#women in refrigerators

[alpaca-clouds]

Let me talk about Women in Refrigerators

You know what? This is a thing that is kinda annoying me in the Castlevania fandom. How everyone is screaming about Women in Refrigerators, while folks so clearly do not understand what the trope actually is about and why it is a bad trope.

Like, there is not a single death of a named woman in Castlevania, that not at least someone has called "fridged". Alright, maybe Drolta. But other than that... yeah, folks definitely have called Lenore and Carmilla fridged. And... No, people, you misunderstand the trope.

The name of the trope was coined based on Green Lantern vol. 3 #54 (from the 90s), in which Green Lantern finds his death girlfriend stuffed in a refrigerator - mostly for shock value in the reader. Mind you, this was the 90s, when superhero comics were really, really edgy and stuff. And in fact the kind of story happened a lot of times during this time. Female characters being killed, raped and tortured for pure shock value, with the story not featuring any idea of what this did to the female character, but rather focusing on what this does to the male characters. (And mind you: Yes, a woman can be considered fridged and still survive the ordeal. A lot of folks do consider Barbara in The Killing Joke fridged as well.)

So, what does "Fridging" in terms of the trope mean? Basically it means that a female character suffers a horrible fate just so that another (most probably male) character can be motivated to do something and react to this thing happening, setting in motion a character arc for the surviving character - or even setting into motion the plot.

In many examples it should also be noticed that at times the female characters mostly just exist to meet their horrible end. Supernatural as a show is really bad in this regard. Like, within the first episode of the show THREE FUCKING WOMEN get fridged, just so that the brothers can travel together and start the plot.

So, let's move back to Castlevania.

Lisa is fridged. There is no way around it. Yes, it does not feel like it, because they still managed to make her a character of sorts, but yeah, she definitely is fridged. She dies a horrible death and that death is what motivates the plot, as well as what motivates both Alucard and Dracula. That is very classical fridging no way around it.

Carmilla and Lenore, though? Yeah, they are not fridged. They are characters who just die. Their death is not used to motivate another character. Their death is also not random, like most fridging deaths. Especially Carmilla is basically asking for her death, of course. She is a villain and gets the same death as all other villains. And while it is a bit different with Lenore, she definitely is not fridged either, giving that she literally dies in the last episode with no plot or development happening because of her death.

In Nocturne it gets a bit more complicated. Is Julia fridged? In a way, I would argue, she is, mostly on the value that she exists as a character to die and for her death to be the basis for Richter's character arc, giving him the trauma he needs to overcome.

Esther meanwhile does not feel fridged to me. Because Annette's trauma is not deeply linked to her death, rather than the entire slavery experience in general.

Tera? Well, for Tera it is too early to tell. I still assume that her change into a vampire is going to be used to have the characters realize, that vampires are not inherently evil, and to give us a view into what vampire society looks like. At least that is what I assume.

By the way: The fridging of female characters is my big issue with the PS2 Castlevania games. Like, in Lament of Innocence both Sara and Elisabetha are getting fridged to motivate Leon and Mathias. And the same is true for Rosalie in Curse of Darkness, who as a character only exists to motivate Hector. I mean, she is so replacable as a character, that Hector fucking replaces her by the end of the game.

#castlevania #castlevania netflix #castlevania nocturne #refrigerated women #women in refrigerators #fridging #feminism #women in media #julia belmont #castlevania lisa #castlevania tera

[evilwickedme]

It's very frustrating to talk about fridging bc the original point of it was like a very specific criticism of how minorities are treated in comic books in particular and it's now been universalized so much people think it means "killing a woman off because she's a woman" or "killing any character to motivate another character" (the definition according to tvtropes fyi, kill it with fire kill kill kill kill). Fridging isn't bad because you're killing a character as motivation, and it's not bad because you're killing a minority off, it's bad because it's a pattern of behavior from an industry overrun by white men writing and drawing and editing those stories. You're allowed to kill a woman off if it suits your story, but the issue was that women are constantly getting hurt or depowered or raped or killed off to motivate other, non-coincidentally male characters.

The problem that stood behind the original women in refrigerators website was that the narrative that the comic book industry at large was telling was that the purpose of female characters was to get hurt in order to motivate some other guy. Kyle Rayner's girlfriend gets stuffed in a fridge, we're not sad because her life got taken from her too soon, we're sad because Kyle Rayner just lost his girlfriend. Gwen Stacy gets killed by the Green Goblin, we're not sad because she didn't get to live a full happy life, we're sad because she didn't get to live a full happy life with Peter Parker. That is not to say that the story doesn't still get told. Peter going after the Green Goblin is horrific and terrible and amazing and leads to some great plot and character development. But the choice was not to hurt Peter himself, not even to threaten his loved ones but not actually harm them, the choice - CHOICE! - the writers in the comic book industry consistently made was to hurt a character who was already part of a marginalized group, and to do that for the benefit of a (presumably) white male cishet able bodied main character's narrative.

