Silk Purse, Sow's Ear

When Barbara Gordon was shot, it looked like the end of the story for Batgirl.

After twenty years of kicking ass and taking names, she was humiliated, crippled and taken off the streets, purely to affect the men in her life. And if a strong, healthy woman couldn't take control of her own storyline, what was the outlook for a paraplegic woman?

Ask John Ostrander.

The pages of Suicide Squad saw the introduction of Oracle, a mystery computer hacker who was popping up all over the DCU. It wasn't long before it was confirmed that Barbara Gordon, former librarian and geek supreme, was behind the keyboard.

With the launch of Birds of Prey, Babs became leader of her own team of kick-ass women. She knows what's happening and who's doing it and she uses that knowledge to get the job done. On top of which, she's one of the few people who will stand up to Batman.

But she's not perfect. In fact, she's far from it. The same things that make her so good as Oracle make her personal life painful. She's interfering. She believes she knows what's best for everybody in her life, and she will manipulate them and others 'for their benefit'. We won't even start on the Wheelchair Issues.

In short, Babs rocks.

So it is perfectly possible to take an initially unpromising character and turn them into somebody who it's a pleasure to see on the page.

Let's take a look at the most obvious male fantasy figure to hit the four-colour pages. Yep, the alien princess with a tragic past, fantastic hair and a very skimpy wardrobe - Koriand'r.

She arrives on the scene wearing a few bits of purple ribbon, proceeds to blast the crap out of everything in the area and then snogs the nearest male. You can practically tick the boxes.

Hot: check.

Sexually open: check.

Powerful: check.

Tragic past from which she needs to be rescued: check.

Yes, folks, we have a full score!

And yet…

Over the years, something has happened. Kory has become far more than a sex object. Sure, she's still gorgeous and she still wears a few strands of purple ribbon. But that has become less important than the fact that she's warm, caring, emotional, quick-tempered and liable to do what she thinks is right. For a few years, she even had trousers!

We don't want sexy characters abolished. We just want them to be more than sexy.