#wheelchair batgirl rates 3/10

[wheelchairbatgirl]

I guess someone had to review all the wheelchairs in Nothing Butt Nightwing.

There are three images of wheelchairs in Nothing Butt Nightwing, which DC Universe Infinite will unfortunately forever log that I have read.

It's a standard hospital wheelchair and the proportions are really weird. Just a note, no one who uses a computer as much as Oracle does would have full length arm rests. You actually cannot get your lap under a table with arm rests like that. So if you're not going to do any research at all about what wheelchair you decide to copy and so you pick a hospital wheelchair, at least pick one with desk arms.

Wheelchair gets 3 out of 10. I was too nice every time before where I rated a hospital wheelchair as "looking like an actual wheelchair", because it does not look, at all, like a wheelchair that an independent person with full lower limb paralysis would use on the daily. At least it's got push rims and breaks. We have that going for us.

And hey, I can respect Dick Grayson more as a cheeks-out supermodel than as a cop.

Wheelchair gets a 3/10 because it's definitely a wheelchair but it's not something we could reasonably expect Barbara Gordon to be living her life in. Someone at least give that woman a cushion or something. If she keeps just sitting on the unpadded sling she's going to get pressure sores.

This is a reminder that if you have family members who use wheelchairs even sometimes to get them a basic gel cushion. Meemaw will love that. It's not too late to get her a Holiday present.

My opinions on the comic itself after the jump because I tried to be short but it got too long:

I told myself that I'd limit my actual analysis of the series to two sentences, so here goes. I believe that whoever wrote this thought that they were doing a clever inversion on the often-critiqued "we're only reading about this superhero because she's hot and her ass is out" trope. The problem is that doing that is not clever, and taking that premise and then doing nothing clever or entertaining with it does not make good content. If it's pointless and empty when it's a female character who just exists for male eye candy, it's equally pointless and empty when you flip the genders.

As an asexual disabled woman who reads comics, I'm very aware that a lot of the things that I like I'm not the target audience for. The number of superheroes outright disabled like me is very small. I don't often get to share in someone's power fantasy. I'm not interested in things just for being sexy or sexual. And because there's a lot that I often have to be aware just isn't for my taste, I get to enjoy comics for the other elements. I like the story, the art, all the things that you get out of an issue that isn't the gimmicks. And I think that means that, when something is all gimmick, it's just not something that I'll like. And a lot of people have that experience; it's not exclusive to asexual disabled women. That's something that's very cool and unifying about a good story: we all resonate with different parts but we all end up liking the same story. However, in order for me to like it, it has to actually have a story. It has to have some kind of meaning, or something funny, or something clever. It needs to make a point or have a purpose for existing. And even some really awful art where every shot of a character is her perfectly-rendered ass can pass if the story is really good. But this story felt so empty. And now i've read it and I just feel empty and a little gross. I don't like when spending time with characters I like ends up feeling like this.