Anna Gunn – Bitch Flicks

The Real Hated Housewives of TV

Naturally, we are all on these anti-heroes’ sides, despite their bad deeds. And Tony Soprano, Don Draper, and Walter White all have an antagonist: their wives. They call their husbands out on their lies, moral failings, and oppose them. Thus, they are seen as the nagging wife that everyone hates.

This guest post by Caroline Madden appears as part of our theme week on Unlikable Women.

On August 23, 2013 Anna Gunn, who starred as Skyler White on Breaking Bad, published an article in The New York Times titled “I Have A Character Issue.” Her article discussed the cruel and sexist online backlash that her character–and even Anna herself–received.

She wrote, “My character, to judge from the popularity of Web sites and Facebook pages devoted to hating her, has become a flash point for many people’s feelings about strong, non-submissive, ill-treated women. As the hatred of Skyler blurred into loathing for me as a person, I saw glimpses of an anger that, at first, simply bewildered me.” She continues, “It’s notable that viewers have expressed similar feelings about other complex TV wives — Carmela Soprano of The Sopranos, Betty Draper of Mad Men. Male characters don’t seem to inspire this kind of public venting and vitriol.”

Gunn writes that she understands that since Walt is the shows protagonist, the audience will root for him. These male anti-hero dramas and character studies started with The Sopranos, and Mad Men, and Breaking Bad continued on with the genius success that changed television forever. Naturally, we are all on these anti-heroes’ sides, despite their bad deeds. And Tony Soprano, Don Draper, and Walter White all have an antagonist: their wives. They call their husbands out on their lies, moral failings, and oppose them. Thus, they are seen as the nagging wife that everyone hates.

Anna Gunn as Skyler White in Breaking Bad — Anna Gunn as Skyler White in *Breaking Bad*

There are many hate groups for Skyler White, including the “I Hate Skyler White” Facebook page with over 30,000 likes. On these boards you can find typical comments like Skyler is a “controlling shrew,” and a “shrieking, hypocritical harpy who doesn’t deserve the great life she has.” (Umm…what? Did you even watch the show? Their life got progressively worse each episode.) And that she “needs to die, hate her strongly.” They even remark on Gunn’s appearance, saying how Skyler “got fatter as the show progressed.” So the consensus among viewers is that Skyler was a drag, a ball-and-chain, and overall an annoying bitch. All because, in Anna Gunn’s words, “Skyler didn’t conform to a comfortable ideal of the archetypical female, she had become a kind of Rorschach test for society, a measure of our attitudes toward genders.” And that attitude looks pretty horrible.

But Skyler’s arc of the show is just as captivating as Walter’s Mr. Chips-to-Scarface transformation. She had a loving husband and a quiet suburban life in a nice home, while still struggling to make ends meet. And then by the end she’s the shell of her former, self- trapped in a shitty apartment with two children. Her reputation is ruined, her brother-in-law killed, and her sister she loved dearly now hates her. Her life turned completely upside down. All because of Walt.

Of course Skyler is not without flaws or faults; she had an affair to deal with her shattered home life, and she was insensitive to Walt’s feelings when he did not want to receive cancer treatment. She and Walt already had underlying tensions in the marriage before he broke bad. But Walt has just a few more faults with all that murder, manipulation, and that little meth cooking habit. Think of all the lies she had to deal with, over and over again from Walt.

All she was doing was trying to protect her family from the danger, and what more of a dilemma when that danger is someone they all once knew and loved. How do you make the right choice in that situation? Why do audiences not even give her ANY shred of understanding? Why is she just vehemently hated? Viewers cannot put themselves in her shoes and think of how they would handle those life-changing events? Nope, she’s just a bitch.

January Jones as Betty Draper in Mad Men — January Jones as Betty Draper in *Mad Men*

Betty Draper is not only hated as a character, but many hate January Jones’ acting. Many feel that she is a bad actress, too wooden, bland, one-note and cold. But regardless of your opinion on her acting, I think she is good at the part, for Betty is cold and blank. Now whether this is intentional on January’s part or it just ends up fitting because January is wooden all on her own, that’s up for debate.

Betty Draper receives tons of online hate, bloggers calling her to be killed off, articles entitled “No Sympathy for Betty Draper” and montages of Betty’s worst parenting moments titled “Ugly Betty.” Online comments on Reddit and other sites include a high number of c-bombs, and comments like “Betty is a fucking, annoying, immature, bitch.” and “I want to slap that bitch every time she is on the screen”

It is very easy to dislike Betty Draper. Is Betty a bad mom? Yes, she is 90 percent of the time. But Don Draper’s a bad dad. Is Betty terrible to most people? Yes. Isn’t Don just as terrible to people? Answer: most definitely yes. With Don being the main character, we are able to see flashbacks of his childhood, letting the audience understand why Don causes so much damage to his family and friends, and why his inner psyche is so troubled. But we do hear from Betty’s as well. And if you’re really listening, you can see why she is the way she is.

