Thursday, September 30, 2004

Identity Crisis Backlash?



SPOILERS for Green Lantern #180-181.

I saw something in this issue that seems to almost have to be tacked onto after the fact. Possibly in a reaction to the criticism DC has been getting in regards to its treatment of female characters in the Identity Crisis miniseries.

In Green Lantern #180. GL Kyle Rayner comes home to find what appears to be the body of his mother in the oven, killed in a similar fashion to his girlfriend Alex Dewitt in the early issues of his run. By the insane villain Major Force, in what seemed to be a storytelling trick of revisiting an old plot to see how the character has changed.

In #181 it is revealed through dialogue only that Kyle's mom wasn't home, and that Major Force had used a mannequin that apparently looked just like Kyle's mom. Yet at the end of the issue Kyle decides to fly off into space, rather than going to check on his mom.

Hmm, Kyle's mom is revealed to not be dead by dialogue only, and in a way ("I just happened to bring a mannequin with me.") that seems rather silly. Then strangely flies off without going to check on her.

Meanwhile another series DC is doing has been getting a response from a fairly decently sized certain of fans. Questioning DC's treatment of female characters, perhaps making members of DC editorial to question after the fact, the direction other stories they have going. Yet the art for is already finished, yet there is still time to fix dialogue.

1+1=?

If so I'm not sure what to make of it. I'd be glad in one sense that DC perhaps has finally started to see a weird trend in their own actions. Yet on the other hand, it seems like this would be the place to try and right something. With a character who has had at most 4 appearances in 10 years, and likely won't ever be used again anyway.

Still I'll look forward to seeing other DC books, to see if they pull back on what seemed like a weird direction towards female characters.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

An intentionally vague comment Ron Marz posted on the Broken Frontier message boards on October 2 seems to support your theory (or something like it):

I also feel like I should at least mention Kyle not
going home to check on his mom. Yes, it's awkward. All
I can say is some things didn't work out exactly as
planned, but that's part of the bargain. It would be
unprofessional and inappropriate of me to comment
further, so I'm afraid I'll have to leave it at that.

Marz's whole post (that's the middle of 3 paragraphs) is at www.brokenfrontier.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=9520.