Girl-wonder.org: Geez, what a bunch of tools.

[Zev]

I came across this essay at the whackos' website and I just had to share. Go over here and read it. I'll wait.

Heroes are the light in the darkness, and the hope we have for a better tomorrow.

Heroes understand that, in the end, bringing themselves down to the level of the bad guys in order to win a fight is just another way that the light can be dimmed.

Just like Max Rockatansky, Mal Reynolds, Harry Callahan, and Bill Munny never said "Now it's personal!" and unleashed the old Finger o' God on their enemies. Which is why Mad Max, Serenity, Dirty Harry, and Tombstone were commercial and critical failures. Or, you know, Achilles in The Illiad. Or, hell, Medea. I have a feeling she would blow puny author's mind, which is why I heart Greek mythology. That, and Zeus/Hera. Their drama is more godly than your drama.

Of course, Miller gave us a Robin, too, which was great. She even stayed Robin until Miller decided that she was old enough for Batman to be screwing her. I’m going to leave that alone, save to mention how interesting it is that so many of Miller’s grim, gritty, half-broken, loner, male protagonists wind up with teenaged girls as lovers.

I love how snooty the article gets here. Because if there's one thing fangirls won't tolerate, it's middle-aged men having sex with teenagers. Quick, dear reader, let's compare and contrast!

Frank Miller-

Nineteen-year-old Nancy: Can we have sex?

Hartigan: There's wrong and then there's wrong and then there's this!

Mary Borsellino, CEO of Girl-Wonder.org-

Twelve-year-old Jason: Can we have sex?

Bruce: YES PLZ!

I'm giving this one to Miller. TKO.

You can have a Batman without a Robin, but, if you do, you really only have part of the story. Deal with it.

And here's where the writer is, I think, just being deliberately stupid. It's true that Batman didn't have his own title for long before he got a Robin. But let's set aside Robin-free classics that Mask of the Phantasm, Batman Beyond, Batman in JLA onward, the Burton Batman movies, Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, Year One, The Killing Joke, most of the Englehart run (except for one or two guest appearances... hell, you're trying to tell me that "The Joker's Five-Way Revenge" and "The Laughing Fish" weren't "complete stories"?)...

Robin is the Cousin Oliver of the Batman universe.

He was added in to tone Batman down. He took the dip out of Bruce's hip, the glide out of his stride. He's the PG-13 rating that didn't let John McClane say "Yippie-ki-yay, mother****er." He's Scrappy damn Doo!

All this "Batman needs a Robin" nonsense (I've always wondered how these fangirls can champion the father-son relationship between Bruce and his protege of the moment, then... I'm trying to think of an inoffensive word... appropriate it into smut. Besides which, if Bruce wants some "light" to counter his darkness, he has Jim Gordon, Alfred, Lucius Fox, Clark Kent, the entire JLA, Wonder Woman, Catwoman... God, I know if I needed someone to brighten my day, I'd call one of those ladies before I spent any amount of time with a boy in short-pants) is ex post facto justification for child endangerment and a really bad fashion sense. The entire concept of Robin should've ended when Dick Grayson grew up and became Nightwing... hell, when Jason Todd got cacked. The reason there's still a Robin running around is because DC wants to sell action figures. Deal with it.

Heroes shouldn’t be built on fear, or on all the niggling insecurities that can make us poor, workaday humans sometimes behave like pricks to our fellow humans.

Batman is built on fear (watch Batman Begins and tell me he isn’t). Peter Parker is built on guilt. The Punisher is built on vengeance. Tony Stark is a drunkard. Superman grapples with feelings of alienation and loneliness. Oracle is built on being shot on the spine by Joker. Wonder Woman is built on… ahem… S&M. Ask for heroes who aren’t built on “niggling insecurities” and you’re asking for boring heroes.

Well, I could go on, but I think I've made my point.

 

[batnkevlar]

Wait, what's your point?

Tim Drake is one of the best DC characters... don't see any problem with him...

 

[The Question]

I think Robin works, but mostly when he's on his own and distanced from Batman, like Tim and Dick are.

 

[CConn]

I think Robin works, but mostly when he's on his own and distanced from Batman, like Tim and Dick are.

Kinda like how you're distanced from anything resembling a human personality.

 

[The Question]

Kinda like how you're distanced from anything resembling a human personality.

That was rude, random, and incredibly confusing all at the same time.

 

[CConn]

That was rude, random, and incredibly confusing all at the same time.

The first two were as I intentioned.

The third...well...I just think you suck horribly.

 

[The Question]

The first two were as I intentioned.

The third...well...I just think you suck horribly.

I got that. The insult itself just didn't make all that much sense.

 

[Zev]

Wait, what's your point?

We should totally spam this story with derogatory comments in honor of GW.org being a pack of hypocrites. Do this in memory of me.

 

[The Question]

Feminism's great and all, but it can be way overdone. Just looking at that site makes me want to go to a Monster Truck rally and drink beer.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

I think Robin works, but mostly when he's on his own and distanced from Batman, like Tim and Dick are.

You mean like Tim was before he got made into angsty Li'l Dick post-OYL.

 

[The Question]

You mean like Tim was before he got made into angsty Li'l Dick post-OYL.

Well, yeah, there's that.

 

[Aristotle]

He took the dip out of Bruce's hip, the glide out of his stride.

And by using those phrases, you are putting the happy in my scrappy and the wind in my sails.

 

[Aristotle]

Kinda like how you're distanced from anything resembling a human personality.

Jesus Christ, that was one of the most randomly nasty things I've ever encountered. Just...wow. You got any issues with the International Jewish Communist Conspiracy you want to air out? Maybe a plan to assassinate the leaders of the Peanut Butter Cartel?

