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Gold Digger (BBC):  Musings on the Sexuality/ Sensuality of Old(er) Women.

In these hazy days of quarantine (what day is it? when’s the last time I went out in a public place? why aren’t people freaking wearing masks in public????), I find myself scrolling through streaming services looking the latest binge-worthy guilty pleasure.  Gold Digger, starring Ben Barnes and Julia Ormond and now available in the US via Acorn, seemed to fit the bill -- pretty people, noir-lite, just BBC/British enough to seem more highbrow than really it is to an American ear.  Bingo, I thought at first.    

Yes.  Now, though, I’ve got questions -- for myself, mainly, and for the creators, too.  

First, the details. Gold Digger is a six-part miniseries created and written by Marnie Dickens and starring Ben Barnes and Julia Ormond as (coincidentally??) as Ben and Julia.  The premise is simple:  Julia, a wealthy 60-year old woman who has always put the needs of others (her loutish, abusive ex-husband, her kids) before her own, hooks up with thirty-six year old Ben. Julia’s three children worry that Ben is a gold digger, and they are convinced that he is preying upon the recently divorced Julia.  Ben professes to be smitten by Julia, but there is a noir-ish overlay to Ben’s past that is designed to keep viewers guessing about his true motives.  The twisty-turning plot sees two of Julia’s children repeatedly trying to breaking up Ben and Julia; Julia’s controlling, violent ex-husband repeatedly trying to manipulate Julia and the kids; and Ben’s past slowly being revealed despite his best efforts at reinvention.  

The core questions that Gold Digger presents are interesting.  How would you react if your 60-year-old recently divorced mother took up with a gorgeous but penniless thirty-six year old guy with a shady past?  How would you react if a man half your age (with no money and a shady past) professed to be smitten with you?  Can you imagine yourself being smitten with an older woman who is presented as gorgeous, but not looks half-her-age Hollywood gorgeous?  How do we, as viewers, react to a May-December romance when the woman is the older, richer half of the equation?  Do we, as viewers, see Julia as sexy, attractive, sensual, alluring?  Or, do we see her as pathetic?  Do we believe that a thirty-six year-old guy who looks like Ben Barnes would really (for non-gold digger reasons) be smitten by a woman of Julia’s (the characater’s) age and appearance?  How does our unease in the face of these questions contribute to viewers’ experience?  How does our unease get in the way?

At the end of the day, Gold Digger depends on viewers believing in the chemistry/ connection between Ben and Julia.  And that’s where it gets complicated for me.   Maybe I did?  Maybe I didn’t?  And maybe I am just not sure, but whether it’s because of actor/ filmmaker choices involving Ormond’s Julia or internalized misogyny, I can’t be sure.  

First, though, Ben.  I thought Barnes’ Ben was spot on.  He’s charming but guarded (for reasons that we come to understand); emotionally open with Julia while lying/concealing facts about his background (again, for reasons that we come to understand); gentle and vulnerable with her while at the same time conveying a sense of menace/ danger/ruthlessness.  He keeps us guessing when it comes to Ben’s motives, and that’s what the story requires.  Plus, he’s a “stone cold fox” as one of the characters says. :-). 

Ormond’s performance is harder for me.  I totally believed her vulnerability/sense of weariness/damage at having reached the age of sixty only to realize just how much time (35 years) she wasted in a relationship with her truly awful and violent ex.  I appreciate why, having been dumped by said ex following the ex’s affair with her best friend, Julia’s relationship with her own body/sexuality/sensuality might be complicated.  And I TOTALLY understand why Julia might question her instincts when it comes to Ben.  It’s hard to imagine Julia (the character) being super-confident about her body/sensuality/romantic choices after what she’s been through.  Especially with her adult children constantly harping on her to dump her boy toy. 

But Ormond’s  performance was SO emotionally reserved. And while that reserve isn’t surprising -- I’d be guarded too in her situation -- it made it hard for me to see why Ben would be so smitten with her as a romantic partner.  And, the filmmakers contributed to this, in my view, by never really presenting Julia (the character) as an object of sexual desire. What do I mean by this? The camera more often than not focuses on Julia’s face (not her body).  And, in those scenes when we do see Julia’s body, she’s often presented in baggy, unstructured clothing -- think coats, lots of scarves, over-sized sweaters.  Also, while we see Barnes’s body in intimate scenes (e.g., the shower scene, the pool scene, sex scenes), we don’t see much of Ormond -- the lights are off, or Barnes is between Ormond and the camera, blocking our view of Julia (the shower scene), or the camera cuts away or looks at Ben and Julia kissing, etc. from a distance (pool scene, kissing scenes).  

I appreciate that these are artistic choices.  

- It’s not surprising that Julia (the character) might feel uncomfortable/ reserved about her body at age 60, after being dumped by the asshole ex, when hooking up with someone who looks like Barnes’ Ben, so in some way, the choice to turn off the lights (literally and metaphorically) is consistent with character.  

- Maybe Ormond, the actress, wasn’t keen on revealing/nude scenes.  I don’t know enough about BBC One to know what the standards/practices rules are regarding nudity/sex, but I TOTALLY support actors’ need/desire to feel comfortable and supported on set.  And, I am all for getting rid of gratuitous nude scenes that treat female performers in a voyeuristic, objectified, or exploitative way.     

- Maybe it’s internalized misogyny.  I’ve spent sooooo many years seeing the sexual lives of women -- especially older women --  presented as pathetic, or creepy, or predatory on screen that maybe I just can’t see Ormond’s Julia as an object of desire for reasons that have nothing to do with her portrayal.  Maybe that’s why I can’t quite believe that someone who looks like Ben Barnes would find someone who looks like Julia (the character) to be sexually attractive. The sea of misogyny in media, after all, is both deep and wide.  And, it’s part of what Gold Digger’s filmmakers are trying to interrogate.   

- Or, maybe it’s that I, as an American, just have a hard time with what might be British reserve in Ormond’s portrayal -- meaning, what was off-putting for me (what I perceived as emotional reserve) might feel very different -- and emotionally honest/true -- to a British person.  

Still, I wish the camera had lingered on Ormond a bit, and presented her -- in an empowering way -- as an object of desire.  Ormond is so pretty, in a realistic (not picture-perfect Hollywood body) way.  Why not show Ben’s (the character) gaze lingering on Julia’s (the character) body (not just her face) -- assuming, of course, that Ormond was comfortable with such choices?  Why not show Julia’s growing comfort with her body/sensuality more explicitly?

Again, I TOTALLY appreciate that I may be imposing an American’s emotional gaze onto a British story. So, I wonder.    

What do you think?  Did you have the same reaction?  A different one?  

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This is so interesting — I definitely want to track down the book. And I totally agree w/ the criticism of RT’s handling of VM (the character and the show).

And, it’s not just that the show’s relationships lacked depth and make no sense, as is pointed out above. Or even that the plot points became less coherent and less compelling as time went on.

It’s that the characters themselves, especially VM, had zero emotional logic by S4. RT never figured out how to write VM as a fully-realized, fully human character, and while that was ok for a while — because we don’t expect teens to have their emotional shit together, because she was still more self-aware than most young females characters on TV at the time, because KB’s performance was special (esp. in scenes w/ Enrico C), because there was space for fandom to fill in emotional depth — RT’s house of cards collapsed in S4 (really S3).

S4 VM (the character) had zero emotional logic. Why did S4 VM become a self-loathing, self-destructive asshole in her mid-30s, despite being surrounded by a loving partner and family and friends? Why does she mock Logan for his therapy? Why she a terrible detective? Why Leo again? Why is she more casually racist vs high school? Why does she push away her lifelong friends and in favor of partying w/ strangers? Why is she so emotionally stunted? Is she really doomed to be forever trapped in high school tragedy? The list of questions is endless. And RT not only failed to answer these questions, he told VM’s largely female fan base to F off when they pointed out that S4 VM made zero sense.

The cold, hard truth is that RT was never able to write VM as a fully-realized, emotionally coherent female character. Note I didn’t say a perfect, totally healthy character, b/c VM didn’t have to be perfect. VM absolutely could have had flaws, experience trauma, make poor choices, screw up. But there needs to be an emotional logic to WHY she acts the way she does, why she is the way she is. And S4 has got nothing for us on this front. Just plot tropes (trauma/ suffer porn) that happen largely off screen, as the writer quoted above points out, a nod to noir conventions that fails to capture any of the fun or depth of that genre, and a cluelessness (some might say misogyny) about what actual female humans are like in their mid-30s.

At the end of the day, VM fails as a character and as a show in S4 because plot — not character — drives the show. And by S4, not even the plot made sense.

THE JUNGIAN SHADOW: AN AUTOPSY

My friend @susanmichelin is reading a book called  ‘Writing the Pilot’ by William Rabkin, and she showed a chapter to me which discusses Veronica Mars. I think several passages encapsulate both why the series has such a talented fandom, and how it contains the seeds of its own destruction.

Here’s Rabkin’s impression of VM, from a plot standpoint:

What you need to think through is just how your style of storytelling is going to affect the content of your stories. For a cautionary tale, I turn to the example of the late and much lamented Veronica Mars…There was only one problem [with the series]– all th[e] great story material happened before the pilot.

That’s right. When we first meet Veronica, it’s been months since Keith lost his job and Veronica lost all her friends and Mom ran away. Even the rape is something of a distant memory.

So how does writer/creator Rob Thomas manage to convey this enormous amount of really crucial backstory? In classic detective novel fashion, through flashbacks narrated by world-weary private eye Veronica.

A classic technique-which in this case, I believe, really killed the show. Because everything Veronica tells and shows us in flashbacks is much more interesting than anything that’s going on in the forward action. Dad’s got a case and it’s got something to do with the Kane family, and maybe even Veronica’s mother. But as mildly intriguing as these hints may be, they can’t begin to compare to the power of the scenes we never see of Veronica discovering her best friend murdered and everything that follows from there.

The effect is that even as we’re watching the pilot-the very first episode of the series-it seems as if we’ve already missed all the good stuff, and we’re seeing the brief “previously on Veronica Mars” that might run before the second-season premiere. There’s a huge distancing effect that’s almost impossible to bridge.

