There have been so many shocks and surprises and the internet just can’t be broken anymore. It’s become tougher, like when you tear a phone book into pieces and eventually it just won’t rip anymore. How do you tell who’s who and what’s what in this new world out there? Don’t worry. I’m here to comfort and guide. Welcome to the world outside B@N. Welcome to Meanwhile….

Did anyone notice I was gone last week? Don’t worry, I’m back with a supersized edition of Meanwhile this week. We’ve got the uproar over Johanna’s Superhero Comics Aren’t For Girls post, Joe Rice leaving Comics Should Be Good, Bloggers visiting other Bloggers, A Behind the Scenes Look at The Umbrella Academy, and more.

Ok here we go. Here’s the big controversy of late.

Johanna starts it all by saying superhero comics aren’t for girls.

“Superhero comics aren’t for girls” is true the same way “romance novels aren’t for boys” or “action movies aren’t for girls” are. They’re gender-identified genres. The people who make them and the majority of the people who consume them know who their audience tends to be. Recognizing that doesn’t make you sexist or invalidate anyone’s tastes; it’s just realism. “Chick lit” and fashion mags are aimed at women; Mack Bolan books and gun and car mags are aimed at men.

What follows is a massive argument spanning over 72 comments that spills out to many a blog and involves pretty intelligent people like Kalinara, Dirk Deppey, Tom Spurgeon, and others.

It all gets a little confusing with the back and forth so we’ll create a little timeline.

May 9th - Johanna posts the initial discussion.

“Superhero comics aren’t for girls” is true the same way “romance novels aren’t for boys” or “action movies aren’t for girls” are. They’re gender-identified genres. The people who make them and the majority of the people who consume them know who their audience tends to be. Recognizing that doesn’t make you sexist or invalidate anyone’s tastes; it’s just realism. “Chick lit” and fashion mags are aimed at women; Mack Bolan books and gun and car mags are aimed at men.

May 10th - Johanna reacts to the disagreements by saying she isn’t one of the gang.

Oh, good, the overreaction to my comments about the audience for superhero comics has already begun. I’m “condescending” and “don’t know what the hell [I’m] talking about” and “offensive” and “talking out [my] ass” because I believe that some genres tend to be gender-identified, and superhero comics make up one of them.

(If 30 years of reading superhero comics and a master’s degree in popular culture focusing on fandom doesn’t give me some slack on “knowing what I’m talking about” in terms of the genre, I don’t know what will.)

May 10th - Tom Spurgeon responds.

I’m not certain I agree with her specific implications, emphasis or even the way the argument is constructed, but Johanna Draper Carlson floats the interesting notion that maybe superheroes are targeted towards boys because superhero comics are boys comics. A modicum of flipping out follows.

One of the odd things that crops up whenever you get into a characterization discussion regarding superheroes is that there’s still an underlying assumption with some folks that superheroes should be subject to criticism and reforms as if they were the entirety of comics. This notion crops up in other places; it led to a long period where many comics critics conflated the growth of the art form with the reform of a genre, even demanding the application of literary standards to works that might naturally and rightfully resist such standards.

May 10th - Johanna posts decades old stats to back up her initial argument.

1. These figures date from 1995. A lot has changed since then. They’d done previous studies in 1990 and 1992, and based on survey ads they’ve run in their comics since then, I believe they’ve done at least two since then. I would love to know what they said, but I doubt I’ll have access to more current figures any time soon (unless a handy anonymous source wanders by).

2. I think these studies were done in order to have information to demonstrate to potential advertisers in order to convince them to spend money. That’s based on titles like “studying the lifestyle and purchasing habits of affluent, highly educated young men”. They were trying to pitch their products as reaching an audience that’s known as being hard to target effectively with advertising. So science likely took second place to marketing.

3. This was all based on under 1000 answered questionnaires out of 3200 inserted in comics. The incentive to answer the packet was a free copy of Zero Hour #0 autographed by the editor (my hubby) KC Carlson.

