Mary-Sue Incarnate - Silk

Oh god, I've been wanting to talk about this for a while, there's writing a female character to help reinforce that there are women in the comic book industry. And then their's creating a character with abilities that's greater than your main title's incarnation.

This is Cindy Moon. Her alter ego is Silk. She was created by the current writers of the Spider-Man series, Dan Slott and Humberto Ramos. She's introduced as a girl that was bite by the same radioactive spider as Peter Parker (aka. Spider-Man). After her powers developed she didn't have much control until she was trained by Ezekiel Sims for a couple of years till he chose to hide her within a bunker to keep her safe from a vampire villain named Morlun. She was then recently released by Spider-Man and has taken on the identity Silk.

Now that the backstory is out of the way, I can get to my opinion of her. When I first saw her, I was a little hesitant since she started out with skills that were greater than pater than Peter's.  With a stronger spider sense, the ability to produce organic webbing from her finger tips, and faster agility, she was a little over-powered without any balance to her stats. A little extra push was that the spider that bit them gave them this thing that lets them feel their pheromones, which cause them to want to fuck like rabbits. The way it was handles felt like this character was forced down our throats without any pacing or breathing room to embrace her presence. But her annoyance was minor and first and it didn't have much impact on anything...yet.

Once the Spider-verse arc (an arc where all the Spiders from different times, universe, and creations are brought together to survive from the Morlun) was brought to light that's when her personality or what was given at the beginning was thrown out the window. She starts with breaking into Peter's place and can't stop talking about either replacing him or wanting to fuck each part of his body. The character feels different from what was originally given. She goes from wanting to find her family after realizing that they left to wanting to focus on Peter's earlobes and replace him despite him doing this longer. She still keeps trying to fuck even after meeting the other spiders. Her dialogue changes from a serious character who experienced a loss of 13 years of her life to a simpleminded teenager making horny and juvenile responses. Despite having greater skills than Peter, she only got by with dumb luck and finding the radiation that could kill the Morluns, did I forget to mention that her webbing can INSULATE HER FROM THE RADIATION! It's another bs power that she didn't need. It gives you no fear if the character will be harmed in the end or makes it less interesting in how she would take out foes. It should also be worth noting that with Dennis Hopeless writing her in the new ongoing Spider-Woman just makes her lines cringe worthy and her behavior childish and stupid. This wasn't what I thought how the character was going to turn out.

I know people are saying that having an asian woman super hero will make it more appealing to woman but it's just a sad result of bad characterization and not enough pacing to make her personality really fleshed out. This is what I was worried about when characters like this are introduced into the comic book industry. It doesn't matter that there is no consistent to her personality and overpowered skills to others. As long as she meets the status quo of being female, not caucasian (asian), and having powers where she can take care of herself (Sadly this could apply with most characters in comics today.) Tumblr sure will be happy to have their little sue is making comic equal not even glancing at why she would be off putting to people other than (OMG THEY HATE MY SOCIAL CORRECT CHARACTER BECAUSE SHE FEMALE IN MALE DOMINATED FIELD.)

I actually feel that Spider-Gwen is better represented than Silk since she actually has a original story and balance powers without needing to prove herself better than the original. (Plus her outfit design is awesome.)




With one saving grace to her is that she's gotten her own ongoing solo series that's being written by Robbie Thompson and illustrated by Stacey Lee. I've read the first story and to my surprise, I actually had fun with her character's portrayal and interactions. Compared to how she was written before, she's finding it hard to cope with her powers since they're a little unbalanced since last arc. She's concerned with her family, she's not use to super hero life and doesn't know how to deal with life outside her bunker. She's described that she' not that sociable and that life feels foreign to her after 13 years. She even has regret on how her life was like with her family in the past. This clear personality is what I wanted in her character for a while now. The comic has humor and actual treats the same sex as a joking side section rather than trying to make a point central. The art style is more playful and fun while fitting in with the tone of the genre. It's a big step up compared to how she was originally written. I hope Thompson continues with his work and resolves my issues with her.









Wow this is a long post. Just wanted to get this off my chest and have a little hope that people can create a character while having balance and a clear personality.

 

Better Version

Oh god kill me.