I wasn’t going to talk about this trailer, honestly. Not because I’m an adult white male, and certain elements on the internet tell me I’m not allowed to talk about it. That’s bull. I’m allowed to have opinions and I’m not just examining storytelling for one group, even though my story preferences will by nature limit my audience. A good story is where you find it, and it’s rare to hear about a good story attached to Ironheart.
Remember, this girl’s backstory is misunderstanding a quote from astronaut Sally Ride about how the more people told her she couldn’t be an astronaut the more determined she was to prove them wrong. However, being an astronaut was already her dream. Riri took it as she needed someone to tell her what she couldn’t be and that would become her dream. She’s a girl who never had a dream who got one because she forced some old white woman teacher to tell her what she’ll never be. The teacher just happened to choose Tony Stark instead of Martha Stewart. That’s already pretty weak if your goal is to convince black girls to give science and engineering a try just to fill a quota count instead of encouraging black teens to follow their dream whether it leads to Tony Stark or Martha Stewart.
So now we have a trailer for Disney Plus’ Ironheart, a show that was kept in mothballs for years after her poor reception from Wakanda Forever despite principle photography already being done. Poor Dominque Thorne (who probably ALSO deserves better and is being convinced by Disney+ that the critics are just sexist racists) is probably too old to play the character now and you know they’re going to shove her into the next Avengers two-part movie, which is probably the only reason the SIX episode show came out five years after it was announced, with the first three going to be dumped at the same time and the other three presumably coming out weekly. This was such a non-entity to me that I wasn’t going to bother with it, but then I heard the usual suspects insisting that to put down this show was to be racist/sexist against intelligent black teen girls. If you ask me the opposite is true. Is this really the best you can give girls of color who want to be engineers?
Ah, there’s that attitude that comics fans loathe about her. Yep, they kept the attitude but lost the armor design. Talk about getting the WRONG thing correct. Now she’s also going to be a criminal to get her armor made since I guess Wakanda kept her old suit. Also, the black girl’s wearing white armor. Wonder how that’s going to go over. What’s wrong with her actual design?
Her personality also continues to suck Then again, that’s the only type of teenage black girl modern writers seem capable of writing, as if the “sassy black girl with an attitude” is the only personality they know. (I thought I needed to get out more.) Stereotypes are the enemy of diversity in characters, a starting ground at best when designing a character or trying to get a one-shot character to stand out for his or her limited appearance. I’m not even convinced every black girl from “da hood” has this attitude and this attitude alone, but I’m exposed to so few black girls OR “da hood” in my life. One was from the islands and was never in “da hood” and every other black woman, teen or adult, I’ve ever met did not share the same personality, nevermind this one that they seem incapable of writing anything else but. Maybe they don’t live in Connecticut?
I am not against a teen girl science genius. Dotty from Clue Club was so young her older teen siblings wouldn’t let her out into the field until she got older. She was a one girl crime lab and there were cases solved only because of scientific genius. Doesn’t count because she was a redhead? She was still awesome. She’s even the only one who gets named in the theme song.
I really do miss this show. MeTV Toons or WB Cartoon Rewind, air this already! I’ll accept on demand on Tubi along with the Scooby-Doo you already have on.
Compare that to Marvel’s other supersmart black teen girl gadgeteer, Moon Girl, who only got smart because she got hit with some mist that shoved her into an egg and messed with her brain. To paraphrase the old makeup ads, maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s Terrigen. I’m surprised they didn’t turn her into a mutant like they did Ms. Marvel, given Marvel’s current treatment of the Inhumans after papa Disney failed to put them over in the “important” media. She also stole Devil Dinosaur from her prehistoric male namesake. (Bet Moon Boy got eaten or sacrificed before the day was out with his protector and only friend gone.) Dottie didn’t just do the lab work and research, she also made all their gadgets. And she’s only 13, and didn’t need a false challenge or Terrigen mist to do any of that. She’s already that good naturally.
Then there’s Valerie from Josie & The Pussycats. In both the original comics and the cartoons where they faced more mad scientists, Valerie was a tech genius and it was her skills, when not screwed up by rich white bitch Alexandra’s latest attempt at glory hogging (or Alan hogging), that would save her friends and defeat the bad guys on Earth or in space.
Sorry, that’s the only video I could find showcasing Valerie. Despite it getting a MeTV Toons airing I guess Josie and the gang aren’t as big as the Clue Club. Hint hint, MeTV. You can have both.
The point is Riri is not the best option to get black girls into STEM. I took two from my childhood but I’m sure there are plenty more, better characters who don’t go into crime to become “iconic” to fuel their egos. Maybe someone who wants to become a hero or make the world a better place? The comics even had her dad and best friend killed in front of her and that only motivated her to make a virtual assistant in the image of her fallen friend. (Screw you, Riri’s dad! Which is dumber when you remember Riri was the other character Brian Michael Bendis created for his kids, this time his daughter while his son got Miles Morales. Sonny got the better deal.) Opposing Riri Williams in all her stereotypical, in-your-face sassy attitude, unable to have her own dream and has to make her teacher give her one as a false challenge because she didn’t understand a quote, poor substitute for Iron Man lack of glory is a good thing. It’s actually saying today’s black teen girls deserve a better role model than this character that never got over with the fans. This will not convince girls to try STEM, especially if their goals are in other areas. You can fix the character, but Disney Minus over here opted to double down on all the bad aspects of the character.
The one time they actually match the source material and they chose the wrong parts. Not surprising they want to dump in on during the empty months and hope they make something back on it. The only ones watching will be the people mocking it, because the biggest supporters are the ones least likely to watch it and just feels good that it exists. They won’t support it, or they’d try to give us better than this disaster in the making.
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