Female Power – Bitch Flicks

Caitlin Snow: It’s Time to Give ‘The Flash’s Overlooked Heroine Her Due

The decision to continually depict Caitlin as afraid of herself and her abilities is unsettling. Women are almost always taught to fear their own power, instead of embracing it or attempting to understand it. It’s sad to see that pattern repeating on a show that has so few leading women in the first place. … Caitlin’s journey shouldn’t be about whether she might turn into a monster, it should be about her becoming whole.

This guest post is written by Lacy Baugher.

There’s so much that The Flash does right. It’s probably the best example of a superhero series on TV right now, featuring fun stories, surprising twists, and strong, compelling relationships between its lead characters. It’s a joy to watch, most of the time. It has a ton of heart, and it generally remembers the most important thing about superhero stories: They’re supposed to be about hope. But for all the great things about it, The Flash has never particularly handled women well.

The show’s issues with how the writers have written superhero Barry Allen’s (Grant Gustin) girlfriend Iris West (Candice Patton) are already well documented elsewhere. She’s been frequently ignored in major stories, lied to by everyone she knows, and was the absolute last person to find out Barry’s secret identity. As a character, Iris has definitely had it pretty rough. But the way that The Flash often chooses to portray its other female lead is just as frustrating, and discussed far less frequently. Caitlin Snow has never gotten the storyline or attention she deserves, and it is well past time for that to change.

Caitlin (Danielle Panabaker) is a brilliant doctor, a loyal friend and an integral part of Team Flash. She is brave, resourceful, and much more capable than she gets credit for; she’s been working to keep Central City safe since the show started, often at great personal sacrifice. Despite all this, she’s still the main character we know the least about, both on a personal and emotional level. The Flash is primarily about Barry Allen’s journey, so it makes sense that the show often prioritizes exploring his various levels of man pain. But we also get plenty of Joe’s man pain. And Cisco’s. And Wally’s. It’s possible this show has actually fleshed out more of recurring sometime-villain Leonard Snart’s inner life than they have Caitlin’s. And she’s one of the show’s female leads!

Instead, The Flash has struggled to give Caitlin any kind of storyline that isn’t somehow focused on the man in her life. She spent the better part of two seasons stuck in stories that almost solely revolved around her romantic relationship. Since the men in her life keep dying or disappearing, Caitlin has been trapped in a constant Greek tragedy of grief, as she’s buried or mourned two different love interests. When we first meet her, Caitlin is coping with the death of her fiancé Ronnie Raymond (Robbie Amell), killed during the particle accelerator explosion that kicked off the TV series. So, as viewers, we’ve actually never known Caitlin when she wasn’t shadowed by some terrible loss.

Of course, it turns out that Ronnie isn’t actually dead, and Caitlin’s season one storyline is focused on finding him, helping him, and then marrying him at the end of it. All of her actions and motivations are tied to him. When Ronnie dies again after their wedding, Caitlin is plunged back into her default state: grief. In season two, she was given another love interest, a Flash from an alternate version of Earth named Jay Garrick (Teddy Sears). Caitlin’s entire season two storyline revolved around Jay — helping him adjust to our Earth, searching for a cure for his mysterious speed illness, and falling in love with him. Sound familiar? It was. At least until Jay was revealed to be evil metahuman Zoom (voiced by Tony Todd), who then kidnapped Caitlin and held her hostage for multiple episodes, trying to force her to romantically accept him. Seriously, this girl cannot catch a break.

For a real sense of how Caitlin has been underused in virtually every way, compare her development to Cisco’s. Introduced at the same time as Caitlin, Cisco Ramon (Carlos Valdes) was also a brilliant S.T.A.R. Labs employee. In the two and a half seasons since The Flash began, we have learned plenty about him beyond that, however. Cisco is a fully developed character with dreams, quirks, and fears. We learned about his childhood and met some of his family. He went on a season-long journey to discover and accept his powers as a metahuman. And while he has had a couple of romantic interests along the way, Cisco’s story has never been defined by them in nearly the same ways that Caitlin’s romantic relationships have defined her. We have learned little about her family, her past, or her personal desires, beyond how they connected to the man she was involved with at the time. On the rare occasions Caitlin got to be involved in a story that wasn’t about Ronnie or Jay, she was usually stuck taking care of one of the other Team Flash members who injured themselves in some way.

Until now.

Thanks to Barry’s creation of the alternate reality “Flashpoint,” Caitlin Snow has been transformed into a version of her comic book alter ego, the villainous Killer Frost. A metahuman with the power to manipulate frozen air, we have already seen one version of this character on The Flash, in the same alternate version of Earth that brought us Jay Garrick. In our reality, Caitlin’s powers slowly manifested themselves over time and she kept them hidden from her teammates out of fear that “Killer Frost” would take over against her will. Caitlin very clearly does not want to be like her evil self from Earth-2; she’s quite worried that she might hurt others with her abilities. In fact, Caitlin seems pretty determined to contain or, if possible, get rid of her powers, and is actively working toward both of those goals.

