Artists Target Comic Sexism By Tarting Up A Male Icon
In the poster for The Avengers, inescapable this past spring, Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow was the only superhero whose assets were displayed as perhaps they would be on the poster for a porno parody version of the movie. Everyone else got to look like ass-kicking saviors ready for battle; she looked like Cirque Du Soleil: After Hours. The poster was sent up in a widely Reddit-circulated image of all the Avengers posed in a likewise fashion, ridiculing this disparity. Now a new project called The Hawkeye Initiative is drawing even more attention to it… with drawings.
During The Avengers, Jeremy Renner’s arrow-happy Hawkeye spends some screen time topless, showing way more skin than Black Widow ever does, and yet the poster doesn’t represent as much. When the two shared a comic book cover in 2011, their poses provided a similar contrast. Now, graphic artists Blue and Ginger Haze have apparently decided that perhaps Hawkeye should be the one striking sultry poses. The two got the ball rolling with a call for other artists to re-envision Hawkeye in the ass-hugging outfits and stripper twirls of not just Black Widow, but all of the comic book universe’s so-called “Strong Female Characters.” If the resulting images look a little ridiculous on Hawkeye, well, perhaps they’re a little ridiculous on them too.
Look through some of the best side-by-side comparison images from The Hawkeye Initiative in the slide show above.
