What to do with this trope...: Action Girl

Why do people keep saying its supposed to be the Distaff Counterpart to Action Hero? Two pages say that. I agree that it needs a tighter definition, but that isn't it. I've never seen it used like that.

I would agree. Unless we want to change the trope to actually mean actionhero counterpart, we should axe that part of the description.

For an Action Girl, I think the main thing would be getting rid of some less clear examples. To qualify, I think that the main purpose of the character has to be to kick lots of ass and do it on a regular basis, with a certain level of competence. She has to be proactive in the plot. One of the problems people are having with the trope is that people are including any character that has ever thrown a punch and happens to be female.

Also, since we have a tropes for women who use different weapons, maybe we should have one for female archers? And have a separate trope about women who fill the warrior role in the traditional sense of the word.

edited 11th Jun '11 9:02:21 AM by LaCapitana

Personally I think we should tighten this a bit, it is one of the standard character types and like a 1000 subtropes.

Also create a separate page for the Distaff Counterpart to Action Hero.

Or just add the redirect Action Heroine to Action Hero.

The subtropes are also having some trouble. Hot Chick with a Sword is under TRS, since it sounds like a fanservice trope but is supposed to be just an Action Girl who uses a sword.

I like that idea a lot but it would mean restructuring the page to include examples outside of actors wellknown for playing Action Hero roles.

I would make them separate but similar pages. The page would have to YKTT Wed and formatted to fit Action Hero though. (why do we even sort Action Hero like it is? There should be plenty of one time only types for it.)

edited 11th Jun '11 9:17:43 AM by Raso

Are we even sure that Action Hero is as media/genre-restriced as its current article description says?

Another issue with Action Hero is that the way the page treats it, as "action movie star", is different from how other pages treat it: as the third part of the Action Hero - Science Hero - Guile Hero trio.

Precisely why I suggested reworking that trope here.

I like the idea of simply reworking Action Hero to include female examples and examples from comic books, manga, TV, and Videogames instead of its current structure. Perhaps there should also be a TRS for Action Hero?

Alright, I've gone through the this thread and compiled a list of easy to reference points that summarize what's been said so far.

EDIT: I'll most likely tweak/update this post as this thread continues.

Current Problems:

1.) It's poorly defined.

- There's confusion if it's a Distaff Counterpart to the Action Hero or its own separate trope.

- Has a very broad definition as evident from its numerous subtropes.

2.) There is Trope Decay since it is misused as either "Any female character who does anything ever" or from the resulting confusion as mentioned above.

- The trope is used as a Double Standard.

- A cultural shift is turning this into a Discredited Trope since being an Action Girl used to be a defining characteristic of such a woman.

- Action Girls are becoming more prevalent in fiction and the existence of one is now both normal and in some ways expected. It is no longer the defining characteristic it used to be.

3.) The misuse is negatively affecting other tropes like Faux Action Girl, Chickification and many other subtropes.

Proposed Solutions:

1.) Rewrite the entire trope with a better definition.

2.) Turn it into an index.

3.) Cut it.

4.) Clarify other tropes such as Action Hero in addition to whatever we decide to do with this one.

If I've left anything out, please let me know and I'll add it.

I think we're starting to get a good idea of what's wrong and I think the proposed solutions are reasonable. Should we start deciding what solution to pick?

edited 14th Jun '11 11:52:38 AM by RedViking

That sums it up pretty well, although solution 4 technically has nothing to do with this trope - I'm just waiting until we resolve this before moving on to Action Hero.

edited 13th Jun '11 8:44:48 PM by nrjxll

You're right that it doesn't directly involve this trope, but it does help perpetuate the confusion over what this trope is supposed to be. A clarification may be in order if nothing else but to curb the misuse of this trope.

I don't see the lack of clarity. Seems perfectly plain to me. If there are examples that don't fit, just cut them.

Action Girl found in: 5458 articles, excluding discussions.

This title has brought 4,571 people to the wiki

Please use the usage button at the top of the thread.

Please state your definition of what an Action Girl is and isn't. It's not perfectly clear to anyone else in this thread.

