Ask, and Ye Shall Receive...Answers: Episode 38

Have you ever noticed that there's so many red-headed females and blonde-haired dudes in comic books?

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41 Comments

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reignmaker

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@g_man: Was hanging off every word, GMan. And then at 04:59 the background music completely took over for me and my mind went to its happy place.

As for the question, I think I agree that it has to do with the visual appeal. Furthermore, red is a power color. Many of these female characters have red hair to go along with their strong, independent personalities.

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AllStarSuperman

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Edited By AllStarSuperman

@reignmaker said:

@g_man: Was hanging off every word, GMan. And then at 04:59 the background music completely took over for me and my mind went to its happy place.

As for the question, I think I agree that it has to do with the visual appeal. Furthermore, red is a power color. Many of these female characters have red hair to go along with their strong, independent personalities.

first of all i went off on that same music. its late and i cant concintrate. and i agree with what you say about red being a powerful color. i also see it like it being non realistic. i mean most comics arnt realistic so why would hair color need to be? i disagree with blonde males being the most attractive. Superman, Batman, Ironman, Nightwing, Redhood, Red Robin, are all dark hair colored. and now that i think of it all my favorite superheroes have dark hair: Superman, Nightwing, Ultimate Spider-Man, Static, Ben 10. But im a dude so what do i know?

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animehunter

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Edited By animehunter

Just watched your video, very interesting never really gave it much thought and thanks to you I'll be seeing red heads everywhere, even in my sleep.

regarding the emotionally meaning of colours I found this info that might shed some light

Source: http://www.color-wheel-pro.com/color-meaning.html

there is more of the same info at these as well

http://www.empower-yourself-with-color-psychology.com/meaning-of-colors.html

http://crystal-cure.com/color-meanings.html

http://mylifemystuff.wordpress.com/2012/04/26/emotional-and-psychological-meaning-of-colours/

Red

Red is the color of fire and blood, so it is associated with energy, war, danger, strength, power, determination as well as passion, desire, and love.

Red is a very emotionally intense color. It enhances human metabolism, increases respiration rate, and raises blood pressure. It has very high visibility, which is why stop signs, stoplights, and fire equipment are usually painted red. In heraldry, red is used to indicate courage. It is a color found in many national flags.

Red brings text and images to the foreground. Use it as an accent color to stimulate people to make quick decisions; it is a perfect color for 'Buy Now' or 'Click Here' buttons on Internet banners and websites. In advertising, red is often used to evoke erotic feelings (red lips, red nails, red-light districts, 'Lady in Red', etc). Red is widely used to indicate danger (high voltage signs, traffic lights). This color is also commonly associated with energy, so you can use it when promoting energy drinks, games, cars, items related to sports and high physical activity.

Light red represents joy, sexuality, passion, sensitivity, and love.

Pink signifies romance, love, and friendship. It denotes feminine qualities and passiveness.

Dark red is associated with vigor, willpower, rage, anger, leadership, courage, longing, malice, and wrath.

Brown suggests stability and denotes masculine qualities.

Reddish-brown is associated with harvest and fall.

Orange

Orange combines the energy of red and the happiness of yellow. It is associated with joy, sunshine, and the tropics. Orange represents enthusiasm, fascination, happiness, creativity, determination, attraction, success, encouragement, and stimulation.

To the human eye, orange is a very hot color, so it gives the sensation of heat. Nevertheless, orange is not as aggressive as red. Orange increases oxygen supply to the brain, produces an invigorating effect, and stimulates mental activity. It is highly accepted among young people. As a citrus color, orange is associated with healthy food and stimulates appetite. Orange is the color of fall and harvest. In heraldry, orange is symbolic of strength and endurance.

Orange has very high visibility, so you can use it to catch attention and highlight the most important elements of your design. Orange is very effective for promoting food products and toys.

Dark orange can mean deceit and distrust.

Red-orange corresponds to desire, sexual passion, pleasure, domination, aggression, and thirst for action.