I speak mostly in past tense because once fridging took hold in the collective popular consciousness it didn't disappear completely, but it did fall out of favor in being used so blatantly. It became isolated cases rather than the main feature of one of the best selling batman books of all time. Characters get killed off occasionally, and those characters are even sometimes members of minority groups, and biases still inform those writing choices, but I'm struggling to remember reading a comic in the last couple of years that specifically fulfills the criteria for fridging.

Anyway if you're reading this in context, you know that at the end of this month (may 2023) Marvel is planning to celebrate the most famous fridging of all time by absolutely not learning their lesson and fridging another character. They're being lazy about it, too - they've decided to do it to Kamala Khan in Peter Parker's book, two characters that mean close to nothing to each other, and being extra awful by making it a Pakistani Muslim woman being killed off during AAPI month, and so far the information we have doesn't even involve Kamala's own friends and family and superhero team mourning her at all. It's supposed to motivate Peter, because it's part of his book, and it's also supposed to parallel Gwen Stacy, and they chose to do... This. Kamala is a wildly popular and beloved character who deserves better, and frankly Peter deserves better too. If you're going to fridge, at least do it well.

But I'm also already seeing white men, who supposedly agree with me and think this is bad, saying, well it's for MCU synergy, not "because she's a female" or "because she's not a white character" (direct quotes don't @ me). And firstly, ok, way to assume the rest of us didn't also catch up to the obvious conclusion that marvel comics is doing MCU synergy, AGAIN. The thing is that those aren't separate concepts at all? Or well, they are, but they don't negate each other. They're trying to do MCU synergy and make Kamala into a mutant, but they could've done that a million other ways, just as cheap and not as offensive - a simple retcon would've sufficed, they just did that a few years ago with Franklin Richards.

They chose to do it by killing her off, and they chose to kill her off in somebody else's book to motivate him rather than tell a story about her, and they chose to do it while celebrating Gwen's fridging for some fucking reason. This is context that, when removed from the situation, makes the whole thing meaningless. And you can say a lot about Gail Simone, but that she didn't have a Goddamn point is not one of them.

#how do I even tag this #fridging #women in refrigerators #kamala khan #ms marvel #spiderman #peter parker #gwen stacy #comics #marvel comics #marvel #sexism #racism #gail speaks

[samasmith23]

The ACTUAL heck?! Not Kamala! Please don't permanently kill off Kamala Khan Marvel!

Wait... WWWHHHAAATTT???!!! This can't be for real! This honestly cannot be real! Apparently there was a leak for the upcoming issue of Amazing Spider-Man (2022) #26 by Zeb Wells & John Romita Jr. in which they apparently kill off Ms. Marvel (Kamala Khan)?!

This has honestly got to be some kind of fake-out or misdirection. It would be absolutely stupid and insulting for Marvel to kill off not only their most prominent South Asian Muslim female super hero in a white male superhero's book (which not only feeds into the misogynistic "women in refrigerators" trope, but is also rather racist and Islamophobic...), but one of the most popular and successful characters Marvel has created in recent memory! Plus, Kamala did actually die already once in the pages of Champions (2019) #2, but she was immediately resurrected in the exact same issue through a deal Miles Morales made with Mephisto (though sadly someone else died in Kamala's place because making a deal with the Devil is the equivalent of making a wish on the Monkey's Paw)!

So what exactly would motivate Marvel to do this?! Given how popular and successful Kamala's character has been both in and outside of comics, permanently killing her off in a completely separate character's series seems like an incredibly bad business decision that will only serve piss fans off!

Overall, I'm desperately hoping that this alleged death for Kamala is either a complete fake-out or just temporary on the Spider-Man author's part. But I'm still really nervous considering that Marvel is also going to be releasing a one-shot issue titled, Fallen Friend: The Death of Ms. Marvel (with some of her original writers like Saladin Ahmed & Mark Waid attached to it)...

Just... why is this happening?!

But as deeply disappointed and frustrated as I am by this leak and news, I strongly condemn any person who tries to harass or send death threats to Zeb Wells or any other of the creators involved with this terrible decision!

In the immortal words of Linkara, we can criticize a bad story without becoming supervillains ourselves. Harassment and death threats are NEVER acceptable under any circumstances, no matter how bad you think a story is!

