Girls Need Role Models: Difference between revisions

The pitfalls of this are in the perception. Female leads in shows like, say sitcoms, are still relatively rare. As a result, the foible of a female lead character is going to stand out a lot more than a similar foible from a male lead character on another show. A female character, as long as this is a rare thing, will always stick out for better or worse. Usually for worse—a female character must be better written and have more plausible flaws than her male counterpart. Otherwise, she's likely to stick out as being filled with stereotypes. It's likewise tempting to make the female character [[Positive Discrimination|better at everything]] to avoid such allegations.

 

 

Compare [[You Are a Credit to Your Race]].

{{examples}}

== Comic Books ==

* [[Wonder Woman]] was created by a psychiatrist that thought this. Of course, the kinds of girls he had in mind were into bondage and swinging, so one would have to wonder if this is a [[Broken Aesop]]...

* Comics and music critic Douglas Wolk once wrote a series of reviews under the secret identity of clueless Comics Journal intern Jess Lemon. "Jess" tears into a ''Vampirella/Witchblade'' crossover when her apologist brother claims that it has strong female characters: ''"When people say they want strong female characters, they don't necessarily mean strong in the sense that they can lift things."''

* The original Larry Hama-penned GI Joe comic from Marvel is well regarded by feminists, citing that the female character's gender was not a focus, and the fact that their gender did not define them or their positions on the team.

 

== Film ==

* It appears that [[The Powers That Be]] working currently on the film of ''[[The Hobbit (film)|The Hobbit]]'' are fully aware of this trope. Many fan eyebrows have been raised on the revelation that Evangeline Lily will be playing a film-only character called "Tauriel," and she is an "[[Action Girl|elf warrior-maiden]]." Granted, the alternative is to abide by the book, which hasn't got a single female character to its name, but fans are still prickly—not least because "elf warrior-maiden" are three prime [[Mary Sue]] buzzwords.

* [[Quentin Tarantino]] claimed, [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7L2ukSJFgCM in a rather amusing exchange with a local film critic], that girls aged 12+ should watch ''[[Kill Bill]]''.

 

== Literature ==

* [[Phryne Fisher]]; as her creator [[Kerry Greenwood]] has said, "But Phryne is a hero, just like James Bond or the Saint, but with fewer product endorsements and a better class of lovers. I decided to try a female hero and made her as free as a male hero, to see what she would do."

 

* Originated with ''That Girl'' and ''[[The Mary Tyler Moore Show]]'', though it was arguably justified in those days. Back then, the leads started off their show by [[She Can Turn The World On With Her Smile|Turning The World On With Their Smile]].

* The whole premise of ''[[Ugly Betty]]''. Compare with [[Yo Soy Betty, la Fea|the original]] [[Soap Opera]] version, where some of the heroine's actions are somewhat questionable, and its point was to [[Inverted Trope|invert]] the [[Beauty Equals Goodness]] pattern in soap heroines.

* Amongst the younger female characters of ''[[Downton Abbey]]'' there is Sybil and Gwen. Whilst Mary and Edith partake in the [[The Glorious War of Sisterly Rivalry]], Anna pines hopelessly after Mr Bates, and Daisy is relentlessly manipulated by Thomas, it comes as a relief to watch Sybil and Gwen form an inter-class friendship based on Gwen's desire to become a typist and Sybil's interest in women's emancipation.

* ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'''s Major Samantha Carter has been cited as one of the greatest female roles in science fiction for a very good reason - she always held her own with "the boys", and aside from one rather embarrassing speech in the pilot episode (after which actress [[Amanda Tapping]] put her foot down and said, "Okay, women don't talk like that,"), rarely made a big deal about being a woman unless someone else made an issue of it first. She was smart, she was a [[Badass]] [[Action Girl]], and she was a real character with real flaws and real emotions. And on top of that, she had one of the firmest friendships in the show with Dr. Janet Fraiser, which was based not on mutual romantic woes but on common interests and real regard for each other.

 

== Video Games ==

* ''[[Saints Row 2]]'' + 3 approaches this trope from the other direction by being completely indiscriminate. The fact you might be female pales to the fact you might, for example, have blue skin, luminous green tattoos and be roughly the shape of a pear. No-one will care, except for the odd comment in the 2nd game calling you the toughest chick they've ever met. By the third game there's plenty of female characters inhabiting the main cast, the main thing that subverts the 'you too, can be a chaotic, violence-loving psychopath!' message, is how [[Stripperific]] most NPC females are.

 

* [[Parodied Trope|Parodied]] by [[Hark! A Vagrant]] [http://harkavagrant.com/index.php?id=311 here] and [http://harkavagrant.com/index.php?id=336 here], as part of a joint project with Carly Monado and Meredith Gran.

 

== Web Original ==

* The ladies from [[The Nostalgia Chick]] take from [[Absolutely Fabulous]] in this regard. You've got [[Slapstick Knows No Gender]], plenty of [[Black Comedy]] including rape jokes, neuroses, pretentiousness, egos, stalking and just plain hilarious evil all round. And with that in mind, you can understand why Lindsay Ellis would get pissed off when the [[Women Are Wiser]] [[Misaimed Fandom]] keeps on popping up despite all of this.

 

== Western Animation ==

* Kitty Katswell in ''[[Tuff Puppy]]'' being kickass [[Action Girl]] and the most competent and [[Only Sane Man|sane]] agent in T.U.F.F.. With a sensible and stylish [[Spy Catsuit]] go with.

* The [[Bratz]] movies and tv show have four female main characters. We have Cloe, the beauty whiz and sometimes nervous wreck; Sasha, the sassy music connoisseur who's also a bit of a control freak; Jade, the fashion maven who can be a bit over the top; and Yasmin, the yoga master who is too shy for her own good. Most of the 'special' characters (the ones that only show up in one movie or episode) are female, as well as the reoccurring villians. Did i mention that the Bratz run their own bestselling magazine ''and'' that they're still in high school? Despite the complaints about their clothes not being age appropriate, they are great role models.

 

== Real Life ==

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Action Girl]]

[[Category:Women Are Delicate]]

[[Category:Gender and Sexuality Tropes]]

[[Category:Double Standard]]