debuted during a time of upheaval in American society. Created by Jack Kirby and Stan Lee and first appearing in Fantastic Four (Lee and Kirby 1966), the character was a response to the political struggle of African Americans during the Civil Rights Movement. Nonetheless, his debut in a series whose narrative functions as a mediation of the traditional nuclear family­ – ­with the Fantastic Four being colloquially known as Marvel’s First Family­ – ­is interesting, given the complexity of the space and settings in which he would later appear. T’Challa hails from and rules the fictional African nation of Wakanda, which, due to its geographical positioning on a mountain made up of the highly valuable element vibranium, has remained uncolonised and hidden from the rest of the world through technological ingenuity. The anticolonialism behind Black Panther is clear, and while neither Kirby nor Lee were black, the creation of the character was in line with previous Marvel creations, many of which mediated marginalisation and identity, even if only through metaphor. Julian Chambliss remarks that Stan Lee and Jack Kirby began a dialogue about the implication of black agency throughout the African Diaspora. The Black Panther reflects broader debates about the impact of black social power within the United States and the postcolonial experience in Africa. (Chambliss 2016: 189)

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The character was not inspired by the political organisations, Black Panther Party (formed in 1966) or Lowndes County Freedom Organization­– b­ oth of which used panther imagery to signify black unity and freedom­– n ­ or were these parties referring to the comics. Nama identifies the spontaneous appearance of panthers in relation to Civil Rights as an ‘example of . . . synchronicity, whereby coincidental events speak to broader underlying dynamics’ (Nama 2011: 42). He continues that these ‘manifestations of a black panther are a consequence of the politics of the period, during which “black” became a defining adjective to express the political and cultural shift in the civil rights movement’ (Nama 2011: 42). Black Panther later appeared in the Jungle Action comic book series (1954–5), whose title is evocative of colonial exoticism and noted as problematic (Nama 2011: 44), during a time when Marvel’s interest in racial equality had not translated to its industrial practices, with the company employing just a handful of black creators. Nonetheless, black artist Billy Graham contributed to most Jungle Action issues, which initially placed the Black Panther within his home country of Wakanda. Nama suggests that these portrayals offered an alternative to the Blaxploitation-­infused representations of the urban ghetto that had become widespread in the media at this time (Nama 2011: 44). The comic, and Nama’s commentary, highlights the importance of setting and space in relation to the character. Scholars have noted this: the character was frequently configured within the ghetto (to comment on African American existential questions) and/­or in the Wakandan jungle (to explore themes of empire and duty through Afrofuturist aesthetics). Indeed, Marvel’s black superheroes were consistently placed back and forth between the ghetto and the jungle, particularly during the 1970s, when urban reform framed the debates around black integration (Terry 2014: 155), although later runs on the character by Christopher Priest4 and Reginald Hudlin5 in the 2000s returned T’Challa to familiar urban settings to critical acclaim. A different period for T’Challa, however, occurred when Marvel reportedly requested that (white) writer Don McGregor include more white people in Black Panther comics (Terry 2014: 178). McGregor’s response transcribed the character into the American Deep South, where he encountered the Ku Klux Klan. While in some ways problematic, these issues are also radical: Marvel’s metaphor for marginalisation directly mapped onto black experience, conveyed through disturbing imagery. A key issue (McGregor and Graham 1976) features T’Challa crucified on a burning cross, a ritual practice historically held by the Klan to terrorise and intimidate (Cunningham 2013: 45). When Kirby took over the character, the tone was significantly more fantastical and less rooted in

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th e (a f r o )f uture o f a div e r s e m a r v e l 245 black trauma. These Kirby issues are not held to particularly high esteem within academia; however, they do showcase the character’s relationship to speculative science fiction and the aesthetics Afrofuturism, through which the film Black Panther was widely discussed in popular discourse. While it is beyond the scope of this chapter to discuss the nuances of Black Panther’s publication history, valuable work has been undertaken by scholars who examine the character alongside other black heroes such as the Falcon and Luke Cage concerning racial contexts (see Nama 2011; Chambliss 2015). Indeed, as discussions of racial equality shifted in US history, so, too, did the Black Panther storylines. Chambliss, for instance, notes the intervention represented by a Hudlin-­scribed storyline around Hurricane Katrina that juxtaposes Black Panther symbolism with the black-­power-­inspired origins of characters such as Luke Cage, Brother Voodoo, and Blade to great effect, as the black characters pledge to protect African Americans in New Orleans from predatory elements attempting to displace the residents. (Chambliss 2012: 113)

Importantly, as mentioned in the previous chapter, Marvel’s roster of black heroes was largely male until the creation of X-­Man Storm. The representation of these heroes is therefore inevitably gendered, while the Black Panther film is likewise largely concerned with black masculinity. Black Panther was released to wide acclaim but was nonetheless the target of online backlash characteristic of the Trump era and its widespread exposure of popular misogyny alongside popular feminism. Before its release, Black Panther’s audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, the film review aggregator site, was targeted by an alt-­right campaign to give the film a ‘rotten’ audience score while it received an overwhelmingly positive response by critics (Desta 2018).6 Claims of progressivism should, nonetheless, be considered carefully. The film is doubtless an unapologetic celebration of African iconography and themes, what Dee Marco describes as ‘a kind of spectacularization of blackness, a kind of exceptionalism both celebrated and desired in ways that have seemingly never been experienced in relation to blackness’ (Marco 2018). Likewise, Chambliss points out that the character’s cinematic debut late within the Marvel boom ‘is a reflection of a persistent white privilege linked to the alignment between power and identity in the superhero genre’ (Chambliss 2016: 189). I therefore tread carefully upon the critical and cultural significance of the film, while also bearing in mind its representation of patriarchal monarchy, which corresponds, interestingly, to the thematic undertones of Ragnarok. The concept of Afrofuturism was a structuring factor of both the film and its framing within the media. If the film achieved anything, it was to

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showcase the radical potential of Afrofuturism and to bring the term to mainstream discourse. Like Ragnarok, Black Panther makes use of Marvel films’ turn to science fiction to make ideological points regarding nationhood, gender and identity, although Black Panther’s final act keeps with the previous emphasis on action and unbound energy portrayed through an extended battle sequence. Indeed, the film is kinetic in its cinematography, which weaves through action scenarios such as dynamic fight sequences, further establishing its entanglement with the action genre through which superhero adaptations have traditionally functioned. Even so, the Afrofuturistic qualities of the film are pronounced, and, indeed, these correspond to the postmodern aspects of Ragnarok’s settings, which emphasised the collision of old and new in the representation of Sakaar the trash planet. The connotations of these contradictory aesthetics, though, are specifically racial due to the enduring practices of Afrofuturism. In exploring the links between black identity and technology, Afrofuturism has parallels and intertextual links with cyborg feminism covered Chapter 7 of this book, although, again, the connotations of this become quite different when the characters, settings and narratives specifically pertain to black subjectivity. As argued by Mark Dery, who first theorised Afrofuturism, the racial dynamics of alien metaphors often articulated within science fiction have a specific resonance with black identities: African Americans, in a very real sense, are the descendants of alien abductees; they inhabit a sci-­fi nightmare in which unseen but no less impassable force fields of intolerance frustrate their movements; official histories undo what has been done; and technology is too often brought to bear on black bodies (branding, forced sterilization, the Tuskegee experiment, and tasers come readily to mind). (Dery 1994: 180)

Dery elaborates that Afrofuturism can broadly be defined as ‘[s]peculative fiction that treats African-­American themes and addresses African-­ American concerns in the context of twentieth century technoculture­ – ­and . . . African-­American signification that appropriates images of technology and a prosthetically enhanced future’ (Dery 1994: 180). As an aesthetic and series of practices of black art production, Afrofuturism has links to Pan-­African Afrophilia that appeared within artistic movements of the 1970s (Eshun 2003: 294). Later, science fiction became a key venue for Afrofuturism, elaborating the, in hegemonic terms, paradoxical connection between technological advancement and black identity.7 From this developed a distinctive philosophy in which prior science fiction by black artists and writers such as jazz musician Sun Ra and novelist Octavia E. Butler were reconsidered through the lens of Afrofuturism

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th e (a f r o )f uture o f a div e r s e m a r v e l 247 (Womack 2013: 16). More recently, artists such as popstars Janelle Monáe and Beyoncé, and writers Gayle Jones and Balogun Ojetade and have been considered in terms of Afrofuturism (see Yaszek 2015; Gipson 2016; Lillvis 2017; Haynes 2018), although this is not to say that they are not exempt from being situated within varying forms of neoliberal feminisms, and indeed, a complex form of postfeminist racial awareness. A fluid concept, Ytasha Womack defines Afrofuturism as ‘an intersection of imagination, technology, the future, and liberation . . . an artistic aesthetic and a framework for critical theory’ (Womack 2013: 9). Afrofuturism is a productive rendering of history and the future simultaneously that accounts for the exceptionality of Africans, and those of African descent, by way of the forced migration of the Middle Passage, rewriting Africans into history and envisaging a future where technology coincides with the ingenuity of African peoples. Through futuristic themes, technological advancement and ancient African cosmology (Brown et al. 2018: 71), Afrofuturism goes beyond merely recuperating the past to account for African subjectivities. To quote Ruth Mayer: Afrofuturist artists turn to black history in order to recreate it in a markedly fantastic mode. Mixing up the imagery of the Middle Passage with contemporary experiences of displacement, migration, and alienation, they turn the project of recuperating the past into a futuristic venture. (Mayer 2000: 555)

The outcome is the contemplation of the following question: ‘Can a community whose past has been deliberately rubbed out, and whose energies have subsequently been consumed by the search for legible traces of its history, imagine possible futures?’ (Dery 1994: 180). In summary, Afrofuturism makes use of the liberating potential of speculative science fiction­– ­it ‘disrupts our understanding of blackness by rethinking the past, present, and futures of the African Diaspora; they merge culture, tradition, time, space, and technology to present alternative interpretations of blackness’ (White 2018: 422). Black Panther exploits Afrofuturist aesthetics, with the production crew drawing from traditional and indigenous African design. For instance, the Black Panther suit was subtly etched with a distinctive triangular pattern, ‘the sacred geometry of Africa’, while also drawing from contemporary superhero suit designs (Carter quoted in Ryzik 2018). Meanwhile, the film’s representation of the African nation of Wakanda is replete with futuristic holographic screens, space-­age transport systems and an inventive means of generating power, most of which stem from T’Challa’s inventor sister, Shuri (Leticia Wright), whose role in the film I discuss later. Much of this technological innovation is signified through bright

