Gender On Television: It's Like Feminism Never Happened

[Bastet]

15 minutes ago, proserpina65 said:

Cagney & Lacey never had dressed like they were going to a club. 

Fun fact:  Tyne Daly shopped for some of Lacey's wardrobe.  The costume department was always pushing to put her in fancier clothes, but she knew that's not how the character would dress, so she'd go get stuff Mary Beth would wear and could afford.

[Raja]

2 hours ago, proserpina65 said:

I'd have expected this from shows made in the '70s. 

2 hours ago, proserpina65 said:

I'd have expected the opposite, actually.  Cagney & Lacey never had dressed like they were going to a club.  Not at work, actually.

Well Cagney & Lacey was an 80s show and the duo was billed as the  first female detective team on the NYPD. Barney Miller would occasionally have women detectives during its 1975 to 1982 run.

In the 70s the first women were going into full policing duties in much of America and thus TV had the three come out of their police academies and quit due to their limited duties and became Charlie's Angels. Pepper Anderson of Police Woman was famously undercover much of the time as she came up before women were accepted for unlimited street duties, at least in the LAPD.

[andromeda331]

7 hours ago, Bastet said:

Fun fact:  Tyne Daly shopped for some of Lacey's wardrobe.  The costume department was always pushing to put her in fancier clothes, but she knew that's not how the character would dress, so she'd go get stuff Mary Beth would wear and could afford.

I'm glad she did that. It made sense that's how Mary Beth would dress. Jane Rizzoli from Rizzoli & Isles dressed normal for a detective. She wore button top or had several of the same type of top in different colors, pants and boots. 

[proserpina65]

12 hours ago, Raja said:

Well Cagney & Lacey was an 80s show and the duo was billed as the  first female detective team on the NYPD. Barney Miller would occasionally have women detectives during its 1975 to 1982 run.

Thanks.  I guess I'm now old enough to get my decades confused. 😵

[Spartan Girl]

So now that most of us have realized Will Schuester on Glee is trash, is it maybe time to admit that Terri wasn’t the monster that the show wanted us to believe she was?

Or putting it another way: the show wrote her using a bunch of sexist “bitch wife” tropes to excuse Will’s behavior and make him out to be a big sad victim instead of a pathetic manchild living out his midlife crisis through a high school glee club?

Really, if had Glee had competent writers that made an effort with their female characters, Terri would have come to her senses and realized that Will was NOT worth faking a pregnancy for, especially when he was emotionally lusting after Emma.

Edited November 26, 2022 by Spartan Girl

[Spartan Girl]

Family Guy recently did a pretty good gag on how dads doing the bare minimum of what we expect moms do to are worshipped as heroes:

 

[Spartan Girl]

The new Fatal Attraction series promised as a more nuanced version of Alex, the version that Glenn Close fought so hard to keep. What we got was an even more evil Psycho Bitch who skips the bunnies and goes right to full-on murder.

The only difference between that and the movie is that Dan at least gets more consequences for his actions, but that victory feels hollow.

[Affogato]

On 6/10/2021 at 7:31 PM, biakbiak said:

He did creepily watch a 16 year old girl while she slept, made a ton of choices for her without asking her before and after she sent him to hell (based on what he felt was best for her) so yeah in boyfriends he is also all the red flags.

It is a vampire story. Vampires are stalkers and serial killers and lead women into wantoness and disgrace and evil. Some of this is hard to avoid. 
 

 

[Spartan Girl]

Does it bother anyone else that in certain fandoms, the female characters are held to a higher standard of morals while letting the male characters slide on everything?

In the Buffy forums, I couldn’t make one comment calling out Xander for cheating on Cordelia and his shitty post-breakup treatment of her without someone coming to his defense with “Well, Willow was as much to blame for the affair as Xander!” or “Well, what was he supposed to do, just take all Cordy’s sniping?”

To which I can reply,

1) Willow was as much to blame for the cheating, and she accepted responsibility for her actions. And unlike Xander, she viewed Cordy’s behavior with grace and understanding.

2) Cordy had a right to be mad that Xander cheated on her. He could have acknowledged that and been the bigger person. The fact that he didn’t speak volumes about how their relationship really meant to him. But I guess all that should be overlooked because he bought her prom dress. 🙄

[Bastet]

37 minutes ago, Spartan Girl said:

Does it bother anyone else that in certain fandoms, the female characters are held to a higher standard of morals

I don't think you need the "certain" in there; I've yet to come across a show for which this isn't the case.  Art very much imitates life in that respect.