Gold evokes the feeling of prestige. The meaning of gold is illumination, wisdom, and wealth. Gold often symbolizes high quality.

Yellow

Yellow is the color of sunshine. It's associated with joy, happiness, intellect, and energy.

Yellow produces a warming effect, arouses cheerfulness, stimulates mental activity, and generates muscle energy. Yellow is often associated with food. Bright, pure yellow is an attention getter, which is the reason taxicabs are painted this color. When overused, yellow may have a disturbing effect; it is known that babies cry more in yellow rooms. Yellow is seen before other colors when placed against black; this combination is often used to issue a warning. In heraldry, yellow indicates honor and loyalty. Later the meaning of yellow was connected with cowardice.

Use yellow to evoke pleasant, cheerful feelings. You can choose yellow to promote children's products and items related to leisure. Yellow is very effective for attracting attention, so use it to highlight the most important elements of your design. Men usually perceive yellow as a very lighthearted, 'childish' color, so it is not recommended to use yellow when selling prestigious, expensive products to men – nobody will buy a yellow business suit or a yellow Mercedes. Yellow is an unstable and spontaneous color, so avoid using yellow if you want to suggest stability and safety. Light yellow tends to disappear into white, so it usually needs a dark color to highlight it. Shades of yellow are visually unappealing because they loose cheerfulness and become dingy.

Dull (dingy) yellow represents caution, decay, sickness, and jealousy.

Light yellow is associated with intellect, freshness, and joy.

Green

Green is the color of nature. It symbolizes growth, harmony, freshness, and fertility. Green has strong emotional correspondence with safety. Dark green is also commonly associated with money.

Green has great healing power. It is the most restful color for the human eye; it can improve vision. Green suggests stability and endurance. Sometimes green denotes lack of experience; for example, a 'greenhorn' is a novice. In heraldry, green indicates growth and hope. Green, as opposed to red, means safety; it is the color of free passage in road traffic.

Use green to indicate safety when advertising drugs and medical products. Green is directly related to nature, so you can use it to promote 'green' products. Dull, darker green is commonly associated with money, the financial world, banking, and Wall Street.

Dark green is associated with ambition, greed, and jealousy.

Yellow-green can indicate sickness, cowardice, discord, and jealousy.

Aqua is associated with emotional healing and protection.

Olive green is the traditional color of peace.

Blue

Blue is the color of the sky and sea. It is often associated with depth and stability. It symbolizes trust, loyalty, wisdom, confidence, intelligence, faith, truth, and heaven.

Blue is considered beneficial to the mind and body. It slows human metabolism and produces a calming effect. Blue is strongly associated with tranquility and calmness. In heraldry, blue is used to symbolize piety and sincerity.

You can use blue to promote products and services related to cleanliness (water purification filters, cleaning liquids, vodka), air and sky (airlines, airports, air conditioners), water and sea (sea voyages, mineral water). As opposed to emotionally warm colors like red, orange, and yellow; blue is linked to consciousness and intellect. Use blue to suggest precision when promoting high-tech products.

Blue is a masculine color; according to studies, it is highly accepted among males. Dark blue is associated with depth, expertise, and stability; it is a preferred color for corporate America.

Avoid using blue when promoting food and cooking, because blue suppresses appetite. When used together with warm colors like yellow or red, blue can create high-impact, vibrant designs; for example, blue-yellow-red is a perfect color scheme for a superhero.

Light blue is associated with health, healing, tranquility, understanding, and softness.

Dark blue represents knowledge, power, integrity, and seriousness.

Purple

Purple combines the stability of blue and the energy of red. Purple is associated with royalty. It symbolizes power, nobility, luxury, and ambition. It conveys wealth and extravagance. Purple is associated with wisdom, dignity, independence, creativity, mystery, and magic.

According to surveys, almost 75 percent of pre-adolescent children prefer purple to all other colors. Purple is a very rare color in nature; some people consider it to be artificial.

Light purple is a good choice for a feminine design. You can use bright purple when promoting children's products.

