Supergirl vs Wonder Woman - perception of strength?

Just a little discussion point that occured to me today.

It's fascinating to me the dichotomy that goes on between Supergirl and Wonder Woman in what they should look like, and in many ways i don't really understand it, as i see them as essentially the same character with different histories, especially in some comic continuities where the powersets save the vision stuff are almost identical.

Take Gal Gadot, who was criticised in circles for being "too thin" to play Wonder Woman. Me personally, i don't see that, as my idea of Wonder Woman is heavily based on the TV show and not a super-muscled goddess. But the opposite is true for me when it comes to Melissa Benoist, as i love the look but because she's got an S on, i almost expect a little more definition in the arms and the perception of strength that it carries, and that the S represents.

What are people's opinion on this....what defines what a heroine should look like for you, how they fill out the costume or what it represents? Or is influenced by a combination of media?

I typically like for super fems to look strong as well as be strong. When I write a story I'll often have her around 185 centimeters tall up to 2 meters in height. I often go larger than that but typically we're talking a giantess at that point. There are some exceptions of course. Armageddon for example is rather on the short side but even she has extremely nice muscle tone.

For me muscle tone is more then just a lady's physical appearance. It relates to her attitude as well. It says that yes she is strong but she's also concerned with getting stronger. She wants to better herself physically and mentally as well. After all you need a good bit of drive to build yourself a hard body especially if you have to come up with inventive exercises. A delicate build on the other hand tells me that the lady isn't interest in bettering her body or lacks the drive.

AuGoose wrote: To me while Supergirl and Wonder Woman may have superficially similar powers, they are almost polar opposite as characters - because of their different places on the spectrum of maturity.

When setback reveals character, Supergirl's failures can be excused as a lack of experience, but not for a lack or power. Conversely when Wonder Woman suffers a setback its typically from a lack of power rather than because she wasn't sufficiently seasoned. And it hardly matters what level her power is at in the story - she clashes with things bigger than her as a matter of course. If she's at her peak, its usually the GOD OF WAR himself. Supergirl is (temporarily) outwitted by mid-level schemers. Wonder Woman is (temporarily) outwitted by international masterminds... and may have actually been gaming them the whole time.

They also differ as "strangers in a strange land". Supergirl is on an alien world with no preconceptions. Its a blank, filling itself in as she learns. Wonder Woman is in no such fluffy cloud land of potential: she's in Man's World, a place she been trained by her culture to expect to be populated entirely by the worst sorts of morons.

I think this goes a bit to there appearance. Wonder woman Typically is a hyper experienced warrior. She tends to look in the comics- STRONG- as if part or good deal of her strength is just her working out(which it sometimes is portrayed as) shes the ideal of the female athlete of power and grace from that.

Supergirl on the otherhand-well the power comes from her power. She tends to be in the comics an idealized female bueaty-busty negative body fat, maybe muscle or not. She looks like she would look great in a bikini-which is a look to a degree where people work out a great deal but the idea is to look almost as if they don't. Thats the idea. She just looks like a normal woman who you could underestimate when it comes to lifting a bag of soil much less a car-which goes to her character.

For women i think muscles are associated with working out, with experience. You spend a lot of time and experience to get there.( men on the other hand you can get away with saying a guy is just strong thats raw youth and potential-hes just big).

By these Measures. Gadot looks a little small and fashion modelly. Benoist doesn't so much look as a comicbook character version of idealized bueaty, but well a movie version(Actresses tend to look by some measures more normal in body proptoions but prettier faces then models as films tends to focus on the face more then print, and with a moving image you are more likely to catch the angle on a models body where it just looks gaunt). Which maybe a bit of Gadots problem. You can still catch the gaunt a bit-but well will see.

happiest_in_shadows wrote: I typically like for super fems to look strong as well as be strong. When I write a story I'll often have her around 185 centimeters tall up to 2 meters in height. I often go larger than that but typically we're talking a giantess at that point. There are some exceptions of course. Armageddon for example is rather on the short side but even she has extremely nice muscle tone.