This is true. When writing, we’re taught to begin in media res—at the first moment of rising action, Campbell’s ‘call to adventure’. And RT deliberately does not. He picks up the story ‘after the dust settles’, and we see only glimpses of important moments via flashbacks. We’re given summaries of Lilly’s murder and Veronica’s rape, but denied the emotional aftermath. The friend history of the Fab Four is condensed into a few memories. We don’t see Lianne leave, or Veronica become ostracized, we don’t watch Logan’s transformation from class-clown close-friend to vengeful jackass. We just meet V enduring the following school year, running background checks for her disgraced dad and locating lost dogs.

The show-nothing trend continues throughout the series, a phenomenon I’ve pointed out in meta: Veronica Mars is about the Jungian Shadow. The most important events are the ones not seen. LoVe’s summer romances always happen off-screen. We don’t watch Logan cope with dead/criminal parents, or go to jail for stabbing Felix. We aren’t shown LoVe’s first time, or characters’ survival tactics in the aftermath of season two. The movie and books barely sketch the nine years L/V were separated, and the two weeks of bliss and two months of cohabitation prior to MKAT are only referenced. Season 4 skips FIVE YEARS of V’s functional relationship, interacting with a happy friend circle, to arrive at the moment when she falls apart. Even Logan’s death is not shown or directly mentioned—nobody so much as says the word ‘deceased’.

Rob Thomas prefers writing mysteries to relationships, and that’s no doubt the reason for these choices. He started the season-one story where he did to avoid scripting emotions (while still using trauma as an engine for plot). This must also be the reason Logan ‘had to go’ in season 4—married LoVe would require writing an ongoing relationship. And he’s only about beginnings and endings, wedged between cases-of-the-week.

But here’s the reason VM worked so well for a core, devoted fandom, despite its failings. While leaving important story off-screen is terrible for the show, in terms of growing audience? It’s an EXCELLENT device for inspiring a creative fandom.

Rabkin goes on to discuss why, despite its relative unpopularity, VM had such a loyal fan base.

Please notice that I say almost impossible. There are people who loved and still love this show, many prominent critics among them… So some part of the audience was able to connect.

But what audience the show had seemed to be constant throughout its run–those who were devoted stuck with it; those who were indifferent to start with were never swayed to become regular viewers.

And I believe that one strong reason for that was the choice of storytelling structure. By setting so much of the show’s story material in the past–and worse, by setting almost all of the really interesting stuff in the past–the creator robbed his own series of urgency, and in fact made what should have been wildly entertaining look like it was going to be hard work. If every new plot twist was going to require fifteen minutes of flashbacks to explain, was it really worth it to sit through another episode? Couldn’t we just get the CliffsNotes instead?

(Now to be fair, asking a devoted audience to work to gain a deeper understanding of a show can be a powerful bonding tool between creator and viewer… But before you can capitalize on this kind of rabid fan devotion, you actually have to attract your initial audience. And you simply can’t do that by saying “do a lot of hard work– it’ll be worth it.” You’ve got to make it worth it to them first.)

Writers and artists are drawn to Veronica Mars, from a fanwork-creator standpoint, because WE get to fill in the blanks. Rob sketched out intriguing characters, but left all the good scenes for fic authors. And in return, fic writers delivered the moment when Logan hears about Aaron’s death; Logan’s downward spiral after Veronica leaves; the first time Logan and Veronica make love; the events of the summer after season 1; Veronica’s nine years as a Neptune refugee. Gif-makers illustrated the parallels the show wouldn’t explore, and meta developed elaborate head-canons. Creator-fans enjoy analyzing the show because it puts us in Veronica’s headspace; we become detectives, searching for kernels of truth. From the first episode, I was fascinated by the attraction/rivalry between Logan and Veronica, and determined to unravel the cause.

And this reason for fan investment is why the revival failed. Because Rob wrote off the characters we loved to ponder, and gave us a Pulp Fiction knockoff instead (minus the coherent plot and jokes, featuring mostly-tropey strangers). Wallace disappeared, except as a judgy fantasy construct, because Veronica felt contempt for the life he’s chosen, Weevil did V (who now loathes him) one last favor before riding off into the sunset. Dick just evaporated or something, and Keith replaced Veronica completely; Matty became his receptionist, with Pony subbing in for Backup, and he acquired a girlfriend off-screen. Most importantly V was shown as uninterested in the good person Logan became–and when he died, the extent of her grief was a lone therapy session and a single tear. Even if he were to be miraculously revived in a future installment, no evidence was shown that she feels more than nostalgia, let alone a lingering epic connection. LoVe, as we know it, is dead.

Because of these plot choices, there are no relationships on which to hang future fan-work (unless someone out there hopes the mumbly child-porn purveyor, the insufferable NPR snob, or the batshit runaway tech heir’s back in the game, now that Logan’s SUPPOSEDLY gone). Closing the book on all characters and relationships effectively destroyed the fandom (and would have done so even if RT HADN’T been gross in recent interviews). And the unwillingness, going forward, to explore exciting character moments on-screen, ensures no new fandom will rise from the ashes. Casual viewers won’t tune in to a complicated-but-unrewarding show, and dedicated fans now know Rob’s breadcrumbs lead nowhere.

Veronica Mars, Girl Detective, was killed as a franchise by lazy, cowardly writing. Rabkin was right to call the show a cautionary tale.

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#Fanart #Fanfic Musings: Female Creators, Female Fans, and Fandom Policing

Earlier today, I re-blogged an exchange about Fan Art.   Someone had asked a creator when they intended to stop drawing fanart, because (no offense, the questioner said), “it just seems like the kind of thing that you are supposed to grow out of.”  Lots of folks have unpacked the biases that underlie this question. I am copying my thoughts here, as a free-standing post, with the suggestion that you check out the excellent commentary in the re-blogged material reflected in my earlier post.

So, here goes.

First, why is it that we don’t demand people grow out of male-centered fan spaces?

- For example, sports culture (particularly basketball, football, and baseball in the US, and soccer globally), is totally a fandom. Complete with cosplay. And ship wars/ drama.  And stan culture. And yet, we NEVER, EVER tell people they need to grow up and exit sports fandom.  In fact, we regularly lionize folks for being life-long, multi-generational fans.

Second, what does the distinction between fanart (that creators and fans apparently need to leave behind, according to the questioner) and non-fanart really mean, when so much of the art that we now consider to be “high art” or canon has its origins in fanart/fanfic? 

- The “Literature” that makes up the Western canon has its origins in essentially fanfic re-tellings of stories from religious texts, folklore, and myths and legends. (Heck, that’s where many of our literary tropes and genres come from — the quest, the chosen one, the prodigal child, the temptress, the ingenue, etc.). The visual arts are no different — all of those now-canon paintings and drawings recreating scenes from the Odyssey and the Iliad, the Bible, etc. didn’t exactly spring full-grown from the head of Zeus, so to speak.

Third, what is really behind this attempt to police creators, fans and fandom culture?  Well, the question is not whether there is a distinction between fanart and “high culture” when it comes to subject-matter — because that distinction is neither real nor meaningful. It’s not even about whether there is or ought to be an age limit on fan spaces -- just try telling a Yankees fan that he’s too old to be paying thousands of dollars to watch grown men play hit, catch, and run. It is about who creates the art and who consumes it, and who decides what we will see/read/hear. More specifically, it’s about a system that devalues the work of female creators, and minimizes and even erases the contributions, perspectives, and desires of female fans. And the patriarchal norms, sexism and misogyny that underlie this dynamic.  

At the end of the day, this dynamic explains how and why get art (TV, movies, images, etc.) where female characters, stories, and bodies are filtered through the male gaze over and over again — with the result that girls and women exist not as fully human in this art, but only as objects of male desire or rage (arm candy, half of a ship, victim of rape or assault), or as instruments of other character’s narrative arcs. 

It’s why women’s sexual lives and sexual selves so often are presented in art as performative (and for the male gaze), rather than as authentically felt, and from the perspective of the female character. And, it’s why female desire -- especially the desire of females who are not teens/20s -- is so often presented as predatory or creepy. 

Patriarchal norms also explain why Hollywood routinely “revises” (to put it kindly) the work of female creators, often sidelining female protagonists, ignoring female fans, and stories perceived to be female-focused. (Looking at you, showrunners/directors and producers behind the second and esp. third Divergent movies; Shadowhunters TV).  And, it explains the treatment of female characters in Veronica Mars Season 4, Game of Thrones.  And, I will always believe that as much as I dislike the Twilight books personally -- and as much as Bella annoys me as a character -- only the first movie (directed by Catherine Hardwicke) captured the essence/ emotional logic of the story.

Finally, sexism, misogyny and patriarchal norms explain the dynamics of fandom culture today.  Which, as best I can tell, is basically a bunch of young people telling older female fans that they are gross, and that they should go back to the hubs and kids. And, a bunch folks heaping abuse upon female creators and fans who question fandom culture.  With no self-awareness about the fact that they are consuming the work of the middle-aged, white (and more often than not straight) guys in Hollywood who control content. 

Cluelessness about the gender dynamics of art is a powerful drug.

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All of this.

Sports culture is totally a fandom. Complete with cosplay. And ship wars/ drama.

In fact, as others have (also) pointed out, much of the art that we now consider to be canon is fanart. The “Literature” that makes up the Western canon has its origins fanfic re-tellings of stories from religious texts, folklore, and myths and legends. (Heck, that’s where so many of our literary tropes and genres come from — the quest, the chosen one, the prodigal child, the temptress, the ingenue, etc.). The visual arts are no different — all of those now-canon paintings and drawings recreating scenes from the Odyssey and the Iliad, the Bible, etc. didn’t exactly spring full-grown from the head of Zeus, so to speak.

So, the question is not whether there is a distinction between fanart and “high culture” when it comes to subject-matter — because that distinction is neither real nor meaningful. It is about who creates the art. Specifically, it’s about a system that, because of misogyny and patriarchy, devalues the work of female creators and the perspectives of female fans.

