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PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   29233 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 19, 2024

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You know what was really awful, with terrible plot, weak characters and acting, and tons of boring filler?

Every Jean Claude Van Damme movie.

Do you know what was widely enjoyed by male audiences, with positive reviews, fond memories, and enough cultural cachet to spawn respectful memes and callbacks?

Jean Claude Van Damme movies.

I'm not going to make any claims about this True Detective thing, I didn't watch the show, haven't followed the coverage or reaction, haven't seen the director's interviews. Don't really care about the particulars of this one case much, the dynamic you are describing is definitely a thing that could exist and very well may, for all I know.

But I do want to complicate the narrative beyond 'The people giving this show terrible reviews aren't saying it's bad because it has female leads and don't explicitly believe that's why they dislike it, therefore the director is wrong to say that they are rejecting it because it has female leads.'

No one would say 'I like Jean Claude Van Damme movies because the lead character is a man.' But a lot of similarly brainless beat-em-up action movies have been released with women leads over the years, often with better objective craft and quality overall, and male audiences have generally rejected all of them. It can be true both that male audiences did not reject those movies out of explicit misogyny, and that they would have enjoyed them more if they had starred a cheesy male lead. Those two things don't actually contradict each other.

So there is in fact a nuanced claim the director could be making here, that audiences 'aren't ready' for a female lead in this type of story, or that the story was written in a way that would appeal more to women audiences but the existing audience was mostly male and liked it less, or that having female leads and director led to some necessary changes from the first season that aren't bad but that are noticeably different and therefore upsetting to big fans who were promised a return to form, or etc. etc. etc.

I just want to carve out the fact that there is room for nuanced claims in this discussion, and we don't always have to reduce discussions about things like this down to the barest-bone caricatures of the two 'sides' in the culture war.

  • -20

Do you know what was widely enjoyed by male audiences, with positive reviews, fond memories, and enough cultural cachet to spawn respectful memes and callbacks?

Jean Claude Van Damme movies.

Can you give 5 examples, please?

As a huge fan of JCVD I can say that 50% of his movies are trash (but enjoyable trash), 45% are mediocre but entertaining, and 5% are good. I don't think I've ever seen anyone unironically argue that any significant amount of his movies are actually good in the critical sense.

I agree. Also, JCVD was never that successful, certainly not successful on the scale that Marvel/DC are pursuing. Arnie and Stallone were very successful, but usually only in films that hold up well. Terminator 1/2 and Rocky stand out as notably original films that were entertaining for a mass audience and yet offer food for thought, despite all the muscle on screen.

You're pointing to one of the core differences at play here. Paraphrasing liberally:

Critic: JCVD movies are trash

Fan: but enjoyable trash!

vs.

Critic: True Detective is trash

Fan: This is just another example of the sexist misogynist backlash. In fact, it isn't even a genuine grassroots opinion and is part of a concerted effort by a politically-motivated brigade that can't accept reality.

It takes two to tango. Low-brow media (generally) doesn't push back against negative reviews, so any "controversies" die out immediately. Prestige media has both supporters and detractors, so they can feed off of each other in a growing cycle of escalation.

Going off of my memories of the Internet that was, it seems like merely being bad was grounds enough for vindictive mockery back then (e.g. Eye of Aragon, Twilight). Nowadays? You have to be actively stepping on toes or egregiously ripping people off to blow up online.

An example: remember Morbius? That Sony Marvel movie from like 2022 that became a whole meme unto itself? Well, this year saw the release of its spiritual successor, Madame Web, and that movie is unlikely to inspire the same amount of memery outside of a perception of it playing in empty theaters.

Check the critical rankings of the classic JCVD movies. I don't begrudge anyone enjoying a piece of entertainment, but critics are supposed to be more discerning in their evaluations. There was a time when I trusted a critic score more than an audience score. Film and TV criticism now seem like mostly extended marketing efforts than honest takes on the quality of writing, acting, direction. Only technical aspects (sound, cinematography) receive regular scrutiny.

My sense is that critics are less willing to honestly critique the merits of certain shows and films that send the right cultural/political messages, or shows and films written, directed by, or starring women and minorities. Maybe they're afraid of being called out as racist or misogynist, or maybe they're just consciously or unconsciously defending their side against the other side, as they perceive the battlelines to be drawn.

The culture wars is have made everything that I once enjoyed so unbearably dumb.

Perhaps you should watch the show and then revisit this post.

You know what was really awful, with terrible plot, weak characters and acting, and tons of boring filler?

Every Jean Claude Van Damme movie.

Do you know what was widely enjoyed by male audiences, with positive reviews, fond memories, and enough cultural cachet to spawn respectful memes and callbacks?

Jean Claude Van Damme movies.

Also every porn movie with female leads has worse acting, plot and characters and yet is welcomed by male audience. I think this totally disproves the misogyny narrative.

