:D I feel like a pet who has earned a biscuit! lmao
Seriously tho, I don't want to see anyone driven away from this community. This is a great game and has some great folks involved in it's fandom. It's so easy for things to get toxic and as far as I have seen, this place never does. ;)
:D I feel like a pet who has earned a biscuit! lmaoSeriously tho, I don't want to see anyone driven away from this community. This is a great game and has some great folks involved in it's fandom. It's so easy for things to get toxic and as far as I have seen, this place never does. ;)
The community us indeed awesome.
I wrote a long reply but the site logged me out as it was posting, so I lost it and I'm too tired right now to retype it. Probably didn't add anything to what I've already said anyway. ;)
For me, the core of this issue comes in as character. Remember when Unity was first introduced and there was some discussion as to why she wore a sports bra of all things as work clothes and/or uniform? It was a strange thing to do when you're facing blasts from alien technology or the brutal fisticuffs of a drug-addled psyhopath. After her flavour text and personality came through, I couldn't care less that she puts her own comfort in her workplace above practicality or safety because she had become a character with charm and wit and a personality.
MindPhyre isn't going to do that. Probably. At the moment, she's formerly human drugged up sex-meat on a stick to hold her up in combat. Will she or any other of the Spites be able to overcome being anything other than one-note and dull as far as personality goes? I fear not, which means she will never elevate past an object of sex appeal. And, frankly, the one thing that actively bothers me about her that no one seems to have segmented out is what I refer to as the 'Anime Window'. That diamond or triangle of space at the upper thighs where they meet the pelvic region. I've always been on what I consider the slimmer side of the spectrum, but my thighs are huge and I stand by my statements that I could easily kill a man with nothing but my legs, partially because I could suffocate him with my bloody thighs. As such, while I've seen the Anime Window in real life, it seems so comedic to me that someone's thighs wouldn't touch when pressed together, that it's a running bother in my mind. MindPhyre has Anime Window in spades.
Take the KickStarted game Guardians Chronicles for a tick.
This is the main team. We have Seargent Freedom, Golden Boy, What's-his-face, and Super Nova, better known as 'The Girl'. She looks ridiculous. Not only is her outfit outright hilarious in practicality, lightly caressing her heaping breasts as it travels in a loose 'V' down to her ever-so-lovingly penned sex, but she's gorram proud of it! This game got (gets?) a lot of heat for it's sexual exploitation, and Super Nova is a prime example. They tossed arguments away with excuses such as 'It's playing with those Comic Book Tropes', 'She CHOSE to dress this way. No one made her', or 'She wants the attention. It's her personality!'
I don't buy it. She's the sole bit of female on the heroic side and is showcasing everything wrong with typical female portrayal in the world of super heroes. There's nothing substantial to back up her hideous outfit and she comes off as a shallow attempt to tempt the masses into buying into the game.
At the very least she isn't Wall Climber, from the same game.
That makes me choke back a bit of bile. Mostly with the 'How in all Hell are her parts doing what they're doing while she's doing...that?'
I can't even be sure if I'm still making the point I was trying to make or not, seeing as I'm at work and coming back to this message after minutes or hours of interruption, but my core problem with these sorts of artistic gender problems is that it seems gross and shallow when there isn't substantial background to go off of. Miss Informatin's mountain bosom (which I made mention of in the original thread after her reveal, and as someone pointed out, the whole piece seems to direct your eye straight to her inflated bazongas) stirs me the wrong way. Is there a reason for her sudden and drastic change from demure to bomb shell? Is this what she's wanted to be the entire time? Is she trying to convey femeninity through her awful scarring?
If there's a reason, I can forgive a lot. If not, than I'm left with a bad, sore feeling in my soul.
One final example: DC's Starfire. We all know her. We all love her (maybe). The recent reboot of her character has come under great war from fans everywhere. Starfire has always been scantily clad (and oddly enough, the sexiest image I've ever seen of her has been when she was MOST clothed, in Robin's dress shirt). On her home world, that was just the way of things. She doesn't quite grasp that showing skin is considered sexual on Earth, in America. The whole planet is new to her. On the surface, it sounds like complete bullpoop, but the way she was written and portrayed in panels left her so charming and relatable that there was no way to think of her as nothing but throwaway jerk-off material made up around the conference table.