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lights, futuristic metal surfaces and translucent holograms. However, alongside these elements, Black Panther’s affinity to African design is signified through intricately constructed props, costuming and sets, often crafted in a way that is itself technologically advanced. For instance, the elaborate headdress worn by Queen Mother, Ramonda (Angela Basset), was inspired by traditional cylindrical Zulu headdress and crafted out of strong 3-­D printed plastic (Ryzik 2018). Moreover, shots of Wakanda’s landscape­– ­untarnished by industrialism­– ­are wide-­ranging, showcasing the scope of T’Challa’s kingdom. In this sense, Black Panther’s portrayal of an idyllic, natural Wakanda somewhat plays into quasi-­Orientalist articulations of ‘the utopian valorization of tribal or “primitive” societies as being more equitable, more ecologically sound, or more natural’ (Gomel 2014: 121), a characteristic nonetheless offset by futuristic imagery. Further drawing on the idea of monarchical tradition (in this case, specifically African) Black Panther, like Ragnarok, is concerned with identity, ethnicity and nationhood as expressed largely through the characters of T’Challa and Erik ‘Killmonger’ Stevens. When his father King T’Chaka is killed during the events of Civil War, in which T’Challa first appeared in film form, T’Challa is crowned king of Wakanda following a contest where he must fight anyone who seeks to challenge the throne. Much like Thor must be deemed worthy of wielding Mjolnir, T’Challa’s victory in the combat makes him worthy of the power of the Black Panther, which is imbued within him through the ceremonial ingestion of a special herb. It is significant (and paradoxical) that Black Panther’s celebration of African aesthetics and spirituality exists in tandem to the recuperation of the Norse mythology (which is at risk of association with white supremacy) that underpins Marvel’s Asgardian storylines. Both films are concerned with an ethnic diaspora pertaining to a fictional nation state, elaborated specifically through a central male hero, only that Wakanda’s racial sensibilities directly map onto the lived experiences of African Americans, particularly through its evocation of anticolonialism and the history of slavery. In the film, T’Challa undergoes a struggle to reconcile Wakandan isolationism (often presented as needlessly pragmatic) with his own world view and status as king. T’Challa is challenged for the Wakandan crown by his long-­lost cousin Erik, the child of an American woman and Wakandan War Dog (an agent of the Wakandan intelligence) and brother of King T’Chaka, N’Jobu (Sterling K. Brown). Querying Wakanda’s international policies and, crucially, witnessing the systemic oppression faced by people of African descent in the US, N’Jobu aimed to cause a revolution, sourcing arms through criminal South African arms dealer Ulysses

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th e (a f r o )f uture o f a div e r s e m a r v e l 249 Klaue (Andy Serkis), a character whose ideology White describes as as ‘a modern version of the colonizing mentality’ (White 2018: 425). In the process, N’Jobu reveals to Klaue the existence of Wakanda and its access to vibranium, which Klaue unsurprisingly wishes to exploit for his own gains. N’Jobu is killed in the ensuing clash with T’Chaka and his fellow Wakandans, who immediately flee, leaving Erik behind. Erik would become the villainous Killmonger after serving as a Navy SEAL and, later, a black-­ops unit, in which he honed his ruthless fighting skills as preparation to challenge T’Challa and seize the Wakandan throne. He would also seek to fulfil his father’s ambitions to cause a global revolution. Importantly, Killmonger occupies the position of both Wakandan and African American and can pass as either. Like the diasporic descendants of Africans, then, Killmonger has a spiritual connection to his ancestral locality. Since I want to maintain the focus on the rendering of race and femininities through these imperial storylines, it is outside the scope of this chapter to discuss how T’Challa and Killmonger are made to navigate a balancing act celebrating blackness alongside the need for the ideological containment of black (masculine) subjectivities. Killmonger remains one of the most elusive, and compelling, of the film’s complexities and speaks to the notion of double consciousness put forward in 1903 by W. E. B. DuBois (1990), himself a science fiction writer, and further elaborated on by theorists such as Paul Gilroy (1993), Frantz Fanon (2008: 82–108; see also Moore 2005) and, from a black feminist perspective, Deborah Gray White (1999) and Patricia Hill Collins (2004: 282). Double consciousness is the state experienced by individuals who are both African (black) and American (white), two facets that are culturally opposed, leading to internal conflict. The film shows a distinctive awareness of ongoing issues racial tensions in the US, for instance in its setting of Killmonger’s formative childhood experiences in 1992, the year, as identified by Renée White (White 2018: 425), of the Los Angeles riots that were the result of police brutality inflicted on Rodney King. Indeed, Marco suggests that ‘Wakandans present themselves as somewhat conflicted but only Killmonger lives that personal double consciousness’ (Marco 2018: 6). Like the comics, then, Black Panther has an ambivalent relationship to blackness as articulated through the settings of the ghetto and Wakanda. It also presents, without query, a hero in a male monarch who upholds tradition. While Black Panther remains a radical figure, the film does little to address the problematics of a superhero-­king who, despite ultimately reforming Wakanda’s isolationist policies to an extent, functions within

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the domineering practices of what Black Panther vaguely frames as ancient African tradition. This is particularly obvious in a sequence in which Okoye (Danai Gurira) of the Dora Milaje, the king’s bodyguards and key members of Wakanda’s Special Forces, declares her duty-­bound loyalty to Killmonger when he forcibly seizes the throne. Indeed, Carrington establishes the problematic origins of the Dora Milaje (the ‘Adored Ones’) within Priest’s run writing Black Panther comics, and later on during writer Ta-­Nehisi Coates’ tenure (Carrington 2018: 227). Conceived as a warrior/­concubine hybrid, Carrington discusses early comic appearances of the Dora Milaje in terms of their positioning as ‘subordinate companions who hope to become his [T’Challa’s] wife . . . [who] make a show of his command over their bodies, surrounding him as objects of an acquisitive desire’ (Carrington 2018: 227). Carrington argues for the comparison of Dora Milaje to real-­life tribeswomen of Dahomey Amazons, as well as Colonel Gaddafi’s Amazonian Guard, also known as Revolutionary Nuns, ‘evoking members’ dedication to the nation and citing their putative chastity as proof’ (Carrington 2018: 238–9). He simultaneously identifies two queer Dora Milaje characters in Coates’ comics as adding complexity to the positioning of the warriors as concubines available to the king in (hetero)sexual terms (Carrington 2018: 229). It is also noteworthy that the filmic versions of these characters’ costuming­– c­ ombining red fabric, leather harness and intricate beadwork­– w ­ ere stated to be inspired by the Turkana, Maasai and Himba people (Francisco 2019). Carrington nonetheless maintains that the Dora Milaje are ‘neither a dubious homage to a Pan-­Africanist patriarch nor an invention cut from whole cloth’, which ‘requires a concerted effort to bridge the gap between black diasporic heritage and its roots’ (Carrington 2018: 238). Concurrently, though, Okoye was promoted as a radical intervention into women’s representation in superhero films, with several feminist readings of the character taking place (Brockington 2018; Coleman 2018; Harris 2018; Lee 2018; Rhiannon 2018). Again, the specificity of context(s) is important, and the lack of a defined and coherent political feminism in these venues, typical for both popular-­and postfeminisms, is noteworthy. As a warrior woman, Okoye resonates with existing frameworks of empowered femininity exemplified by superheroines discussed throughout this book, but the fact that her power is racialised, as well as speaking to nationality, must be considered. There is little use in applying a broad framework of ‘feminism’ to the character in to measure her radical qualities. The film aligns Okoye both to problematic patriarchal ideals of tradition and to a progressivist, or postfeminist, taking account of racial oppression. As with previous Marvel superheroines, this takes the form of ironic

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Figure 10.2  Black Panther’s Dora Milaje Ayo, Queen Mother Ramonda and Shuri.

comments made by the character, as well as Shuri and Nakia. During one sequence, on an undercover mission to catch Klaue in Busan, South Korea, Okoye vocally complains about the discomfort of the wig she wears (Okoye is usually bald, a style uncharacteristic of Western feminine beauty standards). The shot is tight on the women on either side of T’Challa, who wears a black formal suit, and there are few South Korean people visible (occasionally one or two pass through the shot). Okoye remarks that she ‘can’t wait to get this ridiculous thing off my head’, referring to the wig, to which Nakia humorously responds, ‘It looks nice, just whip it back and forth’, a reference to the 2010 pop single ‘Whip My Hair’ in which Willow Smith promotes a carefree attitude expressed through the hair-­whipping gesture (also marked as an oppositional-yet-mainstream celebration of black hair). This ironic repurposing of an American pop song by Wakandan characters is a distancing mechanism, rendering the American pop culture artefact alien to the Wakandans. Okoye later rips the wig off her during a fight, throwing it at her opponent to immobilise him, an act in which she literally and figuratively rejects her Western costume. This is not the only instance of Wakandans referencing American pop culture in the film. Shuri later refers to ‘the old American movie Baba used to watch’, by which she means Back to the Future Part II (Robert Zemeckis, 1989),8 which she is implied to have used as inspiration for the high-­tech self-­lacing shoes she designs for T’Challa, also ironically termed by Shuri as ‘sneakers’ and bearing Wakandan lettering that reads ‘heir T’Chaka’, a play on Nike’s famous Air Jordan brand trainers. These ironic intertextual jabs reconfigure the significance of American culture as foreign to the Wakandans, whose subjectivity is prioritised. This is most obvious in a car chase that takes place after Klaue’s capture collapses into chaos. Okoye and Nakia drive after Klaue and his henchmen, who

