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Women in Star Wars


DANA-kin Skywalker
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Irony is the feminists targeted the Star Wars franchise at all seeing as Princess Leia is largely considered to be the first strong female lead archetype that inspired many a woman for generations.

 

Before her there was just women holding babies or falling for men or weeping at home in the kitchen. Not holding blasters or ordering around a whole rebellion.

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There's so many things off about that statement that I don't even know where to begin.

 

Experiment-- replace "women" for "black people" and feminists for civil rights activists and review your thesis again and see if you feel the same way.

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I think the Bechdel Test has done more harm than good in a lot of cases. It marginalizes a good intention by making some instances of characters or interactions shoehorned. If things happen naturally, great. If it's put in as an empty appeasing gesture, it's usually a mess. There was an episode of Rebels this past year that carefully walked the line, but thankfully kept just shy off tokenism.

But thankfully Star Wars is in good hands with Kennedy. I'm not worried it will be a big problem.

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"These things should happen naturally, not shoehorned in."

 

Naturally, like, how it happens in nature, where the ratio of men to women is more or less even.

 

But we're okay with having casts that are 90% male. Those pesky 10% that are women are fine (I GUESS) just as long as they talk NATURALLY and don't get all their womenness all over my movie.

 

Ugh, women.

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I think the Bechdel Test has done more harm than good in a lot of cases. It marginalizes a good intention by making some instances of characters or interactions shoehorned. If things happen naturally, great. If it's put in as an empty appeasing gesture, it's usually a mess. There was an episode of Rebels this past year that carefully walked the line, but thankfully kept just shy off tokenism.

 

But thankfully Star Wars is in good hands with Kennedy. I'm not worried it will be a big problem.

I understand your point about shoehorning pc-ness, but the bigger point isn't to force equality it's to challenge what we have come to subconsciously consider normal.

 

And it seems like the first people to complain about their stories being ruined are the ones already being represented.

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"These things should happen naturally, not shoehorned in."

 

Naturally, like, how it happens in nature, where the ratio of men to women is more or less even.

 

But we're okay with having casts that are 90% male. Those pesky 10% that are women are fine (I GUESS) just as long as they talk NATURALLY and don't get all their womenness all over my movie.

 

Ugh, women.

I think part of it also depends on the context of the movie. For example, in many war movies, you don't traditionally see a lot of women in the military. Star Wars can say it is a different galaxy and time period but the story was created during a time where I think women in the military were not as prevalent as today. Doesn't make it right but that could explain part of it. However, if they are showing scenes with civilians in them, there should be a fairly equal mix.

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My wife loves Uhura, Princess Leia, Wonder Woman and even She-Ra. She hears people slam their franchises as sexist and laughs. I asked why. She said I'm barefoot in her kitchen, taking care of her babies while she's out doing what she wants. Girl power, she smiled. I said wait. What. She expanded with people see what they want to see. She then told me to stop thinking and finish making her dinner.

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I understand your point about shoehorning pc-ness, but the bigger point isn't to force equality it's to challenge what we have come to subconsciously consider normal.

 

And it seems like the first people to complain about their stories being ruined are the ones already being represented.

 

I get what you're saying, and I'm all for it as long as it's done well. It's just that it usually isn't. It's like going to see your favorite band in concert but having to sit through a political lecture between songs. Even if you agree with what they're saying, you'd probably rather the band get back to the music.

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There's so many things off about that statement that I don't even know where to begin.

 

Experiment-- replace "women" for "black people" and feminists for civil rights activists and review your thesis again and see if you feel the same way.

 

 

It's not my statement it was mentioned in "Star Wars: The Legacy Revealed" if you want a source. George Lucas's writing is credited with spawning the strong female archetype. I don't know what it's got to do with black people and civil rights. But instead of me answering your question, do you think there should be an equal number of women to men in every movie? Like wise, an equal number of black people, chinese people, muslims or zoroastrians. When does it stop being about equality and start being about stupid political correctism?

