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shapinglightBack in September last year I made two posts on the above subject, here and here, the first about the similarities between 'shipping arguments (or more like 'shipping knock-down, drag-out fights) in the X-Men fandom and the Buffy fandom, and the second about how mainstream comics often don't write female characters well (for which also see Comics!Buffy).
Well, I've been lurking on the CBR comics forums again, specifically in the X-Men section, and I've found yet another parallel, this time to the perception among some Buffy comics readers that Angel's season 8 actions are being systematically retconned and whitewashed.
Contains spoilers for recent X-Men storylines, should anyone care.
Which they are. No doubt about it. That's what you have to do when you're stupid enough to turn one of your 'good' characters into a homicidal maniac with delusions of grandeur and were careless enough not to remember to play the 'possessed' card on their behalf beforehand (not a mistake Marvel made with Cyclops in their recent Avengers vs X-Men story. He was good and possessed - and by no fault of his own - long before he killed his old mentor Charles Xavier (and boy, those parallels keep coming). I also think Marvel have handled the fall out from that a damn sight better).
But anyway, the perception remains that Angel is basically getting away with murder (well he is, literally), and this has had a lasting impact on how some fans perceive the character. Retconning things after the event doesn't usually work to change this perception. It just makes fans angry and bitter. And not just Buffy fans.
There's a crossover Avengers/X-Men character who has had the same effect on a large number of X-Men fans. This is the Scarlet Witch (Magneto's daughter, in fact), who is a mutant with the power to affect probability. In a story about five years back or so, she wished there should be 'no more mutants', and suddenly there weren't. Lots of mutants lost their powers and no more mutants were being born. There followed years of 'mutants as an endangered species' stories.
That's all changed now, but the Scarlet Witch remains a hate figure for a lot of X-fans, and it's now got to the stage where any attempt to rehabilitate her just doesn't wash with these fans at all. Like so:
It's pretty obvious that the editors and writers are tired of the whole mutant thing and never really liked it. It seems like they don't really think what Scarlet Witch did was all that bad and are frustrated fans don't just move on. I'm sure they figured putting the blame on Doctor Doom, minimizing what she did, having her be accepted as a hero in Avengers vs X-Men, having her be accepted by X-characters and declaring her redeemed was more than enough.
You could swap Scarlet Witch's name for Twangel, couldn't you, and the meaning would be just the same.
Not sure what this post is trying to say. That fans are the same everywhere? That comic book writers are stupid and thoughtless and never think their stories through properly? Both, probably.
Well, I've been lurking on the CBR comics forums again, specifically in the X-Men section, and I've found yet another parallel, this time to the perception among some Buffy comics readers that Angel's season 8 actions are being systematically retconned and whitewashed.
Contains spoilers for recent X-Men storylines, should anyone care.
Which they are. No doubt about it. That's what you have to do when you're stupid enough to turn one of your 'good' characters into a homicidal maniac with delusions of grandeur and were careless enough not to remember to play the 'possessed' card on their behalf beforehand (not a mistake Marvel made with Cyclops in their recent Avengers vs X-Men story. He was good and possessed - and by no fault of his own - long before he killed his old mentor Charles Xavier (and boy, those parallels keep coming). I also think Marvel have handled the fall out from that a damn sight better).
But anyway, the perception remains that Angel is basically getting away with murder (well he is, literally), and this has had a lasting impact on how some fans perceive the character. Retconning things after the event doesn't usually work to change this perception. It just makes fans angry and bitter. And not just Buffy fans.
There's a crossover Avengers/X-Men character who has had the same effect on a large number of X-Men fans. This is the Scarlet Witch (Magneto's daughter, in fact), who is a mutant with the power to affect probability. In a story about five years back or so, she wished there should be 'no more mutants', and suddenly there weren't. Lots of mutants lost their powers and no more mutants were being born. There followed years of 'mutants as an endangered species' stories.
That's all changed now, but the Scarlet Witch remains a hate figure for a lot of X-fans, and it's now got to the stage where any attempt to rehabilitate her just doesn't wash with these fans at all. Like so:
It's pretty obvious that the editors and writers are tired of the whole mutant thing and never really liked it. It seems like they don't really think what Scarlet Witch did was all that bad and are frustrated fans don't just move on. I'm sure they figured putting the blame on Doctor Doom, minimizing what she did, having her be accepted as a hero in Avengers vs X-Men, having her be accepted by X-characters and declaring her redeemed was more than enough.
You could swap Scarlet Witch's name for Twangel, couldn't you, and the meaning would be just the same.
Not sure what this post is trying to say. That fans are the same everywhere? That comic book writers are stupid and thoughtless and never think their stories through properly? Both, probably.
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no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 03:19 pm (UTC)That comic book writers are stupid and thoughtless and never think their stories through properly?
Pretty much. The fact that Allie still wants to claim the problems of S8 aren't centered around the characterization and overall stupidness, but rather the story being too broad and too many characters is rather telling. 6 years and he still doesn't get it.
As you say, retconning fixes nothing. Even if they magically blip all the comics out of existence and start over, there is still an "official" story out there were Angel listens to a talking K9 and attempts to end the world. The spacefrak will still exist, just as Angel not giving a shit about the people dying exists, no matter how much Gage wants to imply it doesn't.