Light purple evokes romantic and nostalgic feelings.

Dark purple evokes gloom and sad feelings. It can cause frustration.

White

White is associated with light, goodness, innocence, purity, and virginity. It is considered to be the color of perfection.

White means safety, purity, and cleanliness. As opposed to black, white usually has a positive connotation. White can represent a successful beginning. In heraldry, white depicts faith and purity.

In advertising, white is associated with coolness and cleanliness because it's the color of snow. You can use white to suggest simplicity in high-tech products. White is an appropriate color for charitable organizations; angels are usually imagined wearing white clothes. White is associated with hospitals, doctors, and sterility, so you can use white to suggest safety when promoting medical products. White is often associated with low weight, low-fat food, and dairy products.

Black

Black is associated with power, elegance, formality, death, evil, and mystery.

Black is a mysterious color associated with fear and the unknown (black holes). It usually has a negative connotation (blacklist, black humor, 'black death'). Black denotes strength and authority; it is considered to be a very formal, elegant, and prestigious color (black tie, black Mercedes). In heraldry, black is the symbol of grief.

Black gives the feeling of perspective and depth, but a black background diminishes readability. A black suit or dress can make you look thinner. When designing for a gallery of art or photography, you can use a black or gray background to make the other colors stand out. Black contrasts well with bright colors. Combined with red or orange – other very powerful colors – black gives a very aggressive color scheme.

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Zeeguy91

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Wow. This is awesome. Thanks for answering my question, @g_man.

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kamionero

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I think it's a "looks good in print" issue. For the same reason the Hulk is green and not gray. If blue hair was normal there would be blue haired ppl (although to be fair, Wonder woman and Barda often look blue!) because it looks striking and colorful. Especially older characters where they had just primary colors to work with and black was expensive and brown just looked blah... so they went with Red and Yellow... the two colors left.

More women have red because they have more hair. Their skin is already yellow... so if they have a lot of hair they just look like yellow blobs (when color shades are limited), so they go with red.

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iceslick

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@g_man I honestly think it's the sex appeal in this world. I don't normally find blonde guys attractive. But, I do want to say this there is two women in my extended family that were born with very reddish hair like the comics. Knowing them for so many years they always told them that the red hair always got the men's attention. I just think men just love "RED HAIR". I don't know why...hair is just hair...to me I don't see the appeal. lol There isn't that many blonde hair characters I can think of by the way, Captain America, Hawkeye, Iron Fist, Human Torch and Constantine. I can understand for Black Widow because she's Russian and red hair seem to be a popular hair gene in Russia. But the others not so much and I noticed Pepper Potts is kind of orangey now for some odd reason. Anyways, there's just too many red heads in the Marvel U that it gets TOO CONFUSING on who's who. Seriously, I think Marvel needs to get new hair colors like blue, green or purple. lol (I guess green always goes with purple).

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lifeboy

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Edited By lifeboy

Gman, I like comic characters based on a lot of things. One reason that sticks out is when characters look like people that are real. For example, I like zatanna because she looks like phoebe cates. And I 'like' mat murdock because helooks like robert redford (not sure but I think mat is blond). Also I like certain people because they look like comic characters. For example martha maccullen and kimberly guilfoyle from fox news look like powergirl and huntress.

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lifeboy

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Edited By lifeboy

BTW, awesome question zeeguy91

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Med

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Aesthetically, blondes are considered "dumb" and brunettes are "boring". Weird hair colors can't be used for every character, so the only remaining option is red, which the character designers go on to make rich and luscious beyond reality.

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Vulshock

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Maybe they used that hair color back in the day as a way to distinguish the female characters from one another.

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Crimsonlord53

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Look at the outfit's the ladies are wearing green and black red look's good against those colour's.

Sara Pezzzini dose the red head thing best been drawn/coloured with auburn hair most of the time.