[meep.meep]

I don't think you need "in certain fandoms" in there.  In general women are held to a higher moral standard than men in our society.  The whole sluts vs locker room talk thing.

[Dimity]

Even in family sitcoms where the writers are trying to show a dispute between the spouses fairly you can bet if you check out the online comments that it's all "what a bitch" and "how does he put up with her".  And that's in episodes where the intent was not to show the woman in a bad light.  Doesn't matter.

[Spartan Girl]

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind if a female characters are called out on shitty things they actually do. And it annoys me to no end if the narrative just has them play the victim and skate accountability with zero consequences whatsoever. But as you all said, on many shows, women get their feet held to the fire more often than men do. It always winds up as “boys will be boys” as opposed to “bitches be crazy.” 

[Cobalt Stargazer]

5 hours ago, Bastet said:

I don't think you need the "certain" in there; I've yet to come across a show for which this isn't the case.  Art very much imitates life in that respect.

That's because fandom as a whole doesn't particularly have standards, at least not in the way it's usually defined. I was going to quote an old post from  @Danny Franks, then decided on something more current. The entertainment landscape is filled with murderers, rapists, and psychopaths, everyone from Daemon Targaryen to Homelander, and as long as they can manage the 'sad, wet cat' face now and then, they will always have fans. The rallying cry is that it's fantasy, that within the realm of fiction you can like or even love a character who is objectively filth in every sense and it doesn't mean anything in the real world, and yet those awful characters are mostly guys.

[Anela]

1 hour ago, Dimity said:

Even in family sitcoms where the writers are trying to show a dispute between the spouses fairly you can bet if you check out the online comments that it's all "what a bitch" and "how does he put up with her".  And that's in episodes where the intent was not to show the woman in a bad light.  Doesn't matter.

Jewel Staite posted something on threads, joking about her husband admitting that he might be wrong about something, after ten years. She received a lot of hateful comments about that. 

[Spartan Girl]

25 minutes ago, Cobalt Stargazer said:

That's because fandom as a whole doesn't particularly have standards, at least not in the way it's usually defined. I was going to quote an old post from  @Danny Franks, then decided on something more current. The entertainment landscape is filled with murderers, rapists, and psychopaths, everyone from Daemon Targaryen to Homelander, and as long as they can manage the 'sad, wet cat' face now and then, they will always have fans. The rallying cry is that it's fantasy, that within the realm of fiction you can like or even love a character who is objectively filth in every sense and it doesn't mean anything in the real world, and yet those awful characters are mostly guys.

And it’s more frustrating when people use that as the lowest bar to measure a character’s decency. Just because a guy isn’t a murderer/rapist doesn’t automatically make him decent by default. If I had a nickel for how many times I’ve called out a guy character for being a douche  only to have a bunch of defenders come at me with “oh nobody’s perfect, at least least he’s not an actual murderer like (insert character name here),” along with a bunch of other lame excuses for their behavior, I’d be rich.

But I’d bet all that money if any of those said characters were women, nobody would defend them. They’d call them whiny, bitchy, crazy, etc. And that’s what sticks in my craw most of all.

Edited September 12 by Spartan Girl

[Anduin]

I'm expecting that sooner or later, Galadriel will encounter Sauron again. I hope her first action will be to try and stab him in his pretty pretty face. It won't work, his fate is set in stone elsewhere. But she won't fall for any of his tricks. She's all guts, very little brain. But as far as first instincts go, violence is the right one this time. And I hope she keeps trying to stab him in whatever body part is available.

Also, she's spent the last 6,000 years trying to find and kill him. There's no reason she should stop now.

But I find Morfydd Clark prettier than Charlie Vickers, even in his Annatar guise. Is it just because I'm just as shallow but from the other side?

[JustHereForFood]

The hotter the male characters are, the more they can get away with as far as fandom is concerned. I haven't noticed the same with women.

 

[possibilities]

It also annoys me that if a female character is strong, tough, resiliant, and unapologetic about it, she's considered unlikable. Male characters like that are badasses.

Women are also considered "too perfect" if they don't fuck up in major ways, while male characters like that are, you guessed it, geniuses! Badasses! Heroes!

[Anduin]

11 minutes ago, possibilities said:

It also annoys me that if a female character is strong, tough, resiliant, and unapologetic about it, she's considered unlikable. Male characters like that are badasses.

