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Female characters in comics are too often defined by the men around them – and even DC’s newest version of Shazam agrees it’s hurting her life.
Warning: contains spoilers for The New Champion Of Shazam #1!
DC’s new Shazam hero is super-strong, but even she can be a victim of entrenched problems with female representation in superhero stories (even while she points out how writers fall into a trap when it comes to writing female superheroes). The superhero is one of the more powerful characters in the DC universe, able to fly, use super-strength, and launch bolts of lightning from their hands. But in The New Champion of Shazam #1, Mary Marvel becomes Shazam, but her strength isn’t enough to avoid being a female character defined by her relationships with other men.
Shazam has one of the more convoluted histories in the DC Universe – especially thanks to his ever-changing name. Originally called Captain Marvel, Fawcett Comics ran afoul of Timely’s own Captain Marvel. When sold to DC, Fawcett’s Captain Marvel would become Captain Thunder, then Captain Marvel again before settling on Shazam (which is also the word used to transform into his superhero alter-ego) in 2011 as a part of the New 52. But Shazam is not merely one hero, but six; Billy Batson can share his power with his adoptive family, and Mary Marvel is easily a standout character out of the original six.
In The New Champion of Shazam #1, written by Josie Campbell with art by Evan “Doc” Shaner, Mary Marvel is old enough to finally attend college with a desire to independently define herself. According to Mary, “How do you define a person? See, for all my life, the way people have defined me has always been in relation to others.” She’s been defined by her relationships to her birth parents, her foster parents (one of several, as she was in the foster system for awhile), to Billy and her brothers and sisters, and even to her own Shazam superhero identity. Now, she simply wants to define herself as Mary, college student.
Mary has pointed out precisely how female characters are defined by their male writers, especially in comic books. They are most often defined by their relationships to the (usually male) hero and other characters. Supporting female characters like Gwen Stacy, Lois Lane, and other Golden and Silver Age of Comics’ love interests didn’t obtain independent characterization until much later in their comic runs, and even then their lives revolved around the main hero of the book. Mary Marvel, despite being a hero herself, is not immune to the stigma.
Thankfully, the trend has reversed somewhat – but even in this issue, Mary is still granted powers thanks to Billy and a magical rabbit, both of whom are male. Furthermore, she is asked to become Shazam’s new champion by the rabbit instead of choosing to become a hero herself. While this robs her of some agency, Mary Marvel as the new Shazam is far from a victim – both in-universe and in the larger scope of DC Comics.
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