#ms marvel #kamala khan #spider man #peter parker #women in refrigerators #comic spoilers #just... wwwhhhyyy???!!! #amazing spider man #ms marvel comics #zeb wells #john romita jr. #marvel comics #marvel champions #miles morales #mephisto #jim zub #tangent #linkara #Youtube

[paradisechid800]

Okay, but everyone keeps saying "Poor Honzo", "He can't catch a break" and I'm sitting over here like "Poor Harumi". Because she gets killed mercilessly in every damn thing she's in. She could just be sitting there, existing, and the writers just go "Not today bitch". Who the hell did she piss off so much that they want her dead in every excruciating way possible. In Scorpion's invasion cutscene, they literally made the most cruel and sadistic ways to kill her. Like, when will it end?

#justice for harumi #oh and satoshi too if there's time #make her an official playable charater you cowards! #mortal kombat #harumi hasashi #satoshi hasashi #mk #mk1 #scorpion #scorpion x harumi #honzo x harumi #women in refrigerators

[cannibalspicnic]

I've seen a few different people referring to Ro Laren's death as a "fridging" or saying that she was "fridged" etc. It's been bugging me for a while, so I would like to address it because not only does it misrepresent the concept of women in refrigerators but it does a disservice to Ro's character in my mind.

The concept of women in refrigerators came from Gail Simone who noticed a trend of how female superheroes were treated and subsequently killed in comic books after Katma Tui (a female superhero) was pretty unceremoniously sliced up and stuffed into a refrigerator for Hal Jordan (Green Lantern) to find. The brutalization and lack of agency is a huge aspect of women in refrigerators.

"I can't quite shake the feeling that male characters tend to die differently than female ones. The male characters seem to die nobly, as heroes, most often, whereas it's not uncommon, as in Katma Tui's case, for a male character to just come home and find her butchered in the kitchen." -Gail Simone

Generally, a fridged woman not only doesn't have agency in her own death, but the death itself is meaningless to her character development and storyline.

One of Ro Laren's defining character traits is that she is prepared to sacrifice herself, her career, her relationships, her moral certainty to do what she thinks is right. It makes total sense to me that she would be ready to die so Picard could get away.

Another part of Ro's character is her search and struggle for someone to trust and to believe in. A large part of why she betrayed Picard was the old man who reminded her of her father and who probably held beliefs more common to the ones with which she was raised. Her final act being one of trust brings a certain closure for her character that's just hers.

And I thought there was vindication for her. Picard is so far up his own ass about Starfleet, and she's the one who had to bonk him on his head about complete faith in any institution. She was the one bringing one of the major themes of the whole season into clarity because she has always understood the moral complications of war and knows that no side comes out unchanged or untainted.

Anyway, I'm not saying anyone has to like her death or not have a problem with her being brought back just to be killed off, but I very strongly disagree with calling her a fridged woman. Yes, the storyline and Picard's character were advanced because of her death, but that was not the only purpose her death serves.

Thanks for your time!

I will now go back to simping for Vadic.

*climbs off soapbox*

#picard spoilers #women in refrigerators #star trek: picard #gail simone #ro laren #st: pic #st: tng #michelle forbes #commander ro #imposters #picard #star trek: tng #star trek

[racefortheironthrone]

Do you think the term 'fridging' has become overused, and if Brienne does sacrifice herself for Jaime, would that not count?

I think that one of the useful things about the term fridging is that the website "Women in Refrigerators" is still up so we can know exactly what Gail Simone wrote when she coined the term back in the 90s. To quote her:

"Hi. This is a list I made when it occurred to me that it's not that healthy to be a female character in comics. I'm curious to find out if this list seems somewhat disproportionate, and if so, what it means, really. These are superheroines who have been either depowered, raped, or cut up and stuck in the refrigerator. I know I missed a bunch. Some have been revived, even improved -- although the question remains as to why they were thrown in the wood chipper in the first place. I know I missed a bunch -- I just don't know my comics deaths the way I should. I'm not editorializing -- I'm just curious to find out what you guys think it means, if anything. The preceding letter was written and sent by me when I realized one day that most of my favorite female comics characters had met untimely and often icky ends. The history of the idea and this site are listed here, and the responses from various comics professionals are listed here. An important point: This isn't about assessing blame about an individual story or the treatment of an individual character and it's certainly not about personal attacks on the creators who kindly shared their thoughts on this phenomenon. It's about the trend, its meaning and relevance, if any. Plus, it's just fun to talk about refrigerators with dead people in them. I don't know why.

