but baby, face it: that's what it's been for us

[reflectedeve]

I've been having some very angry feminist days lately. Maybe it's time to cut down on reading WFA every day? Because much as I enjoy a lot of the writing there, I'm clearly hyper-sensitive lately. I mean, there is certainly plenty to be angry about (that last link = SPOILERS for "Death of the New Gods"), and that's just in pop culture/comics (and a very small sample at that). Our whole culture is sick. But it's not particularly useful to feel angry all the time, particularly when a lot of it is more of the same every damn week.

This kind of anger and frustration is really always at the edge of my consciousness (what I get for being a fan of comics and genre entertainment, I guess), but I think it's affecting me even more than usual. Certainly it's been impossible to escape or ignore when I'm watching TV, lately.

I think this may turn into a rant . . . it's been coming for awhile. Not to be expecting finesse. ^^; (Cut to protect recent spoilers, more or less, but if you aren't caught up on Heroes, Bionic Woman, and/or Stargate: Atlantis, you might want to skip.)


Heroes has never exactly been a shining example of happy-feminist television. The show's usually relatively multicultural and diverse (for mainstream American TV), at least with its male characters. But, last season, the only two major female heroes were very blonde and generically "attractive" (not that I don't love Claire, and Nikki's okay, but wow); the one really major female character of color was a textbook WiR, and quite a few other women were killed off as well. (Charlie's also a pretty WiRish example, though I did like Eden's heroic death.)

This season, we mostly have Maria, the whimpering woman who is uncontrollably and mysteriously destructive, and relies upon her brother to save her from herself. I am very unimpressed. We also have Monica, who I have high hopes for, but time will tell . . . and Kristen Bell's bratty ruthless killer (I'm somewhat attached to Bell, but still, yawn). I had very brief hopes for Hiro's new object of unrequited affection . . . I was kind of irritated that his great legendary Japanese hero was a gaijin (not terribly original), and her show of bravado made me wonder. But no, now she's a dazzled little sidekick, with the wool pulled over her eyes by Hiro's brief Cyrano act.

Claire's still pretty awesome, aside from being kind of stupid about this new boy; Peter's latest girlfriend has some potential; Angela Petrelli has also been kickass, though of course she was beaten down for it. Molly's in some kind of coma. Candice . . . oh right, she just got murdered. (What percentage of female recurring/regular characters has been killed off, I wonder? Seems like quite a large one.)

If we ever have two women interacting closely with each other on this show, however--particularly as friends or partners in the sense of Hiro/Ando, Noah Bennet/the Haitian (get that man a name already), or Mohinder/Matt--I may die of shock.


Bionic Woman, meanwhile, is a relatively average action show. Jaime's a pretty boring main character, lacking in much personality, but at least she looks great kicking ass (I know, I suck like a big hypocritical sucking thing sometimes). She can be a total idiot sometimes (she discovers that Will has had files on her since two years before they met, but he's still the only man she ever loved? wtf?), and I hated that unborn-baby-death-trauma BS they threw in for no reason, but at least Will died, so we don't have to watch her suck by trying to forgive him or continue to be in a relationship with him, which I'd worried about. Also, in spite of cooperating with them most of the time, Jaime remains healthily furious when the people who changed her try to control her. That's something.

Really, though, I'm watching the show for Sarah Corvis (AKA Katee Sackhoff, siiiigh), and particularly for the scenes with the two Bionic Women together. Their chemistry is incredible, and their relationship would be the most interesting part of the show even if they weren't so very fraught with subtext. (So very. Where are my boatloads of femslash, people?) If Sackhoff leaves the show, I might very well drop it, but . . . I've been starving for female relationships lately, and Jaime has both Sarah and her sister (which could be done better, but it's a start), so there's enough to keep me in there. That, and the fun ass-kicking. I have missed Buffy more, recently.


