I’ve seen some comparisons between the Dora Milaje and Black Widows that gloss over a really key point.
The Dora Milaje are not abused.
Debate who’s more skilled or who’s better for a specific task, absolutely. (At this point, both comics and film canon is pretty overwhelmingly on the side of the Dora Milaje in every match-up we’ve seen, but there are certainly areas where people could have a good-spirited discussion, or imagine an amazing team-up.)
But I think that it’s really important to be explicit about this in any comparison: the Dora Milaje choose their role. They get to decide how to best use their own skills. In current comics canon and all MCU canon, everyone in the Red Room had their choices were taken away from them and their stories are either of taking that back, being corrupted by what was done to them, or death.
The Dora Milaje are champions of Wakanda. They are warriors; some are also spies. But they all have agency, and they have personalities. They were not depersonalized or stripped of their rights to make choices.
Arguably, the fact that being a member of the Dora Milaje is an honor, and that they choose to be there, is part of what makes them the best. And that says so many positive things, about both Wakanda as a country and about the Dora Milaje in particular and, more broadly, about the importance of women having agency over their own lives.
It disrespects the Dora Milaje to compare their training to the Red Room.
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