Her mother focused terribly on her appearance, telling her “You’re painting a masterpiece, make sure to hide the brushstrokes.” In other words, you can be nothing but perfect. Isn’t that a lot of pressure to put on a child? Can’t you see how that would affect Betty? We do see that throughout the show. Betty must always maintain her trophy wife status, meaning be beautiful and thin. (She has extremely disordered eating habits throughout the show.)

Betty is literally a character ripped from the true-life 1950s/early 60s housewives Betty Friedan studied in her book The Feminine Mystique. Like many housewives of that time, Betty Draper went to college, (anthropology at Bryn Mawr) just to buffer the time until she found a man, and then went on to literally do nothing with that degree. Taken from Freidan’s book, “Each suburban wife struggles with it alone. As she made the beds, shopped for groceries, matched slipcover material, ate peanut butter sandwiches with her children, chauffeured Cub Scouts and Brownies, lay beside her husband at night- she was afraid to ask even of herself the silent question– ‘Is this all?”

We see Betty’s trapped in the confines of domesticity described above in the earlier seasons. Don convinces her it’s better for her not to work at modeling, so we see Betty’s ‘busy day’ at home. Breakfast for kids, a load of laundry and housework done by 1 o’clock, then sitting alone smoking and drinking wine at the kitchen table. This is the monotony of her day, nothing to do with her life but wait until Don comes home. If he even comes home that night.

That blankness that Betty has is exactly described in The Feminine Mystique, the hundreds of housewives she interviewed who were trapped in their homes with nothing to feed their minds, just like Betty. I think why people loathe Betty the most is because she doesn’t change. She starts out as a frail oppressed housewife filled with anger and bitterness, but never combats her oppression. Even with a new husband and new life, she still gets worse. She doesn’t learn from her mistakes.

But neither has Don, really. He makes small steps throughout the show, but he still has a long way to go. Mad Men seems to be culminating in the idea that although times and decades may change, people don’t. And both Don and Betty are on that same trajectory. It may be easy to hate Betty because of the way she acts, but she has inner wounds as Don does. And they both have moments of cruelty and honesty, steps back and forward.

Edie Falco as Carmela Soprano in The Sopranos — Edie Falco as Carmela Soprano in *The Sopranos*

The online community was not as potent in the late 90s early 2000s as it is today, so viewers did not have a platform to express their negative opinions as much as they do today. But there are still comments to be found, from DVD rewatches, like, “I wanted nothing more then to see Carmela shot in the face!” or “She should have been whacked from the start!” And, “Carmela Soprano, the whiny bitch who deludes herself into thinking she can have a mafia boss husband and expect her family to lead a moral life at the same time. She wants the luxury but not the consequences. It’s hard to imagine somebody to be so dense, and it hurts the show in my opinion.”

Hard to imagine? Hurts the show? How can someone not see Carmela Soprano as a complex, intriguing character? She is a woman who deals with Catholic guilt over Tony’s sins; she knows she is just as guilty as he is for standing by him. Carmela Soprano is dense? This woman knows her husband has sex with nearly everything that walks. She knows that all those old friends aren’t in the witness protection program- they’re dead. And that is her whole inner conflict. She knows all this but chooses to stand by Tony anyway. No one’s interested in that dynamic? At all? If Carmela was whacked from the start where would the show even go?

These sexist jabs show that some fans have the inner desire for the show to be all whacking all the time. No diversion into the “soap opera” marriage and family boring stuff. And it’s hard to separate that from sexism, since relationship stories are considered “girly things” These viewers are deluded if they think the family stories were a waste of time. Some of Tony and Carmela’s arguments are incredible works of acting from Edie Falco and James Gandolfini, such as this one.

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9oY7zpan18″]

Without these familial conflicts (in addition to his childhood flashbacks and explorations) why would Tony even be in therapy, the entire point of the show itself? Carmela Soprano “hurts the show”? I think not.

I’m not denying that the men, despite all their flaws are complex characters, they truly are, and are a testament to the rich and nuanced writing of these brilliant television shows, Breaking Bad, The Sopranos, and Mad Men. But the wives are, too. Without these women, where is Tony Soprano’s story? Don Drapers? Walter White?

Walter’s loving family is what drives him to start the meth business. At the beginning his only defense is that he did it all to “take care of his family.” Don Draper’s arc and story about the effects of his childhood on his relationships with women and family is nothing without his wife Betty. Tony Soprano’s therapy sessions, the crux of the show, deal with his conflicts between his two families- the mafia, and his wife Carmela.