Lastly, of course, there is Stargate: Atlantis, arguably my biggest fandom show. I've been less in love with it lately, in large part because I am feeling so very female-oriented right now, and SGA has rarely done a good job with its women. Teyla is a really fabulous character, but they rarely seem to know what to do with her, so she usually takes a backseat to plots focusing on her male teammates (though she generally proceeds to be completely awesome in the backseat anyway). Elizabeth was apparently even more difficult for the writers to deal with, stumbling along 'til she was finally dumped. Which made me angrier than I expected, though I at least appreciated that she was allowed to go out more or less in a blaze of glory.

Of course, this new season did add two new female characters to the cast; Sam Carter, imported over from SG-1, and Doctor Keller. I've remained cynical, but I was actually pleasantly surprised by the most recent episode, "Doppleganger." It took me totally by surprise, because I was drawing and not paying the closest attention, but I eventually noticed that . . . there were women all over screen! Where did they come from? The episode started and ended with John and Rodney, as usual (and notably adorable enough to cut through even my recent apathy), but for a large chunk of the middle, the women actually dominated the episode! We had Sam, Dr. Keller, Dr. Heightmeyer, and Teyla all talking and working together, Bechdel test passed with flying colors . . . it was amazing! Of course, just as I was really starting to get into it, they offed poor Kate and went back to the guys. But then, lo and behold, Dr. Keller and Lt. Carter joined the team at their late-night hang-out, at the very end. The new core cast? There were actually as many women as men at that table! Dare I have even the littlest bit of hope?

I need to watch that episode again. It had women and boyslash. And I can even forgive Sam Carter for taking Elizabeth's place and constantly bringing up SG-1. (Have you ever heard about SG-1? They did all of this already! Argh. It's like Kon and his Tactile Telekinesis--just can't stop the comic references today--only not funny.)


At least there's always Avatar: The Last Airbender. Katara's a bit of the annoying self-righteous "girl is the heart and soul of our group" cliche, but she's often pretty kickass. Toph is amazing. Azula bores me, but her cohorts are fresh and fun. And yeah, those girls do relate to each other! (Katara and Toph could stand to do it more, but still.)

[ETA:] Note to self. Do not forget to do this!

Comments

[sae.livejournal.com]

Word, really. Though that Halloween costume thing *wince* is more awful than the usual. (...no... words...)

Obviously, do not start me up on Heroes ;) But I agree, it would be fascinating to compare the on screen deathtoll and see just how biased it is. And I love the Irish girlfriend, I sincerely hope she survives the season.

I'll be curious to see Bionic Woman when the Sarah Corvis arc finishes. They only signed Katie on for 6 episodes, IIRC, and I can't seem to figure out what they'll do without her.

[reflectedeve.livejournal.com]

You should have seen me sputtering with rage over the French Maid outfit . . . or the fact that there were no regular "occupations" included on the girls' page at all. I loved Betty's complaint email, though. ^^

*sigh* I watched this week's episode last night--I had to tape it Wednesday so I could watch the World Series opener ;)--and there was no Sarah Corvis in it at all! It was so boring. -_- I don't know about this.

[prozacpark.livejournal.com]

I've never been able to ignore sexism and misogyny on TV (I was bitching about it back in season two of Angel and everyone was ignoring me, of course,) but now it has gotten to a point where I can't stand it at all anymore, and I think part of it has to do with the crappy quality of TV in general. No way am I sticking around for at least one dead woman per month to motivate the heroes on Supernatural with that quality of writing.

And Heroes, yeah. I like Claire, but that show is everywhere with all the characters, and a lot of them are just not interesting, and it especially lacks interesting women. I think I could've liked Eden, but she was offed pretty early.

I tried "Bionic Woman," but didn't care enough to stick with it, and I haven't watched "Heroes" in weeks. I'm convinced I would find TV more appealing if it only had more interesting female characters.

Do you watch "Big Love" by any chance? Despite the patriarchal set-up, that show has at least half a dozen insanely interesting female characters who all have very individual personalities and really, the show is filled with so much interesting female interaction that the random patriarchal assholery just disappears in the larger scheme of awesomeness.

[reflectedeve.livejournal.com]

I can't ignore it, exactly, but I often feel that I have to be willing/able to sublimate it at least partway, or I'll never be able to watch any TV ever again. ^^; Which would mostly upset me because I'd miss fandom (the parts of fandom that I spend the most time in are all TV-based, for some reason). Speaking of Supernatural, have you seen that "Women's Work" vid?