On a more serious note - the van damme movies were good where they mattered - the action. Nobody watched them for the plot. Also it's not like men shunned Cynthia Rothrock or the likes.

Universal Soldier (1992) was a masterpiece of cinema and the fact it has a 34% RottenTomatoes score is a blight on our culture.

Nobody watched them for the plot.

This is the big issue. From what I did watch, Night Country is not a True Detective series. Had the True Detective name never been attached the critics could sing its praises in peace. They could glorify the importance of its message in a thousand reviews that no one would read. Then, the Prestige TV-cels could have then watched an episode, laughed at it, and never thought about it again.

The studio's decision to attach the True Detective brand cashes in a little HBO credibility with some part of their audience, but apparently the viewership was good? I guess there's a market for bad TV on HBO. It is a shame they pulled a bait-and-switch on a fanbase that I assume really really really wants another good season of True Detective, but alas. It ain't happening. I quickly bailed on the series and have no inclination to watch it.

It depends what you mean, Season 4 was I think (and the audience scores seem to agree) better than season 2. Was season 2 a real True Detective show? What is the requirement (beyond owning the IP) for it to be a True Detective show? I don't think it can be quality, because season 2 was pretty bad.

I think that (setting aside quality) Season 4 is definitely more True Detective than Season 2. In fact I might argue the reason it isn't good it because it is too much True Detective. It takes Season 1 and turns it up to 11. One detective who sleeps around, 1 with weird visions. A strange seemingly posed body/bodies. The spiral, a conspiracy, an ambiguous ending with something unexplained yet some sort of hope for the protagonists, An emphasis on visuals and a crime still being investigated years afterwards. A final confrontation in a maze like cave. The final reveal not really living up to the set up.

I'm not a huge fan, but I do recall it being lambasted for not meeting expectations or anything alike S1. After reading this thread I looked at the TD sub and it sounds like there's a rehabilitation of Season 2 going on.

From what I saw, it has some more similarities to Season 1 than S2. Season 2 may have had more detective work if not the cultish, supernatural vibes? It has been quite awhile since I've seen S2 and I don't think I will watch again. The shootout was the coolest part.

I recently watched Season 3 and it was enjoyable and interesting. After the noise surrounding S2 it makes sense they try to re-align with S1 vibes. It'd be fine if True Detective didn't follow the S1 formula with each season having its own themes, setting, and tone that aren't all that similar to each other. Big A-list names with acting bonafides, interesting/logical/grounded detective work, some well-written twists, and sure some supernatural flair if they want. Setting aside quality, that sounds neat.

Season 2 went to a bigger ensemble, (3 cops 1 mob boss) and yeah had basically none of the supernatural vibes (bar perhaps, Velcoro's dream). I think it is probably the least True Detective season and probably the worst season overall. Though I think it looked worse than it was as it was right after Season 1. I think season 3 got the cop dynamic right but the mystery was weak. 4, tried to go back to 1, which makes sense because most of the criticisms of 2 and 3 were they weren't enough like 1.

Do you know what was widely enjoyed by male audiences, with positive reviews, fond memories, and enough cultural cachet to spawn respectful memes and callbacks?

Jean Claude Van Damme movies

This is a vague statement about things from a quarter-century ago which sounds plausible and yet doesn't provide specific examples and so falls apart when you try to think about anything to back it up, a technique mastered by tumblr's Prokopetz.

(Wait... that's David Prokopetz... are you...?)

There is one Van Damme movie that still has any cultural relevance, and it's Street Fighter, and that is mostly because of a exceptional performance by the late Raul Julia. Nobody cares about Timecop, or Bloodsport, or Double something, or whatever else JCVD was up to in the 90s.

Today's equivalent of Van Damme movies are Jason Statham movies, and those are hardly the cultural juggernauts.

But a lot of similarly brainless beat-em-up action movies have been released with women leads over the years, often with better objective craft and quality overall, and male audiences have generally rejected all of them.

Once again, no examples. Let's try to provide some on our own, then.

2016, Ghostbusters - everything I've seen about this one leads me to believe that it's just not an engaging movie, with the plot strung together from unfunny improv sketches. The same would be true for a male-led movie, the level of contemporary standup and sketch comedy is just abysmal, SNL's material is so bad that being worth even a mild chuckle is a once-or-twice-a-year exception.

2017, Atomic Blonde - I'll give the screenwriters one thing, they understood that for the "female James Bond" to make sense the character needs to be at least bi, or otherwise the dynamic falls apart. Other that that and a nice Blue Monday remix, pretty boring movie. The villain had barely any sensible motivation, and the acclaimed oner action scene was a bit of form over function. Want to see a good oner? Watch the first 10 or so minutes of Climax.