Online, you can see tons of battles between these female characters of who is the bigger bitch, Skyler Vs. Carmela Vs. Betty. You certainly don’t see who is the bigger Dick? Tony Vs. Walt Vs. Don anywhere. One has to wonder if we had complex shows where female characters were the protagonists, the flawed anti-heroes…would their husbands receive such hate online?

You can hate a character, and you can hate a female character. But do you have to express that hate with such highly sexist remarks? These sexist remarks are oversimplifying these complex female characters that the brilliant writers of The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, and Mad Men have given us. These comments show why audiences can’t handle a complex female character, which Carmela, Betty and Skyler are.

Tony Soprano, Don Draper, and Walter White will forever remain heralded as the most complex and fascinating television characters of all time. But the women? Just a bunch of bitches.

Caroline Madden writes about film at Geek Juice, Screenqueens, and her blog. You can usually find her watching movies or listening to Bruce Springsteen. She has a BFA in Acting from Shenandoah Conservatory.

Lessons from Underrated Coming of Age Flicks: Part 2: Back To School Edition

Even you’re not in school, September feels like a time for beginnings. It’s when you met the people who would become your close friends, bought new school shoes, and settled into a new year. With that in mind, I decided to look at a selection of coming of age films loosely based around school and learning. As an extra bonus, all five films come from female writer-directors.

See Part 1 here: Lessons from Underrated Coming of Age Flicks

Even you’re not in school, September feels like a time for beginnings. It’s when you met the people who would become your close friends, bought new school shoes, and settled into a new year.

It’s also when you were a bundle of nerves. Will my classes be too hard? Will I wear the right thing? Will anyone want to hang out with me?

I still feel that way in September, and I don’t think it’s an accident; I still have a lot to learn about life–we all do.

With that in mind, I decided to look at a selection of coming of age films loosely based around school and learning. As an extra bonus, all five films come from female writer-directors.

The D.A.R. support each other in their career ambitions.

All I Wanna Do/Strike!/The Hairy Bird (written and directed by Sarah Kenochan, 1998 )

It’s 1963 and headstrong Odette “Odie” Sinclair (perennial 90s coming of age star Gaby Hoffman) is being sent to Miss Godard’s Preparatory School, an all-girl boarding school, against her will. Her parents have discovered she plans to have sex with her boyfriend and believe the all-girl environment will keep her safe from boys. It’s this tension between ambitious girls and their growing attraction to men that sets the films conflict in motion.

At Miss Godard’s, Odie joins the D.A.R. (Daughters of the American Ravioli), a group of girls (including Kirsten Dunst) with the shared belief that they can be more than wives and mothers. When they discover plans for the school to go co-ed, the D.A.R. girls are torn. They like boys and want them about, but at the same time are concerned that the pressure to look good and appear feminine would detract from their learning. In addition, they believe the teachers will concentrate on teaching the boys as their education is seen as more important. First, they try to sabotage the plans and make the boys at a near-by school appear as sex-crazed drunks, then they take over the school and hold a strike.

Writer/director Sarah Kenochan based the film loosely on her own school experiences in that period and it definitely feels true to life. In addition to being immensely quotable (“Up Your Ziggy With a Wa-Wa Brush!”), it’s packed with memorable, off-beat characters and great 60s fashion. Though it’s set in the 60s, the central conflict of girls fighting for the quality of their education and their ability to be successful career women is something we can all relate to.

Lesson: Though many think otherwise, feminism doesn’t mean hating men. You can have crushes and romances without giving up your self and your ambitions. It may have been harder to learn these lessons in the 60s, especially as they didn’t always appear true, but unfortunately women are still fighting for recognition of these basic truths.

Hanna finds herself attracted to her best friend

Emporte-Moi/Set Me Free (directed by Léa Pool and written by Pool, Nancy Huston, Monique H. Messier and Isabelle Raynault, 1999)

In 1963, the Canadian province of Quebec was having a crisis of identity (and many feel it still is). Much of the population felt they needed to their own country rather than a part of Canada. This identity crisis is mirrored in teenage Hanna (Karine Vanasse). Her life is marked by in-betweens: she is not a child or an adult, she is not technically Catholic or Jewish (as her mother is Catholic and her father is Jewish), and as she begins to experiment, she finds she is neither straight nor gay.
She attempts to create an identity for herself by imitating her favourite film star, French New Wave star Anna Karina in the Godard film, Vivre Sa Vie. In one scene, the film cuts between shots of her and Anna Karina doing the same dance. This imitation gets her into trouble when she experiments with prostitution, which she sees as romantic because of Karina’s role in the Godard film, and is raped. After her attack, she finds her own voice by picking up a video camera and creating her own images.
The film feels earnest, identifying its main characters as a clearly working class family, several of whom are struggling with depression and highlighting the appreciation of movies and music so crucial to teenage dreams.

