You have to decide if it's worth getting burned.

Day 10 of Knollej’s Pride Art Challenge: The Question (Renee Montoya)

Full context for the nosy

"Unnecessary superpowers"

"Origin tied to a joker event"

"We have Tim Drake at home"

"Dukes powers don't help him solve mysteries, don't make for interesting fights, and are actually a detriment to act attempt at at stealthing"

"There really isn't a Duke story you couldn't have told using Tim"

"Speaking of representation, if that's so important--"

Alright, Mr. @lucas-deziderio, let me stop you right there.

It is beyond cool for you to not be into a character. If Duke Thomas doesn’t hit for you, fine. If you want to love Superboy Prime, go live your truth. Nobody is forcing you to care about Duke.

But you are not just saying “Duke isn’t for me.” You are making things up about a character you clearly do not understand so you can dress up your disinterest as objective criticism.

“Unnecessary superpowers” is already a wild place to start, because Duke’s powers are extremely useful for both detective work and stealth. Light manipulation, invisibility/camouflage, enhanced perception, and psychometry are not random useless add-ons. They are literally investigative and tactical abilities. Saying they “don’t help him solve mysteries” or “don’t make for interesting fights” does not tell me anything about Duke. It tells me you don’t know what his powers are.

Then we get to “Tim Drake at home,” which is just lazy.

Duke is not “smart funny Gotham boy sidekick.” Duke’s entire arc is about being a kid from Gotham proper (Which Tim is not) who lived through the city’s failures, organized with other disenfranchised youth, challenged the idea that Batman’s system was enough, and became a hero from the margins instead of from inside the Wayne Manor machine.

That is not Tim Drake’s story.

Tim comes from a completely different social position, a completely different origin, and a completely different relationship to Batman and Gotham. Tim is not the character whose story is about championing the people Gotham leaves behind. Tim is not the character whose heroism is rooted in collective action with neglected kids on the street. Tim is not the character whose existence critiques the limits of Batman’s approach from the perspective of someone Batman’s world repeatedly failed.

So no, there really are Duke stories you could not just tell with Tim. The fact that they both have brains and jokes does not make them interchangeable. That is not analysis. That is skimming a wiki and deciding you found the whole character.

And speaking of representation, “just make other Bat-family members Black” is not the sage answer you seem to think it is. Black lego (LEGO!) Batgirls and a truly mediocre-to-bad Black Tim Drake adaptation in a bad-to-unbearable Titans show, are not the same thing as having a Black character whose story, community, politics, and position in Gotham actually inform who he is.

Duke being Black is not a palette swap. It matters to the shape of his story. It matters that his arc is about Gotham’s neglected kids, civic failure, survival, organizing, and being failed by the very heroic infrastructure that supposedly exists to protect people like him.

So when you flatten all of that into “boring,” then turn around and say representation can just be solved by making somebody else Black in an adaptation, yes, that reads a certain way. And the way it reads is not flattering.

You can dislike Duke. That is your prerogative.

But “I personally don’t care about this character” is not the same thing as “this character has no purpose.” And if your argument requires ignoring his actual powers, ignoring his actual arc, ignoring his actual social context, and pretending Tim Drake can be dropped into his place with no meaningful loss, then your argument is not based in the reality of the fiction.

It is based in your lack of desire to engage with experiences that were not catered toward you.

And just to avoid misunderstanding: when your response to a Black character being defended is “well, if representation matters so much, just make other characters Black,” while also dismissing the actual Black character as boring, replaceable, unnecessary, and not worth understanding?

That is not good-faith criticism.

That is you telling on yourself.

So yes. You can like Superboy Prime. You can dislike Duke. You can think Prime is more interesting. Have fun.

But do not pretend this was some thoughtful literary argument when it was really just you adding your two centavos to a conversation you did not bother to understand.

Calling Superboy Prime lame was not an attack on you.

This is.

This post is an attack on you.

This post is me calling you racist and intellectually dishonest.

I recommend all comic fans to read this 2014 article by Janelle Asselin about the oversexualization of women in regards to a cover of DC's Teen Titans (2014) #1 drawn by Kenneth Rocafort. I use the word women here but the subjects of the cover in question are girls, they are underaged teenagers. Janelle Asselin is known for her work as an editor on Batman, Birds of Prey v2, Gotham City Sirens and Red Robin, as well as creation of the "Hire This Woman" initiative as a writer for ComicsAlliance, spotlighting up-and-coming comics creatives.

The backlash to this article was so severe that Asselin received rape threats, death threats, called slurs, and received misogyny sentiment so vitriolic that the almost 2 decade long running CBR forums had to be shut down, wiped clean of all history, and rebooted.

The article itself is... not particularly intense. It's a straightforward critique, and Asselin goes for a meaningful but pointed tone while making her point in a factual way, perhaps because she could predict what the response would be. She says is that DC needs to take a second look at their demographic and maybe, just maybe, don't sexualize teenagers! She even praises Rocafort for his art.

Former Teen Titans artist Brett Booth accused Asselin for having a hidden agenda behind her criticism as she had left DC, and calling her out for being "sexist to men."

Janelle Asselin later worked as an editor for Rosy Press, which published "Fresh Romance," an anthology of romance comics. She later left the comics industry as a whole in 2016, the same year she came out as a lesbian. In 2017, she explained in an interview the reason she'd left DC in 2011, after she, along with many other women, reported editor Eddie Berganza for sexual harassment and sexual assault (making multiple unwanted advances like kissing), and no significant action was taken until 2017 when Buzzfeed made these allegations public and Berganza was fired.

Rocafort was later a part of the alt-right Comicsgate movement. Brett Booth has a long running history of discriminatory comments but continues to work as a comic artist, notably on several X-Men comics in recent years.

My main motivation for writing this post is for people to understand that misogyny in the superhero fandom is not in our rearview mirror. It is present and prevalent to this day in artwork, writing, as well as the comic industry and culture as a whole.

Links for further reading:

Janelle Asselin's website

Let's Talk About How Some Men Talk to Women In Comics by Janelle Asselin (archived Tumblr post where Asselin discusses firsthand the backlash she received)

Fake Geek Guys: A Message to Men About Sexual Harassment by Andy Khouri (documenting the misogynistic backlash Asselin faced over her article)

The Comics Giant Behind Wonder Woman Is Accused Of Promoting An Editor After Women Accused Him Of Sexual Harassment by Jessica Testa, Tyler Kingkade, Jay Edidin (this is the 2017 article only after which DC fired Berganza)