Fast forward to now, and Starfire has been changed into a cold-hearted, amnesiac, sex-crazed shell of a character, wearing even less(!) than before, having full splash pages of her bathing in a pool, and asking random dudes to stick it in her. Any personality she had before is wiped clean so that readers can feel no remorse when they look at her as nothing but a vagina and tits on two very long, very orange legs. New Starfire is gross. I hope we never get any characters in Sentinels that have no reason to exist beyond T&A.
Side Note: Little Verge has quite the physique for an 11 year old! The only times I've seen anything close to that is with gymnasts, training since they could walk. He looks like a miniature SetBack.
I actually like Original Unity's vest top. She probably should be wearing something a little more protective in a workshop but since I guess she's mostly using her mind rather than dangerous burny tools, I can forgive that.
Her top looks sporty rather than blatantly sexual to me, which fits with her athletic body shape (the shape of a naturally slimmer person who spends a lot of time running around playing with robot dinosaurs). She looks comfortable, and she's wearing baggy combat pants which kind of offset the midriff-baring somewhat.
She's not deliberately drawn to look sexy, she's just concentrating on a job, and that makes her much more appealing to me.
On the subject of idealized male/female forms in comics, I would be utterly shocked if Iron Fist's open chested half-shirt was designed so the ladies would swoon, and I doubt anyone at DC said "Y'know what would make Power Girl look so cool!? A giant boob window!"
Power Girl's expanding chest was a running joke with an artist. He wanted to see how big they could get before editorial caught on.
I'm aware. A joke is not the same as designing a character to be heroic.
The joke came later. MUCH later in Power Girl's career.
...Zenith and Watchmen. All of those comics feature fully powered super people and...
The only super powered people in Watchmen was Dr. Manhattan. Moore took pains to make that clear.
Eh? Feeling picky today or something? Watchmen features a fully powered super hero so what's your point then? It's strange that you choose to quote me so selectively when the other comics that I mentioned (Astro City, Top Ten, Zenith) are lousy with fully powered super heroes.
Side Note: Little Verge has quite the physique for an 11 year old! The only times I've seen anything close to that is with gymnasts, training since they could walk. He looks like a miniature SetBack.
I was thinking the same! My friend's little brother has done gymnastics from a young age and looks just like that.
I'm not following how superpowered vs not superpowered has anything to do with this.
I think it originally ties back to the notion that a super powered mutant will be super buff by nature and my point that they still wouldn't need to be either ridiculously dressed or weirdly proportioned if that were the case. I'm not sure if that keeps us on topic or not but I agree it is somewhat besides the point.
I'm not following how superpowered vs not superpowered has anything to do with this.
I think it originally ties back to the notion that a super powered mutant will be super buff by nature and my point that they still wouldn't need to be either ridiculously dressed or weirdly proportioned if that were the case. I'm not sure if that keeps us on topic or not but I agree it is somewhat besides the point.
My reactions and opinions... All are subjective, and none tries to be a "message", the definition of how things should be seen, understood or whatever. Just my own reflections about my reactions... It won't be a rigorous piece, just a series of ideas and ramblings - sorry !
MyndPhyre : when I saw her I found her... monstrous. Not because I find thinness monstrous in itself - just that in this picture, I immediately thought it was meant to be unsetling, not attractive. I didn't react to her as a "sexual" figure, more as a sickly thin creature wearing a costume meant to make her even worse. For me, she looks "uncanny valley" more than sexy lady. Reason why I don't find she was a "move in the bad direction" or whatever. I may be wrong.
I've reacted "badly" to female costumes in SotM since the beginning. Wraith's and Visionary's swimming suits don't go well with what I think female heroes should wear (same for Beacon or Catastrophe). I prefered Young Legacy's skirt (probably with gym underpants). Or the Tactic's Wraith. There are worse costumes in Comic books, though. And there are many heroins with costumes I find better.