In Simone's original meaning, "fridging" specifically applied to superhero comics, it involved a spectrum of violence from depowering to sexual assault to physical assault to mutiliation to murder, and it was disproportionately gendered. Notably, the qualification that "fridging" is done in order to motivate the (disproportionately male) protagonist rather than as part of a heroic character arc for the woman being fridged, came around a little later, mostly from those creators who were responding to Simone's initial provocation. However, you can see that this particular qualification was an idea floating in the aether at the time Simone was writing her first foray.

Do I think the term has become overused? It's certainly spread to more genres outside of superheroes, but I don't think that's an over-extension, since we're usually talking about the same phenomenon happening in "heroic" subgenres of fantasy, sci-fi, romance, etc.

Does this apply to Brienne sacrificing herself to save Jaime?

No.

Brienne's self-sacrifice is the logical and emotional climax of her own character arc, one rooted in chivalric romance in which Brienne seeks to play the role of the tragic knight. She is introduced as an existential true knight, someone who finds life in Westerosi society a constant trial and humiliation but who longs to escape into a world of song and story through glorious deeds:

"Because it will not last," Catelyn answered, sadly. "Because they are the knights of summer, and winter is coming." "Lady Catelyn, you are wrong." Brienne regarded her with eyes as blue as her armor. "Winter will never come for the likes of us. Should we die in battle, they will surely sing of us, and it's always summer in the songs. In the songs all knights are gallant, all maids are beautiful, and the sun is always shining."

As in real-world chivalric romance, the structures of Westerosi chivalric romance are built around tragedy: the Dragonknight doesn't get to settle down with Naerys, but gives up his life to save King Aegon IV, and it's the doomed chaste romannce and the stubborn attachment to duty that makes it all so damn chivalrous.

Thus, from Brienne's introduction to now, we see Brienne looking for someone worthy to sacrifice her life to save:

she starts with Renly, except that she can't save him from the magic (although that does mean that she doesn't learn how unworthy he was) and becomes blamed for his death instead.

then she shifts to Catelyn, except that she can't save her because Catelyn sends her away so she's not there during the Red Wedding.

Jaime and Brienne's ASOS trek across the Riverlands, from the revelations of his backstory to him jumping into the bear pit to his quest-giving at the end, is entirely about setting him up as the third of three lord/lady-coded characters that Brienne could sacrifice herself for. And lo and behold, we have a situation where Jaime and Brienne are about to come face-to-face with Lady Stoneheart, a scenario we've already seen be grounded in questions of sacrifice and honor.

So unless GRRM somehow fucks up and makes the conclusion of Brienne's arc more about Jaime than Brienne, it's not a case of fridging.

#comics #comics meta #gail simone #women in refrigerators #fridging #asoiaf meta

[invisible-pink-toast]

“The woman dies.

She dies to provide a plot twist. She dies to develop the narrative. She dies for cathartic effect. She dies because no one could think of what else to do with her. Dies because there weren’t any better story ideas around. Dies because her death was the very best idea that anyone could come up with.

‘I’ve got it! Let’s kill her off!’

‘Yes! Her death will solve everything!’

‘Okay! Let’s hit the pub!’

And so, the woman dies. The woman dies so the man can be sad about it. The woman dies so the man can suffer. She dies to give him a destiny. Dies so he can fall to the dark side. Dies so he can lament her death. As he stands there, brimming with grief, brimming with life, the woman lies there in silence. The woman dies for him. We watch it happen. We read about it happening. We come to know it well.”

- The Woman Dies by Aoko Matsuda (translated by Polly Barton)

#you ever read a quote and it's So Good you have to put everything down and immidiately work out an edit for it? #came across the quote watching Final Girl Studios video on Beautiful Dead Girls: The Romanticised Death of the Teenage Girl #a fantastic (although disturbing obviously) video essay on this trope #and there are so.many.examples #was hard to narrow it down to 20 #and that's just of the ones i know! let alone all the many others #plus there's the intersections?? like it's dangerous to be a female character - and a woman of colour (especially black and even more so #with dark skin) - and a queer woman (especially a lesbian) - and an abuse survivor #so based on that they obviously had to kill tara thornton 🙄 #tropes #cw death #women in refrigerators #dead lesbian #tw mysoginy #tw racism #tw homophobia #tw lesbophobia #they deserve better #Aoko Matsuda #the woman dies #quotes #dead girl trope #my post #my edit #lexa #gwen stacy #mako mori #gamora #cordelia chase #poussey washington

[breckstonevailskier]

#mcu salt #mcu criticism #women in refrigerators #wanda maximoff #natasha romanoff #gamora #fuck endgame #anti endgame #anti dsmom

[lesbiandinin]

Banging my head against the wall, but here's the thing: Gail Simone's original list of women who are victims of fridging may seem outdated and it is! Because when it was created, no one was talking about this-there was no dialogue on how badly women were treated in comics and no one who cared. The website was created in 1999. & btw it was not just Gail Simone but Rob Harris, Greg Dean Schmitz and Brian Joines who helped contribute to the list. So, it's not all Simone who made this list, she had a team of friends too.

