Wonder Woman(NBC) *Spoilers!*

[Guy Gardener]

There's plenty of women in comic shops, but they don't read about capes. It's all Niel Gaimen and fricking Manga.

Then of course women are usually smart enough to get their comics couriered. Which is what people with jobs or too many responsibilities do, if they want their stuff weekly.

Comic shop Lurkers are unreasonably social people who gather in the same manner that some drink in a bar rather than collect a dozen from the supermarket for a third the price and the comfort of their own sofa.

 

[Mr Light]

My local comic book shop was always full of extremely sarcastic overweight 20 somethings who hated every comic they read

 

[Captaindemotion]

^ Do you happen to live in Springfield?

 

[Guy Gardener]

After Cobra annexed Springfield, it's amazing, but the monthly orders from all the comic shops in the occupied city tripled.

 

[Christopher]

As for women not caring about comic books...sigh...that's gotta be some kind of sterotypical comment.

Does everything have to be labelled a stereotype and whatnot these days?

It does if it is a false stereotype, and this definitely is. It's true that comics don't do as much as they should to appeal to female audiences, but there are definitely quite a few women out there who love comics, and there are plenty of women who write and illustrate comics.

 

[Guy Gardener]

I've found that of the (regular civilian type) women I know, they will take MY comics, and it's usually a hassle to impossible to get them back, but they NEVER go buy their own.

Opportunists.

 

[the G-man]

Any parent uneasy with their child watching a show that depicted same-sex relations in a positive light is unworthy of the screen it'd be displayed on.

Regardless, TV networks must deal with reality of the consumer and they would be unlikely to make the show so overt as to offend potential viewers/parents of said viewers.

 

[Christopher]

Regardless, TV networks must deal with reality of the consumer and they would be unlikely to make the show so overt as to offend potential viewers/parents of said viewers.

The same way networks were once unlikely to include black characters so as to avoid offending racists? In the '60s, a lot of people were offended seeing prominent black characters in I Spy and Hogan's Heroes and Star Trek and Mission: Impossible, but the networks still made a committed effort to be inclusive. Because they'd discovered that they made more money by appealing to minority demographics than they lost by catering to bigots.

And the same thing is happening now with gay characters. There are already plenty of shows on the air that include openly gay, lesbian, or bisexual characters, with no attempt being made to cloak it and avoid giving "offense" to the closed-minded. Thirteen on House, Camille Wray on Stargate Universe, Sam Adama and Clarice Willow on Caprica, multiple characters on Glee, Captain Jack and others on Doctor Who/Torchwood, Janis on FlashForward, etc. Heck, even The Simpsons' Patty and Smithers, whose homosexuality was once treated as an implied joke, are now completely open about it.

So your point might've been valid a decade ago, when Xena was on the air, but it's outdated now. TV has moved on.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

^^ It's kind of funny now to think back on all the hysteria when Ellen came out.

 

[Takeru]

There's plenty of women in comic shops, but they don't read about capes. It's all Niel Gaimen and fricking Manga.

These women have better tastes in comics than most men. I really like some of Marvel's and DC's heroes, but the comics they've been publishing have been crap for a long time. The various cartoons and some of the movies are really good, but the comics suck.

They should just get rid of the monthlies, awful medium. A single issue is too short to tell more than a simple short story and a more complex story takes forever to finish if it's spread over 4 or 6 issues.

If DC and Marvel had balls they'd cancel everything, get rid of all of the established artists and writers and get new blood to create stories. A single trade paperback (100-120 pages) per hero/team per year is more than enough.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

As for women not caring about comic books...sigh...that's gotta be some kind of sterotypical comment.

Does everything have to be labelled a stereotype and whatnot these days?

It does if it is a false stereotype, and this definitely is. It's true that comics don't do as much as they should to appeal to female audiences, but there are definitely quite a few women out there who love comics, and there are plenty of women who write and illustrate comics.

Oh come on, you guys are in denial. "A few" female fans is not the same as saying that there are enough to support a network show that expects 10M viewers or so, especially if the marketing dept is screaming at you that the advertisers want more female demo for the show.

That's like saying it's a "stereotype" that guys don't like to go to chick flicks starring Jennifer Aniston and Sarah Jessica Parker. I'm sure there are always a few guys in the audience for any of their movies, and not all of them are gay or being dragged there by their girlfriends. That doesn't prove that guys suddenly love chick flicks.

 

[Christopher]

They should just get rid of the monthlies, awful medium. A single issue is too short to tell more than a simple short story and a more complex story takes forever to finish if it's spread over 4 or 6 issues.

