[Header (The Champions v.1, 3, George Tuska pencils, Vince Colletta, inks) and all images used under Fair Use unless otherwise identified]
Scarlett Johansson and Charlize Theron are two of the most successful and highly regarded celebrities in contemporary pop culture. These two women have been in the news recently in ways that seem at first contradictory.
However, just a few days before that accomplishment, Theron, as reported by Zack Sharf, “called out a Hollywood double standard when it comes to action movies. The Oscar winner…said studios often give female actors just one shot to have an action movie hit. When it comes to men, however, they can have a box office flop but still land multiple follow-up projects.”
One of Johansson’s highest profile characters, Marvel’s Black Widow, offers a window into how Theron’s criticism remains valid even in the context of Johansson’s success.
Black Widow first appeared in 1964, nearly unrecognizable to today’s fans as a foil to Iron Man in Tales of Suspense 52. This origin portrays Black Widow in a different color costume on the cover than in the interior, but she is mostly a one-dimensional Cold War temptress.
Tales of Suspense (v1) 52, writers Stan Lee and N. Korok (Don Rico), artist Don Heck
Over the next 60 years, Marvel’s stewardship of Black Widow reflects the ongoing fate of women in pop culture—being underestimated and hypersexualized.
Notably, Theron’s criticism focuses on action roles, as covered by Sharf:
“Yeah, it’s harder. That’s known,” Theron said when asked about gender disparity in the action genre. “Action films with female leads don’t get greenlit as much as the ones with male leads. I think the thing that always frustrates me is the fact that guys will get a free ride.”
In my book-length analysis of Marvel’s Black Widow in print comic books across seven decades, one of the key themes of Natasha Romanov’s characterization is directly stated by Nat in issue 1 of volume 3, by the creative team of Richard K. Morgan and Bill Sienkiewicz: “He’s young—younger than me, anyway. And he’s fast. And he has a knife he knows how to use. But like most men in the end, he underestimates me.”
For current fans of the MCU, Black Widow/Nat as portrayed by Johansson may seem like a much larger character than has been portrayed in the comic books. Marvel has committed to 8 solo-title volumes, although most have been extremely brief. Black Widow has had one 20-issue run, and the critically praised last series, volume 8, only survived 15 issues despite an all-star creative team of women—Kelly Thompson, Elena Casagrande, and Jordie Bellaire.
Superhero comic books and films represent a key tension in pop culture among market forces, fans, and social biases such as sexism.
Theron, I think, is making a valid point that is reflected in Nat’s acknowledgement above; pop culture remains mostly controlled by men—the funders, the creators, and the fan base—who continue to underestimate women as characters and creators.
“[T]alked about … Like a Piece of Ass, Really”
Johansson as Black Widow/Nat entered the MCU in Iron Man 2, and with hindsight, it seems to be a huge understatement that Marvel underestimated the power of both Johansson and Black Widow for the Avengers and MCU.
Johansson, in fact, has addressed that Black Widow was hypersexualized:
All of that is related to that move away from the kind of hyper-sexualization of this character and, I mean, you look back at ‘Iron Man 2’ and while it was really fun and had a lot of great moments in it, the character is so sexualized, you know? Really talked about like she’s a piece of something, like a possession or a thing or whatever — like a piece of ass, really. And Tony even refers to her as something like that at one point.
Unfortunately, this early objectification of Black Widow in the MCU is comic book accurate since many of the depictions of the character in the print comic books has been for the male gaze.
For women characters and creators, then, Black Widow represents that women are often underestimated because they are hypersexualized.
While it seems likely that pop culture will continue to reflect society—especially the worst of society—instead of changing culture for the better, it seems there can be a time and place that pop culture resists underestimating and hypersexualizing women.
Honoring Women in Superhero Comics, Pop Culture, and Beyond
I think volume 8 of Black Widow by the creative team of Thompson and Casagrande represents the power of women creators working with complex women characters. And Kelly Sue DeConnick’s Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons at DC matches that excellence with a classic superhero.
These, none the less, are outliers, and it seems likely derivative women characters (such as She-Hulk), hypersexualizing and underestimating women characters, and giving women creators work as tokenism will persist at the Big Two, Marvel and DC.
Women as victims of sexism are not responsible for changing these realities from a position of less power; however, Johansson and Theron are providing important voices as well as demonstrating their exceptional roles in pop culture.
The irony is that what Theron labels “risk” seems more bankable than yet another film propping up an aging white man paired with a woman half his age—even as we acknowledge that Johansson with a woman writer/director made that work also.
Thomas, P.L. (2025). Haruki Murakami’s 7 stories: “It’s quite easy to become Men Without Women.” In J. Milburn (ed.), Haruki Murakami and philosophical concepts (pp. 65-72). Palgrave.
My high school English teacher and eventual mentor, Lynn Harrill, told me in my junior year that I should be a teacher.
