There are several ways in which comic book movies such as The Avengers strongly reinforces the traditional gender stereotypes. One of the most common ways they do this is by portraying the protagonists as predominantly male. Also, the way in which they are represented is very typical of the male stereotypes; strong, courageous with strong morals. This representation of men would have been created in order to act as role models to the male audience.
It may be considered that comic book movies are slowly attempting to give their female characters a similar importance to the male characters by giving them stronger personalities with a more influential role to the plot which is a very alternative representation in comparison to the stereotypical fragile, damsel in distress.
Despite the new characterization of some of the female characters, certain aspects of them still reinforces the traditional stereotypes. The females are often dressed in extremely tight clothing in order to accentuate their bodies and reinforce the stereotype of women being sex objects to appeal to the male characters in the film and in the audience. This is a great strategy in order to maximise profit as audiences are predominantly male. However with the number of female fans increasing, women are slowly getting more important roles in comic book movies with a few films having a female character as the protagonist. In order to further increase their female fan base, there are several films that will be released in the near future with a female protagonist.
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