For me muscle tone is more then just a lady's physical appearance. It relates to her attitude as well. It says that yes she is strong but she's also concerned with getting stronger. She wants to better herself physically and mentally as well. After all you need a good bit of drive to build yourself a hard body especially if you have to come up with inventive exercises. A delicate build on the other hand tells me that the lady isn't interest in bettering her body or lacks the drive.

My preferences are much the same as Happiest... a super heroine should be tall (but not insanely so, 185 to 190 is plenty tall) and should be very fit, and clearly interested in getting fitter and stronger. After all, when your dominant power is raw muscular strength, and you are serious about your super heroine career, then you'll want to get stronger. Plus you are facing foes and challenges that push your strength to the limit, so more is always better than less. Sure, working out is a challenge (imagine the size of 500 ton weights), but definitely doable.

Supergirl should look like an unusually fit bikini model. The so-called fitness models that were the rage a decade ago are pretty close to what I see, albeit built on a thin-boned frame. She would look striking when wearing her civvies as Linda, but completely over the top when wearing her costume. Like a goddess. Blonde hair should be long with the slightest bit of a wave. And as others have mentioned, given she grew up in an alien culture, she doesn't always think and act like a human. But she's smart, so she understands human culture and society and conventions and can play by our rules when she wants or needs to. But she doesn't always want to. She sometimes uses more force to solve a situation than her human-raised cousin. But she never completely escapes the feeling that she's a duck out of water, and sometimes she can't hide the fact that she was raised in a wildly different culture. Earth will never measure up to Krypton, but it's the best she has and she wants to make the best of that. But she's not as altruistic as Superman.

Wonder Woman shouldn't even be a debate. She's the supreme warrior. Everything in her background, training, experience and genetics is biased toward hand-to-hand combat. She's the daughter of Zeus, and that should say it all. She's imposing and tall and built and hard-muscled. She's not feminine, but she's all woman. She'd be imposing and scary to face as Wonder Woman given it would be obvious that she's about to kick your ass, and that wouldn't matter if you were Thor or Superman. Totally intimidating, but she's also kind and compassionate to those she has no conflict with. But she's lethal to those she does. She may not exceed Superman in raw strength, but her training is much more advanced than his. (He grew up a normal kid with fantabulous muscles, but he's had zero training in the art of combat.) I'd put my money on Diana kicking his ass if it comes to a fight. You can tell that just by watching her move.

Obviously the movies and TV renditions aren't going to match my perspective. That doesn't mean those are going to be unwatchable, but I'm sure I'll be thinking "if they just had the right actress, this could have been awesome". My only hope is that the acting and the script and direction will be good enough to mostly make up for the obvious miscasting.

shadar wrote: My preferences are much the same as Happiest... a super heroine should be tall (but not insanely so, 185 to 190 is plenty tall) and should be very fit, and clearly interested in getting fitter and stronger. After all, when your dominant power is raw muscular strength, and you are serious about your super heroine career, then you'll want to get stronger. Plus you are facing foes and challenges that push your strength to the limit, so more is always better than less. Sure, working out is a challenge (imagine the size of 500 ton weights), but definitely doable.

It kind of kills me when a writer tries to set up a super as being serious about protecting people but after numerous close calls and several buildings being knocked over they don't even seem to consider combat training or strength training. The villains on the other hand are often seen as hitting the books or weights preparing themselves for the next fight. It comes across as the villain carrying more about winning then the hero while the hero just relies on being the good guy. Then again I hate it how more often then not the one seeking power or the scientist trying to create a perfect being is evil.

As I like to envision myself as the mad scientist I question what's so wrong about wanting to give my creation the best start on life possible.

happiest_in_shadows wrote:

shadar wrote: My preferences are much the same as Happiest... a super heroine should be tall (but not insanely so, 185 to 190 is plenty tall) and should be very fit, and clearly interested in getting fitter and stronger. After all, when your dominant power is raw muscular strength, and you are serious about your super heroine career, then you'll want to get stronger. Plus you are facing foes and challenges that push your strength to the limit, so more is always better than less. Sure, working out is a challenge (imagine the size of 500 ton weights), but definitely doable.

