Concepts can overlap. I can appreciate a good booty, and I think there is far too much stigma and shame related to real life body image, ideas and values with men and woman, but especially woman. That being said Power Girl is a fictional character. So an artist can go, hey Power Girl is a healthy fit woman and she looks good and people like booty so now and then the art will reflect this by showing scenes with her and her butt. Most humans have butts so you know, they are going to show up in comics as well.
Then again sometimes an artist can be like… "well lots of our comic readers are guys and guys like female booty and breast.. so let me see if I can forget about Power Girls spine and back muscles and… there I have included both assets and uh she is holding up a mountain" or something. When Hulk lifted up and held a mountain he didn't try to push out his butt, and yeah there are differences between men and woman, and when Superman did his lifting Earth feat he was in small shorts and he has a great muscular physique, but small differences like the angle looking down at him instead of his crotch or butt being prominent are important differences. So yeah this panel does seem quite bizarre and I am not sure we have as many male examples similar to this and there is nothing wrong with sex, booty, all that, the Power Girl series by Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda Conner had cheesecake and was fun but in a way that didn't seem insincere or artificial or demeaning to the character or an audience that prefers good characterization, proper anatomy and organic poses. Basically I think this artist should have chose to have Kara face forward away from viewer or toward viewer. See where Steel is? We as readers hardly see the perspective and for some reason this applies far more frequently with female characters so much so there are even sites dedicated to the term Brokeback (broken back syndrome to allow maximum depiction of both the T and A in T&A)
I also think its cool she is holding a mountain and that its a pretty picture and I really like this artist, but I think the pose looks painful to the point of pandering and I can understand how this could really annoy people and turn them off a comic, and in a way it does exploit Power Girl even if it almost attempts to empower her, not because the character is depicted having a nice bottom or physique - see the Power Girl series by Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda Conner, just that holding a mountain shouldn't be so effortless as to allow that sort of pose and since the character isn't real, its the artist manipulating her body in such a way to get that effect or any other effect they could want, including poses that don't try to get her butt and breasts in one shot whilst holding up a mountain. Books can lose readers when this stuff becomes too frequent.
Log in to comment