A Note on FEMALE FURIES1/14/2020 As a woman who reads comics, this industry doesn't revolve around people like me as their target audience. Which is something women are sadly used to--while we're welcome in the community, women are often seen as second-class comic nerds, as if our gender determines what our interests should be, and how much of those interests we're allowed to know about. Clearly, this isn't the reality, and tons of women of all ages are interested and work/live their lives in comics., regardless of the male domination. This means that when something DOES get actively targeted towards female comic readers, it feels like a gift from the creators made just for us. To clarify, I'm talking about traditional comics themes and characters, but written to actively include female readers in the target audience. One recent example of this is the limited series, Female Furies. It was set up for success among female "sweaties" like me from the start: female driven creative team, female leads, accurate female relationships, recognizable metaphors for our own society, and best of all--it was set up with the backdrop of classic DC comics characters and stories (Hello, Apokalips). In fact, it even includes the original Jack Kirby source material from the old-school Mister Miracle and New Gods books in the back of the collected edition. Needless to say, I tore through the volume in an afternoon, and it left me with chills. I loved it endlessly and want to breathe it's spirit into every comic reader who will listen. But somehow, even through all of this, female Furies is misunderstood. Continue Reading to learn what I mean by that, and why Female Furies is such a perfect battle cry to women everywhere. This book, to me, was incredible. From the first page, you can see what it’s setting up, and I was in for the long haul immediately.
The point the book makes is specific to the Furies, but also can be taken much more broadly, in the sense of the female condition. The Furies, and Granny Goodness, are somewhat exaggerated metaphors for the women of our patriarchal society. Granny does the work, the men take the credit, and when she tries to stand up for herself, she’s told to stop whining and trying to steal the spotlight. After a bloody battle, Darkseid comes to her and forces himself on her in the name of his Worship. The scene is clear. As he makes his demands, she fights back, says no, pleads even. He insists on being satiated, and she unwillingly (as if she had a choice in this scenario) obliges her God. Later, Granny is accused to seducing Darkseid to gain trust and position. She doesn’t speak up for the truth, knowing how they’d make her sound. Her Furies don’t have it any better. After years of proving themselves to be far and above any of the men on Apokalips, they are still consistently pushed back. Their leader is chosen by a minion of Darkseid to be “his” personal project. She loathes him, but due to his position, he is able to secret her away and repeatedly rape her. When she tries to stand up for herself, she’s called a whore who’s sleeping with him for the status, and that she was always asking for it. This man eventually tortures and kills her, but still they say: she was asking for it. The point of this book is clear. So it disturbs me when I briefly Google the book, that the first thing I see is a YouTube review, by a man, titled: “Darkseid gets #Metoo’ed.” It took me a little while to actually pin point why that disgusted me so much. It’s for two reasons. First, this man has attempted to illegitemize the entire Me Too movement by turning it into an adjective used humorously and condescendingly. Second, after supposedly reading this series and all its messages, what he walks away with is that it’s all about Darkseid, who must be pitied. The entire message of the book completely escaped this man so much that he committed the very crime the creators spent 6 issues elaborating on and describing. It’s alarming to me that there are still people in this world that can have a situation as clear as that in Female Furies laid out before them, and still have their first reaction be to the defense of the offending male characters. This shouldn’t be confused as men versus women, or a battle of the sexes. When some of us are made to suffer, the effects are felt for generations. In the end, the Furies are able to gather the women of Apokalips on their side, and push back for the many ages of unbalanced power and mistreatment. Together, they are able to step back and look at their situation as a whole, realize how unjust it is, and take the necessary steps to begin correction. Women are strong, but we are stronger together. Female Furies is written by Cecil Castellucci and drawn by Adriana Melo. On another note, when it comes down to it, a female scriptist is the best choice for a female led book. As soon as wonder Woman is given a female writer, I'll add it to my pull list I've tried reading it a few times over the past years, but the male writers are clearly missing pieces of what it is to be a woman. They tend to miss the mark on female friendships, female drive, and female thought. Wonder Woman, for me, is the ultimate woman, and deserves a female writer who can treat her right.
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