Audiences Hate Bad Writing, Not Strong Women

[abigaillmartin]

To sum it up, I agree with everything in this video. Characters need flaws and it’s okay to make them powerful and experienced but they need to earn it.

As a woman myself, I can’t relate to these characters at all and I don’t like this recent trend. It’s just gotten really annoying for me. What I learned from all of this is how not to write your characters in general. Not necessarily just if you’re writing a female character but all different kinds of characters. I think all of us can learn from these things and hopefully (probably not) maybe Disney.

[river121693]

the Last Jedi is top 5 mainline Starwars film and I will fight you for it.

[cherrystark]

Fair and creating "strong" female leads is super trendy right now, so everyone ones to add one. Disney is so desperate to revamp Snow White that they're following in the footsteps of Snow White and the Huntsman.

Though, I wouldn't just blame the men for poor writing choices when it comes to women. You look at any Disney Channel/Nickelodeon/"kid-friendly" show, which theoretically should have female writers, and you see the same traits carried over. But the shows that I have liked have had excellent female characters but heroes and villains were written by men. I don't credit their gender for their skill, I just consider them good writers whose stories were given the resources to shine.

The parts of the film that annoyed me the most was them trying to flesh out Poe as a character and his whole conflict with the purple hair lady wasn't interesting at all. Yet I hear people rarely bring up that Poe is not a good character at all. He's so much worse than Rey.

I haven't seen it, but the only times I hear about Poe is when people are fangirling over him for his looks, not Poe's actual character.

[abigaillmartin]

Why is "self-acceptance" one of the only hurdles female characters have to face?

There’s plenty of things characters can face with. The possibilities are endless in that aspect.

Honestly I have no idea.

[cherrystark]

As a woman myself, I can’t relate to these characters at all and I don’t like this recent trend. It’s just gotten really annoying for me. What I learned from all of this is how not to write your characters in general. Not necessarily just if you’re writing a female character but all different kinds of characters. I think all of us can learn from these things and hopefully (probably not) maybe Disney.

This! haha. I would rather be annoyed at a character because she's arrogant and has an obnoxious, grading personality like Rachel Berry than a character like Captain Marvel (not Shazam) who is all powerful and (insert annoying character trope)

There’s plenty of things characters can face with. The possibilities are endless in that aspect.

Honestly I have no idea.

Right??? Her options are literally SA, romance where she's objectified, self-acceptance, or "fighting the patriarchy. That's it.

[abigaillmartin]

I haven't seen it, but the only times I hear about Poe is when people are fangirling over him for his looks, not Poe's actual character.

Honestly I think that’s all he was in there for and not just Poe but Finn too. Finn had so much potential. At the moment I don’t wanna talk about Star Wars anymore. I just can’t even…

[NickRowler]

The Last Jedi is often used by fanboys to rant about disliking "Female Leads" to the point that it should be a trope within itself. But honestly it is was the only film not directed by Abrams, so it is somewhat more competent. The Force Awakens felt more like a remake than it's own thing. And Rise of Skywalker is just garbage. Bad writing and toxic relationships (which is also incest). Force Awakens does has its flaws but it's better then Rise of Skywalker and so so so much better than Solo.

[aqua03]

Justice for my man Finn. Dude was done so dirty that even my sequel trilogy hating friends wished he did more.

(ALso I find it hilarious that around the time the movie was getting hyped up, I started taking care of a friend's dog named Po as well.)

[river121693]

(post withdrawn by author, will be automatically deleted in 24 hours unless flagged)

[river121693]

same for Rose, that hack JJ and Disney did her so dirty.

Iono, this video kind of rubs me the wrong way. I get some of it's point, but it's just off.

From the few eps I've seen of She Hulk, it's way better female rep than much of the MCU films. Not every powertful character has to "earn" their power. You can just make a show about a strong character having fun and facing struggles unrelated to her power level.