2019, Birds of Prey, or a Fantabulous etc. etc. - Well this one was at least engaging. It was, however, absolutely murdered by marketing (title change), and was a followup to a flop, so it was dead on arrival. Again, the villain was a bit of a strawman, but at least there was scenery to chew. If you want female-led movies, I saw Underwater on the same day as this one and I liked it much better.

2019, Captain Marvel - this this the one that's usually talked about, isn't it? And it even made pretty enough money, I think? At that point, the MCU has been running for almost 11years, so people got tired of yet another origin story, an the main character is a flying brick whose only solution to a problem is "moar hand lazers", so the action scenes were so-so. Plus there was a weird undercurrent of... revanchism and spite in the marketing and interviews, so that would be a turnoff for the people who were on the fence (that last point is also true to a lesser degree for Ghostbusters and BoP, and to a greater degree for Battlefield V, a non-movie exmaple).

Black Widow, The Marvels - sorry, we're past the endgame, audiences are tired, everythings flopping now, Ant-Man flopped too.

Charlie's Angels - this one is was just straight up bad.

But all that enumeration in unnecessary in the face of the more important point - if I want to see a female-led and female-centric movie, I can just go see Portrait de la jeune fille en feu (shame that one of the lead actresses has quit acting since), I don't owe it to anyone to watch mediocre derivative capeshit. I don't watch Jason Statham movies either.

As far as I can tell, Captain Marvel only made money because it was sandwiched in between the Infinity War movies. People were hungry for Marvel at that point, the last film ended on a cliffhanger and the excitement was palpable. This was clearly the high point of Marvel's energy in pop culture.

I'm of the opinion that they knew Captain Marvel wasn't going to be very good and sandwiched it where they did to boost the numbers.

Ana de Armas was very well liked in Bond - the rest of the movie was an actual disappointment including Bond himself. Charlize Theron was awesome in Fury Road. Mackenzie Davis and Gabriel Luna were great in Dark Fate. Their scenes shine in comparison to Arnold and Linda who drag down the whole movie to mediocrity. Imagine how much better it would have been without them at all (at least Arnold).

The female equivalent of Jon Bernthal is uncommon to begin with and even more so for someone attractive enough to be a lead. Brie Larson doesn’t come close to convincing at portraying violence. Wonder Woman was successful in spite of Gal Gadot looking out of place in most of the action scenes (the last act being the worst by far).

Fights more often come across as cross fit than people trying to hurt each other and fearing for their lives in turn.

There is one Van Damme movie that still has any cultural relevance, and it's Street Fighter, and that is mostly because of a exceptional performance by the late Raul Julia. Nobody cares about Timecop, or Bloodsport, or Double something, or whatever else JCVD was up to in the 90s.

You have it exactly backwards. Nobody cares about Street Fighter, because it's a bad movie all around. Bloodsport, on the other hand, is a genuine 80s action movie, and while it doesn't reach the heights of Predator, it's still easily his best movie and the one I would watch if I decided to get some JCVD in my life.

Kickboxer is also good, albeit pretty much the same movie.

It would be easier to prove your case by showing hard-boiled or action female-led movies that performed well or are loved. Off the top of my head: Alien, Aliens, Silence of the Lambs, Fargo, Gone Girl, Murder She Said.

I thought Salt was a really good action movie with a female lead. I remember seeing talk of a sequel but it never went anywhere.

I’m not sure how well the movie did in the box office.

I tried to limit myself to the last decade, because that's when the complaining and metacomplaining really started.

The Tomb Raider series weren't cinematic masterpieces, but they did quite well with male audiences. Hunger Games also. Terminator 2. Kill Bill 1&2. Various versions of La Femme Nikita. There's really no need to scrape the bottom of the barrel. Add TV series and there's Alias and Buffy right off the top of my head,

But a lot of similarly brainless beat-em-up action movies have been released with women leads over the years, often with better objective craft and quality overall, and male audiences have generally rejected all of them.

Take a list like this (or maybe one with a bit less recency bias).

Do you think those are intellectual action movies, so they don't count as brainless beat-em-up? Are they miscategorized in some way and don't actually have women leads? Do they have worse craft and quality? Are these too few counterexamples to count as "all", or else have they been been rejected (counter to my perceptions)?

As a sidenote, I've only heard of a few of JCVD's works, and none of them because of his name. Beloved action movies starring women popped into my head immediately. I'll be the first to admit I'm not a cinemaphile, but my experiences are completely opposite of the examples you've laid out in your comment.

But a lot of similarly brainless beat-em-up action movies have been released with women leads over the years, often with better objective craft and quality overall, and male audiences have generally rejected all of them.

Such as? Which films are you thinking of?

But a lot of similarly brainless beat-em-up action movies have been released with women leads over the years, often with better objective craft and quality overall,

...yeah they're called Terminator, Aliens, Kill Bill, and Hunger Games, and they range from box-office hit to beloved classic.