I laughed, and certainly as teens are apt to do, hurt his feelings.
Almost fifty years later, and I have been a career educator since 1984.
I realized I wanted to be a teacher and a writer during my junior college years—the former because I had a job as a tutor and the latter because my speech teacher, Steven Brannon, introduced my to e.e. cummings.
I declared my secondary English education major when I transferred the fall of my junior year. And then, almost immediately, I learned a harsh lesson about becoming an education major: It was a “lesser” degree.
I took as many English courses as I could as an undergrad, and in ever class, I had to out myself as an education major, not an English major (almost most of my close friends were English majors).
Over the next five decades, I have had to navigate that “lesser” status when I tried to enter an MFA program while teaching high school full-time (nope), tried to apply for a PhD in English while teaching high school full time (nope), and then completed an EdD (yet another “lesser” degree to go with with my BA in English Education and MEd).
And since 2002, I have had to correct people who assume I am in the English department; nope, I am in Education.
In the good ol’ U.S. of A., as well, the standard beliefs are that education is failing, teachers are people who can’t do (and were mostly weak students themselves), and the discipline of education is a joke.
Just as a recent example, see this on social media:
Why does Hattie's plagiarism & misconduct matter?
Because it exposes the lie at the heart of what is called the 'science of learning', 'evidence-based' or 'education reform' movement.
This movement is not about 'science', but about 'management science', and it's destructive ⬇️ https://t.co/ODuGOTdAX5
Visible Learning, promoted by Tom Bennett, Nick Gibb, Carl Hendrick, & Daisy Christodoulou in the most glowing terms, is a far deeper & more pernicious myth than any of these.
I have recently submitted a book chapter, in fact, on two “pernicious” fads in education—grit and growth mindset.
However, I believe the standard attacks on education, teachers, and then the discipline of education are gross oversimplifications that miss almost entirely the real problems (what Vainker is addressing above and what I am confronting in my chapter on grit and growth mindset).
There are layers to the problem.
First, education as a discipline is robust and valid. My own recognition of that, however, did not fully develop until my EdD program where I was engaged with the scholarship, philosophy, and theory of the field of education—and not distracted by issues of certification and bureaucracy.
Now, that means when people are attacking “education” and the “pernicious fads” they are in fact not criticizing the discipline.
Here are the layers of problems that dilute a valid field:
Certification and accreditation bureaucracy. Regretfully, education is a profession that feels compelled to mimic more respected fields like medicine and law, where credentials are required. However, that layer has more often than not been reductive for the discipline because of the inherent flaws with credentialing and bureaucracy.
The education market place. The current “science of reading” (SOR) movement is repeating what happened during the Common Core era—the education market place using branding (SOR, CC) to spur purchasing cycles in education. To be blunt, the single most powerful and corrupting aspect of education as a field is the market. Any credible or valid education research is necessarily reduced when it is packaged and sold; this is exactly what happened with multiple intelligences, learning styles, grit, growth mindset, etc., creating the perception that the research isn’t credible instead of acknowledging that the marketing is the problem (although in some cases, the market is perpetuating flawed research as well). In short, education reform is an industry, not a process for improving teaching and learning in the US.
Education celebrities. A parallel problem with education market forces is the education celebrity who corrupts the field of education by selling programs, fads, or themselves as “experts” (and sometimes, all of these at once). This is a problematic concern since many of us who work in education, of course, are paid as professionals. Simply being paid as a professional is not something to criticize in a capitalistic society, of course, but money can and does corrupt. One of the best (worst?) examples of how an education celebrity can distort significantly credible and valid research is Ruby Payne, who cashed in (literally) on NCLB mandates and funding. Payne peddled stereotypes about poverty and teaching children in poverty—even though a robust body of research on poverty refuted nearly everything she packaged, promoted, and sold. Part of the problem here is that education celebrities and the market can easily prey on education and educators because the US has been politically negligent in providing schools, teachers, and students the sort of conditions in which all children can learn.
Sexism. Here is a fact at the core of many problems in education: More than 7 out of 10 K-12 teachers and most teacher educators/scholars are women. I leave this as the last point for emphasis because I believe sexism is the foundation of why education remains disrespected as a field and why there is so little political and public support for teachers as professionals (note the current rush to support scripted curriculum as one example). The current focus on “science,” as well, is another sexist movement (repeating the same sort of claims during NCLB) since the quantitative/qualitative divide in what research matters is highly gendered (men do “hard” science, but women do “soft” science).
Bashing student achievement, school and teacher quality, and teaching as a profession as well as education as a field are all a sort of lazy and unexamined national past time in the US.
These sorts of attacks and criticisms are shrugged off as common knowledge and even jokes; again, I believe, primarily because we still see teaching as just something women do with children.
While there is some validity to criticizing educational research that is packaged and sold, this is not something unique to education as a field.
Consider as just one example the perversion of the 10,000 rule in psychology, and the power of Malcolm Gladwell as “celebrity” to do just that.