Women are also considered "too perfect" if they don't fuck up in major ways, while male characters like that are, you guessed it, geniuses! Badasses! Heroes!

I'm from the original Star Wars generation. Leia could be spiky and feisty as hell, and shoot a blaster at the same time. Such things don't bother me. And indeed, she had setbacks, but worked to overcome them.

Galadriel is even spiker, and works equally hard to overcome her setbacks. Although ROP is a funny case. Everyone who hates the very thought of it must have left by now, or I've muted them, leaving only those who accept the show for what it is.

[Annber03]

1 hour ago, possibilities said:

It also annoys me that if a female character is strong, tough, resiliant, and unapologetic about it, she's considered unlikable. Male characters like that are badasses.

Women are also considered "too perfect" if they don't fuck up in major ways, while male characters like that are, you guessed it, geniuses! Badasses! Heroes!

And this is why I tend to be skeptical of the claim that women in TV shows and movies and whatnot are "badly written". In some cases, absolutely, that's the case, but I often wonder if it's less that and more that people are just super picky about how women are supposed to behave and react to things in books, and misake their personal dislike of them/their decisions/etc. as them being "badly written". 

I've seen a lot of criticism of how Kristen in the show "Evil" behaves, from some of the viewers. She's absolutely got a crapton of flaws, to be sure...but there are so many shows out there with male characters who've done all that same stuff, if not worse, and they're seen as antiheroes and still talked about and celebrated as great, iconic TV characters to this day. I enjoyed watching Kristen on "Evil" in large part because she's such a hot mess, and I really appreciate how unapologetic she was about being that way, and that the show allowed her to be that way. 

This is also one big reason I loved Norma on "Bates Motel". 

[Mabinogia]

9 hours ago, Annber03 said:

This is also one big reason I loved Norma on "Bates Motel". 

Norma Bates is one of my all time favorite characters. She is so amazingly complex. The combination of how she was written and how Vera acted her made her incredibly watchable.

10 hours ago, possibilities said:

It also annoys me that if a female character is strong, tough, resiliant, and unapologetic about it, she's considered unlikable. Male characters like that are badasses.

Or those female characters are written off as being "like men" because only men can be strong, tough, resilient, etc GRRRRRRR

Conversely, male characters who aren't portrayed that way are often considered wimpy or "girly". Like, this is 2024, we should be past these gender stereotypes by now. 

[Spartan Girl]

I have a love/hate relationship with Norma Bates. On one hand, Vera did a great job and she was entertaining as hell to watch. But on the other hand, she was a terrible mother and never should have had kids, and I really hated how the show’s final season tried to sanitize all the many, MANY crappy decisions and actions she made that had a hand in driving Norman off the deep end. Once she died, her character (the real Norma, not Mother) became a too-good-for-this-sinful-Earth Madonna symbol to both Norman and Romero. That’s not who she was…and maybe that was the point of that final season. But it still made me eye roll like crazy—aside from that Bates Motel stuck the landing beautifully.

Edited September 12 by Spartan Girl

[Affogato]

11 hours ago, Anduin said:

I'm expecting that sooner or later, Galadriel will encounter Sauron again. I hope her first action will be to try and stab him in his pretty pretty face. It won't work, his fate is set in stone elsewhere. But she won't fall for any of his tricks. She's all guts, very little brain. But as far as first instincts go, violence is the right one this time. And I hope she keeps trying to stab him in whatever body part is available.

Also, she's spent the last 6,000 years trying to find and kill him. There's no reason she should stop now.

But I find Morfydd Clark prettier than Charlie Vickers, even in his Annatar guise. Is it just because I'm just as shallow but from the other side?

I find both of the attractive, but Galadriel is presented as a more complex character at this time. The Lord of the Rings, book, did not lean into its female characters, but the show is making the most of the little we know about Galadriel. Sauron may have had a passing thought about changing, but he got over it. 
 

i don’t think she has very little brain, but she is impulsive. Fight response, ptsd. She has to overcome her impulse to fight everything and learn to trust. 

Edited September 12 by Affogato

[Anduin]

24 minutes ago, Affogato said:

i don’t think she has very little brain, but she is impulsive. Fight response, ptsd. She has to overcome her impulse to fight everything and learn to trust. 

Yes, impulsive is a much better word for her. Thank you! And ROP is doing a lot better by the women, mostly. Miriel seems to be the odd one out.

