I am not a big fan of superhero movies. Blame it on my low anthropology or disdain for a predictable plotline. It’s both really. So when a big budget comic book film comes out that I am interested in, I go with gusto.
Which is why I H.A.T.E.D. Wonder Woman. The whole thing made me want to tear my (long flowy) hair (extensions) out. I was promised feminism. I was told I would feel empowered. Instead, they gave me a boob-tastic babe with a child-like affect in the world. At one point, Wonder Woman seems oblivious to the fact that she has on “no clothes” (see also: her official uniform) in the middle of WWII London. She was like a brunette Marilyn Monroe standing over a fan-generated grate. I got bored with my oppression.
I am thrilled that women can wear whatever they want in the year 2018, but I am less sold on a superhero who dons a metal swimsuit into epic battle. Where the hell is her armor? Is her leg moisturizer going to stop the bad guys?
The other thing about Wonder Woman that was a bee in my bronze bustier was this vision of a bucolic society populated exclusively by women. To quote the whole of the internet, LOL. Come on, y’all. I realize we aren’t all the Housewives of New Jersey, but we ain’t Little House on the Lady Prairie either. We are women: sinful, complicated, intelligent, and, God-willing, able to see when we are underdressed for the occasion.
And yes, I know Wonder Woman is a comic book character. And yes, I know they were just sticking to the storyline. But this “faithfulness” to the story and appearance of Wonder Woman makes what Black Panther has done all the more relevant and necessary.
The women of Black Panther are the kind of comic book heroes I can teach my children about. The Queen Mother (first of all her name, second of all St. Angela Bassett) is this deeply maternal, strength-in-weakness kind of woman. Panther’s sister, Shuri, the Princess of Wakanda, is an actual genius and inventor of all things technology. In other words, she is the princess for modern girls everywhere.
And lest you think great women simply run in the Black Panther family tree, the movie makes it clear that Wakanda is populated by one wise and capable woman after another. Panther’s old girlfriend opens the movie by appearing to rescue women from Boko Haram. And his most trusted general (and entire army) is a group of commanding women who know how to dress for battle in a way that does not scream pool party.
I could go on.
Most of all, I was struck by the Biblical vision that Wakanda recalled. As a woman, one of the most painful and powerful visions of home in scriptures comes from God’s punishment to Eve in Genesis 3:
To the woman he said, “I will make your pains in childbearing very severe; with painful labor you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.”
It is painful because God speaks a harshness over Eve in her fallen estate. She disobeyed God’s law, she knows evil now, and so Adam will be put in charge of her. Sin has come into the garden, and with it, a sense of gendered hierarchy. And while this is difficult and to-be-worked-out-in-the-comfort-of-your-own-home, it also strikes me as oddly hopeful.
Because it means that the vision of the garden does not involve men being in charge of women before the Fall of creation. It means that God’s most perfect vision of home is actually without the questions, anger, and sorrow that our modern gender wars cause us. It is not Adam over Eve, or Eve over Adam, but God over all of us.
I realize that this is a tremendous amount of credit to hand over to a superhero movie. But I’m going with it. Besides, if I’m going to step into the world of superheroes, I would like to see a story where men and women inhabit it together. In wise clothing choices. With self awareness and intelligence.
We were never intended to rule over the lives of the people we love the most. Simply to point to the one who knows us and saves us anyway. Because God’s unadulterated garden in Genesis brings me to me to tears in thanksgiving. And so did Wakanda.
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3 responses to “Wakanda is Where the Real Wonder Women (and Men) Live”
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Good points made with good humor. I understand wanting to show men and women going into battle together, but never understood men armoring up and women stripping for action … what kind of action? We know that. She’s playing to adolescent male fantasies … after all who reads comics?
The Genesis story punishes Adam as well as Eve. He’s told to get off his backside and make a difference. His go-along-tag-along insouciance won’t do any more. God kicks him out and tells him to get a job.
Bravo, Keith Kenny!! You’re totally spot-on about comic-book ‘super-women’ stripping for action. It caters to that adolescent male fantasy-life.
Well, I guess given these comments, I’ll have to do some stripping of my own – stripping away of myths.
A 2011 survey of over 1.2 million comic book fans found that only 6.5% were under the age of 18, and 29% of those were female. Over the entire survey, 25% were female.
So instead of continuing to tell ourselves the myth that this is a teenage boy problem, perhaps the best thing we can do is admit that there are people of all ages and genders and sexual orientations who are identifying with the vision that comics put forth of female superheroes. And then ask ourselves why, because chalking it up to adolescent eros is not going to cut it anymore.