damsel in transition

[kaigou]

[ ETA: to clarify a term I frequently use (but may be unfamiliar to some), "animanga" is a portmanteau of "anime" and "manga", meant as a shorthand for "the Japanese illustrated-story publishing/production industries, including manga (graphic novels), illustrated 'light' novels, four-panel comics, animated television shows, animated miniseries/OVA (Original Animation Videos), and animated theatrical releases". Because there's often a great deal of cross-pollination between the two types (printed vs. moving), I tend to use "animanga" to refer to the entire ball of wax in one easy word. ]

We all know (and likely loathe, at least given the posts I see go past from most of you) the damsel in distress: she does something stupid, gets captured/hurt, has to be saved by the hero, and usually ends up clinging to him. I've been browsing some of the manga that readers have classified (on reader-tagging database sites) as "strong female lead" or "strong female character", and I think we need an intermediary.

Something like, "female character damselfied by the author", or "damsel with fighter tendencies," for a less anti-author spin on it.

The so-called "strong female characters" usually go like this: she's relatively outspoken, strong-willed, and ostensibly very good at whatever she does (even if in some stories we never see her do anything, we're at least told she's good). She's independent, and a common expression or thought among the transistional damsel is that she wants to 'stand on her own two feet'. She'll often explicitly state that she intends to fight [the big bad], alongside the hero, as his team-mate or equal. She doesn't see the hero as her rescuer, but as her mentor or her role model (and sometimes as the person she aspires to equal).

Cases in point: Tokine in Kekkaishi, Sakura, Hinato, hell just about any of the female characters in Naruto, Rukia in Bleach, Lenalee in D.Gray-Man, Marie/Soma in Gundam 00, Hilde in Gundam Wing, Kallen in Code Geass. Yet to be determined if Yura (from Nurarihyon no Mago) will fall into this category, as the fight's not done, so there's still chance for her to fall in line.

These are all combatants, btw; I don't think this transitional category applies to civilians, like Winry (of Fullmetal Alchemist) -- as a non-fighter, her most likely means of expression (in a sense, "her way of fighting") is not going to be head-on battle-mode, so it doesn't seem right to measure her by the same standards.

For each of the cases in point (and plenty others but I'm midway through drawer-building and waiting for glue to dry, so keeping this short) -- the introductory pattern, as combatant, is usually as above. Somewhere mid-battle, however, the damselfied combatant is tripped up. One of three things will happen. Either she doesn't have enough spiritual oomph, eg Tokine, Lenalee, and just about every female character in Bleach. Or she doesn't have the will-power/dedication (or alternately, can't overcome her doubt in herself), eg Kallen, Marie/Soma, and Yura (in her earliest fight-scenes). Or the author simply sets her up against fighters who just happen to out-rank her -- Hilde, and nearly every female in Naruto.

Which ultimately amounts to: she still needs to be rescued, but with a twist: she gets mad at herself for ending up in a place that requires the hero rescue her. You can see the differentiation most clearly in Nurarihyon no Mago, actually: Kana is a true damsel in distress, captured, helpless, and waiting anxiously for someone to come save her, and it doesn't even occur to her that she might've, or could've, done anything on her own behalf. Yura, in contrast, is annoyed at needing to be rescued, and determined to do her best to prevent it from happening again.

So what we get is the apparent warrior-woman, trapped in the position of damsel-in-distress (injured, incapacitated, or just plain outranked and unable to contribute to the overall fight), but also consumed by frustration at her position. She invariably rails helplessly against her, well, helplessness, and we're supposed to see this as a fighting spirit, and ignore that basically she was set up to fail. Again and again these transitional damsels throw themselves against someone far stronger, but digging into that observation means realizing that even these so-called warrior-damsels are always set up as weaker in some way, from the get-go. The story's premise either presumes the female character to be weaker (ie Tokine) or undermines the female character enough to destroy her original potential (Sakura, Lenalee).

We're supposed to see the warrior-damsel's determination to fight "against the odds" as bravery... but I can't help but note that in nearly every bloomin' instance, the fight doesn't cause the warrior-damsel to power-up like it does for her fellow (male) character. It just beats her down, and puts her back into the box of needing to be rescued. The only real difference is that we got teased with the possibility that this time, it wouldn't be so, and we got a lot of words from the heroine about how she wants to fight and/or be acknowledged by the hero and/or be equal to the hero in strength -- but the bottom line is that the message in the actual text is that this will never happen. But that's okay! As long as she wishes it might, that makes her strong female, because at least she's not helplessly accepting her damsel position.

