Profile: Princess Projectra

Princess Projectra
First appearance: Adventure Comics #346, July 1966
Creators: Jim Shooter, Curt Swan

History: Projectra, a member of the Legion of Super-Heroes, was heir to the throne of the planet Orando in the far future, and her power was the ability to generate illusions that could affect all 5 senses of the body. In later years, she fell in love with and married Karate Kid.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: she was erased from continuity/existence during the notorious Zero Hour crossover of 1994, in another example of modern editors treating other people's hard work like tissue paper or less, and replaced by a similar character named Sensor (Jeka Wynzorr), which was the name of a disguise she took up during the mid-1980s for a brief period. It's one thing to create a new character, but doing it at the expense of the original was simply unacceptable. Geoff Johns also allegedly "reintroduced" the pre-Crisis Sensor Girl in the Justice Society series he was writing during the mid-2000s, and under his type of writing, it's definitely not worth the paper it was printed on.

Projectra's co-creator, Jim Shooter, may have reintroduced her during the "Threeboot" era of the mid-2000s, when he was hired to again write some Legion stories, but it was far too late, and took place when one of the worst editors DC was ever under, Dan DiDio, was in charge. He may be gone from their employ now, but the damage has long been done, and even for Princess Projectra, it'll take ages to repair whatever damage was done to her.

New template

After many years, I decided to add a new template to the blog, for as long as I'm still using it, this being the Minima Black template, that I thought might fit the purpose even better than the last one. There are still, to be sure, some parts I'll want to smooth out. But for now, I think I've got most of the important parts in place, and so, I'll see how well I can manage with the new one now, and hope it'll be comprehensive enough for everybody, and easy to navigate.

Record: J. Michael Straczynski

No doubt, it's not every writer who's as polarizing a figure as J. Michael Straczynski, the writer who's worked in both comics and films since the mid-to-late 1980s, and has credits in animation in some form too, along with at least one Marvel Cinematic Universe entry, for Thor. But seriously, he's one of the most overrated writers of his era, particularly since the turn of the century, and his work on Spider-Man stands out as some of his worst, most pretentious assignments in comicdom. And the way he treated some of the women in his work was nothing short of despicable. That editorial interference may have played a part in his writings is no excuse either.

So now, here's the best possible list of examples of what he did wrong as a writer in his career.

• When Straczynski got the writing job for Spider-Man, he went along with Joe Quesada's mandate that initially did not allow Mary Jane Watson to reunite with Peter Parker. And JMS even made hilariously absurd claims he was trying to "get inside Peter's head" in his writings, as though that's possible with a fictional character who doesn't exist. And when Peter and MJ were subsequently reunited in the 50th issue of the relaunch of Spidey's series at the time around 2003, the story was ruined by a plotline that was sympathetic to Doctor Doom, who was apparently portrayed as a stand-in for Saddam Hussein.
• Even before that, JMS' special interruption of his run for the sake of a September 11, 2001 issue of Spidey, in issue 36, became a left-wing diatribe that blamed the victims. That was simply reprehensible, though what much else could you expect from such a boilerplate leftist from Hollywood?
• And about a year after Peter and MJ were reunited, JMS continued to make things horrific with the Sins Past storyline in late 2004, where Gwen Stacy was implausibly made to look like she'd been cheating on Peter with...Norman Osborn?!? And had 2 children with him? And MJ was made to look like a liar when she was depicted as having kept a secret from Peter all those years. The whole storyline was so embarrassingly bad, gave sex a bad name, and only made clear why it would've been better if Marvel had closed down in the early 2000s. Did I mention how the story was not verbatim to the original 1973 storyline where Gwen was unconscious, if not completely dead, when the Green Goblin knocked her off the George Washington Bridge in NYC? Whatever justifications JMS had for altering the history in such contrived and forced manners was utterly stupid.
• When the One More Day embarrassment came about, and Peter "sold" his marriage with MJ to Mephisto for the sake of reversing Aunt May's injury from a mobster's bullet, JMS basically went along with the Quesada mandate that dictated the story being told.
• During his brief Thor run, he depicted Loki causing Sif to be put in the body of a geriatric woman, and women's roles in the story were minimal. It was only at about the end of the run that Sif was finally put back in her own regular form.
• I could even add that his Superman storyline where the Man of Steel went on some kind of "walking tour" was pretty lazy to boot, and didn't amount to much of anything. He left the writing assignment pretty early too.

