David Michael Newstead's Blog, page 121

August

From Vanity Fair: The Future of Women in Comics

Kelly Sue DeConnick is talking to a class of aspiring comic-book writers assembled in a ballroom, located in the back of a former gentlemen’s club on Powell Street in San Francisco. “I hate when I get asked, ‘What’s it like to be a woman in comics?’” she tells them. Then, imagining her sarcastic response: “‘Well, I sit around typing with my vagina, but that gets uncomfortable after a while.’ The notion that somehow women are wildly different infuriates me. Fuck those people.”

As one of the comic-book industry’s most successful writers, DeConnick, 44, has been credited with drawing female readers back to comic books. She is the writer of three popular comic-book series, all starring female characters: the Marvel imprint Captain Marvel, the western Pretty Deadly, and Bitch Planet, a cultural satire about an off-planet women’s prison. She writes passionately, both on and off the page, about feminism, female representation, and the need for more female comic-book creators. At San Diego Comic-Con this week, she’ll participate in three separate panels, including a workshop for another group of aspiring comic-book artists.

DeConnick takes another question from the class on Powell Street; this time, it’s about sexism in the comic-book industry. She sighs and looks down. “Being a woman in a male-dominated industry sort of sucks, but it doesn’t suck any more than being a woman in the world,” she says, facing the class. “My advice? Be terrifying.”

In 2011, Steve Wacker, the vice president of animation at Marvel Comics, proposed the relaunch of the publisher’s classic Ms. Marvel comic-book series, with one caveat: the superhero, Carol Danvers, would assume the name of Captain Marvel. Several superheroes have donned the Captain Marvel jumpsuit over the years, both male and female. But Wacker wanted someone tougher and more symbolic of comics’ changing demographic. “I wanted a lady Chuck Yeager,” he told me recently.

Wacker offered the job to DeConnick, who had pitched a new Ms. Marvel series earlier that year. Within the hour, she had sent him a dozen articles about female pilots in World War II. She also offered suggestions for a new costume. The previous one—thigh-high boots, black swimsuit, and opera gloves—felt somewhat dated. “This is a woman with a military background, a feminist background,” DeConnick said. “The idea that she would be flying around with her ass hanging out is ridiculous.”

The first issue of DeConnick’s Captain Marvel went on sale in July 2012. Historically, new or relaunched comic-book series require an established writer, artist, or character to succeed. DeConnick was relatively unknown, Carol Danvers was a minor character in the Marvel universe, and the Captain Marvel artist, Dexter Soy, had never done a major series before. “No one had any reason to believe that it would make it,” DeConnick said.

Sales of Captain Marvel are solid, but slow compared to DC and Marvel’s biggest titles: around 20,000 a week compared to Amazing Spider-Man’s 100,000 copies. But Carol’s fans are fiercely loyal. After Captain Marvel’s launch, DeConnick began tagging social-media posts related to the book—letters, fan art, cosplay—with the hashtag #carolcorps. It caught on. Fans began referring to themselves as members of the Carol Corps, tweeting photos of themselves reading the books, wearing Captain Marvel T-shirts, or getting Captain Marvel tattoos. A mother and daughter from North Carolina started a Carol Corps cat club, raising money for local cat shelters as a tribute to Carol Danvers’s cat. Another group, the Carol Corps Yarn Brigade, knit Captain Marvel merchandise for sick members of the Carol Corps. “I think it accidentally touched on a real thirst,” DeConnick said. “You’ve got 20,000 monthly readers…in the comic market that’s not that much, but 19,000 of them have tattoos of the main character on their arm . . . it’s something else. It’s a vocal, committed, and supportive fanbase.”

The past 15 years have been defined by what comic-book writer Mark Millar, whose comic books Wanted, Kick-Ass and The Secret Service have all been adapted into feature films, calls “the legitimatization of comics through Hollywood.” Movie franchises from Spider-Man and the massive Marvel Cinematic Universe to TV’s The Walking Dead have helped comic books re-emerge as a dominant force in pop culture. And nowhere is the renewed interest in comics more evident than in the sales of actual comic books themselves. Current industry estimates put the size of the North American market at around $900 million, compared to about $700 million in 2011.