 

[Aristotle]

Feminism's great and all, but it can be way overdone. Just looking at that site makes me want to go to a Monster Truck rally and drink beer.

Feminism becomes overdone the moment it stops becoming about concrete political and social goals, and gets exported into "feminist theory" of any number of disciplines. As a history major, if I have to hear about the feminist interpretation of this or that event one more time, I'm going to eat a baby. I'm as staunch of a feminist as a person can be, but these people are nutty.

 

[fifthfiend]

Just like Max Rockatansky, Mal Reynolds, Harry Callahan, and Bill Munny never said "Now it's personal!" and unleashed the old Finger o' God on their enemies.

So, the author presumably disagrees that such people are "heroes", which incidentally does not actually correlate 1:1 with "main characters in movies". You've proved that people have different definitions of what constitutes heroism I mean okay sure, congratulations.

Which is why Mad Max, Serenity, Dirty Harry, and Tombstone were commercial and critical failures.

Believe it or not, movie theater box-office receipts are not actually the unerring measure of the certitude of one's moral and philosophical outlook that you seem to think they are.

Or, you know, Achilles in The Illiad. Or, hell, Medea.

Also, referring to tragic heroes - you know, heroic characters who were deliberately imbued with unheroic flaws and then rather strenuously punished for said flaws, to demonstrate how unheroic these flaws were - doesn't exactly make the point I think you think you're making.

Because if there's one thing fangirls won't tolerate, it's middle-aged men having sex with teenagers. Quick, dear reader, let's compare and contrast!

Declaring one writer a hypocrite based on the writings of a different writer with which we have no reason to assume the first writer agrees is just kind of dishonest. I mean hey you know, sometimes people who write on the same web-sites as other people disagree about things.

Though arguably it's not less dishonest than, you know, declaring entire groups of people "whackos" based on one blog post by one member of said group. So there's that.

Also: Is there some reason why you didn't just do this as a comment at the blog you're criticizing? I mean I'm asking here, maybe they have a really strict deletion policy for combative commenters or something, in which case fair enough.

these people are nutty.

Having just read the JLA thread I can't make up my mind whether this is deeply ironic or just plain-ol' hilarious.

Just looking at that site makes me want to go to a Monster Truck rally and drink beer.

A real man would drink Jack. And like, beat up some hookers.

 

[Gilpesh]

Also, referring to tragic heroes - you know, characters who were explicitly marked by their deep flaws and then punished for said flaws - doesn't exactly make the point I think you think you're making.

Actually, I think that might make the point Zev is trying to make...

How long have their stories been around?

So basically referring to good stories that have lasted centuries (probably going to last much longer than that creepy Batman and Robin story the owner wrote) about tragic heroes in a thread ranting about a site where someone b***hes that people hate tradgic heroes and flawed people being protrayed as heroes, doesn't prove a point?

Oh wait, nvm. He's wrong.... now let's all go and read creepy homosexual encounters about Batman and Robin... cause without Robin... Batman is nothing...












Oh and ew on that story... the only outrage about comics that people should have... is erotica fanfics written by creepy freaks... who are hypocrites.

 

[BrianWilly]

I like girl-wonder, in general. It thinks about a lot of topics that most comic book readers have the luxury of never having to think about, to the detriment of the medium as a whole.

It's got its fair share of bubbling crazy and unfortunate overreaction, but so does this place. Hell, half of what I read here is utterly

.

Really, my point is that I just have no idea what your point is. One single blogger writes a flawed article and it's like OMFG LET'S MOcKTHOSE WAkOS TOGETHA?

 

[Zev]

My point is that these are the same people who write essays about how much they like kiddy porn (that's from the very same author who wrote this piece) and then they have to gall to demand DC makes Supergirl's skirt longer and Power Girl's breasts smaller. They're hypocrites and I can't stand hypocrites. Never have, never will.

 

[WompuM]

Preach it brother, preach it.

 

[WompuM]

Doublepost.

 

[BrianWilly]

My point is that these are the same people who write essays about how much they like kiddy porn (that's from the very same author who wrote this piece) and then they have to gall to demand DC makes Supergirl's skirt longer and Power Girl's breasts smaller. They're hypocrites and I can't stand hypocrites. Never have, never will.

You're reaching the hell out of this.

1. Neither of these two articles have anything to do with Power Girl or Supergirl as far as I can tell, so whatever the author has to say about Power Girl or Supergirl has to do with hypocrisy, neither you nor anyone else can say.

2. Are "these people" complaining about how Power Girl's breasts or Supergirl's skirt are depicted in fanfiction? No. There's a blatant bit of difference between what fanwriters think up of in the perversity of their own bedrooms versus what major comic book companies publish as canon on a daily basis. I highly doubt "these people" actually want DC to publish a story of Tim Drake receiving ******io from Big Barda, but of course I could be wrong. Regardless...by your logic, no one who's ever drawn, written, or even imagined any character naked or sexualized should have any say whatsoever in any way shape or form about how much clothing any character wears at any time or express disgust at how any writer writes anything relating to sexualization. Have you ever wondered what sex with Wonder Girl is like? Congratulations, you're now a hypocrite and get no say about anything. Even if it is hypocrisy -- which I'm having a hard time seeing, though I may just not be looking hard enough -- it's hardly the moral outrage you're trying to depict it as.

3. And even you should know the fallacy of judging an entire community based on one person.

 

[Infinity9999x]

Kinda like how you're distanced from anything resembling a human personality.

Unless this is an inside joke between you and Q, this post really makes you seem like a major A-hole.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Most people around here are major a-holes. It's the in thing.

 

[Spike_x1]

Kinda like how you're distanced from anything resembling a human personality.

Quite the dick-tacular standard you're setting for him, though.

 

[GyLocke]

Feminism is great and all, but if that site shows us anything, is that women can't comprehend comics.