She's part of her brother's gang - all the members of which have bounties at least as high as her's on their heads, and whom we are shown are fully ready to basically murder the entire staff of Minnie's Haberdashery in cold blood. Unless you also think that the members of the gang have done nothing to earn their bounties, which the film gives no reason to believe is true, then yes, Daisy's backstory makes her evil. She's at the very least an accomplice of the gang's crimes, which puts her squarely into "evil" even if you go with the very kindest interpretation of her character. The other character being evil/morally gray assholes of varying degrees doesn't make her less evil.
Edited by GKG
I do think it is strange that on the one hand everyone insists upon the enjoyable amorality of the violence in the QT universe and yet also runs this Daisy is evil/psychopath - conservative crime and justice narrative without batting an eyelid - I still think that the whole impetus of punishment is unjustified or at least seems unfairly weighted - parts of the film work very well - but parts do not and the Daisy thread is particularly ill thought through. I would actually suggest that the whole of the "evil" and "Violence" in the post civil war era, and the segueing of guerrilla actions during the war into personalized feuds and vendettas which generates the shooting and retaliation is who these actions should be judged in this context of the general viciousness of that era - not in the simplistic terms of evil and good ... I also think of French philosopher Luce Irigaray's concept of women as being exchange value objects between men - I also read her as being Mary Douglas' Matter out of Place and also as being outside the conervative moral law as represented by Ruth and Warren and then Mannix who joins in to their assumption of god-like morality - as the whole narrative of the film seeks to validate and facilitate John Ruth's claiming of the bounty upon Daisy regardless of whether it was valid and justified ... and honour Ruth's intention at the end
Could you organize your thoughts better ? This is nigh-unreadable.
There being "enjoyable amorality" in the QT universe doesn't mean the characters can't be evil. Other Tarantino movies didn't end up with every single character dying at the end. Yet this one does - at the very least, they got all treated equally in death, and no one got away with their crimes alive !
In your first post, you say: "Warren who is also a criminal and a psychopath". Question: what proof do you have that Warren is both of these things, aside from what other characters and himself say about it ? Yet you readily accept that he is, but don't apply the same reasoning to Daisy. We aren't shown Mannix's or Smither's atrocities either. The film doesn't treat Warren
John Ruth claims that she has a bounty of $10 000 for murder; Daisy doesn't try to defend herself from these accusations, despite the presence of numerous people in the Haberdashery who'd automatically get on her side; she repeatedly shows herself to be racist, mean-spirited, and devoid of empathy, spitting on every single one of John Ruth's attempts at being somewhat nicer to her. She threatens the slaughter of an entire town for her own freedom. Boy, if she's an innocent victim, she certainly doesn't act like one ! And that's not even getting into the fact that she associated herself with a band of ruthless murderers who shot several innocent people to rescue one of their own. Even with the "shooting and retaliation" red herring you're trying to introduce here, this is still the case - the staff at Minnie's Haberdashery were litterally nothing but kind and hospitable towards Jody's band. In what world is killing them anything but a giant leap over the Moral Event Horizon ?
You can admit that circumstances can push people towards doing terrible things while still admitting that these things are horrible and should be punished. There's stealing for survival, and there's multiple first-degree murders. The film doesn't present Warren as being more righteous than anyone else - the film doesn't actually try to be didactic in its morality.
Lastly: you're reading far, far too much into this movie. It's schlock. Really elevated, well-made schlock, but still schlock.
Warren has killed nearly 70 men in cold blood in a prison escape - he admits that - and there is also discussion that he killed many Native Americans -is that a character who acts for the good
then there is the rape story which reveals him to have a low moral compass -
all his crimes are played off as trying to survive in a racist world - but he also is basically a shitful person
Warren, Smithers and Mannix all admit and confirm in conversation the crimes that others accuse them of - Nothing is ever said of whatever Daisy is accused of nor does she admit or talk of any crimes.
The whole tropes wikia is usually accurate, informative and insightful - I have been reading and using this site for years - I don't know why there seems to be so many issues with the Hateful Eight pages more than other pages - particularly people seeming to get boners over describing Daisy as a psychopath and reiterating the same description - when if you look at reviews and even how Jennifer Jason Leigh talks about her with affection and commends her toughness and her ability to be brave in the face of all the violence handed out to her - many people regard her as tough and interesting as a female character - feral and wild but not necessarily evil -
the tropes describing her character do not the full range of how people react to her in the wider community - and therefore the editing and selection is innacurate and unrepresentative
I know this "Daisy is a psychopath" line dominates a number of film fanbase fora - but reviews and op-eds have a wider range of opinions and this trope wikia should try and represent these opinions
and at the bottom line - escaping the hangman would be a major motivation for anything - what is she supposed to do in the moral universe - put her hands up and say "its a fair cop gov"
and as for killing the whole town of red rock - that is all hypothetical - in the film Daisy suffers an unnecessarily cruel and lingering death that is undeserved and this seems to be taken by the writers here as just - whereas there are many reviews that complain about the death
stop writing like this - it's extremely annoying - it makes your opinions nigh-unreadable
Yes, and ? The fact is that Daisy doesn't even try to deny that she did something that actually earned her this bounty. Just like Warren confirms Mannix's claims about him, Daisy confirms that she did do something to earn her bounty by never once pretending that she's a poor, innocent soul. There's also that whole "being part of a gang of murderous outlaws" part that you seem to simply brush aside.