Psychology and economics, in fact, have experienced crises of replication that should tarnish those fields at least as much as how we marginalize education.
Yet, psychology and economics are seen as men’s professions, and thus, professions, and receive a huge pass when they simply do not deserve that.
We should stop bashing education as a field, but we should also be far more vigilant about protecting educational research and practice from the corrosive impact of bureaucracy, the market, celebrities, and sexism.
Superhero Black Widow/ Natasha Romanov has endured more than 60 years in the Marvel Universe before becoming a prominent character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe with the Avengers; however, this volume examines how this woman character has mostly been underestimated and hypersexualized. The overview and analysis explore the contradiction between Black Widow’s enduring popularity and the limited commitment to her solo series and character development in print. This discussion centers Black Widow as a representation of the inadequate care and commitment given to women characters in mainstream superhero comics.
Today is election day, and we should all take time to recognize what we believe, and why, especially as that informs how we vote, and again, why.
I am ideologically realistic. In fact, my stoic realism is off-putting to many people who perceive it as confrontational, arrogant.
However, here is an ideal I find very compelling: A free people committed to a democracy insuring for all life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
The United States of America began at least rhetorically along this path, but has fulfilled that ideal only sporadically and often begrudgingly.
The country began in slavery, took a century and a half to allow women to vote, and another four decades to begin to acknowledge racial equality.
In my lifetime, states had to be compelled by the Supreme Court to allow interracial marriage and gay marriage, and of course, a woman’s right to reproductive rights were granted and then stripped away.
Here at what is reductively called the abortion debate is where I see an essential right that cannot be separated from anyone’s full humanity, and of course, the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—universal body autonomy.
Universal body autonomy includes reproductive rights and access to abortion, but our public debates would better serve our ideals if we focused on universal body autonomy.
Since no man is ever compelled to carry a pregnancy to full term, no woman should be compelled to carry an unwanted or medically dangerous pregnancy to full term.
To me, it is that simple in terms of political and cultural ideology—that clear if we as a people do genuinely believe in human freedom and autonomy and that elusive right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Focusing narrowly on abortion is reductive, but that element of body autonomy and reproductive rights can be navigated along the same lines.
First, claims that life begins at conception is a belief, not a medical fact. Among a free people who honor religious freedom, anyone has the right to hold and practice that belief.
However, no one has the right to compel others to conform to their beliefs.
I fully support those who want to advocate for fewer or even no abortions, but again, that is a reductive stance. Abortion is the consequence of unwanted pregnancy and medical danger.
To reduce abortion, we should advocate for practices that reduce unwanted pregnancy (universal access to contraception, comprehensive sex education) and support universal healthcare.
Historically and currently, though, adult men are by default more free than women and children, the latter two experiencing reduced body autonomy by law, compelled or neglected by government policy.
This brings me back to election day, voting, how we vote and why.
Increasingly in my lifetime, Republicans have used religion to justify government restricting basic human autonomy—ignoring religious freedom, individual freedom, and the ideal of universal life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Whether an elected official is openly religious or not is irrelevant; when an elected official chooses to use government to impose beliefs of a few onto everyone, then we no longer find ourselves in a democracy seeking the ideal that should ground us.
Abortion access and reproductive rights are subsets of universal body autonomy, and until we guarantee everyone universal body autonomy, we remain no better than our founders who used “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” as mere rhetoric for anyone not like them.
“What would I write if I could write literally anything in the DC Universe?” writes Kelly Sue DeConnick in her preface to The Pitch for Wonder Woman Historia (the hardback collecting the three volume series), adding, “What was the comic I had always wanted to read?”
A very fortunate 62-year-old reader and collector of comic books, I am reading a copy signed by the wonderful creative team including DeConnick, Phil Jimenez, Gene Ha, and Nicola Scott:
In the second point DeConnick makes about The Pitch, she focuses on what I think must be acknowledged about this thoughtful interrogation of the Wonder Woman myth as well as much of what makes us human (especially issues related to gender):
I honestly don’t think any of my favorite moments appear in the pitch—they were all discovered later, in the writing, the rewriting, or the alchemy of collaboration.
As an avid reader, a writer, and a teacher of writing, I wish I could bottle that thought and pour it into my students—and anyone who seeks to be a writer, to be creative.
That’s it, that’s the path to the beautiful that is Wonder Woman Historia, a work that she be read and reread, a work that should be careful savored by looking carefully at the stunning artwork at both the close-up and at the widest possible angels that reveal some of the best work ever done in comic books.
I cannot recommend this work enough, both for readers but also for anyone who has the opportunity to bring this text into a classroom.
There isn’t much new I can offer so I collect below the four posts I have written already hoping you find a moment to read—but after you read, and reread Wonder Woman Historia.
At my core, I remain an English teacher, and in that role, I have always loved inviting students into interrogating paired texts, especially texts that mix and blend various genres and media/forms.
