> Her male peers like Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, and Frank Herbert did the same.
This is false, at least for Asimov. The main protagonist of I, robot and in roughly a third of the foundation trilogy (second halves of foundation and empire and of second foundation) were both women (and that's just his most famous works). He had a majority male cast but not overwhelmingly so.
(This was a good article btw! Sorry if just dropping in to throw a correction is a jerk move, I just didn't have much to add aside from that. But Susan Calvin and Bayta Darell are genuinely pretty good classic female scifi protagonists! Well to the degree that they're still Asimov characters and he's always more about plot focus than in depth character building).
This was quite a nice essay, thanks. I completely agree with you on how they eff-ed up Chani's character, and in doing so sort of ruined what was one of a remarkable number of strong female characters in the book. Chani needed to be Paul's follower and his lover and his confidant. She most certainly did not need to be skeptical of his role as prophet-king, nor could she walk away from him unless he demanded it, which of course he did not do. She understood him better than anyone. The film makes her physically strong and emotionally weak. Unlike in the film, the women in the book were fascinating and entirely believable. Herbert understood human nature better than the film makers do. Women are not always wonderful, and when left entirely to their own devices can become cruel, backstabbing, scheming... they can become the bene gesserit. I also love how you singled out Galadriel and Lucy as strong female roles. Neither of them are men, and neither of them are weak. They are kind and strong and good. The idea that one can simply superimpose a female shape on a male character is absurd. And I, too, have great trepidation about what Netflix might do to the greatest woman in history.
With so many women insisting that the movies we watch must feature “strong female leads,” the attendant observation to this insistence is that female characters are simply boring, as evidenced by movie after movie. Is this true? First, it has to be acknowledged that compared to richer periods of creativity, movies in general are boring. More influenced by gaming than literature. What do you expect? That said, as a contradictory example I thought the first season of Elizabeth was a remarkable meditation on wearing the crown, reminiscent of Shakespeare’s Henry plays. So—it’s possible.
Keri Russell as Kate Wyler in “The Diplomat” is excellent. She’s flawed and often out of her element but you can’t help but root for her.
> Her male peers like Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, and Frank Herbert did the same.
This is false, at least for Asimov. The main protagonist of I, robot and in roughly a third of the foundation trilogy (second halves of foundation and empire and of second foundation) were both women (and that's just his most famous works). He had a majority male cast but not overwhelmingly so.
Thank you for the correction!
(This was a good article btw! Sorry if just dropping in to throw a correction is a jerk move, I just didn't have much to add aside from that. But Susan Calvin and Bayta Darell are genuinely pretty good classic female scifi protagonists! Well to the degree that they're still Asimov characters and he's always more about plot focus than in depth character building).
A genuine correction is never a jerk moment. I’m not an Asimov scholar so I’m happy to know that threw the ladies a bone.
Favorite actually strong female character: the president in the Battlestar Galactica remake.
This was quite a nice essay, thanks. I completely agree with you on how they eff-ed up Chani's character, and in doing so sort of ruined what was one of a remarkable number of strong female characters in the book. Chani needed to be Paul's follower and his lover and his confidant. She most certainly did not need to be skeptical of his role as prophet-king, nor could she walk away from him unless he demanded it, which of course he did not do. She understood him better than anyone. The film makes her physically strong and emotionally weak. Unlike in the film, the women in the book were fascinating and entirely believable. Herbert understood human nature better than the film makers do. Women are not always wonderful, and when left entirely to their own devices can become cruel, backstabbing, scheming... they can become the bene gesserit. I also love how you singled out Galadriel and Lucy as strong female roles. Neither of them are men, and neither of them are weak. They are kind and strong and good. The idea that one can simply superimpose a female shape on a male character is absurd. And I, too, have great trepidation about what Netflix might do to the greatest woman in history.
Totally agree! On the male side, what do you think about what they did to Stilgar’s character?
With so many women insisting that the movies we watch must feature “strong female leads,” the attendant observation to this insistence is that female characters are simply boring, as evidenced by movie after movie. Is this true? First, it has to be acknowledged that compared to richer periods of creativity, movies in general are boring. More influenced by gaming than literature. What do you expect? That said, as a contradictory example I thought the first season of Elizabeth was a remarkable meditation on wearing the crown, reminiscent of Shakespeare’s Henry plays. So—it’s possible.