Or maybe it just makes her kinda stupid, for entering battles with fighters who out-rank and out-flank her. Or maybe what makes her stupid is signing up for a story with an author who give plenty of lip service among the fan service, but has no intention of actually following through.

ETA: there's another way some authors will handle the "what do I do with the extra chick in the party" question, which is to justify the sabotage as meaningful sacrifice. (The women in Naruto, and Lenalee, get set up for this repeatedly.) The method is this: by some means, the warrior-damsel does take on (and frequently then proceeds to kick serious ass of) a pretty scary big bad -- but in the course of doing so, is either: pushed past her limits and burnt out (Sakura, Tokine), if she's not injured to the point of comatose (thus rendering her not just injured but pretty much a NPC for the rest of the fight, cf Lenalee).

The storyteller's rationalization, as I see it, is thus: every fight must have both a physical climax and an emotional one. The physical, of course, is obvious; the emotional may differ each time. The latter will show up as "what are you fighting for?" or "is this really important enough reason to fight?" or even "do you really have it in you to kill someone?"

A favorite trope of Japanese animanga is the "I fight to protect those precious to me" (well, actually, this is probably a pretty common fight-justification in stories the world over, now that I think about it). If your character is going into a fight and you want emotional conflict along with physical, the lowest-hanging fruit is definitely the "why would you fight this hard?" The character, naturally, will doubt himself suddenly, but hey, look, there! His female teammate fought and gave it her all -- whether now she's injured and rooting for him, or injured and needing his protection (since the author has now rendered her not just badly hurt but also suddenly stupid in terms of any remaining self-defense skills), or just plain out cold. In short, her sacrifice inspires him while at the same time providing an object lesson in "the reason why he fights so hard" -- to protect girls his friends from going through such pain.

Which I think can have its place in stories, and is certainly a valid point in any action-based bildungsroman, but it gets tiresome when you realize that the sacrifice-and-example is pretty much always played by the action-girl, and frequently it's the only role the action-girl can even play. For all the homoerotic subtext some fans want to see, it's actually not very common to see a male character throw himself head-first against overwhelming odds for the sake of an injured or comatose male team-mate or friend. (The various Gundam series and Naruto are major exceptions, though, which might be why they also subtextually hit a lot of buttons, too, because they capitalize on tropes that are more often male-female in other stories.)

As a footnote to all of the above, one thing I've noticed increasing is the number of mangaka who seem to try and balance "lesser physical power" with "greater ruthlessness". Tokine in Kekkaishi is an absolutely stellar example of this, with absolutely no mercy while her male counterpart is really a softie. Sakura shows major signs of ruthlessness, too, but she's not without some modicum of compassion.

The animanga I recall from the 90s and early aughts, the girl's more likely to be a blowhard about having no sympathy for the enemy, but at the last minute! she can't bring herself to fire! and the hero thus must step in. The updated version is that the girl has no qualms about going for the jugular... if only the author hadn't set up the premise or circumstances to make sure she wouldn't actually have enough muscle/power behind her punch. It's like, well, now she's given the opportunity and guts to shoot -- except the author took all her ammunition away.

All these are just more reasons on the list of why I love Balsa and Gen. Oliva Armstrong so much.

Comments

Here via Metafandom, sorry for commenting so late (I got lost on the road of life...)

[artfreak56.livejournal.com]

OMG! You know about Serei no Moribito. I love Balsa for being so amazingly kick-ass.

And, also, thank you for articulating this trope, and the reason why I so strongly dislike characters of this type. The authors may have *intended* to make a strong female character, but if there's no follow through, then the intension isn't good enough. Bottom line being that she just isn't good enough and you know exactly why. Or, if they are given powers, they're always given 'passive' powers - like healing. And I hate that they're so often mistaken for being strong female characters - everytime someone says that, I want to show them Balsa (or Olivia Armstrong or Riza Hawkeye) and say, 'No. *This* is a strong female character. Not that!'

Sometimes I wonder, though, if Arakawa being a woman writing an effectively shounen manga has something to do with how well she handles her characters. Like, the strong women she has in FMA are at no point summarised by the fact that they are women - she just develops them as characters and people, regardless of gender.

