Six-Year-Old Upset By Lack of Female Friendly Avengers Toys

[Trivea]

Honestly? I wish they would stop trying to put female characters in comic books as anything but a plot device altogether, and I'm a girl. No, it's not because "omg they get in the way of my hot boys", it's that they can't create any character without a Y chromosome and not absolutely ruin her. I mean, seriously, male superheroes are cool, but female superheroes? And supervillains, for that matter. I mean, come on, they couldn't even get a female version of their own long-lived character right.

Spoiler: Because only males can look thoroughly ridiculous.

"No, female Loki can't have that helmet! It looks stupid!"
"We had no problem making Loki look stupid in that helmet as a guy for XX years."
"No! Loki's female now! Sex appeal! More boobs, less helmet!"

I may be generalizing here, but I think a lot of the problem has to do with the fact that most comic book creators have never interacted with a girl they didn't draw. Of course, Sailor Moon was written by a woman, and look how well that turned out. But seriously, you have the female love interests (who exist to get saved), the female superheroes (who exist to get saved while wearing spandex), and Aunt May (who exists to hit the villain over the head with her purse while waiting to be saved).

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

There is no Black Widow action figure? Because I got this one as a gift last month: http://www.hottoys.com.hk/productDetail.php?productID=75

Let me check...

Yep, it's still next to the TV set.

DON'T JUDGE ME!

 

[Yuuki]

Since when was Avengers as a franchise ever aimed at females? Actually let me rephrase that, since when has ANY superhero-comic-based movie ever been aimed at females in any way??
Everyone knows why Black Widow was in the movie...it's not for her abilities (or even her role), it's because Scarlett Johansson is HOT and guys will automatically enjoy such a character as long as she's not too bitchy/useless. That's a niche which Black Widow fills in nicely, that's why she's there. What? Everyone's thinking it

Too bad this 6 year old girl isn't aware that Black Widow action figures are likely to in far higher demand from grown-up males than little girls, and there is a huge cult-like demographic of female action-figure collectors that far exceeds her tiny imagination.

Then again I don't really blame her, she's fucking 6.


Next week: Six year old girl upset by sky being blue

 

[lastjustice]

It's not as bad as transformers back in 86. Arcee was a major characters in the film and the 3rd season, and never got a toy till many years later. Usually toy lines manage to sneak in one or two girls. Like visionaries made 2 females, both water creatures, so they were pitted against each other. My sister wanted to get a spider girl toy from super hero squad for my Niece/god daughter since she had the toys from my nephew to pass down, but spider girl was only sold with a vehicle. It ended up becoming too rare and worth too much money later because of that to justify buying.

I started watching Teen titans with my niece because as a series where both genders get fairly represented for most part. I think her favorite character is probably still beast boy since he's funny, but she loves it.(her older siblings usually stop and watch when I put it on for her. It is still a really good show.) She still loves the avengers, but I wanted to expand her horizons of the geek world.It's a job for a godfather hehe..(and as an uncle for all nieces and nephews.) Offset her sports nuts father.

 

[shirkbot]

Hm. Fair point, none of the siblings I live with engage in such toys anymore, so I'm rather in the dark, but it seems to me there's no reason to not move to a general 50/50 gender split in toys. Although not in the realm of toys, Avatar (The Last Airbender), while still a childrens show, had damn near a hard 50/50 split on gender, and every kid I know seems to adore the show, seeming to imply that there's not even a loss in money either.

Kids, in general, don't really care what gender characters are as long as they are awesome.

OT: A fair point. Fairer point: Black Widow is currently the only female Avenger. Isn't the whole exercise stilted from the get-go?

 

[anian]

Maybe teach her that life is almost always unfair, but that she should strive to make the world a better place, become a CEO of a toy company and change that or become a role model for women everywhere or a comic book writer or anything freakin' else, instead of all that, her parents teach her how to make video rants and the internet promptly responds by spreading it around. YAY, PEOPLE!

 

[Vizen]

As someone who works for one of the largest toy store chains in the UK, i can confidently say the Black widow figure is extremely rare, we have been selling the merchandise now for just over a year and only recently have we received the figured linked on Amazon and in limited quantity,

Hawkeye (who also isn't on the majority of the merchandising) has been in stock fairly consistently (about the same as Loki) along with his bow.