I just want to carve out the fact that there is room for nuanced claims in this discussion

Please proactively provide evidence in proportion to how partisan and inflammatory your claim might be. Is an attempt to carve room for nuanced discussion one where arguments and examples that have been brought up countless times are deliberately ignored in favor of implying someone acts out of unconscious bias? Why have you only considered bias going one way, and ignoring the possibility it is the female directors, leads, etc who are biased?

Given the above, I'm afraid I must reject your unsubstantiated claim that you're aiming for nuance, unless you back it up with evidence.

You know what didn't generally get top reviews from critics?

Jean Claude Van Damme movies.

You know what no one got called sexist or misogynistic for disliking?

Jean Claude Van Damme movies.

I just want to carve out the fact that there is room for nuanced claims in this discussion

Smoke and mirrors are not "nuance".

But a lot of similarly brainless beat-em-up action movies have been released with women leads over the years, often with better objective craft and quality overall, and male audiences have generally rejected all of them.

Like what?

There are a lot of misses, but I'd guess that most of them are due to a dynamic where the producers start out with the goal of making an action movie that women will be interested in watching. They then start my casting a lead woman and usually other supporting women, but also change it in other ways such as making these women hypercompetent, degrading the other male characters, or focusing on themes and topics that would be of particular interest to women specifically. It's not really a surprise when men turn out to be less interested in these movies that are after all not for them.

But a lot of similarly brainless beat-em-up action movies have been released with women leads over the years, often with better objective craft and quality overall, and male audiences have generally rejected all of them.

The very obvious explanation is that neither men nor most women actually enjoy watching a woman act like a man. An action movie featuring a thin woman punching, shooting, or otherwise overpowering men is not only wildly unrealistic, but also just aesthetically revolting on a primal level. Women are not actually strong, hypercompetent, ruthless badasses. The number of women who have ever lived who could truthfully be described in this way could probably all fit inside an average-sized parking lot. The number of women who have been successful police detectives is probably a bit larger - maybe it’d take two parking lots to fit all of them - but the fact remains that this is also a heavily male profession, generally utilizing classically masculine virtues.

Now, it’s unclear if you’re identifying this phenomenon as “explicit misogyny”. The director could be fully correct that audiences reacted poorly to this show on account of its female leads, but also totally wrong that this is “sexist” or “misogynistic”. Men and women are different. The overwhelming majority of both men and women are aware of this. They strongly prefer media which accurately depicts men as men and women as women, and in which men and women embody the virtues typical of their respective sexes. I wouldn’t want to watch a film about a male nurse or caregiver; the only three films I can think of off the top of my head which feature males employed in those professions are Meet The Parents (including its sequels), Mr. Mom, and The Pacifier - all of which are comedies which treat this situation as inherently and hilarious incongruous and weird.

Whether we’re talking about action movies or romcoms - the two most broadly popular film genres of our age - the overwhelming default is men acting like men and women acting like women. To the extent that True Detective challenges this dynamic by treating two women as hypercompetent, dogged, logically-minded badasses, it’s doomed to fail. I haven’t seen any episodes of any season of the show, so I can’t comment on whether or not that’s the case, but if it is then perhaps instead of blaming misogyny the director and the writers should blame themselves for making media that people didn’t ask for and didn’t want to watch.

The very obvious explanation is that neither men nor most women actually enjoy watching a woman act like a man.

Anime and other interactive media has quite a bit of this going on already; perhaps you just need to watch more of it. Popular examples include Gunsmith Cats (both the MCs do this), Gunslinger Girl, Ghost in the Shell, Upotte, Re:Zero, Made in Abyss (more 'girl acts like a boy', but she definitely gets beat to shit), Ranma 1/2 (and all the gender-bending anime that would follow in its footsteps; bonus points for female author), Genshin Impact, Fire Emblem, Final Fantasy, the Persona series, Fate/Stay Night (and the Nasuverse in general), You're Under Arrest!, Hunter x Hunter, Trigun, Nier: Automata, Bayonetta, Half-Life 2, and every other shooter video game or RPG that allows you to pick a female player character (the usual answer is "actually, I'd prefer to stare at a girl's ass in third person", but come on). Western examples include Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Alien, The Matrix, Kill Bill, Terminator/2, and the X-Files. For rarer 2010s examples, all the movies in the Kingsmen series have female antagonists; Edge of Tomorrow had an action girl right out of the '80s but that's an adaptation of an earlier manga so maybe it doesn't count. Also the most popular Vtuber in the world is a woman who acts like a man. This isn't an exhaustive list.

