Screenrant recently declared that this year “is shaping up to be a
breakout year for female heroes (and villains) of every sort.” The online magazine
profiled “15 Characters Who Will Make 2016 the Year of
the Female Superhero,” including such popular
figures from the comics as Harley Quinn, Scarlet Witch, and Supergirl. That’s fifteen this year alone – superheroines who
are taking the cinematic wheel and forcing the male Old Guard like Batman and
Superman to take a back seat. What does such a role reversal mean? Is it just a
temporary trend or are we witnessing a cultural shift in our perception of
heroism? And why does it matter?
In recent decades Hollywood has increasingly presented strong female
characters who can hold their own in action flicks, thrillers, and sci-fi epics.
The dramatic difference now, though, is that Hollywood feels the time is right
to give such characters their own movies,
bucking the traditional wisdom that female leads can’t put enough people in
cinema seats. Whether that risk will pay off financially remains to be seen,
but in any case, the sense is that the culture is ripe for women to step into butt-kicking
heroic movie roles that once belonged entirely to men.
It’s not that male superheroes are in danger of becoming extinct. There is
no shortage of them already, and Marvel seems to pluck more out of its bottomless
magician’s hat at will. But their female counterparts are now poised for world
domination. Oscar winner Brie Larson, for example, will play Captain Marvel, the first superheroine to headline a Marvel
Studios film, in a flick that may actually be directed by the first woman to direct a superhero
movie. Wonder Woman is finally set to break out on her own next year in a
highly-anticipated film. The President of Marvel Studios has revealed that, of
all the previously minor Marvel characters who are likely to get their own
films in the coming decade, the studio is “most emotionally and creatively
committed” to one starring Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow. And
although The Rocketeer
was not technically a superhero, Disney is planning a sequel to the 1991 film which starred Billy
Campbell; but in the follow-up, to be called The Rocketeers, the jet
pack-wearing pilot this time will be an African-American female.
Meanwhile the more traditional superheroes don’t seem to know what to do
with themselves anymore. They’ve been reduced to battling each other, as in Captain America: Civil War and Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, as
often as they fight their evil nemeses. Many consider Wonder Woman’s debut in that
latter film to be the movie’s high point. And in the upcoming Thor: Ragnarok, Chris Hemsworth’s Norse
god has even shorn his long locks; is it too much of a stretch to suggest that
this is symbolic of how the rise of superheroines is draining him and his
cohorts of their power, a là Samson
at the hands of Delilah?
Okay, that last example was a
bit of a stretch, but the point is that the old familiar superheroes are
beginning to feel stagnant and occasionally even morally confused, while the
women are an invigorating breath of fresh air. Even many male comic book geeks
seem just as eager as fan-girls are for the breakouts of such characters as
Harley Quinn and Wonder Woman. But while this wave of female empowerment may be
exhilarating for many, there is also an element of emasculation here as well.
That may seem like an absurd statement. Isn’t that taking this comic book
juvenilia too seriously? Aren’t superhero movies for kids? But that’s exactly
the point. Such extraordinary characters as, say, Captain America are important
because heroes are symbols of the way a culture views standards of courage and
virtue, power and freedom, good and evil. From the Goliath-slaying David to
Beowulf to Superman, our legendary heroes define our times and help our youth –
in particular our boys – develop a moral imagination. Superheroes are valuable
personae for preparing boys, through play and fantasy, to choose good over evil
and to one day stand courageously themselves against evil in the real world. And
“when a culture falls down on its job of constructing a meaningful hero-system
for its members," writes the cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker, life “explodes in anarchy and
chaos.”
Boys – more than girls – need a cultural pantheon of vigorous warrior
heroes in place as role models of both physical and moral power. Why “more than
girls”? Because despite Hollywood’s current politically correct obsession with depicting
women as warriors who are every bit the equal of men, in reality men are and
always have been, with rare exceptions, the fighters, the protectors of the
weak, the defenders of home and country.
This is not at all to suggest that women are incapable of courage or
patriotism or ferocity in defending hearth and family, only that for thousands
of years battle has properly been the domain of men and will continue to be.
The stories of our heroic icons are the inspiration for our future heroes, and
today those stories are largely being told in movie theaters. So by all means,
Hollywood, empower women to be heroines in their own right rather than victims,
but don’t let our heroes diminish in the process.
From Acculturated, 8/10/16
