There’s also a notable erasure of strong female characters when it comes to disability, sometimes erasure in a rather literal sense. Marvel recently decided to ‘reboot’ Oracle, aka Barbara Gordon, aka Batgirl, as a nondisabled character, despite a long, distinguished, and notable representation as a wheelchair using character. A strong wheelchair using character. People with disabilities, you see, cannot be strong, so an aberration like Oracle must be destroyed. The only ‘strong’ disabled characters allowed are those who make nondisabled people feel better about themselves by being inspirational and brave. The disability community has protested, but Gail Simone informs us that since ‘some people’ want Oracle cured, one of the best representations of disability in pop culture should be taken away. But you don’t see very many people talking about strong female characters, of any race, trans or cis, when disability is involved; how many Native trans women using wheelchairs in pop culture can you think of?
Meet the White Rabbit:
Created and drawn by David “I Don’t Know How Boobs Work” Finch, Playboy Bunny White Rabbit is one of the new villains DC is introducing into the rebooted DCU. I bet all those feminists who were worried that the lack of female creators at DC would lead to (even more) objectified, oversexualized and otherwise negative portrayals of women in comics feel pretty silly right about now.
On behalf of Jim Lee and Dan Didio, apology accepted.
Oh, and DC’s bringing back the Body Doubles. For those unfamiliar with the characters, the Body Doubles are a pair of generic ‘sexy’ bounty hunters (think the Page sisters without the badassitude) that appeared regularly in the “underrated” ’90s comic Resurrection Man. Incidentally, I tried to read through RM last week in anticipation of the title’s relaunch but stopped out of boredom. Besides the main character’s admittedly interesting gimmick of coming back to life with a new superpower everytime he is killed, it’s a pretty standard story of the amnesiac on the run from a shadowy organization while trying to piece together his past. From the ten or so issues I read, I found out at least one of the Body Doubles is an ex-stripper with a history of sexual abuse (shocking, I know).
