yanbasque:

chifuyu:

Hello boys and girls, followers, tumblr friends,

I am currently doing a little survey and I could really use your help. It is actually nothing complicated, let alone diffcult. I just need a bit of infomration regarding your opinion about the new BATGIRL series, starring Barbara Gordon as Batgirl, written by Gail Simone, with art from Ardian Syaf. Just a few simple questions that I would like you to answer:

1. What is your opinion on Babs getting out of the chair and back into her role as Batgirl in general?

2. Up until now, do you like the new series? Do you dislike it? Why and why not?

3. Do you think that her new portrayal differs drastically from her former characterisation?

4. Are you satisfied with the explanation on how she can walk again given so far?

5. If not, what would you change? How would you like to have it explained?

6. Do you buy the series monthly, or have you only read one of the first few issues? 

7. Do you consider dropping it, or continuing to read it?

And last but not least:

8. Do you think being Batgirl again, and being de-aged, is a step back in her development as a character? 

(Thanks to those who are so nice doing this. Feel free to write as much as you want, share your opinions. I am interested in them)

MY ANSWERS:

1. I was very vocal about my opposition to Barbara Gordon being Batgirl again in the New 52. I’ve written about it extensively on my blog and elsewhere, so I won’t rehash all of it now. But I’ve felt from the moment it was first announced that it was wrong. For several reasons: erasing years of character development; getting rid of pretty much the only prominent and successful disabled character in the DCU; Barbara Gordon goes from being a self-made hero with years of experience who formed and led her own team (BOP) to being a “girl” again; not to mention that it kicks Stephanie Brown out of the role (and out of comics entirely, apparently).

2. I hate the new series. When it was first announced, I was determined to avoid it altogether. Didn’t want to support that decision at all. But Gail Simone kept saying in interviews and on her Twitter that there was more to it than we knew and that readers should give it a chance. So I did. I bought the first five issues and found absolutely nothing that was contrary to what I was expecting at first. It’s pretty simple, really. There used to be Oracle. Now there isn’t. The story of a character with PTSD and survivor’s guilt might be an interesting one that is worth telling, as Gail Simone keeps saying to justify why she’s writing the series, but I haven’t found anything in that story that makes up for the tremendous loss of Oracle. Besides, those stories about PTSD and survivor guilt could have been told about any character. It could’ve been Stephanie Brown. It could have been any other super-hero. You didn’t have to take Barbara out of the chair to tell that story.

In itself, the New 52 Batgirl is not a bad series. But I can’t get over my strong objections to what they’ve done to the character and what we’ve lost (with Oracle and Stephanie Brown Batgirl now being out of continuity), so I feel that for me to keep reading it, it would have to be absolutely amazing. It needs to blow my mind with awesomeness, and sadly it doesn’t even come close to doing that. It’s average at best. And in this case, average doesn’t cut it.

I took it off my pull list after issue 5.

3. No. Her new portrayal is not that different. She’s still Barbara Gordon. But she’s a Barbara Gordon with a different history. She’s younger, less experienced, and she’s never been Oracle. That makes her a less interesting character, to me.

4/5. I don’t care about the explanation for how she can walk. I have never understood why readers are so fixated on that. To me, that’s entirely besides the point. Magical cure vs. science cure, long and difficult recoverry vs. overnight “fix”, it doesn’t matter. It all comes down to the same thing. There used to be Oracle, now there isn’t.

Think of it this way. With Oracle, we had a character who was disabled AND a hero. Now, what we have is a character who used to be a hero, became disabled and was no longer a hero, then recovered from her disability and became a hero again. See the problem? In the old continuity, Oracle showed that being disabled didn’t make you worthless. You could still fight and live your life and do good. In the new continuity the message is that Barbara couldn’t do any of those things while she was disabled. She had to be cured first, so that now she can be a hero again.

It really blows my mind that Gail Simone seems oblivious to that very simple difference. She’s focused so much on the disability and insisted that it would still be in continuity and that her time in the chair wouldn’t be erased. That’s fine. But the point of Oracle wasn’t that she was a character in a wheelchair. The point was that she was a HERO in a wheelchair. If you take away the hero part, that misses the whole point. In fact, it makes it worse, in my opinion. I would have preferred if Killing Joke had been wiped out of continuity entirely, to be honest.

6/7. I bought and read issues 1 to 5. I think five issues is more than a fair chance, considering I didn’t really enjoy any of it. I will not be buying or reading future issues.

8. Yes! Obviously. How could it be anything other than a step back?! It’s the very definition of a step back.

I hope the above was helpful. Sorry if the tone is harsh or emotional. I’m still very passionate and angry about it. I consider it the worst decision DC editorial has made in years. I don’t know if I’ll ever get over it. It’s affected me so much that I’m not even sure I’ll be able to read any of Gail Simone’s other work anymore, despite the fact that she used to be one of my favourite writers.