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shoot at them from a getaway vehicle. Nakia and Okoye, are presented via a medium close-­up of the front of their car as they drive through the streets of Busan, safe in their bulletproof vehicle, and Okoye quips, ‘Guns. So primitive.’ These are colonial discourses of African primitivism reversed, as Wakandan technology is so advanced that it is suggested to make Western firearms obsolete. That this is expressed by women specifically is also significant, given the cultural links between (American) masculinity and guns. The use of guns by the masculine villains of the film is therefore made Other, a striking feat in the context of Hollywood action cinema. With this in mind, it is not entirely clear as whom Okoye, T’Challa and Nakia are attempting to pass through their disguises. Nakia identifies herself as Kenyan and the South Korean locale of a busy street market at night, in addition to the golden interior shots of the illegal casino they infiltrate to attempt to catch Klaue, adds an overarching ambiguity as to whom the characters are trying to convince, as well as what kind of setting they are attempting to blend into. That South Korea is an East Asian country that has undergone significant Westernisation since the 1980s, evoking questions of tradition and nationality, is also noteworthy as it provides a setting that is as ambiguous as the Wakandan characters appear in their disguises. While Carrington argues that the mish-­mash of (Pan)Africanities present in the Black Panther comics render them ‘[v]ernacular texts that synthesize disparate currents in American, Africana, and postcolonial thought . . . [and] ensure that African pasts remain available to the many and varied desires of the black diasporic reading public’ (Carrington 2018: 237), I suggest this melting pot of Africanness in the film is also the result of the ambiguities of contemporary culture. Another female character significant to Afrofuturism is T’Challa’s scientist sister Shuri, who was declared in popular media outlets as Black Panther’s ‘female Q’, referring to the advisory character in the James Bond franchise (Buxton 2018; Davis 2018; Framke 2018; Sherlock 2019). This likening to a white Western male figure associated with advanced technology used to aid the central hero is problematic, measuring Shuri against a norm of patriarchal whiteness. However, the character remains compelling through her representation as a black (specifically African) geek, a phenomenon that has largely been limited to male characters such as Steve Urkel in sitcom Family Matters (ABC, 1989–98). According to Womack, the celebration of black intellectualism ‘totally shatters limited notions of black identity’ (Womack 2013: 13) due to the assumption of African people’s intellectual and biological inferiority in the enterprise of white supremacy and justification of Western colonialism (Crenshaw et al. 2019: 5–6). Shuri’s representation as a scientist with her own labora-

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th e (a f r o )f uture o f a div e r s e m a r v e l 253 tory aligns with recent characterisations of Marvel women as successful professionals within STEM fields (see Chapter 2). Indeed, the number of black women in STEM fields is significantly lower than white women due to the racial discrimination that accompanies class and gender barriers preventing black women from accessing these spaces (for instance within higher education). Given postfeminist culture’s legitimation of essentialist discourse as well as the recent (re)turn within popular culture towards evolutionary biology legitimating racist science (Gallagher 2018: 5; Saini 2019; Evans 2014), Shuri presents an interesting representation of black female intellect. Her exceptionality is doubtless enabled by her privileged status as a Wakandan, rather than as an ‘other’ African. Marco posits that despite its radical undertones and alignment with Afrofuturism, Black Panther still relies on binaristic notions of Otherness in its representation of Wakanda’s relation to other African nations that have been colonised: The Wakandans ‘are themselves “othered” from other Africans and black people in the diaspora’, and as a result ‘Wakandans in this film stand in for Africans but they also do not, as Wakanda had never been colonized’ (Marco 2018: 6). It is therefore taken for granted that Shuri has had access to Wakanda’s knowledge and science. Within the film, then, Shuri’s genius is somewhat unexceptional in its exceptionality­ – ­on an extradiegetic level, though, Shuri’s presence as a black female scientist in pop culture among white, male geeks and intellectuals is significant. Shuri’s portrayal addresses the wider discourse of the racial ‘digital divide’, a perception stemming from the 1990s suggesting that young people of colour had less access to computers and broadband internet than did white young people. While important discussions, Womack highlights that ‘the technology and race debate prioritized the divide at the expense of the ongoing technological innovation in African American communities’ (Womack 2013: 47), further cementing ideologies of African primitiveness. Reynaldo Anderson and Charles Jones likewise argue that there were ‘inequities inherent in what was then referred to as the digital divide, with regard to the conventional narrative that race was a liability in the new century’ (Anderson and Jones 2016: vii). The digital divide thus became ‘a code word for the tech inequities that exist between blacks and whites’ (Nelson 2002: 1), part of an enduring Western image of ‘Third World’ countries that Afrofuturists addressed. Alondra Nelson suggests that this resulted in a dualistic set of hypothesised outcomes: ‘a utopian (to some) race-­free future and pronouncements of the dystopian digital divide’ (Nelson 2002: 1). Digital technology and cyberculture apparently offered both a race-­free utopia and a dystopian replica of existing societal divides, although Nelson highlights that the result for either position

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was a postracial implication that race ‘is either negligible or evidence of negligence’ (Nelson 2002: 1). Nelson concludes that ‘racial identity, and blackness in particular, is the anti-­avatar of digital life. Blackness gets constructed as always oppositional to technologically driven chronicles of progress’ (Nelson 2002: 1). Representations of black geeks therefore have the potential to disrupt these limiting discourses (Flowers 2018: 187). Shuri’s black nerd status is signified through her interactions with technology and what was characterised as her Q-­like relationship with T’Challa. Indeed, the first interaction she has with her brother in the film portrays her desire to improve his Kimoyo beads, a bracelet that allows them to, among other features, communicate via hologram. To T’Challa’s resistance to improvements Shuri answers, ‘Just because something works does not mean that it cannot be improved.’ This encounter takes place immediately after T’Challa arrives in Wakanda with Nakia and Okoye via aircraft, the Royal Talon Fighter, whose futuristic aesthetics and functions were showcased as it flew above the Golden City’s skyscrapers merging ultra-­modern metal surfaces with traditional African thatched roofs. The conversation ends with T’Challa joking ‘I can’t wait to see what kind of updates you make to your ceremonial outfit’, referring to the Black Panther’s crowning ceremony that will take place shortly. Walking away in medium close-­up from behind, Shuri extends her middle finger towards T’Challa and his expression, visible through deep focus in the reverse shot, is of mild astonishment. Importantly, Shuri’s gesture indicates her rejection of feminine interests such as fashion. It also positions her outside the norms of (Western) hegemonic femininity. This is noteworthy because thus far the film encouraged the idea that Wakandans exist outside the confines of colonial ideals in any case, and yet patriarchal limitations extend to this scene, whose effect is humorous, given Shuri’s outright defiance of T’Challa’s assumptions of femininity. Shuri’s underground laboratory is revealed through fluid cinematography, a single tracking shot that enters from the aircraft landing pad area featured in previous scenes. The camera floats down through a tunnel lined with glowing blue threads of light, narrowly missing a flying object that passes, and finishes on a long shot of a white winding platform that spirals up around a pillar decorated with colourful artwork. The walls surrounding the structure appear rough and cave-­like, another blending of new and old. Within the laboratory, T’Challa and the Dora Milaje are surrounded by blue holographic screens covered in Wakandan symbols. This area is part of the intricate spiral platform, with the artwork on the pillar more clearly visible in the next shot, showcasing the merging of fantastical technology and architecture with African-inspired artistic tradition.

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Figure 10.3  Inventor-scientist Shuri alongside T’Challa in Black Panther.

Shuri ironically bows and greets T’Challa; her dress resembles a white laboratory coat, an enduring signifier of the cinematic scientist (Figure 10.3). Indeed, the black scientist is a feature of Afrofuturist literature, what Lisa Yaszek defines as the Bannekerade, which has the potential to offer ‘new images of black genius’ in Afrodiasporic literature (Yaszek 2014: 15). The term is a play on the similarly named Edisonade, a science fiction narrative form centring on ‘the adventures of the technoscientific genius’, named after American inventor Thomas Edison (Yaszek 2014: 16). Following the spirit of Afrofuturism, Yaszek’s Bannekerade is named after the revolutionary-­era inventor Benjamin Banneker, a former slave who promoted the elimination of slavery (Yaszek 2014: 16). Yaszek defines the Afrodiasporic Bannekerade as focusing on the ‘young black male scientistinventor who uses the products of his genius to save himself, his friends, and his community from domestic oppressors’ (Yaszek 2014: 17). While Shuri is not the victim of white oppression due to her privileged status as Wakandan, nor is she male, she does use her power as Wakandan royalty and scientific knowledge to improve other’s lives. The technology she invents is also used by the Dora Milaje and, importantly, as part of the Black Panther suit. After Shuri leads T’Challa through her laboratory, demonstrating her upgraded Kimoyo beads, which now feature remote access options, and then jokes over T’Challa’s ‘royal sandals’ while introducing him to the, in Shuri’s terms, Back-­to-­the-­Future shoes she designed (which initially appear to be only shoe soles). T’Challa’s feet are shown in an accompanying shot as he places the soles on them, and a pair of crisp, black sneaker-­like boots materialise in sections around his feet. The final gadget on T’Challa’s tour of Shuri’s laboratory is the Black Panther suit itself, which, in its compact form, appears as a necklace of claws. The ­laboratory

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scene in which Shuri shows T’Challa his gadgets was, as mentioned, problematically likened to instances in James Bond films when Q, Bond’s quartermaster, provides him with gadgets (often weapons), frequently concealed within ordinary household objects. T’Challa’s gadgets mark an attempt to reign back the fantastical elements of the superhero within a more realism-­oriented set of spy genre discourses. Nonetheless, thinking of Shuri as a ‘female Q’ is limiting, not only because it recentres the overwhelming white Britishness of James Bond (and the paternalism of Q) but also because it overshadows how Shuri’s representation as a world-­leading scientist and inventor ties into the Afrofuturist Bannekerade tradition. There is a sense of playful fun that is signified through Shuri, for instance her squeals of excitement when demonstrating a gadget or using a new invention, that marks a unique, unabashed relish of the character’s relation to science. However, it is also significant that a black female scientist is portrayed crafting gadgets whose functions extend but also restrict the Black Panther’s black, male body­ – ­the suit, boots and helmet form a tight protective cocoon over T’Challa, enclosing his body’s interactions with his surroundings, while the Kimoyo beads allow Shuri to remotely control T’Challa’s vehicles, through which T’Challa effectively hands over his agency to Shuri or, at the very least, shares it with her. Thus, Shuri’s gadgets allow her to participate in the action, albeit by proxy­ – ­a considerable feat for a Marvel woman without superpowers­– ­while also locking her virtually, in terms verging on bodily transcendence, into T’Challa’s reality and experiences. Regarding the wider portrayal of black nerds in the media, Charles Flowers argues that [n]ot only is the nerd constructed as strictly white, or at least opposed to blackness, but he is also exclusively male . . . women who identify as nerds are required to append a gendered pronoun to their nerd identity in the mode of ‘nerd girls’ or ‘female nerds,’ or even ‘black girl nerds’. (Flowers 2018: 170)

