Move over Tony Stark, there's a new Iron Man in town and she's not even a man! The newest character making her way into the Marvel Universe is Riri Williams, a "science genius who enrolls in MIT at the age of 15" and "comes to the attention of Tony when she makes her own Iron Man suit in her dorm." This announcement comes after the much needed effort Marvel has put into creating a more diverse set of superheros. This past year, the company released details about two new superheros in the works, a female Thor and a Muslim teen named Ms. Marvel.
The creator of "Iron Man," Brian Michael Bendis, recently spoke with Time Magazine about his creation of Riri Williams. The idea of a young, black, female superhero came to him during his time working on a television show in Chicago. The show never aired due to the amount of violent content. He states, "This story of this brilliant, young woman whose life was marred by tragedy that could have easily ended her life-- just random street violence--and went off to college was very inspiring to me. I thought that this was the most modern version of a superhero of superheroine story I had ever heard. And I sat with it awhile until I had the right character and the right place."
While many are elated at adding Riri Williams to the Marvel Universe, a subset of fans are not pleased. The group argues against adding more diverse characters, claiming that the prexisting ones should suffice. Bendis hopes that in time, these naysayers will come around to a more progressive way of thinking. However, Bendis said that the praise and love that has come from the addition of new characters has vastly outweighed the negativity. He states, "there was part of an audience crawling through the desert looking for an oasis when it came to representation, and now that it's here, you'll go online and greeted with this wave of love."
So, why has it taken so long for the Avengers to transition away from a group of white men to a more diverse cast? Bendis says that many of the early creators of the series wish that they had created characters that were more representative of the world. He discusses that the world was different during the creation of the series, but that he is ecstatic this is the way that not only Marvel is moving, but the world.
Riri made her first appearance in "Invincible Iron Man #6" and will appear in "Civil War II."