Just putting it out there that misogyny is still an issue in comics.

#women in refrigerators #gail simone #i feel people are far more harsh with simone than male creators who regularly do awful things

[batcavescolony]

I'm here to remind you that DC is the reason we have the term 'fridging’ or 'women in refrigerators syndrome' (coined by Gail Simone). Alexandra DeWitt, who was a girlfriend of The Green Lantern Kyle Rayner, was killed and her body shoved in her fridge for Kyle to find. She was in like less that three comics then she was killed.

Green Lantern Vol. 3 #54

#kyle rayner #green lantern #alexandra dewitt #dc comics #comics #women in refrigerators #everyone point and laugh at Jenette Kahn and Ron Marz since the editor and writer so they will forever be known as #'the DC comics people who inspired the woman in refrigerators trope' #ron marz #jenette kahn #green lantern vol. 3 54 #hal jordan #gail simone #batman #robin #flash #wonder woman #aquaman #alan scott #superman #comic tropes #woman in refrigerators syndrome #comic history #the lantern corps #green lantern corps #new titans #justice league #nero #i mean she probably came back no one stays dead in comics but STILL like three comics in and murdered to move the plot ahead 🙄 #batcavescolony reads comics

[redsrandomrants]

Let Me Tell You Why Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog Has Aged Badly

With the current writing strike going on I remembered how good this was and hoped this strike will produce a sequel but… man, this aged badly. When I was a teenager and I first saw it I loved it, I loved that dichotomy and harmony of My Eyes and I thought Billy was sympathetic and his fall tragic. Um yeah, that’s not the case anymore. 

Billy gives off major incel vibes. He stalks this girl, doesn’t know a thing about her, and the things he finds out he doesn’t like but lies to her and pretends he does literally to get in her pants. He scoffs at the things she's passionate about, creeps on her dates with Hammer, says the actual line “Penny doesn’t seem to care that soon the dark in me is all that will remain” as if it’s Penny’s concern what he does with his life. She doesn’t even know him; she bumped on him on the street once, he was a dismissive ass about her petition, and that’s it. They’ve had ONE conversation that lasted two minutes, and she’s supposed to care about this rude stranger? What I thought as a teen was really cool about their duet I now see as a woman living her best life and some creep trying to claim ownership of her. 

The emotional core of the story is the connection between Penny and Billy, and it’s just done very poorly. Why does he care about her? He doesn’t know her. She looks pretty and that’s it. Penny is the epitome of woman in the fridge trope, just someone who’s there for the men to fight over and dies to further a man’s development. What pushed Billy to murder is not that Hammer was treating Penny badly (he wasn’t) but that he’s gonna have sex with her and “take” what Billy wants. Forget the fact that Penny might want to sleep with the guy, what do the thoughts and feelings of the object matter, am I right. It’s not that Billy is sad Penny has feelings for Hammer and not him, no, no. It’s that she will be claimed by someone else, how dare we think it might be about Penny and what she feels.  In addition to that, the framing of Hammer is that he’s only doing the hero thing about the attention and he doesn’t really care, but does he? Sure he taunts Billy in the laundromat, but he didn’t date Penny just to spite him -- he started dating her before he knew that that they knew each other. Penny is “not his usual, but nice”, he discards the cue cards he could have easily just read from and talks about how Penny is helping him flex “the deltoids of compassion and the abs of being kind”. If we must have a story about a woman being emotional support and making a man better, why can’t it be about a guy who is already doing good for the wrong reasons and she helps him be a more fundamentally compassionate person? Why must it be about the incel who wants anarchy without even knowing what that is? “Anarchy! That I run! It's Dr. Horrible's turn!” — that’s not how that works, Billy.