What I think is that Adam tries hard not to follow the classic hero figures/costume "traditions" - but he likes some kinds of outfits and appearances, and tends to draw them a lot. And I see no real problem with this - as long as he keeps trying not to "objectivize" his character by following the classic "norms" of the genre blindly.
And then there is the fact that these characters are characters in a comic book, not real persons. As such their appearance is "symbolic", they must be "iconic" and immediately recognizable - and their appearance "must" convey the message of their super-hero/villain nature. So they tend to be muscular and/or have idealized figures, sometimes exagerated, and wear impractical costumes as a way to make them recognizable and "different" from the Muggles. Someone wearing a typical superhero costume in reality would, male or female, look more ridiculous than heroic. But in comic books it works - because they are stories, not people.
What I mean is not that there is nothing to say about objectivization in comics - just that comics will often use some visual short-cuts to express "heroism" - not no to comment about sexuality/the ideal figures you should have or anything. The readers may find these "iconic" figures desirable or exciting or demeaning, and they may become so with time in the comics itself, but at first, the intent is just to be some kind of pictorial short-cut.
When a hero / villain is not in the "visual norm" of his role in the comics ( Like Wathchmen's the Owl belly, or the Scholar) it is not a comment on body types, but a visual clue to their other differences from other heroes.
Dr Medico has this physique because he is a hero - as a way to show he is one. Just like a wears a mask - though I doubt he needs to as he is pure energy, and probably easily recognized even with the mask on. This is some kind of visual code.
Please don't take what I am saying as trying to say that there is no reason for debate. I just wanted to point that costumes and body shapes are visual tropes, and we should try to keep this in mind too. It's not realistic art depicting real people, but "expressionist" art trying to evoke feelings, moods, ideas, memories, in the mind of the reader. This said, debating tropes - and changing them - is always a good thing. Especially because, for years, comic books have forgotten, I think, the "meaning" of these tropes, and reproduce/accentuate them blindly - they are no more tropes but meaningless traditions and habits. Or rather perverted tropes, that don't mean what they were meant to express in the beginning, and have become a commentary on bodies and physical norms.
Personaly, I like my heroins fully clothed ( even if Wraith in her bathsuit is my computer's screen wallpaper, and I'd really like to see the girl I love wear it...), and my heroes, male, female or otherwhise, with a variety of body shapes, preferably not muscular. And would have liked Catastrophe to have a full body suit :)
Finally - I think Adam knows its job well, and that he is far, very far, from being "objectivizing", if that may be a word. I like his art and the way he depicts heroes and heroins a lot. Mainly because, each time I see a hero/heroin/villain, I feel like he tried to draw them to convey informations about him/her/it - not because "this is the way people should look like" or "this is the way you must draw a hero".
Also - I haven't be following current heroic artworks, but Adam, I think, tries to evoke the typical drawings and "tropes" of different periods of comic book history, depending on the expansion - with, I think , Tactics art being maybe meant to be evocative of 21st century's expected comic book look. Though I am not knowledgeable enough to be assertive about it.
Well. It was long and not very coherent. I think I will make a costume for me, and will assume the name of "The Rambler".
Any view of things that is not strange is false - Neil Gaiman
I just want to say that this thread makes me really glad I joined this community. The honest, reasoned, and understanding debate says great things about the >G crowd.
I don't think I have too much to say other than what's already been said. Even as a straight white male, I enjoy the level of diversity present in the Sentinels universe. It's a reflection of our real world! And I want the people in my life who aren't straight white males to also enjoy life. And to enjoy this game.