Also she isn't available in the larger figure series which is objectively better and only reserved for Ironman, The Hulk, Thor and Captain America.

Girls tastes are changing the majority hate Barbie these days. We sell way more Monster High in comparison and both boys and girls have been requesting the figure in question to complete there avengers sets.

 

[shirkbot]

If anyone should be pissed about inequality in toys it's the giant green rage monsters.

Why do you think he hasn't turned back into Banner?

This made me chuckle, so I shall re-post it for all. Thank you.

Ah, yes, Joss Whedon lamenting the poor, downtrodden women.
Joss Whedon can bite me for his fucking crocodile tears for women.

It's the public's fault for taking him and raising him up as some sort of supa feminist icon.

He's very good at writing team dynamics, but otherwise he's nothing particularly special.

Companies like to stereotype. But they like to make money more.

Companies like to play conservative and are not always welcoming of new ideas. The fact that developers need to fight to just to get female focus group reps should indicate something's wrong here.

Companies will almost always use old ideas until they make negative money before attempting new ideas. It's part of the reason the U.S. has such absurd copyright laws: Companies just want to use the same properties and ideas forever. If you want something new you basically have to have a new company do it or legally end their ability to do what they've been doing.

 

[Scarim Coral]

Awh, sound like she should start a petition/ kickstarter to make Black Widow into a proper toy.

Still this isn't the first time that companies think action figure should be male characters figure only (I looking at you Mattel Avatar: The Last Airbender toys)!

 

[Pinky's Brain]

They should just roll Pym and Janette into one character and add Wasp as a female power house to the line up (scarlet witch might be important in avenger's 2, but her power set doesn't really promise a prominent role in fights).

 

[Hosker]

So a toy is only female friendly if it's of a female? What's wrong with the male toys?

 

[Paradoxrifts]

Oh, would you just look at that. Isn't that just the gosh-darned cutest thing whenever an adult teaches their children to regurgitate a political agenda on command, and then posts a video of it on the internet?

 

[RJ 17]

To be fair, I do get where you're coming from, but my comparison was really on a general level. Vegeta was a bad guy that turns good, just like Hawkeye. Granted, Hawkeye was a good guy before he became a bad guy that became a good guy again, still, that's what my comparison was based on.

Beyond that, Hawkeye was far more useful than Tien and/or Yamacha could ever hope to be.

Let's be honest. Pretty much every DBZ character that wasn't Goku or Gohan (and even Goku, technically. See the head-injury incident) is someone who was bad and then turned good.

In the words of Piccolo from DBZ Kai Abridged: "Nobody watched Dragon Ball."

 

[Baron von Blitztank]

Wait, Black Widow was in the Avengers?
I was too busy focusing on Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, The Hulk and Nick Fury to notice.

 

[Lieju]

I remember growing up, I would avoid the girl's toy section at all costs. All that pink couldn't be healthy for a boy, right?

I avoided that section too...and it was supposed to be FOR me. Honestly it IS kinda sad. I used to collect power rangers, transformers and have them ride my little ponies. I was all inclusive baby.

Some variance of colour wouldn't go amiss, and the idea that 'girls are attracted to pink or pastel' is only as ingrained as society believes that 'that's the way it is'.

Girls are attracted to all sorts of colours, it's just that pink has been delegated to girls and boys are made to feel as though they must avoid it (for some *cough* asinine reason)...

Waste of a good colour. And honestly I'm not it's biggest fan either but... still.

Ah, yes. I still HATE pink, because as a little girl I was told that I like it.
When I told people that I like blue, I was told 'No you don't'.

Because the kindergarten teachers knew apparently better what I liked than I did.
Luckily my mom let me have blue clothes.

I always got Barbies and toys like that as birthday -presents, even after I told people I didn't want them.
I specifically asked for 'monster-toys' when I was 7, and I got this super-cute dinosaur-thing from my friend.
And this comment from her father :"My daughter told me you wanted monster-toys, but I didn't believe her. She insisted, and eventually we found this dinosaur that suitable for a girl."

At that moment I realized gender-roles were shit.

So a toy is only female friendly if it's of a female? What's wrong with the male toys?

