Masculinity Theme Week – Bitch Flicks

Masculinity: The Roundup

Check out all of the posts from our Masculinity Theme Week here.

Outlander and A Modern Man by Alize Emme

“What is her power over you?” Randall chides Jamie during his psychological torture. As manly as Jamie likens to be, he long ago surrendered himself to Claire’s power over him. In his deteriorated state, only a woman can heal this broken man. While Jamie’s brokenness is wholly justifiable, his extremist way of thinking shows his ideas of masculinity will need to continue to evolve if he wants to fully regain his soul.

Mad Max: Fury Road Allows Audiences to Both Enjoy and Problematize Hypermasculinity by Elizabeth King

As the evil dictator of the territory he occupies in a post-apocalyptic world, he demands more and more gasoline (which is in rare supply), while withholding water from his starved and sickly citizens. He also has a collection of women that he imprisons and uses for breeding purposes. In this single character we see some of the worst aspects of rampant hyper-masculinity condensed into one truly horrifying man.

Masculinity and the Queer Male: There’s Nowt So Queer as Folk by Rowan Ellis

Yet this very concept of shaming queer men for their sexuality while society is praising straight men for their sexual conquests as a key element of “successful” masculinity demonstrates the way homophobia intersects with a devaluing of the feminine.

Strong in the Real Way: Steven Universe and the Shape of Masculinity to Come by Ashley Gallagher

Steven, the title character, isn’t the troublemaking, reckless, pain-in-the-butt Boy-with-a-capital-B I feared I’d have to watch around to get to the powerful women and loving queer folk I really wanted to see. He’s unreserved, adventurous, and confident – all good traits that are fairly typical for boy leads in kids’ shows – but he is also affectionate, selfless, very prone to crying, and just plain effin’ adorable.

The Three Questions That Divide Breaking Bad Fans and What They Tell Us About Masculinity by Katherine Murray

Breaking Bad is one of those well-written, well-acted shows that somehow inspires people to scream at each other in CAPSLOCK. The debate about Walter White and his wife and their drug-trade boils down to your answers to three deceptively simple questions that act as a rorschach test on masculinity in American culture.

The Conflicting Masculinities of Frank and Claire in House of Cards by Tilly Grove

It is this point at which things significantly begin to shift in Frank and Claire’s relationship. This entire situation, which occurred in a succession of embarrassments for Frank, clearly served as a challenge to his dominance and an infringement on his masculinity, especially coming from his wife. For Claire, meanwhile, it is evident that while Frank is fighting desperately to enforce his masculinity and remain in power, she has lost all of hers.

The Blind (Drunk) Leading the Blind (Drunk): Masculinities and Friendship in Edgar Wright’s Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy by Tessa Racked

Two distinct masculinities pull the Trilogy’s heroes in different directions. Given Wright’s frequent use of pop culture references, I’ve opted to borrow Dungeons and Dragons’ terminology and describe these extremes as lawful and chaotic. Lawful masculinity is characterized by competency and order; it is the hallmark of the responsible (but rigid) adult. Chaotic masculinity is characterized by hedonism and anti-authoritarianism, usually embodied in the series by characters in a state of adolescence (whether age-appropriate or not).

A Fragile Masculinity: Genderswapping Male Characters by Alyssa Franke

Part of this belief comes from the assumption that casting women in these roles is always an attempt to tone down the masculine-coded characteristics associated with these characters. Vaguely omnipotent feminist forces are conspiring to emasculate hyper-masculine characters by recasting them as women, so the argument goes.

I Think We Need a Bigger Metaphor: Men and Masculinity in Jaws by Julia Patt

The life Brody has lived is utterly different, if not entirely sheltered. What dangers or dilemmas he’s faced in his life simply haven’t left the kind of marks Hooper and Quint bear. And their lack prevents him from engaging in any stereotypical masculine posturing. He is, by that criteria anyway, untested.

Female Masculinity and Gender Neutrality in Dexter by Cameron Airen

Knowing that his son had and would continue to kill, Harry taught him to follow a strict code that only allowed Dexter to kill “bad” people. Instead of being chaotic, spontaneous, and killing out of pure rage, Dexter developed a more methodical approach. He is a neat monster who creates a pristine kill room with everything clean, tidy and in its place. All of this could be seen as a more feminine kind of control.

The Complex Masculinity of Outlander’s Jamie Fraser by Carly Lane

It’s a surprising twist on the trope. Jamie is undoubtedly a force of man to be reckoned with, though the fact that he is a virgin and thus relatively inexperienced in terms of sex when he encounters Claire – the older, more experienced woman – attributes some unexpected “feminine” qualities to his character.

Mad Men: Masculinity and the Don Draper Image by Caroline Madden

Upon viewing the series after knowing the show’s finale, we see that the Don Draper arc reflects a small change in gender perspectives during that era. The Don of Season 1 would never act as the Don in the Season 7 finale. We see that Mad Men was all about shattering the hyper-masculine Don Draper mythos that he built and trapped himself within.

How Avatar: The Last Airbender Demonstrates a More Inclusive Masculinity by Aaron Radney

All of them, even those that have more traditional male expressions than the others, end up rejecting more toxic expressions of masculinity.

Misogyny Demons and Wesley’s Tortured Masculinity in Joss Whedon’s Angel by Stephanie Brown

Not only does the characterization of this violent misogyny as “primordial” imply that violence toward women is the natural state of men, it also implies that gender itself is an essential and natural state of being. Men are men and women are women. In a universe that generally operates in gray areas, such a distinction is uncharacteristically black and white.

Tough Guise 2: Disrupting Violent Masculinity One Documentary at a Time by Colleen Clemens

Narrator Jackson Katz uses visuals and film clips to argue that such a view of masculinity is creating a crisis in young boys as they grow up being made to feel that violence=agency and that rape is just fine because you should get what you want—and if the answer is “no,” then you just take it.

Off the Fury Road and Without a Map: Masculine Portrayal in the New Mad Max by Zev Chevat

Wrapped in a hypermasculine Trojan Horse of violence and war custom is a heady lesson about the dangers of ceding to those expectations, and about the road away from them and toward something like redemption. Here is a film where women are shown to be men’s combative equals. Even more so, it is a film where the only way the men can escape their own oppression is to join up with, and occasionally defer to, these women.

Negotiated Identities and Gray Oppositions in Ridley’s American Crime by Sean Weaver

With that said, even the traditional gender binary is flipped on its head—the women of the show uphold the patriarchal system that controls them, while the men are often portrayed as effeminate and oppressed by the same system that is supposed to give them power. Yes. Take a second while you process that.

Masculinity in Game of Thrones: More Than Fairytale Tropes by Jess Sanders

Boys are judged on their ability to swing a sword or work a trade, criticised for showing weakness, and taught to grow up hard and cold. Doesn’t sound unfamiliar, does it? Masculinity is praised in Westerosi society, as it is in our own.

Bigelow’s Boys: Martial Masculinity in The Hurt Locker by Rachael Johnson

The movie also, however, offers ideological and anthropological readings of masculinity which are, arguably, a little more complicated. Bigelow appears to have a deep interest in, and respect for, martial masculinity.

Moving Away From the Anti-Hero: What It Means to Be a Man in Better Call Saul by Becky Kukla

Slippin’ Jimmy was to James McGill what Heisenberg was to Walter White–a hyper-masculine alter-ego. OK, Slippin’ Jimmy was only conning a few business men out of their Rolexes, but essentially both men created an alternative, more masculine version of themselves in order to survive and gain success.

The Loneliest Planet and the Fracturing of Masculinity by Cal Cleary

Entourage: Masculinity and Male Privilege in Hollywood by Rachel Wortherly

Turtle reminds Vince that “the movie is called Aquaman, not Aquagirl.” This line is indicative of the “boys club” that continues to thrive in Hollywood. An actress’s livelihood in the industry is dependent on her co-star.

The Courage to Cry: Men and Boys’ Emotions in Naruto by Jackson Adler

However, when boys are told that “boys don’t cry” and that men should “man up,” their emotions are not respected, and they often internalize this stigma, sometimes with devastating consequences. Of course, simply crying won’t cure a condition as severe as PTSD, but men being shown that they are not “weak” for experiencing emotions and needing help will undoubtedly aid in the road to recovery.

Man Up: How VEEP Emphasizes the Value of Masculinity in Politics by Shannon Miller

Because he doesn’t display the same aggressive temperament (he’s actually rather sweet and nurturing) nor does he have a similar function as the rest of the group, his value is regularly questioned and his masculinity is nearly erased. Walsh broaches this issue in the second episode of the series, “Frozen Yoghurt,” when Egan flippantly claims that the famous bag is full of lip balm: “Everything you say to me is emasculating.” And it’s true!

Mr. Robot and the Trouble with the White Knight by Shay Revolver

Let’s Hear It for the Boy! Masculinity and the Monomyth by Morgan Faust

As the monomyth evolves, the question is: will it evolve to include the “everywoman” hero archetype, or will the nature of myth itself change to embrace not just the messaging of individualization, but the representation of unique stories for unique people?

‘Entourage’: Masculinity and Male Privilege in Hollywood

Turtle reminds Vince that “the movie is called ‘Aquaman,’ not ‘Aquagirl.'” This line is indicative of the “boys club” that continues to thrive in Hollywood. An actress’s livelihood in the industry is dependent on her co-star.

This guest post by Rachel Wortherley appears as part of our theme week on Masculinity.

“Ultimately, the show’s theme is friendship and family. The characters may have bling, but they’re grounded guys who look out for each other. That’s the backbone of the show. If it was just about fantasy lifestyles, it wouldn’t be relatable” – Doug Ellin, creator and director, Entourage.

The HBO series Entourage (2004-2011) focuses on four men, born and bred in Queens, as they navigate the tough terrain of Hollywood. The show revolves around actor and superstar Vincent Chase. Rounding out his entourage are: Vince’s best friend and manager, Eric “E” Murphy (Kevin Connolly); childhood friend, assistant, and driver Sal “Turtle” Assante (Jerry Ferrara); and Vince’s older half-brother, personal chef, and C-list actor, Johnny “Drama” Chase (Kevin Dillon). The story and characters are inspired by actor Mark Wahlberg, his manager Stephen Levinson, and various members of Wahlberg’s entourage during Wahlberg’s rise to fame. Entourage has often been criticized for its portrayal of male fantasy lifestyles. Their lives consist of buying expensive cars, attending exclusive parties and movie premieres, and hot girls. Ellin’s estimation is correct. Entourage is not a portrayal of the male fantasy. Instead, it reinforces the harsh reality that being a male, especially in Hollywood, equals power.

