The Chick Discussion - Television Tropes & Idioms

Haphazard: Has there ever been a male version of The Chick? Or is it absolutely required for this trope to be female?

Tanto: RTFE, Evelyn Wood.

In single-sex bands (of either gender), The Chick is characterized by being the most ditzy, childish, immature, or naive member of the group; the one most likely to be held hostage.

Haphazard: Yes, but are there any bands that are a close even mix where The Chick is still male?

Tanto: Theoretically. I can't think of any of the top of my head, but there's no reason why there couldn't be one. Chickdom's a state of mind.

Haphazard: Yeah, that's what I thought... I've written some things where The Chick has most definitely been male, and I refuse to believe that this interpretation is original. Hrrm, I guess this means that the hunt is on, right?

Some Sort Of Troper: Daniel Jackson of Stargate SG 1, surely?

arromdee: I don't want to go into Wikipedia mode, but I'd appreciate a reference, source, or something for the claim that Power Rangers often replaces a guy with a girl. The first Power Rangers series, of course, is notorious for this, but the idea that this was more than a one series thing seems to be an urban legend. Certainly recent sentai series such as Magiranger and Dekaranger already have two girls in them.

If there isn't some good reason to think this is *not* an urban legend, I'm taking it out.

K: If I remember correctly, Gingaman/Lost Galaxy, Go Go V/Lightspeed, Timeranger/Time Force and Gaoranger/Wild Force also did the male-to-female Yellow switch. I'd say 'no skirt = Yellow is male,' but Dekaranger kind of messed that up.

Ununnilium:

Not even Dale? He's The Ditz, so he's halfway there already...

First, Conversation In The Main Page! Discussion goes in the freakin' discussion page! AAAAAanyeurism @-@

Second, nah, he's definitely The Lancer.

Silent Hunter: Great improvement.

Patsy: The page quote is funny, but is it remotely relevent?

Ununnilium: Sure. It illustrates the general attitude towards the old, "token female" version of the trope.

Eh, I guess...

Ununnilium:

This troper always saw Marco as The Lancer and Cassie as the - believable, brave and competent - chick.

I disagree; I think he exemplifies the whole "heart" aspect, especially.

fleb: Did the whole Animorphs section get cut? I can't find what that was a reply to anymore. (Incidentally, I agree that Marco's The Lancer and Cassie, like Katara, is a decent The Chick / Token Feminine Female Character.)

Some Sort Of Troper: Yeah, I don't see where people are getting Marco, the cold, ruthless one, as The Chick from. Cassie always acts as the moral centre (which is mentioned in the trope entry), leans more heavily to the pacifist side than all the others, generally drawing them back from their belligerent impulses (which is mentioned in the entry) and is explicitly the one who focuses on the psychology of the team (and the enemy) and keeping them together (the heart) as mentioned in the description.

Ununnilium: Nice detail work, Sunder The Gold. ^-^

Sunder The Gold: Thank you.

Tanto: Marco's not the chick. Cassie is easily, easily the chick. It's the only gimme classification on the Animorphs other than Jake as The Hero.

Lale: The Avatar entry is cute, but anyone else find it uninformative Fan Wank? What does it contribute to illustrating the trope?

Etrangere: Probably nothing. I still think Katara's The Chick of the group, but there's been countless discussions on that without any consensus so we might as well remove the entry altogether.

Lale: Well, I think, like it or not, the truth is Suki is a Flat Character without her Action Girl skills, and Avatar isn't exactly short on more developed female warriors. The original purpose of The Chick is to be the token female; Suki's purpose is to be the Affirmative Action Girl who keeps the male-to-female gender ratio equal (unnecessarily — girls don't watch this show to watch the girls!).

