Wrote this rant after these articles posted on comicbookmovie.com:

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The writer was trying to defend that DARNA isn't a WONDER WOMAN rip-off... Which I think is pretty stupid.

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You know what? I'm gonna have to stop you right there. This is going too far.

I'm a FILIPINO ARTIST living here in the Philippines.

I was wondering what the hell the article promoting GMA's "new" Darna installment was doing in a site like this when I first saw it. You dug a hole for yourself right then and there when you released that news... Now you're stumbling to defend against the fact that DARNA IS a WONDER WOMAN rip-off.

I read your article that's suppose to defend Darna not being a Wonder Woman rip-off and gave it a chance. You know what I was expecting? That you were going to be giving out a proof that the Filipinos designed the costume and back story of Darna before Wonder Woman. You know what you did? You just gave a useless history of how Darna came to be... Worse - You actually admitted in this article that she IS in fact a rip-off.

I know a lot of Filipino artists out there are going to get offended by what I have to say, but I feel that I have to say it cause you're in denial about a lot of stuff concerning this matter. MARS RAVELO is probably a legend and has inspired a lot of the great Filipino comic artists that we have today like Carlo Pagulayan and Leinil Yu... Respects to him for giving out the inspiration. But you are claiming something that is obviously not. You just shot yourself in the ass my friend... The people reading your article aren't stupid and blind.

I'm writing this comment to counter your denial of an obvious fact and perhaps you might learn a thing or two from this. All the facts that I present to you are based offa WIKIPEDIA. You've already admitted that Darna is a visual rip-off of Wonder Woman... Let's go deeper shall we? Read on.


-Let's start with the dates... VARGA was created in 1947 and WONDER WOMAN on 1941. So Wonder Woman came FIRST.

-WONDER WOMAN was created during WORLD WAR 2. VARGA was created by MARS RAVELO because he thought that the Filipinos needed a superhero AFTER WORLD WAR 2.

-VARGA's original back story was she was an alien whose planet exploded and she came to earth. (SUPERMAN rip-off).

-VARGA became DARNA and her back story was changed into ... She is a warrior from outer space who manifested herself through a girl from earth. (WONDER WOMAN and THOR rip-off)

There weren't that many superheroes back during those days when Darna was conceived which leaves a lot of room for originality in both visuals and character back stories. Why the hell are the character designs and back story so close to foreign superheroes? It's one thing to be inspired by someone else's concepts and try to create your own thing based offa that inspiration, and another thing to directly copy someone else's work and actually be in denial about it when you get caught despite the fact that it's pretty damn obvious. That's called forgery. I don't care if MARS RAVELO or the filmmakers that you mentioned were the ones responsible for this but it's still what it is and you didn't do jack defending your precious DARNA and her creator.


I'm gonna add to this a few other examples of how we FILIPINOS tend to rip things off from the west coz you're asking for it....

- GAGAMBOY. "Gagamba" is the tagalog translation of the word "Spider" for all you foreigners out there. Yes, it IS a rip-off of SPIDERMAN.

- LASTIKMAN is the Pinoy counterpart of the DC hero."PLASTIC MAN". Lastikman was also created by MARS RAVELO. Google "lastikman, vic sotto" to see the Pinoy superhero film where the design of this character is another obvious proof of a rip-off, shades and everything.

- CAPTAIN BARBELL (Also created by Mars Ravelo). A college student that turns into a muscled superhero when he lifts a golden barbell. There's THOR.

- When THE LORD OF THE RINGS was released, we followed up with ENCANTADIA and the "FANTASERYE" genre exploded.


My point to all this (specially the last example) is the fact that we DO follow up on what the west is doing and are highly influenced by what they've started. That's not such a bad thing as Hollywood really is the leader in Movie Entertainment I think. (Although a bunch of other countries are catching up/have caught up already). It's another thing to rip-off and deny everything at the end. That's bad.

I believe we Filipinos are better than just following up on what others have already started. We can do something on our own. Your article on denying all these facts about Darna isn't helping.

I'm sorry to all those aspiring artists that I may have offended. I just want to remind everyone that we should aspire more than to just try to reach up to the level of what's set as a standard by other countries. Well... That's not bad I guess... But stop ripping the shit out of the stuff that you see in the effin' movies s'all I'm saying. Hollywood is doing enough of a good job ripping itself off and recycling (mostly destroying) old material already.

MORE POWER TO ALL PINOY ARTISTS~!

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*Tightens grip on spear and raises shield*