Each episode appears to end with a satisfying resolution. Seasons one and two consist of the guys finding Vince a new role that will propel him to stardom. In season one, Vince is coming off of a mediocre debut film and now wants a role with substance, while his equal opportunity offender and hardball agent, Ari Gold (Jeremy Piven), wants Vince to take a blockbuster film. At the end of season one, Vince films the indie and season two depicts Eric and Ari through the trials, tribulations, schmoozing, and negotiations of making Vince well-known to director James Cameron.

In season two, episode seven, “The Sundance Kids,” the guys end up fracturing a movie deal with producer Harvey Weingard (Maury Chakin) in the hopes of James Cameron casting Vince as Aquaman. At the end of the episode, when James Cameron leaves the film early, their hopes are dashed. That is, until Vince receives a phone call from James Cameron asking him if he wants to be his Aquaman. It is made clear that at this point, Vince is largely unknown. He fails to reach the superstardom of Tom Cruise, Leonardo DiCaprio, or Will Smith, yet Cameron is willing to take a chance. In season five, Vince’s film flops at Cannes and he is out of work for the next six months. In the reality of Hollywood, six months is a vacation for male stars, while it is a death sentence for actresses. Despite the rollercoaster of events, Vince and company still manage to stay on top.

Throughout the series, women are disposable. This notion is solidified in the pilot by Turtle when the guys invite Vince’s groupies over for a pool party: “Sweetheart, look around. Vince is gone. So’s your sister and your best friend. Come on, just make out with me, I’ll show you where Vince eats breakfast.” This can be seen as males using women–or “girls” as the guys refer to them—as a source of status and service. However, there is an equality in the leeching that occurs. Women are for consumption and allow themselves to be consumed. The next day, Turtle gives the girl a fresh pair of Vince’s jeans as a gift and all is well.

However, the most telling episode occurs in season two, episode eight, “Oh, Mandy.” After receiving news that actress and singer Mandy Moore has been offered the role of Aquagirl, Ari, the studio, the guys, and Vince’s opinionated and brass publicist, Shauna (Debi Mazar), scramble. Vince’s past romance with Mandy has the potential to hurt the movie. As a result, Vince has to make the decision as to whether or not she stays on the movie or not. Turtle reminds Vince that “the movie is called Aquaman, not Aquagirl.” This line is indicative of the “boys club” that continues to thrive in Hollywood. An actress’s livelihood in the industry is dependent on her co-star.

While there are notable women in the series, they are largely present to elevate the males. For example, the fact that Ari’s wife, Mrs. Ari is referred to as such and it is the character’s name, until the series finale, demonstrates how her identity clings to being the wife of Ari Gold. Yet she is the figure whom we see a different side of Ari through. While she tolerates his adolescent tantrums, Melissa is able to go toe-to-toe with Ari. In the pilot, as a way of solidifying his masculinity over Eric, Ari boasts about sleeping with supermodels. After audiences meet Melissa, they know this is false. As Ari attempts to skip out on his son’s birthday party to reign in Vince, Melissa calls him an “asshole.” His counter argument is to make a laundry list of everything he has provided for her: the means to contribute to charities, go shopping, and support her deadbeat brother. She simply replies, “Hey little agent boy, you better be back here for the cake,” and his only response is “OK.” His dynamic with Melissa, as well as, Lloyd his assistant/whipping boy, saves his character from being completely unsalvageable.

Women are also seen as the saviors when the stakes are high. In season one, one of Vince’s girlfriends provides a weed dealer to an uptight producer whose dealer is dry. As a result, the producer takes a liking to Vince and accepts his casting in the indie Queens Boulevard. In season two, porn stars rush to Vince’s aid when a journalist at comic-con (Rainn Wilson) threatens to ruin Vince and Aquaman before it has been filmed. Shauna—who calls Vince “Vincent”—acts as Vince’s west coast mother who tells him what to wear, how to act, and attempts to talk him off a ledge when his heart is broken by Mandy Moore. In addition to Melissa, the other women of Entourage, Sloan McQuewick (Emmanuelle Chriqui) and Jamie Lynn Sigler (playing herself), allow for the men to mature from boys playing with toys to men—who continue to play with toys, but have responsibility—at least in their romantic lives.

What is fascinating about Entourage is the timing of the premiere. Two months before the premiere, HBO had just come off the wave of the hit series Sex and the City. While it is not fair to compare the two series, there are areas in which they are similar. Each series has four friends who look out for each other and keep each other grounded and we see an air of extravagancy that is not afforded to the average viewer: shoes, homes, cars, etc. While romance and relationships is the focus on Sex and the City, the men of Entourage spend a fair amount of time talking about women. Eric’s relationships with women is usually the point of discussion.

While Eric’s story and character arc is establishing himself as a viable manager, Eric’s growth throughout the series is arguably the most relatable and interesting. The definition of masculinity—money, power, girls, brute strength—is not necessarily synonymous to Eric. If he were to be compared to a Sex and the City character, he is Miranda Hobbes. Miranda is successful, but her style does not eclipse that of Carrie Bradshaw. Miranda is the everywoman. She is career-driven, maintains a healthy relationship (formerly cynical about men and love), and is the practical voice of reason in their circle of friends. Eric, a former Sbarro pizza boy, is not as handsome as Vince, he drives an old car—until Vince gifts him one—and wears his heart on his sleeve. These two characters are likable because they are not the famous writer or movie star. So, is Miranda a male in women’s clothes, or is Eric a female in male’s clothes? The fact that Miranda, a woman, and Eric a male, can be compared concludes that our ideas of masculinity and femininity are not exclusive.

The reality of Entourage is that their environment allows for adolescent and offensive behaviors amongst men. Males are allowed to make power plays against each other and win. If they lose, their next opportunity is around the corner. This is not afforded to women who either need to be sexy and “bangable” while maintaining the visage of the “cool” girl next door to survive. Ellin is correct that the friendship amongst males is the theme of Entourage, but so is the fact that outside of the family dynamic, the “backbone” of their industry calls for males who look out for each other.

Rachel Wortherley earned a Master of Arts degree at Iona College in New Rochelle, New York. Her downtime consists of devouring copious amounts of literature, films, and Netflix. She hopes earn an MFA and become a professional screenwriter.

The Courage to Cry: Men and Boys’ Emotions in ‘Naruto’

This post by Jackson Adler previously appeared at The Windowsill and appears here as part of our theme week on Masculinity. Cross-posted with permission.

CONTAINS SPOILERS for the Naruto franchise.

It’s still pretty rare to see boys and men cry in TV and film. Male characters shedding a tear or two has become slightly more common (thank you, Scandal), but rarely anything more, even when a character is grieving over the loss of a loved one. TV and film, with or without intention, often spread the stigma against men and boys expressing powerful emotions in healthy ways such as crying. According to Dr. Christia Brown in her Psychology Today article “Boys Who Cry Might Have It All Figured Out,” “For boys, they are taught that sadness is not okay, and expressing sadness is definitely not okay. But emotions don’t evaporate, they have to be expressed somehow. For boys, an acceptable emotion is anger. They can fight, [and] show aggression.” If emotions are channeled into verbal or physical violence, such as when men with PTSD become physically abusive to their partners or spouses (such as in the case of Sir Patrick Stewart’s father), the consequences can be absolutely devastating, and sometimes fatal. This is not to say that anger should be ignored or that anger cannot be expressed in a healthy and non-abusive manner. For example, righteous anger at injustice leads many into lives of activism in which they create positive changes in their communities. However, when boys are told that “boys don’t cry” and that men should “man up,” their emotions are not respected, and they often internalize this stigma, sometimes with devastating consequences. Of course, simply crying won’t cure a condition as severe as PTSD, but men being shown that they are not “weak” for experiencing emotions and needing help will undoubtedly aid in the road to recovery.

For these reasons, I am proud of Kishimoto Masashi, the man who created the Naruto manga series, for creating male characters who unabashedly cry, and who are emotionally supported by their peers when they express their emotions in this way. His manga series, which will conclude on Nov. 10, has since been adapted into two anime series (Naruto and Naruto Shippuden) and several animated films. In Naruto, a story that is set among militarized warrior states and focuses on the ninja who act as their soldiers, men and boys, whether soldiers or civilians, experience severe trauma and great loss. Most of the scenes when a male character cries take place when that character is grieving over the loss of a loved one, but a number also take place when a character is emotionally touched, when they are pleading for the protection of a loved one, when they are seeking forgiveness, when they are lonely, or when they are tortured, persecuted, bullied, or ostracized. When these characters express their emotions through crying, they are not emasculated in the slightest. Heroes, villains, gray-area characters, top-notch soldiers, political leaders, medical professionals, and average civilians all cry in Naruto.

Even the most powerful and intimidating of characters are told by their peers that it is all right for them to cry, and are shown empathy and support. In Naruto Shippuden in the episode “Disappearance,” the characters Itachi and Kisame, elite members of the terrorist organization Akatsuki, receive a false report that Itachi’s younger brother has been killed. When Itachi steps out into the rain for what seems to be a private moment, Kisame says to Itachi, “I don’t know what someone as cold as you could be thinking right now, but from here, you look as though you are crying.” Far from mocking him, Kisame goes on to say, “It’s too bad about your younger brother,” and expresses that it must be lonely for Itachi to be “the sole survivor of [his] clan.” Though Itachi then reveals that he knows the information they received is false, it is a surprising moment of closeness and support between characters whose professions are so violent.

The storyline of the Naruto franchise is an action/fantasy one about a boy named Naruto, who trains to be a ninja and to serve his country. Like Naruto, many of the characters in the story are children who have been affected by war and are trained to become child soldiers. Though the story is written for children, and even contains a fair amount of slapstick and goofy humor, it certainly does not shy away from serious content. “War is hell,” one character says. Many of the child characters experience severe trauma, often, but not always, from war, long before they are permitted to fight in combat. Naruto’s grows up rather alone, even being ostracized and otherwise bullied by his community, and the second main character, Sasuke, who is Naruto’s friend and rival, and Itachi’s younger brother, witnessed the murder of his parents and the genocide of his clan when he was very young.

