Superheroes

Sad that Adam West died. Growing up, I watched his Batman series and believed in all its earnestness. I also enjoyed the Batgirl episodes and wished there had been more of her. I never realized until I grew up that it was pure camp and that Batgirl was only in 1 season out of the three.

I was happy to see a trailer for the Black Panther movie. It looks cool, with a great cast. It's a shame it got pushed back for another stupid Spiderman movie; I saw the trailer for the next Spiderman with Wonder Woman, and I hated it. Stupid Ironman still endangering a naive teen and hypocritically lecturing him about how to save the day, when he basically recruited the kid in the middle of the high stakes Civil War. What a jerk he's become. So of course I'll be skipping that one as I've skipped other Marvel films lately.

Speaking of Wonder Woman, I had been vaguely aware that Gal Gadot was Israeli, and that she had served in the military, but after all, that's mandatory in her country right? And I convinced myself that I could overlook it, separating the actress from the character in the same way I've done with Scarlett Johansson and Black Widow. I can continue to boycott SodaStream, yet see the movies for the character, who is part of a larger ensemble, unrelated to such politics.


However with Lebanon banning Wonder Woman, I finally decided to look into Gal Gadot's history. The political criticism isn't just about her being from Israel and serving in the IDF. It's from her post during the 2014 bombing of Gaza, where she and her daughter are apparently praying for the IDF, not for the Palestinians. One of the hashtags is even about "coexistence". Coexistence would be a two-state solution or any other good faith attempt at peace. I'm sad that she and apparently her daughter have been indoctrinated in this point of view that Israel is acting in self-defense, instead of committing war crimes against people who are living under occupation and oppression. It's horrible. I wonder if she deleted the post afterward because she actually regrets it or if she was just told to delete it for the good of her public image. I don't know, and I don't like armchair psychology anyway.

It's too late for me to take back seeing Wonder Woman, and it's far too late for DC to cast someone else in the role, someone actually Greek for instance, or American as some of the other roles are. I can choose to stop supporting the movie by not buying merchandise or DVDs or other things. I can choose to skip any sequels too. (I mean, I was going to skip Justice League anyway as I generally hate DC films, but I mean any other films featuring just Wonder Woman.)

I still feel in a way that Wonder Woman needed desperately to be a success, in order for Hollywood to take women seriously as actors, audiences, and filmmakers. If it had flopped, we would have failed to have another female superhero movie for years. Wonder Woman is an icon, and we fans have been craving this for so long, it felt necessary to support it, especially on the crucial opening weekend. Just the joy of seeing all the little girls dressed up as Wonder Woman, was so wonderful. If only it wasn't sullied at all... but no movie is perfect. No art or artist is either. I've learned this about other favorite songs and media that I like. Still I've got to draw some lines somewhere, of what I can live with personally, though I'll let others enjoy what they want and set limits for themselves.

Well, maybe for my Wonder Woman fix I can just watch the new movie about creator William Moulton Marston's unusual household of three. I hope it will have interesting things to say about polyamory and feminism. Apparently it's coming out in October this year, so I'll look forward to that.