Theoretically, the Killer Frost twist should be a great development for Caitlin’s character, and in many ways it is. For the first time on The Flash, she has a story arc that is solely about her. Even though the writers have shoved yet another boyfriend in her plotline, Julian (Tom Felton) is very clearly a secondary feature in her story. (In fact, you could argue she’s only involved with him because she thinks he might be able to “cure” her.) Which is fantastic. Because it means that Caitlin finally gets the chance to be a real, three-dimensional person. Her behavior is wonderfully human; she’s selfish and aggravating and makes a lot of poor decisions. Her actions – bringing Julian on to the team, stealing a piece of the Philospher’s Stone – are incredibly self-serving. She’s lied and she’s manipulated people and she’s kept secrets. In short, Caitlin’s kind of a mess right now. And it’s awesome. We’ve never really gotten the chance to see her character like this before.

Unfortunately, The Flash has yet to really embrace the full potential of a metahuman Caitlin. While there were initial hints that she might learn to control her abilities and still maintain her sense of self, the show has recently doubled down on the idea that Caitlin deeply fears her powers. And she kind of has good reason to – because if she uses them, she basically becomes evil; not just a darker version of herself, which would be kind of interesting in its own right. No, instead, Caitlin basically just turns into Earth-2’s Killer Frost. It’s like she’s getting body snatched by someone from another universe. It appears as though she loses her real self completely.

This is problematic on multiple levels. For starters, no one else on The Flash is affected by their powers in a way that alters their core character in this way and there’s been no clear explanation as to why. (After all, Cisco’s Earth-2 doppelganger was also pretty evil. And he’s still fine whenever he “vibes” something.) Plus, the decision to continually depict Caitlin as afraid of herself and her abilities is unsettling. Women are almost always taught to fear their own power, instead of embracing it or attempting to understand it. It’s sad to see that pattern repeating on a show that has so few leading women in the first place.

Caitlin’s journey – whether she ultimately keeps her powers or not – should be about figuring where she fits within Team Flash, within her family, and within her own idea of herself. We have seen Caitlin unnerved by the darkness inside her. She has issues with her mother and even occasionally with members of her own team. She’s certainly lost enough to want to burn the world down twice over. But she’s never really gotten the chance to deal with any of those issues on-screen in a significant way. This Killer Frost arc offers a perfect opportunity for her to finally do so. Caitlin’s journey shouldn’t be about whether she might turn into a monster, it should be about her becoming whole.

While Caitlin has currently become her evil alter ego – a near-death experience necessitated using her ice powers to save her life – it seems unlikely that The Flash will turn her into a full-fledged villain for keeps. (Especially since we’ve already seen evidence that Caitlin is capable of controlling her abilities herself.) Whether this means she will ultimately lose her powers or come to accept them remains unclear. Maybe Julian will find a metahuman “cure.” Maybe Caitlin will end up fighting beside Barry, after she comes back to herself. Maybe Killer Frost really is here to stay. This story could go a lot of ways. But, no matter what happens, it should be about the person that Caitlin herself chooses to be. And The Flash needs to be brave enough to tell the kind of story that gives her that choice.

Lacy Baugher is a digital media strategist by day, and a lover of all things geeky all of the time. Her major interests include British period dramas, complex ladies in superhero stories, and the righteousness of Sansa Stark’s destiny as Queen of the North. Stop by and say hello on Twitter at @LacyMB.

‘Jennifer’s Body’: The Sexuality of Female Possession and How the Devil Didn’t Need to Make Her Do It

And now Anita is “needy” no more because she has tasted the power, lived to tell the tale and will use her new demon passenger to right the wrongs that she sees fit. Even though she’s possessed, you can sense that she will guide herself and the demon within and take control of it. Freedom is a beautiful thing, even if you have to be possessed to make it happen.

Needy, being a good friend to a bad girl.

This guest post by Shay Revolver appears as part of our theme week on Demon and Spirit Possession.

Female possession has been used as a plot device to show what could happen to a woman who strayed from the norm. It was engrained into our subconscious that if you weren’t a good little girl and didn’t toe the line you could, and probably would, be possessed. It would be horrible, you will become deformed, unattractive and suffer like never before. Whether you were a believer or not, you knew that being possessed was never a good thing.