From what I can tell about JMS' career, it doesn't seem like he has much talent for how to portray women in his writings, and not many of his other writing assignments for ongoing series seemed to last long. He's little more than the kind of leftist who's gotten as far as he did based on his leftist politics alone, and today, while he unfortunately still continues to get occasional jobs with Marvel/DC, he is more or less a has-been, and I decidedly won't finance his creator-owned projects either like Rising Stars.

Profile: Glory Grant

Glory Grant
First appearance: Amazing Spider-Man #140, January 1975
Creators: Gerry Conway, Ross Andru

History: introduced as a replacement for Betty Brant as a secretary at the Daily Bugle, Glory Grant first premiered as a new neighbor of Peter Parker's, and he helped her obtain the job at the newspaper shortly after they first met.

Was she subjected to any acts of discrimination? Fortunately, within all the time she'd appeared up to the turn of the century, nothing severe ever occurred. However, after the time when J. Michael Straczynski became writer, it wouldn't be shocking if Glory was subjected to some very bad writing in the years that followed.

Was there anything good to come of this? From what I can tell, Glory may not have been in much use for a long time now. If not, that's fortunate in itself. The less use made of some characters, the better, though at this point, if Marvel did fold as a publisher, it would certainly be for the best, Glory included.

Profile: Misty Knight

Misty Knight

First appearance: Marvel Premiere #21, March 1975
Creators: Tony Isabella, Arvell Jones

History: the first notable black woman in Marvel's universe, Misty began as a NY policewoman whose right arm was destroyed by a bomb attack, and received a special bionic arm to replace it, courtesy of Tony Stark, aka Iron Man. She left the police, and instead formed a special investigative business with Colleen Wing, and subsequently romanced Iron Fist, who was partners with Power Man. All of them formed the early take on Heroes for Hire in the Bronze Age.

Was subjected to the following act of discrimination: since the mid-2000s, when Marvel's quality was on its way downhill, Misty was forced into the proceedings of the Civil War crossover, where she and Colleen were written taking the side of those favoring registration for superpowered heroes, in one of the worst examples of heroes clashing with each other - quite possibly far more than with villains - at the time.

What's wrong with how this was done? It was one of the most reprehensible examples of exploiting other people's creations for the sake of political metaphors that were divisive, and ruined the Marvel universe in the long run. Civil War was but one of the most insufferable crossovers in Marvel's history.

Was there any good to come out of this? Ever since Marvel and DC turned everything into a whole crossovers-every-year situation, there hasn't been anything good for character drama and personality development, that's for sure. Misty's just one of many characters who've only been ruined in their use as a result of this.

Profile: Bat-Girl/Flamebird

Bat-Girl/Flamebird
Real name: Bette Kane (pre-crisis, her first name was spelled with a Y)
First appearance: as Bat-Girl in Batman #139, 1961, as Flamebird in Secret Origins Annual #3, 1989
Creators: Bill Finger, Sheldon Moldoff (pre-Crisis edition), George Perez (post-Crisis edition)

History: originally, this superheroine was created as part of the Batman family, along with original Batwoman Kathy Kane, and first took up the mantle of Bat-Girl, later making appearances in the Teen Titans as a member of Titans West. In the post-Crisis era, she was reinvented as Flamebird, a kooky fangirl-style protagonist who was a teen tennis player, and who wished for the kind of costumed career taken by original Robin Dick Grayson (who later became Nightwing), since she'd had a crush on him, and hoped to meet him in time, though when they finally did, it wasn't the fabulous dream Bette hoped it would be. Though not part of the Bat-family per se in this post-Crisis rendition, Bette similarly specialized in building gadgetry like Batman and his partners did, and practiced combat skills. And, her world view was of the more optimistic (and humorous) variety.

