Race + Comics: When is Diversity ‘Contrived’?

By Arturo R. García

Marvel Comics has spared no effort over the past few years to redefine its’ Avengers franchise as a cornerstone: even before Marvel Films launched the series of movies – Iron Man in 2008, and this year’s Captain America and Thor releases – to culminate in the team getting its’ own movie, the company has made sure the Avengers were at the center of crossover stories like Civil War, Secret Invasion, Siege, and this year, Fear Itself.

“They’re the varsity. They’re the A-list,” Senior Vice-President of Publishing Tom Breevort told Comic Book Resources in an interview. “They’re the Man. They’re not about being super heroes because of demographics or ethnicity. They stand for something specific and occupy a certain role. If you don’t have some degree of that, then it doesn’t feel like Avengers.”

Unfortunately, an ensuing discussion of the criteria needed for a story to bear the Avengers brand went to some depressingly familiar territory.

Part of the interview covered failed pitches for Avengers stories. Brevoort explained that he had rejected ideas for a “1950′s Avengers” or a “Cosmic Avengers.” Another idea he shot down in two separate pitches was, he said, essentially “Black Avengers”:

It was “Let’s put all the African or African-American heroes together on a team for an adventure,” and in those cases too, there was nothing about the idea beyond “It’s a bunch of super heroes together” that said “Avengers” beyond the fact that “Avengers” is a term that’s salable. I think there’s something very specific about what “Avengers” means to the Marvel Universe.

Ideas based on retro and space-based teams have seen light at Marvel, in non-Avengers series like Agents of Atlas, Guardians Of The Galaxy and, more recently, Annihilators. And, as Breevort explained on Twitter, he has approved and edited at least one non-Avengers title featuring a group of heroes of color, The Crew.

But, as Marvel has taken pains to remind us, the Avengers brand is something else. So, could one assemble a 100% POC team – heck, let’s settle for 70 percent – that could suitably represent an A-list faction? For guidance, let’s use Brevoort’s reasoning for how the team featured in Secret Avengers “feels like The Avengers”:

Most of that is that the book was built around Steve Rogers, but also there are other characters like The Beast, who’s not associated with Avengers anymore, but he was for long enough where I can look at him and go, “Yeah, Avenger.” War Machine has never been associated with Avengers very much, but even in terms of his silhouette, he looks like he fits. Valkyrie is storied, having been around since the ’70s, so she’s close enough. She feels legitimate because she’s got history. Ant-Man may be a different guy in the suit, but the silhouette looks right. “Avenger!” There’s enough aggregate there that it feels like an Avengers group.

Hm. Let’s take Brevoort’s “aggregate” theory and see if it works with an Avengers-ish team featuring featuring heroes of color. Besides Cage and War Machine, you could feature:

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