There seems to be a substantial amount of variation in the art from card to card - even in the base game, Tachyon's character card almost looks like a totally different person to me than Tachyon on every other card. (To me, the non-character card one is the "real" Tachyon.) So it's tough for me to notice a trend. But Miss Information did seem rather dramatic. And I know that I can only view things through my personal perspective: http://www.shortpacked.com/2011/comic/book-13/05-the-death-of-snkrs/falseequivalence/
My reactions and opinions... All are subjective, and none tries to be a "message", the definition of how things should be seen, understood or whatever. Just my own reflections about my reactions... It won't be a rigorous piece, just a series of ideas and ramblings - sorry !MyndPhyre : when I saw her I found her... monstrous. Not because I find thinness monstrous in itself - just that in this picture, I immediately thought it was meant to be unsetling, not attractive. I didn't react to her as a "sexual" figure, more as a sickly thin creature wearing a costume meant to make her even worse. For me, she looks "uncanny valley" more than sexy lady. Reason why I don't find she was a "move in the bad direction" or whatever. I may be wrong.I've reacted "badly" to female costumes in SotM since the beginning. Wraith's and Visionary's swimming suits don't go well with what I think female heroes should wear (same for Beacon or Catastrophe). I prefered Young Legacy's skirt (probably with gym underpants). Or the Tactic's Wraith. There are worse costumes in Comic books, though. And there are many heroins with costumes I find better.What I think is that Adam tries hard not to follow the classic hero figures/costume "traditions" - but he likes some kinds of outfits and appearances, and tends to draw them a lot. And I see no real problem with this - as long as he keeps trying not to "objectivize" his character by following the classic "norms" of the genre blindly.And then there is the fact that these characters are characters in a comic book, not real persons. As such their appearance is "symbolic", they must be "iconic" and immediately recognizable - and their appearance "must" convey the message of their super-hero/villain nature. So they tend to be muscular and/or have idealized figures, sometimes exagerated, and wear impractical costumes as a way to make them recognizable and "different" from the Muggles. Someone wearing a typical superhero costume in reality would, male or female, look more ridiculous than heroic. But in comic books it works - because they are stories, not people.What I mean is not that there is nothing to say about objectivization in comics - just that comics will often use some visual short-cuts to express "heroism" - not no to comment about sexuality/the ideal figures you should have or anything. The readers may find these "iconic" figures desirable or exciting or demeaning, and they may become so with time in the comics itself, but at first, the intent is just to be some kind of pictorial short-cut.When a hero / villain is not in the "visual norm" of his role in the comics ( Like Wathchmen's the Owl belly, or the Scholar) it is not a comment on body types, but a visual clue to their other differences from other heroes.Dr Medico has this physique because he is a hero - as a way to show he is one. Just like a wears a mask - though I doubt he needs to as he is pure energy, and probably easily recognized even with the mask on. This is some kind of visual code.Please don't take what I am saying as trying to say that there is no reason for debate. I just wanted to point that costumes and body shapes are visual tropes, and we should try to keep this in mind too. It's not realistic art depicting real people, but "expressionist" art trying to evoke feelings, moods, ideas, memories, in the mind of the reader. This said, debating tropes - and changing them - is always a good thing. Especially because, for years, comic books have forgotten, I think, the "meaning" of these tropes, and reproduce/accentuate them blindly - they are no more tropes but meaningless traditions and habits. Or rather perverted tropes, that don't mean what they were meant to express in the beginning, and have become a commentary on bodies and physical norms.Personaly, I like my heroins fully clothed ( even if Wraith in her bathsuit is my computer's screen wallpaper, and I'd really like to see the girl I love wear it...), and my heroes, male, female or otherwhise, with a variety of body shapes, preferably not muscular. And would have liked Catastrophe to have a full body suit :)Finally - I think Adam knows its job well, and that he is far, very far, from being "objectivizing", if that may be a word. I like his art and the way he depicts heroes and heroins a lot. Mainly because, each time I see a hero/heroin/villain, I feel like he tried to draw them to convey informations about him/her/it - not because "this is the way people should look like" or "this is the way you must draw a hero".Also - I haven't be following current heroic artworks, but Adam, I think, tries to evoke the typical drawings and "tropes" of different periods of comic book history, depending on the expansion - with, I think , Tactics art being maybe meant to be evocative of 21st century's expected comic book look. Though I am not knowledgeable enough to be assertive about it.Well. It was long and not very coherent. I think I will make a costume for me, and will assume the name of "The Rambler".
if I wasn't on mobile I'd highlight the things that I 100% agree with and think are important. But I think you're spot on with a great many things here.
Quick note; in the topic title, it's objectification, not objectivity.