You also learned very early on that if a girl was possessed and acted badly, it really wasn’t her fault and all the boys would run to save her because it was a horrible fate and all the bad things she did while possessed weren’t really her fault because, the devil or (insert demon here) made her do it. The messages in these films, that I both loved and loathed, were clear: if you had a vagina you weren’t to blame for your bad behavior and the devil is gonna get you if you don’t act like the perfect little girl that fits nicely into the mold that our society has set forth.

The devil didn't make me do it — The devil didn’t make me do it

This myth and the tropes within were the status quo for many, many years until Jennifer’s Body came along in 2009 and did something that even I didn’t see coming. It showed a different side of female possession. Sure, Jennifer Check (Megan Fox) gets possessed, and true, she does some horrible things while under the influence of her demon and, yeah, she only got possessed because she did something that good little girls and nice young ladies don’t do, but what’s great about the whole situation is that in the midst of all of the horrible that follows the possession you don’t feel sorry for her. At least, not in the traditional way; you’re actually amused at all the carnage that follows because she looks like she’s having fun and she turns the tables on every horror movie trope you knew you hated or thought was laced with misogyny and seasoned with a heaping spoonful of the requisite female apologetics. Jennifer is bad, but she wasn’t made that way by the possession; had this been a regular old teen movie she would have played the anti-hero that you loved to hate and once possession takes hold she’s like Regina George in demonoid form.

One of the best things about Jennifer’s Body is how inappropriate it is and unapologetic it is for its inappropriateness. Jennifer’s Body is filled with pure naughty, campy fun. But it’s also filled with something even more interesting. It holds a mirror up to society and the dynamics of not only female friendships but also female sexuality. Not only is it the story of a girl “gone wild” in different kind of way, we get treated to two female possessions that have two totally different results. The first one is the possession of the film’s namesake, the flirtatious, wild child Jennifer Check and the second is that of her friend the quiet, good girl next door, Anita “Needy” Lesnicki. Jennifer pushes through and has fun with it and Anita tends to be fearful of the change and eventually comes to grips with her new interior angel and begins to embrace it and relish in her newfound freedom, even if that freedom starts off with her behind bars at a mental hospital.

The film gives us two different views of the same story. When it comes to Jennifer, on one hand she does seem to get “punished” in what feels like the generic, horror film, female possession fashion for ditching her friend and going alone into a van with a group of boys (GASP), but unlike every other female possession film this demon makes her not only stronger but more fearless and she knows how to use her powers. She turns the tables on every guy who crosses her path and takes to her new self like a champ. She doesn’t cry out for help or to be saved, she plays along and enjoys the freedom that the possession gives her and actual enjoys herself a bit. The demon doesn’t take control of Jennifer’s body, or force her to do something that you can sense she really doesn’t want to do. It engages the parts of her that were already there. No one flinches at Jennifer’s post-possession overt sexuality because that was a quality that she possessed before. In fact, her previous overt sexuality is what the demon uses to seduce her prey and from the first ingestion of the school’s football captain to the last man the demon leaves standing she wields her sexuality like an artist. She didn’t get taken over and changed into something opposite of what she was before, i.e. the usual nice girl who should be saved because she was so sweet before; instead it just turns her up to 11.

The other possession in Jennifer’s Body happens to the title character’s best friend, Anita , who gets possessed as an accidental side effect of trying to save Jennifer. Anita knows who her friend is and finds herself attached to her, hence the nickname “Needy,” in a super codependent way. After all of the killings that the possessed Jennifer commits, she shows up at Anita’s house, drenched in blood after her last male kill and tries to seduce Anita as a preamble to the demon, or is it Jennifer 2.0, telling the tale of how she came to be possessed. This confession leaves Anita a little more than freaked and she sets out to help her friend. She does everything that the good girl is supposed to do, including going to the library and researching what has become of her friend Jennifer. The film ends with Anita being forced to stab her best friend in the heart to kill her because she is a succubus and she killed her boyfriend along with a slew of other horny teenage boys. Of course, the good girl, Anita, who has actually saved the day, gets caught by her bestie’s mother wielding the knife over her now dead, or re-dead, daughter, and she’s shipped off to an asylum. It is from that asylum that Anita retells the story and it is also where she will escape from and set out to find the band that turned her friend into a murderous succubus and she kills them all.

Anita’s possession comes from a place of the girl who did everything good and right. She was a good friend, loyal girlfriend, smart, nice, modest. Pretty much everything that girls are supposed to be in these movies. When she gets possessed and retains Jennifer’s powers via a non-fatal bite during the catfight, literally, from hell she goes on to seem happy about it. She’s finally free. She is no longer “needy” or insecure. She finds strength in the knowledge that she can do anything. But, the question lingers does Jennifer want to be saved? Does Anita? Killing and cannibalism aside, what’s so wrong with a girl enjoying herself? Why does it need to be punished?

