People just shouldn't have assistants, Teppy. We should all be EQUAL.

Well, *my* Alfred would be a 20-something hotass, not an old British dude, but I wouldn't be objectifying him.

(Stop laughing!)

(It could happen!)

Plus, no women work as assistants anymore. Clearly that's completely false. Oh wait.

I'm not familiar with Iron Man comics but I was pretty upset with the way Mary Jane was portrayed in the Spider-Man movies. I consoled myself by thinking she must be an amalgam of MJ and Gwen Stacy but then they put Gwen in the last one and now I just hate Kirsten Dunst's MJ. In the comics she saves her own ass (and sometimes Peter's) repeatedly. I think movie Pepper is ten times more capable than movie MJ.

If you ever wondered what Jeremy Irons would look like as Snape here he is about 3 mins into this French and Saunders parody.

Jeremy Irons as Snap looks like the father to Chris Faller from the Hush Sound (far right) [link]

For some reason I cannot find any better pictures of him, but he looks remarkably like I would imagine a young Snape to look like, especially if his father were Jeremy Irons!

I've been reading a lot of blogs that find Iron Man to be sexist (at best) or downright misogynist (at worst).

What say you all?

Well, the gratuitous focus on the flight attendants doing their stripper pole routines didn't make me think the movie was entirely free of gender issues.

There was also the reporter who apparently compensated for her incendiary interview technique by wearing short skirts and putting out for the interview subject. Yes, Pepper called her on it but she was still given favor over all the professional journalists that hadn't slept with Stark at the subsequent press conference, implying that being a spokesmodel that sleeps her way into scoops is a surer way to success in that field than professionalism and journalistic integrity.

So, basically every woman except the female lead was presented as little more than a sex object. But Pepper, who represented about 80% of total female screen time in the movie, was handled in a respectable enough manner.

Interesting -- but VERY CHARACTER-SPOILERY -- article about how part of The Dark Knight was filmed: [link]

ick yeah, I forgot about the stripper pole.

edit: but Tony Stark would have a stripper pole in his private jet.

ick yeah, I forgot about the stripper pole.

Okay, but -- Stark banging the reporter, and having sexy stripper flight attendants is (1) totally in character, and (b) kind of a heavy-handed way to emphasize his Dissolute Ways From Which He Departs After Seeing The Light In Afghanistan.

Plus, I don't actually find the reporter to be a mark in the sexism column. Yes, she sleeps with Stark (but hell, I would, too), but she's also got the connections and the balls to get the pictures that she shows to Tony at the shindig, she's not hesitant to give him well-deserved shit about what Stark Industries has wrought, and she's clearly intelligent.

Just because she fucks a hotass multimillionaire does not make her a character who reinforces sexism.

I didn't think I could get more excited about DK. I was wrong.