Edit wars happen all the time on the wiki. Here is no different.
Actors will almost always talk about their roles with affection, because that's what they do - they sell you a character, and good performances are often a product of actors enjoying themselves. No one is pretending that Daisy isn't tough or brave or smart - that she is. You know who is also smart and tough in this movie ? Warren, yet that doesn't mean anything about his morality. You also know what Jennifer Jason Leigh has called Daisy ? A "murderess". Just because she doesn't put emphasis on that particular part of her character doesn't mean it's not there. That's what nuance is about: you can give evil characters positive or even admirable traits while still having them be evil. A Complete Monster can be brave and tough and smart, that doesn't change the fact that they're monstrous.
Also, read the litterally first two tropes on this page:
- Anti-Hero: They count as either this or Anti-Villain.
- Black and Gray Morality: Even the most morally upright characters in the lodge (which isn't saying much) are rather dark characters.
No one is saying that any one of the characters is good. There's also a reason Daisy's death is listed under Cruel and Unusual Death, and why she's also got Asshole Victim.
Edited by GKG
stop writing like this - it's extremely annoying - it makes your opinions nigh-unreadable - writing like what ... please explain
moral judgements about Daisy are simplistic and one dimensional - you seem to overlook Warren's agression,. selfishness/selfrightiousness
you may think that Daisy is an Asshole victim and I don't
but many professional writers do not regard her as a monster or a freak
and these points of view are legitimate comment about The Hateful Eight - they are not Draco in Leather Pants
http://www.rogerebert.com/balder-and-dash/hipster-misogyny-the-betrayal-of-the-hateful-eight
http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-hateful-eight-2015
http://www.theverge.com/2015/12/31/10695780/the-hateful-eight-tarantino-criticism
http://www.awardsdaily.com/2015/12/27/the-hateful-eight-tarantino-and-that-misogyny-word/
Sasha Stone writes "For the first time, really, Tarantino has flipped his usual moral balance for no apparent reason other than to watch a woman suffer. There is no previous scene, as in Django, where we see what Daisy has done to make her so hateful, or more to the point: to make us hate her. She may be rotten to the core, as they all are (except Samuel L. Jackson and Walter Goggins who are the film’s clear protagonists, working out the rewrite of our unforgivable past) but we have to take the word of a disreputable bounty hunter to believe it. Daisy is the film’s biggest problem, and the reason The Hateful Eight is his most disappointing film. Tarantino is usually not this sloppy with his character’s elaborate background development, especially when it comes to his female characters."
I've read all of these articles. None of them are legitimate. Do you know why ? Because they all ignore the fact that Daisy is part of her brother's murderous gang of outlaws, that she has a bounty like every single one of them, that she honestly doesn't seem to mind the murder of multiple innocents for her own freedom, that she threatens the slaughter of an entire town for the same goal, and that she's (gleefully) complicit in the vicious murder of O.B, who had litterally nothing to do with the violence she's a victim of in the movie. They're in bad faith. They ignore elements that are spelled loud and clear in the movie. They mistake depicting something for endorsing it. Daisy doesn't get elbowed in the face for simply being a "strong" woman. She gets elbowed in the face because she responds to John Ruth's attempts at being a little softer in his treatment by spitting on them. Over the top ? Yes. Mysoginistic ? Absolutely not.
They seem to believe that Daisy's death is crueller than everyone else's in the movie - do you really think that getting shot in the groin then bleeding out over the next half-hour or so is less cruel than being hanged ?
Also: interviews with Jennifer Jason Leigh don't present an "alternative" view on Daisy. They simply elaborate on her character - note that JJL never once tried to pretend that Daisy's not evil. She calls her a "murderess", for god's sake.
Edited by GKG
Thank you for the reply
it is in fact a pleasure (and I am certainly not being sarcastic but sincere) to discuss this film with someone who has such a strong empathy for the "multiple innocents" of the haberdashery, O.B., or even the potential fate of the fictional town of Red Rock - if those 15 men actually do lie in wait, there will be nothing left of that town when the bodies of brother and sister and the other gang members are found (and who does get the bounty money - which would also technically include the vestigial 5,000.00 still on Warren's head and the 8,000.00 of Warrens 3 snap frozen bounties, out there in the snow - with the 50,000 of Jody assuming the rats did not eat him and the 10-15,000.00 price of the others - there's nearly enough to retire to a Long Island mansion on and marry your daughter into a poverty stricken European title)
The intimacy and moral certainty about the imagined narrative makes me feel as you stand close to QT himself, again that is not "horseshit" and makes discussion further interesting
Whilst you may see none of the articles as legitimate, they are written by film critics and academics, people with training, when they do they overlook the clues and endorsements in the film, what are they trying to do or say
Have you seen this interview with JJL
sure she does call Daisy a "murderer" but she says a lot more ...