You can redeem a villain. You can't redeem stupidity and hypocrisy at the level Buffy and Angel display in the comics. Try as you may, you just can't fix stupid.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 09:18 pm (UTC)Well, I suppose you could make a stab at it by having the characters in question own up to it and try not to do it again. And also not undercut their owning up by minimising what they did in the first place (or, where Buffy's concerned, maximising it).
They did pay lip service to the owning up part with Angel early on, but then they undercut even that with the constant retconning. Retconning may be a typical comic book ploy when you've inadvertently thrown your character into the shit (because you apparently didn't realise it was there to start with), but it just feels...dishonest.
And it doesn't help when you start telling fans they didn't say what they saw.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 10:29 pm (UTC)That's the thing, though. In order to learn from it, there has to be some sort of reason to do it to begin with. For example, we all knew accepting W&H's deal would go pear-shaped, but the MoG had some sort of logic for accepting. They thought they could use the master's tools. They themselves ended up being compromised, of course, but lessons were learned. You cannot use the master's tools.
Until a dog asks Angel to do what Jasmine was basically doing--even if you take the retcon into account. It's so stupid and hypocritical that you can't learn from it because you knew not to do it to begin with. Same with bank-robbing, leaving people to die, etc.
And it doesn't help when you start telling fans they didn't say what they saw.
Trying to gaslight the audience is slightly better than insulting them, I suppose.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-28 10:02 am (UTC)When you put it like that, I think the only retcon that could have worked (though people would have utterly despised it) was to declare that both Buffy and Angel had been robots all along.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-28 03:26 pm (UTC)I still think there's a probability it'll end with finding out something's been wrong with Buffy.
But yeah, you can't watch the Jasmine arc and Angel's stance that eating a few people a day was too much the same way after the comics.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-28 07:01 pm (UTC)Maybe he suffered a serious head injury at some point?
Since they're never going to openly state that A:AtF is canon (I know Gage did, but I don't think he counts), and also never going to fill in the blanks between, we can pretty much invent for ourselves what happened to Angel pre-Twangel to make him do such stupid things.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-28 07:17 pm (UTC)we can pretty much invent for ourselves what happened to Angel pre-Twangel to make him do such stupid things.
Yup. And in a way that's smart because they know they can never connect A and B themselves. Just as their never going to tell us what happened because Chosen and Issue #1.
Buffy, Angel, Giles, etc all got lobotomies at some point. How else would one explain Giles spewing that evolution nonsense?
no subject
Date: 2013-07-02 11:13 am (UTC)I'd write the fanfic, only it would be a bit gruesome.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 03:35 pm (UTC)And I hate the idea, which seems so prevalent, that, for a female character, having a crappy job is more important (=feminist) than having a relationship (=misogynistic), as if, in the real world, having relationships isn't the most important thing ANYONE ever does!
Yaaaa! Grumpy old woman talking!
(I'm also -- slightly off on a tangent -- so tired of people using 'sexist' and 'misogynistic' as though they were synonyms. It happens a lot in the Dr Who fandom, so I imagine it happens in Buffy and X-men, too).
I also meant to say, I think comics suffer from the same problems as soap operas -- longevity coupled with a relentless demand for material results in a mess.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 09:29 pm (UTC)This is very true, and why there are so few long term happy couples in either. Soaps/comics demand constant drama and happy couples living happily don't lend themselves to that.
As for what happened with Rogue and Magneto, I agree that the whole 'finding herself' excuse was a crock. I suppose, after what I'd seen of some fans' reactions to the Rogneto 'ship, I was expecting far worse and felt I'd got off lightly.
Actually, someone on that CBR forum did a poll of most popular X-couples recently. Rogue/Gambit won, as I was expecting, but Rogue/Magneto came a very creditable 4th or 5th. And there was me thinking I was the only one who liked the couple.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 05:41 pm (UTC)On the other hand, I am surprised by how blatantly blameshifting they are onto Buffy. Buffy is the TITLE character, and yet they've decided that the post-seed world is her fault (like she was supposed to just allow Angel to destroy the world or something).
I understand whitewashing the hell out of their pet boy, but it really irks that it's done by making all after effects be Buffy's fault. But then, clearly it's her fault for
being a girlnot 'shutting up' and listening when Angel would have mansplained to her why it was necessary to nullify everything she stands for while denying her anything as annoying as a choice.no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 09:23 pm (UTC)Yeah, it still staggers me that they can't see how offensive that was.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 06:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 09:22 pm (UTC)Writing to the comics letters page would be a better idea, but he's printed letters before about the Angel whitewashing (which he of course doesn't believe they're doing) and it hasn't changed anything.
But yes, a well written letter complaining about how Buffy is shouldering way more than her share of the blame would be a very good thing. They just don't seem to get it at all.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 03:19 pm (UTC)That comic book writers are stupid and thoughtless and never think their stories through properly?
Pretty much. The fact that Allie still wants to claim the problems of S8 aren't centered around the characterization and overall stupidness, but rather the story being too broad and too many characters is rather telling. 6 years and he still doesn't get it.
