I Love Badass Girls in Movies, but These Modern Characters Make me Want to Vomit
Modern movie-making has a massive problem, and it’s not the fans. It’s everything else!
I keep hearing about how Disney and the latest flop of their Star Wars project, The Acolyte, is blaming their viewers for comically disastrous ratings and views. Supposedly, we hate women.
I am a huge Star Wars fan, and even I couldn’t force myself to watch more than the first episode of this horrendous disaster, and it’s hardly the thing that comes to mind. Watching people’s reactions to every episode, though, is pure gold!
Do fans really hate strong female characters?
I’m going on a limb and say that this is the saddest excuse I’ve ever heard. Strong, sexy, capable female characters have always been the best sellers in fiction, especially in science fiction and fantasy.
My favorite movie of all time epitomizes that idea—Aliens (Alien 2). Sigourney Weaver was the bomb and carried the movie on her scrawny little shoulders before it was cool.
There are numerous examples, like Linda Hamilton in the Terminator franchise and even Carrie Fisher in the original Star Wars. Hell, people were screaming at Disney for unjustly ( I will die on this hill) firing Gina Carrano from the Mandalorian. And let’s not even go down the rabbit hole of video game characters like Lara Croft from the Tomb Rider franchise or a gazillion anime heroines erupting volcanoes in men’s pants since the eighties.
Sure, men prefer straight women for obvious reasons, and the same can be said for their appearance. Pretty is better than ugly, ddd. Fit is better than fat. Feminine traits are better than male ones on a woman, and so on. It’s just what a straight male prefers (boys, men, he/him for the pronoun obsessed).
There is no point, nor benefit to pretending otherwise or, worse yet, deliberately giving the viewer things he hates (butch, fat, ugly women who don’t like sausages) and expecting him to be happy about it.
Men love women. That’s a fact. Women love women a lot less, but most importantly, they’re not the targeted audience for science fiction and fantasy.
This has always been in the domain of boys and men. Men fantasize of war, exploration, adventure, aliens, conspiracies, monsters, technology, and life on other planets, while women generally prefer more down-to-earth topics like love, relationships, personal struggles, and so forth.
Am I generalizing? Of course, I am. When you want to know your targeted audience, this is your job as well!
There will always be exceptions, and even if 30% of women enjoyed science fiction, they still wouldn’t be your targeted audience, as that number is probably 60% with men. Furthermore, they are much more die-hearted as fans, buy more merch, and stay faithful to a franchise through decades. I’ve never seen women wear Star Wars costumes, play with plastic lightsabers, and pretend they have the force. I’ve seen them in sexy fantasy costumes, giving the nerds their first tenting experience, but that’s hardly the same thing, isn’t it?
In an ideal world, you want both populations to like your product, thus increasing your potential revenue. This classical wisdom of business has somehow escaped film and TV producers.
It’s all about pushing agendas, spreading ideologies and political discourse, and to hell with the actual viewers and fans! Hence, the predictable results. I have always been an avid moviegoer, but I’m just not paying for the horse shit that is being produced lately.
Politics, ideologies, and commercial interests versus stories and relatable characters
Hollywood has always pushed their ideology and politics into their products. It made things barely watchable when it was about American nationalism (for non-Americans, at least), biased, one-sided storylines, botched history, and spreading capitalistic propaganda and consumerism at every step. Hollywood has been shit for a long time.
However, at least those ideals were somewhat relatable to most of their viewers. You know, their customers. The ones who pay to see their shit. Targeted audience. Today, the producers, writers, and executives seem hellbent on alienating and pissing on (not a typo) their customer base at every step!
Listen, I get it. 5% of the population is supposedly gay (in the US and EU). Fine. But that leaves 95% of straight people with a very different set of ideals and morals.
All of those 5% apparently work in the entertainment industry. If you choose to hire only LGBTQ+ whatever people and encourage them to push their agendas and ideology forward as if their lives depend on it, then you should expect that only 5% of all possible viewers are going to enjoy the finished products- at best. It’s simple math and the basics of business! How the hell is this not clear?