Naruto wears his heart on his sleeve, and cries often in the story, which frequently stems from his great amount of empathy and love for others. Naruto cries in the first episode when he overhears his teacher Iruka say to another teacher that he believes in Naruto, and Naruto realizes that someone cares about him after all. Sasuke cries much more rarely, often feigning indifference instead, but frequently channels his emotions into rage or violence. Much of the story revolves around Naruto and other characters trying to help Sasuke to heal, to connect with others, and to let go of rage, violence, and an all-consuming, overwhelming, and relentless quest for revenge. Sasuke and a number of other characters in Naruto either start the story with signs of PTSD or develop symptoms of it along the way.

The Naruto manga series ends in only a few weeks, and has culminated in a confrontation between Sasuke and Naruto. They each have the same goal – to make the world a better, more loving, and more peaceful place. Sasuke believes that he has to take the fate of the world on his own shoulders, and that he cannot ask for help. Naruto hopes to help Sasuke to see that he does not have to face all the pain and hatred in the world, and in himself, on his own. Many men are afraid to ask for help or support when they need it because of the stigma that they are weak if they do. Their emotions and healthy expressions of them are often ignored or mocked. Naruto sets a good example for everyone – that crying, that suffering, and that asking for help do not make a person weak. Naruto is also a good example of someone who shows empathy and support for others’ emotions and needs. I certainly hope that more people emulate Naruto and reach out to those is pain, and that those is pain start to feel comfortable asking for help and expressing themselves in a healthy way. Naruto is a hero who cries, who suffers, and who helps others. If there were more heroes like that in the media, maybe the stigma against men crying or asking for help would cease.

Jackson Adler is a transmasculine aromantic bi/pansexual skinny white middle class dude with an Auditory Processing Disorder and a Weak Working Memory who enjoys cartoons, musical theatre, and vegan boba drinks. Jackson has a BA in Theater, and is a writer, activist, performer, director, teacher, and dramaturge.

Man Up: How ‘VEEP’ Emphasizes the Value of Masculinity in Politics

The promotional image for Season 3 of Veep. — The promotional image for Season 3 of *Veep.*

This guest post by Shannon Miller appears as part of our theme week on Masculinity.

As a person who has experienced her fair share of toxic work environments, I’m not sure how much I’d flourish as a member of Vice President (or President, depending on which season you’re watching) Selina Meyer’s staff. Between the terrible communication, almost complete absence of solidarity, and the revolving door of insults, I’m just not sure I possess the thick skin needed to remain there for the long haul. VEEP, however, does an excellent job of presenting this tumultuous atmosphere in a way that’s sharp, thoughtful, and uniquely hilarious.

The component that makes the show the award-winning masterpiece that it deserves to be is its brand of insults, which are hurled by all members of the staff with an almost enviable ease. They’re often as witty as they are vulgar and everyone is a potential target, including Meyer (flawlessly portrayed by Julia Louis-Dreyfus) herself. The wealth of colorful jabs and hostile language offer more than a momentary laugh; it alludes to what is considered valuable amongst both the Meyer camp and politics, in general. Efficiency, aplomb, aggressiveness, and general competence are regularly encouraged with a simple call to “man up.” In addition, femininity and boyhood are used as favorable taunts to either attack someone’s confidence or goad them in a more advantageous, perhaps much more effective direction.

Consider, for a moment, a recent episode titled “B/ills” where Meyer advises her exceedingly charming running mate Tom James (Hugh Laurie) during a mock debate. “You’ve gotta be aggressive,” she says frankly. “Man up here a little bit.” Or we could glance back at season two’s “Hostages” when she gloats about her elevated role in the White House, or acquiring “a bigger dick.” During that same season’s episode “Signals,” Meyer’s secretary Sue Wilson (played by the underrated Sufe Bradshaw) demands Mike McLintock (Matt Walsh) to “man up and prioritize” when he expresses difficulty asserting himself enough to maintain the VP’s tight schedule.

The references are typically blink-and-you’ll-miss-it quick due to the show’s speedy pace, but the language that they use in lieu of a simple “be assertive” or “ I have more leverage” is seemingly purposeful. Within the VEEP world, assertiveness and power – necessities when working in politics – are directly equated with masculinity. Politics, generally speaking, is a male-dominated field, so this notion isn’t exactly revelatory. Something I find interesting, however, is how frequently this equivalency is perpetuated by the women in this show as opposed to the men. Meyer, Wilson, and Chief of Staff Amy Brookheimer (Anna Chlumsky) are three of the most competent, self-assured characters throughout the series. In my opinion, they seem like women who would rightfully push back against the idea that the attributes that make them exceptional are somehow inherently male. Instead, they’ve managed to integrate this concept into their workplace lexicon. It shouldn’t be said that they’re anti-femininity; in fact, they celebrate the fact that they are successful women. Their approaches to maintaining this success, however, have a surprisingly macho influence. Those who may not adopt quite the same attitude could find themselves on the receiving end of a sharp-witted taunt, like Meyer’s loyal personal aide Gary Walsh.

Gary Walsh: Selina Meyer’s personal aide.

Some might argue that Walsh (Tony Hale) has one of the most difficult jobs in Washington D.C. He literally maintains the Vice-President-turned-President’s entire public image, from the shade of her lipstick to the centerpieces at her dinners. He, on a superficial level, is responsible for making sure Meyer is always presentable, hauling around wardrobe options and a large bag laden with everything needed to keep every follicle in place. More importantly, however, he’s tasked with knowing the names and personal backgrounds of every single bureaucrat, dignitary, and public figure in her path. Almost permanently stationed close to her ear, Walsh is ready to dispatch any necessary information in order to help her exchange necessary pleasantries and maintain a relatively polished impression. Without him, many of her (and, by extension, the country’s) productive relationships would falter before her first syrupy sweet “hello.”

The complexities of his position, however, are widely overlooked as his role is diminished to that of a bag carrier by nearly all of his coworkers, including his boss. The precedent for this treatment is set from the pilot episode when Brookheimer and Dan Egan (Reid Scott) tease him for referencing his bag as “The Leviathan” and remains as an undercurrent throughout the entire series. Because he doesn’t display the same aggressive temperament (he’s actually rather sweet and nurturing) nor does he have a similar function as the rest of the group, his value is regularly questioned and his masculinity is nearly erased. Walsh broaches this issue in the second episode of the series, “Frozen Yoghurt,” when Egan flippantly claims that the famous bag is full of lip balm: “Everything you say to me is emasculating.” And it’s true! The core staff doesn’t see him as a contributor in the same way that they see themselves, so he’s routinely referred to as a woman or a young boy under the impression that both are hefty insults. In “East Wing,” for example, Brookheimer warns him that “his inner child needs to grow an outer man” when he dared to fret over a major mistake. The same could be said, in a way, about the treatment of White House liaison Jonah Ryan (Timothy Simons), who Sue Wilson jokingly claims was in his mother’s womb until he was 15 years old (“Shutdown”). His confidence and enthusiasm for his position are habitually met with an insult that demotes him to a young boy. It could also be said, however, that his immaturity manages to do that, as well.

So, given this fictional administration’s heightened perception of masculinity, how does the show manage not to wildly offend me, a woman and vocal feminist, every Sunday night? It’s simple: VEEP’s depiction of the way the political world values men while consistently undermining women aligns with real life, albeit comically. Female political figures are too often subjected to sexist criticism from the general media, which tends to focus on their hair accessories more than their actual societal contributions. If a woman announces her interest in any sort of office, an immediate question arises as to whether or not she is emotionally stable or focused enough to do the job. It’s no wonder why Selina Meyer would rather not bring too much attention to the fact that she’s a woman when suddenly tasked with stating her stance on abortion (“The Choice”); given the political media’s repulsive proclivity to not take women seriously, how else can she get the public to focus on the actual issue at hand? Her and her staff’s collective attitude regarding masculinity in the workplace is imbued with the discrimination that professional women – especially those in politics – have always experienced. Like many other magnificent comedies, the raucous laughs that come with VEEP can also be indicative of a sad, frustrating reality.

Shannon Miller’s passions include bossy women, social justice and her two-year-old daughter’s version of “Let It Go.” She’s also unapologetically anti-raisin. You can read her thoughts regarding representation in media on her blog Televised Lady Bits or follow her on Twitter @Phunky_Brewster.

‘Mr. Robot’ and the Trouble with the White Knight

This guest post by Shay Revolver appears as part of our theme week on Masculinity.

You’ve probably seen the poster art for Mr. Robot everywhere in the past few weeks. It’s pretty good show and it deserves the attention.

Poster for Mr. Robot Starring Rami Malek — Poster for *Mr. Robot,* starring Rami Malek

From the very first scene of Mr. Robot you are hooked. You find yourself invested in Elliot’s life. You feel connected with him and you hope that he succeeds. It’s a strong opening for what I feel will be an amazing show. The wait between the sneak preview and the next episode has been torture so I’ve watched the pilot more than once with my partner and my son because I can’t get enough. But somewhere in between each of the viewings I’ve had some thoughts that in some way take a part of my love away. The problem with loving good storytelling and being aware of the varying forms of patriarchy or misogyny in some stories is that once you’ve had a chance to digest a piece of media, you find yourself questioning all the little things that you find problematic and sometimes you can’t tell if it’s just you over analyzing or if there really is a problem there.

That space is where I find myself after seeing and loving Mr. Robot. Rami Malek plays the shy and socially awkward Elliot well. In the beginning of the show he takes down a pedophile and you root for him. Throughout the show he seems to inwardly clash with any of the Alpha males that surround him. Mr. Robot (played by Christian Slater) is as much of an embodiment of a man’s man as Brad Pitt/ Tyler Durden was in Fight Club. This statement is true, minus the Fight Club part, with most of the other men in his life, but they seem express all of the “masculine” traits you’d expect from a cis white male. Elliot, on the other hand, gives off a sense of humanity that makes you feel connected almost instantly as you join him on this adventure through his world. Elliot isn’t your typical male. He doesn’t exude all of the traits that you’d expect in a show’s lead. He’s not incredibly charismatic, he doesn’t put out an err of bravado, he doesn’t even have that uber masculine sense of entitlement. He’s not out swilling beer or doing any of the things you would expect. He is in no way a “man’s man.”

The problem doesn’t come from the viewing of this show, it comes from the aftertaste. Elliot is a traditional lone wolf type of man. He has his own rules and own mind and lives his life according to his own ideals. This makes him a nice contrast Amanda’s boyfriend. He’s the uber masculine type of guy that uses niceness as a weapon. He’s smarmy and even before we got into his indiscretions you couldn’t help but not like this guy. He has all the trademarks of a cis white male frat boy. He oozes all the traditionally masculine character traits that are the hallmark of the patriarchy. He has a sense of entitlement and this cloud of arrogance so thick you could choke on it.