McBehrer is the sole winner of this game... And McBehrer, I would step carefully should you find your way down dark alleys. More than one vote said simply, "McBehrer must die."
Mine too! :)
I don't get it Foote, but I'll take that as a compliment/insult/train pun however it was intended
:D I feel like a pet who has earned a biscuit! lmao
Seriously tho, I don't want to see anyone driven away from this community. This is a great game and has some great folks involved in it's fandom. It's so easy for things to get toxic and as far as I have seen, this place never does. ;)
The community us indeed awesome.
I wrote a long reply but the site logged me out as it was posting, so I lost it and I'm too tired right now to retype it. Probably didn't add anything to what I've already said anyway. ;)
Just assume I'm always doing that.
Damn it, Ronway!
For me, the core of this issue comes in as character. Remember when Unity was first introduced and there was some discussion as to why she wore a sports bra of all things as work clothes and/or uniform? It was a strange thing to do when you're facing blasts from alien technology or the brutal fisticuffs of a drug-addled psyhopath. After her flavour text and personality came through, I couldn't care less that she puts her own comfort in her workplace above practicality or safety because she had become a character with charm and wit and a personality.
MindPhyre isn't going to do that. Probably. At the moment, she's formerly human drugged up sex-meat on a stick to hold her up in combat. Will she or any other of the Spites be able to overcome being anything other than one-note and dull as far as personality goes? I fear not, which means she will never elevate past an object of sex appeal. And, frankly, the one thing that actively bothers me about her that no one seems to have segmented out is what I refer to as the 'Anime Window'. That diamond or triangle of space at the upper thighs where they meet the pelvic region. I've always been on what I consider the slimmer side of the spectrum, but my thighs are huge and I stand by my statements that I could easily kill a man with nothing but my legs, partially because I could suffocate him with my bloody thighs. As such, while I've seen the Anime Window in real life, it seems so comedic to me that someone's thighs wouldn't touch when pressed together, that it's a running bother in my mind. MindPhyre has Anime Window in spades.
Take the KickStarted game Guardians Chronicles for a tick.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/ksr/assets/000/529/666/a84ca7bdd9a83ec411d556c03ee0958a_large.jpg?1366465999
This is the main team. We have Seargent Freedom, Golden Boy, What's-his-face, and Super Nova, better known as 'The Girl'. She looks ridiculous. Not only is her outfit outright hilarious in practicality, lightly caressing her heaping breasts as it travels in a loose 'V' down to her ever-so-lovingly penned sex, but she's gorram proud of it! This game got (gets?) a lot of heat for it's sexual exploitation, and Super Nova is a prime example. They tossed arguments away with excuses such as 'It's playing with those Comic Book Tropes', 'She CHOSE to dress this way. No one made her', or 'She wants the attention. It's her personality!'
I don't buy it. She's the sole bit of female on the heroic side and is showcasing everything wrong with typical female portrayal in the world of super heroes. There's nothing substantial to back up her hideous outfit and she comes off as a shallow attempt to tempt the masses into buying into the game.
At the very least she isn't Wall Climber, from the same game.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/ksr/assets/000/528/504/ce8263d6e5eef55084cbe414277b9e9d_large.jpg?1366407655
That makes me choke back a bit of bile. Mostly with the 'How in all Hell are her parts doing what they're doing while she's doing...that?'
I can't even be sure if I'm still making the point I was trying to make or not, seeing as I'm at work and coming back to this message after minutes or hours of interruption, but my core problem with these sorts of artistic gender problems is that it seems gross and shallow when there isn't substantial background to go off of. Miss Informatin's mountain bosom (which I made mention of in the original thread after her reveal, and as someone pointed out, the whole piece seems to direct your eye straight to her inflated bazongas) stirs me the wrong way. Is there a reason for her sudden and drastic change from demure to bomb shell? Is this what she's wanted to be the entire time? Is she trying to convey femeninity through her awful scarring?
If there's a reason, I can forgive a lot. If not, than I'm left with a bad, sore feeling in my soul.