[Affogato]

I’ve noticed a lot of fandom, fic writing/tumblr type fandom, has a romance novel default. Romance novels, not my genre, are comfort food—so is horror—where you can be sure if the ending. Yes a romance novel has a happily ever after or a happy for now. The woman may have jobs and be feisty and brave and know kung fu, but the romantic interest is Everything and ….the woman is the avatar you slip into to dream about him. Sometimes the sexual orientations are different.  So the woman has to change to be what he wants.  Fandom wants a happily ever after, marriage and children, and you were brave and string, but now hot guy will protect you. Sadly narcissists and sociopaths have a certain charisma. They ‘love bomb’. It is epic!  The character of the woman must bow to that. 
 

So a lot of people try to force that peg into that other shaped hole. 
 

but yes, in general strong female characters are rare and people berate them for the flaws that make them interesting. 

[Dimity]

Post that showed up on my FB today - picture it in big scary letters "Fans are shocked by how the actresses from Desperate Housewives look 20 years after show first aired - what happened to them?"  Gee, what could possibly happen in 20 years to alter someone's appearance?  Well I'm stumped.

[kathyk2]

On 9/11/2024 at 7:55 PM, Spartan Girl said:

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind if a female characters are called out on shitty things they actually do. And it annoys me to no end if the narrative just has them play the victim and skate accountability with zero consequences whatsoever. But as you all said, on many shows, women get their feet held to the fire more often than men do. It always winds up as “boys will be boys” as opposed to “bitches be crazy.” 

Amen Brenda and Pope were treated differently on the Closer. She had to answer for everything she did while he didn't. Women aren't allowed to be bumbling as men are nobody would find it funny if a woman couldn't do housework or care for her kids.

[Raja]

28 minutes ago, kathyk2 said:

Amen Brenda and Pope were treated differently on the Closer. She had to answer for everything she did while he didn't. Women aren't allowed to be bumbling as men are nobody would find it funny if a woman couldn't do housework or care for her kids.

Keep in mind Chief Johnson was the ultimate outsider on The Closer. Given the premise that at the time the LAPD at that time would not take transfers and the only way to hire a Lieutenant was as a Chief so all of those command level Captains, Commanders and Chiefs she jumped over when hired showed her disrespect, it was the entire point of the show.

In the sequel the second in command Lieutenant fully expected to take over the unit as a Lieutenant when Major Crimes premiered.

[Palimelon]

Quote

Post that showed up on my FB today - picture it in big scary letters "Fans are shocked by how the actresses from Desperate Housewives look 20 years after show first aired - what happened to them?"  Gee, what could possibly happen in 20 years to alter someone's appearance?  Well I'm stumped.

[Cobalt Stargazer]

On 9/11/2024 at 5:23 PM, Spartan Girl said:

And it’s more frustrating when people use that as the lowest bar to measure a character’s decency. Just because a guy isn’t a murderer/rapist doesn’t automatically make him decent by default. If I had a nickel for how many times I’ve called out a guy character for being a douche  only to have a bunch of defenders come at me with “oh nobody’s perfect, at least least he’s not an actual murderer like (insert character name here),” along with a bunch of other lame excuses for their behavior, I’d be rich.

But I’d bet all that money if any of those said characters were women, nobody would defend them. They’d call them whiny, bitchy, crazy, etc. And that’s what sticks in my craw most of all.

To a point, I agree, and yet. The sticking point for me is that the characters who aren't murderers, etc are excoriated by fandom far beyond anything they're actually guilty of in direct comparison to the characters who are murderers, etc, regardless of gender, although I might swing back around to that in a second.

Why do Xander Harris' flaws make fans so angry? Because that's the pinnacle of it, what I see as way overstating the case of how bad he is, and you don't even have to compare him to a soulless killer. His 'crimes' are: cheating on his girlfriend, not handling the aftermath particularly well, and I guess not telling Buffy the truth at the end of the second season. There might be other stuff, but those are the big three. Even in the show, it's never addressed that Xander turns out to be right about Buffy only wanting her stupid boyfriend back, since she hides Angel and lies to everyone's faces about what's going on, and then she gets caught and everyone was mad for five minutes and then we never hear about it again. Not even from Xander. She at best disregards their emotional well-being and at worst puts their safety at risk, but Xander's the bad guy, because Buffy should be allowed to do whatever she wants.