Heroes is an odd show. The scattered, disconnected characters are disorienting and unsatisfying for me, for the most part. But a few of them do have great connections--not the women, of course, what am I thinking?--and that was enough to get me attached. (I always prefer material with interesting women, but I've long since learned not to expect them, which is very sad.)

This season is having a lot more trouble tying itself together, though, and it broke up most of the connections I loved (though it's made one or two new ones) . . . but I'm curious to see where it goes, so I'm sticking around for awhile, I think. And they did just introduce a new female character who I'm interested in.

The only thing that keeps me in Bionic Woman, as I said, is Sarah Corvis. Really love her: kind of crazy, but also kind of right, trying to connect with Jaime in an awkward half-self-sabotaging way . . . mmm. But this last episode had no Sarah, and brought in a new male love interest, and I'm so bored. So I don't know if I'll stick either.

I've watched a few episodes of the first season of Big Love, but I don't get HBO, so that's about it. It certainly piqued my interest, and I've been meaning to rent some episodes (my local video place has the whole first season, at least), but I haven't gotten around to it yet. I need to finish watching Deadwood, too, come to think of it.

You know what I miss? Xena. Seriously. ^^;

[prozacpark.livejournal.com]

"Women's Work" vid? Link me because I don't even know what it is.

(I always prefer material with interesting women, but I've long since learned not to expect them, which is very sad.)

I used to feel bad and mildly sexist for not liking stuff with male characters as much, but now? Not so much. At least half of our world is taught (in one way or another) to disregard narratives with women. I, at least, have the ability to enjoy male characters and don't dismiss something just because it's "men's fiction/for men." But, yeah, lately, I've been annoyed by this trend enough that if there are no interesting female characters, I almost completely lack the ability to stick with the series. Luckily for me, if a show is smart enough to not be sexist, it's smart enough to not suck as much as TV generally so I don't feel like I'm missing out by not watching some stuff because of my issues.

And they did just introduce a new female character who I'm interested in.

I'll have to check out Heroes again. I think Heroes might work better on DVDs, so I'm probably going to wait until the season is done and then watch it all together. I don't have the patience to put up with the week to week thing when it comes to Heroes.

While we're on the subject of HBO, I know I've mentioned it before, but also give "Carnivale" a try. It's insanely good. I Netflixed "Big Love" and only watched it recently. It's possible that I wouldn't have liked it as much if I were watching it when it was on (seriously, I suck with not being able to put up with the TV scheduling these days).

You know what I miss? Xena. Seriously. ^^;

You know, I got over "Xena" pretty much as soon as I developed a liking for good TV and started my Greek Mythology thing, but I kind of find myself missing the early seasons too. Xena was too Mary Sue-y for me to ever seriously like, but I enjoyed the feel of the show, and I liked the relationships. The other day, I randomly found a Xena comic and flipped through it for Callisto stuff, and ended up reading the entire arc and liking it.

[reflectedeve.livejournal.com]

There's a review of the vid here (http://12-12-12.livejournal.com/16096.html), with links to where it's hosted. (I give you the review rather than the direct LJ posts because there's at least one other interesting "woman issues" vid discussed there. I can't remember if you ever watched Veronica Mars.) Careful, though . . . the vid is stomach-turning. I had to hold off on watching it after I first heard about it, to make sure I wasn't watching right before bedtime.

Heh! I used to feel bad and mildly sexist because most of my writing/comic projects have few to no important male characters. (My main comic? The men are pretty much all villains. Oops.) But that's exactly it: I don't feel bad, because we need more stories with women, dammit. Though someday I'd like to work up to being well-rounded. ^^; And yeah, it's true, really good TV generally does well with its female characters too. The thing is . . . I never even really watched TV before I found fandom, and the majority of the shows I watch, I watch because they feature (usually male) slash pairings. It's worth it because the fic is so good (I have a particular set of writers who I usually follow around to different shows), but obviously it's also kind of stressful sometimes. ^^;

I also love scifi stuff in general, and genre material is infamously bad with female characters (which my experience bears out) . . . I keep meaning to watch Battlestar Galactica already, I hear it's better. I miss Farscape, too.