In movies where female possession is used as the main form of horror, it has always been hard for me to decipher if the reason that so many people attempt to save the “damsel in distress” is because she’s so altered that she needs it, or if it’s because she has become powerful, unstoppable, cognizant, aware, and free. Is it so much better to put the genie of strength back in the box? Is it so necessary for women to conform to society’s norms and expectations that any deviation from these norms causes society to feel fear? Is the dread coming from the empathy we have for the poor girl being possessed, from the feeling that it could happen to us, or from the knowledge that being powerless is a feeling that most women have? It’s should scare us that in movies like this we are only allowed power through artificial, usually male allowed or induced means, and when we become too powerful, the power gets taken away because we can’t handle it or shouldn’t have it. There is often an undertone in these films that the real problem isn’t the demon, it’s the vessel.

The thing that makes Jennifer’s Body so great is that even though Jennifer dies, Anita, the girl who probably needs the strength that possession carries, gets to live and keep her power. There is something empowering about watching her joyfully skip away from the asylum and hunt down the band responsible for her current condition and Jennifer’s possession. She knows that she has the strength that she needs to survive and carry on but also that she’s no longer afraid. The fear of speaking her mind or exploring and existing outside the lines is gone. The possession allows her to speak and live freely, to live outside the lines and define her own goals, needs, and desire. The empowerment comes not from watching her go medieval on the men behind the curtain, but from the innocence on her face as she confronts them. There is something beautiful about taking a genre that has long punished women and turning it on its head. There was no man to save Jennifer here, only another woman, a friend, and she stands tall in victory when the dust settles. And now Anita is “needy” no more because she has tasted the power, lived to tell the tale and will use her new demon passenger to right the wrongs that she sees fit. Even though she’s possessed, you can sense that she will guide herself and the demon within and take control of it. Freedom is a beautiful thing, even if you have to be possessed to make it happen.

Shay Revolver is a vegan, feminist, cinephile, insomniac, recovering NYU student and former roller derby player currently working as a New York-based microcinema filmmaker, web series creator, and writer. She’s obsessed with most books, especially the Pop Culture and Philosophy series and loves movies and TV shows from low brow to high class. As long as the image is moving she’s all in and believes that everything is worth a watch. She still believes that movies make the best bedtime stories because books are a daytime activity to rev up your engine and once you flip that first page, you have to keep going until you finish it and that is beautiful in its own right. She enjoys talking about the feminist perspective in comic book and gaming culture and the lack of gender equality in mainstream cinema and television productions. Twitter: @socialslumber13.

“I’m a Veronica”: Power and Transformation Through Female Friendships in ‘Heathers’

A snappy dark comedy set in a high school bubble, ‘Heathers’ touches on difficult subjects including murder and suicide, and nonchalantly addresses major social issues like female friendship and power. The friendships we are introduced to steer every aspect of the story as it progresses and bring us into a world where female characters aren’t just cardboard cutouts but multidimensional, seriously flawed, and sinfully interesting young women.

This guest post by Alize Emme appears as part of our theme week on Female Friendship.

The 1988 film Heathers, starring Winona Ryder as the hyper-aware, reluctantly popular girl trying to maintain her status with a powerful clique of girls all named Heather, is a cult classic. A snappy dark comedy set in a high school bubble, Heathers touches on difficult subjects including murder and suicide, and nonchalantly addresses major social issues like female friendship and power. The friendships we are introduced to steer every aspect of the story as it progresses and bring us into a world where female characters aren’t just cardboard cutouts but multidimensional, seriously flawed, and sinfully interesting young women.

When we meet Veronica Sawyer (Ryder) she is past the point of enjoying her new popularity and instead is wallowing in painfully self-aware and humorous ramblings in her diary. Her inner monologue serves as an honest look at the cruelty of high school girls, in this case, the clique’s ringleader, Heather Chandler (Kim Walker), with whom she walks a fine frenemy line.

The friendships these characters share are at best a soul-sucking 9-5 job and at worst a dictatorship. For them, being popular is a currency. They use it to inflict pain on unsuspecting peons and to manipulate each other. They are intelligent beyond their years. They relish in the misery of others. They rule the school with an iron fist.

A group of popular mean girls is nothing new, but the one thing Heathers does differently is showcase female power with amazing colors (literally). Specifically, we see female characters displaying traditionally masculine power.

Chandler is a shark. She navigates the power plays of high school like Leonardo DiCaprio’s character in The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) navigates the world of commerce. Perpetually dressed in a crimson shade of red, Chandler makes no apologies for her cutthroat behavior, proudly calling attention to her worshipped status by stating in regard to her peers, “They all want me as a friend or a fuck,” a sentiment relayed by male rap artists J. Cole and Mickey Avalon, and pro wrestler Ric Flair.

