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Invincible Iron Man #15 – Looking Inside The Cover (UPDATE)

There was considerable online controversy regarding what was seen as a sexualisation of a 15 year old character on the now-cancelled Midtown Comics exclusive cover by J Scott Campbell for the upcoming Invincible Iron Man #1. It also kicked off the hashtag #TeensThatLookLikeTeens.

Invincible Iron Man #15 – Looking Inside The Cover (UPDATE)

Some have asked why there was not a similar reaction to a variant cover by Jeff Dekal that will still be made available everywhere – including Midtown Comics.

imvim2015_promoThe thing is… there was a similar reaction. It just didn't get picked up.

Anyway, I decided to do what no one arguing this case has done. I managed to get access to read Invincible Iron Man #1 in which Riri Williams has taken the lead role ahead of publication. And what is also notable that – she doesn't look like that inside the comic at all.

stl023996-029

Frankly it's not her style. Her clothes are functional, chosen without care or style, let alone an attempt to appeal to anyone, as there are far more important things to deal with, like building robot armour or personal emergency response systems. And when real life does impinge, people die. So Iron Man – Iron Heart – is a coping strategy for someone with a brain bigger than this planet confronted with the mortality of flesh. And who is just fifteen.

Look, I probably knew what I was doing when I first posted the Midtown Comics cover prominently, I could see how it would come over, and what the reaction would be.

And a lot of that is down to J Scott Campbell's artwork. In "sexiness" terms it's not much further than Dekal's verson, though Campbell's pose appears to be for the reader while the hip tilt in Dekal's is more about the practicality of carrying a heavy Iron Man helmet. Dekal's version is knocked back in the shadows, Campbell's is under the spotlight.

But some is also regarding the expectation of J Scott Campbell. He has a reputation for drawing traditionally sexy, impossibly anatomical visions of women, whether Mary Jane and Black Cat on Spider-Man or on his own title Danger Girls. It's not undeserved, he has fostered those images in the past with great success and it can make that impossible to unsee when he's drawing a character like Riri.

And that's why it got picked up more than Dekal's version.

UPDATE: Marvel has supplied Bleeding Cool with the following images, depicting Riri's appearance in the comic book.

riris-att_sm ririv2_blu_2 invim2016001004_col

 


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Rich JohnstonAbout Rich Johnston

Founder of Bleeding Cool. The longest-serving digital news reporter in the world, since 1992. Author of The Flying Friar, Holed Up, The Avengefuls, Doctor Who: Room With A Deja Vu, The Many Murders Of Miss Cranbourne, Chase Variant. Lives in South-West London, works from Blacks on Dean Street, shops at Piranha Comics. Father of two. Political cartoonist.
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