(no subject)

[liptonrm_backup]

Am feeling spammy tonight.

You know what I'm tired of in genre tv? The shows about the geeky guys who, for whatever reason, have kinda cool abnormal things happen to them and a whole television is spawned from that event. Sure, great, fine, but where are the shows about geeky girls? And don't try to bring up Buffy. I love Buffy but she so totally does not fit the criterion before or after her Slayer-fication (and neither does Willow, for other sidekick-y reasons).

It's just, I get tired sometimes (ok, more than sometimes) of how television seems to completely disregard the single adult female geek portion of the population. Okay, so we're not a terribly huge segment of the viewing public but we are among the most loyal. And, gah, once again I'm having a hard time articulating why exactly this rankles so much.

And it's not even as if this is a problem only affecting genre television. It's endemic across the board. There are far fewer books about female superheroes, most fantasy and sci-fi novels have male protagonists as do the vast majority of genre movies. There are, of course, some wonderful exceptions to that generalized rule but they are few and far between. When's the last time a girl from a small town discovered that she had some innate specialness and headed off on a hero's quest? Even genre fiction written by women tends to highlight male characters.

So sue me, I find women interesting. I would like to one day have the experience of reading a book or watching a tv show and for once be able to identify with the female character rather than one of the male. It would be nice.

Here endeth the rant.

One of these days I might put up a whole post about how Supernatural is gender subversive, in a way, and how a show that wraps itself in the trappings of traditional American masculinity is traditionally female in perspective. But today is not that day. ;-)

Comments

[hiyacynth.livejournal.com]

I love you and want to bear your fandom babies.

You know, when NMRL gets turned into a movie and then the book gets retroactively published, it's going to be so satisfying. Because--geeky girls on a hero's journey!! You will be so proud of me! And I will talk about you on Oprah and point at entries like this and be like, Hey! We're here! We're geeks! Get used to it!

[liptonrm.livejournal.com]

OMG! I so totally can't wait till NMRL is all set and you have begun your bid for world Hollywood world domination. You will open the entire population's eyes to how smart and cool and sexy we all are. It'll be awesome.

And Oprah will totally love you, us, the whole shebang. You know she gets a kick out of feeling like she's 'discovered' somebody. ;-)

[dotfic.livejournal.com]

Really good points, all. I tend to gravitate towards the male bonding, in terms of what I want emotionally. But I like seeing strong female characters and like it when a woman is in a role men usually have, where she's the farmgirl setting off on the quest, and so forth. Or where there's an even balance of male-female characters. There is a lack of decent female characters in movies particularly. Genre tv is a bit little better.

You may be right about Supernatural. Or, it's that the show has men behaving in ways that people typically associate with women, and are perceived as "feminine" and SPN, by having two such GUY kind of guys acting like that, proves that emotions like those are *human*--that it's not "girlie" to be nurturing.

[liptonrm.livejournal.com]

I, too, tend to gravitate towards shows, etc. that have copious amounts of male bonding. But then, perhaps it's not so much 'male' bonding as it is people bonding b/c give me a show with a ragtag bunch of misfits and I'm all over that too. ;-)

And genre tv is better at including strong female characters then more mainstream fare, film in particular. It's no wonder that so many great film actresses are turning up on cable tv in droves. But that's a whole separate post. It's just seeing all of the ways in which genre media excells at gendered storytelling makes me want it to be even better. I know, I know, I'm so demanding. *snerk*

I really like your SPN comment. Now I have to think about whether that's an innovative stance or whether it's mirroring a shift towards equalization in how society views gendered roles. Excellent.

[oselle.livejournal.com]

I think the lack of female-centered genre TV (and fiction) has to do with money. Girls and women will watch a show or read a book about male characters. Boys and men will not. And while I'm sure there are exceptions to the latter statement, for the most part, guys aren't all that interested in stories about women. Hell, they're not even interested in stories by women, even when the story itself is about a boy -- J.K. Rowling's publishers told her to go with initials instead of her full name for a reason. This is the 21st century and women still have to publish under an assumed name if they want to reach a wide enough audience.

So I'll bet those stories are out there, but they can't get published or filmed or put on television. Eventually, the creator probably just scraps it altogether or rewrites it so that the main character is a guy.

One of these days I might put up a whole post about how Supernatural is gender subversive, in a way, and how a show that wraps itself in the trappings of traditional American masculinity is traditionally female in perspective.

I don't think this is true of the whole series. I think it fluctuates a lot from episode to episode, depending on who was the writer. You can really see this emerge when you watch a whole season back-to-back. The episodes that were written by Sera Gamble, Raelle Tucker or Cathryn Humphris weave in the kind of subtleties that we love -- how the brothers relate to each other, to their past, etc. Episodes by other writers, especially Eric Kripke, seem to focus more on spectacle. When Kripke puts an emotional scene in, it's usually kind of labored. It's weird, because Kripke created the show, but his episodes tend to be my least favorite because they just don't seem very nuanced to me. And what do I know, maybe a show like this shouldn't be nuanced, and maybe I'm too much of a chick, but I just don't think you can get all that much mileage out of killing monsters every week (especially when you don't have a terrific SFX budget). You've gotta have some depth or things get old really fast.