Shuri’s portrayal as a scientist who carries responsibility for her hero brother’s use of gadgets is therefore attuned to Flowers’s argument that ‘the image of the black girl nerd would offer the possibility for resisting . . . controlling images of black women, the demand for black women to conform to white femininity, and the construction of essentialist images of black womanhood through media’ (Flowers 2018: 187). Since Shuri exists diegetically outside the confines of traditional Western expectations of women, she is nonetheless implicitly portrayed as a product of the privileges afforded to her by Wakanda. Echoing Marco’s ideas, an aspect of why Shuri’s character appears radical is because she is Other to the

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th e (a f r o )f uture o f a div e r s e m a r v e l 257 colonised Africans outside Wakanda. Still, in the context of postfeminist images of scientific women having become luminous within a neoliberal capitalist framework, the figure of Shuri does provide unconventional venues for the expression of black girl nerds, albeit within the regulated otherworld of Wakanda. Nakia, a War Dog and T’Challa’s love interest for the film, also provides opportunities to resist mainstream articulations of black femininities. Nakia is portrayed as a humanitarian at the beginning of the film, in which she uses the commonplace image of the veiled, oppressed African woman as a disguise to infiltrate and free a group of women and girls who had been kidnapped by Boko Haram. Her humanitarian ethics are later presented as a point of contention between herself and T’Challa’s isolationism. In a sense, Nakia represents a feminised world view characterised as mutual nurture and support between African nations. A later scene also represents Nakia as being dissatisfied that Wakanda has so many resources and wealth, but does nothing to help its colonised neighbouring countries. Prior to this, the Wakandan state was ostensibly signified as masculinist, maintaining its isolationist policies and asserting control over its subjects while relying on the rule of a patriarchal monarch whose worthiness is determined by the physical act of a duel. Indeed, Wakanda’s progressive politics are signified through the film’s use of women in key action scenes (the Dora Milaje) as well as in intellectual terms (Shuri’s science and Nakia’s ethics), but crucial issues not answered by Black Panther are what relation Wakandan women have to the state, how involved they are in its practices and policies, and, essentially, how the state exercises power over its citizens. It is not clear whether Wakanda even has a constitution, given its reliance on monarchical rule, although, again, there is the danger here of using Western feminisms and democracies as a measuring stick of the film’s ‘progressiveness’. In any case, it is noteworthy that Nakia is key in T’Challa’s eventual loosening of Wakanda’s international policies, becoming a representative of Wakanda on Earth. As a result of these events, T’Challa exposes Wakanda and decides that it can help those less fortunate. One of the film’s final scenes returns to Oakland, where Killmonger’s childhood home, a rundown block of flats, has been condemned as unsafe. Even so, the makeshift basketball basket has been replaced with a real one, indicating that a shift in wealth distribution has taken place. The concluding moments present T’Challa telling Nakia and Shuri that he has bought and aims to redevelop the complex to make space for ‘the first Wakandan International Outreach Centre’, although the specifics are not elaborated on. T’Challa does mention that Nakia’s role will be to carry out ‘social outreach’, while

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Shuri will act as ‘the science and information exchange’. As the conversation takes place, children who had been playing basketball witness the Wakandan plane arriving and approach it in awe. This marks T’Challa’s and Wakanda’s integration into the world (of America) and therefore indicates that his isolationist perspective has been replaced. At the same time, however, the enactment of this form of social charity was enabled by the substantial wealth Wakanda possesses and therefore bears passing resemblance to problematic urban planning practices. Black Panther adopts a chronopolitical (Eshun 2003) approach to developing its narrative and characters, with scenes revisited and assigned different meanings depending on context throughout the film, as well as strategically placed flashbacks and accounts of alternative histories as well as factual reference points. However, the foundations of Wakandan society are represented through a patriarchal framework of monarchy and royal lineage. While the Afrofuturistic elements of the film do, in accordance with the movement as a whole, ‘present new and innovative perspectives’ (Gipson 2016: 92), the film’s central premise, and the crisis on which the hero’s narrative rests, is not much different to that of later Marvel films Thor: Ragnarok and Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2. Like those questions of diaspora posed by the Asgardian ethnicity and its dependence on patriarchal royal lineage, the Wakanda presented in Black Panther wrestles with the concept of Wakandan identity when access to a geographical Wakanda is not available to certain people. These discourses also reach back to the anticolonialism present in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2., particularly in the implications around Peter Quill having a ‘very special heritage’ related to the villainous living planet Ego. In the vast melee of Marvel’s otherworlds­– ­many of which are defined through imperial terms­ – ­it is quite possible for Wakanda to lose its specificity as a venue offering the potential for the expression of radical politics. Indeed, the sheer vastness of the universes and realms in the MCU (which upon Disney’s purchase of Fox looks to become even greater, should the X-­Men and the Fantastic Four appear in future Marvel films)­– a­ ll of them ‘perpetually in crisis’ (Curtis 2013: 210)­– ­are at risk of becoming overwhelming. It is apparent, though, as the decade drew to a close, that enduring discourses of identity in these superhero films remained both gendered and racialised in increasingly complex ways.

Notes 1. Asian-­American director Albert Pyun directed the lesser-­known 1990 adaptation of Captain America, while 2003’s Hulk was directed by Taiwanese Ang Lee.

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th e (a f r o )f uture o f a div e r s e m a r v e l 259 Both Fantastic Four and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer were directed by African American Tim Story and Lexi Alexander, who is of Palestinian descent, directed Punisher: War Zone. None of these films is canonical within the MCU. Thus, much of the prevailing discourse around Ragnarok and Black Panther referred to their significance for people of colour within the MCU (as part of the Hollywood film industry). 2. As confirmed by queer actress Thompson as well as the existence of a deleted scene from the film in which a woman appears to leave Valkyrie’s bedroom (Duffy 2018). 3. Wokeness can be defined broadly as an awareness of social justice issues concerning identity, such as race, gender, sexuality, class, disability, age. Adoption of the term ‘woke’ within mainstream and popular media discourses has been discussed in similar terms to popular feminism as symptomatic of a depoliticisation and commodification of social causes that exists alongside political activisms (see Kanai 2019; Kay 2019). Akin to ‘politically correct’, ‘woke’ is increasingly utilised as a disparaging term in right-­wing media discourses. 4. Collected in Priest and Texeira (2015); Priest and Velluto (2015); Priest and Velluto (2016); Priest and Lucas (2016). 5. Collected in Hudlin and Romita Jr (2017); Hudlin and Portela (2018) and Hudlin and Portela (2019). 6. Rotten Tomatoes creates a numerical aggregate score as a percentage made up of film critics’ reviews. According to set criteria, films are either marked ‘fresh’ or ‘rotten’ depending on the percentage. Alongside the critical score, films are accompanied by an audience score, made up of site user ratings. The system was revamped following abuse of the audience score function by users in relation to both Black Panther and Captain Marvel, among other franchise movies. 7. The relation between technology and blackness is considered paradoxical due to the deeming of Africans and those of African descent as primitive, uncivilised and intellectually inferior, discourses that have been maintained and applied to black subjectivities within white patriarchal societies such as those of the US. Indeed, this calls forth wider arguments around cyborgs, humanisms and posthumanisms regarding race. While there is insufficient scope within this particular assessment of superheroes to further explore these discussions, crucial work has been carried out by Wilkerson (1997), Weheliye (2014), Lavender (2014: 54–88), Jones and Jones (2017) and Lillvis (2017). 8. The intertextual web of meaning comes full circle, here, as Dery’s initial essay in which he defined Afrofuturism was titled ‘Black to the Future’ (Dery 1994).

Afterword: Some Concluding Remarks on Marvel Women . . . Thus Far!

Postfeminist culture shapes understandings of women’s empowerment through the women portrayed in Marvel superhero films and their surrounding popular discourses. Women in Marvel films are ultimately sites of discursive struggle dealing with the postfeminist enterprise of ‘women’s empowerment’ in varying ways. From the renewed traditionalism of the victimised superhero girlfriend to the homogenously thin, white, heterosexual images of beautiful superheroines who fight evil, to the women of colour symptomatic of postracial media culture that rests on racial ambiguity, postfeminism adapts and sticks to the myriad feminine subjectivities portrayed. Above all, I have noted that representations of women in these texts are heterogeneous while all being in some way linked to a culture that strives for a unifying approach to ‘womanhood’, erasing individual experiences that are influenced by factors such as sexuality, class, age and race. I have kept a close eye on the comics on which these representations are based, tracing an historical trajectory between these media, and drawing attention to how feminine subjectivities have developed as a result of both superhero revisionism in varying media and postfeminist culture. Since superhero films have been such a fruitful topic of analytic interrogation, I have specifically attempted to address these issues through targeted case studies. I have offered analysis of the overwhelmingly underappreciated figure of the superhero girlfriend and also considered the roles of heterosexuality and racial discourses in these films from angles that have not yet been considered in academia. Likewise, my discussion of Marvel superheroines assesses such characters specifically through the lens of postfeminist culture. All the while, I want to stress that this work remains interlinked with existing academic inquiries regarding women in both superhero and action cinema. While I have paid considerable attention to Marvel films as intertexts that bear relation to the comics on which they are based, there is still much

