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Why has Social Justice and Feminism become such Pervasive Topics?

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M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#201: Sep 4th 2018 at 3:03:26 AM

The arguments other posters in this thread have made against genderflipping 007 is that he's too shallow, he's a wish fulfillment male fantasy, he's sexist, etc.

Gaon offered a pretty compelling example of this sort of thing in Skyfall already. If I rewatched all of the Bond movies, I'm pretty sure I could find more examples too. And again, Daniel Craig once described Bond as a "lonely sexist".

Disgusted, but not surprised
CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#202: Sep 4th 2018 at 3:05:59 AM

Wish fulfilment characters have a place in fantasy, IMHO.

But I suppose the ohters are a matter of opinion.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#203: Sep 4th 2018 at 3:07:22 AM

They tend not to be very well written characters since their entire purpose is to be a slate upon which the audience can project themselves. Hence the criticism that 007 is shallow.

Edited by M84 on Sep 4th 2018 at 6:09:53 PM

Disgusted, but not surprised
CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#204: Sep 4th 2018 at 3:13:59 AM

Which I would reject as a charge. He's a Static Character but not shallow in many of his movies.

Dalton is probably the best character Bond, even more than Craig.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#205: Sep 4th 2018 at 3:23:38 AM

Dalton was just the darkest and edgiest Bond. YMMV on whether that was a good thing.

Disgusted, but not surprised
CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#206: Sep 4th 2018 at 3:27:24 AM

That is a weird accusation as Dalton is probably the only James Bond who was objectively good.

The others were more Neutral urging on Lawful Evil.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Sep 4th 2018 at 3:27:15 AM

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#207: Sep 4th 2018 at 3:57:18 AM

Let us not forget that Darker and Edgier and Adaptational Villainy are not the same thing. Dalton Bond was simply played much more angsty and serious than, say, Moore Bond.

Disgusted, but not surprised
CrimsonZephyr Would that it were so simple. from Massachusetts Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
Would that it were so simple.
#208: Sep 4th 2018 at 6:43:19 AM

What? Moore Bond was a straight good guy from The Spy Who Loved Me onwards — his first two movies were bizarre attempts at making gentlemanly Roger Moore Bond into the same kind of abrasive asshole Sean Connery Bond was.

Brosnan Bond killed a ton of mooks, but he had an even more benign personality — wasn't antisocial, brooding, or excessively charming, but as a consequence, he did come off as being like a Blairite bureaucrat. Really, the only really really abrasive and off-putting Bonds were Connery and Craig because they hew closest to the he-man raging misogynist from the books.

Edited by CrimsonZephyr on Sep 4th 2018 at 9:43:18 AM

"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."
Hodor2 Since: Jan, 2015
#209: Sep 4th 2018 at 7:15:26 AM

@Crimson Zephyr- Good points. That being said, while I haven't seen any of Moore's movies for a long while, but I do remember reading that he was particularly kill-happy/ a big user of the Bond One-Liner. Of course, he wasn't really played as anti-heroic and as you say, wasn't at all abrasive. Instead, he was gentlemanly and cultured. I also definitely agree with your characterization of Brosnan's Bond, although I would note that the movies had a big emphasis on the idea that he was kind of "outdated", including framing him as being an old-fashioned but charming sexist. Which does make him kind of a jerk, just in a different way than Craig's version.

Been thinking for a while that it would do the Bond franchise a lot of good to go in a Lighter and Softer direction and make Bond a lot nicer and I think also younger. Not quite sure how it would work (especially because in terms of tone, I'm thinking of George Lucas Throwback media like Agent Carter and Wonder Woman), but my basic idea is something closer to The Ipcress File in terms of playing up the idea of Bond as a lower employee in a bureaucracy/office comedy setting- it's just that he's a bureaucrat who goes on cool adventures and sometimes kills people. And while again I'm not quite sure how to work it, I think it's possible to have a Bond who is something of a Chivalrous Pervert with implied and on-screen escapades, but who isn't a sexist jerk.

Speaking of the Chivalrous Pervert trope, it's struck me for a while that it would be clever and unique to play up that aspect of Watson's character (he does allude to "knowing" women on 5 continents), and then as a compliment playing up Holmes' asexuality and rather than having Holmes be a sexist jerk, he (or she) instead would be more Not Good With People but still generally polite.