“Well, I described her when I first met with Quentin as being quite feral, like an animal,” she tells The Daily Beast. “So all the ‘wild’ and ‘feral’ are on point—and ‘rabid’ is excellent. Let’s add that one right on in there.” But she’s quick to make a caveat: “I also think she’s very, very smart."
"She plays it crazy for a lot of it, but there’s a lot that she’s wanting, too,” Leigh says. “At first she just wants everyone to think she’s this crazy wildcat that will do everything and just has nothing to lose. And she doesn’t have anything to lose!” Then that caveat again: “But ultimately she’s very, very smart.”
“Of course I do,” Leigh says when I ask if, despite all that, she thinks of Daisy as a hero. She goes so far as to call her “beloved.” “Yeah, she’s scary,” Leigh says. “But women really like her. I’ve talked to a lot of women who saw the movie who feel somewhat empowered by her. There’s something about Quentin’s female characters that are so gutsy and fierce and kickass that I think it’s empowering in some way. This no-holds-barred quality to Daisy is a release to women in a certain way.”
I do think the character tropes have not quite captured this manner of discussion of Daisy and its more than Draco in tight trousers
she is not a one dimensional monster but highly complex and intelligent
and as for the gang of outlaws - its just the perspective that one holds - as they say one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist. For Jody, spilling the blood of collateral innocents was a matter of family loyalty, a similar situation would be endorsed if it were a more modern mafia or crime family narrative
Whilst Warren certainly howling in great pain and his death was karmic - there was not the close and detailed focus on the process of his suffering , nor its pornic aestheticisation as there was in the direction and framing of Daisy's death - besides he wasn't really injured he had Mannix as a prosthesis
finally I do think that Daisy shares something of the spunky , kicky quality of Janacek's Cunning Little Vixen - here seen killing all the chickens
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyzPbHkqDxA
with Warren's 5,000 and his 8,000 worth of outlaws and all the Domergue gang, which I think is 97,000 = 50 kb Jody, 10 kb Daisy, Grouch 10, Marco 12kb and Pete 15 - 97 KB , = 110 KB altogether lying up there in the cold
Well, the subject of the conversation was whether or not Daisy was evil. Yes, she does have dimensions and strenghts, and while she's certain very, very evil, she doesn't show enough depravity herself to really hit the Complete Monster spot. She has just as much depth as anyone in this movie - again, I'm not arguing against Daisy being a depthful character, or even arguing against her being intelligent. I do think she's an excellent movie character, and that JJL completely steals the show. But these two things don't stop her from being evil in my book - smart for sure, but she uses these wits for murderous self-interest. Most of the cast have done horrible things, most of them have depth and character and personal (if selfish) reasons for what they've done. She's not special in that regard.
Whatever the people writing these articles you've linked are trying to say, them ignoring entire chunks of the film to accuse it of misoginy is intellectually dishonest. It's okay if one feels squeamish or uncomfortable when Ruth punches Daisy's nose in - I do believe that's the impression QT wanted to leave on viewers. But it has nothing to do with misoginy or bad writing. Maybe the thing Daisy did to get arrested could have been discussed a little more at lenght - but the appearance of her brother's gang kind of answers that question.
Crime dramas - even recent ones - generally don't treat the murder of several innocents for the sake of family as something positive, either. It's the bad guys who are ruthless and callous towards the innocent, not good guys. I'm certain Jody truly loved his sister and that his slaughter of the Haberdashery's staff was genuinely for her sake, but I don't think I need to pull anyone's leg much to say that several cold-blooded murders just for the sake of freeing one person isn't something a decent person does. It's not exactly stealing an apple to keep oneself from starving, as I've said. It's killing several people to free one murderer from justice.
Also: the camera lingers for quite a while on Warren after he gets shot. We do get to see his agonizing pain and the sheer quantity of blood he loses. The sequence after he gets shot lasts what, 30 seconds ? Might not be quite as long as Daisy's death scene, but it's not nothing. Maybe there's even a parallel here, I don't know.
Is Daisy so evil? there is a major plot hole in that we do not see what she was supposed to have done to have been arrested by Ruth
people fling terms like "psychopath" around but she only kills on screen in self defence and her laughing and grinning after taking hits is a form of defiance and a refusal to let the treatment meted out by Ruth and the others be seen to affect her.
her long drawn out death seems underserved and out of proportion, especially in Tarantino's slash horror treatement
Ruth and Warren's consistent dislike of her has no actual narrative grounds other than their own opinion
one of the issues is that I think Tarantino's treatment of her is somewhat warped and he gives no reasons - conversely he indulges Warren who is also a criminal and a psychopath - rape narrative - obsession with killing white people - and allows him to be the conscience and voice of law and moral of the film
actually his treatment of race is I think simplistic and annoying - it seems racist to validate blend characters such as Minnie - who is a bit of an annoying twat - and Gemma and to some extent Warren just because they are African American and then define the Domergue gang as evil mostly because they are white and racist
he is trying to make some simplistic point about racial politics in the US or make us feel the rage he feels ... it just does not come off - and it seems like bad script writing but no one dares point to the lack of wardrobe of the Emperor
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