theemeraldbar:So, today I went and visited my mother for the...

theemeraldbar:

So, today I went and visited my mother for the day.  The train ride from Chicago to home is a little over two hours.  The dcwomenkickingass tumblr's match-up between Scandal Savage and Zatanna got me thinking about Scandal Savage and why I like her so much.  This, new comics, and Queen consumed much of my train ride.

I miss Scandal Savage in my monthlies.  I really do.  The only reason I was one of those people up in arms about the DC reboot was because I wanted Secret Six in my folder every month.  The stories were tremendous, the art was astonishing, the books were both dark and twisted but were also hilarious (I'm still not over King Shark eating a jar of "I Can't Believe They're Not Eyeballs!"), and, of course, Scandal Savage was there.  

Scandal meant to me now what Wonder Woman meant to me as a kid.  When I would read my cousin's comic books, they were always about Captain America, Batman, and Spider-Man.  The comic books I got dealt with troubles in Riverdale (read: thrown away).  One day we went to the baseball card shop so they could get new comics and there on the spinner rack was Wonder Woman.  There on the cover of her own book was a woman who kicked ass and was a leading member of the Justice League!  She was equal to Batman and Superman!  The thought of Wonder Woman blew my mind.  Reading Wonder Woman almost gave me a stroke.  She wasn't a damsel in distress.  She wasn't indecisive.  She wasn't like anything I had ever seen.  

Scandal Savage felt like that.  However, I wasn't a kid.  I was in my mid-twenties, and loved the magic and story-telling of comics, but felt that perhaps I wasn't going to be wowed like that by a comic book character ever again.  Along came Scandal.  

Scandal Savage kicked ass. Scandal was a lesbian who wasn't totally defined by her sexuality, and it was amazing. Gay comic book characters are either overtly gay, or they are treated like a gay family member in a WASPy family (you know they're gay, but you don't really talk about it).  Scandal was gay, but it was just a part of the interesting patchwork that made up her character. Gail Simone wrote this character with such grace and heart that nothing about the character felt forced or showy.  Scandal, the human side, felt real.  She was gay. She had family issues. She fell into a depression when Knockout was murdered. She didn't take any shit from anyone. She attacked Bolt for groping her. She was sexual without being a dippy sexual object. She had tattoos. She could hold her own in a fight. In other words, she was incredibly human and became one of the best-written characters in any comic universe.  

There were many aspects of Scandal Savage that I could look at and say, "There I am.  I am represented in comics because you are here."  Sometimes reading Secret Six was like being a kid and reading Wonder Woman. Scandal felt like a high five to my soul. The world of comic books was just better because she was there once a month.  In a comic world full of Batman, Captain America, Thor, Spider-Man, Lantern Corps, and other regular monthlies, Scandal shined brighter than the rest.  I know the character isn't dead and could possibly return in the new DCU, but I also worry about what would happen if she were written by anyone other than Gail Simone.  Gail Simone nailed it.  I probably couldn't thank her enough if I tried.

Scandal, I miss you, girl!  

*************

I've been wanting to respond to this amazing and heartfelt post for a while.  First, thank you for the lovely, moving thoughts. It means a lot.  Whenever I go to a con, the thing that always haunts me is that there are so many portions of the audience who are not represented well in the comics themselves, or are represented spottily, or flat-out badly.  I'm talking about things like ethnicity, gender roles, country of origin, sexuality, that sort of thing.  It's clear that many readers identify with characters that don't specifically represent those aspects of their lives—I've met a ton of black readers whose favorite character is Spider-man and hundreds of women whose favorite is Batman.  But it'd be nice to have a comics universe that looks like the readership, and not the readership in 1958, for example.

Scandal was interesting in her genesis. I wanted a lesbian character who was not about the straight male gaze, someone with a rich life of her own.  When I said to DC that she was going to be gay, I planted my feet and was ready for a fight, because I'd heard that at some companies they didn't really DO gay characters overtly.  And sure enough, I got a message back that they had a concern about that.

So man, I had my arguments ready, I was going to fight for her, just TRY and tell me she can't be gay, guys. I dare you.

So I got the email back from my editor, and the only note was, we think it's great that she's a gay woman, but we don't want her to be portrayed exploitatively.

That was the sole note.

So I had my feet planted and fists up and didn't have anyone to fight, suddenly. You know that feeling where you assume the worst and prepare for it and are completely disoriented when something good happens, instead? That.

I love Scandal, I love how she can slip from middle management mode to don't-you-try-to-fuck-with-me mode in a heartbeat. I love how she's not intimidated by anyone, I love her friendship with Jeannette, I love her yearning for Liana's naivete, and her I-will-walk-through-Hell love for Knockout.

Her relationship with Bane was something I think a lot of us yearn for, a father figure who will move Heaven and Earth for you, who puts you first in all things. Most of us didn't have that. I think at first, she was almost humoring him, but it quickly became more real than her real family ties and a million times more rewarding.

I love Scandal. Thank you so much for your thoughts, I am glad she means so much to you.