That’s how we get art (TV, movies, photography, etc.) where female characters, stories, and bodies are filtered through the male gaze — with the result that girls and women exist not as fully human in this art, but rather as objects of male desire or rage, or as instruments of other character’s narrative arcs. It’s why women’s sexual lives and sexual selves so often are presented as performative (and for the male gaze) in this art (rather than as authentically felt, and from the perspective of the female character). And it’s why female desire, especially the desire of females who are not teens/20s — is so often presented as predatory or creepy. This is why Hollywood routinely “revises” (to put it kindly) the work of female creators, often sidelining female protagonists and ignoring female fans, when adapting women’s work. And, it’s why fandom culture today is basically a bunch of young people telling older female fans that they are gross, and that they should go back to the hubs and kids. With no self-awareness about the fact that they are consuming the work of the middle-aged, white (and more often than not straight) guys in Hollywood who control content.

Cluelessness about the gender dynamics of art is a powerful drug.

Do you ever think you'll stop drawing fanart? No offense it just seems like the kind of thing you're supposed to grow out of. I'm just curious what your plans/goals are since it isn't exactly an art form that people take seriously.

Ah, fanart. Also known as the art that girls make.

Sad, immature girls no one takes seriously. Girls who are taught that it’s shameful to be excited or passionate about anything, that it’s pathetic to gush about what attracts them, that it’s wrong to be a geek, that they should feel embarrassed about having a crush, that they’re not allowed to gaze or stare or wish or desire. Girls who need to grow out of it.

That’s the art you mean, right?

Because in my experience, when grown men make it, nobody calls it fanart. They just call it art. And everyone takes it very seriously.

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@aegisdea is so massively talented! Commission her!!!!

Recent commissions! 

If you’re interested, here’s my commission info: [Link]

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So, to be clear, I think the fact that Darren and Todd pitted Clary/Jace/Clace against Magnus/Alec/Malec is patriarchal BS! The idea that representation is zero sum — either Clary (Jace/ Clace) or Alec (Magnus/Malec) is patriarchal. SHTV did not have to take a zero sum approach to representation. We all could have had nice things!

As a female/ feminist, I wanted SHTV to tell Clary’s story — the story of a young woman who discovers who she is, and then works w/ her love and her chosen family to save the world. Jace is part of that story, and he has his own story to recovering from abuse and neglect, too.

As a person who is deeply invested in LGBTQ+ representation, I wanted to see Alec’s story — that of a brave, strong, heroic young man who finds himself, discovers true love, and is instrumental in saving the world — too. Magnus is part of that story, and he has his own story of learning of and coming to terms with his demon heritage.

Izzy and Simon also have their own stories, and their own important roles in saving the world.

At the end of the day, sacrificing Clary and Jace and Clace to tell Malec’s story isn’t woke. It’s not true to the ethos of the books, the show or the purpose/ goals of true representation. It’s not a just punishment for the supposed sins of Cassie Clare (whatever) or specific performers on the show. It’s just being shitty. And being shitty to characters (and/or fans of those characters or performers) is, at the end of the day, just being shitty. No amount of virtue signalling around my beloved Malec will ever change that.

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One added thought:

I get that not praising Darren and Todd for their representation is not a popular position.  I get that it’s not cool to raise questions about the show’s treatment of Clary and Jace.  I get that some folks can’t see their way past their dislike of certain performers to consider whether the show “did right” by Clary, Jace and Clace.  I get that I am in the minority. It’s ok.

I just can’t help but think that all of the fandom hate that I see for the Clary and Jace characters (and the Clace relationship) is, in part, the product of the showrunners creative choices.  In my view, for whatever reason, the showrunners decided that it was ok to hate the Clary and Jace characters and the Clace relationship.  Through their storytelling choices, they fostered a creative environment on the show, and a toxic fandom environment, in which lifting up Malec required cutting down Clary/Jace/Clace.  I believe these choices reflected patriarchal norms, and sexism/misogyny.  I believe we all could have had nice things.  And, as someone who is female and who cares personally -- deeply -- about the representation of LGBT+ characters and stories, I am angry that the showrunners made fans choose between a kickass female protagonist who gets to save the world AND heroic and loving LGBTQ+ characters and stories.

Why do I think that the showrunners’ creative choices reflect patriarchal norms, and were infected by sexism and misogyny? Sooo many examples . . . .

In their (commendable) effort to make sure that the show avoided tropes that consistently undermine LGBTQ characters (e.g., the kill the gays tropes, tropes about bisexual people being promiscuous, bigoted depictions of LGBT+ characters as weak or only good as sidekicks), they basically dumped every trope onto the Jace character.  This, in turn, undermined Clary and made her an unreliable -- and replaceable-- protagonist.  Because if Jace was really as slutty, bigoted, clueless, weak, and un-heroic as the show tried to make him out to be -- why would a truly worthy protagonist ever love him?  And so the showrunners chose to make Jace unloveable -- and to make Clary worthy only to the extent that she suffered at the hands of, or rejected, Jace -- as their way of lifting up and centering the stories they really wanted to tell.      

- For example, Jace is consistently the butt of weird, slut-shame-y commentary and story lines -- e.g., all of the S2 comments about “book club” and Jace’s sexual past; the hook up with Maia behind a bar not long after Maia tried to kill him (a totally shitty, non-canon plot twist for the Maia character, too).  Why is Jace slut shamed (including by Clary) when literally every other lead character on the show has more sex, and in many cases more sexual partners, than Jace? Simon sleeps with how many people on the show and he’s not slut-shamed?  Clary hops into bed with Simon and she’s not slut-shamed?  Magnus isn’t slut-shamed despite having many sexual partners in the past: In fact, the show was so eager to ret-con out Magnus’s sexual past that they give him a non-canon opportunity to reject the non-canon advances of non-canon Dot.  Alec isn’t slut-shamed either, despite hopping into bed with Magnus very early in their relationship. Don’t get me wrong -- I don’t want ANYONE to be slut-shamed.  And yes, I know that Jace kisses Alene in the books.  But -- for better or worse -- that hook-up is as much about Alene’s confirmation of her sexual identity as it is about Jace acting out his grief/longing over the course of his relationship with Clary.   The bottom line is that Jace is remarkably faithful to his relationship with Clary.  So why was he alone the butt of slut-shame-y commentary is S2 and S3?

- In the show’s effort to avoid the gay sidekick trope, the show re-distributed all of Jace’s heroic plot points from the book to other characters.  For example, the book heavenly fire storyline (Jace is consumed by heavenly fire, Clary figures out how to get the heavenly fire into her sword so she can kill Jonathan) is transferred to Izzy.  Jace’s bravery and heroism in the battle against Jonathan is transferred to Izzy and Alec.  (Remember the we’re Lightwoods moment from the finale -- without Jace?) I am not saying that Jace or Clary alone was responsible for saving the world:  The books are about how Clary grew into her identity as a shadowhunter, and with the help of her chosen family (Jace, Simon, Alec and Izzy) saved the world.  But Jace IS a heroic character in the book.  And S3B and the finale, especially, made Jace into a timid potted plant who mostly stood around and cried while trying to be a supportive  boyfriend.

- Also, why did the show, often in non-canon fashion, make Jace the source of all Magnus/Alec/downworlder problems?  Examples include Jace mistakenly killing downworlders when he picked up the mortal sword; Magnus sacrificing his magic (non-canon, again) to free Jace from Lilith’s possession; Alec almost dying in the Parabatai lost episode; Jace as the non-canon implementer of the downworlder registry.  Book Jace is NOT the source of all downworlder problems.  He opposes the bigoted cohort (and is instrumental, along with Clary, Magnus, Alec and Simon) in the battle against the cohort in TDA). And, he fundamentally loves, supports and honors Alec and Magnus’s relationship over the course of TMI and TDA, notwithstanding some ups and downs (that are not entirely Jace’s fault, BTW).  Jace is not perfect.  But neither is Alec.  And the show erased Alec’s flaws as they related to Jace, and the strength of their parabatai bond, time and time again.

- Relatedly, why was Jace -- the best shadowhunter of his generation (in terms of fighting skills), and a character who is consistently described as smart and compassionate underneath his trauma-induced arrogance and bluster in the books -- so often portrayed in S2 and S3 as a bigoted, clueless, dumb jock.  There is the downworlder registry story line, Jace’s general incompetence in running the NY institute (and the suggestion that he only got the job b/c of nepotism, and was so bad at it that he had to abdicate in favor of Alec immediately); Jace’s potted plant behavior in the finale battle scenes.  

None of this non-canon BS made any sense.  Book Jace is a heroic character:  He’s heroic in the final battle in the TMI series; in his successful service (with Clary) as head of the NY institute in the TDA series; in his opposition to the bigoted cohort in TDA, too; and in his abiding love for Clary.   Ret-coning Jace’s heroism and sacrifice out of SHTV was non-canon.  And, recognizing the heroism of Alec, Magnus (and Izzy and Simon) did NOT require making Jace a bigoted, incompetent ass. 

Apart from the crappy treatment of Jace, my earlier post spoke about ways in which S2 and S3 mistreated female characters, and how the showrunners’ creative choices ended up co-opting female-focused story lines and characters to advance preferred narratives, most of which involved male characters.  Let’s just say that I find it hard to believe that leaving Clary alone on the street with no money, no identity, no memories, no mother, no father figure, no place to live, no best friend, no love of her life ... while every character other than Jace is shown as living their best life without regard to Clary’s sacrifice or Jace’s loss/grief -- was consistent with fundamental narrative arc of TMI.  Especially when the showrunners took time in the finale to wrap up stories about every male character (including non-canon characters/stories) -- e.g., Rafael, Underhill, Lorenzo Rey.  

So no, naming a salad after Clary did not make it ok.   No, the wedding, no matter how lovely, did not make it ok.  And no, the last scene, no matter how beautifully acted, did not make it ok.  F’ing over your protagonist in non-canon fashion because you decide that other characters are more worthy was not ok.  And so I can’t be happy for Malec -- no matter how much I love them -- while Darren and Todd believed it was ok to gut Clary and Jace.

Clary STILL deserved her story

So, Todd Slavkin, the showrunner (along with Darren Swimmer) of Seasons 2 and 3 of Shadowhunters TV, just published a book about his time with the show.  It purports to be a BTS account of his experience running SHTV, with proceeds going to the Trevor Project and a couple of other charities. Sigh.  Every damn time I think I am finally through with this silly, pulpy show, I get pissed off all over again.   

