A few days ago my husband drug me into our local comic book store. There on the shelf was the comic that felt that I had waited an eternity for. Two years actually, but who’s counting? This comic was “Invincible Ironman: Ironheart” When I finally laid eyes on it, 12 year old me was doing back flips and her famed victory dance; current me got a little misty eyed, you know hormones.
Ironheart is basically the story of how a 15 year old black, female, super-genius from Chicago picked up the mantle of Ironman after the death of Tony Stark. He mentored her from beyond the grave, but the rest was pretty much her. I mean, homegirl built her own suit in her garage.
This was a story of a regular black girl who used her brains, not some mutation (no offense Storm), or random scientific mix up (my bad Spectrum) to become great. Do y’all realize how dope this is? It wasn’t some made up land with a made up people that made her great. Don’t get me wrong: I’m still #wakandaforever. But to me, Riri is slightly more obtainable then some of these other characters and she pretty much does it on her own.
Growing up, if I wanted a hero that looked like me, I had Storm. Storm is great: she’s a strong, African queen. She was also just a side kick, or a subplot, and a mutant. What that told me was that I needed special powers and a group to be great. All the other major heroes were either male or white. Even now, when I dress up as certain characters for Halloween I get asked:
“Oh, are you the black version of ____?”
No, I’m them: I just happened to be black. Now there are characters where I don’t have to be the “black” version of and we just got one more.
So I picked up the comic, I read it, it gets me in the feels with the nostalgia. She is the hero my 12 year old self was looking for. After finishing reading I hop on the ‘book and pop into my Black Nerd Group and post my excitement.
“Ironheart is a black female super genius from Chicago? Yass! If you haven’t read it you should.”
I thought I would getting some #wakandaforever love. Sadly, I did not. What I got was harsh criticism of the character an how it was written. Questions of how somehow this post nullifies all the black female heroes.
Of course I tried to squash the negativity with: “Wow the level of negativity is awesome. My bad I get excited for strong female characters that actually look like me.”
Cause they ain’t just gonna gang up on up on my girl Riri while she’s still in her infancy as a character. It just seemed to add fuel to the power and all I could think was: “This is why we as a people can’t progress.”
Why must we hate and tear down everything. We seem to live in a culture where we must tear something down to build something up. Can’t we just be happy. We fought for years for accurate and positive representation and as soon as we get it it’s not good enough. Just like I got excited when the Princess and the Frog came out. Know what I got?
“Why she gotta kiss a frog?”
“She’s not a princess in her own right.”
“Why is she the only one with a job?”
How about why can’t we be happy to have a princess that looks like us? That our little girls don’t have to run around in little blonde or red wigs. That they know they can be a princess in her own right. I mean we are in the beginning of having positive black representation in the mainstream. There are going to be an adjustment, there are going to be reworkings like was done with the well-established white characters. It’s like tearing a baby down as it learns to walk because the other babies who have been around longer are better at walking.
Have y’all ever thought if we keep showing our displeasure for these characters we aren’t going to get them anymore. We will be slated for side-kicks, subplots, made up people from a made up land. Black Spiderman? Back lash and now he’s one of many in a spider-verse verse taking over Peter Parkers spot. Black Green Lantern? Over shadowed by the Lanternverse.
At the end of the day it’s about what makes money and if we sit here and don’t support our characters, who will? Are contributing to our own lack of representation? So dear readers how about we all try to lift up instead of tearing down.
Oh and check out Ironheart.