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work to be done. Marvel’s recent success with television series such as Agent Carter and Jessica Jones are sure to stimulate discussions regarding the configurations of feminine strength presented therein. Agent Carter is particularly interesting in the light of my discussions of postfeminist rhetoric in period settings, as well as further engaging with the superheroic postfeminist masquerade. Agent Carter takes place in the 1940s after the events of Captain America: The First Avenger. Having been given a job with the Strategic Scientific Reserve (SSR), a covert enterprise of crime-­ fighting, and then employed as a secretary, Carter must solve crimes on the sly. Indeed, much of the first season of the season is a meditation on the theme of Carter’s work being underappreciated by her male colleagues. A scene that stands out occurs in the final episode of the season, moments after Carter saves the day. In this scene, Carter’s boss Jack Thompson (Chad Michael Murray) is informed that he may be offered a Medal of Honor for the work that Carter ultimately carried out. Carter’s colleague Daniel Sousa (Enver Gjokaj), who, as someone who has had his leg amputated due to injuries sustained in the war is a notable example of a disabled Marvel character, expresses his disappointment with the situation, telling Carter he must go and inform his superiors of her hard work. To this, Carter responds, ‘I don’t need a congressional honour. I don’t need Agent Thompson’s approval, or the President’s. I know my value, anyone else’s opinion doesn’t really matter.’ This scene speaks to the individualism of neoliberal, postfeminist culture due to its emphasis on Carter’s ‘I’. Here, every woman knows her own value, as an individual, even in the face of blatant institutional inequality, which continues to this day. It also abandons the need for collective action against inequality, for if every woman knows her own value, individually, then instances of sexism are the responsibility of select individuals and not institutions. While Agent Carter was a mainstream network product, both Jessica Jones and its predecessor Daredevil (a reinvigorated retelling of the character who appears in the identically titled film) were produced by online streaming service Netflix. One might ask, then, what opportunities are offered by digital platforms with regards to women’s representation and how this particular form coincides with ideological and narrative elements. Recent scholarly interventions in discussions of Netflix streaming series as ‘quality TV’ are notable here, as Netflix’s partnership with Marvel intersected with ‘the wider cultural traction of “feminist” rhetoric [and] . . . Netflix’s reliance on it as brand identifier’ (Havas 2016: 15; see also Baker 2017, Sweet 2018, Jenner 2018). The significance of these Marvel media texts notwithstanding, Netflix abruptly cancelled all of its Marvel series in 2018, presumably in advance

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of Disney launching its own streaming platform in 2019 with the intention of producing its own Marvel superhero series that join onto the MCU. Series that have been announced address gaps noted throughout this book, for example the adaptation of Kamala Khan (Kit and Goldberg 2019). Indeed, the launch of Disney+, alongside Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox­– ­which previously owned the film rights to the X-­Men characters­– h ­ as reinvigorated discussions around vertical integration and the Hollywood entertainment industry alongside debates centring on transmedia storytelling and franchising. What I propose, here, is that these discussions regarding industrial practices and economics should involve an incorporation of related political and social dimensions of production, representation and reception contexts. Much like the discussion about so-­called quality TV invariably reached to gender representation, Disney’s future Marvel offerings, which can be seen as part of Marvel’s overarching project of superhero revisionism, will doubtless have political implications. In the light of the election of Trump, Brexit and the global turn to right-­wing politics, it is noteworthy that popular discussions of Marvel texts’ feminism(s) are ongoing. This can be attributed to the increased intertwining of both popular feminism and popular misogyny that has emerged over the last decade, part of what Banet-­Weiser has called the ‘funhouse mirror’ (Banet-­Weiser 2018) of popular culture, in which postfeminism and popular feminisms are ‘mutually sustaining’ (Banet-­Weiser 2018: 20) while recentring the notion of white male wounding. Indeed, as Marvel adaptations become more ostentatiously aimed at women through the invocation of feminist discourses, it is likely that these representations, like those of Captain Marvel, invariably hinge on imbuing their heroines with an empowerment guided by ‘entrepreneurial spirit, resilience [and] gumption’ (Banet-­Weiser 2018: 20) in accordance with the spirit of a neoliberal individualism that nonetheless accounts for critiques of itself as such. That said, it has not been my intention throughout this book to tell viewers whether or not they are allowed to find Marvel women empowering. This project was not intended to determine how audiences negotiate the issues of gender and power, but rather how gender and power (combined with postfeminist sentiments related to sexuality and race) are discursively constructed in these globally consumed texts. Regarding audiences, there is much work to be carried out, although Scott’s examination of fan activity within the Hawkeye Initiative illuminates the ways in which superhero fans address gender issues in often resourceful ways (Scott 2015). Meanwhile, Burke’s audience reception study mentioned

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af t e r wo rd 263 in the Introduction makes a strong attempt to address comic book fans’ engagement with superhero films but is largely interested in issues of adaptation. In the Introduction, I stressed the need to consider both postfeminism and Hollywood cinema as sites of development. Given that I have very cautiously suggested that change might be on the horizon for women’s visibility in Hollywood cinema, I must also note that there is still room for more. As mentioned in previous chapters, there is ample opportunity for media texts based on existing Marvel women who fall outside the white, heterosexual, middle-­class bracket, such as America Chavez of the Young Avengers. In terms of Marvel’s comic book output, the company has had considerable success with new women-­centric titles, as I mentioned in the Introduction and throughout. I further hope that a dialogue between both media can be maintained in terms of both representation and scholarly interrogation. Logan and Deadpool marked a generic break from what has come to be widely recognised as traditional Marvel superhero fare. Both became the subject of popular discourses on the social and commercial benefits of R-­rated films superhero films. Indeed, Deadpool makes use of the superhero genre for comic effect (the hero’s healing factor is utilised for this on numerous occasions, such as when he receives a gunshot wound to his backside or when he severs his own hand to release himself from handcuffs, leaving behind his hand with a raised middle finger), while Logan, as I discussed in Chapter 5, used the character’s potential for revisionism to more radical ends focusing on the liberation of marginalised mutants. The generic relevance of these films notwithstanding, the debates circulating these films again boil down to notions of quality and taste, which themselves are gendered. It would, for instance, be interesting to observe how an R-­rated Marvel film based on a female superhero would manifest and how she might be received. Since its inception, the superhero figure has been a site of struggle tying into definitions of gender, sexuality, race and nationality. The endurance of Marvel women coincides with shifting definitions of what it means to be heroic and a woman in contemporary Western culture. More generally, there remains a cultural fascination with these fantastical figures and their articulation of often contradictory politics. In looking forward, we should not lose track of the representations that have existed throughout Marvel’s history, which will doubtless shape forthcoming portrayals in one way or another, and continue to discuss the very complexities that make superheroes so compelling as part of the multifaceted intertextual web of culture.

Filmography

12 Years a Slave (Steve McQueen, USA/­UK, 2013) 42 (Brian Helgeland, USA, 2013), A Time to Kill (Joel Schumacher, USA, 1996) Agent Carter (ABC, 2015–16) Alien (Ridley Scott, USA/­UK, 1979) Aliens (James Cameron, USA, 1986) The Amazing Spider-­Man (Marc Webb, USA, 2012) The Amazing Spider-­Man 2 (Marc Webb, USA, 2014) American Psycho (Mary Harron, USA, 2000), Amistad (Steven Spielberg, USA, 1997) Ant-­Man (Peyton Reed, USA, 2015) Ant-­Man and the Wasp (Peyton Reed, USA, 2018) Avengers: Age of Ultron (Joss Whedon, USA, 2015) Avengers: Endgame (Anthony and Joe Russo, USA, 2019) Back to the Future Part II (Robert Zemeckis, USA, 1989) Barb Wire (David Hogan, USA, 1996) Basic Instinct (Paul Verhoeven, USA/­Fr, 1992) Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (Zack Snyder, USA, 2016) The Birth of a Nation (D. W. Griffith, USA, 1915) Black Panther (Ryan Coogler, USA, 2018) Blade (Stephen Norrington, USA, 1998) Blade: Trinity (David S. Goyer, USA, 2004) Blade Runner (Ridley Scott, USA/HK, 1982) Buffy the Vampire Slayer (The WB, 1997–2001; UPN, 2001–3) Captain America (Albert Pyun, USA, 1990) Captain America: Civil War (Anthony and Joe Russo, USA, 2016) Captain America: The First Avenger (Joe Johnston, USA, 2011) Captain America: The Winter Soldier (Anthony and Joe Russo, USA, 2014) Captain Marvel (Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, USA, 2019) Catwoman (Pitof, USA, 2005) Charlie’s Angels (ABC, 1976–81) Creed (Ryan Coogler, USA, 2015) Daredevil (Mark Steven Johnson, USA, 2003) Dark Phoenix (Simon Kinberg, USA, 2019) Deadpool (Tim Miller, USA, 2016)

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f il mo gr a p hy 265 Deadpool 2 (David Leitch, USA, 2018) Death Wish (Michael Winner, USA, 1974) Dirty Harry (Don Siegel, USA, 1971) The Divergent Series (film series, USA, 2014–17) Elektra (Rob Bowman, USA/­Can, 2005) Family Matters (ABC, 1989–97; CBS, 1997–8) FANT4STIC (Josh Trank, USA, 2015) Fantastic Four (Tim Story, USA, 2005) Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (Tim Story, USA/­UK/­Ger, 2007) Fatal Attraction (Adrian Lyne, USA, 1987) Firefly (Fox, 2002) The Fresh Prince of Bel-­Air (NBC, 1990–6) Fruitvale Station (Ryan Coogler, USA, 2013) Gaslight (Geroge Cukor, USA, 1944) Get on Up (Tate Taylor, USA, 2014) Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, USA, 2012) Gladiator (Ridley Scott, UK/­USA, 2000) The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, USA, 1972) Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 1 (James Gunn, USA, 2014) Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (James Gunn, USA, 2017) The Hand that Rocks the Cradle (Curtis Hanson, USA, 1992) Hanna (Joe Wright, Ger/­UK/­USA, 2011) Hard Candy (David Slade, USA, 2005) Hulk (Ang Lee, USA, 2003) The Hunger Games (film series, USA, 2012–15) The Incredible Hulk (Louis Leterrier, USA, 2008) Iron Man (Jon Favreau, USA, 2008) Iron Man 2 (Jon Favreau, USA, 2010) Iron Man 3 (Shane Black, USA, 2013) Justice League (Zack Snyder, USA, 2017) Kick-­Ass (Matthew Vaughn, UK/­USA, 2010) Kick-­Ass 2 (Jeff Wadlow, UK/­USA, 2013) La Femme Nikita (Luc Besson, Fr/­Ita, 1990) Léon: The Professional (Luc Besson, Fr, 1995) Lethal Weapon (Richard Donner, USA, 1987) Logan (James Mangold, USA, 2017) Mad Max (George Miller, Aus, 1979) Malcolm X (Spike Lee, USA, 1992) Marshall (Reginald Hudlin, USA, 2017) Marvel’s Daredevil (Netflix, 2016–18) Marvel’s Iron Fist (Netflix, 2017–18) Marvel’s Jessica Jones (Netflix, 2015–19) Marvel’s Luke Cage (Netflix, 2016–18) Marvel’s The Avengers (Joss Whedon, USA, 2012) Marvel’s The Punisher (Netflix, 2017–19)

