I have made no secret of just how much I was looking forward to reading DC’s Future Quest, the comic where Team Quest meets the rest of the Hanna-Barbera animation action heroes that I grew up watching. I called it “the comic I’ve wanted to read since I was 10” (see “Confessions of a Comic Book Guy--Overreact Much?”), and I’m happy to report the series has more than met my sky-high expectations. Even #3, where for reasons unknown the originally solicited contents were changed, what we used to call a “fill-in” issue. It’s usually pretty annoying when an ongoing epic gets interrupted this way, but in this case, I will allow it as we’re compensated by a pair of stories written by regular series writer Jeff Parker. One starring Birdman, drawn by Steve Rude, the other The Herculoids, drawn by Aaron Lopresti, both of which filled me with squee.
“Future Quest had high sales numbers, with June #1 issue outselling Batman’s Detective Comics title and Superman’s Action Comics title to take the #30 spot among comics sold in North America. Reactions have been quite positive, with the series garnering good reviews from fan sites and readers, and it has revived interest in Hanna-Barbera generally but especially in a few key properties, most notably Jonny Quest.”
While I think Mr. Hughes might be giving the comic a little too much credit, it certainly seems like Future Quest has managed to (inexpensively) raise the profile of the property. Pre-awareness might be priceless, but it also never hurts to have something to show that your property is currently active. Warner Bros. definitely wants a shared cinematic universe of their own and Jonny Quest would seem to be a good choice for their initial effort.
Last year when director Robert Rodriguez was still working on the Jonny Quest movie Dwayne Johnson was supposed to be Aryan Race Banyon, which at the time I called “unlikely casting.” But, just to show far we’ve come in a relatively short amount of time, they apparently have considered both Will Smith and Idris Elba for the role. If you haven’t heard, Disney is going to be remaking Splash -- with Channing Tatum in the role of the mermaid/ merman. They also have a new version of The Rocketeer in the works, with a black female lead (see “Disney Planning ‘Rocketeer’ Reboot”).
And I guess I was so preoccupied with the prospect of Archie having an affair with Miss Grundy on The CW’s upcoming Riverdale series I hadn’t read about its “inclusive casting” But according to a piece on the Comic Book Resources website, “‘Riverdales Cast, Creator On Representation, Noir-Tone & Why Resistance to Archie Is Futile” the show “features a Black Josie, a Hispanic Veronica and Asian actors Ross Butler and Daniel Yang in the traditionally white roles of Reggie Mantle and Dilton Doiley.”
And in DC Comics it didn’t get much attention but in Wonder Woman #1 her pal Etta Candy was now a plus-sized black woman. My point? It seems like we’ll be seeing a lot more race bending and gender flipping of fictional characters. And if you are one of those guys who were made super unhappy by the “Feminist” Ghostbusters, I’m afraid things will only be getting worse.
And, finally, I thought I was done writing about Riri Williams taking on the role of Iron Man (see “Confessions of a Comic Book Guy--Underrepresented Groups and Tired Tropes”), until saw a piece on the Gradient website, “I’m a 15 year-old girl. Here’s why I’m worried about Marvel’s New Iron Man”. It’s written by Zoe Hannah, an actual teenage girl who’s about to start her first year of college, builds robots and works part-time writing and testing code. Understandably she feels a connection to the character, and this is what she had to say about that Invincible Iron Man cover:
“Instead of focusing on Riri’s genius and strength, Marvel put the focus on her body. At 15 she is still a child, and a sexy image like this is potentially harmful to millions of young teen girls already dealing with body issues. I understand realism is not the point of a comic book, but if their goal was to create a character who girls can relate to and one day aspire to become, they dangerously missed the mark.”
The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.
