Young Girl superhero show/book?

So my daughter, who is 4, is starting to love the idea of superheroes. She asked for a SuperGirl costume for Hanukkah which she loves (and does an awesome super pose in). She likes the look of the spiderman costume. I think the initial draw was the costumes, in fact, and she is only now coming around to them doing super stuff.

Being a good geek dad I would like to encourage this. Anyone have recommendations for any kids shows or books or comics appropriate for 4 with good super women in them? It's not that super men aren't cool, but she loses interest in anything that doesn't have a cool female character in it. Which of course makes me aware of how difficult that can be to find sometimes.

We tried Power Puff girls 6 months or so ago but it was too scary; we'll try that again soon to see if that barrier has been lifted.
I had a random thought of Power Rangers but I know nothing about them. Would they work?

Thanks in advance for any help!

Pixar's The Incredibles could fit the bill here. I could see a 4-yr old dressing up as Violet.

At four, almost any media is too much in this genre. Superheroes are loud and their stories all have bad guys. I asked my kids and one of them recommended action figures as the way to go.

"Sometimes at Toys R Us they have these dolls that have arms that move. I think they have Iron Man and Gun Machine[[sic]."

At a little older, my son liked going through the Marvel Kids and Marvel Adventures books. Those a little more tame than the cartoons; the chibi ones are especially tame.

As for stuff on the screen, maybe KIKI'S DELIVERY SERVICE? She flies around.

Black Barney wrote: Pixar's The Incredibles could fit the bill here. I could see a 4-yr old dressing up as Violet.

Dude, no. That movie is crazy violent and intense.

Kiki's is a great idea regardless of whether you consider her a superhero.

Four is quite young. Kim Possible has a highly qualified female lead, but if PowerPuff is worrying her Kim will as well. Mojo Jojo ain't exactly the scariest villain you'll run into on TV. The other I'd recommend is Teen Titans which has legit female superheroes, but again, I think you'll need to wait a bit as there are bad guys that at times stick it to the Titans pretty hard. The early seasons are WAY more accessible than the stuff being released now by the way, if what I've seen recently is an indication the show was re-invented a year or two back.

S.

Disney it is then!

Black Barney wrote: Disney it is then!

That may be the best choice. Get her one of the Adjective films -- Brave, Frozen, Tangled, . . .

Sagrilarus wrote:

Black Barney wrote: Disney it is then!

That may be the best choice. Get her one of the Adjective films -- Brave, Frozen, Tangled, . . .

Again, I feel I have to jump in here--BRAVE probably has the scariest moments in any Pixar movie. When that Mom turns into a bear and then becomes like a wild animal. And Mordu is nightmare fuel. I haven't seen the others you mention. We cast about for a first Pixar movie for the kids, and it was tough. TOY STORY has Spike, TOY STORY 2 is maudlin, MONSTERS, INC has Randall, dem Hoppers in A BUG'S LIFE. We settled on WALL-E.

A bunch of you are rolling your eyes, I am sure, but my 6yo had to leave the class when they showed FREE WILLY at school, it was just too much. Even now they don't care for TOY STORY, at 10 and 8. With the 4yo around, the movie options are KIKI, MARY**, and TOTORO.

**Holy shit, MARY POPPINS is superheroic.

Yeah, ignore all these canned characters and let her imagination go.

My girls is three and loves to play dress-up superhero. She doesn't have an attachment to play any specific superhero and we buy her generic superhero garments from Etsy, Melissa and Doug and such. Heck, she doesn't even know the name of any superhero. We make up her names when she shows us her outfit.

I would stay away from the cartoons, movies and comic superheros as you'll fall into the trap of marketing and spending. That's a whole 'notha topic though.

At any rate, my daughter got into superheroes because she's into dress up from watching shows like Yo Gabba Gabba and the Aquabats Supershow. The combination of singing and innocent humor in both is great for the age group.

I know a 4-yr old girl who saw Tangled and dressed up like her for 2 years. I think that's a good safe bet.

jeb wrote: At a little older, my son liked going through the Marvel Kids and Marvel Adventures books. Those a little more tame than the cartoons; the chibi ones are especially tame.

As for stuff on the screen, maybe KIKI'S DELIVERY SERVICE? She flies around.

We have some of those chibi books and I love the Hulk in there:

When he gets excited by things like sunny days and ice cream cones he turns into the mean green playin' machine!

They keep that word 'mean' in there. Even the villains are all nice guys in those things.

My son is 2.5 and he finds Brave terrifying (we saw some of it at a friends house, the bear scares him). The Incredibles can't be watched either, there's too many deaths in it. Which is too bad because I love the Incredibles and think it's brilliant. There's some stupid Christian show called Veggie tales and they have a Pirate special my son loves, they may have a superhero themed one but finding something with a female lead will be difficult. I've tried really hard to ensure my son sees women and men in all roles and walks of life. I try to ensure that he sees both sexes doing amazing things. I'm surprised at how hard it is.

The female squirrel in SpongeBob is borderline superhero in some episodes, especially the karate one (which is brilliant anyway). You may be better off just sticking with toys and letting her imagination take over. My son loves super heroes from the toys but there's nothing for him to watch either unless I fast forward through most of the film. We hyper edit things on the fly when need be.

jeb wrote: A bunch of you are rolling your eyes, I am sure, but my 6yo had to leave the class when they showed FREE WILLY at school, it was just too much. Even now they don't care for TOY STORY, at 10 and 8. With the 4yo around, the movie options are KIKI, MARY**, and TOTORO.

**Holy shit, MARY POPPINS is superheroic.

Just want to say that I'm not rolling my eyes and that's pretty much how we approach scariness/violence with our kids at this age (7 and 4) as well. Our kids only get about an hour of video a month on top of that, so we try to make sure its all positive stuff. With a couple of close members of the extended family having died in the past year, they've got enough real-world darkness to deal with.

My son is 21-months-old and his favorite movie is The Incredibles. It used to be Cars, but now he's moving on to Arthur Christmas. All kids are different.

At 2 my daughter was obsessed with Godzilla, and has never shied away from superhero violence, but The Witches and Wizard of Oz are still terrifying at age 7. Some kids are just born with Ameritrash in them.