She does not have a tragic backstory and neither does she have a male love interest, instead forming platonic friendships with the other male characters.ĭanvers’ most intimate and significant relationship is in fact with another woman. It doesn’t help either that the audiences’ main response to the film was to glorify Harley and the Joker’s relationship and to champion it as #couplegoals.Įlektra of Daredevil (2003) and Elektra (2005) faced a similar predicament in her films, serving primarily as a love interest to the male lead in Daredevilbefore being killed and then revived in Elektra where she is portrayed as struggling with trauma (canonically, in the comics Elektra is known to be a victim of sexual assault as a child).Ĭaptain Marvel's Carol Danvers is thankfully spared these done-to-death tropes and is instead celebrated as a skilled pilot and combat soldier who is given the challenge of meditating an intergalactic war between two alien races, the Kree and the Skrull. However, Hollywood undid all this effort with Suicide Squad, in which Harley is just as enthralled with her abusive boyfriend as she ever was. Danvers’ backstory is not centred on being the romantic love interest of the male lead or a victim of male violence who is a scorned and disgraced woman hell-bent on revenge.Ĭompare this with one of the most popular female comic book characters on screen to date – Suicide Squad ’s Harley Quinn, who is known for having a physically and emotionally abusive relationship with the Joker.Ĭomic book writers have tried to give the fan-favourite Harley Quinn agency in her own series, which provided her character with depth and complexities that were absent when she was simply presented as Joker’s besotted girlfriend. Captain Marvel breaks a lot of barriers in the realm of superhero cinema. Captain Marvel – a different kind of female superheroĪs Marvel’s first female superhero lead, Carol Danvers a.k.a.This time the MCU turns the spotlight away from male superheros and towards one of Marvel’s many female comic book characters who has until now have been overlooked by the film industry. The film was a huge win for aspiring black actors and film directors everywhere and was an especially important film for black Americans who do not often get to see black superheros on screen.įast-forward to 2019 and Marvel has made another strategic move to tackle issues concerning the lack of diversity in superhero films with the March release of Captain Marvel, directed by American filmmaking duo Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck. This was a first for superhero film, and Marvel’s willingness to expand its cultural horizons were rewarded with Black Panther becoming the ninth highest grossing film of all time at the US box office. Most notably, Black Panther (2018) was directed by African-American director Ryan Coogler, featured a cast which had a staggering majority of black actors, and whose costume and set design were indebted to various African cultures. And of late, MCU is also being credited with including positive media representation of marginalised identities.
While MCU films are known for being the pinnacle of film production, with their use of top-of-the-line film technologies and memorable costume designs, they are beloved for their explorations of complex characters with compelling back stories that audiences feel like they can relate to.
Diversity in the Marvel Cinematic Universe However, it wasn’t until 2012 when the MCU released the first Avengers film that comic book subculture fully integrated itself into the mainstream consciousness and became incredibly influential within entertainment media.įollowing the release of The Avengers (2012), there was a huge initiative made by film producers to create more movies to share and tell decades worth of stories of iconic comic book characters many of them being silver screen debuts for legendary superheros such as Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Ant-Man, Doctor Strange, Deadpool and Black Panther. The most successful superhero franchise of all the time is the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) which debuted in 2008 with the blockbuster hit Iron Man. Live-action superhero movies are the ultimate pop culture phenomenon of the 21st century, breaking box office records and making massive strides in the film industry.
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