Lesson: You are never going to fit into an image. Your glamourous stars may have tragic pasts, you may have uncool conflicts and interests. Our favourite characters and stars even have fictional, streamlined images meant to tell us the stories we want to hear. They’re never as awkward or as painful as real life.

Harper meets Connie at her sister’s wedding, where she is an overlooked bridesmaid

Guinevere (written and directed by Audrey Wells, 1999)

Harper Sloane (Sarah Polley, now an acclaimed writer-director herself) is Harvard bound and not happy about it. She’s an overlooked younger sister from a buttoned-up, patrician family concerned with status and wealth. Though she plans to attend law school in the fall, she secretly feels uncomfortable about the decision though she’s never thought about what other kind of life there could be for her.

Enter Connie Fitzpatrick (Stephen Rea), a 40-something bohemian photographer, and the only person who sees her secret discomfort. They become lovers and Connie invites her to move in with him, his latest in a long line of muses all of which he calls, “Guinevere.” As a Guinevere, she has to learn some kind of art (Connie’s practices are often referred to as a school she will eventually graduate from), and Harper decides to take up photography. She follows him as an apprentice, not out of her passion for it, but because she enjoys seeing what he does. When she begins to enjoy it and gains confidence, however he is weary about even letting her take a single picture.

Guinevere is set apart from other films with similar stories of romance between young girls and older men, by the constant assertion that Harper is 19 and the relationship is between two adults, though they are often posed as teacher and student. Great care is also taken to show the reality of the relationship, as Harper ends up having to work to support him as his alcoholism and bohemian principles won’t let him. He is not a “sugar daddy” that takes her every care away.

Despite this, it’s unclear what the film’s stance on Connie is, as it makes his program look quite attractive. It helps Harper come out of her shell and establish a fulfilling career. When she returns to him years after their break-up, she is very affectionate toward him and sees it as her responsibility to take care of him as he dies.

Lesson: There’s a fine line between discovering your passion and coming into your own. Be sure you’re really discovering who you are, not who others, your family, your friends, even your mentors and lovers, want you to be.

Bethany graduates valedictorian in a class of one and sees the graduation ceremony as a prolonged humiliation

Sassy Pants (written and directed by Coley Sohn, 2012)

To Bethany Pruitt (Ashley Rickards), pink is the colour of oppression. All her life she’s been homeschooled and forcibly sheltered by her impossibly, even cartoonishly cruel mother June (Anna Gunn). June forbids her to go out with people her own age, has as never let her have a job and steals the money she has saved to go to college. Later on, when Bethany escapes, June even tricks her into coming home by telling her her grandmother is dying. As a budding fashion designer, Bethany’s predicament comes to her clearest in the wardrobe full of baby pink clothes her mother has bought for her.

So begins Bethany’s trip to independence. She packs up whatever clothes are salvageable, moves in with her father and his boyfriend and gets a job at a cool clothing shop where she falls in with a bad crowd and finds herself manipulated by a co-worker. But Bethany doesn’t stay down for long, she works hard and enjoys some success designing clothes for a small store. It’s refreshing how the fact that it is very hard to make it in the fashion world is never on Bethany’s mind, she’s just trying to break into its periphery.

The portrayal of Bethany’s mother, June, is the most contentious aspect of the film. She appears to be a terrible mother and possible sociopath through most of the film; however, it’s possible to interpret this view of her as Bethany’s point of view. In the last act, June’s humanity is carefully revealed and she becomes a sympathetic character.

Lesson: Even the worst monsters have their human moments. You don’t have to forgive the cruelty but you can try to understand it.

Vanessa and her FUBAR friends plan their strategy for Snowstream Survivor

Dear Lemon Lima (written and directed by Suzi Yoonessi, 2009)

Dear Lemon Lima is a charming story about outcasts fighting back, not with force but with friendship. It follows 13-year-old Vanessa (Savanah Wiltfong), a half Eskimo (note: Vanessa and the other characters refer to her as Eskimo, though this is not usually seen as a politically correct term) girl attending an Alaskan prep school on an ethnic scholarship. Vanessa is uncomfortable with the Eskimo cultural identity because her mother is Caucasian and she does not have a relationship with her father and his culture. It represents otherness to her, so she clings to her whiteness, claiming “I’m from Fairbanks!” as proof of normalcy.