The power Chandler displays with Veronica and the other Heathers mirrors that of a macho guy. She tosses around profanity-laced vulgar phrases like an alpha male in a locker room. She’s got the brains and the brawn and the cutthroat mentality of a high-powered man. As other characters rise to power, they adopt the same masculine persona. Women in movies, especially high school movies, are rarely portrayed this way.

After Veronica tosses her cookies at a college party, an embarrassed Chandler vows to make her life hell across their entire Ohio suburb. Fed up with Chandler’s oppressive leadership, Veronica laments to dark and stormy bad-boy new kid Jason “J.D.” Dean (Christian Slater) that she wishes Heather Chandler was dead, rationalizing in a diary entry that it would be a public service to rid the school of such evil.

With slightly less sinister motivation, Veronica and J.D. sneak into the Chandler home and concoct a gag-inducing hangover cure. Veronica balks at J.D.’s suggestion to use liquid drainer but unknowingly serves it to Chandler anyway, killing her instantly. When a stunned Veronica stammers she just murdered her “best friend,” J.D. quips, “and your worst enemy.” Veronica replies, “same difference,” summing up their relationship completely.

Faking Chandler’s suicide comes easy to the morose J.D. and brainy Veronica, who effortlessly forges an eloquent suicide note which skyrockets Chandler’s popularity even higher in death. Veronica’s unsuspecting participation in two additional murders with J.D. drives her to break things off with him and reevaluate her choices.

But it’s the moment Chandler dies that the once-dominating clique experiences a huge power shift. Chandler’s body is in the ground for mere minutes when Heather Duke’s rise to power and eventual takeover of Chandler’s position begins. Duke, played by Shannen Doherty, had been a shy, bookish member of the group, clinging to a copy of Moby Dick in the shadows who in contrast to Chandler’s bright reds, wears green – with envy. She falls to Chandler’s body image pressures and submits herself to be used by Chandler as furniture.

Duke celebrates Chandler’s demise with a huge smile and a bucket of chicken wings, exclaiming, “fuck it,” when Veronica and Heather McNamara (Lisanne Falk) call attention to her sudden hunger. Duke is now hungry for power. When J.D. dangles Chandler’s coveted red scrunchie before her, Duke wastes no time seizing Chandler’s vacated position, promising she can handle the pressure of being a leader.

As Duke’s power grows, pops of red appear in her wardrobe. A red belt here, red shoes there. Until finally, after getting the whole school to sign her prom singer petition, she reclines, covered head to toe in red, with her back arched and feet up, basking in the afternoon sunlight before exclaiming to a perplexed Veronica: “People love me.” Veronica is quick to call Duke out on her sudden transformation and Duke, now embracing her power, demands, “Why are you pulling my dick?” fully adopting that masculine bravado we saw from Chandler. Duke harshly informs Veronica that anyone would want to be popular, no matter the cost.

McNamara, the final Heather, sees her power shift travel in the opposite direction. McNamara’s friendship with Chandler was rooted in control. Chandler’s death relinquishes the hold she had over McNamara but leaves her little ground to stand on. Gone are McNamara’s bright and sunny yellow outfits, replaced with heavy blacks and gray, accessorized only with a single yellow belt or yellow socks. Her turmoil culminates with a failed, but real, suicide attempt. In the film’s rare display of genuine friendship, it is Veronica who saves McNamara from death. It’s a sweet exchange as Veronica offers her shoulder for McNamara to lean on with understanding and solidarity.

The power Chandler and Duke portray is not something to aspire to, Veronica’s inner dialog provides that moral compass, but it is groundbreaking to see female power portrayed in a completely different and masculine light on film.

The girls don’t talk about clothes or boys; McNamara introduces J.D. in a derogatory fashion: “God Veronica, drool much?” making it un-cool that she has a crush. Their resistance to fall to on-screen female friend stereotypes is admirable. At the very least, Heathers succeeds in this area. Whereas other teen high school movies like Clueless (1995) end with finding a boyfriend and the bulk of Mean Girls (2004) conveys one female character taking down another, Heathers ends with Veronica finding and harnessing her power.

Veronica’s transformation springs from her friendship with Chandler. The transition from friend to foe sets off the chain of events for the rest of the film and sparks Veronica’s own journey to owning her power. Veronica is at first reluctantly popular, therefore reluctantly powerful. But her hatred for Chandler leads to her irreversible acts with J.D. and she starts to see herself and her actions with horror.

Veronica continuously returns to the idea that Betty Finn (Renée Esteves) was a true friend who she foolishly ditched for Chandler. But when she invites Betty over to play croquet, a game she played with the Heathers, instead of playing nice, Veronica doesn’t hesitate to be mean for mean’s sake and take the same knockout power shot Chandler did previously. Even Veronica succumbs briefly to power at the cost of her friend. In one of J.D.’s final lines to Veronica he tells her: “You got power, power I didn’t think you had,” a shaky admission to the once reluctant character now able to stand her ground.

