Femininity In Pop Culture

Introduction Earlier this year, Internet personality Meg Turney uploaded a photo of herself in full comic costume (more colloquially known as “cosplay”) to her Facebook page. She wore a strapless purple top with a sweetheart neckline and a pair of high-waisted bottoms, coupled with a bow and arrow slung over her shoulder and a pair of black bunny ears. Her costume that can easily be described as Hawkeye, the lone archer from The Avengers franchise, but dressed as a Playboy Bunny. Ms. Turney’s outfit was nothing more scandalous nor more revealing than a one-piece bathing suit. Yet, hidden deep in the comments section of the photo, a single comment saying about how Ms. Turney was “ultra slutty” and how it would be nice to see a woman with “class

Nowadays, there’s no difference between a PowerGirl comic spread or a Penthouse magazine centerfold. And while I am by no means criticizing female sexuality, I am criticizing a culture that has given us a society where female sexuality is dominated by men and masculinity. First and foremost, I am a pop culture lover. I listen to pop culture podcasts and read gossip rags while I’m in line at the grocery store. My first love will always be pop culture. Over the past 16 years, comic book cinema has really become the forefront of pop culture. From X-Men and Spider-Man in the first few years of the millennia to Iron Man and The Dark Knight and now Batman vs Superman and the success of Deadpool— comic book cinema is the new film du jour and isn’t going anywhere. One of my biggest issues with comic book cinema is its use of female characters, including, but not limited to, their costumes. The last superhero movie I saw with a practical female hero costume was Jaimie Alexander as The Lady Sif in Thor: The Dark World. While her costume does include a skirt and breastplates, she also gets shoulder and forearm armor, knee and shin armor, leggings, and that aforementioned breastplate is actually molded chest armor. I have seen more and more women in film being given “practical” armor, such as Alice in Wonderland, Snow White and the Huntsman, and recently Star Wars: The Force Awakens. But for the most part, women in comic book films are often given very impractical