To complicate matters, she has recently been dumped by her boyfriend, Phillip, whom she believes is her true love. They had a very close relationship, where she called him “Strawberry” and he called her “Onion.” The fact that Vanessa sees herself an a onion, sour and not easy to like, is interesting. She yearns to fit in and be popular, choosing to use the ordinary backpack from her ex’s parents over the cool sealskin bag from her grandmother. In school, she finds herself clumped into the FUBAR (military slang meaning fucked up beyond all recognition) group. The other outsiders who aren’t worried about their status and feel they have reclaimed the word FUBAR, are ready to befriend her, but Vanessa brushes them off.

It’s this that originally makes Vanessa difficult to identify with. In addition, Philip is so ridiculously terrible its hard to believe she still wants him. Then again, she’s a teenage girl blinded by love and sure popularity is the only important goal in life, so she’s probably more like most of us than we’d care to remember. Eventually she realizes she’s too good for Philip and becomes the leader and advocate of the FUBARs so it’s clear she realizes her mistakes.

An interesting facet of the film is its examination of cultural appropriation. Each year, the school holds a competition called the Snowstorm Survivor championship where the school’s all-white student body (Vanessa is the sole native student) compete in events inspired by native games. These activities include a cringe inducing scene where white students dress up in eskimo costumes and do elaborate cultural dances. In addition, Vanessa realizes her scholarship was sponsored by a known racist who instituted the program as a PR move. By the end of the film she connects to her Eskimo heritage by forming a Snowstorm Survivor team that values the principles of the World Eskimo Olympics, a games intended to bring people together rather than tear them apart through competition.

Lesson: Cheer for everyone, have fun and don’t worry about pointless competition and popularity contests. You’ll regret the friends and the fun you didn’t have.

________________________________________________________________________________________

Elizabeth Kiy is a Canadian writer and freelance journalist living in Toronto, Ontario. is a Canadian writer and freelance journalist living in Toronto, Ontario.

Anna Gunn Breaks the Fourth Wall in a ‘New York Times’ Op/Ed

Skyler White (Anna Gunn) sheds a light on our society’s misogyny.

It isn’t rare to see an actor or actress to take to the op/ed pages to pen support or disdain for political issues and candidates or to come forward with personal stories to enlighten and advocate. The actor or actress, however, typically speaks as an individual, removed from his or her fictional life.

However, Anna Gunn (Skyler White on Breaking Bad) took to The New York Times opinion page to tackle an issue that brings the fictional world that Skyler inhabits into Gunn’s personal world. She weaves in the cultural causes and implications of the vitriol directed at Skyler’s character, at Gunn herself, and at certain kinds of women in our society.

In the beautifully written and poignant “I Have a Character Issue,” she describes how she expected, and even understood, that her character was not going to be well-loved at first. After all, she is Walt’s antagonist, and Walt is the protagonist–the greedy, depraved, meticulously drawn anti-hero.

In her analysis of the horrible response Skyler received from Breaking Bad fans (including Facebook pages that we’ve written about at length), Gunn briefly touches upon her fulfillment in playing the role, and her fear for her own safety when online threats and death wishes devolved from using Skyler’s name to actually singling out Anna Gunn–the real person, not the character she played. Her focus, however, is that this response to Skyler is part of a much larger problem in our culture.

Gunn writes,

“My character, to judge from the popularity of Web sites and Facebook pages devoted to hating her, has become a flash point for many people’s feelings about strong, nonsubmissive, ill-treated women.”

And with that, she nails it. Feminists have spent a great deal of time suggesting that the hatred of Skyler White (and other notable anti-heros’ wives) is rooted in misogyny. Vince Gilligan, the show’s creator and writer, acknowledged this in a Vulture interview last May. He said,

“…I think the people who have these issues with the wives being too bitchy on Breaking Bad are misogynists, plain and simple.”

For those of us who already knew that, this was a refreshing sound byte. However, there is much more to audiences’ reactions to Skyler, and Gunn’s piece takes that simple reflection on misogyny and unpacks it, giving meaning to our reactions to the fictional world as being indicative of our society as a whole. And she’s right.

Gunn says,

“…I finally realized that most people’s hatred of Skyler had little to do with me and a lot to do with their own perception of women and wives. Because Skyler didn’t conform to a comfortable ideal of the archetypical female, she had become a kind of Rorschach test for society, a measure of our attitudes toward gender.”

The Skyler White Rorschach test has certainly revealed a great deal of hideous, blatant misogyny and hatred toward women who don’t conform.

Gunn’s New York Times op/ed breaks through a glass fourth wall. Not only is Skyler White one of the most complex female characters on television, but Gunn also uses her real voice in a national publication to lend force to the idea that the hatred and violence directed toward her character, and toward her, reveals much more about our society than most would be willing to admit.