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victorcheenoanleu

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My input is that Jason Todd was once a ginger & Batman was like, "I refuse to raise a ginger!" So to piss batman off he recruited two other gingers & they're now known as "RED Hood & the Outlaws." Hmm.... gingers are just vengeful people lol

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FlashDamn

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Maybe creators just love the color red(I personally love it) as it is a color that can stick in the mind get remembered or it makes the character more noticeable,more important maybe i guess

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Caladorcp

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I think it's about personality. I might be wrong, but I think when a character to is created, they are visually designed to fit a specific personality. A lot of the woman you mentioned are very strong characters (and not just because they are super strong physically). Mystique, Jean Grey, Black Widow, they all have a certain strong personality.

Of course there are strong characters without red hair, but there may be other qualities too that tend to steer a creator in different directions.

I may be wrong...but I think I may be on to something...

Also, visually red just pops. It attracts your eye.

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tupiaz

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@animehunter: Even though I agree and that what I have learned in school a source would help.

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TheManInTheShoe

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I think the reason why women are red-headed in comics is because red-heads are less common in real life, which makes the characters more special in the comic books. But when there are so many red-headed characters it's not special anymore.

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Fantasgasmic

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Edited By Fantasgasmic

I can't seem to find it, but there was a great Captain America page where the Red Skull was taunting Cap because he is Hitler's ideal Aryan Ãœbermensch: blond hair, blue eyes, physically superior.

As a black haired, brown eyed person, I think we of the darker hair and eyes don't always stand out. Our hair and eye colors are Dominant Traits, so they're more common. That's the simple reason I think there are so many blondes and redheads in comics. The background characters are brunettes and black haired folk (who don't even get our own word) so the main characters stand out. And when there are dark haired characters, they often have blue eyes, like Batman.

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cbishop

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@g_man The reason so many villain costumes are green and purple is because of the old four color presses that comics were originally printed on. There were only so many colors to work with, so when the heroes' costumes were one set of colors, the villains got the contrasting colors - so for many of them, that meant green and purple.

Hair is just a similar thing - it's aesthetics; how it contrasts with the costumes and such.

In the 90's, when they went to different paper and different printing processes, they also were able to go with different coloring processes. Artists got more "realistic" about what a person's color choices would be for their costumes, and we wound up with a lot of black leather and brown trenchcoats... and everything looked muddy and run together, and it was hard to tell the characters apart.

Which is why I'm still for spandex heroes, even though they'd never wear that stuff in real life.

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Mucklefluga

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Mabye there are so many pure red heads because having a pure red colour hair is extreme. This makes the female characters more appealing to guys and makes us pick up their comics because they are 'extreme'.

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The_Vein

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@fantasgasmic: That's an amazing strip.

I wish more people would be worried about Bruce Wayne's obsession with young, vulnerable boys who look like small version of himself that he dresses in tight outfits and spend all night with.

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blur99

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More than likely it's because red hair really stands out in a comic.

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Tyrannotaur

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Edited By Tyrannotaur

I agree with others that have said that Red as a color stands out more than your average browns and blacks. Blonde too stands out for the most part. I've heard about studies saying that the trait in the human genome for red hair is slowly going extinct. That could possibly be a reason as to why we see it in comics often. Its something rare and being rare makes it special.

I have to say that the time I spent with red headed characters growing up are the main reason why now its something I find attractive in women. I blame Mary Jane, Black Widow, Jessica Rabbit, Hellcat, Firestar, Scarlet, Etc for that. Oh and Hayley Williams, but thats from my college years. There's just something special about red hair that makes the person more attractive. At least to me.

I can't really speak about the blonde male character thing as I don't find men attractive. I doubt it has to do with the superior race thing that Hitler was preaching about and more with the fact that alot of men back in the 50's and 60s were blonde. Its the same reason so many classic characters are named Hank, Henry, Scott, Barry, Betty, Mary, Sue, Johnny etc. It's name that were more popular back then then now. I assume creators like Stan Lee wanted the characters to seem like the "everyman", rather than a more unique person.