I essentially do not go to the theater any more to see movies, having become pretty content to view films on streaming services. But I splurged and found myself in a nearly empty theater yesterday to watch Barbie.
I have been agnostic about the social buzz around the film, but I must confess that many years ago I accepted that any movie with Ryan Gosling in it is likely worth the time of viewing.
The film not only fulfilled all my expectations from what I have read, but far exceeded what I anticipated. The short response is Barbie is a very smart and purposeful film, filled with excellent writing, filming, and acting. But most of all, Barbie confronts complex topics in simple but not simplistic ways.
And the topics are quite extensive:
Gender
Social norms
Capitalism and materialism
Democracy
Idealism and reality
Patriarchy
Family
Self-awareness, identity, and the existential crisis of being human
Certainly, the film isn’t exhaustive on these topics, and there are moments that feel shallow. But it works so well at making the viewer able to enter into a consideration of issues that are, frankly, extremely difficult to maneuver because the human condition is complex and these topics are fraught with ideological and political triggers.
I suspect, however, that the people who need the invitation Barbie offers are still not likely to reconsider or even consider what the film graciously offers.
If you don’t feel compassion for the close ups of stereotypical Barbie after she is crying and you can see the tears have created little rivers of no make up on her face, well, I dont’ have much hope for you.
But the people I remain forever hopeful about are students.
As sequential art (comic book/graphic novel), this reimagining of Wonder Woman and the Amazons overlaps with Barbie as a feminist text that refuses to be simplistic.
What pairing the texts add is how the works use mythology as an entry point to interrogate gender, norms, and human frailty in ways that are deeply compelling. And of course, at the heart of both works is the insidious influence of power that can be arbitrary and corrosive to human dignity.
The Ken/patriarchy motif of Barbie is brilliant and provides an excellent space for discussing Historia and the Amazons.
The Barbies and the Amazons represent a woman-centered culture, but both are juxtaposed to the real world that is man-centric. And Historia weaves in classic mythology which is a wonderful pairing with the use of Barbies (women) and Kens (men) as types, even as the main Barbie expresses, stereotypes.
The two works also allow discussions of genres and media/forms since the film is primarily satire and has strong fantasy elements that contrast with the darker and more -hyper-realism of Historia.
Both, although in different ways, provide excellent texts for discussing the impact of the visual on engaging with and understanding these texts. Both works are visually stunning.
And finally, the most important aspect of pairing Barbie and Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons as a unit for students is that the texts are the antithesis of the caricatures conservatives are attacking in the culture war against anything diverse, what they slur as “woke.”
Education is about asking hard and complex questions and coming to know what we don’t know, what we don’t yet fully understand.
Barbie and Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons never stoop to indoctrination, never slip into unfair or sweeping ideological pandering.
Especially when experienced together, it is hard to be on the other side with more answers than questions. And that might be the most beautiful gifts they offer us as their audience.
Thomas, P.L. (2018). Wonder Woman: Reading and teaching feminism with an Amazonian princess in an era of Jessica Jones. In S. Eckard (ed.), Comic connections: Reflecting on women in popular culture (pp. 21-37). New York, NY: Rowman and Littlefield.
Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons (Book Three) continues exploring the tensions between gods and mortals as well as between men and women. “Born to die” proves to be a chilling and powerful refrain (establishing the duality of birth/death) throughout this chapter concluding a three-issue arc written by Kelly Sue DeConnick with art from Nicola Scott.
Kelly Sue DeConnick (writer), Nicola Scott (artist), Annette Kwok (colorist), Clayton Cowles (letterer)
Scott continues the awe inspiring artwork by Phil Jimenez (Book One) and Gene Ha (Book Two) with DeConnick weaving an allusive and powerful re-imagining of the Amazons as well as speaking to enduring themes about humanity and human frailties as well as triumphs.
“She Believes Her Sin Set the War in Motion”
While Book Three offers an incredibly compelling narrative both in the writing and the visual dynamics, here I want to focus on the rich allusive and referential elements that reach out beyond that story.
Book Three opens with stunning spreads, the artwork and coloring invite the reader to linger on pages in order to grasp the grandeur that envelopes this world, this story of the Amazons.
The opening scenes include a serpent theme, complicating and flipping the Garden of Eden iconography with Demeter as the serpent transforming to talk with Hera and then the ultimate human frailty, sin, and of course human guilt: “She believes her sin set the war in motion.”
Dualities build, then, throughout adding innocence versus experience to birth/death, gods/mortals, and men/women. And now, “[s]omething terrible is coming.”
The next duality is both a dramatic element of this story and a new duality that reinforces the man/woman tensions—the rugged individual versus collective power wrapped in the classic theme of hubris. DeConnick works elegantly within mythological archetypes and turns them into lenses for our contemporary realities.
Heracles, son of Zeus, represents masculine hubris and serves as a catalyst for the disaster to come because the Amazons embody a higher form of power in their shared commitments.
