This is a comment by Jacobtk on the post “Golden Age Green Lantern Gay Now“.
I see this as a cop out. The average person does not know who Alan Scott is. I do not know how DC can call him icon when he is not even the Green Lantern people tend to think of. This was really a way for DC to play liberal politics to shut up one side and to play to the fanbase by not PC-retconning a character most fans love.
If DC really wanted to make waves, they would have made Hal Jordan or even Guy Gardner (a better choice) gay. Or they could have just made Aquaman gay since everyone already thinks he is.
On a side note, let us hope that DC changes Alan Scott’s weakness from wood.
Photo credit: Flickr / JD Hancock
About the Editors
The average person doesn’t read comic books. They don’t know Guy Gardner, either. Or even Hal Jordan, for that matter, unless you mention that he was played by Ryan Reynolds. Alan Scott is an icon, as is his daughter Jade.
Sure, he’s not a top tier DC character but he’s also one who’s pliable enough to be transformed. Hal Jordan can’t be re-written as a homosexual because that messes with his relationship with Carol Ferris which is an impetus for a large portion of his story.
It’s not about liberal or conservative (even though it’s so tempting to make everything seem that way in this election year). This is about changing the history of a character and that requires a character who is mutable.
For the record, Aquaman did get a complete revamping for the New 52; he’s a badass now.
p.s. I agree. That wood nonsense is just silly.
Yeah, because “the color yellow” makes SO much more sense.
Right on. DC have lost serious credibility by showing such weakness. It’s as hollow as the “Dubledore is Gay” thing from J.K Rowling.
Check out my article on the whole, shameless debacle
http://fundividedattention.wordpress.com/2012/06/03/great-scotts-dcs-closet-come-out-cop-out/
The main reason for making Alan gay is because the reboot made him younger, and thus wiped his gay son out of existence. This is just a way of rebalancing that. Also, DC already have a married gay couple in Apollo and Midniter, this isn’t really a big groundbreaking political move for them – It’s just something the writer of Earth 2 wanted to do.
They aren’t trying to be groundbreaking, they are trying to hit the gay money when its the hot thing
So it would be better if they just made all of their characters White Anglo-Saxon Protestant Heterosexuals? Perhaps, the national conversation concerning sexuality/gender politics has inspired DC to make a statement.
To think that print comic books are making any significant amount of money (let alone from some mythical monolithic homosexual reader base) is asinine. If the business model at DC Comics is to bank on homosexual readership then they need to fire just about everybody on the board.
Comic books have a history of commenting on social issues. Green Lantern got mixed up in race riots a few times in the past. Kyle Rayner’s roommate was gay-bashed. Captain America fought Hitler. Wonder Woman fought gender-bias in several storylines.
This is what they do. Science-Fiction and Fantasy have the power to comment on social issues with more power than those taken more seriously (comedy has the same privilege). Or perhaps you’ve never seen The Twilight Zone.
No, it was the constant complaining from liberals about the lack politically correct diversity that prompted DC to play politics. Progressives in the comic book community have been beating that drum lately. They run many of the popular comic book websites, so their voices are the loudest, even if the majority of fans could not care less about these topics.
The irony is that most of the people pushing for these changes do not buy the books. They may buy the first issue, but few stick around. Most of these books never solicit, let alone sell, in the top 25 books, and the few that do only do so because of the creators working on the books, not the characters. In the end, DC must rely on their fan base who always buys their books, but by playing politics DC turns those fans off, further causing the books to tank.
Science fiction is a good way to talk about social issues, yet that usually works best when there is actually a story rather than a pathetic attempt to appease a niche audience. DC’s (and Marvel’s) current changes are the latter, and that is why they fail.
Equal representation is not niche.
Maybe Focus on the Family will start printing comics.
Okay, last post, I promise. Then I’ll be done beating a dead thread. I don’t know if you have either a) never been 8 years old or b) never felt ‘other’, but you’re missing something important- kids are the driving force behind superhero stories.
So I don’t know if you never read them as a kid or if you never felt left out of them but it’s important. When I was eight years old, a friend of mine told me that I couldn’t be Superman because Superman is white. I can only think of a few instances since then that have been quite so heart-breaking.
Try to show some compassion that outweighs your conviction. Think about who this affects. What do you think this means to a young Green Lantern fan who has secret feelings?
Equal representation is not storytelling, and it is not what comics are about nor should it be. Equal representation is simply playing identity politics, and that only appeals to a niche audience that rarely buys comics, including comics featuring the politically correct characters they demanded.
I can appreciate people wanting characters to look like them, but that argument works in the reverse. If you cannot identify with characters who do not reflect your life or experiences, how can you expect other people to care about or identify with characters who do not reflect their lives or experiences, let alone expect them to support people changing characters they do identify with just to appeal to another group?
People should set aside the identity politics and just worry about telling good stories with good characters because a good story with good characters will take care of the rest.
And for the record, I have read comics for as long as I remember, and I have been a Batman fan since I was five. It was partly my love for Batman, a character I am nothing like, that helped me get through 14 years of abuse. So I am well of aware of the importance a character can have on a child. I am also aware of what it feels like to have a character you love retconned for no good reason.
Fair enough. Perhaps new characters (the diverse cast of Batman Inc. comes to mind) is the answer. Or independent comics.
High five for having an internet disagreement that remained civil. *Slap*
I disagree, you are disgusted with him turning out to be gay, and are using ‘bawwwww the PC police don’t let us have fun!” as a cop-out excuse, there are genuine reasons for objecting to a character being suddenly made gay, ‘bawwwww PC police!” isn’t one of them.