The music is great, and all the actors are so charming, and I really think the third act works in isolation, but the relationships in the first and second are too toxic to build a good foundation to that. Maybe instead of Billy having a song about how he’s obsessing over a girl he’s never met, it could have been about this girl he does know and what he actually likes about her? Maybe instead of getting mad that Hammer is taking something that “he wants” he gets mad that Hammer is abusing her? Or like just any legit reason to get mad that’s about her and not his own feelings of inadequacy? Maybe instead of him lamenting that “Penny doesn’t seem to care” about a guy she doesn’t know, he laments how she seems to be falling for Hammer’s lies while he, let’s say, checks out other women on their dates? 

I know this was made in 2008 but man. It could really use a rewrite to make the core relationships a little stronger. 

#Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog #captain hammer #dr horrible #aged badly #let me tell you why #Women in Refrigerators

[thestarlightforge]

Hey guys, for anyone who’s read “Gearbreakers” (Zoe Hana Mikuta):

Do Sona or Eris die?

Just got out of Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Pt. 1 and watched Ilsa die, not knowing that would happen going in, while Benji and Luthor are once again fine. She’s been my favorite since the first of those Rebecca Ferguson was in, and I’d deluded myself into believing she was safe, selectively forgetting that part of the MI formula. (So many badass female characters, but killed off in an ever revolving cycle… So many mixed feelings about this franchise.)

For “fridging women,” for “bury your gays,” and in general/life stuff… I don’t want to get burned again right now. And I have no fear of “sunk cost.” I will stop reading if that’s where this is headed.

#lgbtqia #wlw #gearbreakers #mission impossible #mission impossible: dead reckoning #mission impossible spoilers #spoilers #spoiler #rebecca ferguson #tom cruise #tv tropes #women in refrigerators #bury your gays

[samasmith23]

Kamala Khan's death in Amazing Spider-Man (2022) #26 leaked NOT once... but TWICE in a row!!!

It looks like someone at Marvel RRREEEAAALLLYYY wants this whole publicity stunt of killing off Ms. Marvel (aka, Kamala Khan) to FAIL super hard considering that the pages for tomorrow’s Amazing Spider-Man (2022) #26 have been leaked not once, but twice now! And now we sadly know exactly just how Kamala dies…

Umm… last time I checked, Kamala has a healing factor. Sure it’s nowhere as powerful as Wolverine’s (and it does require Kamala to eat a lot in order to replenish her energy reserves), but unless that sword is powered by some kind of magic bullcrap which completely shuts off her healing factor, this makes zero sense! Kamala literally healed from a bullet wound to the stomach in her opening arc, and even survived having an entire building collapse right on top of her (just barely, but still)!

Also, it feels so random and arbitrary to have Kamala randomly use her shape-shifting powers to pose as a body-double Mary Jane, especially since she’s not utilized them a lot due her opening arc centering around Kamala becoming comfortable in her own skin after previously trying and failing to resemble her idol Carol Danvers (therefore overcoming her personal insecurities and internalized Islamophobia).

Plus, last time I checked Kamala's only since then shape-shifted into a couch, James Rhodes, and a scary cartoon face.

While it does feel somewhat in character for Kamala to risk her life to save someone she barely knows as part of her characterization as a superhero, the actual execution of it feels incredibly at odds with her past character development (whether it be struggling with her fears of death and mortality in Magnificent Ms. Marvel, or already receiving validation from her family, friends, and dozens of other superheroes, including Peter Parker, so why does she need it from him again when she dies?!).

Based on these leaked pages, I get the general impression that Zeb Wells originally fully intended to kill off Mary Jane here since all throughout his Spider-Man run he’s heavily hinted at it and foreshadowed it with that Paul guy (seriously... WHO THE HECK IS PAUL?!) and their two kids (who are apparently actual mystical constructs or something…), and that mystical supervillain wanting “the Scarlet Woman’s blood” (I know the phrase "Scarlet Woman" is specifically meant to refer to MJ’s red hair, but it is also unfortunately a derogatory slang term for a sex-worker). But maybe Marvel editorial told him to rewrite his planned death of Mary Jane at the last minute as a desperate effort to promote the upcoming The Marvels movie (which Wells shares a co-writing credit for the screenplay of), or Wells wanted to subvert reader expectations but did so in a distasteful manner?

I honestly don’t know... but if I had to guess I’d probably say it’s the former option since Marvel previously killed off Doctor Strange and the Scarlet Witch before resurrecting them a few months later to hype up their upcoming MCU films, plus the Spider-Man offices in particular are notorious for their editorial mandates and interfering with writer’s plans at the last minute (just look at how they recently forced Nick Spencer to settle on retconning Sins Past out of existence instead of One More Day like he was originally building-up towards). And do I think that Zeb Wells himself is an Islamophobic misogynist because of this? Probably not... especially considering I don’t know the guy’s personal politics (maybe he's a swell person IRL) and editorial mandates are likely at play here. I do think that killing off Kamala in such a random and distasteful manner is still a bad look and does give off those unfortunate implications. However, based on what I know I feel that this is more a case of judging the actions as bigoted (whether they were intentional or not) instead of labeling the person themselves as a bigot.