The TL;DR version:  OH MY GOD CAN THIS MAN PLEASE JUST STOP???!!!!  SHTV had the IP rights to the 6-book Mortal Instruments Series.  Clary is the protagonist of this series:  Her journey is the scaffolding upon which the series’ narrative is constructed.  Centering Clary (and her love Jace) in what author Cassie Clare has described as a “girl power” story was an intentional narrative choice in TMI. So why, then, did Todd and Darren treat all of the female characters like garbage and erase Clary’s entire narrative arc in favor of bizarre non-canon plot twists and ancillary characters? Why did they encourage toxic fandom ship wars that pitted fans of Clary (and her love Jace) against fans of Malec?  We NEVER, EVER should have had to choose between representation of LGBTQ+ characters and stories and Clary’s narrative arc.  

Longer version:

First, credit where credit is due.  I am glad that Todd is raising money for worthy charities.  I am a long-time supporter of the Trevor Project, and the show and its fans have been loyal supporters of this organization for at-risk LGBT+ youth for years. Good for him for publicly supporting the Trevor Project once again.

Second, SHTV is to be commended for its racially diverse casting (casting choices for which Todd and Darren cannot claim credit, BTW, since they were brought on in S2) and for its commitment to representation for LGBT+ characters and relationships.  While the show was far from perfect in this regard, in my view – I don’t think they got bi representation right with Magnus – credit is due. 

BUT NO AMOUNT OF VIRTUE SIGNALING OR REPRESENTATION THROUGH MALEC CAN MAKE UP FOR THE MESS THAT DARREN AND TODD MADE OF SHTV, ESPECIALLY IN 3B AND THE FINALE. I have gone down this rabbit hole so many times, so I will just summarize here:

In a nutshell, every female character was hijacked.  

- For example, Mayrse seems to have existed in S2 and S3 solely to be punished for her S1 homophobia through a non-canon de-runing, then redeemed by becoming captain of the Malec ship.  In S3, in particular, it’s as though she has no other children. She does not realize that Jace has been possessed by Lilith.  She is never shown helping Jace deal with the loss and heartbreak he experiences first after thinking that Clary was killed by Lilith, and then after Clary’s memory is wiped. Literally the only moment that Mayrse and Jace appear together in the finale is at the Malec wedding – when she (along with everyone else) neglects to realize that Clary is distraught because her runes are disappearing.  By the end of the finale, Mayrse is surfing in Brazil, worried about the effect of humidity on her hair, while Jace remains suicidal and grieving.  Seriously?!?!?!  Putting aside all of the non-canon fan service plot twists, have the showrunners ever met a mother?  No mother would ignore the pain and trauma that Jace experienced due to his possession by Lilith, or after Clary’s exile from the shadow world.  And, what does show Mayre’s treatment of Jace say about adoption?  For a show so concerned about representation, what about Jace’s story as a survivor of abuse and neglect?

Clary. What is there even to say.  

- For one thing, the show completely botched Clary’s love life.  First, there was the jumping into bed with Simon, her lifelong best friend, without any sense of struggle/ uncertainty about her feelings, followed by episode after episode of Climon shipping.  Book Clary is conflicted – she doesn’t always treat Simon very well, but she’s 15 (in the books), and she’s dealing with her identify as a shadowhunter and her feelings for Jace (and the whole incest story line (which I am glad the show dealt with reasonably quickly)). Show Clary seems almost entirely unconflicted.  It’s as though sex with Simon was no big deal – even though the show suggests that Simon (HER BEST FRIEND) may well have been her first sexual experience, and forgetting the fact that she’d clearly been falling for Jace (who she now thinks is her brother). 

-Second, the Dark Clary storyline is creepy, at best, especially regarding Clary’s sexuality.  Think about it.  Clary  does not sleep with Jace on the show until after Lilith puts the twinning rune on her.  (Despite having jumped into bed with Simon no problem.)  And then, full-on Dark Clary is shown going down on Jace in a club, and assaulting him, when he was grief-stricken and basically roofied. (Apparently, the only time women on the show get to be sexually assertive is when they are evil (read-Lilith) or possessed (Clary)).  None of this made any sense. 

-Third, the memory wipe is total bullshit.  In what TMI universe would Clary, the protagonist, be left alone on an NYC in a skimpy party dress, with no money, no identity, no memories of the past 4 months, no apartment, no mother, no father figure, no love of her life, no best friend, and no chosen family?  In what universe would her love Jace not have seen her runes disappearing?  In what universe would Jace have let Clary walk about the door sobbing, especially when she had just killed her last living relative to save the world, and after she had only just returned from the twinning rune/dark side?   In what universe would an angel have exiled Clary from the shadow world, and taken away her memories, after she saved the world?  Especially when literally every other character got to keep the Sight despite their bad acts (read, Valentine, Aldertree, Jace as the owl, possessed Alec after killing Clary’s mother, Sebastian/ Jonathan after mass murder …)

Maia’s random Jace hookup. ‘Nuff said.

And finally, the Jace character was basically collateral damage for all of this.

- The show vacillated between blaming Jace for Magnus/Alec/ Malec problems (Magnus losing his magic to free Jace from Lilith) and erasing the parabatai bond between Alec and Jace entirely, especially in 3B, even though though the parabatai relationship is core SH canon.  Alec doesn’t realize Jace is possessed for most of 3A.  He tells Jace to suck it up in 3x11 when Jace is clearly grieving and suicidal.  And, he is shown mixing cocktails in Alicante with Magnus in the finale without a care in the world for Jace’s struggle in the year following Clary’s exile.  It’s all Malec all the time for Alec.  Yes, Jace/Alec have their ups and downs in the books.  But they work through them.  And, the parabatai bond is a source of strength for both book Alec and book Jace. With a couple of exceptions, this nuanced and lovely book relationship is lost in the show.

- In fact, the show deprived Jace of every relationship.  As noted above, Mayrse doesn’t seem to remember that Jace is her child in S3.  Alec is focused entirely on his relationship with Magnus most of the time.  Jace and Clary have basically no screen time as a couple.  And, no one really seems to give a shit. Not for Jace the son/sibling/parabatai.  And not for his mental health, or his trauma after a childhood of abuse and neglect.

After all of this, the wedding was just icing on the cake. Alec and Magnus’s marriage is well-earned in Clare’s books. They get married after five years of a healthy, loving, committed relationship.  They remain – in addition to their relationship with eachother – son/sibling/parabatai (Alec) and a brave and loving downworlder (Magnus).  None of this let’s get married the day after Jonathan’s mass slaughter and after Clary is forced to kill her last living relative, after three or so months of mostly unsuccessful dating.

I want to be clear that I LOVE the Malec relationship, and that representation of this relationship as loving, healthy and joyous has a great deal of personal meaning to me.  But I should never have had to sacrifice Clary (and her love Jace) to see a meaningful relationship between Magnus and Alec on-screen.  We ALL deserve nice things, after all.  Lifting up Malec NEVER, EVER mean we had to destroy Clary, Jace and Clace.

SO, I’ll be donating on my own to the Trevor Project.  Maybe someday Todd and Darren will reflect upon the damage that they did.

[noxstellacaelum]

Clary STILL deserved her story

So, Todd Slavkin, the showrunner (along with Darren Swimmer) of Seasons 2 and 3 of Shadowhunters TV, just published a book about his time with the show.  It purports to be a BTS account of his experience running SHTV, with proceeds going to the Trevor Project and a couple of other charities. Sigh.  Every damn time I think I am finally through with this silly, pulpy show, I get pissed off all over again.   

The TL;DR version:  OH MY GOD CAN THIS MAN PLEASE JUST STOP???!!!!  SHTV had the IP rights to the 6-book Mortal Instruments Series.  Clary is the protagonist of this series:  Her journey is the scaffolding upon which the series’ narrative is constructed.  Centering Clary (and her love Jace) in what author Cassie Clare has described as a “girl power” story was an intentional narrative choice in TMI. So why, then, did Todd and Darren treat all of the female characters like garbage and erase Clary’s entire narrative arc in favor of bizarre non-canon plot twists and ancillary characters? Why did they encourage toxic fandom ship wars that pitted fans of Clary (and her love Jace) against fans of Malec?  We NEVER, EVER should have had to choose between representation of LGBTQ+ characters and stories and Clary’s narrative arc.  

Longer version:

First, credit where credit is due.  I am glad that Todd is raising money for worthy charities.  I am a long-time supporter of the Trevor Project, and the show and its fans have been loyal supporters of this organization for at-risk LGBT+ youth for years. Good for him for publicly supporting the Trevor Project once again.

Second, SHTV is to be commended for its racially diverse casting (casting choices for which Todd and Darren cannot claim credit, BTW, since they were brought on in S2) and for its commitment to representation for LGBT+ characters and relationships.  While the show was far from perfect in this regard, in my view -- I don’t think they got bi representation right with Magnus -- credit is due. 

BUT NO AMOUNT OF VIRTUE SIGNALING OR REPRESENTATION THROUGH MALEC CAN MAKE UP FOR THE MESS THAT DARREN AND TODD MADE OF SHTV, ESPECIALLY IN 3B AND THE FINALE. I have gone down this rabbit hole so many times, so I will just summarize here:

In a nutshell, every female character was hijacked.  

- For example, Mayrse seems to have existed in S2 and S3 solely to be punished for her S1 homophobia through a non-canon de-runing, then redeemed by becoming captain of the Malec ship.  In S3, in particular, it’s as though she has no other children. She does not realize that Jace has been possessed by Lilith.  She is never shown helping Jace deal with the loss and heartbreak he experiences first after thinking that Clary was killed by Lilith, and then after Clary’s memory is wiped. Literally the only moment that Mayrse and Jace appear together in the finale is at the Malec wedding -- when she (along with everyone else) neglects to realize that Clary is distraught because her runes are disappearing.  By the end of the finale, Mayrse is surfing in Brazil, worried about the effect of humidity on her hair, while Jace remains suicidal and grieving.  Seriously?!?!?!  Putting aside all of the non-canon fan service plot twists, have the showrunners ever met a mother?  No mother would ignore the pain and trauma that Jace experienced due to his possession by Lilith, or after Clary’s exile from the shadow world.  And, what does show Mayre’s treatment of Jace say about adoption?  For a show so concerned about representation, what about Jace’s story as a survivor of abuse and neglect?