Of course, I'd actually say that in a good number of these cases the women aren't actually acting like men, but then that generates the "what's 'acting like a woman' mean?" question (in the same way as "what's 'acting white'?"). Gynosupremacists (and black supremacists) are by definition going to answer that question as selfishly as possible- and in so doing miss the truth that nobody has a monopoly on acting constructively (in fiction or in real life), most constructive (and destructive) actions don't have a gender, and all successful writers understand this. Now, it might be the case that the more flashy constructive/destructive actions do tend to go to characters on the right end of the population distribution- which is why they tend to be white and male- but the choice to just not do that is always there (the problem comes from progressives wanting it for free, hence the desire to colonize previous works rather than creating something out of whole cloth- this is the root of corruption).

The best example of "wants it for free" I think I've ever seen is the opening to Terminator 6; where it's literally "fuck you, we're killing off the whole reason for the plot in the first place; this series is now about (if memory serves correctly) some random interracial lesbian couple".

To the extent that True Detective challenges this dynamic by treating two women as Mary Sues who just have victory outright handed to them, it's doomed to fail.

Beauty cannot come from corruption. The reason all the competent female characters come from the '80s and '90s is because feminism and gynosupremacism weren't quite yet the same thing for the average writer (or investor); that's no longer true, so all they can possibly write are Mary Sues. Places that don't have a culture of open gender warfare are less likely to suffer from this, though Japanese media also tends to have weird out-of-character things like "lost a fight, time to go back to the kitchen" (Sloot's DBZ example) so you have to contend with that instead.

Anime and other interactive media

Anime isn't interactive media, unless you're referring to anime-style video games.

Also the most popular Vtuber in the world is a woman who acts like a man.

Hold on, which one? This needs some qualifications, because I can immediately think of several who are #1 for certain metrics/categories, and I wouldn't call Ironmouse or Gura very man-like in mannerisms.

EDIT: And yes, the difference between strong female protags then and now is that, before, there was genuine challenge for the likes of Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor. They didn't suffer from the boring inevitable invincibility we accuse shonen protags of having, they had to face genuine life-or-death struggle.

that's no longer true, so all they can possibly write are Mary Sues.

But in the show that kicked this discussion off (True Detective) this isn't true. Navarro is a schizophrenic with anger issues whose mistakes allow her sister to commit suicide and then provokes fights in order to have herself punished and beaten for her failure and is unable to have mature emotional relationships. Danvers is a bitter, emotionally repressed, failure of a wife and mother, tormented by the death of her husband and son, who treats everyone terribly and drinks and has meaningless sex a lot.

They make obvious mistakes, mess up a lot (missing huge clues that are right in front of them) and are pretty clearly flawed in a lot of ways. They are both unlikable characters. And this appears to have been intentional as Jodie Foster describes her character as a horrible Alaskan Karen. Most of the criticism above is not that they were Mary Sues but that they were portraying mostly masculine character traits. Most of the traits we see for them would be entirely normal to see on a hard boiled male noir detective.

The arc they both go through interestingly is to be more open to feminine traits (being more emotionally present and open (and physically present for her kid in Danver's case), and to let go of the rigid hierarchal structure of the law, to see the predominantly female scut work in the town as worthy of respect. It's certainly a feminist message in that respect, but you could have swapped in two male detectives as the leads who would learn the same message without having to change anything pretty much.

For a spoiler we meet a weak female character early on who is missing fingers, they find a palm print on the murder victims clothes which matches those missing fingers, yet dismiss the suspect due to her status. It turns out she was indeed part of the group that murdered the victims. The group of female cleaners has access to the various pieces of information they needed to solve the crime they were avenging because they were able to wander around the police station, lab facility and everywhere else in town as no-one gave them a second thought including our two female lead cops.

I think there's a fair bit of context that's needed to make a decent female action character. It's easier to suspend disbelief when it's already been suspended for fantasy settings.

A female superpowered character is just as realistic as a male Hulk. In animated media, the downside of unrealistic representation (drawings) is balanced by the ease of implementing fantasy settings. An anime will never look as realistic as a live-action show, so writers may as well make full use of fantasy settings.

On the other hand, live-action shows can very easily make us believe in the reality of their settings. Real actors make us believe that we have real people on the screen, and their work (can) add a depth of visceral emotion that cannot be replicated by animated drawings.

Here the issue is also with the actors and actresses. While it is very easy to animate a badass superheroine/magical girl/ruthless adventurer etc, getting Brie Larson to look menacing/intimidating is not an easy feat. Even if the character is supposed to be fantastically superpowered, the behavior of the actress (and supporting cast) does not meet expectations. Weak punches that don't connect getting turned into devastating conflagrations by CGI does not satisfy the way a painstakingly choreographed movie like John Wick would.

Male actors themselves go through a whole transformation to embody an 'action hero'. Sadly, most of the cape movies actors are on steroids. Keanu Reeves who does not look like a great badass in real life apparently spent a long time practicing with real guns to be 'John Wick'.