As you say, retconning fixes nothing. Even if they magically blip all the comics out of existence and start over, there is still an "official" story out there were Angel listens to a talking K9 and attempts to end the world. The spacefrak will still exist, just as Angel not giving a shit about the people dying exists, no matter how much Gage wants to imply it doesn't.
You can redeem a villain. You can't redeem stupidity and hypocrisy at the level Buffy and Angel display in the comics. Try as you may, you just can't fix stupid.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 09:18 pm (UTC)Well, I suppose you could make a stab at it by having the characters in question own up to it and try not to do it again. And also not undercut their owning up by minimising what they did in the first place (or, where Buffy's concerned, maximising it).
They did pay lip service to the owning up part with Angel early on, but then they undercut even that with the constant retconning. Retconning may be a typical comic book ploy when you've inadvertently thrown your character into the shit (because you apparently didn't realise it was there to start with), but it just feels...dishonest.
And it doesn't help when you start telling fans they didn't say what they saw.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 10:29 pm (UTC)That's the thing, though. In order to learn from it, there has to be some sort of reason to do it to begin with. For example, we all knew accepting W&H's deal would go pear-shaped, but the MoG had some sort of logic for accepting. They thought they could use the master's tools. They themselves ended up being compromised, of course, but lessons were learned. You cannot use the master's tools.
Until a dog asks Angel to do what Jasmine was basically doing--even if you take the retcon into account. It's so stupid and hypocritical that you can't learn from it because you knew not to do it to begin with. Same with bank-robbing, leaving people to die, etc.
And it doesn't help when you start telling fans they didn't say what they saw.
Trying to gaslight the audience is slightly better than insulting them, I suppose.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-28 10:02 am (UTC)When you put it like that, I think the only retcon that could have worked (though people would have utterly despised it) was to declare that both Buffy and Angel had been robots all along.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-28 03:26 pm (UTC)I still think there's a probability it'll end with finding out something's been wrong with Buffy.
But yeah, you can't watch the Jasmine arc and Angel's stance that eating a few people a day was too much the same way after the comics.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-28 07:01 pm (UTC)Maybe he suffered a serious head injury at some point?
Since they're never going to openly state that A:AtF is canon (I know Gage did, but I don't think he counts), and also never going to fill in the blanks between, we can pretty much invent for ourselves what happened to Angel pre-Twangel to make him do such stupid things.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-28 07:17 pm (UTC)we can pretty much invent for ourselves what happened to Angel pre-Twangel to make him do such stupid things.
Yup. And in a way that's smart because they know they can never connect A and B themselves. Just as their never going to tell us what happened because Chosen and Issue #1.
Buffy, Angel, Giles, etc all got lobotomies at some point. How else would one explain Giles spewing that evolution nonsense?
no subject
Date: 2013-07-02 11:13 am (UTC)I'd write the fanfic, only it would be a bit gruesome.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 03:35 pm (UTC)And I hate the idea, which seems so prevalent, that, for a female character, having a crappy job is more important (=feminist) than having a relationship (=misogynistic), as if, in the real world, having relationships isn't the most important thing ANYONE ever does!
Yaaaa! Grumpy old woman talking!
(I'm also -- slightly off on a tangent -- so tired of people using 'sexist' and 'misogynistic' as though they were synonyms. It happens a lot in the Dr Who fandom, so I imagine it happens in Buffy and X-men, too).
I also meant to say, I think comics suffer from the same problems as soap operas -- longevity coupled with a relentless demand for material results in a mess.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 09:29 pm (UTC)This is very true, and why there are so few long term happy couples in either. Soaps/comics demand constant drama and happy couples living happily don't lend themselves to that.
As for what happened with Rogue and Magneto, I agree that the whole 'finding herself' excuse was a crock. I suppose, after what I'd seen of some fans' reactions to the Rogneto 'ship, I was expecting far worse and felt I'd got off lightly.
Actually, someone on that CBR forum did a poll of most popular X-couples recently. Rogue/Gambit won, as I was expecting, but Rogue/Magneto came a very creditable 4th or 5th. And there was me thinking I was the only one who liked the couple.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 05:41 pm (UTC)On the other hand, I am surprised by how blatantly blameshifting they are onto Buffy. Buffy is the TITLE character, and yet they've decided that the post-seed world is her fault (like she was supposed to just allow Angel to destroy the world or something).
I understand whitewashing the hell out of their pet boy, but it really irks that it's done by making all after effects be Buffy's fault. But then, clearly it's her fault for
being a girlnot 'shutting up' and listening when Angel would have mansplained to her why it was necessary to nullify everything she stands for while denying her anything as annoying as a choice.no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 09:23 pm (UTC)Yeah, it still staggers me that they can't see how offensive that was.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 06:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-06-27 09:22 pm (UTC)Writing to the comics letters page would be a better idea, but he's printed letters before about the Angel whitewashing (which he of course doesn't believe they're doing) and it hasn't changed anything.
But yes, a well written letter complaining about how Buffy is shouldering way more than her share of the blame would be a very good thing. They just don't seem to get it at all.