May 10th - deconcentrate responds to Johanna’s post.

These are all men. And these are all not just men, but men who, on average, like the big dumb fight-and-team-up books because they’re glorious pieces of cliche-reveling, men who like people who run around in spandex and fight crime, men who end up unapologetically obsessed with superheroes and in several cases one superhero in particular that they end up touting as “the greatest ever” because they’re just so damn jazzed about the character, men who really don’t mind the weird color printing of the ’60s still being carried over to today’s advanced printing techniques, and above all, they think the superhero genre is a pretty nifty-keen idea.

And they all really want their comics to lay off the fucking sexism already, because it’s polluting a genre that doesn’t need it.

May 10th - Ragnell twitches.

Now what I want to know, before I Hulk out, is what in the genre inherently makes it male. Give me a reasonable argument, something that is fundamental to superheroes that can not be removed without gutting the basic concept of a superhero (sorry kiddos, sexist art doesn’t cut it because 40s and 60s superhero comics didn’t look like porn and they still worked), something that can not work with genders reversed, something that I can’t link an post countering it to prove that it is actually gender-neutral or even appeals to our feminine cultural experience more than it does to a masculine cultural experience.

Either give me that irrefutable argument, tell me what in Skadi’s name is so exclusive in its appeal to male fans and is so inherent in the genre that they are justified in repeatedly alienating female fans, or shut the fuck up with this “superhero comics are for boys” meme because it is pissing me and a lot of other female superhero fans off greatly and I’d wager you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.

May 10th - Dick Hates Your Blog responds by saying it’s more hatred of Marvel/DC by Johanna.

This really seems to be about Carlson’s ongoing vendetta against Marvel/DC more than anything. I think it’s pretty clear Carlson wants to see these companies suffer, and any opposes any train of thought suggesting these companies could improve their products (in this case the suggestion that Marvel/DC could eliminate some of the more egregious examples of sexism).

May 11th - Kalinara responds to the Blogosphere/LJdom/Anyone Expressing An Opinion ANYWHERE

You are not the Spiderman to our J. Jonah Jameson.

We are not picking on you. We don’t hate you. We’re not out to get you. You posted something and we responded. Did we misunderstand the point you were trying to make? Maybe. It does happen sometimes. But did we misunderstand because we just want to jump down your throat?

No.

Honestly, I think most of us have better things to do than harass one lone dissenting voice just for the sake of harassment. We respond to what you said.

May 11th - Designated Sidekick responds.

Look, anyone who tries to tell me that I need a vagina to read a romance novel is clearly misusing their equipment (book and body part). If you try to tell me that comic books require penises to be read, I’m going to ask you to leave, and I won’t want to know what you’re doing with the print media and your body parts. So basically, quit trying to tell me that I need a gender to get into a genre. This ain’t world of warcraft people, you can equip genres of any type, in any class.

May 11th - Thom Wade doesn’t want to get in the middle of this.

Imagine a show on TV that had a primarily white audience being defended by,”Well, our audience is primarily white, so it does not really matter if our minority characters are basically stereotypes.” Would we nod and just say, “That’s the just the way it always has been and always will be”? No, we would ask for change. We would be seeing letter writing campaigns to get the guy who said it fired. “Thats just how it is” seems like a defense for doing/saying nothing.

Super-Hero comics that are not sexist are good whether there are a lot of women reading them or not.

May 12th - Blurred Productions responds to Johanna.

Fundamentally, I believe that no genre is gendered. Typically, of course, many are. Romance novels (you know with the bare chested dude and swooning woman on the cover) are gendered female, either by marketing and/or creative intent. But that doesn’t mean that romance novels are on the basic level (you know like the Platonic ideal of a romance novel… or something) are feminine works of literature. A writer could easily write a romance novel gendered towards males or one that was gendered neutral.

Then everything got mixed in with the MJ statue argument.