What would be needed for satisfying live-action female badass movies would be a crop of actresses who would dedicate themselves to the genre like exists on the male side, and actually work on the craft, instead of feminist fantasies that neither women or men are interested in watching.

So for good live-action female action character:

  • fantasy settings with internal consistency / without some feminist diatribe (in a world where women are somehow super-human strong, patriarchy-related woes are irrelevant)

for realistic settings:

  • female ways of being strong (strength of character, resilience, grit, craftiness)
  • some explanation for that woman even being there - ex she's exceptional, just one strong woman out of a mostly male unit of badasses, and not the main char - she's in a context where humans in general are underpowered so the male/female difference is not as meaningful (Alien)
  • actress able to convince her audience that she can embody the strong character she was casted for
  • supporting cast also reacting in a convincing way to the female character

I think the biggest issue with having women on the set of an action movie is that it breaks the magic, in a way. Mostly because female actresses in general seem to be bad at demonstrating violence, and nobody making these movies seems to have any issue with that.

Gunslinger Girl

I'd argue that the enjoyment of watching Gunslinger Girl wasn't all that much related to how cool the girls looked doing manly things like chasing down and shooting terrorists in city streets. I always thought the action scenes had more of a somber and tragic tone than thrilling (though they often were thrilling). Then again, perhaps being funneled into a thankless, depressing, and dangerous line of work by a society that abandoned you before turning you into a monster might be the most manly thing there is, so I guess this counts.

I couldn't watch Gunslinger Girl. The whole setup with older men mentoring young girls to do weird things, even if in this context it was assassination, seemed too close to grooming for me.

As someone who watched a few episodes of the anime and didn't stick with it, I imagine it pretty much was just grooming without any sexual component to it--was probably the point, even.

It did start as a comiket doujinshi, so the grooming angle was explicit in every sense of the word. Complete with management having the "what did we learn, Palmer" discussion after a lovesick cyborg murder-suicides her handler: "sprinkle some terrorist blood around the scene, destroy the ballistics report, and for god's sake don't do whatever we did again"

Also the most popular Vtuber in the world is a woman who acts like a man.

Which one is that again?

Gura, the shark girl. Male-coded interests, male-coded avatar, male-coded lack of disgust/manners/candor, male-coded memes (some of them are harder to catch, but c'mon, titling your video referencing "pee is stored in the balls"?)

It's not necessarily a 1:1 example because, well, tomboy... but there's something qualitatively different between her and the other girl streamers in that the whole "men and women are different" thing is minimized [even if it is an act, or specifically engineered to do that, you can't tell]. It's the "girl you used to be friends with a long time ago at the age before men and women naturally drift into their own spheres of influence" thing- and while all of the streamers do this to some extent, she just happens to do it better.

Yeah, I dunno, I feel like Mori is the more man/tomboy/ladette-ish of HoloMyth, Gura just comes off as "wacky girl" to me.

Boy-coded, maybe.

women are not actually strong, hypercompetent, ruthless badasses.

Indeed. If anything, the opposite.

Men, on average, are much physically stronger than women. Aside from physical characteristics, the concept of "badassery" usually entails some combination of stoicism, risk-taking, hyperagency, self-accepted disposability/expendability—traits that are very much more present in men than in women.

Thus, it's far easier to suspend disbelief for a male "badass" than a female "badass", just as it is easier to suspend disbelief for men dunking in pick-up basketball games than women dunking.

Counterpoint: God created man (and woman), but Sam colt made them equal. There’s nothing inherently revolting about a woman with a gun. In fact, I’d say there are lot of ways to make female violence appealing to men, especially if skin-tight costumes are involved.

The catch is that making the violence great is still only going to pull in men. Might even push women away, whether or not the lead provides Representation. It’s not hard to believe that female audiences are generally looking for something else in their films.

Now, a more nuanced claim might say that empowering women is incompatible with the post-Bourne zeitgeist of gritty, jump cut fisticuffs. Maybe the 80s fetish for martial arts provided suspension of disbelief. Maybe men lost all plausible deniability for wanting Trinity to step on them.

I’ve gotten the impression that the generic modern fight scene is just a lot cheaper and easier to produce. You don’t need Jackie Chan on retainer. Movies which do invest heavily in stunts and choreography, ones like Fury Road, still come out looking pretty good.

To the extent that True Detective challenges this dynamic by treating two women as hypercompetent, dogged, logically-minded badasses, it’s doomed to fail. I haven’t seen any episodes of any season of the show, so I can’t comment on whether or not that’s the case,

They certainly weren't hyper-logical and hyper competent. Dogged, probably, yes. I think there is also the fact, that of the female police officers I know, they do seem to act more masculine, presumably because they are in an overwhelmingly masculine space. If you are going to portray female cops I think you should show them as more masculine acting than the average woman, because they probably would be in real life. Female cops are likely to be more aggressive, because those who are not, are not likely to want to be cops at all.