Watching Elliot interact and rebuff him makes you feel like you’re on his side. This is where things start to get a little tricky for me. The thing that feels homey about Elliot is that despite his social awkwardness he generally cares for other people like his best friend Amanda (played by Portia Doubleday) and his therapist Krista (played by Gloria Reuben). The problem isn’t with the caring, the problem is with the way he shows it when they’re not around. In this regard he exudes a hyper masculine sense of over-protectiveness. During one of his exchanges with Amanda’s jerk of a boyfriend, Ollie (played by Ben Rappaprt), you find out that Elliot has been cyber stalking him. He discovered fairly early on that he was cheating on her and had been since shortly after they exchanged “I love yous.” But Elliot hasn’t told her yet. His reasons are self-serving–he doesn’t want to deal with the mess she’ll become after another break-up and he feels like he can “manage” him better than whatever guy she’ll find next. So instead, he keeps this secret from his best friend. This behavior runs parallel with the fact that every time that Amanda seems to be faltering at work, he swoops in to save the day and defend her from anyone who tried to make her seem less that capable. He can’t help himself from trying to save the day, from being a “White Knight.”

Gloria Reuben as Elliot's Therapist Krista — Gloria Reuben as Elliot’s therapist, Krista

I have long had a problem with this archetype both in media and in real life. To me this whole phenomenon of men feeling the desire to swoop in and “Save the Princess” seems to be more of a hindrance to feminism than a companion. Women are not helpless creatures who need protecting, at least not in the White Knight type of way. There is always an undertone in their actions that seem to convey the message that they’re just letting us have our way and will wait in the wings until they have their moment and can save us from ourselves. One of the biggest shows of Elliot’s underlying muber masculine White Knighting actions was him deciding to frame the CTO of E-Corp because he was rude to Amanda. In that moment he had the choice of two envelopes, one leading to the real culprit in the hacks, the other leading to the CTO. He was set to turn in Mr. Robot and his crew until the moment that the CTO kicked Amanda out of the room. Elliot took issue with that and in an effort to “protect” her and “defend her honor” he sets the CTO up to take the fall. I will give the writers credit for what they choose to do with Amanda’s character. To her credit, she calls Elliot on his choice to jump in during a meeting with their bosses to cover for her, she didn’t know to what extent he tried to defend her. But, the scene seems in a way that the show is aware of this element of the dynamic and makes sure that we know it too.

Elliot (Rami Malek) Seemingly Confused That Angela (Portia Doubleday)

Unfortunately, the problem with the White Knighting doesn’t end there. Elliot is fond of his therapist, Krista, and feels sorry for her and her relationship issues, mainly her trouble finding a suitable man after her divorce. His solution to facilitate keeping her safe and teaching her “to read people” involves him digging up dirt on her current online dating love interest. This is a side note in the pilot episode. Toward the end of the episode, shortly after you realize how awesome this series is going to be, he finds the dirt that he as looking for. Once again, instead of telling her himself, he chooses to confront him and blackmail him into telling her the truth about himself and breaking up with her. In the next scene that his therapist appears in she’s obviously shaken and appears to have been crying. He knows that his plan has worked. She is now “safe” and he seems pleased with his work.

Elliot and Mr. Robot Talk Business — Elliot and Mr. Robot talk business

This is another one of the problems that I have with White Knight syndrome. The types prone to exhibiting this behavior tend to have a lower opinion of women that than their outwardly sexist counterparts. White Knights take up the causes of the women in their lives and speak out for them, but it is usually done in a manner that seems to suggest they think that these women are incapable of speaking up for themselves. Elliot unfortunately seems to be as textbook as it comes in this regard. In some ways he seems more sinister in his actions because he seems so nice and unassuming , these traits make it so you don’t realize he’s moving pieces around in the lives of the women in his life.

He is resolute in his thinking that he knows what is best for them and will “protect” them from themselves by any means necessary. He does all of these things from the shadows while outwardly expressing genuine concern.

I can’t tell if Elliot’s behaviors are a sign of the times or if they’re his true feelings left out exposed like a nerve , a gift from the writer expressing the realism of White Knights, and I’m not sure where the show will go from here. I love the premise; the show itself comes off as a cross between Fight Club and Hackers–two of my favorite films–and the writing, direction, and camera work are amazing. I hope that in future episodes the women speak out more and he proves himself as less of a panderer and more of a genuine person whose actions toward the women on the show relay the words that he speaks to them. It’s hard to tell where this characters interactions will take the story, but I hope Elliot evolves into something better than the anti-hero that he is now because, as I said before, the show I plan on watching is phenomenal.

Elliot Does a Victory Stance After Taking down the Man (because the man was mean to Amanda) — Elliot does a victory stance after taking down the man (because the man was mean to Amanda)

Shay Revolver is an inked vegetarian, mom, feminist, cinephile, insomniac, recovering NYU student, and former roller derby player currently working as a Brooklyn-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 both on screen and behind the camera. She prides herself on using all (or damn near close) to an all female crew because it’s harder for women to build up their reel. She also thinks that everyone should check out the weekly @bitchflicks twitter chat about feminism and media every Tuesday at 2 because it’s awesome and she loves engaging with other women.

Twitter : @socialslumber13

Tumblr : Shay Revolver

Let’s Hear It for the Boy! Masculinity and the Monomyth

This guest post by Morgan Faust appears as part of our theme week on Masculinity.

I had a professor who began our first writing class with a wonderful speech about how as writers we have the most important job in the world since we create the myths that inform and mold society and its expectations of itself. Granted, his job was to convince us grad school was worth $40,000 a year….but the idea that narratives have real power did stay with me (so I guess he proved his point). Our national cinema (by which I mean the big stuff that shows up in theaters and is sent out around the world) says a lot about who we, as a country, think we are.

To judge by last year’s overseas box office numbers, we are a nation of white boys and men who fight imaginary baddies…oh and Angelina Jolie. There are many things we could tease out about America’s self-assumed national identity from our cinematic persona with regard to race, heteronormativity, military prowess, but this is Bitch Flicks and the topic is masculinity, so for today, let’s stick to that. Notably, in those top ten movies we have (often in the form of a sequel, triquel, and I don’t even know where to begin counting the X-Men movies) the story of a scrawny, nerdy, outcast boy who goes on a journey and becomes the hero he was meant to be. This story is known to its friends as the monomyth. So what does this myth say about us? A whole heck of a lot! So come with me, oh humble reader, and you will be transformed!

They’re softly lit, and ready for action.

A fantastic, recent example of our everyman hero, monomyth affinity is The Lego Movie. This story has all the notes of the humble hero myth: the hero Emmet, a good-hearted nobody who is chosen by a higher power, Vitruvius, to be the “special,” is then supported by a team of talented people–Wild Style, Batman, and Unikitty–to try and conquer evil Mr. Business. He eventually discovers he had the power to defeat the big bad in him all along! (Sound familiar, Bilbo? Mr. Potter?) Lord and Miller know their stuff. They play craftily with the myth; it’s story structure (ultimately our characters are actually Legos, not people, and they represent the feelings of the boy that is playing with them. Therapists would have loved working with this kid). It has a great message about play and finding your own voice, and says we can all be heroes! Especially boys! Oh, right. While the message of the movie might be about everyone, the story is about an everyman. I am reminded of the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.” It represents all people, but it definitely says men.

You could be me! Unless you’re, you know, not a straight, white, um, yellow dude!

So let’s dig into the component parts here. We have Emmet who is a good guy, friendly, upbeat, hardworking but unappreciated by his peers (calling Steve Rogers). All of these are traits you choose to have, rather than are born with, which fits in perfectly with the Alger Hiss American Dream we hold so dear: we are not a nation of fated success stories, we are individuals formed by our choices. Monomyth heroes are often orphans, or at the very least unloved by their parents, so they are truly, self-made men. How to Train Your Dragon’s Hiccup is small, hardworking and big-hearted. Harry Potter, even though put upon by awful relatives, was still generally a good kid who tried his best. And Luke was, well let’s be honest, he was a brat, but he was supposed to be a good-hearted, ambitious kid, who wanted to get out and see the world. This is a particular vision of masculinity; it’s not the “right man for the job” skill set of Indiana Jones, Hercules, or James Bond, instead, these are highly attainable character traits.

For all these boys/men, at some point early in the story, someone or thing plucks them from their mundane existence to send them on their path to greatness. The Lego Movie has fun with this conceit by getting a bit meta and literally calling him “the special,” but it is still the familiar notion that through no action of his own, Emmet is lifted up and named the one person who can save the world; and while he doesn’t see it about himself yet, the powers that be have faith in him that he will one day be the hero they know he can be. Which leads us nicely to the next thing a humble hero needs: his team.

In The Lego Movie this is made up a of team of Master Builders, a group of elite builders with the ability to create anything from legos, a skill that Emmet notably lacks. And while this group has their doubts about him, they never abandon him, they listen, and they follow his leadership. Each is a different variation on Emmet, and a manifestation of a skill set he doesn’t have, which in this case, as in many movies, includes a token woman (in Lego there is a token woman, and a token female crazy pony). Despite their abilities, each of these characters are included in the story only so they can help the hero find his inner strength and attain the goal of defeating evil.

We’re here for you! Here and slightly behind you!

Which brings us to the final piece of the monomyth: the hero had the answer inside of him all along. Whether it be the hero’s discovery that in fact he is special, like with Harry Potter (not only am I a wizard, I’m a Horcrux!), or simply that some character trait that had been deemed worthless proves vital, like with Kung Fu Panda’s Po, his love and belief in his heroes proves to be the thing all heroes need to succeed. The journey has brought the hero to a crucial juncture, and in order to defeat the big bad, our man has to come to face-to-face with his true self and embrace his identity.

What a perfect ending to an American myth: we each have greatness inside of us, no matter who we are!

Those aren’t noodles in there, I’m full of greatness!

And it is, it’s a great story, maybe the greatest. In fact, most religions have some version of this very idea at the core of their system (think how at the end of every yoga class the teacher ends saying Namaste or “the God within me greets the God within you”). So if this self-empowerment myth is limited only to men, what does that say about our culture? Well, we see its reflection in the XY domination of the White House. We see it again in Lily Ledbetter’s fight for equal pay. And we see it in the hiring practices of Hollywood (hey there Colin Treverrow!). We have a national love affair with underdog male success stories, a love affair that has not yet extended to women. And that is a damn shame.