I would posit that as entertaining as a character like Homelander might be, he's not relatable, again not in the way we usually define it. Viewers are comfortable enjoying watching him, because even though he's damaged and homicidal and just generally a piece of crap, his flaws are so outsized that there's nothing to compare it to in 'the real world'. It's not just the Sad Wet Cat face, although that's a piece of it.

Xander? Xander is relatable, especially given the nature of the show he was on, and if his flaws make the collective Us uncomfortable or even angry, that's why. It's not about Whedon, although I can see how that's a convenient explanation, because this discussion has been taking place for a long time, way before all that stuff was being talked about. I defend him both because I like him and because he's the only character from the show the collective We expect better from. Everybody else can do whatever, but Xander has standards he should live up to, because that's Fandom Logic.

[Spartan Girl]

Xander was sure singing a different tune about Anya, and that’s all I’m going to say about that.

People have very skewed definitions about what makes a character relatable. They trashed Carol Danvers for not being “relatable” enough, and yet I and others found her very relatable enough. Which proves my point: all the characters trolls trash for being “unrelatable” are almost always female, while the “relatable” or “likable” ones were almost always male.

Edited September 15 by Spartan Girl

[DXD526]

Quote

Post that showed up on my FB today - picture it in big scary letters "Fans are shocked by how the actresses from Desperate Housewives look 20 years after show first aired - what happened to them?"  Gee, what could possibly happen in 20 years to alter someone's appearance?  Well I'm stumped.

I see this kind of thing all the time, and it never ceases to amaze me. A picture of a film or TV star from the 70s or 80s, captioned 'You won't believe what she looks like today!!' Um, really? Given that that was 40 or 50 years ago, I probably will believe it. Why is it being brought up?

Idiocy.

[Raja]

18 minutes ago, DXD526 said:

I see this kind of thing all the time, and it never ceases to amaze me. A picture of a film or TV star from the 70s or 80s, captioned 'You won't believe what she looks like today!!' Um, really? Given that that was 40 or 50 years ago, I probably will believe it. Why is it being brought up?

Idiocy.

The look what happened post on Facebook being mentioned looks like the clickbait ads I used to see here on the bottom bar before I gave up trying to read this site without an ad blocker. There were both the she still looks good at x age along with the National Enquirer don't feel bad about yourself look at this star without makeup type.

[tearknee]

You always imagine after reading these stupid "... how she [usually a female actor from the 1970s/80s] looks NOW! posts, saying to the Comic Book Guys' that post them:

"You look just like Audrey Hepburn"

"Thank you"

"As she is now"

(Henry Davenport to Sally Smedley in "Drop the Dead Donkey" I lifted that from)

[Spartan Girl]

Interesting video. I agree that Faith and Xena’s redemption arcs were written WAY better than Regina’s because they stopped making excuses for what they did and accepted that nobody had to forgive them. 

[scarynikki12]

I appreciate Faith willingly going to prison before returning for the end of Buffy. That’s the kind of choice that goes a long way towards convincing me the character feels remorse, recognizes their bad actions/villainy, and is an early step towards redemption. Regina just had to make a sad face about no one begging for her lasagna and she’s considered redeemed. 

[kittykat]

I mean look no further than Walt and Skylar White.  The most toxic of that fandom thought that murdering, drug cooking, friend betraying Walt was a badass kingpin the common man could root for.  Skylar by all means was no saint but according to the Walt devotees she was the bitchiest bitch to ever bitch.

[Irlandesa]

15 minutes ago, kittykat said:

Skylar by all means was no saint but according to the Walt devotees she was the bitchiest bitch to ever bitch.

Every time this comes up, this is the character I think of.  Over the first two seasons, she was lied to by her husband about his whereabouts, his drug dealing, his illness and his work with his former student. He missed his daughter's birth because of it.  He killed people. He sexually assaulted her. 

But because she gave him a lackluster hand job in the premiere episode, so many perceived her to be the devil's incarnate and all questioning of her very lying husband was uncalled for.