Great action movies with female leads are films like Alien where the lead is not beating the xenomorph senseless through pure baddassery like later Rambo films, she's mostly running, but also the only character who takes the threat seriously, and during the big fight she's using heavy equipment she's shown as having relevant skills to use.

Women are not actually strong, hypercompetent, ruthless badasses.

Neither are most men, even most action movie protagonists. Most of them are heroes, and being a hero means having a flaw you are blind to, having a cathartic moment and fixing yourself. Steven Seagal and JCVD are famous for portraying hypercompetent protagonists and their movies aren't really taken seriously by anyone.

Among the newer action movie protagonists I can only name John Wick as the strong, hypercompetent, ruthless badass. And his character arc in the first movie (and the sequels are trash) is not heroic at all. He's neither stronger nor wiser in the end.

I can only name John Wick as the strong, hypercompetent, ruthless badass. And his character arc in the first movie (and the sequels are trash) is not heroic at all. He's neither stronger nor wiser in the end.

I simply cannot agree with this. Revenge is heroic, very heroic.

What he gets at the end is not strength nor wisdom, it's satisfaction. He accomplished what he set his mind to do, he finished the task he undertook, a task he set for himself not because he wanted to, but because he had to, because he was forced.

Revenge is one of the most heroic motivations, and Wick is a hero. It's also one of the few motivations that can be equally shared by men and women, as some of the most famous revenge movies star women as the ones taking revenge (Kill Bill, Carrie, Gone Girl).

What he gets at the end is not strength nor wisdom, it's satisfaction. He accomplished what he set his mind to do, he finished the task he undertook, a task he set for himself not because he wanted to, but because he had to, because he was forced.

Does he? His victory over Viggo is hollow. Both men who have slighted him are dead, but this won't bring his friend or his only living memento of his wife back. Wick's revenge is just a repressed death wish driven by grief. In the end, he's not satisfied at all, he's empty, bereft of emotions or the will to go on, saved only by the belated realization that there's more to his existence than grief and revenge, that despite the fact that he's lost three companions he might still save another life and form a new bond.

The mafia boss himself, Viggo, has a better character arc. He thinks of himself as the papa bear, his paternal obligations force him to protect his wayward son even from Keanu Reeves. But when push comes to shove, when he's staring at the barrel of a gun, he crumbles and trades his son's life for his own. Emasculated by his weakness, he seeks his own death in a way that mirrors John's, except he's driven by shame.

Most of them are heroes, and being a hero means having a flaw you are blind to, having a cathartic moment and fixing yourself. Steven Seagal and JCVD are famous for portraying hypercompetent protagonists and their movies aren't really taken seriously by anyone.

I'm surprised this never occurred to me, but it definitely seems like the last decade or so of Strong Female Action Heroes in films has been as if major Hollywood studios handed Seagal billions of dollars to make his god-fantasy wish-fulfillment vehicles just with more expensive CGI. And then blamed the audience for being bigoted against fat people (or whatever other category you could stick Seagal into) when they complained about boring, unlikable, unrelatable protagonists with no growth.

JCVD is also a funny choice of example in the previous post, since AFAICT, JCVD isn't held in all that high regard today outside of the campy nostalgia. What do people remember him for today, maybe Street Fighter, famous mainly for the franchise and for being a filmmaking disaster, and Bloodsport, the one that was a breakout film for him. There are far better examples of similar action stars from his era who were far more successful, such as (obviously) Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone. And the films these guys were known for - e.g. The Terminator, Rambo, Rocky, Predator, Total Recall - were generally praised for having good scripts. Not fancy or deep or thought-provoking - though maybe on occasion - but having fun plots with charismatic, likeable characters that were easy to root for in stakes that made sense and seemed important and often even went through some journey of growth themselves.

To add on re Jcvd, the most prominent film of his I recall is JVCD, that meta film where he plays a loser version of himself directing his thousand yard stare at his own miserable life as essentially an international joke because of his old action films.

I think Van Damme is also remembered for his leg splits, incidentally. His ability in that regard is almost a meme unto itself.

The number of women who have been successful police detectives is probably a bit larger - maybe it’d take two parking lots to fit all of them - but the fact remains that this is also a heavily male profession, generally utilizing classically masculine virtues.

Given that the new series of True Detective stars Jodie Foster, it's probably worth pointing out that, thirty years ago, she won her second Oscar playing an FBI agent-in-training, in a film which was both acclaimed by critics and awards bodies (still the most recent film to win the Big Five at the Oscars) and a huge commercial smash ($270m against a $19m budget). For added diversity points, at various points in the film Foster's character is assisted by a fellow agent-in-training, a black woman.

