When it comes to characters with botched potentials, especially those coming from DC and Marvel, that I feel some of it’s got to with the way the character’s usually portrayed that undermines their potentials to be more than that. I feel when it comes to DC’s Stephanie Brown, some of the problems lie with portraying her as a giddy bimbo regardless of the fact that she sewed an outfit all to her own means writers are way better off portraying her as Batman’s answer to Edna Mode. Edna Mode is this Pixar character who designs outfits for superheroes, considering she knows how to sew she should ought to learn how to sew clothes for everybody else in the Batfamily.
In fact, she should be something of a butt-kicking Edna Mode considering she has trained under Cassandra’s wing for some time now. You might say this makes her into a Mary Sue, but in reality that’s showing something realistic. In the sense that there are things she’s real good at like sewing and things she’s gotten the hang over such as fighting, it’s not that hard if only writers took sewing seriously and she should be to sewing what Barbara is to computers. It’s not even a stretch for her to turn sewing into a business, something she could do by using Batman’s money alone. It’s not that hard for as long as you take sewing seriously.
I guess some of the problems with the way Stephanie’s written is that they kind of forget that there are things she might be really talented at, something that would’ve been remedied had they portrayed as sewing and mending costumes for the entire Bat-family. It’s not that hard really, if they also know how to sew themselves. Then you have characters that could easily go to a darker route, if only writers had the guts to go with that. Something like Marvel’s Kate Pryde becoming the X-Men’s resident assassin/hitwoman which kind of happened in Age of Apocalypse, not so much in the usual continuity even though it’s the most sensible direction to take her to.
She’s killed someone before, so having her kill people on the job would be a logical choice. Especially considering the ability she has, which’s well-suited to it really. If Invisible Woman’s powers actually lend themselves to security (if only they considered this), Kate’s own are perfectly suited to assassination and theft when one thinks about it. I guess if writers did take what’s logical for Kate to go to, it would be much darker than they would’ve wanted, especially when it comes to Age of Apocalypse, perhaps that’s why they shy away from turning her into a full-blown assassin for good in the normal continuity.
I guess why some writers don’t bother taking characters to where they’d logically go’s that either they’re held back by preconceptions of what they should be even when they can like with Stephanie Brown, or that the logical conclusion’s the more undesirable one like with Kate Pryde. There are also things that are beyond the writers’ knowledge, I guess it’s too much for some writers to know a thing or two about sewing when they don’t. Maybe that’s why they never bothered having Stephanie own her sewing skills to the point where she’d even make costumes for people and even turn it into a business with Batman’s funding.
Even if that’s the most sensible direction to take her to.
fynm 