She is “out-fanfictioned” because, as the strip specifically calls out, she is a girl and a jet. Setting aside for the moment whether “fanfictiony” is an insult or not, why is being a woman more fanfictiony? What makes being a woman a trope? Aren’t girls, like, 51% of us? Is there more than one dude Autobot jet? Yes? Do we do comics about how we roll our eyes at new dude Autobot jets? No? Then why is a lady jet something we single out?
You draw enough TF commissions you see these details in fan characters a lot. Girl-seeker, badass loner, ninjabot with sword… or some combination.
Windblade is none of those. Zero.
She’s not a seeker. She’s got friends. She’s not a ninja.
(Also, as if there were any doubt that you were using “fanfictiony” as an insult, your bit here clears that up.)
And for the record, no, I don’t recall having been asked to draw a Transformers fancharacter for probably half a decade. Plenty of canonical ones, sure. The closest I’ve gotten is “Optimus Prime as a Green Lantern.” But being asked to draw ladyseeker ninja loners is not a trend I can vouch for.
Also David, not sure why you are having fun insulting me. The one time I’ve met you (maybe twice?) you seemed very polite.
I’m not really having that much fun. I would have been super ecstatic to see a comic from you celebrating a new female character, rather than playing into how our society mocks and denigrates them merely for existing. I am WEARY of this. And I am pushing back against it because it’s stupid and it’s damaging and I don’t want to see any more of it. The best thing I can say about it is that maybe you didn’t think through the implications of what you were saying very well and, in the service of making an easy joke, have regurgitated the script culture has given us regarding how women characters are strongly suggested to be viewed.
tl;dr: This strip made me very very angry. Walky smash.
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