Veronica realizes that she can’t allow herself to be used as a pawn in other people’s games, albeit Chandler’s, Duke’s, or J.D.’s. She’s aware that her actions are “teen-angst bullshit.” She takes matters into her own hands and not only does Veronica stop J.D. from blowing up the school, she asserts herself as the “new sheriff in town,” symbolically ripping the red scrunchie from Duke’s head and donning it herself as she struts down the hallway. With her new can’t-mess-with-me power, she vows to do right as the new school leader and offers an olive branch to a previously bullied student, officially clearing the slate for change.

Veronica’s realization that seeking out genuine friendships is more important than popularity is the real takeaway from Heathers. The importance of having female friends that build each other up instead of tear each other down is paramount. We as women should strive to buck the status quo of mainstream movie frienemy friendships and seek out ones that are rooted in respect and support. But as a whole, the message of the film is clear: Don’t be a Heather; find a Betty Finn.

Alize Emme is a writer/director living in Los Angeles. She holds a B.A. in Film & Television from NYU and tweets at @alizeemme.

Monsters and Morality in ‘Maleficent’

At its core, ‘Maleficent’ rewrites the morality tale that we all know. Instead of showing us that there is good and there is evil and never the twain shall meet, it tells us that sometimes people do bad things because they are hurt or scared but if they show remorse, realize the error of their ways, and act in ways that show love or kindness–they can be redeemed.

Spoiler Warning

Maleficent seems to be part of a growing trend to retell fairy tales in a way that complicate their morality lessons. For those that don’t know, the character of Maleficent is based on a classic Disney villain that first appeared in Sleeping Beauty. The original depiction of Maleficent is monstrous; in my opinion she was one of the most terrifying villains aimed at young children that Disney has produced. In the original she is an extraordinarily powerful evil fairy. She takes offense at not having been invited to Aurora’s christening and so as her birth gift curses the child to prick her finger on a spindle and die. The three good fairies are only to mitigate the curse so that Aurora would fall into everlasting sleep instead of dying.

Movies like Maleficent and shows like Once Upon a Time have complicated the notions of good in evil. In these types of stories we are given a view that Evil is not simply birthed, it must be created and can come down to the different ways in which people react to trying circumstances. For example in Once Upon a Time, both Snow White and Regina face hardship from an early age. This shows us that what separates the two is that Snow is able to work through her pain and practice compassion, whereas Regina becomes fixated on vengeance and tallying up all the wrongs that have been done to her, further fueling her undying need for vengeance which creates a vicious cycle.

In Sleeping Beauty, we know nothing about Maleficent’s origins; she is just a proxy for the forces of evil. She does bad things because she is bad; there is no further analysis required. Her motivations are irrelevant–we are meant to think nothing could possibly justify the things she does. Maleficent serves to complicate what we know as evil. Instead of Maleficent simply being caricatured as the “mistress of all evil,” we are introduced to her as an innocent, young girl who is kind to strangers and and is concerned with looking after the other fairies. As she grows older, Maleficent becomes powerful and takes on the mantle of protector of her people–a role that she takes very seriously. She ends up leading the fairies into battle when the King of the humans comes to try and conquer them out of greed. In this version, Maleficent is portrayed as a woman with power who is also virtuous, at least until she is hurt very badly.

There is little development of Aurora the princess; she comes off as a very naive child, despite her circumstances, which force her to become somewhat self-reliant. In some ways while giving Maleficent her person-hood, the movie removes that from Aurora. She seems to be merely a plot device. While not ideal, I am OK with it in this context.

Generally, female fairy tale villains can be divided into two broad categories (obviously there are exceptions): vain sorceresses – think the Evil Queen in Snow White or women with power who are just evil for the sake of it. Aside from Maleficent, Ursula the sea witch also fits into this category as does the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland.

The subtext is of course that women with power are dangerous and cannot or should not be trusted. The hero or heroine of a fairy tale is often concerned with removing the evil woman from power and restoring the natural balance of things, so to speak. This is why reshaping these narratives is so necessary; it allows us to disrupt the common gendered tropes that exist in a way that has real power. It is nice that in this case the true evil is not a woman with power, but instead a man who has greed and ambition and is willing to do whatever it takes to get what he wants, even if it means hurting the only person who has shown him kindness.

