Great... now movie posters are sexist?

[Homeless Nutter]

I just see a Smurf person choking a Smurf person. Many people see it as a Smurf man choking a Smurf woman though so I expect many people to think it is sexist.

As for the caption: The character doing the choking, Apocalypse, believes all the weak should be killed and only the strong mutants should survive. That's regardless of gender. Basically the caption is X-Men related.

The poster is a piece of promotional material, out of context. The slogan may be the words of a villain - but there is nothing there to inform non-nerds of that. Someone unfamiliar with X-men can clearly see a large, masculine character choking a small female character - the gender distinction is unmissable. This can be misinterpreted in very disturbing ways.

Say - what if you saw a similar poster for a WWII movie, where a Nazi was choking a Jew (or, say - a strong-chinned alien with a swastika, choking a smaller alien with a yarmulka and a large nose), with the slogan "Only the strong will survive."? Wouldn't that seem somewhat in bad taste, to say the least, as well, as potentially suggesting "alternative" interpretations, for people with particular views, regarding race?

I don't know if the X-Men image is sexist per se (although the creators had many mutants available for the poster, most of them male - yet they chose a female one to be choked by the "strong" character), but it obviously promotes violence against people, who are physically weaker, unless you are intimately familiar with X-men lore. Which a great number of people are not. If a marketing company chooses an image, or a slogan to be displayed out of context - it's their damn job, to make sure it's not going to inspire misinterpretations. That's what they're paid for...

EDIT: Unless, of course, the whole controversy was premeditated, in order to trump up publicity for another run-of-the-mill comic book movie.