But regardless of whether or not the decision to fridge Kamala Khan is the fault of Zeb Wells, or Nick Lowe or someone else over at Marvel Editorial, I do want to make one thing perfectly clear... DO NOT... I repeat... DO NOT SEND ANY OF THEM DEATH THREATS! Like, I've already lost count of how many people I've encountered on both Twitter and Tumblr who are seriously outright calling for both Wells and Lowe's blood in response to these leaks.

And since the issue is being released tommorow, I feel the need to reiterate that harassing creators and sending them death threats is NEVER acceptable under any circumstances, and that doing so makes you no better than the kinds of supervillains that Kamala regularly fights against! We can criticize a bad story WITHOUT becoming supervillains ourselves! Follow the advice of @atopfourthwall here for heavens sake people:

Now this is hopefully going to be the last time I discuss Amazing Spider-Man (2022) #26 here on Tumblr as I have zero plans on giving any actual money to the issue myself. I may consider reading the Fallen Friend: The Death of Ms. Marvel one-shot, if only because it's being written by several of Kamala's past creators G. Willow Wilson, Saladin Ahmed, and Mark Waid, so I trust them to be able to salvage something decent out of this whole fiasco. But that's it. I do plan on releasing a future post which provides an in-depth analysis about the ways in which Ms. Marvel comics have discussed themes of death in a much more nuanced and respectful manner, but I have no idea when it will be released.

Until then folks... vote with your wallets. Please do not cave into the outrage machine and feed into the publicity stunt that this whole mess so obviously is. Don’t give tomorrow's issue of Amazing Spider-Man any more attention than it's already received. Instead go support all of Kamala's past adventures to show your love and appreciation for the character if you do not own the graphic novel collections already. And most importantly... for the love of all that is holy, DO NOT attack the creators involved with this terrible decision and especially DO NOT send them death threats!

#ms marvel #kamala khan #amazing spider man #marvel comics #spider man #peter parker #women in refrigerators #zeb wells #john romita jr #g willow wilson #saladin ahmed #mark waid #nick lowe #editorial mandates #linkara #atop the fourth wall #R.I.P. Kamala Khan #invincible iron man #brian michael bendis #james rhodes #tony stark #muneba khan #nick spencer #the marvels 2023 #mary jane parker #who the hell is paul?! #Youtube

[fandomshatewomen]

Epiphany I just had...

I'm going through the archives like I'm supposed to add tags and such and it just occurred to me that so many of the original ladies of the MCU are dead now.

I was editing this posts tags

and like Jane Foster is dead, Frigga is dead Natasha Romanov is dead, Gamorra is dead. the only original MCU lady left standing is Pepper Potts.

like don't get me wrong I know some of the men are dead (ok tony stark is dead and steve rogers is written off now too but loki has his own show gdi) but its really not the same at all.

here's some reading further reading on women in refrigerators

mod ali

#mcu fandom misogyny #fridged women #women in refrigerators #jane foster #natasha romanoff

[leviticus101st]

Spoilers for Amazing Spider-Man 26

I’d clip, but I literally don’t give a shit.

There is only one thing that can be said.

WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?! WHAT?!

WHHHHAATT?!

3 questions.

1: WHAT?!

2: WHAT THE FUCK?!

3: WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?!

I decided to log off a bit to collect my thoughts....and with that I can confidently still say "What the actual fuck?"

Let's leave aside the problematic shit for a minute and talk about the other stuff.

You kill off a character who was the main character of her own book in a completely different book. One that she was barely in. One where the events of the book have nothing to really do with her.

It's one thing for Spider-Man writers to lazily just default to 'story where Peter gets sad' or refuse to have his most iconic love interest get back with him.

It's a whole other thing to screw up an actually good character for their stupid melodrama.

"Oh but it's comics. She'll be back in a bit"

Ya don't do the sappy death shit when you're aware that another writer is going to undo it.

Man, I can't imagine that these guys even bothered asking G. Willow Wilson, Sana Amanat, Adrian Alphona, or Jamie Mckelvie for permission nor can I imagine Marvel even telling any of them about this.

Ya think about the DC Sandman stuff and how in Dark Knights Metal Scott Snyder asked Neil Gaiman for permission to have Dream show up just to provide exposition.

Can't imagine why I'm thinking about that right now.