Clary. What is there even to say.  

- For one thing, the show completely botched Clary’s love life.  First, there was the jumping into bed with Simon, her lifelong best friend, without any sense of struggle/ uncertainty about her feelings, followed by episode after episode of Climon shipping.  Book Clary is conflicted -- she doesn’t always treat Simon very well, but she’s 15 (in the books), and she’s dealing with her identify as a shadowhunter and her feelings for Jace (and the whole incest story line (which I am glad the show dealt with reasonably quickly)). Show Clary seems almost entirely unconflicted.  It’s as though sex with Simon was no big deal -- even though the show suggests that Simon (HER BEST FRIEND) may well have been her first sexual experience, and forgetting the fact that she’d clearly been falling for Jace (who she now thinks is her brother). 

-Second, the Dark Clary storyline is creepy, at best, especially regarding Clary’s sexuality.  Think about it.  Clary  does not sleep with Jace on the show until after Lilith puts the twinning rune on her.  (Despite having jumped into bed with Simon no problem.)  And then, full-on Dark Clary is shown going down on Jace in a club, and assaulting him, when he was grief-stricken and basically roofied. (Apparently, the only time women on the show get to be sexually assertive is when they are evil (read-Lilith) or possessed (Clary)).  None of this made any sense. 

-Third, the memory wipe is total bullshit.  In what TMI universe would Clary, the protagonist, be left alone on an NYC in a skimpy party dress, with no money, no identity, no memories of the past 4 months, no apartment, no mother, no father figure, no love of her life, no best friend, and no chosen family?  In what universe would her love Jace not have seen her runes disappearing?  In what universe would Jace have let Clary walk about the door sobbing, especially when she had just killed her last living relative to save the world, and after she had only just returned from the twinning rune/dark side?   In what universe would an angel have exiled Clary from the shadow world, and taken away her memories, after she saved the world?  Especially when literally every other character got to keep the Sight despite their bad acts (read, Valentine, Aldertree, Jace as the owl, possessed Alec after killing Clary’s mother, Sebastian/ Jonathan after mass murder ...)

Maia’s random Jace hookup. ‘Nuff said.

And finally, the Jace character was basically collateral damage for all of this.

- The show vacillated between blaming Jace for Magnus/Alec/ Malec problems (Magnus losing his magic to free Jace from Lilith) and erasing the parabatai bond between Alec and Jace entirely, especially in 3B, even though though the parabatai relationship is core SH canon.  Alec doesn’t realize Jace is possessed for most of 3A.  He tells Jace to suck it up in 3x11 when Jace is clearly grieving and suicidal.  And, he is shown mixing cocktails in Alicante with Magnus in the finale without a care in the world for Jace’s struggle in the year following Clary’s exile.  It’s all Malec all the time for Alec.  Yes, Jace/Alec have their ups and downs in the books.  But they work through them.  And, the parabatai bond is a source of strength for both book Alec and book Jace. With a couple of exceptions, this nuanced and lovely book relationship is lost in the show.

- In fact, the show deprived Jace of every relationship.  As noted above, Mayrse doesn’t seem to remember that Jace is her child in S3.  Alec is focused entirely on his relationship with Magnus most of the time.  Jace and Clary have basically no screen time as a couple.  And, no one really seems to give a shit. Not for Jace the son/sibling/parabatai.  And not for his mental health, or his trauma after a childhood of abuse and neglect.

After all of this, the wedding was just icing on the cake. Alec and Magnus’s marriage is well-earned in Clare’s books. They get married after five years of a healthy, loving, committed relationship.  They remain -- in addition to their relationship with eachother -- son/sibling/parabatai (Alec) and a brave and loving downworlder (Magnus).  None of this let’s get married the day after Jonathan’s mass slaughter and after Clary is forced to kill her last living relative, after three or so months of mostly unsuccessful dating.

I want to be clear that I LOVE the Malec relationship, and that representation of this relationship as loving, healthy and joyous has a great deal of personal meaning to me.  But I should never have had to sacrifice Clary (and her love Jace) to see a meaningful relationship between Magnus and Alec on-screen.  We ALL deserve nice things, after all.  Lifting up Malec NEVER, EVER mean we had to destroy Clary, Jace and Clace.

SO, I’ll be donating on my own to the Trevor Project.  Maybe someday Todd and Darren will reflect upon the damage that they did.

[noxstellacaelum]

Reposting this, as well, since it too may be lost in the ether.  Apologies.

Filtering Female Characters Through the Male Gaze

Female characters filtered through the male gaze:  A (way) too long post about why we need a more diverse and inclusive approach to staffing showrunners, writers, directors, crew – heck, all roles – in TV and movies.  

Yes, I know I am not the first person here on this.  

And note that while I have included a few tags b/c I talk about my frustration with Shadowhunters, Veronica Mars, the Irishman, Richard Jewell, and a few other recent shows/movies, I don’t get to this stuff until the very end,  I appreciate that fans may not want to wade through the entire essay, which (again), is a bit of personal catharsis.

I recently had a random one-off exchange with a TV writer on twitter.  The writer said that she had enjoyed the movie Bombshell much more than its Rotten Tomatoes rating would have suggested.  She wondered if the disconnect between her experience/perception of the movie and that of mainstream reviewers might have been shaped by gender: Specifically, she observed that Bombshell is a movie about women, but most reviewers are male.  

I have complicated feelings about Bombshell.  On one hand, yes, there was and is a toxic culture at Fox News.  Yes, Gretchen Carlson and Megyn Kelly were victims of that toxic culture.  But no, these women were not mere bystanders:  They traded in the racism, misogyny, and xenophobia (for starters) that still characterize Fox News today.  Why should these wealthy, privileged white women – both of whom spent many years as willing foot soldiers in the Fox News army – get a glossy, Hollywood-approved redemption/vindication arc?  On the other hand, I am glad that the movie makers made a film about sexual harassment, and that the movie presented Kelly, in particular, as an at least somewhat complicated character.  This would not be the first time that a movie about women – especially complicated, and not always likeable women – has proven to be polarizing.

My ambivalence about Bombshell notwithstanding, the writer with whom I exchanged tweets is (not surprisingly, since she is in the industry and I am not) on to something when it comes to gender, character development and critical reception. It’s not just that Bombshell was about women, but reviewed largely by men; it’s that stories about female characters (real or fictional) often are filtered through the male gaze in Hollywood:  On many projects – even those focused on female characters – creators/ head writers are male, directors are male, showrunners are male, and producers are male.  This matters, because preferencing the male gaze impacts what stories about women get told, who gets to tell them, and how these stories are received inside and outside Hollywood.  

First, though, the caveats. I do not mean to suggest that men can never tell great stories about women.  Of course they can.   I also don’t mean to suggest that being female exempts creators, writers, directors, showrunners, etc. from sexism or misogyny (or any other forms of bigotry, as my discussion of Bombshell suggests).   There are plenty of women who prop up the patriarchy.  Rebecca Traister’s work speaks to this issue, as does the work of Cornell philosopher Kate Manne.  There is an important literature on the concept of misogynoir (misogyny directed at black women, involving both gender and race), a term coined by black queer feminist Moya Bailey, as well.  Intersectionality matters in understanding what stories are told, who gets to speak, and how stories are received in and outside Hollywood.  I also don’t mean to suggest that there are no powerful women in Hollywood.   Shonda Rhimes; Ava DuVernay, Reese Witherspoon (increasingly, given her role as a producer of projects like Big Little Lies), Greta Gerwig’s work in Lady Bird and Little Women, and others come to mind.  As I am not in the entertainment industry, I am sure others could put together a far more complete and accurate list of female Hollywood power brokers.  And, finally, I appreciate that Hollywood is a business, and people fund and make movies that they think their target audiences want to see.  So long as young, male viewers are a coveted demographic, we are going to see projects with women who appeal to this demographic onscreen.

Given these caveats, why do I think that the filtering of female characters through the male gaze is an issue? For me, it has to do with a project’s “center of gravity” – that place, at the core of the project’s storytelling, where the characters’ agency and autonomy comes from.  It’s where I look to understand the characters’ choices and their narrative arcs.  When a character’s center of gravity is missing or unstable or unreliable, the character’s choices don’t make sense, and their narrative arc lacks emotional logic. Center of gravity is not about whether a character is likeable.  It’s about whether a character – and the project’s overall storytelling and narrative voice – make sense.  

When female characters are filtered through a male gaze, a project’s center of gravity can shift, even if unintentionally, away from the characters’ agency and point of view:  So, instead of charting her own course through a story, a female character starts to become defined by her proximity to other characters and stories.  She becomes half of a “ship” … or a driver of other characters’ growth (often through victimization, suffering, or self-sacrifice) … or mostly an object of sexual desire (whether requited or not).   Eventually, she can lose her voice entirely.  When that happens, instead of a “living, breathing” (yes, fictional, I know) character, we are left with a mirror/ mouthpiece who advances the plot, and the stories, of everyone else.

What are some recent examples of this? The two that I have mentioned recently here are Shadowhunters and Veronica Mars S4.  

- With SHTV, I will always wonder what might have been if the show – which is based on books written by a woman, intentionally as a “girl power” story – had female showrunners. Would an empowered female showrunner have left Clary, THE PROTAGONIST OF A 6 BOOK SERIES – alone on an NYC street in a skimpy party dress, in November, with no money, no ID, no mother, no father figure and no love of her life, stripped of her memories, her magic, and chosen vocation, as punishment, after she saved the world?  Would a female showrunner have sidelined Clary’s love Jace, and left him grieving and suicidal, while his family lived their best lives and told him to move on?  Would a female showrunner have said, in press coverage of the series finale, that the future of the Clary and Jace characters was a matter for fan fiction?  After spending precious time in the series finale wrapping up narrative arcs for non-canon and/or ancillary characters.  And to my twitter correspondent’s point, I guess I am not surprised that mainstream entertainment media outlets didn’t call out the showrunners’ mistreatment of Clary, and by extension, Jace, and the obliteration of their narrative arcs – and yes, I am looking at you, Andy Swift of TV line (who called the above-mentioned memory wipe “actually perfect”).