By the way, have you seen/read Blood+ at all? I think Saya from that is a truly strong female lead and, though I haven't finished watching the anime, I know she's going to stay kick-ass seeing as she's the only one who can do what she does. I've seen the movie and read the two 'oneshot' manga prequels that are set before the anime and I really like her as a character.

[kaigou]

I never close comments, so you're welcome whenever. (Hell, look at how long it's taken me to catch up...)

I don't think it's that these transitional damsels are "mistaken" for strong female characters, so much as we accept them as strong for lack of any truly strong characters. Calling them "stronger than usual" female characters, maybe, or "closer to good"... heh.

Although, if I could get rid just of the trope of female characters always being the healers -- I mean, even AtLA played that card -- then that might be enough for me to achieve in this lifetime. (Given the size of the problem, it might be the only thing I'd achieve in this battle, but hey, better than nothing, I suppose.) Seirei no Moribito's Tanda might be one of the few male healers I've seen, though come to think of it, I'm fairly certain the doctors or healer-type characters we see in FMA are predominantly male; Mei and Winly's mother might be the only exceptions. And while I raise eyebrows at the fact that I can't recall a single National Alchemist who's female, so I suspect there are points where even Arakawa had blindspots as to "what women can do", she's still remarkably fair for what she does write.

[lady_ganesh]

I wonder if that's sexism on the part of the state, rather than Arakawa though-- Olivier Armstrong got sent to the middle of nowhere, after all.

[kaigou]

Err, as regards Armstrong's assignment (Briggs), I got the feeling it was more that she was the kind of personality that could get things done, but the top brass wouldn't feel comfortable having her too close by because she's also the kind who'd probably sweep the rug out from under the top brass. She and Mustang were playing similar deep games, after all; she just did it by amassing an entire contingent loyal to her (which she could do, being far out of sight), while Mustang was stuck on a smaller scale since he was right under the noses of the brass.

However, by blindspots as to "what women can do" I meant things like the dearth of female National alchemists -- or, hell, any female alchemists other than Izumi, now that I think of it. Did we see any, anywhere? I can't recall any, nor can I recall seeing any other women in the military ranks (ie at Ishbar) other than Hawkeye. Arakawa did a very good job with named female characters, but not so good a job when it came to filling the supporting staff of red shirts with female faces. That's what I meant by a blindspot on the part of the author.

Here from metafandom

[hanachan01]

The first anime has the character of Lyra, who IIRC is a state alchemist. She only shows up for one episode, but returns later in a different form (not spoiling if you haven't seen it). The big bad is also a female alchemist. There is also another female homunculi besides Lust, if that can count as alchemy.

I think it is really interesting that there are more male alchemists, a position involving more intelligence and studying, where the female soldiers are shown to be better at handling guns and using brute strength.

[kaigou]

Yet again demonstrating that adaptations are more sexist than the originals (even in cases when the originals aren't exactly paragons of feminist thought) -- the FMA-adaptation (first anime) repeatedly casts female -- and sexualized female, at that -- characters as the bad guys. Lyra isn't exactly little miss innocent in her first outing, and her thirst-for-power puts her smack-dab in the path of the oncoming Dante, whose motivation isn't (per the original storyline) to "gain godhood" or even "to gain freedom/self-awareness" but "to win back her man". That's Dante's biggest push, as I recall: she hates the Elric brothers because they're the sons of Her Man, and she hates/loves Her Man, and seems to recall (oh, look, another trope I hate) that if she could only be Young And Beautiful Again Then He'd Love Her. Or some such crap like that. Add in the sudden and inexplicable sexualization of the mother-figure per the final homunculus to appear, and it's just one big ball of sexist stupid, really.

I think the only reason Hawkeye and Izumi come out of it all with minimal bastardization is because the anime-team had enough of their characters as grounding that they couldn't go too far. I think at points they did try -- Izumi tends to fall over coughing blood a helluva lot more in the first anime than in the second -- and Hawkeye gets a lot of "almost showing her stuff (but not actually hitting anything)" in the first, while in the second she definitely takes out a number of the bad guys and doesn't even flinch.

I think it is really interesting that there are more male alchemists, a position involving more intelligence and studying, where the female soldiers are shown to be better at handling guns and using brute strength.