But there is hope, a whole lot of it. Things are changing (Hillary!), and that myth is becoming more inclusive. On the one hand, we see that the traits our male heroes often embrace in order to defeat the big bad are becoming more traditionally feminine characteristics: kindness, generosity, self-sacrifice and teamwork. It’s not just about who’s the strongest or fiercest, it’s about love and respect for others. All good things. And we have Buffy, we have Katniss, and (coming this summer!) the return of Sarah Connor. There is a difference, however, between our female heroes and their male counterparts, and that is that they are fleshed out, full characters. They are not mirrors to reflect an improved image of the audience, they are women with families, feelings and flaws; they are people, not archetypes.

These heroes are women, but they aren’t everywoman. — These heroes are women, but they aren’t *everywoman.*

Morgan Faust is writer/director who works in LA with her creative partner and brother Max Isaacson. Together they form the duo BroSis. When they aren’t writing action films with kick-ass women heroes, they’re keeping it goofy over at FunnyorDie.com. Click here to see what she means.

Twitter @morganfaust

Instagram @brosisgrams

Moving Away From the Anti-Hero: What It Means to Be a Man in ‘Better Call Saul’

This guest post by Becky Kukla appears as part of our theme week on Masculinity.

I think I should start by saying that I’m not a huge fan of Breaking Bad. In a discussion about Better Call Saul, this question always seems to crop up and I have to be honest–I found the series tedious and repetitive. I also found it to be a really dissatisfying critique of masculinity when it had so many opportunities to explore it. Walter White relied notoriously on masculine techniques and tropes in order to succeed in his work. Walt refuses help, is intent on remaining the breadwinner of the White family, lies and manipulates others to prove his worth and ultimately becomes the epitome of what it means to be “macho.” In itself, this is not problematic, but Breaking Bad’s refusal to acknowledge Walt as being any less than ‘God-like’ meant that criticism of his masculinity was unable to be explored in any kind of depth.

This is not meant to be a debate about the ins and outs of Breaking Bad’s hyper-masculine problems, however. I’m sure an entire thesis could be written, or has been written, on the depiction of masculinity in Breaking Bad, but it feels like a topic that doesn’t need much more discussion. Better Call Saul, on the other hand, feels like it has a lot to offer viewers in terms of examining masculinity. Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul have been and will continue to be compared in almost every aspect of their design. It makes sense – they are both created by Vince Gilligan, share many of the same actors and follow a narrative based around a lone-wolf type protagonist. A man trying to make his own way in the world: a portrait of masculinity. Saul Goodman is supposedly the new “anti-hero,” following in the footsteps of Don Draper, Tony Soprano and of course our very own Walt. Emphasis on the supposedly, because although Breaking Bad might be more universally loved, the first season of Better Call Saul alone sparks the debate that the spin-off series might be more adept at handling the complicated issue of masculinity on screen.

James McGill/Saul Goodman (Bob Odenkirk) begins the series working as a retail assistant in Cinnabon, after falling from the highest heights as Walt’s lawyer. He’s living in an empty apartment, he has stopped practicing law and his life has been destroyed from getting involved with Walt. Flash back to six years before Saul meets Walt. Saul (at this point we should really be calling him James) is a struggling lawyer. It feels similar to the beginning of Breaking Bad. James is down on his luck, has struggled for years through college to get a law degree only to have ended up writing wills for the elderly living in a nearby care home. Oh and he lives in the nail spa that he tried to convince Walt to launder money through. It’s a nice touch and it tells us exactly where James McGill is at in his life.

A common theme in T.V. and films is the idea that, in order to qualify as masculine, one must have success and status. Better Call Saul plays with this concept in terms of Jimmy’s status in society and in comparison to his peers. We know, because we watched Breaking Bad, that Jimmy ends up as the infamous Saul Goodman: lawyer to the sleazy hardened criminals. He is going to be successful, if only for a short time. Currently however, Jimmy is not successful. Jimmy’s closest friends, Kim Wexler (Rhea Seehorn) and his brother Chuck (Michael Mckean) are both smarter than him, more skilled than him and by the end of the series, are both accomplished lawyers at a reputable firm. If success and status are masculine attributes then it seems like the only character missing out is Jimmy himself. Backtrack a few years though, and we learn that James Mcgill used to be Slippin’ Jimmy – expert con artist. He was skilled, immoral, and his alter-ego Slippin’ Jimmy successfully made a living out of conning various rich (and stupid) individuals at bars. Slippin’ Jimmy was to James McGill what Heisenberg was to Walter White–a hyper-masculine alter-ego. OK, Slippin’ Jimmy was only conning a few business men out of their Rolexes, but essentially both men created an alternative, more masculine version of themselves in order to survive and gain success.

Only Slippin’ Jimmy became James McGill when he decided to shape up and work hard to gain a law qualification. Due to the sudden and heartbreaking death of his fellow con-man Marco, James realizes he can’t go back to that life even though it made him more money than his current work within elder law (unglamorous and very moral). Breaking the law or using immoral means to gain money is seen as a sign of masculinity; think about Goodfellas or The Godfather. James’ conscious decision to straighten his life out, get a degree, and make an honest living could be construed as going against masculine ideals – especially in the shady world in which James resides. Throughout the series, James struggles when pulled into cases which are on the wrong side of the law – the Kettleman case is a great example. If success and money are attributes which make one a “real man,” James McGill has neither, but Slippin’ Jimmy/Saul Goodman have both. Clearly James is still a real man despite having neither success nor money, so what does this say about the fluidity of masculinity?

One of the most unconventional aspects of James’ life is his brother Chuck. Likewise Walt is the provider for his family in Breaking Bad, James is the primary carer and provider for Chuck. Chuck suffers from a “rare condition” (it’s not really established whether this is predominantly a mental or physical condition) in that he is allergic to electricity. James assists Chuck with meals, money and is his general carer around the house. While Walt uses his role as the provider (a typically masculine characteristic), James’ character seems to take on both maternal and paternal attributes – negotiating a balance between masculinity and femininity. James provides for Chuck, but he doesn’t use this power to manipulate Chuck or coerce Chuck into helping him.

Chuck is actually far more closely aligned with prior representations of masculinity on T.V. Like Walt, Don, or Tony, Chuck is reserved and unemotional. He keeps to himself, doesn’t make any friends and has one major flaw. In Chuck’s case, it’s being allergic to electricity. Unlike the Walter Whites of this world, however, we are not invited to share in Chuck’s successes or to even view him as a sympathetic character. At best, he’s completely insane and at worst, he is a nasty piece of work – denying James the right to work at HMM. There is no room to love a character like Chuck in Better Call Saul. There is no room for the anti-hero or to explain the qualities that come with it. Chuck isn’t a nice person because he’s out for himself. In Breaking Bad we would be invited to try and understand this, but in Better Call Saul we have already met James – a character who negotiates his own needs and wants without neglecting others in his life. James still strives for success, but he doesn’t behave like our traditional male heroes (or anti-heroes depending on which way you see it). James shares his problems with the people in his life – Mike, Chuck, Kim, and Marco – and isn’t afraid to ask for help. This subversion doesn’t make him any less of a man, just adds more depth to his character.

For a character, and indeed a series, that I think we all expected to be Walter White 2.0, James McGill is pretty interesting and unconventional character. The show itself could do a lot more with its female characters and diversity in general (it’s about as white-washed as Breaking Bad), but James’ characterisation is a start at least.

Becky Kukla (twitter – @kuklamoo) resides in London, watches a lot of Netflix and is trying to live off a career in the T.V. industry. She blogs a lot in her spare time (Femphile.co.uk), and wrote her BA thesis on Femininity in Sci-Fi TV with a special focus on The X-Files. Spooky.

‘The Loneliest Planet’ and the Fracturing of Masculinity

This guest post by Cal Cleary appears as part of our theme week on Masculinity.

It’s a frequently stated truism that the patriarchy hurts men the same way it hurts women. The system of rigid gender expectations can be punishing for anyone who doesn’t conform to its strictures. Those punishments aren’t just external; failure to live up a made-up masculine ideal can cause considerable internal anguish. Few films have dealt with the transformative strength of that failure as powerfully as The Loneliest Planet. Written and directed by Julia Loktev, loosely adapting Tom Bissell’s short story “Expensive Trips Nowhere,” the film is, in part, a powerful meditation on the way a single moment can clash with a man’s internalized expectations to destroy his sense of self.

The Loneliest Planet is, essentially, a movie with three characters. Nica (Hani Furstenberg) and Alex (Gael García Bernal) are engaged, a pair of active world-travelers who can tackle any challenge together. Before their wedding, they visit the country of Georgia, where they hire a guide, Dato (renowned Georgian mountaineer Bidzina Gujabidze), to take them on a long hike through the nation’s incredibly scenic countryside. Along the way, they meet a group of heavily armed men who are suspicious of the trio, questioning them briefly. Then, they walk back, exploring more of Georgia’s gorgeous natural landscapes.

That really is it for plot. But the key twist in the film’s halfway point is what gives the film its power, and there’s no real way to discuss what the movie is saying about masculinity without first talking about the twist. So, for the spoiler averse – and this is the rare twist best experienced without knowing quite what to expect – I suggest taking a break and checking the movie out now. For those who’ve seen it, or who don’t mind a bit of foreknowledge, however, read on…

The key moment, the scene that gives the film its shape, happens at the halfway point, when the trio meets the armed men. Neither Alex nor Nica share a language with him, so they aren’t sure what the confrontation is about. Despite the presence of guns, Loktev shoots the scene in a fairly low-key manner, highlighting not the tension but the lack of control for the two tourists. It is this lack of control that makes Alex so uncomfortable. He tries to insert himself in a conflict that Dato appears to be handling well, demanding to know what’s going on – only to find a large rifle leveled at his face. Alex’s immediate response is to push Nica in front of the barrel and hide behind her – but only for a second. After that gut reaction, he reasserts himself, pushing Nica back behind him and aggressively posturing for her, recklessly pressing his forehead to the rifle’s barrel.

It turns out to be a false alarm. Dato talks the armed men down, and then he accompanies Nica and Alex as they walk back home. At no point do any of the characters discuss what just happened. Alex grows immediately taciturn, and Nica is clearly uncomfortable. Something very fundamental about their relationship has changed, and Julia Loktev does an amazing job at showing how differently Alex and Nica see that event without ever coming out and saying it.

