The first ever feature film to have a female super hero as a lead character was DC ‘Supergirl‘ (1984, Jeannot Szwarc). However, it’s not the character everyone thinks of in terms of groundbreaking gender inclusion in superhero films.
Since ‘Iron Man‘ (2008, Jon Favreau), Marvel have established themselves as the goal to beat in terms of comic-book adaptation, and they really lived up to their audience expectations by releasing their first female lead super hero film ‘Captain Marvel‘ (2019, Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck). More than that, Marvel had their first queer character with Valkyrie form ‘Thor: Ragnarok‘ (2017, Taika Waititi), but Carol Denvers is the first queer female lead in a Marvel super-hero film. While it was a breakthrough and made almost eight times what it originally cost, Captain Marvel didn’t do so well in the public eye with only an audience score of only 48% on rotten tomatoes.
A year before Captain Marvel, DC Comics also produced their own female lead super-hero film ‘Wonder Woman‘ (2017, Patty Jenkins), which again made eight times what it cost in worldwide box office but did better with the public the Marvel heroine with an audience score of 87% on rotten tomatoes. Similarly to Carol Denvers, Princess Diana is a queer female super-hero, but the DC film came out earlier and, as such, the Amazon ended up being the first ever LGBTQ female lead character in a hollywood super-hero film.
The rivalry between DC and Marvel is not new, and according to the audience, the Warner Bros. comic book publisher seem to be winning in terms of queer female representations in super-hero films.
That’s not all. Beside Valkyrie in Thor: Ragnarok, Marvel has systematically failed to portray any female LGBTQ characters in their ensemble films. After a culmination of 22 films they released ‘Avengers: Endgame‘ (2019, Russo’s brothers) which ultimately was their last chance to give the audience a lead female queer character before the end of phase 3. Fans were outraged because all they got was 30 seconds scene of an unknown gay male character saying he lost his husband in the snap.
It was then DC’s turn to give their contribution to female LGBTQ representation in the super-hero universe with their first all female lead ensemble film: ‘Birds of Prey’ (2020, Cathy Yan). Beside, bisexual Harley Quinn, who had already appeared in ‘Suicide Squad (2016, David Ayer), the film also portrays a lead lesbian woman in the character of Renee Montoya.
Birds of Prey was strategically released perfectly around Marvel fails to uphold audience expectations.
Is this how DC is going to establish their supremacy over Marvel? Should the Disney giant start feeling concerned for the future of their brand in a world that need characters ahead of their time?
Léon Bodier 
