In "Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice," Wonder Woman does not have a relationship with Superman at all, but she does have one with Batman. When Batman and Wonder Woman are both portraying normal people in normal lives, she is portrayed as trying to win Batman over with her looks, or at least trying to memorize him. Once Batman becomes distracted by her for a little and loses track of her, Wonder Woman slips away and steals his hard drive. Her relationship with Batman is purely based off of looks and beauty, but there is also an element of mystery, which is her sneaky ways. Eventually, Wonder Woman emerges, but Batman is surprised to see her, even though he already knew her true identity. This lead me to believe that Batman viewed her as weaker than himself, even though Wonder Woman is the one with the true super abilities and Batman is purely technology and working out to build up his strength.
In "The Incredibles," Mr. Incredible attempts to work a normal job, while him and his wife, Holly (known as Elastic Girl), are trying to stay undercover and live the average life of a human. Unfortunately for Holly, her husband is the one that gets to leave the house and go work, but Holly has to stay home and maintain the household and children. When Mr. Incredible comes home after work, he is unappreciative of Holly and her efforts, and often times, Holly even needs to clean around him while he is sitting down and relaxing. Eventually when Elastic Girl and Mr. Incredible come out of hiding to face the villain of the movie, Mr. Incredible urges Elastic Girl to stay home, so she doesn't get hurt. Of course we could say that he does this because he loves her, which could be true, but they used to fight crime together all the time before they went into hiding. It seems to me that Mr. Incredible is worried that she may become hurt because he is female and less capable than other male superheroes. Besides Mr. Incredibles unwillingness for Holly to put herself in harms way, it seems that the only other troubling relationship aspect that they have would be his impatience and lack of help or appreciation he has for Holly's housework.
In "Wonder Woman," Wonder Woman is excelling than most of the young girls her age, so she is sought out by a man named war, whom is going to train her to become the ultimate warrior. Even though Wonder Woman excels at almost everything that she does while training, War still treats her as a mere child. He continues to call her "little one," which undermines the respect she has worked to gain. Also, Wonder Woman aims to please War at all times, and she even talks about wanting to him War proud and happy, which I found to be troubling. Why would she want to please a man that she really just met? Wonder Woman should be focused on bettering herself and making herself proud and happy, but that relates to modern day society. Women's lives are focused around pleasing a male in every sense, including, pleasing him mentally, emotionally, and sexually. Later on in the graphic novel, War sends Wonder Woman into a cave where nobody returns from, and ultimately, they die. When Wonder Woman finds the Matador within the cave, she decides to pardon the Matador and allow him to keep his life. War instantly appears within the cave, attacks her, and calls her his biggest failure because she didn't listen to his instructions. Ultimately, I think War was displeased because Wonder Woman did not submit to his final request, which in the end, War was tricking her to defeat all of his enemies. The relationship within this graphic novel was an older man taking advantage of a younger girl and making her complete all of his requests and desires, but eventually, he submissiveness passes, which reveals War's true colors.
In "Catwoman," Catwoman's relationships with men are very volatile. The comic is organized with present day action about Catwoman's life, known as Selina Kyle, but they have frequent flashbacks to the past to explain to us who the characters are that she is interacting with. The graphic novel begins with Catwoman being beaten by a past employer and thrown into a dark alley by a dumpster. As she sits there bleeding and crying, another man walks by and notices her in pain. Although he offers help to her at first, we find out in the end that he was actually just using her and hiding her from her true identity. This man, who offered her a second chance for a new job, eventually throws her off of a roof building, but thankfully, Catwoman hits a canopy and survives. Throughout the graphic novel, all of Catwoman's relationships with men are full of deceit, broken promises, and physical abuse. Catwoman learns quickly that a man is not to be trusted in life or with any aspect of herself, so it turns her into Catwoman. Even when the man was trying to help Catwoman in the alley, he described her as, "snarling girl in an alley who tried to scratch me." This proves that he thought of Catwoman as less than he was and that she was unworthy, so all of the relationships between Catwoman and male characters are relationships that any and every woman should want to and needs to stay away from.
In "Supergirl," Supergirl crashes down to some strange planet, where she is met immediately with hostile robots. We eventually find out that these robots are male humans who are controlling them, and they are trying to capture and kidnap Supergirl. Supergirl continues to fight back, but eventually the robots are able to overcome her and they begin the process of completely overpowering her to take her back with them. Just in time, Superman comes and saves the day for Supergirl, and he rescues her from the attacking robots. This is really the only male character within the graphic novel, and his role and relationship with Supergirl is that he is her savior. This portrays to the reader that Supergirl is unable to overcome her own struggles, so she needs a male superhero to come save the day for me, which depicts that Supergirl is inferior and weak when compared to the abilities and strength of Superman. In reality, Supergirl should have been able to defeat the robots since she has super powers herself, but when Superman shows up, he makes the battle look effortless, and he seems unfazed.
The female characters relationships with their male counterparts were similar in some ways, but I think they also related to female stereotyped roles. In their relationships with these male characters, they are filled with stereotypes and assumptions about women that are not always true. Often times, these women are portrayed as weak and in need of saving, in which the creators of these graphic novels offer up a savior, which is almost always a male. Hopefully, comics and graphic novels make a transition to more female leads within comics, and although they may need a friend or a shoulder to lean on once in awhile, they do not need a savior. They only need themselves and the ability to find the inner strength within them to overcome their battles and obstacles.
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