Art imitates life. Life imitates art. And how we feel about that art tells us a great deal about ourselves. In the case of how much hate is directed at characters like Skyler White, it’s no wonder that the work of women’s equality activists–whether they are fighting for proper representation in the media or working for pro-women legislation–is not nearly done.

________________________________________________________

Leigh Kolb is a composition, literature and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri.

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Gender Flipping in Hollywood by Holly L. Derr at Ms. Magazine Blog

First Annual Studio Responsibility Index Finds Lack of Substantial LGBT Characters in Mainstream Films by Max Gouttebroze at GLAAD

25 Movies by Female Directors Every Aspiring Filmmaker Should See by Michelle Dean via Flavorwire

Will Black Actresses Ever Catch Up To Their Peers? by Aisha Harris at Slate

Julie Taymor’s 10 Golden Rules of Moviemaking by Jennifer M. Wood at MovieMaker

13 Kickass Women’s Movie Roles Originally Meant for Men by Autumn Harbison at PolicyMic

How Cristina Yang Changed Television by Willa Paskin at Slate

The Skyler White Problem: Can We Accept Complex Female Characters? by Jos Truitt at Feministing

Wonder Woman Can’t Have It All by Alexander Abad-Santos at The Atlantic Wire

Racism within white feminist spaces by Mia at Black Feminists Manchester

On Feminist Solidarity and Community: Where Do We Go from Here? by Mikki Kendall at Ebony

A Day In the Life of a Troubled Male Antihero by Mallory Ortberg at The Toast

“The Butler,” My Grandmother, and the Politics of Subversion by Nijla Mu’min at Bitch Media

I Have a Character Issue by Anna Gunn at The New York Times

What have you been reading/writing this week? Tell us in the comments!

Bitch Flicks Weekly Picks

Gender Flipping in Hollywood by Holly L. Derr at Ms. Magazine Blog

First Annual Studio Responsibility Index Finds Lack of Substantial LGBT Characters in Mainstream Films by Max Gouttebroze at GLAAD

25 Movies by Female Directors Every Aspiring Filmmaker Should See by Michelle Dean via Flavorwire

Will Black Actresses Ever Catch Up To Their Peers? by Aisha Harris at Slate

Julie Taymor’s 10 Golden Rules of Moviemaking by Jennifer M. Wood at MovieMaker

13 Kickass Women’s Movie Roles Originally Meant for Men by Autumn Harbison at PolicyMic

How Cristina Yang Changed Television by Willa Paskin at Slate

The Skyler White Problem: Can We Accept Complex Female Characters? by Jos Truitt at Feministing

Wonder Woman Can’t Have It All by Alexander Abad-Santos at The Atlantic Wire

Racism within white feminist spaces by Mia at Black Feminists Manchester

On Feminist Solidarity and Community: Where Do We Go from Here? by Mikki Kendall at Ebony

A Day In the Life of a Troubled Male Antihero by Mallory Ortberg at The Toast

‘Breaking Bad’ and the Power of Women: Skyler, Lydia and Marie Take Control

Skyler is calling the shots now.

Written by Leigh Kolb

Warning: Spoilers Ahead

Throughout the last five seasons of Breaking Bad, the female characters have played key roles–from playing adversaries to aiding and abetting–yet they are often overlooked as secondary characters. In fact, a recent article in The Atlantic doesn’t even mention any of the female characters (save for a passing mention of Jane being a “lovely” secondary character in an infographic). While Walt and Jesse are the focus of the series, and they operate in a largely masculine and man-centric world, without Skyler and Lydia, they would have been stopped long ago.

Skyler thought of the car wash. She got the car wash. She laundered the money and kept it safe. She kept the IRS away from her boss and her household. She is consistently rational and protective of her life and her family.

Lydia provided an “ocean” of methylamine. She had threats to the business taken care of. She expanded the operation overseas, and won’t settle for disappointed customers. She is fiercely in charge of her business.

Marie figured out the details of Skyler and Walt’s deceptions quicker than Hank did. She’s willing to attempt to steal–baby Holly this time, not a spoon–to punish Skyler and protect her niece.

Is there a new holy trinity in Albuquerque?

We can’t help but think about the juxtaposition of scenes in last summer’s “Fifty-One” when Skyler submerges herself in the pool and we cut to Lydia at an electrical grid. Each episode, these two become increasingly invested in and in control of producing and protecting Walt’s legacy. Skyler confronted Lydia at the car wash, but that was her home turf. Surely they’ll meet again–and that meeting (like the water and electricity) could be deadly.

(It’s important to note that this most recent episode, “Buried”–perhaps the most woman-centric of the series–was also directed by Emmy-nominated Michelle MacLaren, who some critics consider the show’s “best director.” Another fun fact? A female chemistry professor is the show’s “lead meth consultant.”)