Comics writers in the past were able to put very effective, rich stories into single issues, but that's because they put more than three panels and a sprinkling of dialogue on a page. Look at comics from the '40s and their pages are just jampacked with dialogue, often with as many as nine panels per page. Back then, half an issue could tell a story that would be spread out over three or four issues today.

 

[C.E. Evans]

There's plenty of women in comic shops, but they don't read about capes. It's all Niel Gaimen and fricking Manga.

These women have better tastes in comics than most men. I really like some of Marvel's and DC's heroes, but the comics they've been publishing have been crap for a long time. The various cartoons and some of the movies are really good, but the comics suck.

Oddly enough, the various cartoons and movies are based on storylines from the comics.

They should just get rid of the monthlies, awful medium. A single issue is too short to tell more than a simple short story and a more complex story takes forever to finish if it's spread over 4 or 6 issues.

If DC and Marvel had balls they'd cancel everything, get rid of all of the established artists and writers and get new blood to create stories. A single trade paperback (100-120 pages) per hero/team per year is more than enough.

To destroy the industry once and for all perhaps...

 

[Admiral2]

There's plenty of women in comic shops, but they don't read about capes. It's all Niel Gaimen and fricking Manga.

What's wrong with Manga? A lot of it's better than American comics.

 

[Warped9]

The various cartoons and some of the movies are really good, but the comics suck.

I bailed on comics about two or three years ago because the bang-for-the-buck value had long disappeared. A series of animated straight-to-dvd films and/or live-action features are offering a much better return and more entertainment value for your money.

 

[Guy Gardener]

There's plenty of women in comic shops, but they don't read about capes. It's all Niel Gaimen and fricking Manga.

What's wrong with Manga? A lot of it's better than American comics.

I liked Akira, everything else I've tried to read is about 10 year old boy wizards fighting multi-penis monsters.

To be fair most American comics are shit, until they acquire some British talent to make them gritty and intelligent.

 

[the G-man]

Regardless, TV networks must deal with reality of the consumer and they would be unlikely to make the show so overt as to offend potential viewers/parents of said viewers.

The same way networks were once unlikely to include black characters so as to avoid offending racists? In the '60s, a lot of people were offended seeing prominent black characters in I Spy and Hogan's Heroes and Star Trek and Mission: Impossible, but the networks still made a committed effort to be inclusive....

But it was a gradual thing. Except for Cosby's "I Spy" everything you cited had the black characters as sidekicks. And even Cosby was supposed to be the sidekick.

There are already plenty of shows on the air that include openly gay, lesbian, or bisexual characters, with no attempt being made to cloak it and avoid giving "offense" to the closed-minded. Thirteen on House, Camille Wray on Stargate Universe, Sam Adama and Clarice Willow on Caprica, multiple characters on Glee, Captain Jack and others on Doctor Who/Torchwood, Janis on FlashForward, etc.

Yes, there are supporting characters who are gay but few, if any, major characters. Yes, you had Will on "Will and Grace" and there's the gay couple on "Modern Family."

But "Will and Grace" was not a family show and "Modern Family" is still really nervous about the gay couple being too overtly affectionate on the show (I think the only kiss they dared show was a quick peck on the lips).

With this in mind, right or wrong, I just think that a network would still be unlikely to have a main character, especially a character who's typically (again, right or wrong) thought of as a "family friendly" one, be anything more than subtextually gay, ala Xena.

 

[Admiral_Young]

Is it not feasible that NBC was marketing "Wonder Woman" to a comic book audience regardless of sex or demographic? Or is that just naive thinking on my part? I'm a fan of comic books in general. I don't much care if they're female based or male based characters. If the writing is good, the characters are interesting, and the story is engaging I will read or watch.

That is kind of why I dismissed StarTrek1701's comment that women could care less about comics. There might be a divide sure, but why does there have to be one in the first place? Why can't these projects be for comic book audiences in general?

 

[the G-man]

Why can't these projects be for comic book audiences in general?

Because there are not enough comic book fans to sustain a TV series, at least on network TV.

According to this chart, the best selling comic books currently only sell a few hundred thousand issues. A network TV series needs millions of viewers just to be a flop.

Furthermore, according to at least one report, approximately one-quarter of US comic book readers are senior citizens and, therefore, outside the coveted 18-49 viewer demographic.

As such, you will never see, at least on network TV, a series designed to appeal exclusively, or predominantly, to comic book readers.

 

[CaptainCanada]

Wonder Woman's primary value to her owners is as a merchandising symbol on stuff sold to little girls, so there's no way they'd make her a lesbian (at least as things stand right now; maybe in 50 years if the gay civil rights movement continues to advance apace).