When Marvel makes the stakes #tooreal

Or why I loved She-Hulk until I didn't. (SPOILERS)

The all-too-real stakes in She-Hulk (SPOILERS)

The very first week of the COVID 19 lockdown, the s.o. and I decided to do a Marvel Movie Marathon. (Or, I decided and the s.o. was totally fine with it.) We proceeded to watch all 23 movies in order that had been released by March 2020 in a row. We didn’t watch every single night, but we did finish all of these Phase 1 movies within 30 days or so.

Since then Marvel has brought new movies, and they’ve brought short-arc TV series to Disney+, and we have continued to keep up with every one. Honestly, I look at this oeuvre similarly to how I look at the Lord of the Rings oeuvre or the Star Wars oeuvre. It’s like the cliches about pizza and sex. Even when they’re not great, they’re pretty great. (I think it’s relevant to note that it’s mostly guys who use that cliche when it comes to sex.)

I avoid entertainment that seems based on real-world violence, but comic book violence has always been easier for me to take. (Although, seriously, aren’t there people living and working in those skyscrapers the Marvel heroes take down in the Battle of New York?) I do not watch Law & Order SVU or, say, a mini-series about Jeffrey Dahmer, because ew, David. But bring on epic space battles.

Lots of the Marvel movies and shows do have thinly-veiled metaphors that evoke current events. For example, while Ted Lasso was the soothing, restore-my-faith-in-humanity balm my soul needed in the first year of the lockdown, WandaVision was the catharsis my soul needed, a meditation on grief and how it changes us.

These movies and shows address other important topics too…climate change, the risks of AI, xenophobia, Islamophobia, other phobias, toxic masculinity and toxic capitalism, and always, always family dynamics.

Then there are the lighter franchises…Thor being an example of a Marvel superhero whose movies tend to have more humor.

And the latest Marvel TV series, She-Hulk, seemed cut from similar cloth. Even more so, with its fourth-wall-breaking, meta-commentary on the fact that it was a TV show to begin with.

It also felt nicely low-stakes. One primary character was villain turned self-help guru the Abomination, and the only consistent villainess we’ve gotten a peek into is an Influencer with some shady business practices. It was LA Law if Harry Hamlin was a 6’7” green lady. It wasn’t world-changing, it almost felt like it could be an episodic good time for seasons to come, giving us a peek into the travails and foibles of superheroes…they’re just like us!

Interspersed throughout was knowing commentary about what it’s like to be a woman in the world of comics, and in the world in general. In the very first episode, as protagonist Jen Walters is learning about being a Hulk from her cousin the OG Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) she says this:

"Well, here's the thing, Bruce, I'm great at controlling my anger, I do it all the time. When I'm catcalled in the street, when incompetent men explain my own area of expertise to me. I do it pretty much every day, because if I don't, I'll get called 'emotional' or 'difficult', or might just literally get murdered. So I'm an expert at controlling my anger because I do it infinitely more than you!"

Women everywhere said, “OMG, yes!” And as the series went on, there were other little bones tossed to us by the women show runner, writers, and directors. Scenes that showed Jen having a healthy sex drive, and experiencing the pitfalls of dating in a totally relatable, non-super-hero way. Scenes of Jen feeling patronized, but being so badass it hardly mattered. I felt like She-Hulk saw me, saw women fans, and dared some of the more obnoxious male fans to say the quiet parts out loud when it comes to misogyny…and then shushed them.

But in the last two episodes before season finale coming this week, I began to feel let down, and as the penultimate episode of the season ended, I thought, “I hated that.”

The downhill feeling started during Episode 7, when Jen spends some unplanned time at a retreat center run by Emile Blonsky, aka The Abomination. Somehow this incredibly smart, self-aware woman only needed a bunch of misfit men to help her come to realizations that seemed pretty obvious, really. And this savvy woman also didn’t blink an eye when one of those misfit men turned out to be a dude who attacked her a few episodes earlier. OK, maybe you buy he’s reformed, but wouldn’t you still want to know who sent him???

Then in Episode 8, just when it looks to be wrapping up, the show starts its, at this point trademark, meta commentary on how there’s still time in the episode, so something must be coming, some twist, some higher stakes.

And sure enough, those higher stakes come. It starts with just everyday humiliation. Jen thinks she’s won a Female Lawyer of the Year Award, but turns out they’ve given the award to, like, every female lawyer they could find. And then the fatuous male emcee asks these women what it’s like to be a “female lawyer." Ugh, right?

The ughs had just gotten started, because the end of the episode turns into an epic, slut-shaming, revenge p0rn onslaught that makes Jen lose the self-control she touted in Episode 1.

See, the high stakes were personal. The high stakes were about trying to take down a woman for daring to be great, smart, powerful, sexual.

I felt a little sick to my stomach. Because this is that real-world shit women go through on the regular. This isn’t comic book violence, this is the soul killing risk any woman who dares to be too prominent, especially on the Internet, faces.

I mean, yeah, I get it. I get that it’s a real thing. And that it’s real bad, and that they’re showing us that. But there’s also something torture-p0rny about it. We are to understand this humiliation of Jen Walters is bad, but we are still watching the humiliation.

This is the stuff that turned me off of being a die-hard Game of Thrones fan. Sure, lots of powerful women with agency. But they pay a very high price for that power, and are brought down in the most heinous ways. No, thanks.

Of course I’m going to watch the She-Hulk season finale. And I’m going to hope we’re left with hope. Hope for a second season. Hope that she will get appropriate revenge on the people who violated her.

Hope we can get back to her kicking ass, taking names, solving the superhero legal case of the week, and not have a show that is clearly by and for and about women feels like they need to show women just how bad it can get for us. Trust, we know.

Have you been watching She-Hulk? What do you think?

As always, I’d love if you left a comment and let me know your thoughts on all of the above. This is basically my blog now! I’d appreciate a share of this newsletter or my podcast. And check out my LinkedIn Learning Course, Telling Stories That Stick, a 57-minute course on crafting your stories for different audiences (media, investors, prospects, hiring managers) and making sure those stories stick…and convey exactly what you hope to convey.