It's also reductive to say that SheHulk, Rey and Capt Marvel all have the same self acceptance goal. They come from different background and achieve that in different ways. Comparing them to characters from Live Die Repeat and Arcane is ridiculous because those characters are simply written to have different goals

Most complaints I've seen about SheHulk and TLJ come from butthurt men. Both of these shows/movies are very well reviewed by critics.

And are we really gonna talk about female characters not "earning power" in a world where Superman, Batman, Sword Art Online, are among the most popular media?

[AmysGames]

I don't entirely agree with the point at the end of the video that "self acceptance" is a bad moral to preach, nor that good characters need to constantly put others before themselves. It is important to be able to accept yourself as you are, and not feel forced to conform to what other people tell you to be... but self acceptance doesn't mean you don't ever have to improve yourself, or that everyone else is an idiot, or that you can't accept help from others. It's all about balance.

Anyway, the dirty secret of writing strong female characters (or characters of any gender): it's really not that different from writing strong male characters. Obviously there will be some things that women tend to experience that men don't, just the same as POCs or any other type of character, but by and large, people are people.

[VibrantFox]

Okay so just the title made me gawk but then I decided to give it a fighting chance and watch/listen but again a few minutes in and I'm wincing again. I'm also not digging his tone but I feel like that's just a thing for commentary videos like this so I'll let that slide but only just barely

I wanna note before continuing that I'd really like to see a female perspective on the subject or just wider commentary from folks from a wider variety of backgrounds coz I feel like I always see way more dude critiquing female characters and some of the flaws that are pointed out are the very same things that guy characters get applauded for time and again (but maybe that's just me idk)

I'll also add that I haven't seen much of any of the titles the guy mentions outside of isolated clips either praising or critiquing their respective piece of media so I'll be speaking as an outsider at best on that front.

Jumping in to the actual video I can say there are instances where bad writing has ruined a character but there's also a hell of a lot of butthurt men who just enjoy whining about strong female characters in their male dominated media and no one can really deny that as fact. Star Wars, LotR, Marvel and DC are mostly and mainly marketed to a male audience so it's expected that the minute a strong woman is added to the mix a certain demographic is gonna pitch a fit (it's probably a science in itself these days)

That said I feel like some of the instances mentioned in the analysis can be fixed with basic logic or an altered perspective. For instance I haven't watched She-Hulk but looking at whats there I immediately thought "maybe the reason the woman has a different level of control versus her male counterpart is a matter of logic vs emotions". Like looking at the clips he's chosen it does give a vibe of bitching about the patriarchy (which lets be honest i'd say it's a little warranted men can and have been a pita and not every guy is introspective enough to note his own flaws or listen to others when they're pointed out) but specifically with regards to level of control we see Bruce react emotionally with the Hulk, his other form being a byproduct of or coming out with strong and generally negative emotions whereas She-Hulk seems to be a logical thing, she can think focus and take on the form or put it away without the added need for emotional cool down like Bruce (or wind up when they've needed him to change [not counting i guess the avenger's "i'm always angry" bit unless that was like a "turning point" for his character {it's been a while i forgot i'm not a marvel/dc girlie])

Swiveling back with Mulan i really thought it would've been a retelling of the same animated film but given all the drama surrounding it i just didn't want to support or acknowledge it in general. Obviously the animated og is a fine example of strong lady: she has logic where brawn doesn't l\ie but still builds up her strength to become a good warrior, something that's equally present in media with male leads so i see no need for beef there but again that's just the og not the new one so i wont speak on that.

Like overall I do think there's something to be said about overall writing quality but I'm gonna raise eyebrows if a person only has a problem with the female lead than any other character in a piece of media coz if that alone is the issue it seems sus. Yes it's possible a person is just really trash at writing female leads and yes it's possible some folks are just really bad writers but when I look at other media I've watched it just seems more like an audience issue than the work itself.