If you sell fat-loss products in North Korea, you’re going to go broke.
If you sell porn in Muslim countries, you won’t only go poor, but you’ll end up murdered on the streets.
If you sell dildoes in churches, you might make a lonely nun or housewife happy, but you won’t pay rent with that money.
If you sell baby products or biology books to the LGBTQ+ community, well… you know.
If I were an alien and judged our society by movie and TV entertainment alone, I would come to the only conclusion possible. Everyone’s gay, “they,” or at the very least, will fuck anything with a hole.
But here’s the reality check - that’s not true!
Yes, there are elements in every society that belong to that group, but they are a small minority.
Focusing on minorities doesn’t stop with sexuality. Oh no. They do the same thing with race. Again, the black population in the US is about 14%, and in the EU, it’s about 3%. Asians account for 7% of the total population in the US and 3% in the EU. If you want to sell tickets in China or Japan, well, you’re barking up the wrong tree here as well.
Is this your targeted audience? Fine. However, since you're targeting a niche minority, don’t expect to break viewership records.
Don’t get me wrong—I’m all about love, equality, and inclusion, but never a forced one! While your experience might vary, I was under the impression that we had achieved legal and societal equality, for the most part, for women, gays, and people of different races.
It was a good thing. I loved it! Balance was restored for the first time in history. Their representation in movies represented reality unless it was a niche topic catering to a niche targeted audience.
However, making everything a strong female character, gay, trans, and a race minority, is not only unnecessary and ill-advisable but also insulting and annoying to the rest of the population. It feels extremely forced, artificial, and even intentional.
I get why an angry minority, fueled by resentment of the past, would want to have their revenge once given sufficient power. I do. It’s only natural. But you’ll have to accept responsibility and take the consequences of those actions. You’ll have your laugh, but you’ll go broke!
Nowadays, you can just tell whether something will be good TV or bad TV by looking at the poster.
If you see a perfect rainbow of different races, sexual orientations, and the rest of forced ideologies on the front page, you know that it will most likely be completely unwatchable. Not because you hate those minorities, as those behind the failed projects like to accuse us, but because politics, ideology, and propaganda took priority above character development, relatability, and, most importantly, story!
If you struggle to understand this point, imagine Kim Jon Un, the great communist leader of North Korea, producing a movie about the importance of democracy and the dangers of extreme ideologies in Western societies. You know it’s going to be all about “me, me, me, and communism under me good.”
When an ideology consumes you, you have lost objective reasoning capabilities. You know, such as publicly laughing about how you aim to piss off the die-hard fans of the franchise you bought and about half the general population. It may be fun for a moment, but it’s definitely not smart—bloody idiots.
Why we don’t like these new female heroines?
The following is only my opinion, as I can’t speak for everyone. Having said this, I think it’s pretty universal for everyone with a functioning brain and knowledge of the laws of physics.
Women are not equal to men in fights.
Listen, I’m all for girl power, but I’m also a large, strong male with years of experience in martial arts. I’m sure there exists a woman out there that could kick my ass, especially since I’m not the killing machine I used to be in my early years, but I have more chance of meeting a grey alien in a spandex fucking a goat behind a garbage bin, than to have my ass handed to me by a girl.
Yes, a strong, professional female martial artist could maybe take on an average, drunk bloke with precisely zero ability to fight back, at least until she can escape. Maybe, unless he grabs her or falls asleep on her. If he’s had any training or just experience fighting, she’s more or less dead.
This is reality and physics. Even if you find that one exception, we might call her a superwoman, for she is a myth and a unicorn. Something similar can be said of a hundred-pound flyweight man fighting a heavy-weight bloke. Actually, that’s not a fight - it’s called a suicide, a mauling, or manhandling.
If you’ve never experienced what kind of a difference weight makes in a fight, you have no idea. There is a reason why there are very narrow weight classes in professional martial arts. A twenty-pound difference (10 kg) with similar levels of skills, and the lighter fighter practically doesn’t stand a chance!