- Likewise, with Veronica Mars, would a more diverse and inclusive writers room have made S4 Veronica less insightful and less competent than her high school self, or quite so riven with self-loathing, or quite so careless and cruel with the people in her life who love her?  Would a more inclusive creative team have made S4 Veronica less aware of the class and race dynamics of Neptune, yet more casually racist, in her mid-30s, than she was in high school?

- There are so many other examples from 2019.  Clint Eastwood falsely suggesting that a female reporter (who is now deceased and thus unable to defend herself) traded sex for tips from an FBI agent in Richard Jewell. Game of Thrones treatment/resolution of the Ceresi and Daenerys characters – where to even start.  Martin Scorsese’s decision to give Oscar winner Anna Paquin’s character a total of 7 lines in the 3-plus hour movie the Irishman.

- And, in real life, I wonder whether a Hollywood that empowered and supported female creators would make sure that people like Mira Sorvino and Annabella Sciorra got a bunch of work while also making sure that Harvey Weinstein never again is in a position of power or influence.   Same with female comics targeted by Louis C.K. Matt Lauer, Charlie Rose … the list is long, and Kate Manne’s work on what she calls “himpathy” is useful here.

To be clear, I am not saying that stories involving “ships” of whatever flavor, stories of suffering and self-sacrifice, and stories of finding (or losing) intimate relationships are “bad” or “wrong” or inherently exploitive of female characters.  I don’t think that at all.  I also don’t think that female characters have to be perfectly well-adjusted, virtuous, or free from bias, or that they should never be make bad choices or mistakes.  I want female characters who are flawed, nuanced.  I don’t mind lives that are messy, or romantic entanglements that are complicated.  Finally, I don’t think that that faulty, reductive, or unfair portrayals of female characters is a new thing.  Mary Magdalene was almost certainly not a prostitute, after all.  And classicist Emily Wilson – the first woman to translate the Odyssey into English – has brought a hugely important perspective (including an awareness of how gender matters in translation) and voice to the translation and study of canonical characters and works.

At the end of the day, I just want female characters to be able to speak with their own voices, from their perspectives.  I want them to have their own, chosen, narrative arcs.  I want them to speak, act, see, and feel as autonomous individuals, with agency, and not just in reference to others.  And, I think that more a more diverse and inclusive approach to staffing writers rooms and in choosing show runners, directors, and key positions in storytelling would help.  

[noxstellacaelum]

Sometimes, you just want to contemplate an AU where you have a really big sword.  Thank you to the super-talented @aegisdea for this bit of fun.

[noxstellacaelum]

No, it’s not just because the guy is hot ... and other BS about a female fan base (Looking at you Veronica Mars and Shadowhunters)

So, I suck at Tumblr.  I changed my name and suddenly all of my links are broken.  A friend asked me to repost this when she could not find it, so apologies for round 2.

I wrote recently about how filtering female characters through the male gaze can cause a project’s “center of gravity” to shift away from the agency and autonomy of female characters. This is how we end up w/ stories where women are there (narratively) to be pretty arm candy, or objects of sexual desire, or romantic partners (half a ship) vs characters who shape their own romantic and life choices. This is how we get female characters subjected to endless, pointless pain and trauma — usually sexual assault/ rape narratives (GoT, Veronica Mars). Or female characters who sacrifice endlessly and forgive every transgression, so that a man can be redeemed/ understood/ forgiven. (Why else would Buffy forgive Spike?) As I said, I don’t think every silly, guilty pleasure TV show or movie has to be a feminist icon story. Men can tell good stories about women. And give me flawed, complicated, nuanced characters and relationships any and every day of the week. I prefer truthful storytelling, not a kind of hagiography w/a side of feminism for my female characters.

Still, I had to just shake my head — after gagging on my coffee — when I saw the recent TV Line article quoting a senior executive at HULU as saying that the negative reaction to the ending of S4 Veronica Mars was A-O-K b/c it was a testament to how much people love the show. And, that the end was all part of RT’s super-well-thought-grand-plan to make VM into a noir detective show where Veronica solves random mysteries in random places and has no friends, no family, no relationships — having been an asshole to everyone in S4. Never mind S4 Veronica’s questionable detective skills, as evidenced by her failure to figure out who was behind the bombings until it was too late. Yeah. Whatever.

Of course, I didn’t stop at the article. I had to look at the comments. The official RT fanboy line appears to be that people who hated the ending are basically weak, stupid (heterosexual, I guess) girls who are upset that we won’t get to look at Jason D’s abs anymore. Apparently, we just don’t understand RT’s art and vision. Sad, really.

And so it goes. Once again, female fans are reduced to unthinking, stupid, crying hordes upset when we don’t get our happily-ever-after.

This is such complete and total bullshit. I hated all of S4 Veronica. VM in S4 is an unrecognizable asshole. She mocks Logan for seeking help for his PTSD. She misses or ignores her dad’s health crisis. She’s casually racist. She randomly uses drugs w/ strangers. She’s terrible to her friends (Weevil). And she’s the worst detective ever. Killing Logan off as some kind of suffer porn for VM was just one more piece of the shitty story telling that was S4. Especially since there was zero narrative explanation of how or why smart, gritty teenager Veronica fell into the abyss of self-loathing, self-absorption and cruelty that defines her in S4.

To my mind, though, the mansplaining from HULU, RT and crew is one of many examples of how Hollywood dismisses female fans along with female characters. In addition to Veronica Mars, I’ve written about how Shadowhunters TV betrayed both its female characters and many of its female fans. And, just as happened w/ Veronica Mars, when people objected, the show runners and their shills told us that we didn’t understand the showrunners’ art or storytelling; that we were upset bc not all of the couples got a wedding, that fan fiction could sort out the narrative mess left after the finale. As if completely sidelining the protagonist and her romantic partner, then tacking on a rom com meet cute at the end, made it all ok.

It wasn’t OK. It was BS. And, depressingly, not a surprise when one examines how the show treated its female characters and fan base all along.

- Cassie Clare, the author behind the six book series, has hinted on her Tumblr blog that from the very beginning, the male producers and show runners behind the TV adaption did not value her heavily female fan base. The show even added a lot of computers/ tech (explicitly NOT canon in the Shadowhunters universe), and made a character a police officer (not a bookstore owner) when it launched to attract an older male audience according to Clare. (Apart from the non-canon aspect of computers, stereotyping much on who likes tech?).

More importantly, the storytelling around female characters, and the treatment of their sexuality, showed the lack of regard the show had for female characters and their fans. Where to even start:

- The show aged-up the characters — which I am totally on board with — but then cast an actor who is only six years older than Matt D. (he played Alec) to play Mayrse, Alec’s (and Izzy and Jace’s adoptive) mother. 6 years!?! There are plenty of skilled, age appropriate performers one could have picked. Don’t tell me that casting decision was the product of anything other than the male gaze.

- Book Mayrse is a complicated and not always likeable character. Totally cool. Show Mayrse exists in S1 of SHTV for the sole purpose of being bigoted and homophobic re Alec (with a side of slut-shaming for her daughter Izzy). Then, in S3, she exists solely to punished (w/ a random de-rune-ing) and then redeemed for her homophobia by becoming “captain of the Malec ship.” S3 Mayrse seems to be entirely unaware that she has other children. Not Izzy. And not depressed, and suicidal Jace. A more richly observed character who is a mother would not act this way.

-Book Izzy is sexy and body positive. And a formidable warrior. Awesome. Show Izzy is often reduced to slutty eye candy in S1. She’s turned into a drug addict in S2. And, then, in S3 and the finale, she’s charged w caretaking duties for Jace (bc the show ignored the parabatai bond bw Alec and Jace and Mayrse was absent, as noted above). And, in the climactic fight scene, she’s disarmed by Clary (who had been training for a couple of months at that point) and needs to be saved by Simon, her non-Shadowhunter soon to be boyfriend. Simon is hugely heroic in the books, as is Clary, but their heroism is not at the expense of, or in place of, Izzy’s strength and heroism. (Or, maybe it’s that show Simon saves show Izzy from show Clary that’s the problem: book Izzy would not have been bested by Clary, book Clary never would have attacked her friends and chosen family, and the dark Clary made zero narrative/ emotional sense.

- Clary, the protagonist, is wholly sidelined in 3B and the finale. I won’t go down this rabbithole again, except to say that the show’s decision to strip Clary of her entire narrative arc — her mother, her father figure, her memories, her magic, her identity her chosen family, and her love — deeply, deeply betrayed the character and her fans.

- And, as I’ve written before, the dark Clary storyline seemed more about putting Kat M. In sexy clothes and having her act in a sexually aggressive way toward Jace (let’s call it what it was - the show hinted that she went down on Jace in a club while Jace was distraught over losing Clary and basically roofied) (bc sexually aggressive women are either slutty or evil on SHTV, I guess.). It made no sense.

-The whole Climon storyline was cringe worthy, and her weird shame-y commentary on Jace’s past sex life made no sense either.

- Maia hooking up w/ Jace behind a bar, and forgiving her attacker.

The list goes on and on.

I am sick and tired of Hollywood reducing female characters and female fans to unsophisticated, silly, shallow people looking only for the love of a (generally straight white) man. I am sick of shows sacrificing female characters and their fans to tell stories about other characters, even when those stories are worthy. (We shouldn’t have had to choose between, say, Magnus, Alec and Malec, and Clary, Jace and Clace.). I am sick of characters and fans serving as a mirror or vehicle for other characters’ stories.

Female fans watch TV. We buy movie tickets. We participate in fandoms. Stop telling us that we should be content w/ scraps from the storytelling table.

[noxstellacaelum]

4casc replied to your post “4casc replied to your post : So I don’t watch…”

And, for me, it’s not just that the dress and shoes are frumpy. It’s that they are weirdly virginal/ infantilizing, too — as though VM was heading to her first communion. So many tropes — virgin/ whore; VM only interesting if she is sexually available for random hook-ups; marriage = death of sexual desire; marriage = settling.