Using dynamic ant imagery, this scene reminds me of Adrienne Rich’s poem confronting “the book of myths” and masculine/feminine power:
my mask is powerful it pumps my blood with power the sea is another story the sea is not a question of power
In victory, the Amazons show respect and care for the vanquished:
But the consequences of these women and their power are monumental since they invoke the ire of the god of gods:
Scott’s use of silhouette throughout adds a chilling element to the central tensions of Book Three.
At the core of the story of gods versus mortals, DeConnick and Scott show readers that death begets death—and that “might makes right” remains when men rule over all, especially when women assert their power.
DeConnick also includes literary nods to Aristophanes, with the Amazons performing Thesmophoriazusae, a play about women subverting patriarchy, and quoting Euripides:
Death and honor are framed against the greatest of powers, the will of the gods, echoing the Garden of Eden allusion from the beginning and raising the issue of power again:
This leads us to the key refrain: “We are—all of us—born to die.”
“You Treat Us as Livestock”
It is this issue of power within masculine/feminine dualities that DeConnick continues to explore through the lion/sheep duality:
The Amazons find power in being a community but also in the mentoring relationship (not antagonism) between those who are innocent and those with experience.
Just as a different kind of power is detailed among the women, the Amazons, so is a different way to interrogate the classic motif of hubris found in Greek tragedy:
The hubris/humility duality reveals the “complicating” consequences of aging, experience, which sets adults apart from children.
The central tension of Book Three is the wrath of Zeus and the consequences of the Amazons’ power and resistance. This ultimately creates the duality of life versus freedom:
Of course this is a fabricated duality because of the capriciousness and shallowness of a god who represents patriarchy and misogyny:
The shepherd/sheep duality fits into a literary history of confronting patriarchy and misogyny through using women-as-animal imagery (see Zora Neale Hurston’s mule imagery in Their Eyes Were Watching God).
Power in the hands of gods, the patriarchy, is exposed as capricious and cruel versus the contrast of justice and mercy:
Here the sacrificing nature of women along with the death/birth duality begins to build to the climax of these tensions:
Wonder Woman Historia across three books proves to be a work that portrays and confronts dualities in ways that force readers to rethink enduring motifs and themes within and beyond mythology.
While there is great loss and often violence, Book Three ends with triumph, hope, and birth/rebirth rising out of that loss:
By the end of Book Three, even “born to die” is turned onto itself as a superhero is born into the matriarchy of goddesses and Amazons—although the very real threats of the world and beyond remain ever in the background.
Books 1-3 of Wonder Woman Historia offer a compelling and visually stunning exploration of heroism that is solidly situated in superhero royalty (Wonder Woman among DC’s Big Three), yet this is not predictable superhero story.
DeConnick along with Jimenez, Ha, and Scott tells stories of dualities and confrontations by turning those dualities around and inviting readers to rethink those tensions in ways that speak to the very real world we walk in today.
Thomas, P.L. (2018). Wonder Woman: Reading and teaching feminism with an Amazonian princess in an era of Jessica Jones. In S. Eckard (ed.), Comic connections: Reflecting on women in popular culture (pp. 21-37). New York, NY: Rowman and Littlefield.
Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow is in comic book limbo.
Again.
The limbo after the end of v.8, just 15 issues, suggests that Marvel is only capable of underestimating her in the long run, but the latest (last?) run shows once again—and possibly at the highest level—that breathing rich and vibrant life into this character is not only possible but also needed.
The core team of v.8 offers readers one of the best volumes featuring Black Widow—Kelly Thompson (writer), Elena Casagrande (artist), Jordie Bellaire (colorist), and Adam Hughes (cover artist) with additional artists Rafael De Latorre, Carlos Gómez, and Rafael Pimentel making strong contributions.
While many familiar patterns are once again found in v.8, this run is held together by the unifying purpose that resonates throughout the writing and the visual power, solidly anchored in a creative team of women (Thompson, Casagrande, and Bellaire).
Covers by Adam Hughes alert readers to the visual allure of v.8—a red/black motif driven by Elena Casagrande and Jordie Bellaire interiors. (Issue 1 and issue 11)
“This Can’t Be It”
Just a few beautiful pages into issue 1—immediately situating Black Widow with Hawkeye and Captain America—Natasha thinks in dramatic fashion, “This can’t be it,” as she falls, drugged, from her apartment window.
Issue 1 with Thompson (writer), Casagrande (artist), and Bellaire (colorist).
In hindsight, with Black Widow’s current limbo in mind, this seems like a signal larger than the narrative tension of yet another death of Natasha Romanoff. However, Natasha is not dead, but is discovered by Clint and Bucky to be living months later in San Francisco (a nod to the Daredevil/Black Widow run from the early 1970s) as Natalie with a partner and a child—seemingly unaware that she is Black Widow.