If, and only if, there is an enormous skill gap, can the weight factor be made obsolete. A skinny but expertly trained fighter will likely be able to defeat a heavier, unskilled man. Should that heavier men know even the basics of fighting, the wee fucker better have an angel on his shoulder, or else it’s nap time.
You can make a Chihuahua as vicious as you want, but an old, crippled, fat Rottweiler will eat it for breakfast. It may not be fair, but it’s the truth. Physics don’t lie, I’m afraid.
Furthermore, while fighting in the movies has always been unrealistic and more artistic than anything else (flying roundhouse kicks in tight spaces come to mind), these modern “one-hundred-pound wet” heroines are now thrashing about dozens of three-hundred-pound military-trained men in hand to hand combat as if they’re making a sandwich.
Yes, that was on purpose. Just to tickle the easily offended among you. Anyway, it’s such nonsense, it’s not even funny anymore. At least give the girls some claws, sharp teeth, or knives - a fighting chance, I beg of you!
They’re just not likable.
More importantly, while the writers give these strong women superhuman abilities for no good reason whatsoever, they forget to sprinkle them with something essential: likability and relatability. I almost admire their ability to pull that off.
They are mostly bland characters with no soul who never struggle and don’t develop over the course of the story. If anything, they behave more like stoic men than women in every scenario, which is ridiculous and makes no sense.
We may be equal, but we are not the same. Let’s celebrate those differences and work with them, not pretend they don’t exist.
You almost never worry about these characters.
First, you don’t particularly like them, and second, they seem to experience no adversity in their lives and effortlessly glide all the way to the end credits. We go to the movies or watch TV to feel things and get lost in another world. Even if alien and futuristic, that world must be somewhat relatable. If nothing else, in the basic human struggles, pain, love, sorrow, overcoming obstacles, finding courage, and developing grit.
Listen, I’m no legendary writer myself. I may rant about these things on this little platform, but I’m equally aware that I don’t think I could do much better myself. All authors embed a little of themselves in their world. It is inevitable.
Therefore, it’s logical that the stories and characters born under the pens of these modern writers and producers somewhat reflect what they believe. It’s only human.
Expecting an angry old lesbian with a distorted understanding of history, who hates men and fiction with all her heart, is hardly able to hide that. We can’t change who we are. That includes my revolt against modern themes coming from Hollywood. It’s yucky, and I don’t want to watch it anymore.
This begs the question - why do it?
Why alienate the fanbase in order to spread your ideology when this will never turn them to your side but only infuriate them and lose you money in the process?
Why deliberately push your ideas despite knowing full well they will result in smaller viewership, sales, and a diminishing fan base?
Why target the minorities you can’t possibly live off unless you’re doing an indy project just for them?
I could assume it’s some sort of revenge or other hateful reason, as most do. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. It could be an attempt to connect with said minorities, which is fine if you don’t like money. Perhaps they justify their ideological battle to increase the general public's acceptance of those minorities, which I get. Maybe, it’s an experiment in how far you can push before you get your ass handed to you, like a spoiled little brat. Could be.
In reality, if it smells, sounds, and looks like paid propaganda and deliberate pushing of political agendas against all reason, it probably is.
While true intentions will remain a mystery and a matter of debate, one thing is certain - the effect. It’s just not working, people! Folks are refusing to pay for the shit you produce, there is almost violent outrage on the internet, and you’ve become a laughing stock everywhere, outside your little particular corner of “yes-folk.”
It might be time to reflect and make some changes.
While you’re perfectly entitled to project your ideologies and politics in your movies and TV shows, the audience is also well within their rights to tell you to shove it and stop watching. Cause and effect. You can be stubborn and continue on this path, but it will cost you dearly, as it already has.
One flop is a coincidence. Two may be bad timing, but most projects failing miserably is a pattern. A pattern that reveals something is terribly wrong.
I guess now is a good time for me to reflect on my own writing and the reasons why no one reads my stories. Maybe I should just do what Disney and Hollywood do: “Put a black chick in it, give her superpowers, and make her gay!” I’m sure that will solve all my problems Right? Right?