Maleficent’s downfall is love or sentimentality; her old human friend uses his relationship against her for his own personal ambitions and she is left bereft. She becomes hard and un-trusting because the violation she suffered was so traumatic. Angelina Jolie’s portrayal of Maleficent’s pain and loss at this point is quite poignant. Maleficent believes that she is doing her best for her people but she can no longer relate to them as she is not the carefree young girl that she was. At the same time it is love that redeems Maleficent when she falls deeply in maternal love with the object of her curse. She realizes that her pain and isolation have stopped her from truly being who she wants to be, and she will no longer let the man who assaulted her have that power over her anymore. There is something quite lovely about this; it tells us that yes, love can sometimes lead to hurt and betrayal, but it can also bring out the best in us. Love is an overarching theme in Maleficent, and one of the best moments comes when Prince Philip, who has met Aurora once, is unable to wake her with true love’s kiss. The good fairies are highly disgruntled, and for it seems to prove that love cannot exist. However when her own kiss wakes Aurora, she realizes that love comes in many forms, and it is not always a lie.

At its core, Maleficent rewrites the morality tale that we all know. Instead of showing us that there is good and there is evil and never the twain shall meet, it tells us that sometimes people do bad things because they are hurt or scared but if they show remorse, realize the error of their ways, and act in ways that show love or kindness–they can be redeemed. The contrast between Maleificient and the king is quite clear. Whereas Maleficent has been able to move on from her hurt through love, the king becomes consumed by his desire for vengeance; it becomes the only in thing in his life and that ends up making him the real evil and leading to his downfall. As far as fairy tales go, Maleficent is the most feminist retelling of one that I have seen in a long time.

Gaayathri Nair is currently living and writing in Auckland, New Zealand. You can find more of her work at her blog A Human Story and tweet her @A_Gaayathri.

Ruthless, Pragmatic Feminism in ‘House of Cards’

The women of ‘House of Cards’ are not “Strong Female Characters.” They are well-written characters with a great deal of power, which they wield alongside the men. They are integral parts of the narrative. When female complexity and power is written into the narrative, everything else–including passing the Bechdel Test–effortlessly falls into place.

Written by Leigh Kolb.

Season 2 spoilers ahead!

Novelist Elmore Leonard said, “If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.” I think about that often when looking for or critiquing the dearth of feminist film and television. We often wring our hands over the Bechdel Test and the lack of “Strong Female Characters.”

Ideal feminist media would be like Leonard’s ideal writing–films and shows that don’t feel like they’re trying to be feminist. They just are. Complex women and women’s stories that aren’t just pieces of the whole, but are woven in seamlessly throughout the narrative–that’s what I want.

House of Cards delivers.

Last year, after season 1 debuted on Netflix to critical and popular acclaim, Amanda Rodriguez and I both wrote about House of Cards and the wonderfully complex female characters (see: “The Complex, Unlikable Women of House of Cards” and “Claire Underwood: The Queen Bee in House of Cards“). The simultaneously awful and wonderful female characters whose stories were essential to the action in every single episode. Nothing ever felt forced, and the fact that these women were both sympathetic and loathsome was an absolute delight for those of us feminist viewers who are tired of “strong female characters” who pay lip service to some kind of surface-level inequality.

House of Cards’s feminism is remarkable, because it feels wholly unremarkable.

Season 2 debuted on Feb. 14, and although Netflix doesn’t reveal exact numbers, Variety reports that the viewership in the first few hours “soared,” with many subscribers watching multiple episodes at once.

And since the only Olympic-style sport we are interested in in our home is the long-form binge watch, we were finished with season 2 by Saturday night. Within the first two episodes, I was fairly certain this was the most feminist TV drama I’ve seen–because what we want (complexity, equality, and representation) is woven in seamlessly. House of Cards is not primarily about a man. It’s not primarily about a woman. It’s about people.

In the promo materials for season 1, we saw Frank Underwood sitting alone in Lincoln’s monument. Ostensibly, he’s the show’s protagonist. And in season 1, I suppose it did often feel that way.

However, the season 2 poster features Frank again sitting in Lincoln’s seat, but Claire is sitting on top of it also. From the first shot of season 2–Frank and Claire running together–we know that Frank isn’t really our sole protagonist at all anymore.

The first two episodes tie up many loose ends from season 1, and introduce new ones for season 2. In the first episode, Claire picks up her appointment with the fertility doctor not, as we learn, to become pregnant herself, but to find out more about the drug that Gillian is on so she can threaten to withhold her insurance from her, thus getting what she wants from Gillian. “I’m willing to let your child wither and die within you,” Claire says to Gillian. Frank pushes Zoe Barnes into the path of an ongoing train, and she is killed. Frank, who has taken his place as vice president, courts Jackie Sharp to be the House Majority Whip. Why? Her military record of having to order strikes and kill people (including women and children) shows Frank that she is a bastion of ruthless pragmatism, which is how he and Claire move forward; and with this, season 2 begins.

