Stargirl =/= Kitty Pryde

I was surfing around the Internet today when I saw something interesting at one particular comic book fan's site. It was a rant about Stargirl. Specifically about how in an interview at Newsarama, the interviewee described Stargirl as bubbly.

The reviewer took offense, stating that Stargirl is "not some bubblegum popping, bubbling cheerleader." (The original post is here if you're curious)

He believes that Stargirl has more in common with Kitty Pryde, as an intelligent, super-competent character far wiser than her years than say Jubilation Lee.

Now I have a lot of respect for this reviewer's opinions, though we rarely agree, but in this case, I really and truly disagree. I've in fact, I think, never disagreed so much with a character assessment in my life.

I love Courtney Whitmore. I honestly do. She's one of the few teenage girl characters in anything that actually reads like a real teenage girl. She's bright, sunny, optimistic. She's grown out of her very irresponsible and flighty stage, but she still knows how to have fun and when to not take things so seriously.

What makes Courtney work for me is her humanity and relatability. She's not a genius and she doesn't have superpowers, she wasn't born to some great destiny. She's just a kid who seized the opportunity to annoy her stepfather and discovered her true potential in the process.

Kitty Pryde and Courtney Whitmore couldn't be more different, honestly. Kitty is an extraordinary young woman. She's a veritable, verifiable genius. She's got, debatably, the most versatile power on her team. She's got incredible martial arts and computer skills. She speaks many languages. She's had nothing resembling a normal life since she was thirteen years old.

Courtney's not like that. She's not a genius. She's never been characterized as one. She's clever and quick-witted, with a very refreshing dose of common sense most of the time, but that's hardly the same as Kitty's academic expertise. Courtney is adaptable, she's made her converter belt and cosmic rod her own through clever usage. However, she does not have the technical skills or capability to reverse engineer a prototype or even make modifications on the ones she has. If they're broken, she'll need to go elsewhere to fix it. She also does not have the experience that Ted Knight or Jack had with the rod, yet, or Sylvester with the belt. She's got a lot of ways to go before she's as capable with her powers as Kitty Pryde is with hers.

Courtney's had some physical training with the JSA, but she's no hyper competent ninja. She can use the monitor systems and a lot of Pat's inventions, but that's scarcely the same as Kitty Pryde's expertise. She's had a very normal life, even with her stepfather's hobbies and past. Her herodom is very much incorporated into every other aspect of her otherwise reasonably normal life.

Aside from being the token youngest in her group, she's really nothing like Kitty. But honestly, she's very much like Jubilee. They're both bright and friendly, they're both very open-natured and more "doers" than "thinkers". They're both very clever, though it's occasionally deceptively hidden behind layers of *teenageness*. They're more adaptable/clever than they are book smart. They have healthy social lives. Heroing is fun and a responsibility but it's a part of their lives, not the whole thing.

Stargirl and Jubilee tend to both be portrayed as much more human than Kitty or most of their teammates. Both girls can be irresponsible and immature and very flighty, but both girls have their hearts in the right place. Both girls are something of the emotional hearts on their teams. Kitty was more of an equal, but Jubilee and Courtney are definitely junior members, but it's through their openness, honesty, loyalty and forthrightness that they become as much a symbol to the team as a member.

In that sense, she's the cheerleader of the team because she's what keeps morale up. (By the way, I'm pretty sure that he wasn't talking about her literally being a cheerleader.) She's a visible reminder to the rest of the team exactly why they keep fighting. She's a symbol of hope and the future, the next generation primed to carry the good fight into the future. And that's what she does! She's mature enough to even understand this. She does this bravely, knowingly and with all of her heart.

And that's why Stargirl is amazing. Not because she's a ballet dancer/ninja/hacker with a pet dragon. Not because she's got Ted Knight's Cosmic Rod or Sylvester Pemberton's belt. But because she's a normal, and yes, bubbly, teenaged girl who steps forward to do what she needs to do without ever sacrificing who she is in the process.

I've never liked the phrase "I don't know what book/movie/show, he's talking about..." because it's presumptuous and rude, dismissing any disagreement or differing opinion. In this case, though, our opinions are so directly opposite that it does seem as though we've been reading two completely different comic books altogether. Honestly, I wouldn't trade for a heartbeat.

And I'm pretty sure that if I scanned through Stars and S.T.R.I.P.E or JSA, I'd find at least one occurrance of Courtney chewing gum.