Readers, like Clint and Bucky, recognize that Natasha remains just below the surface, eager to reappear.
Thompson is the star writer of this series, but a strong case can be made for Casagrande’s artwork defining this run. As “Natalie” thinks, “Well, this doesn’t suck.”
Soon, Yelena (White Widow) appears as a covert babysitter, and the usual cast of characters in Black Widow narratives is gradually assembled while Natasha remains underneath this new “Natalie” with an inexplicable child (only three months have passed since her fall and disappearance).
While the story arc seems to be well-worn territory so far in issue 1, one of the most effective examples of the purposefulness throughout this series is the use of color.
Issue 2 highlights the wonderful use of color motifs by Bellaire; here the vibrant red with Natalie/Natasha and green with the introduction of Arcade.
Another compelling aspects of issue 1 is watching Natasha/Black Widow resurface from the puzzling new life of Natalie (one Yelena, Clint, and Bucky gradually piece together). First, the motorcycle, and then, building a homemade bomb.
Issue 2 is a stellar showcase of Casagrande’s and Bellaire’s work.
Clint and Bucky grapple with Natalie/Natasha’s happiness from afar while they, along with Yelena, discover that Natasha is a pawn in an elaborate scheme monitored by Arcade, including that the child is in fact Natasha’s.
Gradually, a gallery of villains are revealed in issue 3 as Black Widow continues to resurface and then forms her own group, another of the many gifts offered by Thompson’s writing.
Issue 3 also portrays fresh and dynamic takes on iconic depictions of Black Widow—the acrobatic fight scene and the superhero landing pose:
Casagrande and Bellaire remind me of the brilliant run by Phil Noto in v.5.
By issue 4, Natasha regains her memory, and readers learn about her manufactured family—a family that is none the less “real.”
Issue 4 includes flashback scene art by Carlos Gómez.
Once Natasha/Black Widow understands her predicament, she joins Clint, Bucky, and Yelena in an elaborate scheme to protect her partner and child—a plot that once again leaves Natasha alone.
Casagrande and Bellaire render the images in issue 4 and issue 5 as dramatically as the plot itself.
The tensions, romantic and otherwise, between Natasha and Clint as well as between Natasha and Bucky are emphasized in issue 5 as Natasha grapples with the new reality of a manufactured family that she loves and must abandon to protect.
Thompson’s take on Natasha’s need to be a mother (explored in several earlier volumes) and the classic theme of being a superhero as a barrier to maintaining relationships are fresh and sincere.
“‘…And This Is My City Now'”
Even though v.8 has a core creative team of women, elements of the male gaze, objectification, and sexual innuendo are not absent, but framed in a different context, enabling readers to interrogate how women navigate s violent and sexually aggressive world.
Issue 6 includes a staple of Black Widow stories—sexual innuendo—with Rafael De Latorre maintaining the outstanding artwork presence.
In the second third of this volume, the story shifts to Natasha/Black Widow taking control of her world—the sexual banter vocalizes her power and control, for example. And this new life, this new world, is in her reclaimed city of San Francisco.
As Black Widow asserts control, the falling imagery in issue 6 parallels the first issue fall that is the initial transition of this volume.
This volume is grounded in women creators who, by issue 7, begin to center the narrative on women characters as Black Widow forms a group of women superheroes.
In issue 7, Natasha interacts with Spider-Girl and Lucy, characters that highlight elements of the complexities involved with being a superhero as they are compounded by also being a woman (as well as issues related to age).
For Lucy, coming to terms with new super powers highlights her frailty and the uncertainties of being differently human. One of the hallmarks of the Marvel approach to superheroes from the beginning in the 1960s was emphasizing the “human” in “superhuman”—such as acknowledging the negative as well as positive consequences of being “super.”
In many ways, Lucy parallels Natasha’s journey, and she offers a context for the dualities of being superhuman. (Issue 8)
As well, the interactions between Yelena and Natasha explore the iconic “with great power comes great responsibility” motif. Yelena speaks often for her own interests as Natasha remains deeply committed to serving those in need.
Issue 8 continues to explore Natasha’s commitment to San Francisco as her city now.
Thompson’s work as writer for this volume excels in the complex and rich portrayal and development of the characters, notably the women. Like Natasha, Yelena stands out in Thompson’s care for the character.
None the less, Yelena receives some of the often problematic elements found in many volumes of Black Widow—being bound and killed. In issue 8 and issue 9, Thompson’s approach to these well-worn narratives rises above mere objectification (being bound) and simplistic as well as hollow tension (being killed).
Yes, Yelena is bound to a chair, but the perspective avoids the lurid gaze found in earlier volumes, and Yelena’s apparent death also fits into a motif of the power of women to (in this case) literally save each other’s lives.
The second third of this volume reaches a milestone for the much underestimated character of Black Widow, the legacy issue 50 (issue 10). Marvel’s new normal of constantly rebooting and renumbering is annoying, and in my opinion, nonsense, but the legacy acknowledgements temper some of that.