Edit: Another thing that came to mind is the sort of reverse instance where strong guys get turned into weaklings and suddenly there's a lot of hate there so I really wanna put those two discussions side by side and see what's up. Yes it's a lil off the original topic but I feel like it has some relevance to the conversation about strong men vs strong women versus weak men vs weak women. Like there's something there but I can't quite put my finger on what

[NickRowler]

I don't know much about She-Hulk (I have no plans to watch it, not my thing) but I wonder if people's issue with Rey and Capt Marvel is that they are just very emotionally cold characters. I didn't like the Captain Marvel film because of the bad writing and I didn't find Captain Marvel to be a partially likable character. But I also don't like Batman for similar reasons.

I wonder if the reason why some people are more OK with an OP character like Superman is that the stories try so hard to make him a boyscout/himbo type character.

[BoomerZ]

The biggest problem is you can't just write a character like a man and turn it female. I'm sick of 115 lb woman beating the crap out of 235 lb men. That will NEVER happen in real life. There is a reason we have weight classes in combat sports. A 115 man against a 235 man has no chance, what do you think a woman has? Last Jedi was hot garbage. Actually all the sequels were. And it wasn't just because Rey is an awful character, it because the writers had no idea what they were doing. Rian Johnson in the behind the scenes laughed about how annoyed people will be at him. That is not how you make a movie. And "strong" female doesn't mean dude personality in a females body. Captain Marvel was a straight up sociopath. Which would be fine if she wasn't the the hero of a superhero movie. Finally you don't make a woman strong by making the men weak around them. Luke, Indiana Jones, He-man cartoon, Han Solo ,etc were made weak to show off the new strong female. It comes off as cheap and insulting to fans.

[DiegoPalacios]

i think the common mistake is that they either make the "strong female"'s only defining trait to be strong or they make them preachy jerks.

[MK_Wizard]

Yeah, I saw that too. The big problem with modern strong women is that they can't be human. It takes strength to ask for help, to love, to admit you're scared and to accept that sometimes, you're not the person for the job.

I really miss the days when female characters were not these cold emotionless robots who surround themselves with weak men, and were instead these women who truly could stand on their own two feet, but were also kind, fun, had friends and were not ashamed to fall in love with a great person who can be an equal partner.

Heck, Princess Peach from the video games is better written and stronger than these Disney female characters. Princess Peach had moments where she felt genuine compassion for Bowser and even showed him kindness. She was even compassionate and sweet to his son Bowser Jr. because she saw that he wasn't a bad kid, he just really wanted a mother and saw one in her. It takes strength to recognize that someone who has made mistakes and does wrong still has good in them and doesn't kick them when they're down.

[vapidink]

I love well-written characters that aren't just a painfully obvious attempt to pander to people, which is not what Disney usually gives us. They do the same with POC characters, btw. I'm a woman, I love seeing cool female characters, but a lot of the newer movies with a female lead are awful because the writing feels forced. I don't like Captain Marvel and I wanted to like her. She was just very smug in an unlikeable way, but there wasn't a lot of emotional depth given to her compared to some other characters.

A lot of people say Tony Stark was a smug jerk and people liked him, and yes, that's true, but Tony was overconfident and that was his main fault, something he comes to realize as his story progresses. There was still a part of him willing to sacrifice for others and some of his mistakes were made because he wanted to protect people, like him creating Ultron. In the first movie we see him change as a person, he connects with someone under dire circumstances and their loss changes him and his view on the things he's done in his life, and we see him continue to change as a person in the other movies he's in.

Captain Marvel didn't have that. She was self-assured in her power even when she wasn't so in her identity and there was never really anything to really challenge her. She didn't sacrifice anything, was mildly inconvenienced by the antagonists, and the scene in the movie where she's supposed to be at her lowest and then gets back on her feet had very low stakes and ended up feeling overly-dramatic. Carol didn't change except for getting her memoires back. At her core, she's still the same person at the end as she was at the start.

So yeah, bad writing is a plague upon the world and even though there's a lot of people who like to hate on these characters just 'cause they're women, there's some valid criticism out there in the more rational parts of the web.

Editing to add: I just realized Captain Marvel's biggest mistake was probably trusting a man who ended up betraying her and I'm going to cry at how dumb that is.