However, the male characters (and audience members) habitually underestimate the women. Hank assumes Skyler is an innocent victim. “Ladies first,” Declan says to Lydia.

In “Buried,” Skyler and Lydia are rising to the top of their prospective enterprises.

Skyler covers a sickly Walt with a feminine quilt, comforting him, and nursing him back to health. “Maybe our best move here is to stay quiet,” she says, acknowledging that to keep the money and keep all of them relatively safe, they need to not talk. She reassures Walt that Hank seemed to have “suspicions, but not much else.” (She knows this because Hank corners her in a diner and tries to get her to talk and give him something–she refuses, screaming “Am I under arrest?” to get out of the situation.) Hank calls her a victim. By the end of the episode, it is clear that Skyler’s no victim. How far could Walt have gotten without her?

The feminine is highlighted in “Buried,” and given great power.

Lydia visits the meth lab in the desert, where Declan and company are making meth that is not up to her or her Czech clients’ standards. “It’s filthy,” she says of the lab. “What are you, my mother?” Declan responds. They underestimate Lydia. If they would have listened to her and followed her pure-meth protocol, perhaps they would have survived. She covers her eyes as she walks past the carnage that she ordered (she was brought to the desert blindfolded, and chose to leave blindly). She steps next to corpses with her feminine, red-soled Christian Louboutins.

If the cooks had listened to Lydia, things would have ended differently.

Lydia often isn’t focused on as a main character, but those Louboutins are carrying her into a pivotal role. But will she be taken seriously? A critic at Slate said, “Her girliness is annoying—calling Declan’s lab ‘filthy’ was sure to make him reference his mom—but she also happened to be right. The man had no standards.” Would Walt have been “annoying” if he had critiqued the way a lab was run? Probably not.

Even with Skyler and Lydia’s power plays and scheming, too many are still focused on the likability of the female characters. (In a thread on Breaking Bad‘s facebook page right now, hoards of people are calling for Skyler to be beaten or killed.) Lydia is too “girlish.” And Marie? “She is so annoying that she deserves to die.”

Critics and audiences wring their hands over who we’re “supposed” to like in Breaking Bad. If we operate in high-school superlative absolutes of “most likable” and “most hated,” how would Vince Gilligan have us categorize the characters? Are we truly supposed to feel good about liking anyone but Jesse?

In reality, we’re allowed to like male characters who maim, kill and hurt children. We’re allowed to root for male anti-heroes and revel in their dirty dealings. The women? Well, if they’re not likable, Internet commenters want them dead.

In “She Who Dies With the Most ‘Likes’ Wins?” Jessica Valenti argues,

“Yes, the more successful you are—or the stronger, the more opinionated—the less you will be generally liked… But the trade off is undoubtedly worth it. Power and authenticity are worth it… Wanting to be liked means being a supporting character in your own life, using the cues of the actors around you to determine your next line rather than your own script. It means that your self-worth will always be tied to what someone else thinks about you, forever out of your control.”

And while I’m fairly certain Valenti wasn’t cheering on money launderers, murderers, or meth dealers, the women of Breaking Bad have appeared to break bad. Their moves will undoubtedly decide the course of the rest of the series.

Audiences, though, too often want to box female characters into “likable” and “hate and kill” categories. While Skyler populated the latter category for years, it seems as if people are now–to an extent–trying to wedge her into the “likable” category. (This critic lauds her as the “best character” on Breaking Bad, and describes her as a wife and mother and extols the virtues of her as a moral center–why does she have to be moral to be a good character? Is it because she’s a woman?)

The Breaking Bad social media team coined #Skysenberg after “Buried,” showing that Skyler has crossed over and fully enmeshed herself with Heisenberg. (This is awfully and misguidedly close to her taking her husband’s name and adopting his characteristics. Because Skyler isn’t necessarily doing what she’s doing to protect Walt.)

This symbolic move into Walt’s court, though, won her some new fans:

Ugh, awful women.

High five, bro!

Heisenberg is sacred–no girls allowed!

And that’s what’s most important.

Yes. You’re right. Everything he did was for her.

Ding ding ding!

Skyler doesn’t care if you like her. Neither does Lydia. Or Marie. Gilligan himself recognizes the hatred and has said, “I think the people who have these issues with the wives being too bitchy on Breaking Bad are misogynists, plain and simple.” Skyler, Lydia and Marie are poised to decide the outcome of Breaking Bad. Skyler is calling the shots instead of Heisenberg. Lydia is decimating–and will certainly replace–a drug cartel. Marie desperately wants to see Walt and Skyler punished; her desire for revenge seems to overshadow Hank’s desire to protect his career.

