After watching Thor last weekend, the boys and I started picking apart some of the holes in the plot. Anthony pointed out the absurdity of Thor’s conversation with Natalie Portman’s character about his home planet Asgard. “What are they supposed to talk about, movies?” I said. But when I thought on it later, their conversation was pretty pointless. But then again, so was Portman’s character. And when I thought on it longer, pretty much all comic book movie love-interests are pointless. What purpose do they serve? One could cynically suggest that it’s the studios forcing otherwise talented screenwriters to include a female lead in order to attract women to their movies. but if you ask me, it’s the writers who are partly to blame.
Female love-interests are a lazy way to ground superheroes in reality. Given the larger-than-life characters they’re saddled with writing for – Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, et al. – it makes sense to want to give these guys some humanly attachment, and what better way to do that than through the loving arms of a beautiful woman? It also gives them someone to save, another lazy plot trick if you ask me.
But when I think back on my favourite comic books growing up, they didn’t feature a superhero and his lady love for any significant stretch of time. Yes characters like Superman will always have their Lois Lane, but the best stories were the ones that pushed the limits of the characters. The Killing Joke showed just how far the Joker’s madness went and gave a possible rationale for it; Born Again saw Daredevil’s life destroyed by his arch nemesis the Kingpin; and All-Star Superman saw the Man of Steel confront his own mortality.
In film, however, the common wisdom seems to be that superheroes need a Mary Jane Watson to save or fight for, but in so few of these movies are they actually interesting or even integral. I don’t necessarily have a problem with Thor falling in love with Natalie Portman, but over what exactly? Their dialog doesn’t exactly make you swoon. It doesn't make you feel anything actually. An argument can be made that Chris Hemsworth and Natalie Portman are to date the best-looking comic book couple, but beauty is fleeting, and so is my patience with this type of “romance.”
And less you think I’m in favour of removing all women from comic book movies, I will point out two examples – Lois Lane (Superman) and Catwoman/Selina Kyle (Batman Returns) – that did work and actually made their respective films better.
Margot Kidder set the bar for all women in comic book movies, particularly for how Lois would be portrayed in future incarnations. It doesn’t hurt that she was real looker either, but more interesting was her feisty attitude around Clark Kent, and her school-girl crush around Superman. A lot of this had to do with her genuine chemistry with Christopher Reeves. Their flight over Metropolis remains my favourite part of the movie.
And Michelle Pfeiffer too deserves credit for creating a formidable villainess for Batman. Batman Returns may be the weakest of the four good Batman movies, but it does feature the best romantic subplot, a notch above Vicki Vale, and ten times better than Rachel Dawes (Is it any wonder why she's mercifully killed off in the first half of The Dark Knight?) I think what separates Catwoman from the rest of Batman’s love interests is she’s more or less his equal, whereas Dawes and Vale are always subordinate, in constant danger and in need of saving.
Pepper Potts in the Iron Man movies is another love interest that gets a pass, largely because her romance with Tony Stark is more fun, in contrast to the brooding and super seriousness of Bruce Wayne and Peter Parker's relationships.
I suppose in the hands of a good screenwriter, a female love interest can be a boon to a comic book movie rather than dead weight, but if Thor is any indication, their presence is just a pretty distraction.
I don't know why they have to have love interests, and I'm a huge comic fan. There are some heroes in comics who either don't have love interests, or they aren't traditional helpless females. Theses characters are often outside the mainstream, and never get movies though, despite usually being pretty cool characters.