Right, right, Carnivale. I need to see if I can interlibrary that or something.

Well, I was already completely steeped in Greek mythology before I started watching Xena, but eventually I learned to mostly relax and ignore how inaccurate it was (I mean, it clearly wasn't even trying). I loved the campy feel of the show to bits, the close female friendship/buddy relationship (as I mentioned in my post about Strangers in Paradise for my yuletide author, more than anything I crave shows with female friendships like the male ones I enjoy . . . and tend to slash), Joxer, Callisto . . . no, really, I know it's kind of terrible at times, but the first two or three seasons of Xena are pure joy for me. Top of my list, once I have a little spare money to spend on DVD sets.

I never could get into the comics, though, like the old Buffy ones . . . didn't generally like the art.

Speaking of comics, just saw your email--thank you so much! You spoil me! I was at the library today and almost ordered up some BoP, but I'd already sent out interlibrary requests for so many titles (mostly for yuletide research), and I didn't want to overload too much. I need to repay you by working on my damn recommendations, though I just wound up adding more titles to the list. ^^; Gushy one-paragraph reviews are so much harder to write than I expected.

[prozacpark.livejournal.com]

I have no idea what happened to the formatting of that comment, but here's hoping that this one comes out better:

The video is downloading now, and I'm already having second thoughts about watching it. Heh. I've been happy with fandom lately, and do I want to depress myself and hate all TV ever? ;) I already really dislike Supernatural, but I realize that this crap is everywhere...it's just more obvious on a show that ignores and kills women as its premise every week. So, yeah.


But that's exactly it: I don't feel bad, because we need more stories with women, dammit. Though someday I'd like to work up to being well-rounded.

Exactly the way I feel. I have feminist friends who refuse to read anything with female characters because it depresses them. And I always say that if you ignore it, it won't go away. You have to read, criticize, and create a different narrative if you can. And I'm glad that you're focusing on creating on interesting female characters first. You can be well-rounded later. We need this first. :)

I also love scifi stuff in general, and genre material is infamously bad with female characters (which my experience bears out) . . . I keep meaning to watch Battlestar Galactica already, I hear it's better. I miss Farscape, too.

I tend to love sci-fi, but hardcore space sci-fi has never been my thing with the exception of Firefly. And, yes, I need to watch BSG, too. I've heard really good things about it. And I need to give Farscape another try, possibly.

I loved the campy feel of the show to bits, the close female friendship/buddy relationship (as I mentioned in my post about Strangers in Paradise for my yuletide author, more than anything I crave shows with female friendships like the male ones I enjoy . . . and tend to slash)

Yeah, I know what you mean. "Strangers in Paradise" was all kinds of awesome in its portrayal of a female friendship that worked like only male friendships do in fiction. And, in some ways, I think, Rachel/Kitty works on that level, too. It's interesting to note the differences we generally have between slash and femslash (or male friendships and female friendships) in genre fiction (canon or otherwise). We have male relationships like Achilles/Patroklos or Alexander/Hephastion that have the power to change the world because you have powerful men involved with each other, and they wield real power in the outside world. Compare that to the female relationships we have: they're mostly confined to the domestic sphere and generally aren't portrayed as all that heroic, no matter how powerful the women involved were because historically, women haven't had much power. (Women involved in het relationships get to affect the world through the men they're involved with, of course.) I think Rachel/Kitty and Katchoo/Francine come close to the kind of relationships we see only between men. Whatever your reading of it (femslashy or not), these relationships matter in the bigger scheme of things the way relationships between women rarely do. I don't know if that made any sense, but if I explain more, I'll probably be composing an essay on your LJ. ;)

I'm always happy to share my fandomy love, and "Birds of Prey" is just so much love that everyone needs to read it. And for recs, you can always just give me some titles and I shall wikipedia them, since I seem to have time right now to read a bit. :)

[reflectedeve.livejournal.com]

I'm already having second thoughts about watching it.