Edited by Hodor2 on Sep 4th 2018 at 9:18:43 AM

CrimsonZephyr Would that it were so simple. from Massachusetts Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
Would that it were so simple.
#210: Sep 4th 2018 at 7:22:07 AM

There's a fair amount of office life and culture in the books that the movies excise out — Bond, when he's not on an adventure, is basically just a guy at the office — think Mad Men, except Don Draper brutally murdered someone on the weekend. He's on a first-name basis with his colleagues, the other Double-00s, and has his own secretaries who aren't Moneypenny. Book Bond, despite being drenched in Fifties misogyny, racism, and paranoia excessively even for the time, is also given a considerably more down-to-earth profile — like, for example, his Trademark Favorite Food is scrambled eggs, not martinis and caviar; the reason he loves the haute couture is because it's postwar Britain and no one has that shit.

Re: Chivalrous Pervert. It's definitely doable with Bond — honestly, I think that's a characterization that more or less fits Lazenby's, Dalton's, and Brosnan's takes on the character, both then and now. Moore is a mixed bag — his first two films were very antifeminist, and there are sexist flubs scattered throughout films that show him to be, on the whole, respectful in a way that Connery Bond and Craig Bond never are.

Edited by CrimsonZephyr on Sep 4th 2018 at 10:40:05 AM

"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."
vicarious vicarious from NC, USA Since: Feb, 2013
vicarious
#211: Sep 4th 2018 at 8:41:31 AM

Interesting

About gender flipped Sherlock Holmes, my opinion is that it should be okay. I do like the original character as is and I don’t think anyone here is saying that portrayal is invalid and that it has to be a woman or something else.

Basically there should be room for everyone

megaeliz Since: Mar, 2017
#212: Oct 4th 2018 at 7:53:47 PM

Maybe this is more a critique of lazy writing than anything else, but generally, I think that diversity shouldn’t be the only selling point of a character. You still have to give me a reason to care about them, just like any other characters.

A goood example of this is the The Smurffette Principle. The idea of adding a Token Female character to an otherwise male cast popped up in the 80s, as a way to appeal to young female audiences, by creating representation. but the problem was that most of these characters weren’t fleshed out beyond “doing Generic Girly Stuff”.

KazuyaProta Shin Megami Tensei IV from A Industrial Farm Since: Jan, 2015 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
Shin Megami Tensei IV
#213: Oct 4th 2018 at 7:56:23 PM

[up] Nobody here is saying otherwise. You have to flesh out your characters if you want them to shine.

The issue is that minorities never get to even be in the background.

Watch me destroying my country
RedSavant Since: Jan, 2001
#214: Oct 4th 2018 at 11:20:07 PM

And people (men) hold those characters to higher standards. They have to "earn" being female, or black, or gay, or whatever, instead of just being a side character who's another white male - who can be as flat and bland as the paper he's written on, and nobody seems to care then. The 'well-written character' demands only begin when the character is anything else.

Edited by RedSavant on Oct 4th 2018 at 2:22:33 PM

It's been fun.
M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#215: Oct 4th 2018 at 11:28:17 PM

Much like in real life. White male mediocrity gets a pass, but minorities have to constantly prove themselves.

Disgusted, but not surprised
Robrecht Your friendly neighbourhood Regent from The Netherlands Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: They can't hide forever. We've got satellites.
Your friendly neighbourhood Regent
#216: Oct 5th 2018 at 3:51:09 AM

It's perhaps useful to note that the term 'diversity' and the phrase 'diversity for the sake of diversity' are, accidentally or intentionally, a smokescreen that serves to occlude what is actually important: Representation.

Angry gets shit done.
KazuyaProta Shin Megami Tensei IV from A Industrial Farm Since: Jan, 2015 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
Shin Megami Tensei IV
#217: Oct 5th 2018 at 4:23:07 AM

Diversity is used as synonimous for representation. There criticism to be done to the word (Diversity when everyone is in the same ethnic group?), but smokescreen? Dunno

Watch me destroying my country
PhysicalStamina ain't nothin' but a party y'all (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Coming soon to theaters
ain't nothin' but a party y'all
#218: Oct 5th 2018 at 5:39:02 AM

"Diversity for the sake of diversity" definitely seems to be a smokescreen for "more non-white people than I as a white person am comfortable with".

