There is always a question that is being asked about religion and pop culture and where it fits in the medium. As religious peoples ourselves, who frequent other religious pop culture blogs like Beneath the Tangles, it’s safe to say that we exist there as much as we exist in real life.

Whether it is Star Wars or Bee and PuppyCat, religion and it’s undertones are going to show; but they wont always be represented in it’s clear form and most often will get ignored. Representation. A word that’s been used so many times now, people believe when companies add or change a character it’s due to fill a status quo. Obviously not. We know full well that we don’t have the powers of our favorite fictional show, we just want to be there.

In an interview in 2015 with Newsarama, the late Stan Lee said the following about the costume design for Spider-Man,

“What I like about the costume is that anybody reading Spider-Man in any part of the world can imagine that they themselves are under the costume. And that’s a good thing”

Stan Lee, 2015

One of the great things about comics, especially Marvel, is just that. So the question arises to, why all the distress about Ms. Marvel? Even though her first appearance was August 2013 in Captain Marvel issue #17, people still feel as though Marvel is trying to meet a status quo. The unfortunate reality is, Muslims already existed in multiple comic universes.

Green Lantern (Simon Baz) – DC’s Green Lantern Corps

Dust (Soorayah Qadir) – Marvel’s X-Men

M (Monet St. Croix) – Marvel’s X-Men/ Uncanny X-Men/Earth 616

Buraaq (Yusuf Abdullah) – Split Moon Arts

Josiah X (Josiah Al-Hajj Saddiq) – Marvel Earth 616
A byproduct of Nazi’s trying to continue on making super soldiers like Captain America

The Nightrunner (Bilal Asselah) – DC New Earth

Silver Scorpion (Bashir Bari) – Liquid Comics
A disabled Muslim superhero

Now that we know the Muslim heroes exist, why not cast them with their real life counterparts.