Many of these new readers are women. In 2014, females between the ages of 17 and 33 were the fastest growing demographic in comics. According to comic book historian Tim Hanley the number of female-led comic-book titles has doubled in the last five years, with fans devouring heroines like selfie-snapping Batgirl, the new female Thor (who, after an initial period of fanboy anguish, is outselling the last Thor comic book by 30 percent), and Spider-Gwen, a version of Peter Parker’s first love, Gwen Stacy, who is bitten by a radioactive spider and becomes Spider-Woman. There’s even a new, all-female Avengers team called A-Force that will continue later this year.

These books, and associated phenomena like the Carol Corps, continue to prove the existence of an ardent female fan base for comics. But the legitimatization of comics through Hollywood has largely yet to extend to female characters. A stand-alone film for Wonder Woman and a Supergirl TV series are both on the way, but a planned Captain Marvel film has been delayed, and Marvel’s Black Widow doesn’t just lack her own film, but was the butt of sexist comments from several Avengers stars earlier this year. “I do think it’s interesting we got a talking raccoon before we got a female lead in a comic-book movie,” says Millar.

DeConnick will likely be part of changing that. She and her husband, Matt Fritchman (better known by his pen name, Matt Fraction), run the company Milkfed Criminal Masterminds, and signed a development deal with Universal Television earlier this year to adapt both their comics and the work of others. Her run with Captain Marvel will end later this year, in part to allow her more time to focus on television projects. While her work is credited for pushing Marvel toward a Captain Marvel film, she, too, remains skeptical about Hollywood’s commitment to female heroes: “I’ll believe these films are definitely happening when they are on the screen.”

DeConnick has been a comics reader since childhood, but she only came to the industry after earning a drama degree from U.T. Austin, writing copy for the nude photo spreads in dirty magazines (“I hate to break this to you, but that’s not actually the models talking”), and eventually posting her own stories on a message board for author Warren Ellis, of the Planetary series. Ellis then invited her to work on a new site, artbomb.net, where she wrote catalogue entries for comic-book issues. Later, she got a job re-writing Japanese manga comics for a small publisher. She worked alongside a translator, making sure dialogue and story arcs made sense in an English-speaking context. She did this for seven years, in which time she estimates she wrote more than 11,000 comic-book pages. “So when people say dialogue is the best part of my scripts, it’s because I had a lot of practice.”

She met Fritchman on a Warren Ellis board in 2001. They married the following year. At the time, Fritchman was writing and directing commercials and music videos, but eventually moved into writing comic books full time. His creator-owned series, The Five Fists of Science and Casanova, drew the attention of Marvel, who later hired Fritchman to work on The Immortal Iron First, Uncanny X-Men, The Mighty Thor, Hawkeye, and The Invincible Iron Man, which led Fritchman to a job consulting on the 2010 film Iron Man 2. In 2009, DeConnick submitted a blind pitch to Marvel for two one-off comic books; she left out the part about being married to Fritchman until after her ideas were accepted.

Women weren’t always so rare in the world of comics—in the so-called “Golden Age,” which lasted from the late 30s to the early 50s, they were read by males and females in almost equal numbers. But until recently, DeConnick and her friend Gail Simone, a legendary writer for Wonder Woman and Batgirl, among others, were some of the few women at comic-book conventions. Both still face staggering amounts of sexist responses to their work. Deconnick began writing Bitch Planet as a direct response to people complaining about Captain Marvel’s new direction when she took over the series. “I wasn’t like, writing feminist pamphlets, you know. I was writing stories about this lady who shoots beams out of her hands. But I had the gall to have inter-generational female friendships and a largely female cast and, you know, every once in a while, a joke. It ruffled feathers and I thought, Well, if that’s what we’re going to talk about, then let’s talk about it.”

It’s not just women who are becoming increasingly represented in comics. Spider-Man is now a black Hispanic kid named Miles Morales. Simone’s Batgirl comic introduced Alysia Yeoh, the first transgender character in a mainstream superhero book. Later this year, DC will publish a new series starring gay superhero Midnighter. One of Marvel’s digital top sellers is the new Ms. Marvel series, starring a 16-year-old Pakistani-American teenager from New Jersey named Kamala Khan. “Ten years ago, if you told me I’d be co-creating a series about a superhero who happened to be a Muslim girl, I’d have choked on my laughter,” says Sana Amanat, the director of content and character development at Marvel.