One final example: DC's Starfire. We all know her. We all love her (maybe). The recent reboot of her character has come under great war from fans everywhere. Starfire has always been scantily clad (and oddly enough, the sexiest image I've ever seen of her has been when she was MOST clothed, in Robin's dress shirt). On her home world, that was just the way of things. She doesn't quite grasp that showing skin is considered sexual on Earth, in America. The whole planet is new to her. On the surface, it sounds like complete bullpoop, but the way she was written and portrayed in panels left her so charming and relatable that there was no way to think of her as nothing but throwaway jerk-off material made up around the conference table.
Fast forward to now, and Starfire has been changed into a cold-hearted, amnesiac, sex-crazed shell of a character, wearing even less(!) than before, having full splash pages of her bathing in a pool, and asking random dudes to stick it in her. Any personality she had before is wiped clean so that readers can feel no remorse when they look at her as nothing but a vagina and tits on two very long, very orange legs. New Starfire is gross. I hope we never get any characters in Sentinels that have no reason to exist beyond T&A.
Side Note: Little Verge has quite the physique for an 11 year old! The only times I've seen anything close to that is with gymnasts, training since they could walk. He looks like a miniature SetBack.
I fall up the stairs.
"Right, Left, Right, Left! Chu! Chu! Chu!
I actually like Original Unity's vest top. She probably should be wearing something a little more protective in a workshop but since I guess she's mostly using her mind rather than dangerous burny tools, I can forgive that.
Her top looks sporty rather than blatantly sexual to me, which fits with her athletic body shape (the shape of a naturally slimmer person who spends a lot of time running around playing with robot dinosaurs). She looks comfortable, and she's wearing baggy combat pants which kind of offset the midriff-baring somewhat.
She's not deliberately drawn to look sexy, she's just concentrating on a job, and that makes her much more appealing to me.
Just assume I'm always doing that.
Damn it, Ronway!
But oh dear God, the thigh gap. :(
Just assume I'm always doing that.
Damn it, Ronway!
The joke came later. MUCH later in Power Girl's career.
The only super powered people in Watchmen was Dr. Manhattan. Moore took pains to make that clear.
Eh? Feeling picky today or something? Watchmen features a fully powered super hero so what's your point then? It's strange that you choose to quote me so selectively when the other comics that I mentioned (Astro City, Top Ten, Zenith) are lousy with fully powered super heroes.
I'm not following how superpowered vs not superpowered has anything to do with this.
Just assume I'm always doing that.
Damn it, Ronway!
I was thinking the same! My friend's little brother has done gymnastics from a young age and looks just like that.
I think it originally ties back to the notion that a super powered mutant will be super buff by nature and my point that they still wouldn't need to be either ridiculously dressed or weirdly proportioned if that were the case. I'm not sure if that keeps us on topic or not but I agree it is somewhat besides the point.
Fair enough.
Just assume I'm always doing that.
Damn it, Ronway!
My reactions and opinions... All are subjective, and none tries to be a "message", the definition of how things should be seen, understood or whatever. Just my own reflections about my reactions... It won't be a rigorous piece, just a series of ideas and ramblings - sorry !
MyndPhyre : when I saw her I found her... monstrous. Not because I find thinness monstrous in itself - just that in this picture, I immediately thought it was meant to be unsetling, not attractive. I didn't react to her as a "sexual" figure, more as a sickly thin creature wearing a costume meant to make her even worse. For me, she looks "uncanny valley" more than sexy lady. Reason why I don't find she was a "move in the bad direction" or whatever. I may be wrong.
I've reacted "badly" to female costumes in SotM since the beginning. Wraith's and Visionary's swimming suits don't go well with what I think female heroes should wear (same for Beacon or Catastrophe). I prefered Young Legacy's skirt (probably with gym underpants). Or the Tactic's Wraith. There are worse costumes in Comic books, though. And there are many heroins with costumes I find better.
What I think is that Adam tries hard not to follow the classic hero figures/costume "traditions" - but he likes some kinds of outfits and appearances, and tends to draw them a lot. And I see no real problem with this - as long as he keeps trying not to "objectivize" his character by following the classic "norms" of the genre blindly.