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Once Upon a Time in the West (Sergio Leone, Ita/­USA, 1968) Point of No Return (John Badham, USA, 1993) The Punisher (Mark Goldblatt, Aus/­USA, 1989) The Punisher (Jonathan Hensleigh, USA, 2004) Rear Window (Alfred Hitchcock, USA, 1954) Rebecca (Alfred Hitchcock, USA, 1940) The Right Stuff (Philip Kaufman, USA, 1983) Saturday Night Fever (John Badham, USA, 1977) Selma (Ava DuVernay, UK/­USA, 2014) Shane (George Stevens, USA, 1953) Shazam! (David F. Sandberg, USA, 2019) Single White Female (Barbet Shroeder, USA, 1992) Spider-­Man (Sam Raimi, USA, 2002) Spider-­Man 2 (Sam Raimi, USA, 2004) Spider-­Man 3 (Sam Raimi, USA, 2007) Spider-­Man: Far From Home (Jon Watts, USA, 2019) Spider-­Man: Homecoming (Jon Watts, USA, 2017) Spider-­Man: Into the Spider-­Verse (Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey and Rodney Rothman, USA, 2018) Star Trek: The Next Generation (CBS, 1987–94) Sucker Punch (Zack Snyder, USA/­Can, 2011) Supergirl (Jeannot Szwarc, UK, 1984) Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, USA, 1976) Terminator 2: Judgment Day (James Cameron, USA, 1991) Thor (Kenneth Branagh, USA, 2011) Thor: Ragnarok (Taika Waititi, USA, 2017) Thor: The Dark World (Alan Taylor, USA, 2013) Titanic (James Cameron, USA, 1997) Top Gun (Tony Scott, USA, 1986) The Twilight Saga (film series, USA, 2008–12) Unforgiven (Clint Eastwood, USA, 1992) Veronica Mars (UPN, 2004–6; The CW, 2006–7) Violet and Daisy (Geoffrey S. Fletcher, USA, 2013) Wall Street (Oliver Stone, USA, 1987) What’s Love Got to Do with It (Brian Gibson, USA, 1993) The Wolverine (James Mangold, USA, 2013) Wonder Woman (Patty Jenkins, USA, 2017) X2 (Bryan Singer, USA, 2003) X-­Men (Bryan Singer, USA, 2000) X-­Men: Apocalypse (Bryan Singer, USA, 2016) X-­Men: Days of Future Past (Bryan Singer, USA, 2014) X-Men: Evolution (Kids’ WB,2000–3) X-­Men: First Class (Matthew Vaughn, USA/­UK, 2011). X-­Men Origins: Wolverine (Gavin Hood, USA, 2009) X-­Men: The Last Stand (Brett Ratner, UK/­USA, 2006)

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Index

abject, 150–1, 159–60, 162, 169 action cinema, 17, 33, 46, 127, 130, 133, 246, 252 heroes, 32–3, 34, 76, 130 heroines, 16, 19, 26, 28, 33, 39, 68, 71–92, 93, 97, 99–100, 179–81, 222–5 active/ passive dichotomy, 18, 33, 37, 43, 59, 69, 74; see also Mulvey, Laura adaptation, 10–13, 32, 47, 91, 104, 111, 161 aesthetics, 11, 17, 117, 130, 218, 223, 237, 242, 244, 245, 246, 247, 248, 254 African American, 211, 225, 241, 243–6, 248–9, 253, 259 Afrofuturism, 242, 244–7, 252–8 agency, 47, 61, 66, 96, 119, 128, 148, 151, 156, 183, 256; see also postfeminist: choice Amazing Spider-Man films, 58–67 animality, 134–8, 140, 221 antihero, 77–80, 121 Ant-Man (Scott Lang), 91 Asgardian identity, 161, 164, 165–6, 236–41, 248, 258 Avengers films, 7, 11, 26, 55, 93, 98–101, 168, 186, 187–91, 217 Back to the Future, 251, 255, 259 Bad Girl art, 70 BDSM, 149 Beyoncé, 247 biocapitalism, 125 biological sex, 53, 134, 173, 180, 187, 193, 208; see also essentialism bisexuality, 174–5, 183–4, 209 black girl nerds, 256–8 Black Panther (film), 7, 211, 218, 232, 233–4, 237, 241–59 Black Panther (T’Challa), 211, 218, 233–6, 237, 241–58

Black Widow (Natasha Romanoff), 85, 89–90, 93, 97–101, 207 Blade films, 75–6, 85, 86, 93, 217–22 Blade (character), 75–6, 217–21; see also Jenson, Karen Blaxploitation cinema; 218–19, 221, 244 body horror, 150, 160 body without organs, 171, 172, 177 Bond, James, 252, 256 Boseman, Chadwick, 242 box office revenue, 2, 4, 16, 19–20, 242; see also reception brand identity, 3, 11, 67, 86–7, 124, 164, 213, 251, 261, see also consumerism Brexit, 233–4, 262 Brown, Jeffrey, 2, 19, 70, 84, 100–1, 119, 125, 126, 133, 135–6, 179–80, 181, 215, 216, 217, 225 Burke, Tarana, 3; see also Me Too Butler, Judith, 94, 171, 173–4, 177, 179, 181, 183, 197–8; see also performativity Cage, Luke, 80, 218, 233, 245 Campbell, Joseph, 32–3 Captain America (Steve Rogers), 2, 8, 93, 101, 104, 201–4, 207, 258, 261 Captain America films, 7, 93, 101, 104, 201–4, 207, 248, 258, 261 Captain Marvel (film), 4, 80, 91, 93, 96, 101–18, 121, 192, 203, 259, 262 Captain Marvel (Carol Danvers), 4, 80, 91, 92, 93, 96, 101–18, 121, 192, 203, 259, 262 Carter, Peggy, 14, 93, 202–4, 261 cinematography, 5, 84, 85, 131, 138, 140, 246, 254 civil rights, 3, 126, 175, 184–5, 198, 214, 218, 223, 231, 243, 244 clones, 78, 123, 125–6, 127, 128, 140, 143 colonialism, 129, 140, 162, 166–8, 170, 188, 211, 237–8, 241, 244, 252–4

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colourblind racism, 212–13, 215, 216, 239, 240 colourism, 224 comic books, 1–3, 4, 5, 7–13, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 25, 26, 27, 29, 30–2, 34, 35, 36–7, 38, 44, 46, 47, 48–9, 63, 69–71, 75, 78–9, 81, 82, 84, 85, 88, 90, 104, 111, 124, 135, 145, 149, 157, 161, 172, 175, 188, 198, 204, 205, 207, 214–16, 237, 242, 244, 263 comics studies, 7–10, 27, 211 commodification, 22, 24, 86, 87, 91, 129, 169, 213, 214, 216, 223, 229–30, 231, 232, 259 consumerism, 22, 73, 87, 96, 97, 108, 115, 230, 232 costuming, 38, 63, 69–71, 81, 84, 85, 90, 95, 97, 114–6, 143, 149, 151, 153, 163, 169, 187, 216, 242, 248, 250–1; see also postfeminist: masquerade Creed, Barbara, 150; see also femininity: monstrous cross-dressing, 71–3 Cyborg Manifesto, 184–5, 192; see also Haraway, Donna J. cyborgs, 171–3, 184–92

dystopia, 120, 124, 127, 129, 131, 143, 179, 230, 236, 237, 253

damsel in distress, 26, 30, 41, 42, 44, 50, 51, 54, 208 ; see also women: in refrigerators Daredevil (Matt Murdock), 35, 76, 77, 80, 86, 90, 157, 261 Dark Knight Returns, The, 31 Dark Phoenix, 151–6; see also Grey, Jean DC properties, 2, 8, 9, 30, 69, 95, 102, 103, 115, 214, 215, 234 Deadpool, 5, 44, 126, 208–9, 263 DeConnick, Kelly Sue, 103–4 Deleuze and Guattari, 171, 172, 184 diaspora, 165, 168, 240, 243, 247, 248, 253, 258 disability, 23, 71, 90, 130, 159, 259, 261 disguise, see postfeminist: masquerade Disney+, 14, 27, 262 Disney, 7, 14, 27, 258, 262 Ditko, Steve, 9 diversity, 3, 164, 213, 214–16, 218, 230, 231–2 domesticity, 14, 22, 51–2, 72, 107, 113, 174, 192 Dora Milaje, 250–1, 254, 255, 257 double consciousness, 249 Dyer, Richard, 69, 212

family, 35–6, 45, 54, 113, 115, 118, 120–1, 129, 132, 134, 143, 165, 166, 171, 187–92, 198, 206, 209, 235, 243; see also queer: family Fantastic Four, 7, 48, 82–3, 85–6, 88–9, 198, 206, 217, 243, 258, 259 far-right politics, 25, 130, 143, 163–4, 165–6, 167, 170, 241, 245, 259, 262 fatherhood, 36, 45, 77, 126–7, 129, 135, 136, 174, 187–8, 201 female audiences, 15–16, 19, 63, 117, 119, 228, 262 femininity, 4, 14, 22, 24, 25, 27, 42, 46, 47, 66, 73–6, 86–88, 91, 94–101, 102, 104, 108, 109, 112, 117, 118, 120, 121, 132, 135, 145, 147, 149, 150, 151, 159, 160, 162, 163, 166, 167, 167, 174, 177, 179, 180, 181, 184, 186, 193, 195, 198, 208, 212, 219, 221–2, 224, 226, 230, 231, 235, 243, 250, 254, 256 black, 213, 219, 221–5, 250, 254–6 heroic, 14, 33, 68–92, 93–118, 102, 104, 241 heterosexual, 41, 46, 47, 53, 67, 88, 91, 181, 195–9, 198, 206–7, 208, 260, 263 monstrous, 145–70