Etrangere: I'm sorry, I don't think that The Chick = Flat Character (whether or not that's what Suki is, I agree she's not the deepest character of the group, but neither has she got the same development time). The Chick is a character who's defined by her traditionnally feminine skills. She's the character with the social skills, The Medic skills and who's the heart of the group. That's right there in the description, look it up. None of those things are like Suki. As for the male-to-female ratio, you can't read the writers' mind and nothing they said in their interview indicates that's what they were worried about (nor do I see why they should be worried about it, Avatar's got brilliant gender dynamics starting with S2 - and, by the way, YES that's why me and other girls I know were watching the show : the cool female characters. The cool male characters too, but it's one of the thing that made Avatar extra awesome).

Lale: I think that stuff about heart and social skills etc. was added to make the entry seem fairer and more gender-neutral; token female was the original idea, but...

Never Mind. Next trope...

Avatar The Last Airbender: Fans have argued that every single member of the Gaang is The Chick:
- Aang, because of his naivete and idealism.
- Katara, because of her healing abilities and being the Team Mom.
- Sokka, because he's a non-bender, The Chew Toy, and loves shopping.
- Toph, because she's a Rebellious Princess.
- Zuko, because he's royalty and eye candy... who serves the group tea!
- And for some it is the Action Girl, Suki, for being the token Affirmative Action Girl of the team.

Lale: I was going to let this drop, but in light of this:

From Avatar The Last Airbender Discussion
KJMackley: I know there has been a lot of debate on this subject but I inserted a line about Katara being The Chick. After helping with Tropes Are Not Good, Square Peg Round Trope and thinking about their relationship with Tropes Are Not Bad, I realized that the only reason people are arguing that Katara isn't The Chick is because she is an Action Girl, not a Distressed Damsel. That isn't the defining characteristic of The Chick, yet Katara fits into being the team's moral center, has healing abilities, is the romantic interest of the hero and lastly, is female (feminine balance). I actually find it more impressive that they were able to combine The Lancer and The Chick so effectively, often the Action Girl is just a girl with a guy's personality.

Etrangere: Yes, I agree with KJ Mackley. Those are the reasons why I think Katara is The Chick.

KJMackley: I did a major rewrite of the description. Nothing too earthshattering different, but I emphasized that The Chick can have good qualities and just because they are often written poorly, they are not necessarily bad.

—-

Orihime: ... How does this belong in The Chick? I don't see anything but B*tching About Female Characters You Don't See As "Strong Females" and bashing of the whole Chick archetype, TBH. To me, it first more in Dethroning Moment Of Suck.

A very good example of this is Paul Dini's run on the Batman title, Detective Comics:
- Harley Quinn - a professional psychiatrist turned into a giggling manic schoolgirl by ‘female weakness’.
- Poison Ivy - his major story with her includes her being stalked by a giant plant, possessed with the souls of the people she fed to it (cliche alert), leading to an entire issue of poor excuses for tentacle porn in which she is raped by said plant and develops a phobia of her own freaking powers, rendering her utterly pathetic and useless.
- Catwoman - his major arc with her reduces her to “Batman’s ex/Woman in Fridge”, less than half a year after the final issue of her series said the exact opposite.
- Likewise Zatanna - all the character-building and ideas created by Morrison in s7: Z are thrown out the window in favour of a Mary-Sue “Batman’s Girlfriend” who never stops doing regular conjuring tricks in order to look cute.
- Oh, and the ‘new, improved’ Ventriloquist. The Ventriloquist-Scarface team worked only because it was a juxtaposition of how pathetic Arnold Wesker was compared with his alter-ego; look, for instance, in BATMAN: CITY OF CRIME, where his blank expression and silent demeanour next to his alter-ego gives him an almost frightening aspect. Replacing Wesker with a beautiful vapid blonde woman negates all of the character’s interesting features and potential for scariness, partly because it suggests that Scarface is more of a malevolent spirit than one man’s alternate personality (it is scientifically and psychologically impossible for two separate people to engender the same alternate personality), and partly because it implies that beautiful blonde women are just as pathetic as sad, useless old men. Which is a pretty broad generalisation, no?
- …And continuing with that trend, the new Ventriloquist’s origin? “Hush’s Girlfriend”.

Toph is far from being the chick, but is The Big Guy (more specifically a Cute Bruiser).

Not this trope means shouldn't be listed.

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