Light Feminine and Dark Feminine

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This is a character contrast trope. Both female characters are decidedly feminine, but in different ways. The Light feminine is generally angelic and feels love. The Dark feminine is generally devilish and plays with desire. Either type can be the girly girl portrayed in the Tomboy and Girly Girl contrast. When a love interest is involved, it's likely to lead to a Betty and Veronica love triangle: Betty being the Light feminine, and Veronica being the Dark feminine.

As with any two character trope, the two characters have to have some sort of relationship with each other, be it friends, family, love interests, or rivals for a love interest, so the two characters can be playing the traits directly off each other.

The dark feminine character is not a villain or a whore but half of a good girl, bad girl or naughty and nice pair. Remember not to put a square peg in a round trope. Remember Dark Is Not Evil.

Compare The Three Faces of Eve. The Spear Counterpart is Noble Male, Roguish Male.

Examples of Light Feminine and Dark Feminine include:

Anime and Manga

Comic Book

  • In Bone, Rose is the Light Feminine, while her twin sister Briar is the Dark Feminine.

Film

  • Gentlemen Prefer Blondes: Russell is the Dark Feminine, while Monroe is the Light Feminine.
  • Sunrise: The Woman from The City is the Dark Feminine (hedonist, cheater), while The Wife is the Light Feminine (goody-goody all the way through).
  • Batman Forever has Two-Face's molls, Sugar (played by Drew Barrymore) and Spice (played by Debi Mazar). Subverted in that both of them are "bad", and "Sugar" is probably worse because she gives The Riddler the cube with the information about Bruce Wayne's Secret Identity.
  • Discussed in Black Swan.
  • Pepper Potts and Natasha Romanoff/"Natalie Rushman" in Iron Man 2 and The Avengers.

Literature

  • Gone with the Wind: Melanie is the Light Feminine, while Scarlett is the Dark Feminine.
  • The Jack Weyland book Michelle and Debra has the obedient Michelle as the light and her rebellious best friend Debra as the dark.
  • The two leading ladies in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Blithedale Romance. Priscilla is the demure, fragile, domestic (read: conservative) Light Feminine; Zenobia is the mysterious, sensual, outspoken, transcendental feminist (read: liberal) Dark Feminine.
  • In Animorphs, Cassie and Rachel have shades of this: Cassie is a down-to-earth Friend to All Living Things who only fights the Yeerks because she has to, while Rachel is a borderline-Dark Action Girl who honestly enjoys the war on some level, despite having the appearance and fashion-obsession of a supermodel. Despite all this, they're also best friends.
  • Ellony Leckery and Pharinet Palindrake in Chronicles of Magravandias, Ellony being a straight example of The Ingenue while Pharinet is something of a Yandere when pushed. Other female characters in the story, particularly those who fill similar roles or are related to them or are named for them are more balanced between the two extremes.
  • Antonia and Matilda in The Monk, as highlighted by Ambrosio's interest in both of them, their similar appearance, and the roles each of them play in the story.

Live Action Television

  • Two Broke Girls: Max is the Dark Feminine, Caroline is the Light Feminine.
    • Lampshaded by Sophie, the title character in "And the Upstairs Neighbor", when she compares them to a chocolate and vanilla cupcake respectively.
  • June (light) and Chloe (dark) in Don't Trust the B---- In Apartment 23
  • Degrassi has the noble Emma as light and her best friend the provocative Manny as dark.
  • In Buffy the Vampire Slayer there are the two slayers, the responsible Buffy and the destructive Faith.
  • How I Met Your Mother has the motherly, married, Girl Next Door Lily and the vain, independent, sexy Robin.
  • Merlin has Guinevere, the good hearted heroine, and Morgana, the villainess.
    • Though interestingly, Gwen is linked more with desire than Morgana, who (despite a couple of early Femme Fatale scenes) almost comes across as asexual in her complete lack of interest in men.
  • Robin Hood had Marian as the light feminine, who was replaced by Isabella, the dark feminine.
  • The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air: Hilary (dark) and Ashley (light).
  • Xena: Warrior Princess (dark) and Gabrielle (light). Granted, Xena was a Tomboy Princess, but in her first appearance she was also quite decidedly The Vamp.
  • Most of the final two contestants of America's Next Top Model counts: Cycle 1's Adrienne (dark) and Shannon (light), Cycle 2's Yohanna (dark) and Mercedes (light), Cycle 3's Eva (dark) and Yaya (light), Cycle 4's Naima (dark) and Kahlen (light), Cycle 5's Nicole (light) and Nik (dark), Cycle 7's CariDee (light) and Melrose (dark), Cycle 10's Whitney (dark) and Anya (light), Cycle 14's Krista (dark) and Raina (light), Cycle 15's Ann (light) and Chelsea (dark), Cycle 16's Brittani (light) and Molly (dark), and Cycle 17's Lisa (dark) and Allison (light).
  • New Girl: Jess is the Light Feminine while Cece is the Dark Feminine.
  • Snow White and Red Riding Hood from Once Upon a Time. It's practically in their names!

Mythology

  • In an apocryphal Abrahamic mythology, Lilith (the first wife of Adam) represents the Dark Feminine—while Eve (Adam's second wife) is the Light Feminine.

Newspaper Comics

  • Non Sequitur: Kate is the Light Feminine, while Danae is the Dark Feminine.

Video Games

Western Animation

  • Adventure Time: Marceline is the Dark Feminine, while Bubblegum is the Light Feminine.
  • My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic:
    • Fluttershy (Light) is kind, caring, very much like a mother to the animals. Rarity (Dark) is vain and slightly manipulative, but still a good-hearted pony.
    • This contrast is also readily apparent in the princesses. Celestia tends to act motherly and patient towards her subjects, while Luna is more intimidating and impulsive.
    • Another possible pair of characters to display this contrast is Pinkie Pie and Twilight Sparkle. Pinkie is Light, in that she tries to make everypony happy and operates primarily on intuition. Twilight is Dark, having a prideful and slightly selfish streak and operates primarily on logic, although, like Rarity, she's still a good-hearted pony.
  • G.I. Joe Scarlett is light feminine while Jinks is dark feminine.
  • With regard to Northern Water Tribe social norms, in the first season of Avatar: The Last Airbender, the dutiful, self-sacrificing Yue is Light Feminine and rebellious Action Girl Katara is Dark Feminine. However, Katara is arguably the Light Feminine when compared to the series' other Action Girls due to her unofficial status as everyone's mom.
  • Total Drama: Heather is Dark Feminine while Lindsay is Light Feminine.