See I actually haven't been reading the Zeb Wells Spider-Man stuff, only really memeing on stupid pages uploaded online.

The only reason I'm assuming that Kamala was chosen to be killed off was because they thought the outrage would be funny. Given the creative's behavior.

Alrighty. Time to just talk about the real shit.

You took the biggest example of a Muslim Superhero, a hero that gave representation to a group that still suffers so much discrimination to this day, and you killed her off.

A character that truly meant so much to so many people and they kill her in this piece of shit.

I want to say that this was just pure ignorance, but given the behavior exhibited by the creators, I'm not giving them that benefit.

They probably want to laugh at the people upset about this, not knowing that killing Ms Marvel, I'd say a group is right to be upset.

Although I will say this. Please, for the love of God, do  not harass, send death threats, or threats of physical violence to anyone over this.

This is a god forsaken piece of shit and we should treat it as such, but don't be a piece of shit yourself. That being said, next point

TIME FOR EVERY OLD MALE COMIC WRITER'S FAVORITE GAME SHOW!

WOMEN IN REFRIGERATORS!!!!! FILMED IN FRONT OF A LIVE STUDIO AUDIENCE!

ALL FOR A CHANCE TO WIN A NEW CONVERTIBLE, ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS WRITE A SEQUENCE OF A FEMALE CHARACTER BEING KILLED FOR NO NARRATIVE REASON OTHER THAN TO INJECT UNNEEDED PATHOS IN A DUDE'S STORY!

ZEB WELLS IS SCORING HIGH WITH THE DEATH OF BELOVED SUPER HEROINE KAMALA! WHO WE DON'T SEE ANY OF HER FRIENDS OR SUPPORTING CAST AROUND FOR HER DEATH!

INSTEAD WE SEE A DUDE SHE DIDN'T EVEN REALLY KNOW CRADLING HER BODY SADLY! THAT'S SOME GOOD MAN PAIN POINT'S!

UNFORTUNATELY, WELLS WON'T BE TAKING HOME THE WHEELS!

BECAUSE WRITERS LIKE ALAN MOORE KNEW BETTER THAN TO GIVE HIS FRIDGE TARGET THE SWEET RELEASE OF DEATH!

Seriously though, they unironically pulled the Women in Refrigerators shit and it's infuriating as hell.

But yeah, I'm sure the next big event comic that will change everything forever will bring her back, if we even have to wait that long.

Screw this shitty ass run for pulling this shit.

#spider-man #Ms Marvel #Peter Parker #kamala khan #Marvel #comics #amazing spider-man #rant #fuck this shitty run #women in refrigerators #also the art is really fucking bad

[miserableandmagical94]

The strangest thing about Satine’s fridging is not necessarily the fact it would make Obi-Wan sad, but because it's used as a counterpoint to Anakin...

So there are two levels for the Women in Refrigerators trope: Disposable Woman or Stuffed into the Fridge. Satine's death teeters into both. Her death does spur the story of Mandalore's destruction forward. Still, given that The Mandalorian is deliberately ignoring Satine's existence, I'm not even sure what the overall point of her death is outside of her proximity to Obi-Wan.

Now, where does Anakin come into this? Simply put, Obi-Wan and Satine are the foil to Anakin and Padme. That is the purpose. Obi-Wan is Anakin's foil. So, Satine shows that Obi-Wan also had that voyage of temptation (pun intended) but ultimately chose to remain in the Jedi Order. Anakin decides to marry Padme in secret.

And unfortunately, men use Satine and Padme as pawns to draw Obi-Wan and Anakin to the Dark Side. Obi-Wan does nearly let the rage consume him when Maul murders Satine. However, as he is Anakin's foil, he decides to reject it.

The thing is, though, Satine did not need to die to prove this point. We already know Obi-Wan does not surrender to the Dark Side. RotS came out in 2005, and The Lawless came out in 2013. Her death only turns Mandalore into a land of suck, which again has not been referenced at all despite her sister being the co-protagonist of The Mandalorian. Furthermore, it does not really drive Obi-Wan's story. Like in the show's context (I know some comics have mentioned it in passing), it's only really used to guilt-trip Obi-Wan into thinking of a solution to help Bo-Katan. BTS issues may have affected this, but I struggle to see a real justification within the narrative for Satine dying.

This is nothing to say about Padme's death, which... I love RotS, but they really shafted Padme in the theatrical cut, and her death only serves the purpose of explaining where Luke and Leia's mother is.

#this was a ramble #i apologise in advance #satine kryze #padme amidala #women in refrigerators #star wars