A Hero I Can Believe In

February 23, 2018 by Editor-in-Chief in , Arts & Culture

By Anonymous

Content warning: description of depressive episode

Spoiler alert: you should probably watch Black Panther before reading this.

I wasn’t prepared for Black Panther. It gave me something new to believe in.

This is not an origin story, and it’s not a typical superhero story. The Black Panther isn’t tasked with saving the world. The film is full of difficult questions and is unapologetically black. Ryan Coogler shows off blackness in all its complexity—as a diaspora.

Kamala Khan: The Ms.-Ing Piece of the Marvel Universe

October 31, 2017 by Editor-in-Chief in Identity, Arts & Culture

By Padya Paramita

Content warning: mention of Nazis

On the day after the 2016 US presidential elections, a queer international student of color found herself at a comic book store face-to-face with a superhero she had never seen before. In encountering Kamala Khan—known by her superhero alias, Ms. Marvel—I discovered a girl much like myself: brown, Muslim, fighting demons, trying to find a balance between Americanization and her South Asian roots.

Falling (Back) in Love with Peter Parker

September 27, 2017 by Editor-in-Chief in Arts & Culture

By Samantha English and Olivia Funderburg

Content warning: implication of anxiety and claustrophobia

Disclaimer: If you haven’t seen Spider-Man: Homecoming or Captain America: Civil War, read with caution.

The original Spider-Man was created in 1962 by Stan Lee, who had noticed a rise in teen comic book readers and a lack of teen comic book characters. Most Marvel characters were adults at the time—take, for instance, Iron Man and Captain America, who both have origin stories linked to war even if their comics were written with a young audience in mind. Lee wanted a teen character that young people could identify with. He created Peter Parker, a fifteen-year-old New Yorker who loved science, was the victim of high school bullying, and, because of a radioactive spider-bite, spent his after-school hours protecting people on the streets of Queens in a mask and spandex.

When Marvel decided to incorporate the character of Spider-Man into the complex, multi-character, multimillion-dollar Cinematic Universe, the company finally took Peter Parker back to his roots