 

In the US alone you would have to have every movie coming out with 40% white, 25% black and 35% latin american actors to start looking anywhere near equal. Oh and 10% of those whites have to hate the blacks and latin americans. And that's even before you make sure half of those are female.

 

"These things should happen naturally, not shoehorned in."

 

Naturally, like, how it happens in nature, where the ratio of men to women is more or less even.

 

But we're okay with having casts that are 90% male. Those pesky 10% that are women are fine (I GUESS) just as long as they talk NATURALLY and don't get all their womenness all over my movie.

 

Ugh, women.

Lucas, I'm not sure where you're coming from with this. I think you're trying to paint me as some kind of chauvinist male elitist woman hater. And I'm just not. In an earlier post I said it is better for people to challenge the writers to write more stuff with better numbers in than try to add more of another group to a movie after the fact. I'm all in favour of equality and I find all types of discrimination abhorrent. But if a political force can challenge the entertainment industry and force them to change something that's already written to fit in with their version of equality then I don't agree with it. It's like them adding another four female Avengers to balance the numbers up a bit. Is that an acceptable change? In my opinion no. Writing a whole new superhero movie with more women in sounds like a good thing to me though. Similarly if the next installment of the SW saga has more female lead characters and they're actually written in to the story in the first place then I'd be more than happy with that.

 

The complainers are reactionary and they're only moaning about things after the fact. That's where the issue arises for me. Perhaps they don't get the chance to moan beforehand if they don't know who's going to be in it. A great example of some great forward thinking writing is the Hunger Games series. A pretty decent balance in there. Why can't we write more new stuff like that?

 

But then again, maybe if we moaned a little more about world hunger and child poverty we might get something done about that! But no... lets start with the important issue of women not getting enough jobs in the entertainment industry. Don't get me started on women over 50 not getting any roles at all. OMG. Knock those other things down the list until we've got that right. In fact... lets petition the UN to make sure that they see this inequality!!

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Hobbit might not be the best argument piece considering 75% of that 9 hour sojourn turned out to be "completely superfluous and unnecessary."

 

Stevil, I think you have a real misconception over what happened with this movie after that initial cast picture was released. As far as I know, there were no sweeping changes made. They didn't do major rewrites to include new roles tailor made for women or non-white ethnicities. Gwendoline Christie and Lupita Nyong'o were announced after the fact- whether they were cast after the fact is irrelevant in my opinion. Both of their resumes speak for themselves. If you have a problem with qualified women getting a role that was written, at its most basic level, "for" a male actor, then :shrug:.

Writing a whole new superhero movie with more women in sounds like a good thing to me though

 

Didn't you just call the all female Ghostbusters film "abhorrent" somewhere in this thread?

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I think it is interesting we debate whether or not a minority or woman in a lead role is appropriate or is just done for PC reasons, but not so with a white male lead. It is almost as if some people need justification for casting someone that is not a white male in a lead. To me, the only time it matters if it is to make an accurate description of historical or modern events.

 

District 9 took place in South Africa and almost all of the leads were white. I don't remember people being in uproar over that. However casting a minority as a black Stormtrooper is a cause for examining whether or not a black lead is cast to make it PC or he was actually best for the role.

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I personally don't think that putting a female in a traditional male role is an issue at all. A lot of people were pretty upset about Starbuck in the Battlestar Galactica reboot, but Katie Sackoff ended up completely owning that role and made everyone forget about the gender role.

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Shoehorning is adding females to a well established cast of characters just to even out the demographics. But these new episodes were a blank slate, no set cast of characters, so adding more women to the mix shouldn't be "weird" or "forced" unless the writer makes it so.

 

And I wouldn't consider movie Leia to be some great example of a strong female character. She spends most of ANH and RotJ needing to be rescued...by men.

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Hobbit might not be the best argument piece considering 75% of that 9 hour sojourn turned out to be "completely superfluous and unnecessary."