Here’s two livejournal entries that pretty much sum up that whole affair.

I’ll leave the MJ thing for Lisa to cover.

And as far as I can tell these arguments are still going on now and don’t look like they’re going to end anytime soon.

Did I miss anything important? Let me know in the comments and I’ll add it to the timeline.

UPDATE: Dave Lartigue responds to the whole argument with this.

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Now we can stop gawking, drive on by the car accident, and get back to the fun stuff like Bully posts on his blog.

He really is pretty clever. Check out his Mothers Day Poem for proof.

In honor of this Mother’s Day
A little bull would like to say

Tho’ I don’t know my own real mother
I love her lots just like no other

And hope wherever she may be
She misses, cares for, and loves me

But if a mom I had to choose
Someone to sing with quiet moos

I think I’d pick take a second look
At a mom from a comic book

Speaking of Bully, he showed up for a get together over at Laura’s!

I’m sure that Bully will have his own report of the meal, but I just want to say that Bully sometimes chews with his mouth open and talks with his mouth full… but he’s still fun to hang around with, so don’t let that put you off.

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Get well Scott. We miss you.

Hi everyone. This is Scott’s wife and I am posting on his behalf. For the next few days Polite Dissent will not be updated. Scott is in the hospital after having a minor myocardial infarction (heart attack). He is doing fine now and I’m sure he will give you all the details when he can.

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Joe Rice leaves Comics Should Be Good.

I was excited to take my writings to a larger audience, but, in the end, I don’t think I work well with a larger audience. Thank you to those of you that have expressed your fondness for my stuff, but most of you would probably read it elsewhere anyway.

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A Note To Comics Critics:

This is professionalism. Via Beaucoupkevin.

When Vincent Gallo’s “The Brown Bunny” played at Cannes in 2003, I walked out of the screening and declared it “the worst movie in the history of the film festival.” This was an unwise thing to do. My policy for years has been to avoid giving a negative review of a festival film until it has a chance to open.

Gallo issued a curse on my colon. I responded that the video of my colonoscopy was more entertaining than his film, and there the matter rested until 2004, when Gallo released a “final cut” of “The Brown Bunny” which was re-edited and 30 minutes shorter. I went to see it, and now I could see better what he was getting at, and I gave it a positive review.

“Ill bet you hated to change your mind,” I was told. No, I was happy to. It is a hard and frustrating thing to make a movie, and credit must be given where due.

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Plok wants to try his hand at reimagining character concepts and is asking for your suggestions.

what character do you think I should take a run at, one-shot solo adventure style? Don’t give me Batman, or Mister Miracle or Flash or anything…nothing that ambitious. The Human Torch is okay; Spider-Man isn’t. See what I’m saying? Wonder Man, sure; Iron Man or Daredevil, no. Captain America is right out. Superman? Ridiculous.

I’m sure Johnny Bacardi would like to see him take a crack at Dr. Fate.

Like the Creeper, everybody seems to love Doctor Fate…but nobody seems to know what to do with him. Other than the 1975 Walt Simonson/Martin Pasko First Issue Special one-shot, it is my carefully considered opinion that the character has never really had the creative team to maximize his potential andmake him an interesting character in his own title.

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52 Pickups successor I was 28 When I Heard the Countdown Start is going strong thanks to advance previews of each Countdown issue.

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Stuart Immomen discusses the work of Vince Colletta.

As Eddie Campbell so eloquently stated earlier in the month, Vince Colletta generally gets a bum rap in the annals of comics history, and, just as generally, the accusations are unfounded, or at least, not based on the work itself. It’s a shame, really, as Colletta, despite everything, was a key silver age player, and really as talented as the next hack, if not more.
But that’s the lot of the inker, isn’t it?

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Paging Brad Meltzer. The folks at Mercury Studio would like to clear up a few things.

In this Associated Press article, Colleen Long credits Brad Meltzer’s Book of Fate as being the first novel to also include a comic- a section of a Justice League story he’d written.

