Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION Dr. Gym'll's Cultural Rarities Article: The Racial Politics of Regressive Storytelling

Written by Chris Sims of Chris\' Invincible Super-Blog and Comics Alliance, this article is, I think, required reading for everyone who loves the DCU.

Granted, the issue is a rather complex one--there is a sales aspect to consider here as well (although I personally believe it to be somewhat of a red herring)--but I think he makes a very valid point, and one I've been ruminating on for quite some time. Given how entrenched the Legion is in both aspects of the debate (and Sims, a huge Legion fan, mentions the franchise in the article), I think it's worth discussing here.

Thanks for posting that observant article, Ian Lad.

The reference to Johns' nostalgia makes me think of the expression "Your good old days were somebody else's bad old days."

Comic fans seemed to be pretty happy to see more racial diversity in superheroes - which doesn't take away anyone's love for the old white-skinned characters.

And it's not just white skin - consider the "civilian" names given to superheroes. They're mostly very whitebread names - Clark Kent, Barry Allen, Diana Prince, Ray Palmer - no Kowalskis or Romanos. Well, we still have Helena Bertinelli.

well, i think a lot of people will always see hal jordan as the green lantern, and ronnie as firestorm etc. and that era is popular again.

after creators have been trying to make strides for diversity with 2nd or 3rd generation characters of the name. i just think that 2nd or 3rd generation characters are derivative (no matter what their ethnicity) ....... in general, having less authenticy and innate draw.

i guess that is how characters are created and put in the mainstream of the DCU? by being version 2, or 3 rather than a whole new character who happens to be this or that. and writers try to introduce diversity in these new version 2s ... good for them. i guess. kinda sorta.

maybe brand new characters are hard to market and have no staying power.

for some reason john stewart appeals to me more than hal. maybe cause hal's too much of a womanizer, he's like that popular kid in junior high with the leather jacket and gel'd hair.

kimiyo has been very poorly used and written lately. she is not the pro i thought she was in the 80s.

what i think is funny, is that there is some imbedded racism in some of these type of debates. we all see the legion as anglo saxon, yet most of them have black or brown hair. besides the alien ones, (or even/especially the alien ones who were colonized from earth) who's to say they are not ethnically hispanic, middle eastern, or some mixture of many things. (which in the future would be the case ... i presume) we bring some of our own shit to the table.

i think it's awkward when writers try to diversify, or give their characters an ethnicity to add depth, especially in an american context is just superficial and can often come off very blunt. and honestly, they are all american, that's their shared culture that i think dominates ethnicity in an international context.

vixen's cool. black lightning too. i guess zatanna would even be considered 'ethnic' in the DCU.

psylocke of the x-men, not so much. (ha now the x-men is one to talk about!) how come hisako's name (armor) is not like amber or amanda and she's not from the suburbs. cause that would be honest. it's a new generation writer guys. ruskie's and german speakers might've been progressive in the 70s and i'm greatfull for it but ...

"But Ryan Choi was a character that actually had a character, and was one of the few Chinese-American characters in comics that didn't have powers relating to Kung Fu dragon" thank you.

the funny thing, in the future, most people should be of asian and/or indian ethnic (these national terms should become meaningless in regards to ethnicity as it is for americans) decent considering the population and presuming more global equality and transnational mixing. but they may look a bit like our legionnaires because of the mixing. and really legionnaires may not even know their ethnicity. or if they do know their background maybe they can trace it back to the country but that could be irrelevant to ethnicity. 1000 years is a long time. race and ethnicity may be irrelevant in the 31st. unfortunately with the good comes some loss of cultural identity.

anyway, it's possible in the future that mixed, plural, ambiguous, or unknown ethnic identity would be the norm.

Gah! With the headache I've got going on today, that article (or at least the passage from it you've printed for us here Ian Lad) is enough to induce full on nausea.

I am SO sick of these kind of chicken little "the sky is falling" comic readers running around trying to tell us that the fact that DC (or Marvel) is returning to telling stories about their most popular, most famous and most bankable versions of their characters (at a time when comic companies need all the money they can get) is somehow some sign that they have a specific vendetta against non-white characters or something.

It's total garbage! And that's coming from someone who is VERY VERY VERY supportive of minority characters of every persuasion in his comics and would love to see more and more of them.

First of all - why is the fact that the roles are being passed back up a bad thing? Maybe they never should have been passed down in the first place.

The roles of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman are never going to be passed down for any significant length of time. (And anyone who selfishly thinks they should be has no idea what's kept those characters as popular as they are for so long.)