It kind of kills me when a writer tries to set up a super as being serious about protecting people but after numerous close calls and several buildings being knocked over they don't even seem to consider combat training or strength training. The villains on the other hand are often seen as hitting the books or weights preparing themselves for the next fight. It comes across as the villain carrying more about winning then the hero while the hero just relies on being the good guy. Then again I hate it how more often then not the one seeking power or the scientist trying to create a perfect being is evil..

She-Hulk is one of the few superheroines who has been shown working out. I think this might have started as a John Byrne excuse to put her in some 80s aerobics wear and show off in the gym or the famous skipping rope gag, but nonetheless she exercised even when gamma-charged up (which was all the time in the Byrne run actually). It was expanded upon in the Dan Slott run to explain that if Jennifer Walters works out as a human, she is exponentially stronger when she turns into She-Hulk.

As for Supergirl and Wonder Woman, I always imagine Diana to be very toned and muscular as she is a warrior-goddess. I don't have any problem seeing Kara depicted as thin because she is only a teenager and I think of most teens as being skinny. My assumption is that when she grows up, she will end up looking more like Power Girl in musculature. PG is essentially supposed to be a grown up version of Kara, right? Not the exact same person, but essentially her counterpart...?

Agent00Soul wrote: She-Hulk is one of the few superheroines who has been shown working out. I think this might have started as a John Byrne excuse to put her in some 80s aerobics wear and show off in the gym or the famous skipping rope gag, but nonetheless she exercised even when gamma-charged up (which was all the time in the Byrne run actually). It was expanded upon in the Dan Slott run to explain that if Jennifer Walters works out as a human, she is exponentially stronger when she turns into She-Hulk.

As for Supergirl and Wonder Woman, I always imagine Diana to be very toned and muscular as she is a warrior-goddess. I don't have any problem seeing Kara depicted as thin because she is only a teenager and I think of most teens as being skinny. My assumption is that when she grows up, she will end up looking more like Power Girl in musculature. PG is essentially supposed to be a grown up version of Kara, right? Not the exact same person, but essentially her counterpart...?

I had forgotten that about She-Hulk though I never saw much of her to begin with. I do find the concept of having two forms where if she strengthens herself as a human she grows stronger as a super human very interesting. It would also make learning self defense much easier. She wouldn't have to worry about snapping a skilled but human trainer in half.

Still I'd like to see more from other heroes showing that they're working on bettering themselves. Well the female heroes. I couldn't care much less about the males.

Agent00Soul wrote:

happiest_in_shadows wrote:

shadar wrote: My preferences are much the same as Happiest... a super heroine should be tall (but not insanely so, 185 to 190 is plenty tall) and should be very fit, and clearly interested in getting fitter and stronger. After all, when your dominant power is raw muscular strength, and you are serious about your super heroine career, then you'll want to get stronger. Plus you are facing foes and challenges that push your strength to the limit, so more is always better than less. Sure, working out is a challenge (imagine the size of 500 ton weights), but definitely doable.

It kind of kills me when a writer tries to set up a super as being serious about protecting people but after numerous close calls and several buildings being knocked over they don't even seem to consider combat training or strength training. The villains on the other hand are often seen as hitting the books or weights preparing themselves for the next fight. It comes across as the villain carrying more about winning then the hero while the hero just relies on being the good guy. Then again I hate it how more often then not the one seeking power or the scientist trying to create a perfect being is evil..

She-Hulk is one of the few superheroines who has been shown working out. I think this might have started as a John Byrne excuse to put her in some 80s aerobics wear and show off in the gym or the famous skipping rope gag, but nonetheless she exercised even when gamma-charged up (which was all the time in the Byrne run actually). It was expanded upon in the Dan Slott run to explain that if Jennifer Walters works out as a human, she is exponentially stronger when she turns into She-Hulk.

As for Supergirl and Wonder Woman, I always imagine Diana to be very toned and muscular as she is a warrior-goddess. I don't have any problem seeing Kara depicted as thin because she is only a teenager and I think of most teens as being skinny. My assumption is that when she grows up, she will end up looking more like Power Girl in musculature. PG is essentially supposed to be a grown up version of Kara, right? Not the exact same person, but essentially her counterpart...?

Actually, she's the exact same person, except from another dimension of existence. She's typically portrayed as being about ten years older than Supergirl, but I've never seen that established as canon.

