DC Bombshells by Marguerite Sauvage

DC Comics JewShowdown round 1B part 4

Both of those characters are not known as Jewish/known at all, but I put Miri here because I love her (most biased poll ever) and because her Jewishness is such an integral factor and trait in her character and I love that for her. Moyshe is here as the only representative of Hayoth, the Israeli superhero team because I didn't want any of them here (once again, rigged; I hated a group of Jewish characters so they're simply not an option) but he has a name that's incredibly similar to a relative of mine so I let him be. If you really want to vote for Hayoth, just vote for him lol.

I know their names are iconic but please please please consider the twins being named Miriam and Yusuf.

YUUP AND THATS THE QUEEN!!!

Miriam Batzel, the Shazam of Earth-X!

Born Willem Batzel, Miriam and her friends Freddy and Kit did whatever they needed to in order to survive the apocalyptic conditions that the US found itself in after the appearance of Overman and the German Reich’s overwhelming victory in World Wars II and III. Exploring the tunnels underneath what was once the city of New York, Miriam encountered something unusual: a functioning subway car, spewing impossibly bright lights and painted in bizarre, unnamed colors that move and shifted, as if they were arrive. Taken to the Garden of Eternity and brought before the great witch Shazam...you know the rest.

Returning to her own Earth, Miriam soon became one of the few people in the world to discover that Overman had left Earth decades ago, and soon found herself in the rogues gallery of his more violent successors, Cyborg Overman and the Eradicator. But there were allies to be found yet, on Earth-X...and elsewhere...

So Miriam is the DC Bombshells version of Mary Marvel. Bombshells is a pretty solid AU all around, and elements of it will probably make it to the main AU at some point, but obviously the setting suits Earths-2, 10, and 20 a bit better. I actually want to do a big E-20 post at some point, I have a big Lovecraftian OMAC take for that one that’s v Hellboy/Mignola inspired.

Anyway, as much as I like the Shazam sibling dynamic, Miriam here fills in for both Batson twins, while Freddy gets powers later on and Kit’s Kid Eternity will get more explicitly tied to Shazam and the Garden of Eternity.

“And I think it’s time for a different path. The path I was meant for... the path I already walked.” | Bombshells: United #22

No words...

Miri Marvel

Dear Shazam writer(s): don’t make it about Billy Batson

With what’s happening around the world with greater frequency and less (if any) consequence, please consider the Bombshells route. The Shazam movie needs to be about Miriam Bätzel, a young Jewish girl living under Nazi occupation, whose mystical powers come directly from adhering to her faith and never faltering in believing in her identity, her abject refusal to bow down to nazism.

And on another level, a lot of the harshness of Shazam for Billy is he’s “forced to grow up” basically. There’s a panel where Superman discovers Shazam is just a little boy and it’s heartbreaking.

(From Superman/Shazam: First Thunder #1-4,  Judd Winick and Joshua Middleton)

This little kid isn’t being allowed to be a little kid! Well, welcome to Being A Woman 101. Girls don’t mature faster than boys, they’re held responsible as adults earlier than boys. They are guilted, punished and gaslighted as soon as they become just tall enough, just curvy enough, just bloody enough. Trans girls are held at arm’s length like criminals, they have to fight right out the gate to be allowed to exist, let alone feel like a child. Girls who are black, latinx, non-white in any capacity are treated with mistrust and given harsher punishment and held to harder and higher standards far earlier than white girls.

The heart of Shazam is having your childhood ripped from you because of some “greater responsibility.” Is that not the female experience?

Re: that Bombshells anon/ask: Zatanna in that verse is actually Romani-Jewish! And aside from Kate Kane, there's also Felicity Smoak, one of the Batgirls and Miriam Batzel AKA Miri Marvel (Mary Marvel in the main verse).

Thank you for this follow up! Making Zee rroma-jewish is amazing. And thank you for reminding me of Felicity and Miri, both of whom are great characters in the series and uuuuh should date. 

DC Comics JewShowdown round 2B part 2

Oh it's getting even more difficult (for me) Miri you did great but you aren't gonna make it through this round sorry

Honestly, I don’t think I’ve read anything that I’ve more purely enjoyed than DC Bombshells. Here we have a reimagining of Billy Batson as Miriam Batzel, a Jewish girl invoking the names of Jewish heroines in a ghetto under attack by Nazi’s. Just brilliant.

ETA: Sorry - Mary Marvel