Do not spare the feelings of those who would not spare yours.
KazuyaProta Shin Megami Tensei IV from A Industrial Farm Since: Jan, 2015 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
Shin Megami Tensei IV
#219: Oct 5th 2018 at 6:22:11 AM

[up] Oh, that's true. Change white with male honestly, because I've seen Hispanics that say the same.

I mean the word "Diversity" for itself. Not "diversity for the sake of diversity" which is a buzzword for racism most of the time.

Watch me destroying my country
megaeliz Since: Mar, 2017
#220: Oct 5th 2018 at 7:01:00 AM

As I said, It’s more about lazy writing than anything else.

Robrecht Your friendly neighbourhood Regent from The Netherlands Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: They can't hide forever. We've got satellites.
Your friendly neighbourhood Regent
#221: Oct 5th 2018 at 7:33:57 AM

The reason why even the term 'diversity' is a(n often unintentional) smokescreen is that you can easily have diversity without having anything close to representation.

Say, for instance, a science fiction show where all the aliens are played by non-white actors and all white people are playing humans. It has a very diverse cast, but next to no representation of non-whites.

Similarly just about any work where the characters come from a variety of ethnic, economic, national, religious and generational backgrounds and span a variety of genders and sexualities... But the writer is a middle-aged, white, American middle class, cishet woman and therefore all characters are written from that perspective. That's a diverse cast of characters, but not a representative cast of characters. (Being a huge fan of Urban Fantasy, I read a LOT of books that are like that.)

Angry gets shit done.
Cris_Meyers reluctant author, willing misanthrope from Chicagoland (Fifth Year at Tropey's) Relationship Status: Showing feelings of an almost human nature
reluctant author, willing misanthrope
#222: Oct 5th 2018 at 11:38:07 AM

[up]Isn't that kind of a catch-22, though? Could a white, cishet author ever really be able to write a, say, black homosexual character from any perspective other than their own?

There's a whole set of experiences that they just don't have, and those experiences are what make up the perspective.

unknowing from somewhere.. Since: Mar, 2014
#223: Oct 5th 2018 at 2:12:35 PM

[up]Part of it, then it become a thing of "we need representation and you beter give us all of it", in part is why we need more diversity behidn the scene, no just because they can represent better that way but because eventually allow a bigger pool of series and good representation for future writer to pick up.

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"
Robrecht Your friendly neighbourhood Regent from The Netherlands Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: They can't hide forever. We've got satellites.
Your friendly neighbourhood Regent
#224: Oct 5th 2018 at 2:42:31 PM

[up][up] I can actually answer this, because I have the likes the Ilona Andrews and Diana Rowland to refer to.

Both of them (Well... All three of them, because Ilona Andrews is actually husband-and-wife writing team Ilona and Andrew Gordon) are white, middle class (etc.) and the way they make sure they can include other perspectives than their own is simply by talking to people from those different backgrounds about their experiences.

And a lot of Urban Fantasy writers (or writers in general, but the rest of this is somewhat specific to UF) just simply don't do that. They'll include a character whose description includes something like 'dark chocolate skin' or 'a complexion like freshly baked clay' (actual quote, also terrible symbolism, freshly baked terracotta clay is beige, it doesn't darken into that familiar lovely red until after it's cooled and glazed) or some other sufficiently flowery race flag, so they can say they have a PoC character without actually going through the effort of making that character representative of the experience of someone of that background.

Edit:

Also, and this is fairly important too, sometimes, in some fields, white cishet etc. creators need to recognise that a field is already glutted with works written from their perspective and it doesn't need their personal one added to that pile. That's why broad representation isn't just important internally in works, but also in creators as group.

Edited by Robrecht on Oct 5th 2018 at 11:57:17 AM

Angry gets shit done.
Cris_Meyers reluctant author, willing misanthrope from Chicagoland (Fifth Year at Tropey's) Relationship Status: Showing feelings of an almost human nature
reluctant author, willing misanthrope
#225: Oct 5th 2018 at 3:00:44 PM

Ah, I see. Thus such characters can be representative despite the author not having shared experience to pull from.

That's something my wife and I grapple with, bring a duo of UF writers ourselves.


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