Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Comics, dc, dc comics, entertainment, feminist, j scott campbell, sjw, wonder woman

J Scott Campbell And Wonder Woman's New Shoulder Pads

Legendary artist J Scott Campbell, creator of Danger Girl and co-creator of Gen-13 posted on Facebook in response to the new look Wonder Woman costume. It made quite an impact.

I rarely comment about comic book industry matters on my personal FB page, but I gotta say, shoulder pads, especially big bulky metal ones NEVER look good on women. Everything about them is unfeminine and lacks style. No grace to this approach at all.
And on a side note, I find the continued knee-jerk reaction to internet message board critics demands to keep female heroines covered from head to toe in fabric an overreaction. She's an Amazon Warrior, she's NOT in the *Taliban! unsure emoticon

With the post-backlash addition.

(*Well, apparently the Twitterverse is flipping out over my comparison of her coverage to being in the Taliban. It was a flippant and off the cuff exaggeration. Figured that was obvious, but I suppose you can't be surprised these days. Also, my issue wasn't with "women wearing armor", it was with the bulky clunky shoulder pads. Again, a detail lost over there on Twitter I guess.)

The response on J Scott Campbell's Facebook was generally positive from his followers. Here are the first responses.

Jesse Garza Pretty soon they're put a scarf over her hair.

Travis Newman They are bending to the will of Tumblr sjw and bloggers who, for the most part, don't read or buy the books or have any intention of doing so.

Jesse Garza Don't forget angry Feminists!

J Scott Campbell I'm very happy not to be drawing this. Political correctness by committee doesn't interest me.

Travis Newman I respect and support the idea of feminism but pick your battles. Nitpicking everything dilutes the message and makes for more *eye rolls* than *nodding heads*

I'm not sure exactly who was doing the nitpicking here. But J Scott had a few more observations on the matter to share.

J Scott Campbell I bet those blue areas were exposed at one point in the design process, that looks like a compromise of some kind to me.

J Scott Campbell There are tasteful and non-trashy ways to have some exposed skin without resorting to this mess. Everyone is afraid of everything these days and my god does it show!

J Scott Campbell I think that's one of the major problems that I have with this costume Ally, it seems anything BUT "practical"! How on earth is she suppose to be agile with fluid movement in this clunky and cumbersome hot mess..?! Lol!

J Scott Campbell Mainstream comics have been increasingly sad since slowly losing all of their edge these past several years. The pressures of corporate conglomerates

J Scott Campbell Btw, I like Dave Finch very much. This isn't an attack on him if he in fact designed this (I don't know, did he?) It's more of a commentary where the industry seems to be headed in general.

J Scott Campbell Again, I'm assuming this is designed by committee because it just looks like it is. It reminds me of this:

J Scott Campbell "Ugly" is about right Jennifer . I woulda been better off just leaving it at that! It's when I try to explain and rationalize my opinion that I apparently get myself into trouble

J Scott Campbell If the shoulder pads were more elegant Lindsay , closer to the form of her body, more curvaceous, I could maybe live with that. Kinda like the Elves armor in the LOTRs and Hobbit movies, that armor has a very graceful, feminine quality to it, does that make more sense…?

J Scott Campbell I'm getting more and more opinionated about this stuff the older I get and the more experience I acquire Greg . But you can't let that intimidate you. You learn by doing and observing. You can't be afraid to fail, as long as you learn from it. I look back at a lot of personal design fails, but I've learned…

J Scott Campbell And lastly, if we were talking about "true practicality" NONE of these superhero costumes would look fun at all! They'd be quite boring and colorless most likely. What's the fun in that!

J Scott Campbell This is how the angry side of the feminists are reacting to my critique of the costume on Twitter. Why exactly did my criticism of a bad costume design turn into an anti-feminist attack… Oh right… "The Internet".

J Scott Campbell And btw, this graphic only adds to my case! Looks awful!

Other creators added their own take, again, mostly supportive,

Joe Madureira Not a huge fan of the costume either, honestly. Let's see who gets cosplayed more–this one, or the classic. My money is on classic. But I'm almost more disturbed by the arm blades than the costume itself. WW never struck me as an 'armblade' character ( which makes me think of Wolverine ). She's more of a Capt. America–not to say that characters can't change/evolve but this seems like too much for me. Though to be fair, I can't say without reading the story and just seeing an image out of context. But yeah, I feel ya.

Alé Garza Yeah she's a virtual God… Do gods need armor and blades ala razor from the 90s? I think not… Like I said to some of the people saying well superman and batman aren't half naked then I say fine give her a unitard but make it work and keep it consistent w the flashes green lanterns supes and bats… Just make a good design… This looks way too much like it was like "well color her flesh areas black that'll make em happy"

ChrisCross X I agree, J Scott . It's a severe overreaction on both sides. Even with the proportions of women. Men aren't losing it over the over being drawn over striated , over muscled and always angry. And while a woman's boobies shouldn't be the size of watermelons, and fighting in bikinis and a gun… Unless you're Milo Manara..lol… There can be a feminine take on great clothing design that can accommodate the form as well as be funky and work with the scheme of the concept.

ChrisCross X Wonder Woman is supposed to be the epitome of sexy, woman, grace wisdom love and fury. None of this is shown here. Never mind what was done to Supes and Batman.

J.d. Lombardi Love that you said this J Scott and I couldn't agree more.

J.d. Lombardi Also I think the larger point here is that no matter how talented the artist may be, not everyone is a costume designer.

Stjepan Šejić so she likes diablo! XD

EL Joe Benitez I'm more of an ISIS man myself. Taliban is sooooo 2000 late

EL Joe Benitez Bring back the thongnitard from the 90s

Leinil Francis Yu Not a sex object but a war machine. Or are those blades for something else?

Leinil Francis Yu Short hair and this would be perfect.

While one retailer who managed to get IDW to take down the Mimi Yoon Powerpuff Girls cover, say,

Dennis L Barger Jr What do you know about making women sexy in comics? Oh wait your f*cking j Scott Campbell, maybe someone should listen to you then

So…. what do you think? You can read the full comments in context here, but I always liked these shoulder pads in action…

Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!

Stay up-to-date and support the site by following Bleeding Cool on Google News today!