And then there is the fact that these characters are characters in a comic book, not real persons. As such their appearance is "symbolic", they must be "iconic" and immediately recognizable - and their appearance "must" convey the message of their super-hero/villain nature. So they tend to be muscular and/or have idealized figures, sometimes exagerated, and wear impractical costumes as a way to make them recognizable and "different" from the Muggles. Someone wearing a typical superhero costume in reality would, male or female, look more ridiculous than heroic. But in comic books it works - because they are stories, not people.
What I mean is not that there is nothing to say about objectivization in comics - just that comics will often use some visual short-cuts to express "heroism" - not no to comment about sexuality/the ideal figures you should have or anything. The readers may find these "iconic" figures desirable or exciting or demeaning, and they may become so with time in the comics itself, but at first, the intent is just to be some kind of pictorial short-cut.
When a hero / villain is not in the "visual norm" of his role in the comics ( Like Wathchmen's the Owl belly, or the Scholar) it is not a comment on body types, but a visual clue to their other differences from other heroes.
Dr Medico has this physique because he is a hero - as a way to show he is one. Just like a wears a mask - though I doubt he needs to as he is pure energy, and probably easily recognized even with the mask on. This is some kind of visual code.
Please don't take what I am saying as trying to say that there is no reason for debate. I just wanted to point that costumes and body shapes are visual tropes, and we should try to keep this in mind too. It's not realistic art depicting real people, but "expressionist" art trying to evoke feelings, moods, ideas, memories, in the mind of the reader. This said, debating tropes - and changing them - is always a good thing. Especially because, for years, comic books have forgotten, I think, the "meaning" of these tropes, and reproduce/accentuate them blindly - they are no more tropes but meaningless traditions and habits. Or rather perverted tropes, that don't mean what they were meant to express in the beginning, and have become a commentary on bodies and physical norms.
Personaly, I like my heroins fully clothed ( even if Wraith in her bathsuit is my computer's screen wallpaper, and I'd really like to see the girl I love wear it...), and my heroes, male, female or otherwhise, with a variety of body shapes, preferably not muscular. And would have liked Catastrophe to have a full body suit :)
Finally - I think Adam knows its job well, and that he is far, very far, from being "objectivizing", if that may be a word. I like his art and the way he depicts heroes and heroins a lot. Mainly because, each time I see a hero/heroin/villain, I feel like he tried to draw them to convey informations about him/her/it - not because "this is the way people should look like" or "this is the way you must draw a hero".
Also - I haven't be following current heroic artworks, but Adam, I think, tries to evoke the typical drawings and "tropes" of different periods of comic book history, depending on the expansion - with, I think , Tactics art being maybe meant to be evocative of 21st century's expected comic book look. Though I am not knowledgeable enough to be assertive about it.
Well. It was long and not very coherent. I think I will make a costume for me, and will assume the name of "The Rambler".
Any view of things that is not strange is false - Neil Gaiman
I just want to say that this thread makes me really glad I joined this community. The honest, reasoned, and understanding debate says great things about the >G crowd.
I don't think I have too much to say other than what's already been said. Even as a straight white male, I enjoy the level of diversity present in the Sentinels universe. It's a reflection of our real world! And I want the people in my life who aren't straight white males to also enjoy life. And to enjoy this game.
There seems to be a substantial amount of variation in the art from card to card - even in the base game, Tachyon's character card almost looks like a totally different person to me than Tachyon on every other card. (To me, the non-character card one is the "real" Tachyon.) So it's tough for me to notice a trend. But Miss Information did seem rather dramatic. And I know that I can only view things through my personal perspective: http://www.shortpacked.com/2011/comic/book-13/05-the-death-of-snkrs/falseequivalence/
if I wasn't on mobile I'd highlight the things that I 100% agree with and think are important. But I think you're spot on with a great many things here.
Quick note; in the topic title, it's objectification, not objectivity.
McBehrer is the sole winner of this game... And McBehrer, I would step carefully should you find your way down dark alleys. More than one vote said simply, "McBehrer must die."
McBehrer confirmed to be Biomancer!
-- Trajector
Pages