[kalmia]

The issue with all of those female characters is that their defining traits are their strength and the fact that they aren't "clouded by emotions" like the rest of woman are or some other bs. The writers try too hard to make a "strong" female character to the point where being a "strong female character" is the only defining thing about them. I didn't like Captain Marvel for this exact reason. Why can't female characters be strong and also have feelings? Why can't they be strong and also have interests? You can still have a female character be really cool and beat up bad guys for fun, but they can also like pink and have a boyfriend and be clever and have friends. I hate a lot of these "strong female characters" because they're just stereotypical male characters but with boobs slapped onto them. It's so obvious when writers take a character and just go "Okay, but what if they had long hair and breasts?" and call it a day like that's the most progressive, award worthy thing anyone has ever done. I hate it because they make sure to take away many of the stereotypical female attributes, like being girly and wanting to be in love, as if THOSE are the things keeping women in media from being strong.
It pisses me off. Not only do they just completely detrive the female characters from any "girl-like" attributes, but they just do not feel like real characters in any sense. Instead, the vibe I get from most of them is just a mold of a boring character trope the author thought of with a name and some dialogue. They feel very pandered and not natural at all.

[cherrystark]

I don't entirely agree with the point at the end of the video that "self acceptance" is a bad moral to preach, nor that good characters need to constantly put others before themselves. It is important to be able to accept yourself as you are, and not feel forced to conform to what other people tell you to be... but self acceptance doesn't mean you don't ever have to improve yourself, or that everyone else is an idiot, or that you can't accept help from others. It's all about balance.

I don't think there is anything "wrong" with self-acceptance either, but for me, it ties in more with women having limited "acceptable" storylines and them lacking nuisance. Even stepping away from the examples he used in the video, I watch a lot of crime procedurals, and a large number of the women on the crime-solving team are flat to me. The female character is often portrayed as all brains, beauty, procedure, and no-nonsense (which is fine) but her male counterpart will be funny, sweet, and compassionate. He gets to be human and show emotion in pretty much every episode while she shows angst, annoyance, and IF the episode is about crimes against women - human emotion. Unless she's an Abby Scuito or Penelope Garcia, she doesn't get character development until the actress either fights for it or the actress gets pregnant and fights to not have to hide her pregnancy. (This doesn't happen in every series, but it happens in a lot of them)

Swiveling back with Mulan i really thought it would've been a retelling of the same animated film but given all the drama surrounding it i just didn't want to support or acknowledge it in general. Obviously the animated og is a fine example of strong lady: she has logic where brawn doesn't l\ie but still builds up her strength to become a good warrior, something that's equally present in media with male leads so i see no need for beef there but again that's just the og not the new one so i wont speak on that.

Okay, so a former friend made me watch a lot of Wuxia which is the style they were going for with the live-action Mulan. Her "chi-powers" are totally on brand for the genre but they forgot about that the fact that her "gravity-defying" martial arts ability is standard for the genre. EVERY trained martial artist can do what Mulan can do. So her having to learn control and to struggle to improve her skills would have been WAY more interesting.

Another thing that came to mind is the sort of reverse instance where strong guys get turned into weaklings and suddenly there's a lot of hate there so I really wanna put those two discussions side by side and see what's up. Yes it's a lil off the original topic but I feel like it has some relevance to the conversation about strong men vs strong women versus weak men vs weak women. Like there's something there but I can't quite put my finger on what

I get this. I really do. I think people tend to forget that "strong" has more than one meaning, especially when it comes to characters. They always seem to equate "strong" with physical strength instead of nuanced characters. Especially when I was younger, I tended to gravitate more toward male characters because they tended to be nicer and friendlier. Now, I just want well-developed characters.

[river121693]

yeah I think this is true. She Hulk is definitely fun compare to Rey and Capt Marvel. I'm really not sure why these characters are written to be overly cool and serious.
That said, it's not a gender-specific issue. Superman, Black Panther, Batman, Captain America, James Bond, Dom from FF series etc. often has the same issue and we don't give them as much flack over it. I wonder how much of it is also gender expectation.