Throughout the first half of the film, most characters outside the small group instinctively defer to Alex, a role he happily relegates to his equally competent partner. A group of locals approached as they seek out a guide ask Alex if Nica is his wife – she answers. They ask Alex if Nica can carry a heavy-enough load to be an effective hiker – she answers. Early in the film, during a perilous river-crossing, Dato has concerns that Nica can make the trip safely, but Alex lets Nica go first, and has no doubts that she’ll be able to handle herself. Alex is comfortable not taking the lead, despite what everyone else expects, and Loktev constantly reinforces that through the staging and the shot composition, as well as frequent interludes that highlight the physicality they have in common, the confidence they have in their own bodies working precisely how they want.

Alex is, in many ways, the ideal of the modern man: Handsome, athletic, intelligent, well-traveled, well-off financially but still environmentally sensitive, and with a romantic partner he treats as an equal. Because of this, he has no trouble shrugging off the gendered stereotypes expected of his relationship in the first half of the film. But as soon as he is given reason to doubt his own traditionally defined masculinity, it all falls apart. Suddenly, he thinks Nica needs help lifting her own pack, needs help steadying herself while she takes off a shoe – help he himself refuses to accept from her later, when he twists his ankle and tries to shrug it off. It isn’t the external expectations that get to him, the fear of judgment from other people, but his own concern that he isn’t man enough. The specifics of how masculinity presents may have changed from the days of Ernest Hemingway’s “The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber,” a story with thematic and structural ties to Loktev’s film, but the way some men react when they begin to question their own masculinity has not.

Nica, of course, is shaken up just as much as Alex by the event with the gunman, but the way Loktev and her performers portray the aftermath, their violations seem very different. As portrayed by Furstenberg, Nica seems to feel betrayed by Alex’s action, but she is clearly willing to forgive him as she processes what happened. She begins to open up again. Alex, on the other hand, seems to feel unmanned. Both characters are profoundly shaken up by the incident, but Nica fears for her life, no longer certain if she can trust her partner, while Alex fears that he looks weak. Which is, I guess, a purely visual way of expressing Margaret Atwood’s classic sentiment: “Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.”

The Loneliest Planet is a difficult movie in a lot of ways, telling almost its entire movie nonverbally. Indeed, the characters’ feelings and relationships are mostly defined by their staging and the camera’s movement, which can make the long, dialogue-free stretches feel slow. Until you start to notice the way the landscapes change to counter the emotional state of the characters, or the way walking order during the hike can define relationships. Until you realize that the film is very much about language, and that the things Alex and Nica can’t bring themselves to say are far more important than any words they may use to paper over the issue.

The Loneliest Planet ends in uncertainty. Alex and Nica are back together, but the casual intimacy of the film’s earliest moments is gone, perhaps forever. Even at the end, Alex is more withdrawn. He has learned something very dark about himself, and it’s something he still can’t quite process. You can be a sensitive multi-lingual world-travelling guy who looks like Gael García Bernal, but can you still consider yourself a man, he seems to wonder, if you’re a coward?

Cal Cleary spends most of his time judging others, writing film and comic reviews for GeekRex and novel reviews for Luxury Reading. When he’s not writing online, he’s librarianing in rural Ohio, and he definitely hasn’t figured out that librarianing is not a real word. Follow him on Twitter (@comicalibrarian) for links to more of his work.

Negotiated Identities and Gray Oppositions in Ridley’s ‘American Crime’

This guest post by Sean Weaver appears as part of our theme week on Masculinity.

When I was a young preteen kid, my dad told me tales of how Miami Vice and Magnum, P.I. once helped him entertain the dream of becoming a private detective. He was so enamored by detectives and the law that he took a college course on crime, criminal investigation, and the law. Unbeknownst to him, I remember stumbling across one of his old tape recorders, hitting play, and listening to his own secret sting operation play out. Perhaps that’s where I began my long career of advocating social justice–justice against a system that is seriously flawed.

With all nostalgia and conspiracy theories aside, at first glance, Jonathan Ridley’s (director of 12 Years a Slave) American Crime seems like one of those old school detective thrillers, the likes of which have entertained American television and cinema since the 1980s. Up to its premiere on March 5, 2015, I had seen previews on ABC. I imagined it would be everything I had hoped in a detective drama: the gritty neo-noir tone, the masculine detective hero out to solve the un-solvable case, and the plot line driven by suspense and a nagging “Who dun it?” Instead, what I came across is a show that is powerfully poignant, thought-provoking, and one that delves the viewer deeper into the conditions of the human experience.

This isn’t a show aimed at entertaining. It is a show that relies on provoking the viewer into moving past that cushy comfort zone of self-identification, and questioning the very foundations that control our daily lives: social justice, race, and gender. In her review on American Crime in The New York Times, Alessandra Stanley beautifully captures the sentiment and driving force of this show. She states, “This series is at heart a murder mystery—someone has been killed, and the show withholds who did it. But solving the crime isn’t the point. The murder is a clue to the mysteries of character, experience, and self deception…”

It is a murder mystery. But, as Stanley so eloquently puts it, it isn’t. It’s so much more. In the introduction to her book Detecting Men: Masculinity and the Hollywood Detective, film critic Philippa Gates writes:

“The detective genre has traditionally been a male-centered one based on the social assumption that heroism, villainy, and violence are predominantly masculine characteristics. The detective genre has traditionally been a male-centered one based on the social assumption that heroism, villainy, and violence are predominantly masculine characteristics…Not only is the genre male-centered, it is also hero-centered, tending to adhere to a structure of binary oppositions— good/bad, civilized/uncivilized, law/crime, order/chaos, and heroes/villains…[However] Not all detective films make absolute distinctions between these oppositions, and the examination of the indeterminate, ‘gray’ area between heroism and anti-heroism also proves illuminating in terms of the social mores and attitudes toward crime and law that it can reveal.”

Gates rightly points that not all detective films, and in this case show, make absolute distinctions in these traditional masculine tropes/themes. American Crime focuses on illuminating this “gray” area that reveals the social mores and attitudes toward crime and law, and in turn attitudes on crime, race, and gender in American society. It forgoes the masculine detective hero out to solve the crime, and instead focuses on those impacted by such crimes—whether they are guilty by circumstance/hearsay, victims in their hurt, or even willing participants. Like Stanley also points out, this “gray” area exists in the things the characters fail to say or do. By focusing on this “gray” area, viewers can truly come to appreciate the complexities of this astounding show.

Set amidst the dark and drug-filled backdrop of San Modesto, California, the show centers primarily on four families and the suspects associated with a high profile murder, all poised to give into the collision course of hate, fear, and suspicion that guide their highly racialized and gendered lives. In short summary for those who haven’t yet seen American Crime, the driving plot is that a White man is killed by a Black man, under the guise of a “hate crime.” Hold on to that for a second. A Black man is charged with committing a hate crime against a White man. Talk about flipping the traditional binary. With that said, even the traditional gender binary is flipped on its head—the women of the show uphold the patriarchal system that controls them, while the men are often portrayed as effeminate and oppressed by the same system that is supposed to give them power. Yes. Take a second while you process that. And finally, each character is hell-bent on seeking a social justice, whatever that may be, that reasserts their own existence. I’d rather not give away to many more details. Take my word for it, watch it.

With all the background stuff out of the way, the task of unpacking the complex lived realities of the Skokie and Nix families is rather daunting. However, at the head of the Skokie family is Barbra Hanlon (Felicity Huffman), mother of the murdered White man, and ex wife of Russ Skokie (Timothy Hutton). Barb fits all the characteristics of the stereotypical suburban middle aged White woman. She is assertive, grieving, and every bit fearful of those she perceives as “other.” She is the walking parrot of the patriarchy, and embodies all its masculine ideals. She wields power, through her very own existence. So much so, that if you hadn’t watched the first few episodes, you would swear that she was the intended murdered victim.

She creates fact from the truths she is unable to face. She decries her son a hero, even after authorities question her son’s involvement in an illegal drug cartel: “You want me to say stuff about my son that isn’t true? He is a war hero, a veteran.” Finally she gives into the easy out of declaring racism and her son’s murder a hate crime, knowing that the lead suspect of her son’s murder is in a relationship with a White woman. She groups people by the stereotypes engrained in her social upbringing—even going as far as declaring, “It was probably one of those illegals.” At one point, she comes into her power and wields it, well, like a man—even going as far as purchasing a firearm. The feminist in me cringes at this description. Because on the surface it seems like the stereotype of the grieving hysterical mother is being perpetuated once again. But there comes a point in the show where the viewer realizes she is not just a woman facing “hysteria.” No, the show is pushing past the perceived identities we take so much stock in. Instead, it shows how easily it is for the oppressed to become the oppressors by wielding fear and distrust. It also shows how people often negotiate the power of their identities at the expense of others.

The antithesis to Barb’s masculine ideals is her ex-husband, Russ. Like his wife, Russ takes stock in illusions that the exterior just needs to be brushed off. Russ is the failed man. When I say failed man, I mean he fails to live up to the expectations of the patriarchal world that controls his life. He is weak, timid, and ultimately unable to hold ground with his wife. At one point Barb delivers the ultimate emasculation speech, concerning where and who should bury their dead son exclaiming, “You walked out. You no longer get to say you’re his father.” The viewer becomes perplexed and is left with figuring out whether she is right or wrong. Is he the hero because he has returned? Does he return to step into the perceived masculine role of putting the pieces back together? Does his masculinity rely on the perceived social norm that the man is the back bone of family? Has he really overcome his gambling addiction? For Russ, the answer is yes, because countless times he declares, “We need to be a family.” In the end, Russ can only reclaim his own lost masculinity by taking his own sense of justice. In the final episode, Barb is distraught that the man she deems murdered her son is released. Her masculine veneer fades, and the viewer is left with a defeated woman realizing the realities she has fabricated are nothing but lies. After being cast off by Barb in a moment of rare intimacy between the two, Russ returns home to the gun that Barb has entrusted in his care. She has rejected his last attempt to once again reunite the family, his last attempt to be a man. He fails to be the hero, and instead becomes the villain he has tried to protect his family from by murdering Carter Nix (Elvis Nolasco).