So if we start retiring/killing off their peers to bring in new versions, we've created a situation where Clark, Bruce and Diana are now the elder statesmen surrounded by these younger replacements. Not a very attractive dynamic to lure younger readers to their biggest money-making names.

And then what happens to the JSA? They've already got the elder statesmen role. Do we just kill them off? That won't go down well with certain quarters. And what happens to the Titans? They used to have a very clear, functional and relateable role as the younger sidekicks of their adult counterparts. Then they all got aged and a new crew of Teen Titans came along (Kon, Bart, etc). And look at how no one's known what to do with the adult Titans ever since.

And one day Kon and Bart and the rest will get inevitably aged and a new bunch will be introduced to take their place and then what have we got - a Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman who are stuck in time while everyone else ages and dies around them and these like 60-70 years worth of comics events are somehow supposed to all fit into a timeframe of about 10 years?

It's ridiculous. The selfish demands by some fans that DC keeps moving forward and updating and 'graduating' its characters is what's killing the DC universe. Marvel has nowhere near the problems in this area that DC has and that's because it has for the most part wisely kept the same people under the masks of its main heroes since their creation.

So ignoring the fact that the whole point of the argument in that paragraph is based on a faulty premise, let's go through the examples in it -

* Firestorm - ignoring the fact that Jason seems to be as equal a part of the matrix as Ronnie is, Ronnie Raymond is a popular character who had a solo series that lasted longer than 100 issues, was a longtime popular member of the premiere DCU team, guest-starred all over the place in the DCU from Brave and Bold, DC Comics Presents, Flash, Extreme Justice to Power Company and more, was featured in a popular cartoon series, had his own toy and has some very vocal fans who've been calling for his return ever since his extremely unceremonious blink and you'll miss it after-thought of a death in Identity Crisis. While Jason is a character whose solo was cancelled after about 30 not very well-received issues. Why does their have to be a nefarious motive for what is obviously a business decision?

* Dr Light - this part is especially disgusting and shows just how poorly thought out the ideas of the original writer of that piece are. Far be it from me to ever defend anything James Robinson has written in the last 10 years but the fact that the original Dr Light threatened to rape the new Dr Light's children is somehow evidence that Kimyo is now "permanently soured"? We're meant to think Kimyo is now worthless because of some evil thing Dr Light did to her? Sorry What a crock of shit! And talk about blaming the victim! Kimyo is still a good character. What happened to her during Blackest Night was just the same painful character growth that nearly every hero has to face at some point or another.

* Wally West - is still married to Linda Park. And Geoff Johns has repeatedly said that Wally will have a role in the new ongoing. But that's the only defence I'm going to give that abortion of a character rebirth.

* Kyle Rayner - the only thing I hate more than when people try to claim that Kyle's once-mentioned and then never heard of or artistically represented again Mexican heritage is a good example of racial inclusion in comics is when people try to hold up characters like Tasmia or Querl as examples of racial inclusion in the Legion. And anyone who is still complaining about the fact that Kyle Rayner got replaced by Hal Jordan as the lead in Green Lantern needs to take one look at the sales charts and then get back to me with a counter-argument.

I want more minority characters in comics! Racial, Sexual, Religious, Differently-Abled, Health-wise (i.e. Speedy), Philosophical... I want a DCU that is chocka-block full with all sorts of different colourful characters and viewpoints.

But I also understand that I am a fan of the DCU because of certain characters that were there long before I started reading it and will still be there long after I'm dead. It would be selfish of me to demand that DC replaces Clark or Hal or Arthur or Diana or any other one of its head-lining stars with a gay, black, muslim character that only I and a handful of other readers would be willing to spend money on.

So we're in a catch-22. Due to the era they were created in, the popular characters in the DCU are predominantly inhabited by straight, white men. And completely new characters are a very difficult sell to a shrinking comic-buying market. DC obviously tried the tactic of replacing a few of their 'lesser' but still popular names (Atom, Firestorm, Question, etc) with minority versions and they were mostly unsuccessful. (Though I think they should be commended for at least trying.) But they were doomed from the start.

The main way I think minority characters are going to start making inroads in the DCU is if they start being introduced as completely original, unique characters but with strong connections to extablished popular DCU franchises. AND THEN NOT GET KILLED OFF! Orpheus seemed like a really cool new addition to Gotham. If they'd let him grow some more instead of stupidly killing him off he could've gone somewhere. I've long thought that DC needs to put in place a no-kill policy for a while in regards to it's characters but that goes especially so for it's minority characters. They have so few of them and they really do need to give them some time to develop. Once they have then hopfully we'll have some good minority characters able to headline their own books.