Earlier this year, street artists in San Francisco began covering up anti-Islam advertisements on city buses with images of Kamala, alongside slogans calling for free speech and an end to racism. Ms. Marvel writer G. Willow Wilson didn’t know until someone brought it up on Twitter. “To see a character for whom I had very conservative hopes—I expected the series to run for seven or eight issues, ten tops, if right-wing backlash didn’t kill it sooner—become a symbol of hope and renewal, has just been incredible,” she told me. “If nothing else, it shows you how much is changing, not just in the comics industry, but in our culture as a whole.”

“There are a great many people who have grown tired of being ignored, pushed aside, or relegated to some sort of supporting role,” says Thomas Fogg, a 34-year-old member of the Carol Corps from Chattanooga, Tennessee. “As a father of a little girl, I like being able to show her other women who have struggled with the same things she’s struggled with and have overcome them.” William Evans, 35, who edits the website blacknerdproblems.com, added, “There are still so many people that don’t understand the power of representation and seeing a reflection of yourself in the stories and entertainment you indulge. When a woman becomes Thor or a black character becomes Captain America, a new portion of the audience suddenly stops feeling like outsiders in a medium they love.”

DeConnick and Fritchman’s company, Milkfed Criminal Masterminds, allows them control over their creator-owned work. DeConnick keeps a punishing daily schedule: up at 3 A.M., writing until 5:30 A.M., mom duty until the kids leave for school, back to writing until 4 P.M., then, when the kids come from school, it’s dinner, homework, violin lessons, and family time. She’s in bed by eight P.M. Some time ago, DeConnick worked with a comic-book artist and friend to design the giant, elegant Kraken tattoo currently on her back—a reminder of her unique, and sometimes exhausting, artistic process. “Every time [I start working on a new project] I am convinced I’m a horrible fraud and I’m never going to get this figured out . . . then, three days later, I rise from this dark place with a finished script. This is the process.”

The couple lives in Portland, in a four-bedroom house that backs onto woodland. DeConnick often wakes up to deer grazing on her back porch. They have two children, Henry Leo, 7, and Tallulah Louise, 5. Every Friday, the family goes to the house of comic author Brian Michael Bendis for dinner, along with some of Portland’s other comic-book professionals. DeConnick tries to impart the importance of the situation on Henry and Tallulah: “I say, ‘Uncle Brian writes Spider-Man, you know.’ They don’t get it.’”

Both DeConnick and Fritchman are over 10 years sober—DeConnick just celebrated her 15th anniversary. She attended her first A.A. meeting in New York in 2000—a year before she met Fritchman—after a friend challenged her to go a week without drinking. When she realized she couldn’t, she signed up. Fifteen years later, she still attends weekly A.A. meetings, a ritual she says taught her it’s O.K. to be uncomfortable from time to time—and make others uncomfortable when they need it.

Though she’s now leaving Captain Marvel behind to focus on her television work, as well as Bitch Planet and Pretty Deadly, DeConnick knows the character will stick with her. “Carol’s rubbed off on me a bit, living in my head these last few years. She’s taught me to keep pushing myself,” she said. “I’m afraid of failing, afraid I’ve peaked. But who would I be if I let that stop me, right? Corny as it is to say, it would be as though she’d taught me nothing.”

Simone, who is currently working on a number of comic titles for DC and Vertigo, as well as unannounced film and television projects, is not worried about DeConnikc’s future.

“When I was dreaming of what the future of women in comics could be, I was dreaming of her. I just didn’t know it yet,” she said.

The Quotable Teddy Roosevelt #1

Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.

Streaming This Weekend

zTailors

By David Michael Newstead         

Even if you’ve never heard of zTailors, you’re already familiar with it. That’s because the founder of zTailors also founded Men’s Wearhouse forty years ago. And for much of that time, you probably saw George Zimmer in TV commercials declaring “You’re going to like the way you look. I guarantee it!” But in 2013, he was ousted as the CEO of Men’s Wearhouse after a power struggle with the company’s board of directors. Skip ahead to June 2015 and George Zimmer recently launched his new business venture, zTailors – basically an Uber for tailors or “a unique service that offers mobile, on-demand tailoring” if you prefer marketing speak.