This makes the "you only hate season 4 because you can't stand to see strong female detectives" defense even harder to take seriously. No one* had a problem with a thriller revolving around a strong white female detective (and her black female partner) 30 years ago. You'll have a hard time persuading me that the average prestige TV audience member in 2024 is more misogynistic (and racist) than the average Anglophone cinemagoer in 1991. Not saying it's impossible, just saying it's a point that needs to be argued for and can't be taken for granted.

*Except feminists and trans activists.

I watched Silence of the Lambs a while ago, and I remember that Lector expounded that Buffalo Bill wasn't necessarily trans, he just hated his own identity--which, sure, these days, that might be more of a distinction without a difference, but it doesn't seem like the movie is as anti-trans as one might think.

Also, the source novel really labours the point that Buffalo Bill isn't actually trans, to the point that it almost disrupts the immersion. There's a point where one of the characters contacts a gender reassignment clinic looking for information on people who applied for the surgery but were rejected, and the doctor is like "you have to understand: we do not want the general public to think trans people are dangerous. This is already an incredibly marginalised community, making their lives worse in any way is completely unconscionable."

I once argued that, on the film's release, TSotL wasn't transphobic, because during production "trans" was an identity category subject to medical gatekeeping: only people formally diagnosed with gender dysphoria by a qualified mental health professional are "really" trans; Buffalo Bill has not been formally diagnosed with gender dysphoria (and has had his request to medically transition refused on that basis); ergo Buffalo Bill isn't a trans woman. (One could plausibly argue that it was homophobic at the time of release, as Buffalo Bill is stated to be homosexual. My understanding is that Demme took this criticism seriously and made Philadelphia in a conscious effort to atone for it.)

But under the modern self-ID rubric, Buffalo Bill says she's a trans woman, therefore she is, therefore the film retroactively becomes transphobic by depicting a stunning and brave trans woman whose trans identity motivates her to become a vicious serial killer who starves and mutilates her victims.

In other words, TSotL wasn't transphobic until trans activists made it so.

Jodie Foster's character also has a line where she specifically calls out that this behavior is unusual for transvestites, who are normally passive and far from dangerous. I believe the controversy existed at the time, and they slightly altered the script to ward it off.

It's based on the book, where the statement "transsexuals are passive types usually" is made (top half of the page around 164 or 5).

There are a bunch of action movies with female leads that are widely considered good or at the very least have mass appeal. See: Aliens, Fury Road, Kill Bill, Terminator, Hunger Games, Underworld (not actually very good but a box office hit), etc. That expands further when you include movies that don't have female leads actually beating guys up but still taking aggressive, active roles. See: Zero Dark Thirty, Silence of the Lambs, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoos, Sicario, half of all horror movies ever made, etc.

An action movie featuring a thin woman punching, shooting, or otherwise overpowering men is not only wildly unrealistic, but also just aesthetically revolting on a primal level.

Humans have had warrior goddesses for thousands of years. Surely the ancient Canaanites did not find Anat aesthetically revolting.

I guess the Underworld series falls into the "fighting f*cktoy" genre, so it doesn't really count. At least not in the eyes of mainstream feminists.

I mean, sure, but that's not a very nice way to talk about Michael Sheen

And for any characters where it's too hard to apply that label, behold the Female Character Flowchart for some other options. (It's from a post on a 2010 nerd-feminist blog that was linked on Jezebel and made the rounds, it stuck with me because normally you only see such critiques used one at a time.)

And they have to resort to scare quotes ("Strong" female character) to disparage one expected action character path.

Surely the ancient Canaanites did not find Anat aesthetically revolting.

Another possible reading is that it took divinity for a woman to transcend their stereotypes.

See also the ancient Greeks, who typically divided the sexes into separate spheres so strongly that would make a medieval trad blush -- while also worshipping and holding in high esteem goddesses like Artemis, Athena, and Hera, who are often depicted as more competent than the male gods. Certainly less likely to be diverted from their goals by a sexy woman.

There are a bunch of action movies with female leads that are widely considered good or at the very least have mass appeal. See: Aliens, Fury Road, Kill Bill, Terminator, Hunger Games, Underworld (not actually very good but a box office hit), etc. That expands further when you include movies that don't have female leads actually beating guys up but still taking aggressive, active roles. See: Zero Dark Thirty, Silence of the Lambs, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoos, Sicario, half of all horror movies ever made, etc.

That long list of examples feels like it's undermining Darwin's little rant somewhat...

I don’t think he’s supporting guesswho or the directors so much as arguing with the Hoff.

They made like five Underworld movies and five or six Resident Evils, and they didn't churn all those sequels out to lose money. That's ten or eleven reasonably successful female-led shit kicking action films over a period of fifteen years or so of the early 21st century, named off the top of my head with zero effort. I'm sure there are more. The idea that men don't like women in action movies is just a meme that gets trotted out by PR departments when something woke sucks.

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