Was subjected to the following acts of discrimination: in a Beast Boy miniseries published around 2000, co-written by Geoff Johns and Ben Raab, and illustrated by Justiniano/Josue Rivera, she was made to look like a stupid idiot, as though her being hot was almost literally the problem, and the only way for her to be a "serious" superheroine was to dress in a more modest outfit and cut her hair shorter. The decidedly atrocious costume design Justiniano came up with as the artist was one of the biggest insults to the intellect, and when Bette was subsequently cast in the 2000 Titans Annual, the same writers even insulted her by having Arsenal and Nightwing talk about how they "love" her new outfit and attitude. The latter which included a panel with a bleeped expletive, as though being profane actually makes her more "serious" too.

What's wrong with how this was done? One of the most irritating things about these stories is that neither the writers, artists, nor the editors ever explain clearly why they believe how dressing or talking makes the character more "convincing" as a costumed crimefighter, if they even take the time to explain at all. And when you consider that Justiniano, as noted earlier, was arrested, convicted and jailed a decade later for possession of child porn, one can only wonder if he drew the more modest outfit for Flamebird as a form of virtue-signaling, and a way to conceal how evil and corrupt he actually was in real life.

Was there anything good to come out of this? Since then, the DCU's gone way downhill into a shoddy, sexless mess, and one can only wonder how much more awful Justiniano's costume design would be if he'd drawn it today, ditto Johns/Raab's writing. Like much of the rest of the DCU, even Bette's suffered bad writing since. Flamebird may be a minor character, but she's one of many who deserved far better than such an embarrassment, ditto her original creators, Finger, Moldoff and Perez, all of whom were insulted by Johns, Raab, Justiniano and even Eddie Berganza, who, if memory serves, was the editor on titles like the Titans at the time.

Record: Justiniano

There used to be an artist working in comicdom who went by the pen name of Justiniano, but whose real name was Josue Rivera. He was arrested around 2011 and convicted for possession of child pornography, similar to how the disgraced Gerard Jones was later arrested and jailed for the same offenses. And Justiniano also had at least a few stories and illustrations in his comics portfolio that were either demeaning to women, or they were forms of virtue-signaling that were likely drawn as virtue-signaling, in an attempt to conceal what a wolf in sheep's clothing he really was. Here's a few of the shoddy details from Justiniano's resume:

• In 2000, he drew a Beast Boy miniseries (written by Geoff Johns and Ben Raab) where Flamebird/Bette Kane was a co-star, and not only was she made to look like a bimbo, towards the end of the miniseries, she was depicted donning a more modest looking costume and sporting a shorter hairstyle in what was apparently the artist and writers' idea of how she should be a "serious" crimefighter, not to mention a form of virtue-signaling. If this had been done today, chances are high Justiniano would've taken a more woke path than what he did here in how to illustrate her. The loathsome design also appeared in the Titans Annual for 2000, also illustrated by Justiniano.
• In that same story, towards the end, Gar Logan noticeably hits a woman. It may have been a crook (supposedly a daughter of Madame Rouge from Doom Patrol, even though there's nothing in past DC history to make it plausible), but the way it was drawn was so alarming, it's clear it was meant to be some kind of reprehensible "justification" for wallowing in shock value.
• In 2005, Justiniano drew all 6 issues of Day of Vengeance, a miniseries written as a followup to Identity Crisis and a lead-in to Infinite Crisis, where Jean Loring becomes a female version of Eclipso, and the way it was written (by Bill Willingham) also made it look like one side of a conversation where a woman's being sexually harassed. This was easily one of the most loathsome moments from Justiniano's undeserved career.
• Towards the end of his worthless career, he drew some issues of a Spirit series (written by Michael Uslan), based on Will Eisner's famous Golden Age adventure series (1940-52), where a villainess insults Ellen Dolan by calling her a "fat ass".

At least a few stories illustrated by Justiniano at the time had traces of contempt for women, and one could wonder if that had anything to do with his taking the assignments. It's a good thing he was caught and jailed, and now his worthless career's been over for nearly 15 years. But who knows how many more artists like him will turn out to be terrible felons?