Except that we don't see too many female soldiers, even in the manga storyline. Hawkeye, Armstrong, Hawkeye's friend (who has to put up with sexual harrassment from Gen. Grumman, to boot). I wouldn't say any of them are examples of brute force/strength, except possibly Armstrong (and look what her family is like -- she's hardly an example of 'normal'). Both Hawkeye and her friend are marksmen, which is definitely more a matter of nerves of steel and an ability to remain calm under incredible pressure. It's finesse and technique, more than usual basic soldier skills... and as for intelligence and studying, we really only see the Elrics putting that into practice (other than flashbacks with Mustang). Then again, like Armstrong, the Elrics aren't exactly examples of normal, either. The rest of the alchemists are almost as brute-force approach as regular soldiers -- or maybe it's just that none are developed/given back-story enough to see that there's more.

Either way, the manga storyline is still better than the average shonen story, while the first adaptation could be a textbook case of how sexist anime-producers can make even the most pro-feminist storyline become, if allowed.

Here from Metafandom

[waterfall8484]

Thank you for saying this, it cannot be said enough! Perhaps if enough people are vocal about it, we might get some more real strong women one day... Yeah, right.

I really don't have anything to add, I just wanted to let you know I love your post. :~)

[kaigou]

Perhaps if enough people are vocal about it, we might get some more real strong women one day...

I think it can happen. I look at the reactions to AtLA -- both while it was airing, and then the catastrophe of casting for the movie -- and the loud (and often in large-venue places, not just in little side-blogs on the internet) response of how the movie had down-graded not just PoC but all the female characters, as well. I think sometimes what it takes is someone stepping up and saying, "let's give it a shot, give a character of ___ type a chance to shine, and see what happens." When it goes well -- as did AtLA, and FMA -- I think it can herald a new approach, or at least make other authors/readers think twice about following the same paths. Someone's blazed a new path to follow, and when readers/viewers respond, other authors/creators are bound to try and capitalize on the revelation that "gee, maybe this is something people like [and would pay money for]".

Buffy the Vampire Slayer is an excellent example of that kind of genre-breaking, genre-creating landmark. There are many ways in which BtVS sticks to genre, and some ways it tries to subvert genre, but it definitely broke genre clean through with its lead character... and she was popular. Even massively popular in contrast to what prevailing opinion expected would be popularity level of an action-genre with a female lead -- that is to say, "no one but chicks will watch this." Of all the fandoms I've been in, the BtVS fandom came the closest to being fifty-fifty split between the sexes (and as a result, I was astonished to enter an anime fandom and find that guys constituted maybe one-twentieth of the conversation). I don't have enough fingers and toes to count all the male friends who were total BtVS addicts, and that completely dispells the Hollywood assumption that guys won't watch a movie/show where the lead character is a girl -- let alone a girl who can easily kick any other character's ass, and does so, regularly, and on-screen, at that.

In the decade after BtVS aired, you can see Buffy's influence in plenty of movies and books and television shows. I don't think too many have come close to the right combination to really capture the new genre created by the BtVS genre-breaking, but a helluva lot have tried. Okay, plenty of them go for the superficial ("we'll make her smart-mouthed, and fashion-keen, and pretty, but she'll still need the hero to save her in the end") but it's still a recognition that something in BtVS, and Buffy, got a huge rise out of viewers, and they responded in droves. Naturally others are going to want to capitalize on the phenomenon, and it doesn't actually matter to me that many may have money as the motivation (ie, people will spend a lot more on a strong female character than they do on the three most popular male characters all put together, or whatever business statistic we invent). All I really care about is that the character/s get created and given screen-time, and I'm aware money makes things move -- so if a story appears that reflects my requirements, I will certainly spend money on it, to encourage the money-motivated to keep giving me what I want.

I think AtLA's Katara also has the potential to be considered a genre-breaker, though we'll probably have to wait a few more years to see what else in pop culture appears, to be able to draw a line between AtLA's influence and whatever comes after. (Not to discount Aang, of course; he's a genre-breaker but in terms of race/ethnicity, not gender.) But I do think, given the general reaction to AtLA -- and the massive negative reaction to the movie -- that it's possible Katara may become this decade's version of Buffy, in terms of inspiring many many follow-up attempts to repeat the things that made her strong. It doesn't hurt at all, in my opinion, that Katara also breaks the BtVS-created convention that if you're going to have a strong primary female that she be white and middle-class.