Yes to all this. Sadly.

[noxstellacaelum]

I Won’t Be Watching Marriage Story

The NYT recently touted “Marriage Story” as the most “hopeful” in the filmmaker’s “series” of movies about “excruciating divorces.” I suppose I should want to see it: The filmmaker is known for his focus on careful writing and character, and the actors’ performances have been widely praised.

And yet, I don’t want to see it, even though it’s already streamable. Not (just) because a series of movies about hyper articulate rich white people getting divorced, complete w/ soulless lawyer tropes, sounds like a painful slog. I am fine w/ movies that aren’t about unicorns and butterflies. I don’t want to see it (more) because I find myself wondering why some people — largely wealthy middle-aged white men, if we are being honest — get to tell their stories over and over again. And, why this same demographic seems to have such a stranglehold on storytelling generally. When so many other artists struggle to be heard at all.

To be clear, I don’t mean to suggest that these films are not well-crafted. Or, that the performances are not lovely. Or, that the stories these creators are telling are inherently unworthy. I also don’t mean to suggest that projects and stories with different creators— female creators, creators of color, creators from the LGBTQ+ community — never appear on screen. Shonda R., Greta Gerwig, Reese Witherspoon, JLo, come to mind.

And yet, in 2020, I still question why the folks with money fund the projects that they do. And, I want to interrogate why so many of those projects end up centering such a narrow set of viewpoints, experiences, and stories. With the result that, instead of a vital and diverse range of stories, we seem to be getting endless reboots and remakes, the same characters, and the same stories, with the same performers (ScarJo again???), over and over again.

I get that Hollywood is conservative when it comes to money, and that it’s hard to get projects funded w-o a proven record of success. Especially for projects that do not center or target the coveted young male demographic. Hollywood is a business, not a charity or Kickstarter for social justice projects, after all. Truly, as someone deeply familiar w/ private equity, VC and Wall Street, I get it.

But the money folks should get the no risk no reward ethos of investing, right? It’s not all about scraping small profits from lots of creatively bankrupt projects, is it? Maybe, just maybe, the market for reboots, remakes, and the seemingly endless number of film and TV shows focused on a limited number of demographics (angsty white guys, angry white guys) is saturated??? Maybe, finally, stories that rely upon tropes involving women, people of color, members of the LGBTQ community have run their course?

At the end of the day, I want to see stories from lots of different people. People with experiences that are entirely different from my own. I want to see authentic, diverse, and inclusive projects on screen. I want to hear voices that I haven’t heard before. That’s what will get me to the movies in 2020.

[noxstellacaelum]

No, it’s not just because the guy is hot ... and other BS about a female fan base (Looking at you Veronica Mars and Shadowhunters)

I wrote recently about how filtering female characters through the male gaze can cause a project’s “center of gravity” to shift away from the agency and autonomy of female characters. This is how we end up w/ stories where women are there (narratively) to be pretty arm candy, or objects of sexual desire, or romantic partners (half a ship) vs characters who shape their own romantic and life choices. This is how we get female characters subjected to endless, pointless pain and trauma — usually sexual assault/ rape narratives (GoT, Veronica Mars). Or female characters who sacrifice endlessly and forgive every transgression, so that a man can be redeemed/ understood/ forgiven. (Why else would Buffy forgive Spike?) As I said, I don’t think every silly, guilty pleasure TV show or movie has to be a feminist icon story. Men can tell good stories about women. And give me flawed, complicated, nuanced characters and relationships any and every day of the week. I prefer truthful storytelling, not a kind of hagiography w/a side of feminism for my female characters.

Still, I had to just shake my head — after gagging on my coffee — when I saw the recent TV Line article quoting a senior executive at HULU as saying that the negative reaction to the ending of S4 Veronica Mars was A-O-K b/c it was a testament to how much people love the show. And, that the end was all part of RT’s super-well-thought-grand-plan to make VM into a noir detective show where Veronica solves random mysteries in random places and has no friends, no family, no relationships — having been an asshole to everyone in S4. Never mind S4 Veronica’s questionable detective skills, as evidenced by her failure to figure out who was behind the bombings until it was too late. Yeah. Whatever.

Of course, I didn’t stop at the article. I had to look at the comments. The official RT fanboy line appears to be that people who hated the ending are basically weak, stupid (heterosexual, I guess) girls who are upset that we won’t get to look at Jason D’s abs anymore. Apparently, we just don’t understand RT’s art and vision. Sad, really.

And so it goes. Once again, female fans are reduced to unthinking, stupid, crying hordes upset when we don’t get our happily-ever-after.

This is such complete and total bullshit. I hated all of S4 Veronica. VM in S4 is an unrecognizable asshole. She mocks Logan for seeking help for his PTSD. She misses or ignores her dad’s health crisis. She’s casually racist. She randomly uses drugs w/ strangers. She’s terrible to her friends (Weevil). And she’s the worst detective ever. Killing Logan off as some kind of suffer porn for VM was just one more piece of the shitty story telling that was S4. Especially since there was zero narrative explanation of how or why smart, gritty teenager Veronica fell into the abyss of self-loathing, self-absorption and cruelty that defines her in S4.

To my mind, though, the mansplaining from HULU, RT and crew is one of many examples of how Hollywood dismisses female fans along with female characters. In addition to Veronica Mars, I’ve written about how Shadowhunters TV betrayed both its female characters and many of its female fans. And, just as happened w/ Veronica Mars, when people objected, the show runners and their shills told us that we didn’t understand the showrunners’ art or storytelling; that we were upset bc not all of the couples got a wedding, that fan fiction could sort out the narrative mess left after the finale. As if completely sidelining the protagonist and her romantic partner, then tacking on a rom com meet cute at the end, made it all ok.

It wasn’t OK. It was BS. And, depressingly, not a surprise when one examines how the show treated its female characters and fan base all along.

- Cassie Clare, the author behind the six book series, has hinted on her Tumblr blog that from the very beginning, the male producers and show runners behind the TV adaption did not value her heavily female fan base. The show even added a lot of computers/ tech (explicitly NOT canon in the Shadowhunters universe), and made a character a police officer (not a bookstore owner) and added a police procedural framework when it launched to attract an older male audience according to Clare. (Aside from the tech not canon issues, gender stereotyping on who likes computers much?!?)

More importantly, the storytelling around female characters, and the treatment of their sexuality, showed the lack of regard the show had for female characters and their fans. Where to even start:

- The show aged-up the characters — which I am totally on board with — but then cast an actor who is only six years older than Matt D. (he played Alec) to play Mayrse, Alec’s (and Izzy and Jace’s adoptive) mother. 6 years!?! There are plenty of skilled, age appropriate performers one could have picked. Don’t tell me that casting decision was the product of anything other than the male gaze.

- Book Mayrse is a complicated and not always likeable character. Totally cool. Show Mayrse exists in S1 of SHTV for the sole purpose of being bigoted and homophobic re Alec (with a side of slut-shaming for her daughter Izzy). Then, in S3, she exists solely to be punished (w/ a random de-rune-ing) and then redeemed for her homophobia by becoming “captain of the Malec ship.” S3 Mayrse seems to be entirely unaware that she has other children. Not Izzy. And not depressed, and suicidal Jace. A more richly observed character who is a mother would not act this way.

-Book Izzy is sexy and body positive. And a formidable warrior. Awesome. Show Izzy is often reduced to slutty eye candy in S1. She’s turned into a drug addict in S2. And, then, in S3 and the finale, she’s charged w caretaking duties for Jace (bc the show ignored the parabatai bond bw Alec and Jace and Mayrse was absent, as noted above). And, in the climactic fight scene, she’s disarmed by Clary (who had been training for a couple of months at that point) and needs to be saved by Simon, her non-Shadowhunter soon to be boyfriend. Simon is hugely heroic in the books, as is Clary, but their heroism is not at the expense of, or in place of, Izzy’s strength and heroism.

- Clary, the protagonist, is wholly sidelined in 3B and the finale. I won’t go down this rabbithole again, except to say that the show’s decision to strip Clary of her entire narrative arc — her mother, her father figure, her memories, her magic, her identity her chosen family, and her love — deeply, deeply betrayed the character and her fans.

- And, as I’ve written before, the dark Clary storyline seemed more about putting Kat M. In sexy clothes and having her act in a sexually aggressive way toward Jace (let’s call it what it was - the show hinted that she went down on Jace in a club while Jace was distraught over losing Clary and basically roofied) (bc sexually aggressive women are either slutty or evil on SHTV, I guess.). It made no sense.

-The whole Climon storyline was cringe worthy, and her weird shame-y commentary on Jace’s past sex life made no sense either.

- Maia hooking up w/ Jace behind a bar, and forgiving her attacker.

The list goes on and on.

I am sick and tired of Hollywood reducing female characters and female fans to unsophisticated, silly, shallow people looking only for the love of a (generally straight white) man. I am sick of shows sacrificing female characters and their fans to tell stories about other characters, even when those stories are worthy. (We shouldn’t have had to choose between, say, Magnus, Alec and Malec, and Clary, Jace and Clace.). I am sick of characters and fans serving as a mirror or vehicle for other characters’ stories.

Female fans watch TV. We buy movie tickets. We participate in fandoms. Stop telling us that we should be content w/ scraps from the storytelling table.

[noxstellacaelum]

Why Veronica Mars Won’t Have a Season 5

My introduction to Veronica Mars came in the midst of my father’s death. I watched episodes in hospital waiting rooms before it happened, and holed up in my room afterwards. I found a lot of comfort in the strength that the characters provided. The scene of Logan at his mother’s funeral - maniac and trying to find the humor in it - is exactly what I felt at my father’s. I, like Logan, made jokes and tried shrugging it off. I was certain that this was some sort of cosmic joke, and I was on the receiving end. Veronica’s personality shaped most of who I was in high school - my dad passed away two weeks before I started. Her snark, intelligence, and resilience inspired me so much then. I found a wonderful community with fans of the show, and to this day as a semi-adult I love and adore so many people I met through the show.