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Fantasgasmic

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mattwing87

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I am blonde haired in real life and when I see Cap, Hawkeye, Iron Fist, Flash, Cannonball it makes me feel somewhat better. Blonde guys don't get much love in real life :(. Society favors dark hair more than light hair it seems. I am more attracted to brunette girls but I don't pass up on blonde girls though.

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dcfox

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Edited By dcfox

There's only one way to answer this question. I think @g_man needs to have Stan Lee on the Wednesday podcast.

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HeraldofGanthet

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Blonde hair? I've got three words for ya: "Curse of Kordax".

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TheHeat

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I love red heads, especially if they're Irish.

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Tazirai

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I dont buy into the Blonde being the most attractive thing. For maybe Euro style Westerners, maybe. But I live in a diverse world, and find all types attractive. As a Black male im drawn to women with all color locks, but usually not blonde. I find real world Red Heads amazing and personality wise strong and capable. Not all but the majority of them, hence I'm attracted to that. Lately however My love of British Psylocke has me seeing alot in girls with purple hair. It takes a certain type of guts to walk around with purple locks.

The posting about purple and pink, fit her to a T! It's the female Superheroine I was attracted to the most. She was tall, regal, elegant and had that royal dignity about her. Loved it. Im a bit like Scott SUmmers, I love Telepaths, and most are of the "abnormal" hair color variety. Only two blonde Telepaths I love to death are Mentala, and Saturn Girl. Esper Lass had that Black haired thing going on, loved that.

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Battle_Forum_Junkie

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@g_man

You forgot Star-Lord. He's blonde now...

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RedheadedAtrocitus

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I owe it to the fact that redheads are a seriously low-numbered type in the human species that comic creators want to overcompensate for it on the pages and panels of the comics they write. Just my silly and fun opinion :) Blonde males on the other hand I'm not sure about...though I really say I cannot understand the appeal. Maybe its something that attracts females? As for female redheads I think its just another appeal factor as well and reader-males enjoy it.

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Billdevil

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Edited By Billdevil

<p>In several of these cases, these are classic characters, and their hair colors were limited by the color palet back in the day. Bond was yellow, ginger was red and black was blue. Ie Black Panther in a blue outfit. Now that comic characters are more diverse, the color situation has changed little. African Americas, and Asians generally have very dark hair.</p>

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Mandrewgora

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Edited By Mandrewgora

I got no complaints, towards them Redheads.

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dangermart

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You don't see many redheads in real life, Tony? Come to Scotland, we have 13% ... and while I'm an English brown-haired incomer, my baby brother's a ginge, as were my grandads ... want to borrow some ginger genes?

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Rafa Lee

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Edited By Rafa Lee

Well i believe everything comes down to the primary colors RED, BLUE and Yellow our famous RGB, so you can not have characters with Blue hair so that comes into the costumes, but you can have Red hair or Yellow (blonde).

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deactivated-579e79a09210d

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After, you posted this. I try to think of blonde and brunette girls and there are not as many as I thought there. Just look at Ness in my profile picture.

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Raw_Material

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Nice to point it out like that. Lol.

There are countless of Redheads and Blonde haired dudes in comic books. As an example, I'll be sticking with my blonde haired dude, Aquaman and his redheaded wife Mera. Atlantean law states that any being born with blonde hair is a curse and so Aquaman as a baby was exiled to Mercy Reef, left to die. I think the color schemes are definitely what attracts a lot of reader, but also think they should apply a different color of hair, here and there. Like you said girls usually dye their hair that specific color, so it would be nice to see some of the non natural redheads to show their blonde or brunette side. I tend to be more intrigued by blonde hair women such as Emma Frost, Invisible Woman, Star Girl...I mean the list goes on. But I think the main reason why colorists favor more readheads and blondes I believe is because of the sexuality concept of it all. Look at the movie aspects, Black Widow in the Avengers and Mary Jane in Spider-Man...damnn don't they just look hot AF.

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Raw_Material

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Edited By Raw_Material

P.S. I wonder how Scott Snyder's taking all of this in. Having the fact that his wife's a natural redhead.