Also Raelle Tucker seemed like a tremendous Deangirl and I'm hoping her leaving doesn't deprive us of all the terrific Dean-angst we've come to enjoy. I want my Dean Winchester tortured, angry, fucked up and, whenever possible, trussed up in some way. Dig it?

[liptonrm.livejournal.com]

Sorry it's taken me for-freakin-ever to respond. I wanted to give it the thought it deserved and was having a hard time rubbing two coherent thoughts together in my head.

Was also dealing with a kind of rage spiral because while I understand that much of what you said re: the dearth of good female characters in genre media is accurate the fact that that inequity exists makes me more than a little angry. Screw 'em, screw 'em all. Only makes me even more determined to find a way to tell my stories the way I want to.

And now, moving away from the rage black-out arena, SPN.

I agree that Kripke doesn't have nearly as good a hand at the emotional stuff as Gamble, Humphris, and, especially, Tucker have. His saving grace is that he totally recognizes his weaknesses. I think it was in the Pilot commentary where he made a point of saying that the show wouldn't be a fraction as awesome as it is without the much classier writers who were working on it. The fact that he recognizes that he needs to surround himself with stronger talents gives me hope even though Raelle is leaving us.

I want my Dean Winchester tortured, angry, fucked up and, whenever possible, trussed up in some way.

So say we all. mmmm Deanangst. It's the best possible kind of angst available on the market.

[oselle.livejournal.com]

Eek, didn't mean to instigate a rage spiral.

I've actually been trying to think of female central characters in genre fiction but haven't been able to. I'm really not well-read, or well-viewed in fantasy or sci-fi, although I'll bet if I were, I'd still have a hard time finding great female leading characters. Agent Scully is one of the few that comes to mind. Lyra in the Philip Pullman His Dark Materials trilogy also comes to mind, but I just wound up hating those books so much that I don't want to think about them. Lyra is a fairly interesting character until she hooks up with Will and saves the world by having pre-teen sex at which point she loses her innate ability to read the golden compass and thereby forever forfeits her right to be a great girl heroine and OMG I hated those books.

That girl in The Secret Garden kind of kicked ass. Does that count?

I don't think Raelle Tucker would have written any "super badass" lady hunters in leather stilettos. Do you? So the other women writers on that show, or at the least, X-Files alum Ben Edlund, need to step into the void she's left behind lest the show descend into some Spike TV-caliber bucket of suck JUST AS I'VE GOTTEN INTO IT.

[liptonrm.livejournal.com]

For all my bitching and moaning there are some good examples of lead female characters. The only problem is that genre fiction embraces the 'hero's quest' motif pretty strongly across the board so while there are strong female characters they don't tend to be the focus of story movement. The only shows I've seen that buck that trend are Buffy, Battlestar Galactica and, of course, Xena. ;-)

OMG, my desire to club Pullman over the head never, ever diminishes. I get it, he wanted an atheist parable (and if I had the space I'd descend into a tangent about the flawed manner in which he went about it) but he sure didn't do a good job at making it seem appealing. And Lyra was a great character but once that Will guy showed up I could see the writing on that wall. Of course some poor little girl would never be able to save the universe so why don't we let some boy show up and make sure it gets done.

Ugh. *washes bad taste out of mouth*

Mary Lennox so counts. I loved that book. As do Dorothy Gale and Lucy Pevensie and Jill Pole and Anne Shirley. Wow, OK, so that's why I still like children's literature so much. Good to know.

[oselle.livejournal.com]

Just realized that some of the most interesting female characters are pre-pubescent. Wonder what that's supposed to tell us?

You know who I loved? She wasn't really a heroine but she pulled off the "hero's girlfriend" role to great effect without being annoying -- Marion in Raiders of the Lost Ark. I think because she was modeled on all the great Hollywood women of the Thirties and Forties, like Katharine Hepburn and Joan Crawford. She doesn't really do anything and she usually has to be rescued but you somehow like her. She's no Mary Sue and she's never a jackass or a bimbo and she just conveys strength and sass without having to be sullen and bitchy about it.

Pullman. I can't believe they're filming those books. Did anyone at New Line actually read them...all the way through?

[oselle.livejournal.com]

Oy, I should clarify in the above that "Boys and men will not" watch a show or read a book about female characters. But I'm sure you knew what I meant :D

seriously?

[bookgrl.livejournal.com]

the fact that you can use the word endemic while ranting about the serious lack of good geeky female role models in television? Love it!

Re: seriously?

[liptonrm.livejournal.com]

You know me, I'm all about showing my awesome geek solidarity. The girl geeks shall rule the world!

Once we've conquered television, that is. =D