[dejla]

I'd never thought of it that way. Thank you!

[kaigou]

Well, neither had I, until I started trying to figure out why I liked some female characters but kept getting disappointed by them halfway through the stories!

[dejla]

It's a brilliant insight! Now I have something else to consider when writing.

[hsiuism.livejournal.com]

I agree with the core of your post, especially the observation that writers often deliberately set female characters up to fail (using shonen manga criteria for success and failure). But I do have a small quibble with the term "damsel in transition." This type of female character isn't transitioning to anything, to my mind. It's the same-old same-old sexism, done up in a new-millenium package. In general, I prefer female characters from the early/mid-90's, whose creators more often than not followed through on the "strong female character" trope, whether the strength was physical, intellectual, emotional, outright bitchiness, etc.

What I'd like to see more from fans is more acknowledgement of the difference between what characters do and what writers do to them. There needs to be more calling out of authors for writing female characters from a sexist viewpoint, and less blaming female characters for the sexism of their creators.

[kaigou]

This type of female character isn't transitioning to anything, to my mind.

I think there's ambiguity somewhere in my original post that I need to clarify, because you're the third or fourth person who's interpreted it as a transition to, rather than a midpoint between. I don't see it as a chronological or evolutionary thing on a grand/literary scale -- as though previously we had only damsels in distress, and now we're in a transitional phase, and eventually we'll only have strong female characters -- because, as a writer, I think there is also a literary value in damsels. Some people just aren't cut out to be the hero (though I would like to see more, uh... what would the masculine version of the "boy who needs to be rescued" be?).

No, I mean 'transitional damsel' in a very author-specific sense, that the author him/herself is attempting to move away from the genre convention that a hero must have a damsel to rescue, by writing stronger female characters... but is falling short, or makes it only so far and then lapses back into damsel-characterization. It's a failure solely on the part of the author, really, to carry through on the promise of the strong female character, and instead we readers end up with the author's mishmash of a near-hit, and a definite miss. But at the same time, when I look at some writers, I can see that where they began with transitional damsels (in the sense of starting with the premise of strength but then retreating into genre convention in re conventional roles for female characters), some of those same authors, in later stories, have started to try a little harder, put a bit more thought into what exactly you can do with a female character, how it's possible to crack the genre convention and come up with a truly strong female character.

That's one reason I mention both D.Gray-man and Kekkaishi -- because there are marks at the start of each that we'll get a strong female character, but each story over the long haul does falter, and we end up with a transitional damsel. She's strong, but not strong enough; she can fight, but not well enough; she's all sorts of more than just a damsel but still not truly an equal in her own right. But, as those same stories develop, those two particular mangaka have begun showing signs of getting some kind of confidence in the story/writing to regain lost ground, and try developing their main female characters into something stronger.

So I see it as transitional for the author, between the age-old sexism of the genre constraints and something that lets them break free. The danger, though, is in those authors who figure it's enough to stop there, as though this in-between point in their own writing and/or understanding of female characters is paying just enough lip service to viewers/readers who want strong female characters... and the genre conventions of their editors, publishers, and overall audience expectations that firmly declare that strong female characters are nothing but a detriment (if not outright unrealistic or unwanted) in a shonen/boys action story. So they sprinkle the superficial trappings of the strong female over the damsel in distress, and we get this halfway creature that's neither truly a damsel nor truly strong.

That said, if I come across at any point as blaming the (female) characters for the roles they're given to play, it's entirely facetious. I'm fully aware that the only mastermind behind any story, and the only one who carries the blame (or credit), is the author. The characters are just puppets... but that doesn't mean I don't get annoyed at how the potential of any female puppets is so flatly dismissed by many authors.

[ladynogitsune]

So true, and God, do I hate it.

I don't follow most of the series you've listed, but Naruto alone makes me want to strangle something. It's never been a very feminist manga, but it's gotten so much worse in recent chapters. Heck, even the great Fourth couldn't keep his sexist notions to himself.

I don't really agree about Kallen, though -- or maybe I'm just missing something. She can't keep up with Lelouch when it comes to changing things, but that's true for pretty much all the characters. Still, she was absolutely vital for many of his plans and one of the best pilots in the show by far. I also didn't get the impression that her ruthless streak was supposed to come off as an overly bad thing. She certainly was no worse than Lelouch, and as far as I remember, she always had the last word in her arguments with Suzaku.

