in 2016 let’s all stop treating fusion as a sex allegory. intimacy and close relationships between women does not equal sex, and implying otherwise is pretty goddamn lesbophobic.
not to mention, literal children have performed fusion on the show before. it is a show for children. there is no place for sexual references, especially not by adults in the fandom. it’s gross and inappropriate and more consideration needs to be given to the children who watch this show
Seeing as how I’ve done both the top ten for best and worst superhero costume redesigns, I feel obligated to put my money where my artistic mouth is and take a stab at fixing or updating some of these costumes. I’ve picked five here based on:
It’s a particularly awful outfit that doesn’t fit the character, or
It’s a solid character who just needs some updating or tweaking
I’ll list these in order of “reboot depth:”
5. Starfire
What’s wrong: In the wake of DC’s “new 52” this felt like a no-brainer. Starfire is a decent character who’s always, in my opinion, gotten the short end of the costume stick. I get that she’s supposed to be sexually liberated and somewhat polyamorous, and that’s fine, but dressing like a John Carter’s Princess of Mars-themed stripper doesn’t cut it. Really, up until the Teen Titans cartoon she’s always been in the most awkward and impractical getups for someone fighting crime.
The Fix: I went for the simple route and took some notes from the cartoon (notably the skirt). I wanted to make sure it kept the bubbly, innocent feeling of the character while also hinting at some power (with the exposed arms here). The overall effect is meant to convey someone who’s tough, cheerful and comfortable flying around in the air.
4. Dr. Strange
What’s wrong: I love Dr. Strange, but he’s always had the worst outfits. For a guy who basically hangs out in his house in the West Village, he seems to always wear the most ostentatious getups. He’s not an alien from another planet or from some culture that would dress that way, he’s a grown man who became a wizard well into adulthood. Nothing wrong with having some style while you’re maintaining the balance of the mystic planes.
The Fix: Two parts Vincent Price, one part Christopher Lee and one part Dr. Orpheus, this Dr. Strange is still magical, but with a more coherent design direction.
3. Ms. Marvel
What’s Wrong: Simply put, I think it’s embarrassing for Marvel to showcase a prominent character like Ms. Marvel and have her wearing that outfit. It’s just so tacky, and tells us nothing about the character. Basically they just changed the colors of Jean Grey’s Phoenix costume and exposed more skin. Come on, guys.
The Fix: Since her origins are ostensibly tied with Captain Marvel, I decided to go a route that’s more along the lines of the Ultimate Marvel version of that character, where her abilities come from alien technology rather than vague space magic. The notion that she’s, for example, permanently bound with this technology that she doesn’t fully understand can make for some interesting stories. There can be some potential with this character again with just a little bit of tweaking.
2. Wonder Woman
What’s Wrong: Wonder Woman, in my opinion, is a character that’s always been on the cusp of being really neat but never quite making it like Superman or Batman. Although a feminist pop icon, her origins are too tied up with creator WIlliam Marston’s obsession with bondage. Because of this (and an all-too-frequent parade of poor or sexist writing), she’s never had a solid, progressive design. The 21st century can update this character.
The Fix: One part Thor, three parts Xena. I’d push the mythological angle further. Just as nobody thinks of Thor as “Superman with a hammer” I don’t want Wonder Woman to be “girl Superman,” as she’s sometimes seen. I’ve also tweaked her origin slightly, making her a more literal “statue come to life.” This isn’t as extreme as it seems: in regular canon, Wonder Woman’s origin was that she was formed out of clay by the queen of the Amazons, and imbued with the powers of the Greek Gods. This, I think offers more story possibilities if she’s less literally human, physically. Her personality would remain the same (nothing more fun than the perspective of an Amazon in the modern world), but we now have an added Pinnochio-style layer.
The costume change is mostly conservative. Because of the strong fetish associations (and overall impracticality for a fighting Amazon), I’ve removed the lasso in favor of more traditional Greek weapons. The overall effect is intended to push Wonder Woman’s core themes further while making her also stand out as more than just “the female superhero.”
1. Superman
What’s Wrong: Since his creation, Superman’s drifted from being a progressive champion for the common man to a patriotic middle-America boyscout who represents the establishment and traditional values. When he was developed in the 30s, Superman was very much a Depression-era hero, mostly going after villains like crooked money lenders and saving people who were being abused by the system. His superpowers came from the fact that he was from a more advanced society, and his morals too were because he was simply a brainier, more sophisticated guy. During and following WW2 and into the Cold War, though, he became an official symbol for American values in particular (it was originally “Truth and Justice,” without “the American Way”). He was now not just an alien, but an alien raised by simple Kansas farmers and his abilities had a more generic “superpower” explanation. This is all fine, really, but I think the original concept is more compelling these days.