Adam Hughs offers another visually dynamic cover for legacy issue 50, a fitting tribute to Black Widow as a underestimated and hypersexualized character in the Marvel Universe.
Issue 10 introduces another derivative woman superhero, Hawkeye, like Spider-Girl, but the assembling of a mostly women team remains a powerful aspect of this run. Natasha herself acknowledges this, suggesting a sense of community linked to their shared womanhood (even with a touch of her sarcasm).
While the comic book industry has suffered from lacking representation and often failed by seeking diversity in derivatives (women taking on male superhero roles), Natasha’s “My kind of team” carries a great deal of weight in terms of Thompson’s rich portrayal of both being a superhero and a woman.
This key legacy issue also includes more of the iconic depictions of Black Widow as an acrobatic and gifted super-agent and fighter.
Paneling and coloring continue to define v.8 as one of, if not the best runs featuring Black Widow.
“This Is Beautiful”
Issue 11 highlights in the final third of this volume Natasha’s remaining internal struggles. Although she has found and fostered a community with her new team, she remains in her bones a loner, and as in previous volumes, continues to value the power of secrets.
Nat certainly is well represented on a motorcycle—the solo vehicle that is an extension of her individuality as well as her power and grace.
How humans are portrayed in comic books has a long problematic history. Men and women alike are often drawn in distorted ways (particularly for me, the low point being the artistic style of the 1990s)—although women are more often than not hypersexualized. Black Widow has suffered that fate often, too often, so v.8 is an interesting way to interrogate women’s bodies, the gaze afforded readers when women are centered, and the role of clothing and fashion in depicting women superheroes.
Casagrande’s style is often similar to Noto’s in terms of portraying superheroes closer to realistic human shape while embracing elements of beauty without reducing women to their cleavages or mid-drifts (see here).
In short, women are celebrated as beautiful, unique, and powerful without the lens of the lurid male gaze. Fashion, in fact, plays a central role, and the characters are allowed to embrace what is often seen traditionally (and problematically) as womanhood in complex and even playful ways by the characters themselves.
In earlier volumes, Natasha and Yelena were puppets for revealing outfits and exposing cat fights. Thompson and Casagrande avoid these failures by centering both characters as autonomous humans who are both their bodies and much more.
At the center of how characters are portrayed, in fact, is the wonderful work of Casagrande and Bellaire (again). Possibly the best way to describe v.8 is that the entire run is simply beautiful—in the most inspiring use of the word.
Issue 12 is stunning in terms of art and coloring, a masterclass in the ways in which comic books can avoid underestimating characters and their readers.
Another element of fashion is the use of flashback in issue 13 with artwork on a variant cover and interiors by Rafael Pimentel. The use here of the gray Black Widow costume associated with Frank Miller is both a homage of sorts to the comic book legacy of the character as well as another dynamic exploration of how Black Widow is often defined by her costume.
Pimentel provides a stellar and complimentary addition to v.8. The variant cover for issue 13 is one of the highlights of the run.
The final issues of this volume, beginning with issue 12, matches Black Widow against the Living Blade (issue 13 provides the backstory for their rivalry). From the re-introduction of the Living Blade (and Natasha’s internal monologue exposing her fear) to the most WTF scene of issue 14, the core team of Thompson, Casagrande, and Bellaire take readers on a genuinely dramatic ride, punctuated with the sort of real surprise (Black Widow’s arm severed) that is rare in comic book narratives.
Bellaire maintains a high level of purposefulness in how the color motifs drive the narrative, tone, and emotional impact established by Thompson and Casagrande.
Many of the problems created throughout this series are resolved satisfactorily and without slipping into cliche; there simply is no lazy work in v.8.
And while I remain very frustrated that this series ended after (only) 15 issues and the Black Widow remains in comic book limbo, I think the real accomplishment of the series is the willingness to drive the narrative to a positive ending (in a way that reminds me of Alice Walker’s choice of ending for The Color Purple).
Despite the weight of her past and the traumas that continue in her life, Natasha makes a heart-warning final pronouncement—”This is beautiful”—and musters a genuine smile.
Issue 15, in many ways, offers the perfect way to think about v.8, “beautiful.”
This post is intended for people who have viewed the full series, including the final episode, of Ozark.
Many people have acknowledged that Ozark is a well-acted derivative of Breaking Bad. But an analogy just as important, if not more so, is that Ozark is a 2010s-2020s version of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1910s-1920s The Great Gatsby.
Marty and Wendy Byrde are essentially Tom and Daisy Buchanan, although Wendy is often more like Tom, and Marty, more like Daisy. None the less, Marty and Wendy fit well narrator Nick Carraway’s description of the Buchanans:
I couldn’t forgive [Tom] or like him, but I saw that what he had done was, to him, entirely justified. It was all very careless and confused. They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made….