[andromeda331]

Regina got away with everything she did. Because you know she was the victim. Sure she massacred villages, raped Graham and murdered him when he figured it out, got 28 years of revenge, treated her son like crap, murdered her father. But she was the victim. Not her victims. Poor Regina ah... had a terrible mother who she got rid of so she was free to do whatever she wanted. Her boyfriend was murdered by her mother. But you know it was really 10 year old Snow's fault. And it's totally okay that she murdered another woman's fiance because she was feeling sad. It was their fault anyways for trying to get married on the day Daniel died. Sure she was going to set off the bomb or whatever to blow up Storybrooke, but that was because no one wanted her to come with them. But Tamara and Owen got to it first. You know Owen who she tried to kidnap as a kid and murdered his father? Separating Hansel and Gretel from their father because they didn't want to live with her. After she forced them get an apple from the witch's house and they weren't the first she sent as there were dead bodies or bones of children there. That's not her fault. It's the kids.

[Anela]

7 hours ago, kittykat said:

I mean look no further than Walt and Skylar White.  The most toxic of that fandom thought that murdering, drug cooking, friend betraying Walt was a badass kingpin the common man could root for.  Skylar by all means was no saint but according to the Walt devotees she was the bitchiest bitch to ever bitch.

Yep. the only time I remember being against her, was when she wanted another character to be killed. Otherwise, I was defending her to people on my facebook list, at the time. 

[Spartan Girl]

1 hour ago, Anela said:

Yep. the only time I remember being against her, was when she wanted another character to be killed. Otherwise, I was defending her to people on my facebook list, at the time. 

If you’re referring to Jesse, even that was misogynist hypocrisy at work because the same people crucifying her for that were the ones that made excuses for all the manipulating, gaslight, and emotional abuse Walt put Jesse through to get to that point—and Skyler didn’t even KNOW about that. All she knew was what Walt told her: that he tried to burn their house down because he was pissed at Walt and ergo a potential threat. Had she known what Walt did to Brock, she would have killed him herself.

7 hours ago, Irlandesa said:

Every time this comes up, this is the character I think of.  Over the first two seasons, she was lied to by her husband about his whereabouts, his drug dealing, his illness and his work with his former student. He missed his daughter's birth because of it.  He killed people. He sexually assaulted her. 

But because she gave him a lackluster hand job in the premiere episode, so many perceived her to be the devil's incarnate and all questioning of her very lying husband was uncalled for.

CORRECTAMUNDO.

[JustHereForFood]

On 9/15/2024 at 7:31 PM, Cobalt Stargazer said:

Why do Xander Harris' flaws make fans so angry? Because that's the pinnacle of it, what I see as way overstating the case of how bad he is, and you don't even have to compare him to a soulless killer. His 'crimes' are: cheating on his girlfriend, not handling the aftermath particularly well, and I guess not telling Buffy the truth at the end of the second season. There might be other stuff, but those are the big three. Even in the show, it's never addressed that Xander turns out to be right about Buffy only wanting her stupid boyfriend back, since she hides Angel and lies to everyone's faces about what's going on, and then she gets caught and everyone was mad for five minutes and then we never hear about it again. Not even from Xander. She at best disregards their emotional well-being and at worst puts their safety at risk, but Xander's the bad guy, because Buffy should be allowed to do whatever she wants.

I would posit that as entertaining as a character like Homelander might be, he's not relatable, again not in the way we usually define it. Viewers are comfortable enjoying watching him, because even though he's damaged and homicidal and just generally a piece of crap, his flaws are so outsized that there's nothing to compare it to in 'the real world'. It's not just the Sad Wet Cat face, although that's a piece of it.

I think you answered your own question here. Xander creates such a reaction with some fans (especially women) because they've known so many people like him in real life. Meanwhile, we don't actually encounter murdering vampires, so Spike probably doesn't bring up quite as much personal feelings. Apart from the attempted rape, which sadly looks like something out of real life and man, do I hate how that is often swept under the rug with "But he had no soul yet" or some variation of "Buffy was already using him for sex so what" which I don't even know where to begin with.

[Spartan Girl]

The fact that the Agatha All Along’s main storyline was actually Wanda’s in the comics is more proof that the MCU treats female characters like they’re interchangeable. They destroyed of all Wanda’s hard-earned character development to rush her heel turn in Multiverse of Madness and then kill her off, then gave her comic storyline to Agatha fucking Harkness.

[tearknee]

Love, Sidney (1982-83) was a small but first step on a long road to gay male (and LBTQI) fronted series in later decades, even though the actor himself was cishet.

Without the firing of the starter's pistol, you never reach the finishing line.

The series My Two Dads was groundbreaking for having a girl being raised by two men without a woman.

Even if the two men characters weren't gay, it was still valuable to show the general public that two cishet men raising a cishet girl such as the character of Nicole wouldn't automatically be predatory towards her.