In the following episodes, Claire faces her rapist (who assaulted her in college, and now Frank must give him an award for his military service), and honestly tells Frank how she wants to “smash things” and how much she wants to talk about it. These scenes were excellent because she didn’t let Frank be the vengeful husband. She stopped him, and then kept her power by talking about the assault. It wasn’t presented as if her sexuality was Frank’s to protect; the experience was hers. She wants to let her husband in, but she doesn’t want him to avenge her honor. That’s her job.

When she goes on national television and admits to having an abortion, she says that it was to end the pregnancy that resulted from the sexual assault. She named her attacker, and a young woman called in to the show, saying that he had assaulted her as well. This kicks off a season-long story line about a military sexual assault bill that pits women against women and shows the politics of justice as being just that: politics.

Screen-Shot-2014-02-14-at-6.15.18-AM — Claire bares all–in her own way–on national television.

But here’s the rub: Claire had three abortions, not one, and none were from the rape. She is matter-of-fact with her doctor and press secretary that she had three abortions, and we learn that one was during the campaign with Frank, and two were when she was a teenager. One could see these story lines as using infertility, rape, and abortion as plot points.

And you know what? It’s fantastic. I love that these typically silent or exploited topics get so much air time in House of Cards, and that Claire is more human for having gone through so much, yet she uses it all for political and personal gain. (A recent study showed that when female characters consider or have an abortion in film or TV, they are disproportionally killed or at least punished.)

When done properly, I applaud these female-specific plot points. These events are plot points in women’s lives, and they should be used well on screen. House of Cards does just that.

Historically, men have wars and external, political struggles to define and provide fodder for their journeys (both fictional and non). We see this represented with Frank’s visit to the Confederate re-enactors and his war miniatures. Women’s struggles and choices–infertility, sexual assault, and abortion–are widespread and underrepresented. To have Claire live through and use these experiences is refreshing and brilliant (and appropriately villainous).

The season goes on to show the fallout that Claire receives from admitting to having an abortion (even though she publicly says she had one after a rape), including an attempted bomb attack by a man whose wife had had an abortion, and the angry, vitriolic protesters outside her home. (She tells Megan, the young sexual assault victim at one point, “They’re loud, but I think we need to be louder.”) What a great message.

Claire is a horrible human being for many, many reasons–but her abortions aren’t included in those reasons. The show makes that clear.

Jackie–Frank’s replacement and sometimes-ally sometimes-adversary–is a force. She, in her relationship with Remy, is the one who initially isn’t interested at all in a relationship. She gets tattooed to help deal with the pain of the deaths she was responsible for in the military. She’s powerful and political, and we see her as both the enemy and ally throughout the season.

Screen-Shot-2014-02-14-at-5.24.03-AM — Jackie, adding on to her poppy tattoo (symbolic in its remembrance of bloodshed in war, and therapeutic in its pain).

In addition to the complex shaping of women’s stories and the characters themselves, the way the show handles masculinity and sexuality seems revolutionary.

In season 1, it’s evident when Frank goes back to his alma mater that he had had a sexual relationship with a close male friend. There wasn’t much hoopla about this, it just was what it was. In season 2, Claire, Frank, and their bodyguard, Edward Meechum, have a threesome. The next day, Frank says to Meechum as he gets in the car, “It’s a beautiful day.” And that’s all there is to it. Meanwhile, Rachel has developed a relationship with Lisa, and it’s portrayed as a loving partnership (although the camera does linger on their sex scene while it artfully pans away from the aforementioned threesome).

There’s no moral focus or panic about people’s sexuality. It just–is what it is. No fanfare. And the fact that we get to see women having orgasms (in season 2, an especially steamy scene between Jackie and Remy) is a pleasant detour from the norm as well.

In what continues to be one of my favorite articles regarding feminist media, “I hate Strong Female Characters,” Sophia McDougall says,

“Nowadays the princesses all know kung fu, and yet they’re still the same princesses. They’re still love interests, still the one girl in a team of five boys, and they’re all kind of the same. They march on screen, punch someone to show how they don’t take no shit, throw around a couple of one-liners or forcibly kiss someone because getting consent is for wimps, and then with ladylike discretion they back out of the narrative’s way.”

The women of House of Cards are not “Strong Female Characters.” They are well-written characters with a great deal of power, which they wield alongside the men. They are integral parts of the narrative. When female complexity and power is written into the narrative, everything else–including passing the Bechdel Test–effortlessly falls into place.

This is ruthless pragmatism: feminist style, and it is excellent. In a sea of male anti-heroes on TV, it’s time that women share the stage. House of Cards shows its hand, and it’s a royal flush, with the queen right next to the king.

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