belief in thought

THIS FOX IS LIKE, “BE A DEER AND STOP KISSING ME, PLEASE!” AND THIS DEER IS LIKE, “I CAN’T HELP MYSELF, YOU’RE SUCH A FOX!” THESE TWO! AM I RIGHT!? GET A FOREST!!!

Ann Friedman's Disapproval Matrix for handling criticism is a thing of genius, not to mention essential internet-age literacy. She explains:

Complement with Benjamin Franklin’s trick for neutralizing critics, Daniel Dennett on how to criticize with kindness, and Anne Lamott’s definitive manifesto for handling haters.

When you and your friends do something horrible as a team

Playing Doctor. Masters of Sex star Teddy Sears on suits, psyches and getting it on with Allison Janney

“Allison had never done a nude or sex scene before ours, so she was quite nervous, and I believe we connected on that level because this was all new for me, too. My wife is an actor, so she totally gets it. We don’t miss an episode of Masters of Sex and that doesn’t mean she’s entirely comfortable watching the physical stuff. But it’s OK—she just looks away.”

[more]

And aside from my issues with the story in an actual story telling sense, in that Thor is not a legacy or a title in the sense of Captain America or Hawkeye or even Iron Man and therefore, no one can be Thor but Thor, what I really dislike about this move from Marvel is that it’s in no way progressive.

They’ve rather handily come up with a gimmick that allows them to release a lot of big press about being progressive, pat themselves on the back about being progressive, without actually having to commit to being progressive in terms of their representation of women and their support of their female characters.

This replacement Thor has an expiration date.

She’s not going to be around now permanently. Thunderstrike didn’t last forever, and while he has a few devoted fans, it’s gone down as one of those Thor story arcs everyone likes to forget about. Actual Thor Odinson has been an integral part of the Marvel universe since his creation. They can’t get rid of him. 

He is going to get Mjolnir and his powers back. And when that happens, it’s goodbye replacement Thor.

She has a built in device that allows them to return to the status quo.

Along with that, they are literally taking a woman, stripping her of her identity, giving her a man’s name and a man’s powers to borrow. She has no powers of her own. 

Please explain to me how that is in any way creating a new female superhero. 

They’ve tried to insist that she’s not just a female knock off of a male superhero, but she literally has the male superhero’s name and powers that were taken from him as a punishment and given to her.

Marvel has a lot of female characters that they flat out just do not promote or ignore who are amazing in their own right, with their own powers, with their own identity.

If they were actually committed to building and rallying behind amazing women and to really represent us, they would actually market the hell out of those characters. They would have went on the View and hyped Ms. Marvel and how Kamala Khan is showing what it’s like to be a teenage Muslim girl in America while struggling with superhero identity. They would have promoted Storm’s solo book that is finally being released. They would actually have America Chavez IN A FUCKING BOOK as opposed to floating in the ether somewhere. 

They would push and push and push these female characters and put amazing creative teams behind them and actually stick with them. 

But they don’t. They cancelled female lead Journey into Mystery and Fearless Defenders, and Fearless Defenders featured a racially diverse cast with canon bisexual and lesbian characters. And while I am still hunting for the post I saw to corroborate the numbers, apparently JiM’s sales were comparable with Remender’s Captain America book. One was written by a woman starring a woman. One was written by a white guy starring a white guy. JiM’s reviews are universally better than Captain America’s. JiM was cancelled. Captain America was not. In fact, they’ve handed over even more books to Remender.

Gee.

How progressive.

i’ve just been informed there’s a metal band with a parrot for the lead singer

their name is hatebeak

ya think i’m foolin