The Superhero Genre #1 | Page 4

Although the superhero genre is one of the most successful genres of all time, it stills does represent equality in a weird way with the ratio of male to female superheroes way over onto the male side. However, that has started to change with more and more female-led superhero films being released, most notably Wonder Woman, the upcoming Captain Marvel (led by Brie Larson) and Ant-Man and the Wasp (co-led by Paul Rudd and Evangeline Lilly) as well as the recent announcement of a Black Widow solo movie starring Scarlett Johansson to be released within the next few years following Avengers 4 in 2019.

Ethnicity is something that isn’t really talked about in the superhero genre, but from looking at anything in the genre you can tell that there is a limited amount of African-American, Asian or Mixed-Race characters, with the only exception being Marvel’s Luke Cage on Netflix which features a majority African-American cast and Marvel’s Iron Fist which features a mixture of Asian and white actors. However, it is only a stepping stone as it does seem like the amount of non-white characters in superhero films are increasing with each passing film. The most recent Marvel film titled Black Panther, which stars Chadwick Boseman and Michael B. Jordan and is directed by Ryan Coogler, is the first superhero film to feature a predominantly African-American cast and is critically and commercially one of the most successful Marvel films of all time, also being one of my favourites.