Well, feel free not to watch it, if you haven't already! It's pretty much what you'd expect, and it's certainly upsetting. It didn't so much depress me about the state of television in general--it wasn't a revelation to me, really--as make me feel sick and a little scared. One of those things that goes beyond fandom into my head and into the larger cultural implications. Such fun. But I was glad that it was made; glad to see fellow fangirls making that point. Particularly since I rarely see anything about Supernatural except squeeing over the "poor angsty pretty boys" (who are often angsty because hey, another random woman was burned up/murdered).

You can be well-rounded later. We need this first. :)
*laughs* What I figure! Though my current projects aren't exactly examples of what I've been craving, either, female-dominated though they are (in the main one, character relationships actually take a backseat to plot and single-character introspection--how did that happen?), so clearly I also need to be particularly mindful when coming up with new projects. ^^;

And I need to give Farscape another try, possibly.
Well, I recommend it, though . . . have you tried it before and disliked it? (It certainly has some interesting and often quite strong female characters, though I wouldn't hold it up as an example of great female friendships. It's more an example of good and original writing, in a genre that tends towards long chains of rip-offs and recycled concepts.)

Compare that to the female relationships we have: they're mostly confined to the domestic sphere and generally aren't portrayed as all that heroic
That's certainly an interesting observation. While I'm generally more interested in powerful bonds between women, than in bonds between powerful women . . . we certainly could use some epic (possibly romantic) female relationships! (Heh, I was actually writing a sort of cliche high fantasy epic that involved something like that, when I was a teenager. I wound up dumping it because it was so cliche, aside from the female-dominated part.)

I'm always happy to share my fandomy love
You're the best. And, I'm probably going to post up my first 15 recs tomorrow, complete with tiny write-ups. Though, I might go through my entire list and come up with a Helen-specific shortlist to pass on. Partly because you've been waiting so patiently (and have been so generous), and partly because I already know that some of my recs won't appeal to you. ^^; My list as it stands isn't aimed at any one person or group, even women. (I have eclectic tastes, and as some of the bloggers I like to read have pointed out, female/feminist fans are not a hive mind, sooo.)

[tammy212.livejournal.com]

Heroes women: What about Nikki's slide from comfortably integrated woman at the end of the last show to quivering "Don't free me of my shackles I'm here among my proven worst enemies to be cured" girl of the last episode?

I actually think Claire's new boyfriend is hot and don't blame her. I trust her to keep her head. Not the writer, but the character seems so far to be able to kick the writers into line when she must.

Why are they afraid to get any of the girls together? Are they worried critical mass will result, or something?

I'm still watching, though I'm damned if I know why.

[reflectedeve.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, good point, I'd forgotten her; maybe because we really haven't seen much of her so far this season. That was irritating . . . though I have to admit, the writers failed to endear Nikki to me from the beginning, and in many ways it just seemed like more of the same.

Heh, well, hotness aside, I'm simply frustrated with Claire's decision to lie to her father and avoid all the issues that are being raised by both men in her life (pertaining to each other, I mean). I realize that teenagers do that sort of thing all the time, but she's a smart girl and it's not an ordinary situation, and I'd like to be able to expect better, I guess. Noah may be an undeniably devious and frequently amoral character, but he has at least proved himself to be really committed to her safety; Claire's new boy is still largely an unknown quantity, and has been fairly irresponsible on a couple of occasions. The idea that she'd choose his confidence over her father's so easily bothers me.

It's less of a feminist gripe than a "why must the characters be stupid" one, maybe; and a highly subjective one at that. It's more included here because Claire has been the one female character who I've felt consistently satisfied with. (I have these quibbles with the guys, too--oh, Mohinder, what have you done now?--but they are overall more solid than the women, who are few and frequently more essentially problematic.)

Why are they afraid to get any of the girls together?
Good lord, I wish I knew. I find it absolutely maddening. It's no longer enough for me that a genre show, book, or comic contains a "strong" female character--that was what I wanted, and got less often, as a child--perhaps because being female is still treated as such a primary personality trait that we just can't have too many of them on the screen/page, lest we get confused or something.

I'm still watching, though I'm damned if I know why.
Heh! That could probably be the conclusion to my entire post.