When the movie was announced, I was ecstatic. I remember rushing to a bathroom stall at my high school so I could eloquently keyboard-smash about it with my friends, donating to the Kickstarter, wearing my t-shirt, going to the theater with my friend to watch it and livestreaming it the night of its release with my online friends. In a sea of horrible feelings and helplessness, Veronica Mars helped me feel empowered and supported.

That’s partly why all of this stings so badly and feels so much like a betrayal.

Keep reading

[noxstellacaelum]

Filtering Female Characters Through the Male Gaze

Female characters filtered through the male gaze:  A (way) too long post about why we need a more diverse and inclusive approach to staffing showrunners, writers, directors, crew – heck, all roles -- in TV and movies.  

Yes, I know I am not the first person here on this.  

And note that while I have included a few tags b/c I talk about my frustration with Shadowhunters, Veronica Mars, the Irishman, Richard Jewell, and a few other recent shows/movies, I don’t get to this stuff until the very end,  I appreciate that fans may not want to wade through the entire essay, which (again), is a bit of personal catharsis.

I recently had a random one-off exchange with a TV writer on twitter.  The writer said that she had enjoyed the movie Bombshell much more than its Rotten Tomatoes rating would have suggested.  She wondered if the disconnect between her experience/perception of the movie and that of mainstream reviewers might have been shaped by gender: Specifically, she observed that Bombshell is a movie about women, but most reviewers are male.  

I have complicated feelings about Bombshell.  On one hand, yes, there was and is a toxic culture at Fox News.  Yes, Gretchen Carlson and Megyn Kelly were victims of that toxic culture.  But no, these women were not mere bystanders:  They traded in the racism, misogyny, and xenophobia (for starters) that still characterize Fox News today.  Why should these wealthy, privileged white women – both of whom spent many years as willing foot soldiers in the Fox News army -- get a glossy, Hollywood-approved redemption/vindication arc?  On the other hand, I am glad that the movie makers made a film about sexual harassment, and that the movie presented Kelly, in particular, as an at least somewhat complicated character.  This would not be the first time that a movie about women – especially complicated, and not always likeable women – has proven to be polarizing.

My ambivalence about Bombshell notwithstanding, the writer with whom I exchanged tweets is (not surprisingly, since she is in the industry and I am not) on to something when it comes to gender, character development and critical reception. It’s not just that Bombshell was about women, but reviewed largely by men; it’s that stories about female characters (real or fictional) often are filtered through the male gaze in Hollywood:  On many projects – even those focused on female characters – creators/ head writers are male, directors are male, showrunners are male, and producers are male.  This matters, because preferencing the male gaze impacts what stories about women get told, who gets to tell them, and how these stories are received inside and outside Hollywood.  

First, though, the caveats. I do not mean to suggest that men can never tell great stories about women.  Of course they can.   I also don’t mean to suggest that being female exempts creators, writers, directors, showrunners, etc. from sexism or misogyny (or any other forms of bigotry, as my discussion of Bombshell suggests).   There are plenty of women who prop up the patriarchy.  Rebecca Traister’s work speaks to this issue, as does the work of Cornell philosopher Kate Manne.  There is an important literature on the concept of misogynoir (misogyny directed at black women, involving both gender and race), a term coined by black queer feminist Moya Bailey, as well.  Intersectionality matters in understanding what stories are told, who gets to speak, and how stories are received in and outside Hollywood.  I also don’t mean to suggest that there are no powerful women in Hollywood.   Shonda Rhimes; Ava DuVernay, Reese Witherspoon (increasingly, given her role as a producer of projects like Big Little Lies), Greta Gerwig’s work in Lady Bird and Little Women, and others come to mind.  As I am not in the entertainment industry, I am sure others could put together a far more complete and accurate list of female Hollywood power brokers.  And, finally, I appreciate that Hollywood is a business, and people fund and make movies that they think their target audiences want to see.  So long as young, male viewers are a coveted demographic, we are going to see projects with women who appeal to this demographic onscreen.

Given these caveats, why do I think that the filtering of female characters through the male gaze is an issue? For me, it has to do with a project’s “center of gravity” -- that place, at the core of the project’s storytelling, where the characters’ agency and autonomy comes from.  It’s where I look to understand the characters’ choices and their narrative arcs.  When a character’s center of gravity is missing or unstable or unreliable, the character’s choices don’t make sense, and their narrative arc lacks emotional logic. Center of gravity is not about whether a character is likeable.  It’s about whether a character – and the project’s overall storytelling and narrative voice – make sense.  

When female characters are filtered through a male gaze, a project’s center of gravity can shift, even if unintentionally, away from the characters’ agency and point of view:  So, instead of charting her own course through a story, a female character starts to become defined by her proximity to other characters and stories.  She becomes half of a “ship” . . . or a driver of other characters’ growth (often through victimization, suffering, or self-sacrifice) . . . or mostly an object of sexual desire (whether requited or not).   Eventually, she can lose her voice entirely.  When that happens, instead of a “living, breathing” (yes, fictional, I know) character, we are left with a mirror/ mouthpiece who advances the plot, and the stories, of everyone else.

What are some recent examples of this? The two that I have mentioned recently here are Shadowhunters and Veronica Mars S4.  

- With SHTV, I will always wonder what might have been if the show – which is based on books written by a woman, intentionally as a “girl power” story – had female showrunners. Would an empowered female showrunner have left Clary, THE PROTAGONIST OF A 6 BOOK SERIES – alone on an NYC street in a skimpy party dress, in November, with no money, no ID, no mother, no father figure and no love of her life, stripped of her memories, her magic, and chosen vocation, as punishment, after she saved the world?  Would a female showrunner have sidelined Clary’s love Jace, and left him grieving and suicidal, while his family lived their best lives and told him to move on?  Would a female showrunner have said, in press coverage of the series finale, that the future of the Clary and Jace characters was a matter for fan fiction?  After spending precious time in the series finale wrapping up narrative arcs for non-canon and/or ancillary characters.  And to my twitter correspondent’s point, I guess I am not surprised that mainstream entertainment media outlets didn’t call out the showrunners’ mistreatment of Clary, and by extension, Jace, and the obliteration of their narrative arcs -- and yes, I am looking at you, Andy Swift of TV line (who called the above-mentioned memory wipe “actually perfect”).

- Likewise, with Veronica Mars, would a more diverse and inclusive writers room have made S4 Veronica less insightful and less competent than her high school self, or quite so riven with self-loathing, or quite so careless and cruel with the people in her life who love her?  Would a more inclusive creative team have made S4 Veronica less aware of the class and race dynamics of Neptune, yet more casually racist, in her mid-30s, than she was in high school?

- There are so many other examples from 2019.  Clint Eastwood falsely suggesting that a female reporter (who is now deceased and thus unable to defend herself) traded sex for tips from an FBI agent in Richard Jewell. Game of Thrones treatment/resolution of the Ceresi and Daenerys characters – where to even start.  Martin Scorsese’s decision to give Oscar winner Anna Paquin’s character a total of 7 lines in the 3-plus hour movie the Irishman.

- And, in real life, I wonder whether a Hollywood that empowered and supported female creators would make sure that people like Mira Sorvino and Annabella Sciorra got a bunch of work while also making sure that Harvey Weinstein never again is in a position of power or influence.   Same with female comics targeted by Louis C.K. Matt Lauer, Charlie Rose … the list is long, and Kate Manne’s work on what she calls “himpathy” is useful here.

To be clear, I am not saying that stories involving “ships” of whatever flavor, stories of suffering and self-sacrifice, and stories of finding (or losing) intimate relationships are “bad” or “wrong” or inherently exploitive of female characters.  I don’t think that at all.  I also don’t think that female characters have to be perfectly well-adjusted, virtuous, or free from bias, or that they should never be make bad choices or mistakes.  I want female characters who are flawed, nuanced.  I don’t mind lives that are messy, or romantic entanglements that are complicated.  Finally, I don’t think that that faulty, reductive, or unfair portrayals of female characters is a new thing.  Mary Magdalene was almost certainly not a prostitute, after all.  And classicist Emily Wilson – the first woman to translate the Odyssey into English – has brought a hugely important perspective (including an awareness of how gender matters in translation) and voice to the translation and study of canonical characters and works.

At the end of the day, I just want female characters to be able to speak with their own voices, from their perspectives.  I want them to have their own, chosen, narrative arcs.  I want them to speak, act, see, and feel as autonomous individuals, with agency, and not just in reference to others.  And, I think that more a more diverse and inclusive approach to staffing writers rooms and in choosing show runners, directors, and key positions in storytelling would help.  

[noxstellacaelum]

This is amazing. And 100% on point. Thank you.

An entirely too long post on how to fix Veronica Mars

So, anyone who has followed this blog for any length of time knows: 1) What a massive Veronica Mars fan I was and 2) how distraught I’ve been over the most recent season that debuted on Hulu in July. I’ve been pretty angry about it since it dropped, but the first month after I was pretty occupied with real life stuff. Now that I’m more settled, I’ve found myself getting sadder and angrier over time with just how terrible S4 was and what an obvious fuck you to longtime fans it was. It feels dumb to be so upset over a tv show, but this show got me through a lot over the past 8 years, and I feel like it’s been taken away from me.

 It’s anyone’s guess as to whether there will be a new season. Ideally it would end here with maybe an alternate ending filmed to avoid alienating fans further. On the one hand, the botched release, overwhelmingly negative response, and silence from the creators after initial interviews don’t look good for renewal chances. On the other hand, Hulu doesn’t have a lot of streaming hits, it probably did relatively decent numbers, and there are rumors floating around that its pickup chances look good. On a personal level, I hate the idea that this is where the legacy of Veronica Mars ends, while at the same time being extremely wary of what the creators have planned. I think a big part of the disappointment with S4 was that the movie and books set up what could have been some really interesting storylines and situations, all of which RT and co. squandered for cheap drama and to apparently turn the show into an entirely new vehicle; additionally I had hope that S4 would be a chance to rectify some problems the show has long had, but again, S4 exacerbated them. At this point I don’t expect anyone higher up in the creative process or at Hulu to give a fuck about the fans or making the show better as long as they hit streaming targets, but here are some suggestions:

Keep reading