The Byrdes leave a staggering trail of carnage, larger but similar to the bodies in the wake of the Buchanans. Both couples survive mostly unscathed—at least still wealthy and alive.
If we include the Breaking Bad comparison, the two series’ creators made some important and different decisions about Marty and Walter White—the main white male center of the “vast carelessness”—and some profoundly important different decisions about the parallel characters of Jesse and Ruth—both sympathetic characters who suffer some of the greatest consequences of the carelessness.
Ozark and Breaking Bad ultimately offer some excellent aspects of contemporary series, and nearly equal elements that are problematic. Notably, the shows center whiteness against Mexicans as murders and drug lords—with the whiteness often seeking viewer empathy.
The back story of Walter White—and the annoying messaging that being reduced to a high school teacher is proof Walter has been cheated by the universe—folds into his cancer diagnosis; this feels much reduced in the scene where Marty is on his knees about to be murdered, only to start the momentum toward nothing ever really touching Marty Byrde, unlike Walter’s fate.
Bryan Cranston and Jason Bateman go a long way to help the writers skirt past the ugliest of truths beneath these men scorching the earth for the good of their family. They are, in fact, the worst sort of “careless people,” selfish and calculating.
Breaking Bad, like Better Call Saul, are far better written and filmed than Ozark, even as these series are carried by incredible acting, possibly even better in Ozark than its obvious inspiration.
On balance, Break Bad is the better series, but in its last episode, Ozark makes a case for itself because of the decisions around Ruth, in contrast to her parallel, Jesse, from Break Bad.
Like the Buchanans, the Byrdes are outsiders, and although Jesse is a local like Ruth, Ruth’s parallels in Gatsby are the Wilsons, low- to working-class characters. And like Myrtle and George Wilson, Ruth as redneck young woman, is sacrificed beside her not-yet-finished empty pool with a corpse buried beneath. The imagery of her death is intensified as we hear her telling Wyatt he doesn’t know how to be rich—paralleled by Myrtle’s pathetic efforts to play rich in Gatsby.
Ozark seems to argue that the class barrier trumps race and gender. It certainly dramatizes that class trumps character and intelligence and work ethic.
Ruth splayed on her dirt yard—reminiscent of Myrtle mutilated in the road by Daisy driving Gatsby’s gold Rolls Royce—comes after mid-final-episode the Byrde’s suffering a dramatic car accident, one shown in an earlier episode, one no one could simply walk away from.
For me, the car wreck had no emotional weight, even as Marty and his children crawl free, miraculously unharmed, even as Wendy appears unconscious (dead?) until Marty rouses her. The family soon after arrives at their house in a taxi, Wendy noting they survived only somewhat battered and bruised.
But it is Wendy’s comment to Novarro’s priest that reveals the narrative purpose of the accident—not to tease the audience with one or more Byrde deaths but to show that the entire series is an extended allegory about the Teflon promises of whiteness and wealth.
As Wendy boasts to the priest as she takes him by the shoulders, they will survive, and they do.
The series ends black screen, a gun shot, the Byrde’s winning (a more honest and cynical ending than Breaking Bad), murderously (again) after Marty softly nods to his teen son, Jonah, who fires the shot.
Like Walter White, for Marty, and now Jonah, “what he had done was, to him, entirely justified.”
Many plot lines and characters force viewers to repeatedly interrogate that very concept; Walter and Marty live by the ends justifying the means.
Yet, none confront that central question more vividly than the tensions between Wendy and Ruth about the killing of Wendy’s brother, Ben.
The last episode highlights the emptiness pervading Ozark with Ruth caving to Wendy about culpability for Ben’s murder, prompted by Wendy committing herself in yet another grand manipulation (suggesting viewers should feel empathy for Wendy since, as the scene depicts, she shares with Ruth the consequences of an abusive father).
Ozark and Breaking Bad left me wondering how I am supposed to feel about the characters.
It is there I focus on Ruth and Jesse, the characters with the most lingering sympathetic qualities in spite of their very human flaws, and frailties. I think we can (and should) find more sincerity in the struggles of Jesse and Ruth against the backdrop of the posing and ruthlessness of Walter and Marty.
Like Gatsby, Ozark is a deeply cynical work about the American Dream. This American nightmare is more like what John Gardner lamented:
That idea—humankind’s inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness—coupled with a system for protecting human rights—was and is the quintessential American Dream. The rest is greed and pompous foolishness—at worst, a cruel and sentimental myth, at best, cheap streamers in the rain. (p. 96)
“Amber (Get) Waves (Your) of (Plastic) Grain (Uncle Same)” in On Writers and Writing, John Gardner (1994)
The Byrdes shit all over the Ozarks, and we are left with one final wry smile from Marty and, yes, the gun shot.
“[L]et other people clean up the mess they had made”…
educator, public scholar, poet&writer – academic freedom isn't free
dr. p.l. (paul) thomas 