The way this theoretically works is a customer makes an appointment, an experienced tailor comes by their home or office, and the customer gets his or her clothes back within a week thanks to free pickup and free delivery. That includes a wide range of alteration services for both men’s and women’s clothing, which usually runs $15 to $20. But other alterations can cost $50 or more and the tailors themselves must have at least five years of experience in their craft.

Now when I first learned about all this, I was intrigued. So, I thought I’d give it a try. I also happened to be motivated by the fact that I had just torn one of my dress shirts, so all the more reason really! And I have to say, using zTailors was a pretty good experience for me. I made an appointment. A tailor dropped by my house over the weekend. He was friendly and answered my questions. And I got my shirt back a few days later.

In the interest of being a discerning customer though, here are a few notable pros and cons.

Cons

You typically have to book appointments two or three days in advance. Admittedly, this isn’t a big deal in most cases. But if you were having some sort of fashion emergency before a big presentation or a formal event, zTailors is not the equivalent of clothing 9-1-1. That’s because you also won’t get your clothing back until a few days later as well.
Obviously, the more rural the location the less likely there is a tailor near you, much less a small army of them. The zTailors website allows you to search by zip code and it was hit or miss for places I’ve lived over the years.

Pros

You can always pay with a credit or debit card.
No brick-and-mortar store means prices are more affordable.
Seasoned expertise from tailoring professionals can add a lot to your wardrobe and allows you to customize and get better fitting clothes.
Free pickup and delivery! It’s hard to quantify the convenience and flexibility of free pickup and free delivery to your home or office, but the fact is you don’t have to go run yet another errand across town.

Check out zTailors for yourself – https://www.ztailors.com/

From NPR: Why My Mom Didn’t Say ‘I Love You’ For 11 Years

By Adebisi Alimi

Earlier this year on my 40th birthday, my mother sent me a text that said, “I love you.”

This was the first time she said this to me since I publicly came out as gay on Nigerian television in 2004.

A few months before my birthday, my father called me. We had not spoken in almost ten years. He had tried to pressure me into an arranged marriage with a woman. When I refused, he said he never wanted to speak to me again and cut me out of his life. He called after a near-death experience. He cried as he apologized for misunderstanding me, for hating me for something he knows I can’t help and for failing to remember the bigger picture: I am his son.

This story of acceptance is not unique to me. Over the past few years, parents and other family members, and friends of LGBT people, have begun sharing their stories with me and telling me how my story has helped them communicate with their children.

Of course, Nigeria is still a very difficult place for the LGBT community. A same-sex relationship is punishable by up to 14 years in prison. And polls show that 90 percent of Nigerians believe homosexuality is unnatural.

But the latest polls do show a significant shift that mirrors the changes in my family. While 96 percent of people opposed relationships between same-sex couples in 2010, that number is now only 87 percent. And 30 percent of Nigerians said they believe that LGBT people should have access to healthcare, housing and education.

And as attitudes change, I am hearing some remarkable stories.

A woman wrote to me on Facebook after she kicked her daughter out of their home for coming out as a lesbian. She had come across one of my interviews on YouTube. This led her to contact me. After her painful narrative of her guilt, regrets and confusion, she asked what she should do. I told her to go look for her daughter and bring her home.

Nigeria is at the tipping point of greater change. We have a new government that campaigned on a change agenda. I believe that, along with the progress shown in the poll, now is the time to start work to review Nigeria’s repressive laws and work to create non-judgmental educational curriculum and civil society engagement on the issue of sexuality and gender. With an increase in open discussions around sexual orientation and gender identity comes more understanding, tolerance and acceptance.

Not only is Nigeria is at a tipping point internally, Nigeria also is moving the continent of Africa toward social justice. This is our chance to lead the way toward the elimination of anti-LGBT attitudes and laws.

Unlike the United States, Nigeria may not be ready for same-sex marriage anytime soon. But I think we are getting closer to decriminalizing same-sex relations and creating laws to protect LGBT people from discrimination and harm. This, I am sure, is not too much to ask of good and loving religious Nigerians. Nor is it too much to ask people to simply accept family members and friends who come out as gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender.

Now I talk to my parents on a weekly basis. We talk about so many things. We’ve become closer. They are coming to understand and accept me.

Adebisi Alimi is an LGBT advocate, an HIV activist, and the first person to come out as gay on Nigerian television. He is a 2014 Aspen New Voices Fellow at the Aspen Institute.