It’s horribly, appallingly nerdy of me to pipe up about this, (or even to know it, I guess) but Laura Esquivel and Miguelanxo Prado beat him by over a decade. Esquivel’s novel “The Law of Love” came out in 1995 and contained several comic book sections illustrated by Prado that functioned as part of the narrative.

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Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba have been busy. Fabio is working on the next album of Casanova following Ba’s run on the previous album. You can sneak a glance at his work on the book here and here. Meanwhile Gabriel Ba is hard at work on The Umbrella Academy. You can find a behind the scenes look at the FCBD issue here.

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The talented Eddie Campbell draws the other Dark Knight.

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Since I missed last week I didn’t get to help announce the all new ISB. I helped Chris set himself up in his all new digs, so go check it out. The content is the same face kicking action as what amounts to normal around that site.

Also, in a suprising bit of synchronicity, I’m currently reading World’s Finest #187. What issue did Chris cover last night? World’s Finest #186.

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Comic Coverage looks at a recent Mark Waid interview and takes exception to his statement saying “fun” comics don’t sell.

Mark Waid on Brave and The Bold: The moment all the reviews started coming in they all said, “It’s fun.” “It’s fun.” “It’s fun.” I started to sweat, because “fun” is a death word in comics these days.

The Roar of Comics noticed the interview too.

It seems “fun” and “interesting” are not the same thing to most comics fans. Judging from sales charts, the comics buying audience wants books about familiar superheroes, preferably acting in large groups, in stories that will have “repercussions” on later books. And since a “fun” book sounds like the opposite of a “serious” book that has “serious consequences”, I guess most buyers don’t feel “fun” books are worth spending money on.

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Did you enjoy your Comics Festival on FCBD? Well, if you didn’t get enough then you can always check out Comics Festival 2005 FCBD offering online.

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Dark Horse really needs to get their act together.

All of these are books with stories by or co-written by Joss Whedon. All of them are getting a huge promotional push right now, thanks to the phenomenal sales of Buffy: Season Eight. All of them are completely unavailable for at least a month, if not longer (and if not much longer in some cases).

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Jim Roeg is back with another Double Articulation Digest!

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From Martian Manhunter’s Blog:

Anyway, I’m sort of curious what the standards of admission are for joining up with the Justice League in this day and age. Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman are gimmes - nobody ever takes that team seriously if those guys don’t show up, and if they aren’t there, we get stuck with, like, me bossing Agent Liberty and the Black freaking Condor around.

Fine, I’ll accept Canary. Maybe even Hawkgirl. But nobody can fill me in on why they aren’t in the Justice Society, where all you need for membership is a picture of one of your parents wearing a fetish suit or evidence that you once punched a Fifth Columnist in the balls back in the Big One.

I don’t fit the JSA profile because I didn’t get here until the fifties, so I couldn’t kick Hitler’s groin to powder. Way to retroactively screw me again, Dr Erdel.

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152-page PDF collection of articles on comics. Via NeilAlien

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Lefty Brown lists his top ten favorite 80’s comics.

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Well, that Zod is a bit different than I’m used to.

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JLA Lockeroom Figures!

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This meme needs to be revived every year. It’s far too easy to complain about everything these days.

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Matt Rossi discusses Marvel Earth’s changing status in the overall Marvel Universe.

just what is Earth’s status in the universe at large in Marvel’s setting? In the past it’s been the plaything of warring intergalactic empires, who even left fully functioning cities on its moon and genetically altered races on its surface. On several occassions humans have interfered with the politics of the Kree, Skrull and Shi’ar Empires, even going so far as to ‘kill’ or imprison their leaders. Galactus has been foiled by Earth twice. What relationship, if any, does the Earth have to alien powers such as Xandar (which is the one that the Nova Corps were created by, as an example), the Kree, the Shi’ar, the Badoon, etc etc?

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And Finally, a reminder that Free Comic Book Month is still going on.