I like to think that PG has always been extremely muscular and buxom, and she flaunts it to the extreme. In contrast, SG will always be closer to a fitness model -- slender but extremely fit, and more modest. But never bulky like PG. They were just born with different body types.

The TV version of SG is apparently going to be 24, so the teenage waif thing would be out in any case. Given the actress they have chosen, they went for middle of the road. She's not skinny, but she's not muscular either. More like most moderately fit mid-twenties women who are trying to look good. But not obsessively.

That's where I think reality (and the further subset called TV Casting) don't cut it. No way a Kryptonian is going to look like the average 24 year old. Their genetics are the result of tens of thousands of years of science and intent.

I mean, where does Kal El rank on the scale of human male attractiveness? Many people would say "off the chart".

So where should Kara rank on the scale of human female attractiveness: Off the chart as well. 15 on a scale that ends at 10.

In Kal's case, look who they chose to play him: Henry Cavill. He's on the human chart, but banging up against the top pretty hard.

The actress (Melissa Benoist) for Supergirl: cute, but nowhere near the top of the chart.

PS: Trying to rank male or female attractiveness is even more dangerous than ranking the power of super heroes. So don't shoot me.

shadar wrote:

Agent00Soul wrote:

happiest_in_shadows wrote:

shadar wrote: My preferences are much the same as Happiest... a super heroine should be tall (but not insanely so, 185 to 190 is plenty tall) and should be very fit, and clearly interested in getting fitter and stronger. After all, when your dominant power is raw muscular strength, and you are serious about your super heroine career, then you'll want to get stronger. Plus you are facing foes and challenges that push your strength to the limit, so more is always better than less. Sure, working out is a challenge (imagine the size of 500 ton weights), but definitely doable.

It kind of kills me when a writer tries to set up a super as being serious about protecting people but after numerous close calls and several buildings being knocked over they don't even seem to consider combat training or strength training. The villains on the other hand are often seen as hitting the books or weights preparing themselves for the next fight. It comes across as the villain carrying more about winning then the hero while the hero just relies on being the good guy. Then again I hate it how more often then not the one seeking power or the scientist trying to create a perfect being is evil..

She-Hulk is one of the few superheroines who has been shown working out. I think this might have started as a John Byrne excuse to put her in some 80s aerobics wear and show off in the gym or the famous skipping rope gag, but nonetheless she exercised even when gamma-charged up (which was all the time in the Byrne run actually). It was expanded upon in the Dan Slott run to explain that if Jennifer Walters works out as a human, she is exponentially stronger when she turns into She-Hulk.

As for Supergirl and Wonder Woman, I always imagine Diana to be very toned and muscular as she is a warrior-goddess. I don't have any problem seeing Kara depicted as thin because she is only a teenager and I think of most teens as being skinny. My assumption is that when she grows up, she will end up looking more like Power Girl in musculature. PG is essentially supposed to be a grown up version of Kara, right? Not the exact same person, but essentially her counterpart...?

Actually, she's the exact same person, except from another dimension of existence. She's typically portrayed as being about ten years older than Supergirl, but I've never seen that established as canon.

I like to think that PG has always been extremely muscular and buxom, and she flaunts it to the extreme. In contrast, SG will always be closer to a fitness model -- slender but extremely fit, and more modest. But never bulky like PG. They were just born with different body types.

.

I never took PG as a "alternative reality Supergirl", as in they are the biologically the same person (not that she served that functional place in Earth 2). I don't see her like the Earth 2 Batman/Bruce Wayne, or Superman/Clark Kent, she seemed more in the vein of Green Lantern or Flash (Alan Scott vs Hal Jordan, Jay Garrick vs Barry Allen). She had a similar backstory and a similar Kryptonian name, but there were differences in costume, personality, and presentation as well as age. When she appeared, Supergirl had already graduated from College and was older than Power Girl was chronologically, but Power Girl already had a different body type (And wally Wood kept adding to her already impressive bust size every issue until someone noticed and said something). But in addition to her bust size, she was curvier (hip/waist/shoulder) ratio, and always seemed huskier to me than Supergirl was portrayed. And her personality was totally different (She absolutely didn't take shit from anyone for any reason, and made sure that people knew where she was coming from.). Yeah, it was love at first read for me and PG.

