In her 2011 dissertation, “Heroine Abuse: Feminism, Femininity and the Female Action Hero,” Cristina Stasia identifies the ways in which female action heroes contradict the code of femininity, and challenge women’s traditional their social role. More recently, female characters in the Marvel Cinematic Universe show a subtle erosion of these positively gendered messages. There has been a slight increase in the percentage of Marvel’s female superheroes (1:5 in 2012 and 4:17 in 2019), but recent years have shown more regression than progress. The characters on screen continue to show little agency, are allowed significantly less screen time than their male counterparts and often aren’t even allowed to speak to each other. I will be analyzing agent Agent Peggy Carter’s appearances in five Marvel movies and her ABC television series Agent Carter (2015-16) . Peggy Carter was created in 1966 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby as a romantic interest for Captain America. Starting with Captain America: The First Avenger, this minor character evolved into a self-sufficient heroine. In her TV show, Carter made space for herself in a “man’s world” without depending on a male superhero or other male agents to allow her presence or voice. These developments were emphasized and reiterated through her cameos in later films and other series. However, in the final scene of Avengers Endgame, Captain America travels back in time to reclaim his old life and Peggy is demoted from secret agent to supportive spouse. Captain America’s happy ending changes Peggy’s future and erases all the progress she made as an independent and heroic woman. Peggy is ultimately “put back in her [1966] place” by Marvel, and the audience learns that no matter how far a woman moves forward, she always run the risk of being pushed back into place to make her man happy.
About the presenterAndrea Yzaguirre
Andrea Yzaguirre is studying English at Ithaca College. She hopes to go on to get a masters in English and perhaps pursue a doctorate in literature.