[kaigou]

Err, I don't mean that the description of the basic personality -- the near-tsundere elements, like ruthlessness -- are necessarily bad in their own right. It's that they're frequently undermined by lack of follow-through on the author's part.

As for Kallen, there are others in the replies who've put it far better than I... and man, I wish I could tag replies to make sub-thread content easier to find. When a post hits as many comments as this one has, cripes. How do people handle it who get five, six, or more pages of replies? I'd go mad. Anyway, hrm, I think it's in a subthread started by Starlady -- look for that on the first page, because she goes into Kallen and the is-she/isn't-she question of whether Kallen qualifies as a strong female or a transitional damsel. I'm of the mind that Kallen is among those closest to moving out of inbetween and into being written as truly strong in her own right, but the series stops just shy of really managing it.

The excessive fan-service for Kallen at the start of S2 really didn't help my reaction, either. It made me feel like the series was making her strong, and then immediately reducing her to nothing more than a sex object, as if to say, she could be have her moment of strong but we all know she's still nothing more than panty flash. That's one instance of the text creating a contextual dismissal of a character that, on paper/script or summary, would otherwise look pretty strong -- if you left out the visual, you'd also be leaving out the way the camera diminishes her to the prurient aspect.

[ladynogitsune]

Gah, and I even looked for subthreads on the matter - seems I really fail, because I did see the comments about Kallen's ruthlessness, but completely missed that there was more. Sorry about that.

Now that I've read that thread, I think I agree, after all. It never really struck me because Code Geass has fanservice everywhere (*looks at Gino pointedly*), but they really went overboard with Kallen. I do believe that she has a great personality and got to shine in the end, but it's also true that the writers did a good job at distracting from that more than once.

It reminds me a little of how they handled... ah, wait, you haven't finished the series yet, right? I'd better save that for another time, then.

[hanachan01]

Here a bit late from metafandom...but I strongly agree! This is one the reasons I love FMA, because the women can be badass without being reduced to damsels (or sex objects, for that matter). I think female manga creators are generally better at this- Ranma 1/2 by Rumiko Takahashi also shows a lot of strong female fighters, and even the civilian characters are cool. The male lead even turns into a female sometimes, and his fighting strength is not diminished. Maybe it is a reflection of the idea of, "writing what I want to read," that is discussed so often but rarely put into use?

I think the reason this happens a lot is because Japan tends to play into men's protective feeling a lot more than other cultures. I'm really into Asian pop music, and I read an article recently discussing the sudden popularity of Korean girl groups with Japanese women. One reason the article pointed out was how Korean girl groups tend to be more sexy and cool (think updated versions of groups like Destiny's Child or Spice Girls), while Japanese girls groups are more cutesy and aimed at men, who want to protect these innocent-seeming girls as if they were their sister or girlfriend (There are J-Idols who break this trend, but I'm not going to get into that now). Obviously shonen is aimed at males, so stirring up their protective sides is an easy way to get them emotionally invested in a story/character.

You should read this if you haven't, it's a very similar argument framed in Western media.

Also, I would suggest the manga Fairy Tale by Hiro Mashima. The character of Erza reminds me a lot of Major General Armstrong, but mixed with a typical shonen hero, and all the female characters are pretty cool. The main female, Lucy, get rescued in the first episode, but after that she gets to fight more, and she's emotionally very strong.

[kaigou]

(hey, you're not late -- I've been so busy I only just yesterday found out it's already October.)

The male lead even turns into a female sometimes, and his fighting strength is not diminished.

But wouldn't this possibly be because he's already 'allowed' to be strong by virtue of being male, underneath/within his female guise. In other words: regardless of his appearance, fundamentally he remains male, so it's suddenly 'okay' to show him as strong. It makes him a kind of non-female woman, beyond a token, because he's a woman but with (viewer-provided) male privilege. To me, that storyline is both subversive... and sometimes really infuriating, because the message could just as easily be taken as: "as a girl, you could be this strong, if you were also secretly a boy -- but since you're just a girl, what you see here is still off-limits."