The Fix: ”Superman: the Man of Tomorrow, Strange Visitor from Another World.” I really want to push that. First off, Kryptonians should actually look like aliens and not white people. Here I have Kal-El from a race of beings who are essentially post-human (in that they’ve long since merged with technology). They’re strange to our mortal eyes but mean well. I’d keep the “destroyed planet” origin but more heavily emphasize the “non-interference” part of Superman’s mission statement.
If you’ll remember from the 70s movie, his father Jor-El told him he was forbidden to interfere with the course of human history, but when you think about it, that’s kind of vague. What I’ve done is added a Star Trek or Uatu the Watcher kind of prime directive to all advanced species: Kal-El can’t let people know that he’s an alien, nor can he openly interact with them using advanced technology. Still, he’s a compassionate guy and wants to help, so he takes the form of “Superman” to inspire the mortals in a constructive way. Also, the notion that he can take on different forms means that the Clark Kent secret identity need not be as bad as it currently is.
The costume redesign holds to the basic themes but makes it a little more working class. The buttons at the top are meant to invoke overalls, and the sleeves are cut a little higher for someone working with their hands. I’ve removed the spandex and gone with looser fitting slacks, while keeping a short cape and boots, since he’s still an adventurer.
Overall I want to evoke a classic Superman feel while making it a little more modern in its exploration of the sci fi themes. He’s still basically the same guy: an alien from another world looking to fight injustice, but without the overt patriotism and a quirkier execution of the secret identity.
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So there you have it. I’ve hope you’ve enjoyed my superhero costume trilogy!
That Superman is… probably the best redo of Superman I have ever seen, both in looks and backstory. Bravo!
cool stuffff
The Starfire is a no brainer, the Dr. Strange is my new unrequited fictional crush, the Wonder Woman is breath-taking and that take on Superman is one thousand degrees of shit I didn’t know I wanted but I would be so comfortable if they uprooted over 70 years of comic book history to change him into this.
so i was wondering where rey learned to understand binary (the language of astromech droids) because she’s a lone scavenger living on a desert planet and i was thinking that maybe sometime in the course of her star destroyer spelunking adventures, let’s say she’s 14 years old; she finds part of an astromech droid that’s still functioning just enough to talk. so she decides not to trade it to unkar plutt for portions and takes it home instead, cleans it up. hooks it up to an old comm screen so she can see what it’s saying while she’s still learning all its beeps and whistles. and then at the end of a long day, when she gets home, she scrubs the sand off her face, pours the sand out of her boots, and just sits and talks to her barely-functioning astromech droid, whose knowledge is thirty years old: coruscant, the seat of the empire (what empire?) updates on the construction of the death star. bounty notices for han solo, smuggler. the imperial senate, disbanded (but what about the new senate?)
the hot, dry air of jakku, making mirages of old memories just outside the shell of her AT-AT. the desert so quiet that you can hear sand sliding down the dunes, in soft silky layers. rey, scraping crumbs off her plate with her fingertips, pressing her droid with more questions. what’s naboo? what’s a forest? how big is a forest? what’s a tree? how many trees are there? (no one else tells her about these things. no one else talks to her.) the droids go everywhere, she realizes. they see everything and keep everything, scavengers of memory and information, of events and people and ideas. she learns binary until she gets good enough to detach the comm screen and just listen; during the day she quietly practices binary to herself, whistling each beep and tone as she hikes the dunes to the star destroyers, her calves aching. when she gets home, the droid greets her with a happy beep. for a few months, it feels nice, strange, hopeful. it feels odd to have someone waiting for her. refreshing, almost.
and then one day rey comes home and the astromech droid doesn’t beep, no whistle of greeting. the light in its glassy round eye is dark. the fuel cells are dead. her heart sinks. she searches the star destroyer endlessly for another working fuel cell, tries to trade for them at niima outpost, but to no avail: the model is too old, and any fuel cells that could work are all being used for other things. that night she wears her x-wing helmet and sniffs, watching the stars, wrestling with hope and despair in equal measure; in the morning she drags the droid to unkar plutt and trades its parts for twelve portions. the first portion is bitter and tasteless, more so than usual, but it’s alright, rey thinks. her friend even fed her.
and now she talks to all the astromech droids that pass through niima outpost. they don’t mind talking to her. they’re happy to tell her how hyperdrives work, what a compressor does, how to fix an acceleration compensator. and every time she hopes that maybe, the droid will end up on a distant planet somewhere else, and it’ll mention a girl on jakku, a girl who polished its casing and oiled its hinges, a girl who’s been waiting for a long time, and someone will look up with a twinge of recognition and realizeit’s time to go back. it’s time for her to come home… it never happens. but rey tries anyway, because the droids go everywhere, see everything, meet everyone… so she stays, and waits.
