Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons^™

Women In Refrigerators: The Objectification Of Women In Comics, Kyra Nelson

AWE (A Woman’s Experience)

In Green Lantern issue 54, Kyle Rayner, a new addition to the Green Lantern corps, walks into his apartment. On the table he finds a note saying a surprise awaits him in the refrigerator. Kyle makes his way into the kitchen and to his horror discovers the body of his strangled girlfriend, Alex, stuffed into the refrigerator. Alex, who only made it through five issues of the series, suffers a fate similar to those of many other women in comics. Frequently, comic book writers employ female characters as little more than plot devices designed to provide emotional drama and backstory …