Do Marvel’s Recent Diversity Announcements Mean Anything?

Yes. Well, I guess my work here is done. I suppose I should elaborate. First I’ll give you the background: On two separate occasions this week, Marvel made announcements about two of its most visible characters. The first announcement was that Thor would become a woman in the comics in the near future. Then, if that didn’t rile people up enough, on The Colbert Report on Wednesday night, they announced that the new Captain America will be Black Superhero Sam Wilson aka Falcon aka…

The shorthand reasons for this: A story arc in the Thor: God of Thunder Book will leave the present Thor “unworthy” to wield the God Hammer Mjolnir and someone else, a woman, will step up in his place. I do think that Jason Aaron and company could’ve been a little bit more clear in the delivery of this news compared to the ambiguous “Thor will become a woman” as I doubt they mean that the present male character that is Thor, son of Odin will physically become a woman, daughter of Odin. At least I don’t think so (which too, could be very interesting to me). Though I am glad that our new character will not be named Lady Thor or She-Thor or some shit like that.

As for Captain America’s shield changing arms, the super soldier serum that has bulked Steve Rogers up to mythical physicality before has been extracted from him and the fact that he’s like 96 years old, catches up to him. Unlike the confusion with Thor, Captain America actually is a title, so that means the mantle can be taken up by anoth…