I've checked out Fairy Tale previously, and couldn't get past the first episode. The mangaka is seriously enamoured of One Piece -- storytelling style, illustration style -- and I loathe One Piece with a passion. It's entirely possible that means I'm missing a strong female character (or several), but I don't think I could take multiple episodes of refried shonen cliches, if I couldn't even make it more than an episode of feeling like it was a whole lot of seen-this-before-enough-thanks.

But then, that's sometimes a problem, too, isn't it? A writer might stick to so many genre conventions that the overall story is boring, but this incredible loyalty to many conventions frees the writer up to try breaking other/smaller conventions... except that this requires finding/keeping an audience willing to put up with all the canned genre conventions just to get to enjoy the few parts that break genre. (Then again, I've put up with some inherently stupid or hackneyed stories just to enjoy protags that are neither Japanese nor Anglo, so I'm familiar with how the process works.)

[kinsugi]

YES! YES, YES, YES! and again, YESSSSSSSSSS!

Oh, you have made me so happy with this analysis. The writers ALWAYS, ALWAYS do this to us. Thank you for a brilliant articulation of the problem.

I am repeatedly frustrated by Bleach: no matter how powerful they are, the women always end up pulling back to give the stage up to a male character... and let's face it, sometimes Bleach is a lot worse than that, but we do have the fast-forward button when that happens. On the plus side, I must admit that all the characters, male and female, have grown significantly over the years, especially Orihime.

Naruto... having come this far, I find I've simply stopped reading it. I can't bring myself to care about all the side trips. I'm hoping that someday, before I die, the story will be brought to a proper close, but I fear cash cows are not allowed to have a graceful end.

Motoko Kusanagi, who dragged a passionate sci-fi fan to anime with a single movie, does what she wants, and ended up (spoiler) saving the everyone's asses in the second movie.

But then we have something like Katekyo Hitman Reborn!, the recent rage on a favorite forum, in which the women literally stay home to cook, shop, clean, and do laundry for the men.

Thank you. I'm glad that this December's annual re-reading of favorite old GW fiction (such as Drums, Monster Trucks, 25 Years) brought me to your newest pseudonym and writings!

[kaigou]

Heh, my shady past always seems to find me, no matter where I hide!

For a really excellent takedown of Bleach in re women, you should look for snarp's posts on women in Bleach. I think there's a sticky post with links at the top of snarp's journal. Those posts were part of what made me start to realize the pattern.

And yeah, absolutely that GitS breaks the pattern of the action-damsel. If I were ever to cosplay again, it'd be real tough to pick between Gen Olivia Armstrong (FMA) and Major Kusanagi. Okay, I can do without the purple bustier-thing, but the full battle gear is manageable.

Sometimes I read branchandroot's rants on KHR and all I can think is, I am damn glad I stayed away from that story. And then what do I do? I start watching Korean dramas, in which it's pretty much 9 out of 10 are damsels and number 10 is an old woman -- it's like you can only be something other than a damsel, or an aspiring damsel, once you're in your nineties... makes me need a hit of FMA to recover, y'know?

[kinsugi]

In the first season of Black Lagoon, I think Revy, the other two female leads, as well as one or two secondary characters and random street prostitutes, all show different models of women's struggle to attain independence. I may write something more detailed about this at some point, since women with whom I've discussed the idea get pretty into it.

I have not yet watched Brotherhood, but it is FIRST on my list for 2010.

I'm not ready to address role-models for women in popular TV and film... Hollywood or Asia... because it would quickly become RANT. When I do write something, I'm more likely to discuss women who kick ass again, though, because that's what I like. I almost wrote a term paper to compare women in Hong Kong wire fu vs Japanese chambara.

Question: Do you want to receive comments on your old fiction?

I've wandered around your site here and you don't seem to have any fic tags. (I do look forward to reading your essays on favorite series like mononoke and mushishi.) So perhaps you don't care to be reminded of the old stuff...?

[kaigou]

(Sorry, been AFK for a bit)

I don't mind comments on older fiction -- I never really close comments on anything, and I try to reply if I have the time and/or braincells. (Not much of either, recently, but hey, these things come and go.)

The fic tags are lacking because I combined two journals into one when I moved over to DW, and the fic/fandom journal had never been tagged. It's on the list to do, along with world domination, which is to say: it probably requires the search function. Errr, sorry?

I almost wrote a term paper to compare women in Hong Kong wire fu vs Japanese chambara.

Now that's a paper I'd like to read.