We've used the usage button, but given how much of a mess this trope is, the wick/inbound count alone doesn't save it. As noted, one of the issues raised in the thread is "2.) There is Trope Decay since it is misused as either "Any female character who does anything ever" or from the resulting confusion as mentioned above." - if it's decayed that badly, then it's not surprise it has so many wicks, but most of them are probably wrong. Given how hard it seems to be to figure out what this is, a wick check won't do any good, since there is no One True Definition to compare the wicks to.

Edit: Didn't see the other post.

edited 13th Jun '11 9:48:16 PM by nrjxll

I saw plenty of people in the thread who weren't having any problem with the definition. It is a supertrope, wide by definition.

If an example doesn't fit, it needs to be fixed. This may mean just cutting it or it could mean moving it to one of the subtropes.

I haven't seen a single definite this is what this trope is post. I've seen a lot of people theorizing what the trope is, what it was supposed to be, what it originally was, et cetera, but I can't find any post (besides yours) saying that they have no problem with the definition. And cutting bad examples is treating the symptoms, not the disease - this trope has several fundamental problems that are causing it to be misused.

Again, what would be your definition for the trope?

None of this is to say I favor cutting it - I think it could wind up being necessary to rewrite the entire thing from scratch. but that can be done with the Sandbox. Cutting outright would make too many redlinks to be worth it.

edited 13th Jun '11 10:12:34 PM by nrjxll

Thanks Red Viking for the summary. It helped me to realise some other points: I don't see how Action Girl could be a Distaff Counterpart to Action Hero - he is from the definition a tolerated kind of Marty Stu. Action Girl has little to none Mary Sue traits. This connection just doesn't work.

I think that Action Girl is usually defined as "A girl that can save herself, can beat the Big Bad herself and isn't just an appendage to the male hero." That is, not Distressed Damsel. I know modern works tend to make the casts more balanced, but that doesn't mean Action Girl is any less relevant: we have Action Hero and Non-Action Guy, so we should have The Chick and Action Girl too. Actually, if Action Girl is a Distaff Counterpart to anything, it's Non-Action Guy - these are both characters that break the stereotyped male/female roles. (And then Action Hero is a Distaff Counterpart to The Chick).

Another problem is that allmighty list of subtropes. I don't think that's a good idea. We could make it a separate Index Of Fighting Women and just mention it on the page (just look at The Hero for what I mean).

Anyway, we can't repair this trope in one big rewrite. I think we should start with this:

• Clean the examples that list any girl that has a single action moment in the whole story (because we all agree these don't fit, even if we don't know the precise definition)
• Remove the mentions of being a Distaff Counterpart with Action Hero.

edited 14th Jun '11 9:23:41 AM by AnnaTheCrow

1) I would prefer to swap "can beat the Big Bad" with "can beat the Mooks on her own (and sometimes clobber the Big Bad too)", since in my experience an Action Girl who is not the heroine/protagonist rarely gets to take down the Big Bad.

2) Are we sure that the term Action Hero is only ever used in the sense described by the article? I mean, the name itself can describe something considerably broader (but not too broad) than the article's writer seems to believe. How about splitting it into "normal Action Hero" and "Hollywood Style Action Hero"?

edited 14th Jun '11 9:20:59 AM by MarqFJA

And another bump.

If the consensus is "good trope that's being misused as any action scene ever," do we just need to do a cleanup? If that's the case, this thread should be locked, or moved to special efforts.

If we retain it at its current (very broad) definition, in my eyes it falls under People Sit On Chairs.

Yes, there are female characters who kick ass on a regular basis. Plenty of them. Modern media are oversaturated with them. Once it was unusual, but not anymore. Does these characters' gender somehow make them "special"? In this day and age, leaving this as a trope in its present formulation just reeks of a double standard.

So either narrow it down, or (my preference) axe it.

1. That's not what People Sit On Chairs means. It doesn't mean "it happens a lot"; it means "it happens without adding anything to the storytelling."
2. Something doesn't have to be unusual to be a trope.
3. Just because a trope or character type is not popular anymore doesn't mean that we axe it. We're trying to catalog tropes, not just "currently popular tropes".

edited 7th Jul '11 6:12:48 AM by Madrugada