*applause* for Blacula

PB also has a great point--replacement heroes always exist in the shadow of the original. Even She-Hulk is still "the female Hulk". Because they aren't original. And unlike the Golden Age / Silver Age there has been no cooling off period in comics where super heroes were completely unpopular and readers have moved on; it has not happened and therefore the popular versions remain popular.

The only solution is new characters and a commitment from DC not to kill them, but rather develop them.

Ryan Choi was dead on arrival. Anyone who thought otherwise was living on another planet. If he'd been a different hero other than another Atom, that might not have been the case. But but making him a more derivative and less authentic version it certainly was always going to be the case.

This may seem excessively rambly and overlong. My apologies.

The sales/popularity argument: Like I said, this is a red herring. Sales, now more than ever before, has less to do with the character and more with the creative team and level of support. A book’s success isn’t usually due to having a character people like, but to the people writing it—it’s why Morrison's Batman and Robin (which, it’s worth saying, doesn’t currently feature THE Batman) is doing so well, while other books aren’t.

Not to mention, there’s the fact that a lot of the characters who’ve gotten the “regressive storytelling” treatment have been characters who have no proven selling power as characters: Barry Allen hasn’t carried a book in twenty-five years; saying that more people prefer him to Wally West or Bart Allen is pure conjecture at this point. Ditto with Ronnie Raymond and Ray Palmer; Ryan Choi may have been dead in the water, sales-wise, but he starred in a series that was generally well received and a likeable character. Who’s to say that Palmer will do any better?

Green Lantern, at least, has evidence backing the claim that Hal can sell as much as Kyle, given the right creative team. Even so, it’s had the benefit of actually getting the A-list treatment. Hot creators and artists, crossovers, and publicity up the wazoo. It’s worth noting, however, that if we’re talking general consciousness, the Green Lantern most likely to be recognized by the general public was the one starring for five years in the Justice League animated series—John Stewart. It's also worth noting that Green Lantern saw a substantial increased in sales when Kyle first replaced Hal.

Personally, I think this is the least persuasive detail Sims’ essay, because, as you say, Kyle’s heritage, such as it is, has rarely been touched upon (it doesn’t help that he’s spent most of his time since the revelation in space), and despite being demoted, he still has a definite prescence. Still, since it’s been brought up, I’d like to say a little something.

Now, I haven’t read Green Lantern #150 in years, and don’t remember how the scene in question went—I remember liking the issue in general and not thinking too much about that aspect until reading the message boards, but I don’t know if that opinion will hold six years later. Still, even if the “revelation” didn’t work in execution, I think it’s a nice idea in concept, and one that reflects everyday reality. Yes, Kyle was not originally meant to be of Hispanic descent, and revealing him to be one was a retcon no matter how you look at it. Still…why not? After all, plenty of Hispanics have “white” skin color—I see it every day in Puerto Rico—so why couldn’t Kyle or his dad be? And it didn’t mean that Kyle suddenly had to suddenly “rediscover” his Latino heritage—it’s not how he was raised, so it’s not his reality, another thing that’s also true to life—his Hispanic experience is just as legitimate as Jaime’s. While the gesture wasn’t necessary and may smack of pandering to some, I also think it’s a more nuanced portrayal of Hispanic existence than what we usually get, even if nothing has really been done with it since.


One could try to make that case…except that when one realizes that apparently, the melting pot ended up in something looking very white, with white names, and exclusively white cultural norms, in direct opposition to existing trends, it just starts feeling like a cop-out.


Yes, Ronnie was popular—twenty years ago. There’s no evidence that he’d be just as popular as he was back then, and that a new Firestorm series starring him would do as well as his previous one (which, is worth mentioning, was eventually cancelled because DC found its sales figures unacceptable—the argument cuts both ways).
On that note...

The Firestorm Reversal, with the super-hero now having Ronnie once again in the driver’s seat and Jason in the mentor role traditionally held by Professor Stein, represents both problems dealt with in the essay nicely.

Personally, I’d be satisfied with a Jason/Ronnie Firestorm with Jason in the driver’s seat and Ronnie as the mentor (although I’m sad it they had to kill Gehenna, a character I rather liked, to do it—part of an unrelated gripe). I think it worked quite well when it was done in Jason’s book, and represents actual character growth for Ronnie, as he grows from student to teacher. Plus, it has the bonus of allowing Firestorm to remain black, which in a diversity-starved verse is damn good thing AND is more consistent with the version of the character currently appearing on Batman: The Brave and The Bold, which is currently watched by far more people than will ever read Brightest Day.

A Ronnie/Jason Firestorm, on the other hand, doesn’t work half as well. Jason is redundant, since Ronnie has more experience playing both sides of Firestorm, and therefore doesn’t need a less-experienced guy as a mentor, only as a side-kick. Plus, it whitewashes one of the few non-white characters currently in semi-regular rotation, in a manner that, combined with everything else, is just rife with unfortunate implications.