Eastwood, Clint, 124, 127 economies of visibility, 2 editing, 5, 84, 140, 165, 190 Elba, Idris, 240 Elektra, 76–80, 84–5, 86, 93, 102, 105, 110, 119–23, 125–6, 129, 132–3, 135, 152, 157–8 emotions, 16, 35, 36, 41, 52–3, 60, 63, 81, 83, 86, 88, 99, 105, 136, 206 empire, 161, 165, 166–8, 234–5, 236, 238, 239, 244 empowerment, 4, 15, 22–3, 25–6, 30, 52, 68, 73–5, 91, 94, 104, 114, 116–7, 118, 120, 123, 129, 136, 149, 223, 224, 228, 229, 231, 260, 262 Enlightenment era, 172, 185, 188 essentialism, 53, 72, 94, 101, 120, 134, 135, 141, 155, 174, 197, 206, 253, 256; see also biological sex exertion, 39, 178 exoticism, 211, 216, 223–4, 226, 227, 228–9, 231, 235, 244; see also Orientalism

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inde x 309 queer, 81, 173–84, 208, 238, 250 white, 46, 67, 88, 91, 113, 181 212, 260, 263 see also postfeminist: masquerade feminist politics, 2–3, 4, 6, 21, 23, 25–6, 87, 94, 103, 108, 109, 113, 114, 115, 167, 172, 184–6; see also postfeminist feminist film theory, 4, 15–20, 107, 210 femmes fatales, 147–8, 160 fidelity, 11–13 fight sequence, 38–9, 40–1, 42–3, 57–8, 64–5, 76, 84, 85–7, 89–90, 105, 122, 140, 160, 165, 180, 182, 187, 189–90, 207, 227, 246, 251 film narrative, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 29–34, 35–41, 43–6, 47–8, 50, 53, 55, 56, 57, 61, 63–6, 71, 73–4, 75–6, 78, 80–4, 93, 96, 97, 98, 102, 112, 122–3, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 131, 133, 141, 142, 148–9, 151, 164, 178, 183, 186, 190, 191, 195, 199–204, 207, 223, 227, 229, 238, 241, 243, 246, 258 flashbacks, 35, 77–8, 111, 112–4, 116, 122, 151, 189 franchising, 7, 17, 20, 27, 47, 102, 119, 130, 262 Friedan, Betty, 174 frontier myth, 130, 141, 143 frustration tactics, 68–92, 148, 149, 156, 178 Gamora, 187, 189–90, 217, 235 gaslighting, 106–8 gay, 87, 185, 213, 232 gaystreaming, 24 gender binary, 18, 73, 88, 100, 183, 184, 193, 195, 197 fluidity, 55, 172, 173–84, 185 identity, 173, 177, 183–6 parody, 177–9 performativity 97, 172, 173–4, 177, 180–3; see also Butler, Judith roles, 10, 44, 45, 55, 58, 74, 86, 88, 94, 96 101, 121, 131, 134, 174, 179, 180, 198, 206, 207, 229 genre, 8, 9, 14, 17–18, 19, 27, 44, 63, 68, 72, 119, 126, 130, 150, 168, 171, 217, 225, 245–6, 256, 263; see also action: cinema; science fiction Gill, Rosalind, 6, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 47, 70, 108, 118

Gillen, Karen, 187 Girl Power, 120, 133, 203 girlfriends, 10, 29–45, 48–67, 78, 82, 203–4, 209, 216, 260 globalisation, 213, 214, 227, 230, 231, 232 gothic melodrama, 107, 117 Grey, Jean, 69, 73, 80, 81–2, 131, 150–6, 158, 159, 162, 168; see also Dark Phoenix Guardians of the Galaxy films, 118, 171, 184, 186–92, 217, 235, 258 gun culture, 252 Haraway, Donna J., 184, 185, 186, 189, 191, 192 Hawkeye Initiative, 262 Hela, 161–8, 236, 238, 239 heteronormativity, 29, 152, 194–9, 204 heterosexuality, 24, 29, 30, 41, 53, 155, 170, 175, 184, 193–209 Hollywood mainstream, 32, 164, 173, 195, 210, 225 Millennial, 16–17, 32 New, 32 hooks, bell, 213, 215, 231 Hulk (Bruce Banner), 7, 100, 201–2, 236, 240 humour, 44, 89–90, 179, 208–9, 237, 238 identification, 37, 112, 113, 117, 121, 189, 193 ideology, 4, 12, 14, 18, 133, 134, 165, 238, 239, 249 patriarchal, 4, 18 indigenous peoples, 130, 216–17, 230, 236, 247 individualism, 22–4, 65, 108, 109, 114, 117, 123, 135, 143, 121, 231, 234, 261, 262 intertextuality, 9, 12–13, 111, 124, 143, 242, 246, 251, 259, 260, 263 Invisible Woman (Susan Storm), 2, 48, 82–4, 89, 149, 151, 198, 217 Iron Man films, 7, 26, 29, 30, 47–58, 59, 66, 85, 89–90, 93, 101, 206 Iron Man (Tony Stark), 48–58, 67, 89, 93, 101, 207 ironic sexism, 89, 182 ; see also postfeminist: irony Islamophobia, 1, 170 Jackman, Hugh, 130 Japanese culture, 226–30; see also shōjo

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Jenson, Karen, 217–21 Jones, Jessica, 14, 80, 261 Jungle Action, 244; see also Black Panther (T’Challa) Keen, Dafne, 128–9 Kirby, Jack, 9, 243, 244, 245 kissing, 38, 40, 41, 53, 80, 148, 152, 154, 158, 159, 179, 181, 202 Lawrence, Jennifer, 177, 182, 235 Led Zeppelin, 240 Lee, Stan, 9, 16, 243 legacy characters, 114, 120, 123–4, 132, 133, 140, 142–3 lesbian, 27, 174–5, 158 LGBTQ Rights, 24, 198, 208, 214 liberal politics, 24, 164, 168 Logan, 120–1, 123–44, 263 luminosity, 48, 108, 113, 115, 116, 117; see also McRobbie, Angela McRobbie, Angela, 5, 21–2, 24, 48, 96–7, 109–10, 181, 212, 227 MacTaggert, Moira, 87 ‘mammy’, see racial stereotypes Madrid, Mike, 10, 68, 71, 88, 149, 151, 216 male gaze, 18, 59, 88; see also Mulvey, Laura marginalisation, 24, 76, 86, 104, 127, 164, 233, 243, 244 Mariko, 226–7 marketing, 17, 63, 102, 111, 118 marriage, 32, 83, 195, 198–9, 205–6, 227; see also heteronormativity martial arts, 77, 89, 218, 228 Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), 7, 14, 17, 27, 91, 103, 105, 107, 161, 173, 184, 191, 235, 236, 237, 258, 262 Mar-Vell, 103, 105, 107, 110, 111, 115, 116 masculinity 10, 16, 24, 27, 42, 52, 69, 73, 74, 81, 94, 95, 96, 104, 111, 112, 118, 129, 130, 131, 155, 179, 180, 186, 193, 208, 216, 222, 226, 242, 245, 252 ageing, 124, 127, 130–1 black, 242, 245 in crisis, 186 white, 10, 129, 130, 188, 216, 222, 226 and women, 74, 94–6, 111, 112, 179–80 Me Too, 3, 6, 23, ‘melting pot’ myth, 225, 252

memory, 102, 110–11, 115, 117, 205; see also flashback metrosexual, 76 militarism, 104, 109, 110–18, 125, 134, 189, 203, 234, 235 Millett, Kate, 45 mise en scène, 5, 39, 84 misogyny, 30, 76, 87, 100, 106, 169, 234, 245, 262 monarchy, 167–8, 234, 239, 245, 248, 249, 257, 258 motherhood, 23, 101, 120–1, 123, 125, 126, 129, 150 Ms. magazine, 25 Ms. Marvel (Kamala Khan), 1–2, 10, 103, 231, 262 multiculturalism, see postracialism Mulvey, Laura, 17–18, 33, 37, 43, 69, 73 muscles, 69, 155, 180 musculinity, 72, 80; see also Tasker, Yvonne Muslim, 1, 2 mutant metaphor, 87, 125, 127, 175, 177, 214, 222, 231, 243, 244 Mystique, 2, 101, 171–84, 185, 192, 208, 224, 230, 235 nakedness, 35, 57, 89, 95, 136, 178–9, 182, 204 Nakia, 242, 251–2, 254, 257 Natchios, Elektra, 2, 76–80, 84–5, 86, 90, 92, 105, 120–3, 126, 129, 132–3, 143, 157–8 Nazis, 165, 170, 202 Nebula, 171–3, 184–92, 235 Negra, Diane, 22, 24, 25, 26, 52, 53, 74–5, 86, 198 neoconservatism, 24 neoliberalism, 22–3, 24, 25, 52, 96, 105, 108, 118, 126, 128, 129, 167, 175, 213–14, 233–4, 247, 257, 261, 262 Netflix, 14, 27, 35, 80, 218, 261 Nine Inch Nails, 110 Nirvana, 110 Noddings, Nel, 146–7, 149–50, 160 Norse mythology, 161, 163–4, 166, 236, 240, 248 nostalgia, 21, 45, 110, 207 O’Day, Marc, 73–4, 76 objectification, 22, 24, 69–71 Okoye, 250–2, 254