In the excellent “I hate Strong Female Characters,” Sophia McDougall points out that

“If Strong-Male-Character compatibility was the primary criterion of writing heroes, our fiction would be a lot poorer. But it’s within this claustrophobic little box that we expect our heroines to live out their lives.”

Skyler and Lydia especially are clearly breaking out of these boxes, and Marie isn’t very far behind. But aren’t women supposed to be moral centers? Aren’t their roles as “wife” and “mother” supposed to define them? Aren’t they supposed to not get their hands dirty? We are so accustomed to enjoying and eagerly watching male antiheroes, but watching female characters embody the same traits has been, until now, incredibly rare.

At this point in the series, though, these complex female characters are calling the shots. (“The men are basically just sitting around diddling themselves,” my husband said.)

We don’t need to like female characters for them to be well-drawn and powerful (just like we don’t need to like Walt). We need to get over that. Skyler, Lydia and Marie aren’t just wives and/or mothers anymore. The are characters–not just female characters, or worse yet, “strong female characters.” They are effective and compelling, just how characters who happen to be women should be.

Skyler isn’t Skysenberg. She’s Skyler. And she’s got this.

Are we done here?

________________________________________________________

Leigh Kolb is a composition, literature and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri.

The Golden Age of Television: Boys Only

Written by Rachel Redfern

The rise of the anti-hero has most TV and media reviewers heralding the past ten years as revolutionary, a “golden age of television.”

And I think it’s true, great television seems to be popping out of the seams of my TV and an ever-expanding “To Watch” list on my desk. In fact, looking at the recent figures for big summer blockbusters (most of which seem to have failed miserably) some (myself included) are wondering if Hollywood studios might be fading into the shadows of networks such as AMC and HBO.

TV, because of its much longer time allowances (12-20 hours of viewing per season) and recently-improved watching options (Hulu, Netflix, DVD releases and, let’s face it, illegal streaming and downloading) seem to create far more interesting characters and way more space for subtle scheming and intrigue in their plot lines. Increasingly, Hollywood opts for a bigger explosion to counteract its total lack of originality and character development.

So, in a word, I would argue yes, I find higher quality entertainment and better stories about life and humanity in television than I do at the movies.

But I don’t see many women in these shows either.

Some of Brett Martin’s “Difficult Men”

GQ writer Brett Martin’s new book Difficult Men: Behind the Scenes of a Creative Revolution from ‘The Sopranos’ and ‘The Wire’ to ‘Mad Men’ and ‘Breaking Bad’ is all about the fabulously conflicted male characters springing up in television: Walter White, Don Draper, Al Swearengen and the others that are the front men for this great revolution. And writing about these complex male characters is important, but the book’s content reveals one of the major flaws within this golden age–where are all the conflicted, complex women and the TV shows that center on their lives?

I can think of only two (please add to this list though in the comments if you can think of any more): Homeland and Weeds, although Game of Thrones has several interesting female characters running around. (It perhaps has one of the better ratios of compelling female and male characters.)

Claire Danes as Carrie Mathison in Homeland

I’m not sure that blaming the producers and writers of these shows is going to get us anywhere because the problem is obviously much deeper than that, and it begs the question, why aren’t women’s stories interesting to producers and writers? Why aren’t female protagonists fascinating and complex?

Do audiences consider stories with female protagonists un-relatable? Uninteresting? Too unbelievable? Or does this lack merely reflect life in that there aren’t any women doing enough “complex” and “darkly-human” things to model the character after?

I don’t believe any of that is true, but that doesn’t change the amount of women headlining an AMC show. In thinking about my favorite shows, I can only think of a few female characters that I would consider unique and groundbreaking. Consider Breaking Bad: while Skyler is an interesting enough character, she’s far less compelling (and obviously secondary) to the character development that Walt is showcasing, often being seen as no more than a “nag” or “hen-pecking shrew” to many viewers (not this one). In fact, the backlash against Skyler (Anna Gunn) has been so intense (consider the meme below as a common example of how the internet seems to view the poor woman) that Gilligan actually addressed the problem in a recent interview.

One of the nicer internet memes for Skyler White (Anna Gunn)

However, as a whole, with the story centering on and following a female protagonist, the number is proportionately small.

So ladies, either we are far too flat and boring to be on TV, or as it has been for so long, our stories and interactions are still being undervalued. Therefore, we should set some goals for ourselves: be marvelously interesting (sarcasm) and (more importantly) continue to write, produce, direct and support more TV shows about women–because I don’t see many others doing it for us.

Rachel Redfern has an MA in English literature, where she conducted research on modern American literature and film and its intersection; however, she spends most of her time watching HBO shows, traveling, and blogging and reading about feminism.