So why the change? Well, given that Ronnie hasn’t had a book in more than a decade, sales aren’t a logical reason. And I don’t want to believe that race is part of the decision. So what is it? Again, it’s because a particular writer wants it that way, because that's the way it was.


Inertia? With Wonder Woman and Superman, at least, their continued fame seems to be not too dissimilar to that of the Archie characters: they’re famous because they’ve always been there, not because of any inherent worth or popularity. Look at the sort of writers that have worked on both books: Greg Rucka, Gail Simone, Phil Jimenez, Geoff Johns—none of them have exactly managed to set the sales chart on fire or made the wider world stand up and take notice.

The Silver Age: Sims I think, expressed my thoughts on this quite nicely.

Yes, the silver age was great. A huge part of it was because creators weren’t afraid to actually create. Take Jim Shooter*: had he been content with the existing mythos, then the franchise would have likely stagnated and lied forgotten in limbo. Instead, he did the opposite; in his first story, he created four classic Legionnaires, and an alien race that forms an integral part of the DCU. A few issues later, he created the Fatal Five, the Controllers, and the Sun-Eater—again, integral parts of the series. Stan Lee and Jack Kirby created worlds the way we eat breakfast. Not all of their creations were instant successes (although a fair amount were), but over time, they were allowed to become great. Heck, the Silver Age Flash and Green Lantern concepts were completely new stories adapted to an existing power set.

While Geoff Johns has created a number of original characters and concepts (note that his biggest overall success—the revitalized Green Lantern franchise—is the one that features something we hadn’t seen before) he’s grown progressively more focused in returning concepts to the way they were back in some undefined past: the epitome of this philosophy? Brightest Day, dedicated exclusively and explicitly to characters we’ve all seen before.

One can make the argument that new characters aren't needed--that the DCU was fine the way it was in 1978 and if sales can remain steady (which they never did, even back then) then there's no reason to change. And heck, it may even work--the Archie franchise has lasted for decades on that very premise. And yet look at franchises who have managed to do that: Scooby Doo, the Archie franchise,Pokemon, Mickey Mouse, Garfield. Innofensive pap that eventually becomes self-sustaining and creatively worthless, until somebody decides that--hey, we need to change things up.

One problem: The guy who’s killing them off is often the guy isn’t interested in creating new ones to replace them; he’s too interested in playing with his childhood toys to work his proven sales-attracting mojo on new concepts.

That is precisely half the solution.

The other half is for these characters to be supported by the fan base. Good luck with that one.

This is an excellent article by Chris Simms. I'm glad somebody had the nerve to say the things that he said - things that happen to be the truth. He is not talking in a "sky is falling" tone. His observations are well thought out and articulated. The lack of diversity in mainstream comics isn't just an unfortunate by product of the times in which most of the mainstay characters were created. The publishers and distributors had specific racist policies in place.

Simms is not blaming the regressive storytelling for the racism. He’s simply pointing out that the practice erases some of the advances that had been made. Yes, new characters are ultimately a big part of the solution. There doesn’t seem to be much room for new characters in the current climate, though. The message seems to be that DC will only support the Silver Age purists vision of the company. That’s a vision that is pretty clean, white and neat.

Add to this the fact that there's actually something kind of offensive about the message that minorities can be successful, but only by modelling themselves after white people.

In the long term I think a lot of these legacy-minorities will be viewed as being as ill-thought out as minority-stereotype characters of a generation ago. It's simply a bad way of trying to introduce diversity.

That's my pet peeve with this whole notion, is that minority replacements are being shoehorned into the roles of successful white characters, rather than minority characters being given their own individual introductions.

I don't want a 'black Aqualad' or a 'latino Blue Beetle,' I'd rather see pre-existing characters of various colors or races developed (Vixen, Cyborg, etc.), and *new* characters introduced, who happen to be of color / gender / whatever, but whose powers aren't defined by some stereotype (an asian who isn't a martial artist, for instance, or a black character with *mental* powers).

Replacing Hal Jordan with 'Earth's first woman Green Lantern!' or Barry Allen with 'the gay Flash!' or Bruce Wayne with 'The Black Bat!' isn't the answer.

It cheapens the whole notion of inclusion, if the only 'inclusion' that happens is for a white character to die (or retire) and a person-of-color to get their hand-me-downs.

That being said, I pretty much loathe Hal Jordan, and am way, way, WAY over Barry Allen's death. Kyle Rayner can be hispanic or Irish or Ainu, for all I care, I just think he's a much more interesting character.