 

Stevil, I think you have a real misconception over what happened with this movie after that initial cast picture was released. As far as I know, there were no sweeping changes made. They didn't do major rewrites to include new roles tailor made for women or non-white ethnicities. Gwendoline Christie and Lupita Nyong'o were announced after the fact- whether they were cast after the fact is irrelevant in my opinion. Both of their resumes speak for themselves. If you have a problem with qualified women getting a role that was written, at its most basic level, "for" a male actor, then :shrug:.

Writing a whole new superhero movie with more women in sounds like a good thing to me though

 

Didn't you just call the all female Ghostbusters film "abhorrent" somewhere in this thread?

Yes because they had a film with all men in already. Then they changed it on this new wave of equality.

 

Shoehorning is adding females to a well established cast of characters just to even out the demographics. But these new episodes were a blank slate, no set cast of characters, so adding more women to the mix shouldn't be "weird" or "forced" unless the writer makes it so.

 

And I wouldn't consider movie Leia to be some great example of a strong female character. She spends most of ANH and RotJ needing to be rescued...by men.

She had a blaster and she was a princess and a senator. She wasn't your typical fawning female love interest. Later on she was one of the leaders in the rebellion, She was a spy at Jabba's palace and a freedom fighter on Endor.

 

More Power :)

 

Written that way!!

 

Seriously guys I wouldn't complain if they made a majority female casted star wars. As long as they write it that way.

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And I wouldn't consider movie Leia to be some great example of a strong female character. She spends most of ANH and RotJ needing to be rescued...by men.

Every character needed to be rescued at some point.

 

ANH: Luke rescued by Obi Wan from Sandpeople and then again in the Cantina. Leia rescued by Luke, Han, and Chewie. Then, she returns the favor by coming up with the idea to go down the garabage chute. But then they all need to be rescued by C3PO and R2D2. Luke then rescued by Han in the Battle of Yavin.

 

ESB: Luke rescued on Hoth by Han. Luke rescued by Leia, Chewie and Lando after his fight with Darth Vader.

 

ROTJ: Han almost rescued by Leia in Jabba's Palace. Then Leia, Chewie, and Han rescued by Luke. Lando rescued from the Sarlacc by Han. Luke rescued by Darth Vader.

 

I'm sure there are many more examples. Seems like Luke was the one who needed the most rescuing. :D

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At some point...not for the majority of the film. Most of those "rescues" are just "oh ****" moments where another character temporarily steps into the action. Leia's constant need to be rescued drove entire plotlines. If she hadn't been captured and sent that message in ANH, arguably the entire movie wouldn't have happened, and all because Luke thought she was beautiful (which is, of course, the best reason for any woman to be on film.) I mean come on, she literally winds up mostly naked and chained up. Can you conceive for just a moment of that having happened to any one of the men from the movie? Did any of the men stop in the middle of a mission to profess their love? Did she even get a chance to come onto anyone, as opposed to being the object of someone else's chase? No. She was pursued until she relented.

 

Yes, she had some quippy lines and some weapons, but that alone doesn't make one a strong character. She's a strong, capable woman, but in the movies she was written to be a typical female trope and only a plot driving vehicle for the boys. It's hard to separate the character "as a person" from the character as a part of the whole story, but just because a female in a movie is an "awesomely strong person" doesn't mean that she's necessarily a strong character in the movie, and vice versa.

 

This article does a pretty good job of pointing out the differences.

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Writing a whole new superhero movie with more women in sounds like a good thing to me though

 

Didn't you just call the all female Ghostbusters film "abhorrent" somewhere in this thread?

Yes because they had a film with all men in already. Then they changed it on this new wave of equality.

 

 

You don't think it was because Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Leslie Jones, and Kate McKinnon are funny actors who (in the case of two of them at least) have had prior box office success?

 

Is it a reboot you have a problem with, or the women?

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