“Comics court girls inspired by Japanese manga.”
While I think it’s great that comic companies are finally starting to acknowledge that girls, in fact, to read comics, I’m not sure they’re going about directing their marketing at females in the right way. First of all, they’re focusing on teenage girls and practically ignoring adult women readers. DC’s Minx line’s (don’t get me started on the title) titles sound like they were pulled off of Nickelodeon’s Saturday morning lineup. Now, if I’m remembering my days as a teenager right, I never read or watched anything marketed at teenagers. I liked that stuff when I was a preteen, and my friends had similar tastes. I didn’t read comics as a teenager (I picked up my first comic when I was 20), but if I had, I more than likely would have read the stuff I read now: superhero comics, the stuff directed at adults. Nevermind that DC’s efforts completely disregards the female readers that they already have, teenage or adult. What about the girls who already read the superhero comics?
The article points out a couple of efforts Marvel has made to appeal to women, namely bringing in Eric Jerome Dickey and Joss Whedon to write X-Men titles, along with the new Anita Blake series. While I think the Anita Blake comics are laughably bad (same with the books, but that’s a different rant), I do see how they can appeal to adult women readers, much like the book series. Paranormal romance is very popular right now, and it might be a smart way to draw in female readers. Hell, I wouldn’t mind more comics along this line, as long as they’re not based on Laurell K. Hamilton novels.
Now, I definitely appreciate Joss’s run on Astonishing X-Men. Joss knows how to write strong women, and John Cassaday’s art doesn’t turn the women into sexpots (well, except for Emma, but that’s her schtick). Kitty and the female students like Hisako look like real young women, and it’s refreshing. I haven’t read the Storm mini, so I can’t comment on that. But the thing is that these writers are men. If Marvel really wants to make steps toward both bringing in new and satisfying current female readers, I think they should start bringing in female writers on their major titles, not just smaller projects. Bring in women to write X-Men and the Fantastic Four, the superhero titles.
And work on that whole “drawing women as huge-breasted semen receptacles thing.” Let’s just start somewhere, eh, comic companies?
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It’s nice to hear someone else articulate so well the frustrations of being a real grown-up woman who reads comics. I’m lucky in that Million Year Picnic is just up the road from me. It happens to have one of the best collections this side of the Mississippi, including a kick-ass independent and “adults only” (not just pron) section.
Incedentally, you are in great part responsible for my descent into the seamy underbelly that is comic book collection. If Hugh Jackman hadn’t done such an excellent job portraying Wolverine, and if I hadn’t come across your fanfic site (as well as the WRFA), I wouldn’t have nearly as much geek cred as I do. And I might have some more pocket change.
Very nice post!
I agree with you. I think that this is a big, untapped market just waiting for readers to buy some good female oriented comics.
@Okelle: I know, it drives me nuts to see the big companies basically plug their ears and say “la la la!” instead of actually acknowledging and trying to cater to the expectations of their adult female readers instead of spewing out fanboy wet dreams all the time. I’d like a few fangirl wet dreams, thankyouverymuch. ;)
And I’m pleased to hear of the enabling. I live for sucking people into fandom, muahaha!
@dracschick: Thanks! While I’m not the biggest Anita Blake fan anymore, I do think that the comic companies could do really well with similar series. I’d LOVE to see Karen Chance’s new series in comic book form.