The Femme Fatale & Poison Ivy
If Batman stories take their inspirations from noir fiction, then Poison Ivy is the archetypical femme fatale. She controls men’s minds, and literally sentences them to their deaths with a kiss. For the majority of her 50-plus year existence, her role in Batman stories has been that of the deadly siren, a seductress who lures men in like flies and traps them.
In a noir story, while the male protagonists are allowed to be complex and walk in shades of gray, female characters are reduced to a rigid binary. You are either the innocent wife/maternal figure, or you are the seductive whore luring men into their doom. The Virgin-Whore dichotomy is remarkably stark in these stories, limiting the expressions of female sexuality, and damning those who take pride and power in it as villains.
That isn’t to say that the femme fatale archetype cannot be empowering. Women and effeminate queer people such as myself often see such characters as the only ones we can identify with in such stories. They’re the only places in noir fiction where women are allowed any power and agency, where they are able to transcend their intended role as objects of male desire. Their femininity has become a weapon, and with it they will carve out a space for themselves in a male-dominated world, or die trying. It’s hard not to relate to that.
In her debut episode on Batman the Animated Series, Poison Ivy is dating a pre-Two Face Harvey Dent, and even despite the limitations of children’s programming, emphasis is placed on her female charms and sexuality. She’s been barely with Dent a week, and already he’s talking about proposing to her. She’s administered a poison to him via a lipstick she’s created based off a rare plant. He collapses following a lengthy makeout session and is rushed to the hospital, where she then tries to do the same to Bruce Wayne in the parking lot. His loyalty to his friend Harvey is all that saves him from the same fate.
The episode takes on noir’s strangely puritanical views of sexuality. Bruce Wayne’s chastity spares him from Poison Ivy’s wicked wiles, while Harvey Dent is nearly murdered for giving into her temptations. Despite all this, it’s difficult not to admire Ivy’s complex plot.
This episode has her stripped of her plant-based super-powers. Instead, her brain is her most formidable weapon. She is a ruthlessly intelligent botanist and geneticist, and even comes armed with a stylish crossbow. Rather than depict her sexuality as her ultimate weapon, she is shown as being capable in many other regards.
Poison Ivy further complicates the femme fatale archetype with the addition of her ecological motivations. She sees nature being destroyed and snuffed out by corporate greed and pollution, and in her mind is waging a war for the fate of the planet itself. This renders her far more sympathetic than most comic book super-villains, particularly as we’ve come to understand how the effects of mankind’s disastrous practices on the environment contribute to global warming.
The live-action depiction of Poison Ivy in Joel Schumacher’s widely-criticized Batman & Robin is not so sympathetic.
While there’s definitely a lot about this movie I enjoy, particularly Uma Thurman’s delightfully campy performance, it’s so very emblematic of every problematic depiction of this character to date. Her motivation to save the planet feels at best a foot-note, and the scene where it features most prominently, we’re meant to make fun of it, rather than sympathize. Despite it being my favorite scene in the film for how hilarious Thurman’s expressions are, the scene paints her environmental concerns as hysterical and out-of-proportion. She is a parody of a militantly left environmental activist. One of the most complex aspects about her character, reduced to a joke.
Poison Ivy’s primary role as antagonist in this film is not so much her control over deadly mutant plants, or even her brilliant mind as in the animated series. Instead, she drives both Batman and Robin to lust over her, and then compete, thus rendering them vulnerable to Mr. Freeze’s plans. The threat to male power is a beautiful woman driving them apart.
This relates back to my primary issue with the femme fatale archetype as a whole. Poison Ivy is not a real person who exists with her own agency. She was dreamed up and created by men to titillate other men. Men create an archetype of a sexual object for their own enjoyment, projecting their desires onto that object, but with a warning that if she were to ever control this sexuality for herself, she would be a danger to them.
In the age of MeToo, this feels particularly insidious. We limit positive depictions of female sexuality to situations where they are passive objects, thus enforcing a culture of rape and oppressive power dynamics between men and women. Depictions of women who own and embrace their sexuality are portrayed as a threat to male power.