On the receiving end of the prosecution is the Nix family. Carter Nix stands accused for the murder of Matthew Skokie. While the show never reveals whether or not Carter killed Skokie (which to me is a nod to the infamous system in which the guilty go free and the innocent accused), the viewer is left to come to their own conclusion. The facts are plentiful, but the truth is even harder to discern, and is found only in what is left unsaid. On the surface, it might seem like the show is reproducing the Black “thug” stereotype; Carter is a drug addict dating a White woman with the same problem. In fact, every chance they get the prosecution tries to save Carter’s girlfriend Aubry (Caitlin Gerard) from the menacing Black man: “Give us something to put him away.” However, Carter is far from the stereotypes that seem to define his life, and consequently his actions. Like his White counterpart Russ Skokie, Carter is a defeated man, emasculated in every sense of the word. While the circumstances differ, the same power structure is at play. The reason Carter relies on drugs is to create realities he wishes to see as truth. In one scene, Carter discusses how Aubry has saved his life with his sister Aliyah Shadeed (Regina King). He states he was miserable being an accountant, subservient to the White men that controlled his life. He then shares with her a magazine clipping of a Black man and White woman, the reality he wishes to share with Aubry, but cannot due to the interference of what is socially acceptable and not. He must negotiate his identity for drugs, and perceived lived realities, all while fighting an impenetrable system of control.

Finally the last person who seems to take a central role in the unfolding drama is Aliyah, Carter’s sister. She is every bit the counterpart to Barb Skokie. In fact, she is just as strong and willfully powered. She becomes the spearhead of a campaign to free Carter and is right to point the finger at a system that is massively corrupt. In one brilliant dialogue with Carter she states, “You sleep with their women, use their drugs, and take their guns. And you don’t expect to be locked up here?” She is a strong figure and is masculine in her own rights. However, in her fight to free Carter from his metaphorical chains she becomes just as guilty of upholding and instilling fear and hate. Like Barb, she becomes the victim; it is no longer her brother’s fight. In doing so, she manages to push Carter into breaking up with Aubry, forcing Carter to take sides in an invisible war. Just before the final scene in which her brother is murdered, Aliyah gives a speech in her mosque stating, “If we as a people cannot forgive, then we are cursed to hate.” The irony is that Aliyah was only able to forgive once her cause had been won. But her victory comes at the cost of her own negotiated identity, proving that the true American crime is not the physical act of murder itself, but something far more harmful: the negotiation and deception of one’s self.

Sean Weaver has a MA in English/Literature from Kutztown University. He is currently News Editor at Vada, an online magazine from the UK with a new queer perspective. When he isn’t reading or writing, he is hard at work looking for new ways to understand what it means to be queer.

Twitter: @levirush8

Blog: http://post-colonial-scholar.blogspot.com

‘Outlander’ and A Modern Man

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

Setting aside everything there is to know about the current television landscape, the Starz series Outlander might seem like a completely modern story about two people navigating the start of a new relationship — minus the time travel, two husbands, and lack of indoor plumbing. Outlander, the tale of Claire Randall (Caitriona Balfe) the Englishwoman who accidentally leaves the 20th century and her husband when she travels 200 years back in time and meets Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan) and a love she cannot deny, actually is a modern portrayal of sex and gender on TV. But what makes Outlander modern is also what makes it rare: Masculinity as told for the female gaze.

Ronald D. Moore, Outlander’s creator, deserves credit for fully developing the masculine men Diana Gabaldon established in the book series of the same name. On one end of the masculinity spectrum there are characters like Frank Randall (Tobias Menzies), Claire’s husband, the scholarly gentleman who is considerably more sexually timid than his wife, and Ian (Steven Cree), Jamie’s brother-in-law who is remorseful after murdering a man and befriends a criminal because he’s the only one who treats him like a man. On the polar opposite end of the scale are Dougal MacKenzie (Graham McTavish), kin to Jamie and recreational adulterer at large, and Captain Jack Randall (also Menzies), an 18th century version of Dog the Bounty Hunter mixed with one of the Hulks buttoned into a red tailored coat whose very layered homoerotic tendencies make him a predator for women and men alike. Somewhere in the middle of this virility brigade is Jamie Fraser.

“There has never been a man on screen quite like this Jamie character. He’s tough and brash, heroic and noble, but he’s also invested in love and intimacy.”

Jamie completely redefines the nuances of masculinity and what it means to be a man on screen. Where the traditional television narrative would dictate Jamie pushes, he instead pulls; where he could take the easy road, he takes the high road. Jamie challenges Jamie as much as any outside force and reveals himself a better man each time. And it doesn’t hurt that he’s built like a Greek god, with the hair of a cherub, eyes like the sky, and more often than not is covered in blood, sweat, or mud. Outwardly, Jamie is masculinity personified.

It’s hard to look so good while wearing a skirt, let’s be honest.

Inwardly, Jamie reserves no ego about being a virgin exploring sex and sexuality with his new bride and more experienced partner, Claire, on their wedding night. He takes the warnings from his fellow male friends that women don’t care for sex to heart when he sees this could be true for Claire. Jamie doesn’t just use Claire for his own agenda and roll over and leave once he’s satisfied; he cares for her in every sense that there is to be a lover. He wants to learn from her. He is swept up by the mysticism of their unusual love and doesn’t mind how it looks to serve Claire publicly or please her privately.

To the hyper-masculine Dougal, who knows the “importance” of keeping a woman waiting so she doesn’t fancy herself with too much power or control over her husband, this is a sign of weakness. But Jamie’s defiance of the MacKenzie Clan’s male domineering agenda is clear. “I said I was completely under your power and happy to be there,” he tells Claire after eagerly returning to her.

The rules of how to be a man have been clearly ingrained in Jamie. He struggles with the idea of how to uphold a masculine image while also respecting his wife. While Claire persists with being a huge factor in challenging Jamie’s pre-set thinking. Where Jamie sees fit to reprimand Claire for putting herself and others in danger by archaically spanking her, Claire bucks at this tradition and uses it as an opportunity to renegotiate the rules of their relationship.

Claire will not remain idle while Jamie follows blindly the regressive ways of his predecessors. She challenges him. She reminds him a woman’s voice is just as important as a man’s, that wives are not property. She is the force that whispers in his ear to pull when the status quo says to push. Instead of digging in his heels, Jamie takes a vulnerable turn and admits to Claire that the thought of losing her scares him. He is a man who can show emotion and understands that love allows for forgiveness.

“I saw a ridged man bend,” Jamie says before realizing traditions are not set in stone. Jamie comes to the conclusion that in order to make his marriage with Claire formidable, he cannot continue to abide by the rules of older generations. His mindfulness leads to the pledge that he will never again raise a rebellious hand to his wife.

By nature Jamie is a protector and he fiercely protects women. He takes two floggings to protect his sister, he takes a beating to protect Leary (Nell Hudson), and he’s married Claire to protect her from the Red Coats. Jamie quite easily fills out the honorable male role of providing security. The idea that women want to feel secure is sometimes correlated with money, but as true love stories go, Jamie can offer Claire only the skill of his two bare hands.

“You need not be sacred of me nor anyone else as long as I am with you,” Jamie tells her shortly after arriving at Castle Leoch. Despite the wealth of safety Jamie provides for Claire, she also saves him. She is as much his savior as he is her hero. She sews his wounds, she rescues him when he’s captured, but most importantly, her love sparks new life within Jamie. She gives him something no one else can; with her he is whole. Jamie doesn’t shy away from Claire’s ability to help him. But he does show resignation when he cannot provide for her.

After realizing his father’s savings, originally endowed for Jamie and Claire to raise a family, must now go to staving off a low-life criminal out for the bounty on Jamie’s head, Jamie tells Claire, “I’ve let you down”–words most men on TV never utter. His humility shows the side of a man who understands the weight of his actions and the reach of their consequences.

Jamie is an amalgamation for this time. He has taken the old traditions of patriarchy and retained only what is needed to be a survivor. He has expanded his own notions of male dominance and marriage for the woman he loves. He is tender, but still commanding. In many senses, Jamie is the evolution of the perfect modern man. And instead of being the hero at the end of the story, he is in turn, the victim.

Throughout this first season of Outlander, Jamie and Randall have crossed paths in a twisted juxtaposition of showmanship. Both of these men tether the series as pillars of opposing masculinity. Randall is filled with brute strength fueled by a sadistic mind charging at anything he wants to possess. He holds a sadistic domination over Jamie having personally whipped Jamie within an inch of his life.

Jamie and Randall, a long and storied history.

During an exchange at Fort William, Randall taunts Jamie: “Who’s the man in this match, Fraser?” Jamie’s unwillingness to fight Randall is seen as weakness; he is less a man for not desiring bloodshed. While war and murder are commonplace in this time period, Jamie derives no pleasure from the passing of men, like Randall who feeds off the weakness of other. Jamie is a valiant warrior on the battlefield but when the opportunity presents itself for Jamie to avenge himself with Randall, he doesn’t follow through. “It never occurred to me to kill a helpless man, even one such as Randall,” Jamie says. This logic makes the brutality of their final meeting all the more agonizing.

As these things go on television, women are shown as the victims of rape and sexual assault. Outlander has plenty of this as well, and no matter how accurate it is to the time period, the bodice-ripping and men treating women like objects is still the show’s greatest fault. Men prove themselves in this era by taking whatever they can dominate, women or otherwise. And in a different twist on this theme, the show’s final culmination of sexual violence occurs not between a man and a woman, but between two men.

Through disturbing mind games and gruesome treatment, Randall breaks Jamie. For a series where the entire show is a metaphor centered on power and dominance — countries over countries, men over women, lairds over tenants — this is the ultimate domination.

The two men who have foiled each other the entire season act out the most gruesome rendition of good versus evil, Christ imagery and all, and evil triumphs. For Jamie and his traditional masculine mentality, this is a loss only death can free him from. He is defeated, victimized, and literally crippled, and the one person who can save him is Claire.

How do you redefine masculinity on television? Outlander has only scratched the surface of potential for shows to portray more evolved men on screen. Jamie is the kind of man women want to watch. But he should also the kind of man other men want to emulate. A little old, a little new–a modern man for our modern world.

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

‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ Allows Audiences to Both Enjoy and Problematize Hypermasculinity

This guest post by Elizabeth King appears as part of our theme week on Masculinity.

