Comicry- An example of being Not Smarmy About It
A recent to-do (in a positive sense! Shock! Awe!) in the Feminist Comics Hive Vagina Blogosphwhatever is about this (questionably worksafe) set on scans_daily, wherein Wolverine confronts Spider Woman (or I guess her secret identity or something) while she's showering, AND IT'S NOT SMARMY.

Before I get into the major babblage, I'll have to admit that I haven't read this issue, just the pages on the link, so I have no idea if it's bad anywhere else, nor do I really care. (I mean, this is Modern Superhero Comics and not Tomb of Dracula or some adorable/horror rag from Japan, so I'm not really a regular reader.)

Anyway. Non-smarminess.

1) He's got on clothing. Also, it's Wolverine. Wolvie (unless there's some sort of massive character change since I stopped paying attention to the X Men) is, as Kalinara points out, just not a guy one would expect to be rapin' people, or even thinking about "oh hott, girl in shower woo!" He's thinkin', "O hay, she's naked and unarmed, so I'll have a tactical advantage."

2) She's also thinkin', "O hay, I'm naked and partially unarmed, so he's kind of got the tactical advantage here. Eh, whatev, I'm not a moron, so I won't do anything that gives away major fear." She's not all "eek big dude in my shower WHATEVER SHALL I DO ONOES!" she's all "Wolvie WTF I was just about to start using the Pert Plus DO YOU HAVE NO MANNERS AT ALL wait you're Wolverine I should be glad you didn't bring in beer and a cigar or something."

3) Mostly closeup shots, with a couple of vaguely tasteful medium shots. Not only do the closeups crop out anything that'd set off the nudity taboo sirens, they enhance the Dramatic Tension of the story, which is (I assume) what the writer is going for. There's some Unnecessary Boob Action going on in the medium shots, but it's not "HAY KIDS LOOK BOOBS OMG SEE IT'S A GIRL SHE HAS TITS WHOA HOLY SHIT!" it's just, "Tense confrontation where we also have to cover up nipplage for ratings reasons." Plot and drama first, cheesecake is an afterthought.

(Though I personally think that the first panel of the second page looks out of place, but that's more because it looks like someone used cutouts of the figures and assembled them onto a background. It doesn't even look like the shower's running. What the heck? Also, Wolvie in particular looks generic and kind of wrong. Neither has an expression that looks like a standoff is happening. Though her "aw, how cute, little fuzzy man has dropped in on my shower" expression is slightly amusing.)


So, see? It can be done, and done well! All it takes is, y'know, not treating your story like it's wank material!