For history: Supergirl graduates from College: Adventure 406 (1971). Power Girl First Appearance: All Star Comics #58, 1976. I don't recall her being a college graduate and she seems younger than that (I may have to pull this first issues out and re-read them for a hint on her true age, but it always seemed to me she was the high end of teenager, maybe 18-19, but not graduated from college.) (I am not sure but I think Supergirl was the first DC/Marvel character to actually AGE.)

And that continued in every portrayal of her, until they got rid of Supergirl (Crisis), and then at that point when they created the next Supergirl (matrix) and eventually brought back Kara Zor-EL, suddenly she was back much younger, and was now younger than Power Girl (This is all post-2000). Power Girl took an age bump when she was moved over to Earth-1, and was suddenly someone who ran a big tech company, and therefore was expected to be in her late 20's, and was on par with Supergirl's age when she died. So PG being older is modern, much like Wonder Woman being a buff warrior. OTH, WW was always a warrior, from an island of warriors. I really think the modern take owes a lot to Title IX and the culture being aware of what an athletic woman can do, and what she would look like.

It's a bit weird to me to play that chronology back through my head (several DC ret-cons and writings, and changes to PG's origin story). But I was reading those comics when they came out, and it colors how I see things.

So i've never taken her as simply and older "Supergirl" who worked out more, mainly as she wasn't older! Of course that's been ret-conned, and now the statement is absolutely true. I just don't like it. I don't mind she's older (it fits her better, and makes an interesting Supergirl to have her a bit immature, and to have spend all her formative years as a Kryptonian). But I don't like the DC52 where they are genetically identical, just that PG is a bit older take. I like PG being her own woman.

Also, PG shouldn't wear the "S", though with the current backstory of Earth-2 it does make sense, it just seems wrong, and a disservice to the character to me.



And my vote:

PG: Super Buff
WW: really athletic, but defined muscles. She should look really super fit
Supergirl: she should look like a fitness model. If she flexed, and strains, you can see some muscle but she's not super defined, and she's got a great figure, and looks fantastic in a bikini. And I think she works better younger, doubly so if PG is around. But the TV show pegging 24 seems ok to me, and I'm really glad that she's not in High School or College (there are already plenty of shows that deal in that area).

happiest_in_shadows wrote:

shadar wrote: My preferences are much the same as Happiest... a super heroine should be tall (but not insanely so, 185 to 190 is plenty tall) and should be very fit, and clearly interested in getting fitter and stronger. After all, when your dominant power is raw muscular strength, and you are serious about your super heroine career, then you'll want to get stronger. Plus you are facing foes and challenges that push your strength to the limit, so more is always better than less. Sure, working out is a challenge (imagine the size of 500 ton weights), but definitely doable.

It kind of kills me when a writer tries to set up a super as being serious about protecting people but after numerous close calls and several buildings being knocked over they don't even seem to consider combat training or strength training. The villains on the other hand are often seen as hitting the books or weights preparing themselves for the next fight. It comes across as the villain carrying more about winning then the hero while the hero just relies on being the good guy. Then again I hate it how more often then not the one seeking power or the scientist trying to create a perfect being is evil.

As I like to envision myself as the mad scientist I question what's so wrong about wanting to give my creation the best start on life possible.

In fairness strength at supergirl level as typically depicted in comics, i don't think is something you could really train-very little on earth could provide much effort, and a 100 ton barbell is a cool visual, but not practical or physically possible. Very fewthings of that weight could surivve being picked up by something the size of a person.

(this is assuming that kryptonians would directly benefit much from traditional excerise. Its quite possible that there muscles are a touch for show for radiation or some kind of inereta killing powers),

thought Fighting yeah. though if anoyne has ever seen any MMA most real fights turn pretty quickly to one person on the ground either attempting to break the other persons arm with leverage, or on the onto punching them until they stop. flying around buildings i don't think really is realistic. Less dramatic though

castor wrote: In fairness strength at supergirl level as typically depicted in comics, i don't think is something you could really train-very little on earth could provide much effort, and a 100 ton barbell is a cool visual, but not practical or physically possible. Very fewthings of that weight could surivve being picked up by something the size of a person.

