The Correlation between Heroes and Heroines in Superhero Movies

In commercials of Super Bowl 46, the trailer clip of the new movie, The Avengers, has been opened to the public. The commercial showed that the team of superheroes from Marvle comics such as the Hulk, the Iron Man, and Captain America will rescue the world this coming May. Even though most superheroes in the movie are male characters that have muscular builds and supernatural powers, there is a female character, Black Widow, who has a sexy body and foxiness. Why are superheroes male characters and do heroines support them in most of the hero movies? The following article is dealing with this topic.

In the article “Sweetheart, This Ain’t Gender Studies”: Sexism and Superheroes, Carol A. Stabile (2009) wrote that hero movies and television series focus on male heroes who protect children and females. In addition, female characters of these shows are sub-characters and their sexuality is overemphasized. To be more specific, the author pointed out that heroes in recent movies and television shows, unlike the past, are getting the bigger diversity of characteristics while heroines show us “the constant recycling of sexist stereotypes” (p.88). Moreover, through the television show Heroes, whose main characters are “international, multiracial, multilingual casts,” the author argued that female characters of the show just support male characters or are helped by them. On the other hand, men characters represent stereotypes which prevent invasions like 9.11 and protect the fears of females and children.  

As many researchers explained, gender socialization in childhood is affected by family members, friends, and schools as well as mass media. Although family members, especially parents, might influence gender socialization of their children when they are infants and in childhood, teenagers are becoming more influenced by mass media. For example, we can easily watch media content which highlights sexism of women or masculinity of men, including television shows, movies, and commercials every day and everywhere. On the basis of other research in gender studies, the author identified gender stereotypes of mass media by using the specific example, Heroes.

On top of that, I think this article was dealing with a very interesting topic and I agree with the author’s opinion that female characters lack in hero movies and television series. From classical literature such as Greek and Roman mythologies to recent television shows, stereotypes of gods/goddesses or heroes/heroines have been fixed in our minds. In the article, the author mentioned that the cultural change might command new stereotypes of heroes and heroines in mass media content. I not only hope that but also think that maybe new media contents can lead to new cultural change as well as they reflect social situations.