In Batman & Robin, Poison Ivy isn’t just a threat to the protagonists, but to her own allies. She manipulates and controls Bane. She murders Mr. Freeze’s wife to steal him all to herself, and propels him to destroy the world with ice. Every male-figure in the film falls prey to her seductive power.
So it’s fitting that Batgirl be the one who finally defeats her. I’d say this might be the film finding a moment of self-awareness in its troubling views of women, but really it feels like I’m just watching a direct visual representation of the previously discussed virgin-whore dichotomy. Batgirl criticizes Poison Ivy, saying she gives women a bad name by using her sexuality to manipulate men. Batgirl is the good woman because she is chaste and pure (despite wearing an outfit clearly designed to titillate male audience members), and Poison Ivy is the evil seductress.
Complicating matters, is that Poison Ivy in this film is born when she is murdered for refusing a man’s advances. Her coworker and colleague Dr. Jason Woodrue proposes a romantic partnership that she turns down. He flies into a rage and kills her with her own poisons, burying her beneath a pile of plants and chemicals. When she emerges later, he is her first victim. Batman & Robin is the story of a murdered woman taking revenge on the men who destroyed her, but Batgirl and her internalized misogyny is supposed to be our feminist hero.
Not every depiction of Poison Ivy is so harshly one-sided. In a later BTAS episode, Poison Ivy’s deep friendship with Harley Quinn is introduced. Despite her extreme misanthropy, Harley is someone Ivy cares deeply for, and has frequently come to her aid and defended her against her abusive lover, the Joker. In later comics, this friendship has blossomed into a full-blown romance between the two women.
Turning Poison Ivy into a queer character radically alters the inherent sexist nature of the archetype. Her sexuality isn’t for men. She cares little for them. It is for her, and it is for those who she chooses to share it with. That her love for Harley Quinn is shown frequently to be genuine and selfless adds yet another layer of sympathy to the character. Instead of demonizing her for her sexuality, she is humanized by it.
As our understanding of the effects of corporations and capitalism upon the environment grows, so too did comic’s depictions of Poison Ivy’s motivations and character. Her love for Harley Quinn was only just the beginning, as it was later revealed that despite her violent form of activism, Poison Ivy has a maternal side, a love for all vulnerable beings beneath her protection. This protection isn’t just limited to Harley and her plants, but also orphaned children, who she has taken to live with her and sheltered during some of Gotham’s darker days.
The Poison Ivy of today is a far more complex character than is typically allotted by the limiting femme fatale archetype. She remains a dangerous and deadly adversary, but her powers have become as multi-sided as her personality. She can create life as well as take it. She no longer sits so easily on one side of the virgin-whore dichotomy, but walks between multiple shades of lover, monster, and increasingly, hero.
While I criticized the video-game Arkham Knight for it’s hyper-violent and borderline fascist depiction of Batman, I’m grateful that it’s the first game in the series to respect Ivy’s growth throughout her history as a character. While she remains a dangerous figure, she understands the larger picture of what is at stake in Gotham, and allies with Batman to use her control and communication with nature to help save the city. She even goes so far as to sacrifice herself by giving the last of her power to protect others.
In various depictions of Poison Ivy, she is often both used to titillate male audiences, while punishing and demonizing female sexuality. This is an insult to the growth and stories that have fueled the character over the years, and made her one of the most dynamic and interesting women in the whole of the Batman mythos. As the tv series Gotham pushes its own depiction of Poison Ivy further on her evolution, I can hope that it’ll look to the legacy of the character, and respect her growth outside of her original archetype, instead of falling back on lazy stereotypical depictions of the evil sexy temptress.
Make Poison Ivy gay dammit.
Dorian Dawes is the author of the queer horror anthology Harbinger Island. Their non-fiction and essay work has been featured in Bitch Media, Your Tango, Gay Pop Buzz, and the Huffington Post. You can support their work at patreon.com/doriandawes
