Two panels about comics at WisCon proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that women can do comic book trivia throwdowns worthy of the most rabid fanboys. I now know all about Jean Gray's 1960s roommate Millie the Model and Rogue's ambivalent mother-daughter relationship with Mystique. And let's not forget Patsy Walker, the model who later became superhero Hellcat. Thank you, Karen Healey, Lisa Fortuner, and Rachel Sharon Edidin for ruining my mind.
The first panel (at left), about superheroines, turned briefly into a debate about why women like superhero comics despite the occasionally sexist storylines and drawings that feature women doing "pornface" (if you don't know what I mean by that, you obviously have never looked at comic books drawn by Greg Land). One woman in the audience asked, "The rape stories in comics make me sick -- why don't you women read alternative comics?" She was answered with a barrage of fannish astonishment. Edidin, who works at Dark Horse, said she loves sequential action-adventures; Fortuner said superheroes are just plain cool. Writer Charlie Anders added that she thinks there's a certain snobbishness about superhero comics, as if they aren't as "smart" as alternative comics. All five women on the panel said they'd grown up reading superhero comics and wouldn't be themselves without them.
A panel about the women of X-Men focused a lot on how Jean Gray's character had been weirdly changed for the movie. "In the books, Phoenix is a force outside Jean Gray," pointed out Healey. "But in the movies, it's an evil inside her, as if somehow being a powerful woman turns you evil." Healey added that the movies also portray Professor Xavier as erecting a barrier in Jean Gray's mind to "hold back" the Phoenix. The implication in the movies is that she needs a man to protect her from her own power, whereas in the comics she fights the Phoenix force on her own, and chooses to commit suicide to save the world from it. Edidin talked about how Storm's character in the comic books is a powerful African goddess whose strong body channels winds. "But she's this tiny breakable American in the movies." Everyone agreed that the surly, goth Rogue from the books is way better than the pouty Rogue who gives up her powers in the movies. When asked what she'd like to see from X-Men in the future, Healey said, "I'd like to see the Phoenix power go inside a man for once." Everybody clapped.