My Three Sons, two decades before, was also a good step towards showing the public that a mom wasn't actually inherently required. Unfortunately, in the last few seasons it became a kind of dime store version of "The Brady Bunch" when Dodie played by Dawn Lyn joined and etc.

[Affogato]

On 9/18/2024 at 8:57 PM, JustHereForFood said:

I think you answered your own question here. Xander creates such a reaction with some fans (especially women) because they've known so many people like him in real life. Meanwhile, we don't actually encounter murdering vampires, so Spike probably doesn't bring up quite as much personal feelings. Apart from the attempted rape, which sadly looks like something out of real life and man, do I hate how that is often swept under the rug with "But he had no soul yet" or some variation of "Buffy was already using him for sex so what" which I don't even know where to begin with.

About Spike’s attempted rape of Buffy it is not that she used him for sex, although she had been using him. It is that she acted the same way she did and he had every reason to assume that if she really meant it she would fight him off.  When he found out he was wrong he was remorseful and he went out and got a soul.
 

But the point was , at least in part, that it was in a gray area. Good lord, it was not an after school special, but if it was, be more sensitive to others and what they are going through. 
 

to add, the real issue is that it represented the attempted rape as something that was in part Buffy’s responsibility. Note that I did not say fault.  You can argue this was irresponsible as a topic in a teen show, but here we are. 
 

Xander was a well rounded character. you don’t have to want him as a friend, although overall he was a pretty good one. In my opinion, a lot of the time. He had pretty much raised himself, as it turned out, and it showed. 
 

Anout the gender thing the question is why are people so focused and defensive about rhe guys on the show? There was a largely female cast and some of their characters did bad things.  

 

Edited September 20 by Affogato

[tearknee]

Look at how Mugabe is still widely praised across Africa, despite what he did in power. Similar sort of principle, sadly.

[Affogato]

On 9/17/2024 at 6:53 AM, andromeda331 said:

Regina got away with everything she did. Because you know she was the victim. Sure she massacred villages, raped Graham and murdered him when he figured it out, got 28 years of revenge, treated her son like crap, murdered her father. But she was the victim. Not her victims. Poor Regina ah... had a terrible mother who she got rid of so she was free to do whatever she wanted. Her boyfriend was murdered by her mother. But you know it was really 10 year old Snow's fault. And it's totally okay that she murdered another woman's fiance because she was feeling sad. It was their fault anyways for trying to get married on the day Daniel died. Sure she was going to set off the bomb or whatever to blow up Storybrooke, but that was because no one wanted her to come with them. But Tamara and Owen got to it first. You know Owen who she tried to kidnap as a kid and murdered his father? Separating Hansel and Gretel from their father because they didn't want to live with her. After she forced them get an apple from the witch's house and they weren't the first she sent as there were dead bodies or bones of children there. That's not her fault. It's the kids.

I stopped watching this show pretty early on. But yes. She was a narcissist. Did people like her? I thought she was the evil queen. 

[Spartan Girl]

1 hour ago, Affogato said:

I stopped watching this show pretty early on. But yes. She was a narcissist. Did people like her? I thought she was the evil queen. 

She was until the writers decided to redeem her. Which was a big mistake because she was more fun evil.

[scarynikki12]

Regina remained evil she just got better publicists. The show did that thing I hate and has sadly become the norm for characters who are evil but popular with viewers: a character in the show declares the evil one to be redeemed and then this declaration is treated as gospel. The evil character never actually changes their behavior, apologizes for the past actions, or bothers to make amends to those they've wronged even a little but they're considered redeemed and woe be to anyone who disagrees. Once had enough of us voicing objection to Regina being declared redeemed that they'd occasionally touch upon the issue but nothing permanent. Regina got to claim until the show's end that Snow had Daniel killed but Snow was only allowed to fight back once (as far as I can recall) and it was because she was under a spell. Meanwhile the actual murderer of Daniel, Regina's mother Cora, was allowed to mend her relationship with her daughters, her death was presented as a great tragedy, and the show retconned her history to make her own evil deeds be the fault of Snow's mother. Then the show ends with Snow leading the campaign to declare Regina the dictator of the multiverse. 

They really should have given Regina a spinoff. Take her away from the thousands of people she kidnapped, brainwashed, and ruined their lives and give her a new start in a world where no one has heard of her and she gets to learn and make new choices. Instead she continued on as she always had just with her victims becoming her cheerleaders.