When I went to see Mad Max: Fury Road, I didn’t know anything about the film except that it was supposed to be “really, really good.” After leaving the movie theater, I was completely stunned. The film takes such a unique approach to a very common Hollywood action plot that it would be difficult not to be impressed with the creativity of Fury Road’s director, George Miller. Fury Road is also stunningly self-aware, and that alone makes it stand out in its genre. But the true creative genius is that the film includes all of the problematic, hyper-masculine core elements of action movies, but they are portrayed in such a way that audiences are not merely entertained by those elements, they also cannot help but to recognize them as problematic.

Hallmarks of a typical action movie are scenes and characters that include violence, destruction, bulging muscles, fire, fast cars, and attractive (but mostly irrelevant to the plot) women. Action movies revel in and glorify hyper-masculine imagery, particularly violence, and have little to no self-reflection regarding the destruction, havoc, and exploitation that results from uncritically embracing hyper-masculine values. Titles like Die Hard, The Matrix, and Terminator quickly come to mind as exemplars of this type of entertainment.

In Fury Road, oppressive violence and exploitation are personified in the legion of antagonists: the war boys and their villainous leader, Immortan Joe. Immortan is almost too perfect in this regard. As the evil dictator of the territory he occupies in a post-apocalyptic world, he demands more and more gasoline (which is in rare supply), while withholding water from his starved and sickly citizens. He also has a collection of women that he imprisons and uses for breeding purposes. In this single character we see some of the worst aspects of rampant hyper-masculinity condensed into one truly horrifying man.

What’s more is that Immortan Joe and his warboys all drive huge, emissions spewing, weaponized vehicles, designed to easily rip across their barren desert landscape and kill their enemies in many creative ways. They thrive off of consumption, exploitation of resources, and find glory in killing. They are (of course) all armed with excessively rigged-up guns, and when their war party of cars is assembled, the image is so on the nose that it is almost comical. There are entire scenes that are so overly masculinized that they become absurd.

But this is, in large part, the beauty of the film. Fury Road delivers all the high speed vehicles, bloodthirsty men, car chases, and explosions we want and expect in action movies, but these images are intentionally presented in such an extreme manner, rendering them absurd; the audience can’t help but have their exhilaration filtered through criticism. Fury Road is not escapist like so many other films in the action genre. On the contrary, it uses the spectacle of action tropes as a means of calling attention to the problems with those tropes.

The character of Max also fulfills many stereotypical masculine traits. He is stoic, quiet, a loner, and not afraid to wield a weapon. Much of his dialogue is grunting. While he demonstrates many masculine qualities, these traits are not pushed to the extreme limits like they are with Immortan Joe. In addition to being gruff and stoic, Max is also cooperative, level-headed, and willing to defer to the expertise and skills of women. Max’s masculinity is nuanced. It is the product of the state of the society he lives in, but he does not buy into the oppressive/ destructive narrative.

Max demonstrates that masculinity can embraced without it necessarily being brutish or a force force for destruction. Compared to Immortan and the warboys, Max’s character communicates that masculinity itself is not what creates oppression, but when the core features of traditional masculinity go unchecked and become dominant (a la Immortan Joe), it can only spell disaster.

Elizabeth King is a freelance writer based in Chicago, Ill. She is a feminist, environmentalist, and ice cream enthusiast. You can find her on Twitter @ekingc, and read more of her work on her website: www.elizabethcking.com.

Masculinity and the Queer Male: There’s Nowt So ‘Queer as Folk’

This guest post by Rowan Ellis appears as part of our theme week on Masculinity.

If we were being cliche about it, we’d start this essay with a nice textbook definition of masculinity. “The Oxford Dictionary defines masculinity as…” But the thing is, the dictionary defines masculinity as “possession of the qualities traditionally associated with men,” and queer media, of which Queer as Folk (North American version) is but one example, should surely take issue with this very premise considering how heavily it relies on assumptions around a gender binary that doesn’t really exist. Queer as Folk is overwhelmingly about men, but they are men living in a subculture with different “traditional qualities.” Queens, Bears, Straight-Acting, Leathers… any number of ideals of what it is to be a certain type of man in a certain type of tradition. When sexuality is bought into the mix, and the queer body is the one playing with these gendered constructs, we find an element of doubt: if what it means to be a man can change so easily between male identities, then there is no innate power behind it. Effeminate gay men, like Emmett Honeycut, are subverting gendered stereotypes, of course. But masculine gay men, like Brian Kinney, are also subverting preconceptions around sexuality, and are in turn fucking with gender in a similar way. If the power of masculinity is that it is the thing “ordinary” straight men are meant to aspire to, for a gay man to inhabit that aspiration is for the queer to encroach on and upset the accepted balance.

Brian Kinney is a “man’s man” in a different way to that masculine ideal... — Brian Kinney is a “man’s man” in a different way to that masculine ideal…

Queer as Folk, based on Russell T. Davies’ original British series of the same name, follows a group of five gay men, and their two lesbian friends, in Pittsburgh. The creation of the series was born of a desire to see the reality of modern gay life on screen, and the show doesn’t disappoint. There are story lines that deal with things such as coming out, marriage equality, gay bashing, HIV+ characters, assimilation vs. subversion of mainstream society, adoption, gay parenting, workplace discrimination, religion, accepting and condemning families, and, of course, sex–themes and ideas which were both universal to the gay experience, and specific to the life of gay people in the period between 2000 and 2005 when the show aired. This pioneering attitude toward sexuality across an entire ensemble cast in such a frank and explicit way cements its place as a cornerstone of queer media history, and an important series to explore in regard to sexuality and masculinity and how they connect.

The Queer as Folk Season Four Cast getting cosy. — The *Queer as Folk* Season 4 cast getting cosy.

The show balances characters across the spectrum of masculine and feminine, with people like Brian or Drew Boyd on one side, and Emmett on the other, with the rest placed somewhere in between. It demonstrates the differing elements of gender presentation, from looks to interests, and suggests these are innate parts of a person which are then packaged and labelled by society to the either one thing or another. Ben Bruckner’s interest in quiet peace and serenity might exclude him from the masculine, while the fact he is the top in his relationship with Michael might pull him out of the feminine; these labels become ultimately meaningless not just in queer characters, but in any characters. However the show doesn’t deny that social pressures can shape someone’s natural disposition and interests to conform to the expectations of gender. We can see how Drew’s intense masculinity is something which is tied to his vehement denial of his sexuality, creating a defensive barrier that keeps Emmett at a distance because he doesn’t fit with the artificially created version of Drew.

Ben: so studious, so Zen, so into Michael.

The show also addresses the issues that come with excesses in the physical power of traditional masculinity, through toxic masculinity and violence. As a show in the early 2000s, cases of this violence turned onto the queer community, like that of Matthew Shepard in 1998, were a very real fear. Justin’s gay-bashing at the end of the first season cut brutally through the softening of Brian’s distanced outward demeanor as they danced together at prom. Thus men who needed to use their masculinity against other people, rather than a genuine and internal reflection of their own identity, were clearly shown to be a problem, not an aspiration. This idea was bought even closer to home in Season 4 when Justin joins the Pink Posse, a group of vigilantes who forcibly strip homophobes in public, and his anger escalates to a horrific peak when he gets his chance at revenge.

Justin’s hypermasculinity spirals out of control while on the road to revenge.

When Justin brings home a gun, and later uses it to terrify and humiliate Chris Hobbs, he has reached the outer extreme of masculinity. That classic visual cliche of the gun as phallic symbol rings true, as he forces Hobbs to take the weapon into his mouth and “suck it” at his command. This extremity is ultimately condemned by the writers and framed as a downward spiral for Justin, rather than an upward journey to masculine perfection and strength. At a simplistic level he is working toward what society might deem desirable masculinity: he is attaining power both physically and sexually, he is defending himself, he is showing only the “strong” emotion of righteous anger. But when this is played out literally in front of us, as an audience, we recoil in horror at the reality that this hypermasculinity can produce, further undermining its apparent appeal.

Hypersexuality in the gay scene has long been a criticism leveled against the community as a whole, as well as the TV series itself. The stereotypes around gay life and promiscuity are arguably enforced in Queer as Folk, where we are introduced to our male leads in the omnipresent club Babylon, full of men looking for sex (especially contrasted to the domestic frame of motherhood given to Mel and Lindsay as we first see them in the delivery room). Yet this very concept of shaming queer men for their sexuality while society is praising straight men for their sexual conquests as a key element of “successful” masculinity demonstrates the way homophobia intersects with a devaluing of the feminine. Women, including the way their sexuality is viewed as precious and dirty at the same time, are traditionally tied to femininity, which is in turn linked to weakness. By linking gay men, femininity and sex together as the stereotype does, we can see how male sexuality can be condemned when it is with another man, but not when it is exclusively with a woman. However, the show occasionally falls in playing out the masculine/feminine dichotomy within its queer relationships, rather than subverting this heteronormative pattern entirely–the pinnacle of masculinity, Brian, refusing to bottom and the butch/femme dynamic of Mel and Lindsay’s relationship. Are the explicit queer politics of Brian, or the “we’re not like you” speech from Michael, enough to counter this? Maybe the answer to that, like our relationship with gender in the real world, isn’t clear cut.

The explicit sexuality of the show doesn’t allow for a sanitized and comfortable view of gay men.

Subverting this binary with masculine women, and indeed feminine men, has a complex history in fiction; from the villainous dandy to the “strong female protagonist,” character tropes are full of gendered workings. Masculinity is a difficult thing to pull apart in the real world, but in fiction it has been decided and crafted by a writer specifically to feed into that particular character. In a patriarchal world where masculinity is power, strength, and the ultimate goal, we might be tempted to see masculine characters as a sort of ultimate character. One of the clear strengths of Queer as Folk was the way it refused to be a show which played into the idea of there being only one way that queer people should play out their gender identity. It didn’t lay claim to sweeping generalisations that feminine gay men are out “giving us a bad name,” and that masculine gay men as assimilated traitors. Ultimately the portrayal of masculinity, and indeed femininity, in the show felt natural and unique for each character. It uses its ideas around masculinity, and indeed femininity, to expose the reality of gay life, and how it intersects with, and pulls away from, heteronormative society. It is certainly true that if the show was remade now (and there are vague hints of that as a possibility) fans like myself would hope for a greater depth of diversity both within the queer spectrum (the L and G of the acronym were well-represented, but not so much anyone else) as well as in intersectional ways (not having an all white main ensemble would be a great start). But for a pioneering show of its kind, there was nowt so great as Queer as Folk.

Rowan Ellis is a British geek using her YouTube videos to critique films, TV, and books from a queer and feminist lens.