(this is assuming that kryptonians would directly benefit much from traditional excerise. Its quite possible that there muscles are a touch for show for radiation or some kind of inereta killing powers),

thought Fighting yeah. though if anoyne has ever seen any MMA most real fights turn pretty quickly to one person on the ground either attempting to break the other persons arm with leverage, or on the onto punching them until they stop. flying around buildings i don't think really is realistic. Less dramatic though

Not all forms of exercise involve weight training. Running and pushing yourself to move faster is a good method of working the legs. In one story I'm working a bit the super fem exercises by performing certain dances that some professional trainers helped her to develop. She just performs these dances as quickly and aggressively as she can so that she's still stressing her body.

Plus we're talking about the DC Universe here. Just think of how strong whatever Metallo is made of is. I'm pretty sure there are plenty of super strong metals for them to use for training. Luther sure seems to have plenty of them to build his machines.

castor wrote:

happiest_in_shadows wrote:

shadar wrote: My preferences are much the same as Happiest... a super heroine should be tall (but not insanely so, 185 to 190 is plenty tall) and should be very fit, and clearly interested in getting fitter and stronger. After all, when your dominant power is raw muscular strength, and you are serious about your super heroine career, then you'll want to get stronger. Plus you are facing foes and challenges that push your strength to the limit, so more is always better than less. Sure, working out is a challenge (imagine the size of 500 ton weights), but definitely doable.

It kind of kills me when a writer tries to set up a super as being serious about protecting people but after numerous close calls and several buildings being knocked over they don't even seem to consider combat training or strength training. The villains on the other hand are often seen as hitting the books or weights preparing themselves for the next fight. It comes across as the villain carrying more about winning then the hero while the hero just relies on being the good guy. Then again I hate it how more often then not the one seeking power or the scientist trying to create a perfect being is evil.

As I like to envision myself as the mad scientist I question what's so wrong about wanting to give my creation the best start on life possible.

In fairness strength at supergirl level as typically depicted in comics, i don't think is something you could really train-very little on earth could provide much effort, and a 100 ton barbell is a cool visual, but not practical or physically possible. Very fewthings of that weight could surivve being picked up by something the size of a person.

(this is assuming that kryptonians would directly benefit much from traditional excerise. Its quite possible that there muscles are a touch for show for radiation or some kind of inereta killing powers),

thought Fighting yeah. though if anoyne has ever seen any MMA most real fights turn pretty quickly to one person on the ground either attempting to break the other persons arm with leverage, or on the onto punching them until they stop. flying around buildings i don't think really is realistic. Less dramatic though

Trying to visualize how an invulnerable, flying, superstrong person would fight is a large challenge. I for one would submit that it wouldn't be anything like the fighting we see among normal people. The ability to fly fast, to hit hard and take being hit hard would change the style completely.

On the other hand, once the combatants were locked together, then only raw strength and resistance to injury would matter.

When I invented Velorians, I tried to address this subject, and it was my assumption that they couldn't actually kill or seriously injure each other with their bare hands. No matter how long they battled. The only way to inflict injury or death was to drain the other persons energy (Orgone) which reduced their body's ability to protect itself on a cellular level. I gave them a weakness -- they lost control of their Orgone energy during orgasm. A highly trained warrior (like a Protector) could take advantage of that, absorbing the other's power, a little more with each climax. Things got more complicated with female combatants. Which is one of the reasons the Arions focused on creating the most powerful female warriors they could. Their men kept getting fu**ed into submission.

That made sense to me, because orgasm is a moment where people experience total loss of control. If it's done right, anyway. <grin>

But it was also my subcultural attempt to portray something the general audience comics couldn't. It just made sense to me that beautiful but invulnerable super woman would be highly sexual, and she'd use it as an additional power, especially against males of her own power level. An invulnerable female wouldn't have the usual risks from casual sexual encounters. Which would be incredibly liberating.

But that doesn't map into anything we'd expect of G-rated SG or WW. Which is kind of the point.