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inde x 311 Orientalism, 211–2, 216, 218, 223, 226, 227, 228, 235, 248 origin story, 35, 37, 49, 117, 204 otherness, 146, 166, 185, 211, 214, 217, 225, 231, 235, 253 paedophilia, 136–7 Paltrow, Gwyneth, 26, 66–7 pansexuality, 208, 209; see also bisexuality patriarchal, 4, 18, 20, 26, 45, 52, 68, 69, 71, 73, 77, 80, 91, 96–7, 102, 105, 109, 110, 117, 118, 135, 145, 146, 155, 164, 167, 168, 169, 181, 185, 186, 192, 196, 205, 209, 214, 235, 241, 245, 250, 252, 254, 257, 258, 259 penetration, 84 phallic, 72, 84 point of view, 37, 40, 41, 51, 59, 111, 121, 140, 175, 197, 237 political incorrectness, 21, 75, 233–4 popular culture, 1, 2, 4, 6, 10, 14, 21, 30, 33, 47, 114, 118, 119, 123, 186, 187, 228, 229, 241, 253, 262 feminisms, 25, 91, 94, 102, 104, 106, 108, 245, 259, 262 psychology, 197 post-9/11, 36, 127, 228 postfeminist authenticity, 23, 108, 112, 117, 120, 123, 218 choice, 22–4, 41, 47, 54, 65–6, 81, 90, 96, 117, 151 culture, 6, 19, 21–6, 29, 45, 48, 54, 66–7, 68, 70–1, 73–5, 85–8, 94, 96, 108, 119–120, 123, 145, 149, 181, 184, 186, 192, 203, 207, 210, 211–13, 224, 231, 252, 260, 261 irony, 68, 89–90, 93, 98, 181–2 masquerade, 93–118, 177, 180, 181, 261 posthumanism, 171–3, 177, 179, 182, 184–92, 259 postmodernism, 96, 237, 238, 246 postracialism, 129, 143, 212–17, 224, 227–8, 231–2, 233–5, 237–8, 241, 254, 260 Potts, Pepper, 2, 47–59, 67, 89, 206 Psylocke (Betsy Braddock), 215–16, 232 Punisher films, 6, 35–6, 40, 45, 113, 210, 225, 259 Punisher (Frank Castle), 6, 34–6, 40, 43, 45, 77, 113, 225, 259

quality discourses, 11–12, 14, 31, 77, 80, 261–2, 263 queer, 4, 20, 23, 27, 71, 81, 118, 167, 171, 174, 177, 179, 181, 183, 184, 191, 192, 193–6, 206, 207, 208, 238, 250, 259 family, 118, 191 readings, 27, 81, 118, 171, 179, 206, 208–9 theory, 4, 193–6, 207 women, 20, 23, 71, 167, 174, 207, 238, 250, 259 see also Mystique racial difference, 211, 213, 215, 216, 230, 238, 239; see also postracialism racial stereotypes, 222, 224 racism, 1, 71, 106, 163, 212, 214, 215, 233, 234, 237, 243 Rambeau, Maria, 111–6, 118 rape, 24, 30, 31, 33–4, 105, 219–22 reception, 1, 5, 12, 80, 102, 262 refugees, 105, 230–1, 240–1 revenge, 14, 32–4, 35, 44, 151, 189, 199; see also women in refrigerators revisionism, 8–9, 103–4, 114, 123, 142–3, 260, 262, 263 Ripley, Ellen, 71–2, 74, 88, 121 Riviere, Joan, 94–6, 100, 110; see also postfeminist: masquerade Rogue (Marie), 80–2, 136, 152 Romijn, Rebecca, 176, 181, 235 romance, 16, 17, 63, 193, 195, 199–200, 202, 206, 217, 229 sacrifice, 43, 82, 101, 127, 131, 151, 221 Said, Edward, 211; see also Orientalism Saldaña, Zoë, 217, 225, 235 Schatz, Thomas, 16–17, 32, 145 science fiction, 17, 48, 120, 171, 186, 192, 236, 237, 242, 245–247, 249, 255; see also Afrofuturism scopophilia, 18, 73; see also Mulvey, Laura self-confidence, 23, 106, 108, 118, 223 self-reflexivity, 61, 115, 127, 130, 131 sex workers, 133, 156, 159, 218 sexual difference, 22, 73, 96, 134, 148, 215 sexualisation, 6, 32, 24, 68–71, 74, 80, 86, 88, 133–4, 136, 148–9, 156, 169, 177, 179, 211, 223–4; see also objectification

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sexuality, 2, 3, 4, 14, 17, 18, 24, 26, 27, 46, 74, 75, 88, 106, 107, 136, 147, 148, 149, 151, 154, 156, 159, 168, 169, 173–6, 179, 183–4, 193–209, 213, 214, 219, 221, 223, 224, 225, 226, 259, 260, 262, 263 shōjo, 228–9 Shuri, 247, 251–7, 258 Silverfox, Kayla, 44, 78, 216–17 Simone, Gail, 30, 32; see also women in refrigerators slavery, 125, 235, 236, 237, 238, 242, 243, 248, 255 soap opera, 8, 17, 205–6 Spider-Man films (Sam Raimi), 27, 29–30, 31, 36–43, 51, 55, 56, 59, 60, 63, 65 Spider-Man (Miles Morales), 231–2 Spider-Man (Peter Parker), 2, 11, 27, 29, 30, 31–2, 35, 36–43, 47, 51, 52, 55, 56, 58–67, 82, 91, 92, 199, 204–6, 231–2 Stacy, Gwen, 2, 31–2, 34, 36, 38, 41–2, 43, 47–8, 58–67, 91; see also women in refrigerators Stam, Robert, 11–12 Stone, Emma, 67 Storm (Ororo Munroe), 222–223, 224, 230, 231, 234, 245 superhero genre conventions, 3, 17, 30, 44, 68, 90, 80, 81, 93, 104, 108, 171, 185, 209, 263 superpowers, 2, 10, 31, 37, 39, 40, 44, 58, 60, 61, 65, 68–9, 73, 77, 78, 80–4, 87–9, 97, 105, 106, 108, 116, 121–2, 123, 131, 137, 139, 140, 148–9, 151–3, 155–6, 157–9, 160, 161, 162, 163, 168, 174, 175, 176, 178, 182–3, 189, 190, 192, 204–5, 208, 222, 223, 230, 235, 256 Tasker, Yvonne, 17, 19, 22, 24, 25, 26, 33, 72, 74, 111, 112, 180, 222 teenage girl subjectivity, 1, 70, 78, 93, 119, 120–6, 133–6, 229 television, 9, 11, 14–15, 77, 261–2 temporality, 8, 48, 104, 191, 203 Thanos, 184, 187, 189–90, 191, 235 Wasp (Hope van Dyne), 91 Thor, 161–8, 199–200, 236–41, 248 Thor: Ragnarok, 115, 145, 161–8, 208, 211, 233, 236–41, 245–6, 248, 258, 259 transmedia, 10–11, 14, 17, 19, 32, 130, 262 trauma, 31, 38, 55, 122, 124, 243, 245

Trump, Donald, 1, 7, 25, 103, 106, 108, 120, 127–8, 145, 161, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 211, 233–4, 238, 239, 241, 245, 262 Twilight, 20, 63, 119 Typhoid, 152, 157–9, 162, 168 US Air Force, 103, 105, 110–13, 116, 117–18 Valkyrie, 164, 168, 208, 236–41, 259 vampires, 75–6, 85–6, 93, 217–21; see also Blade victimisation, 29, 32, 33, 36, 39, 43, 44, 45, 51, 62–3, 66, 98–100, 106, 118, 126, 135, 169, 195, 219, 220, 221, 255, 260 villainesses, see femininity: monstrous violence, 6, 15–16, 23, 30, 70, 79, 84, 98, 118, 125–7, 133–42, 162, 209, 219, 221, 238 Viper, 158–61, 162, 168, 227 virgin/whore dichotomy, 147 visual effects, 108, 115, 187 vulnerability, 35, 38, 43, 50, 57, 93, 133, 150, 182, 227, 239 Wakanda, 234, 235, 241, 243, 244, 247, 248, 249–53, 254, 255, 256, 257–8 Watchmen, 31, 69 Watson, Mary Jane, 36–43, 51, 52, 56, 59, 60, 65, 199, 205 westerns, 124, 130, 138, 139 white supremacy, 145, 161, 163–8, 221, 227, 233, 236, 238, 241, 248, 252 whiteness, 23, 24, 25, 46, 66, 68, 73, 76, 88, 91, 109, 113, 121, 124, 129, 130, 155, 172, 175, 181, 185, 188, 203, 210–12, 213, 214, 215, 216, 217, 218, 220, 222–7, 228, 230, 232, 234, 235, 240, 244, 245, 252–3, 256, 259, 262, 263 witches, see femininity: monstrous wokeness, 241, 259 Wolverine, The (film), 158–61, 210, 226–30, 231 Wolverine (Logan), 44, 78, 80, 81, 82, 114, 120, 121, 123–43, 154, 155, 159, 160, 178, 179, 216, 217, 226–7, 228, 230, 263 women of colour, 20, 23, 24, 71, 125, 167, 210–32, 260 and evil, see femininity: monstrous

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inde x 313 filmmakers, 3, 16, 103 in refrigerators, 29–46, 47, 48, 49, 53, 56, 63–6, 81, 98, 125, 195, 203–4 working, 22–3, 51–4, 91, 103, 131, 261 Wonder Woman, 25, 27, 102, 215, 234, 241 X-23 (Laura), 78, 119–20, 121, 123–43 Xavier, Charles, 81, 82, 126, 127, 128, 129,

131, 132, 133, 134, 137–8, 140, 141, 143, 151, 152, 153, 154–6, 177–8, 222, 223 X-Men films, 5, 27, 44, 73, 78, 80–2, 87, 123, 125, 127, 132, 150–6, 171, 173, 175–84, 192, 210, 216–7, 222–4, 230–1, 262; see also mutant metaphor Yukio, 159–60, 226–30