What's wrong with female toys? Why can't boys play with female characters?
The issue is not that a girl can't play with a male superhero-toy, it's that female superheroes are underrepresented.

As a little girl I played with both male and female toys, but my most badass characters (A tyrannosaurus and a dragon that were only women because I decided so)were female, because I guess I identified with them the most.
Also since there were less cool female characters, I suppose I had to make up for it by creating my own.

Also I decided Leonardo from Teenage mutant ninja turtles was a girl.

 

[an annoyed writer]

I actually agree in part with the kid, for one reason: see my avatar? It's of Quorra, from Tron Legacy, as portrayed by Olivia Wilde. Now during the release of Tron Legacy, they made a bunch of figures of the characters, her included. Unfortunately, there is only one figure in the entire line that portrays her, and it commits a rather grievous crime: it does not portray her face. The figure is only available with a helmeted head, and because of that people have had to kit-bash figures to give her a proper face, with various degrees of success.

Why doe that piss me off? Well, anyone that has seen Tron Legacy knows that Quorra is considered one of the lead characters. The other leads got Helmeted and helmetless sculpts, while she is the only lead character produced without a proper face sculpt, even though she spends the majority of the film helmetless. Why? probably because marketing.

 

[BarelyAudible]

I actually agree in part with the kid, for one reason: see my avatar? It's of Quorra, from Tron Legacy, as portrayed by Olivia Wilde. Now during the release of Tron Legacy, they made a bunch of figures of the characters, her included. Unfortunately, there is only one figure in the entire line that portrays her, and it commits a rather grievous crime: it does not portray her face. The figure is only available with a helmeted head, and because of that people have had to kit-bash figures to give her a proper face, with various degrees of success.

Why doe that piss me off? Well, anyone that has seen Tron Legacy knows that Quorra is considered one of the lead characters. The other leads got Helmeted and helmetless sculpts, while she is the only lead character produced without a proper face sculpt, even though she spends the majority of the film helmetless. Why? probably because marketing.

To be fair: Maybe they didn't get the actress' approval for the face sculpt, or they didn't want to deal with the approval process. Christian Bale's "John Connor" figure is covered up with goggles and a face mask.

Still bull though.

Action figures are the toys that let kids play with their favorite characters, and it sucks that girls (and some of the characters they like) get shafted.

There is a Black Widow toys, but its in short supply.

Batman and Bane get dozens of cheaper figures, but Catwoman is limited to the adult collections, pricing her out of what parents would pay for a little kid.

Female Yellow/Blue Rangers are hard to find, and Pink is even rarer.

And yes, I'm still sore Sari Sumdac never got a figure.

 

[Lightknight]

Aww, that's sad, the parents don't let their kids browse amazon.

http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Select-Exclusive-Action-Figure/dp/B005OZOF52

That's the first action figure I found with a very basic google search.

Now, what wouldn't be fair would be to force stores with limited shelf space to carry a product that is less popular than any of the other products that could fit in that space. Capitalism, yo.

Regarding the pink ranger comment, amazon to the rescue! http://www.amazon.com/Power-Ranger-Samurai-Action-Figure/dp/B004H0MBPQ

This whole thread could have stopped at: "Six-year-old upset"

 

[BoogieManFL]

Aside from the toy issues, as characters one of the main things I like about Hawkeye and Black Window is their ability to reasonably hold their own despite more or less being regular people. They just have to compensate for the lack of powers with a lot of skill and teamwork.

 

[BarelyAudible]

Aww, that's sad, the parents don't let their kids browse amazon.

http://www.amazon.com/Marvel-Select-Exclusive-Action-Figure/dp/B005OZOF52

That's the first action figure I found with a very basic google search.

Now, what wouldn't be fair would be to force stores with limited shelf space to carry a product that is less popular than any of the other products that could fit in that space. Capitalism, yo.

Regarding the pink ranger comment, amazon to the rescue! http://www.amazon.com/Power-Ranger-Samurai-Action-Figure/dp/B004H0MBPQ

This whole thread could have stopped at: "Six-year-old upset"

Thank for proving my point twice over. Did you look at the prices? Its bad enough that women are in short supply on the shelves, but you have to deal with the secondary market and their mark-ups!


Capta: comfort zone

Maybe if marketers got out of their comfort zone, we wouldn't have to deal with that.