Oh boy do I have a treat for you
cyberpeeps, my good friend, and fellow kickass nerd Ruth (otakubookworm0) is here. She’s about
to lay the smack down on Hollywood because of how they portray female
characters in their movies…this is going to be good! So sit back and relax and
get to reading people, trust me you won’t be disappointed. And when you’re all
done, go show her some love on her Facebook page (facebook.com/ruth.garcia23).
MJM
Hi, y'all.
My name's Ruth and I'm here to talk about things we all hate: Michael Bay movies and what's wrong with the world
today...but wait! It's not what you think.
So my
husband and I went to see Transformers last night. I was super excited to see a
couple with a little girl next to us; the girl looked about 6 or 7 years old. Nothing
warms my heart more than seeing girls get excited about robots and cars and
"boy stuff", so I was giving that couple some mad props (in my mind,
of course, who wants some random weirdo congratulating them on badass parenting
at the theater?).
The movie
fires up, and my brain turns into dormant mush for ~3 hours from the overload
of sexy cars, explosions, slo-mo,"witty banter" and OMG Optimus
Prime, but a few things stuck out to me, even in my passive state.
I loved the
movie. I became a kid again, and gasped and cheered and smiled and got my $12
worth from my slice of Hollywood. BUT!!!
there were a number of things I found downright not okay with this film.
After the
movie was over, I dragged out my soap box and dusted it off, tossed some ideas
around with my husband, and called up the indomitable MJM to see if he'd let me
bend your internet ears for a few (more) paragraphs (I'm not what I'd consider
a feminist, or an alarmist of any kind, so I won't be using subjective words like
"moral corruption" or "outrage", just so you know).
Annnnnd,
without further ado or nonsense, here's my 5 cents. Mild spoilers for Transformers:
Age of Extinction below, if it's possible to spoil a movie such as this.
The
daughter character was absolutely everything wrong with young girl characters.
Yeah so she's wearing short shorts, and whining at her dad, but why is she so
WIMPY? She's been waiting for someone to save her, her whole life? Except when
it comes to choosing a boyfriend her dad will hate, and supporting said
boyfriend in two (only two in a three hour movie!) clinch moments. She takes
damsel in distress straight back to Super Mario's Princess Peach. Except when
she's defying her own survival to argue
with her dad while swinging on a cable
50 stories above ground.
Way to show
our little 7 year old what real girls can be like in a crisis.
There was a
samurai Transformer this time. 'Nuff said. At least Ken Watanabe voiced him. Why
do all the Chinese people mysteriously know martial arts? (My husband brought
this up, and I agree.) Although, the secretary's badassery went a long way
towards making up for the awful and insipid daughter.
Mark
Wahlberg's character repeatedly called the Irish boyfriend "Lucky
Charms". Not funny. Especially
since Markie Mark's character is from Texas, where hey, I guess it's okay to
use casual racial slurs as humor. Par for the course, along with his terrible
parenting skills.
His
character also uses 'bitch' as an insult, a number of times. E.g. "You're
not gonna bitch out on me, are you?" While I get we're trying to prove
that this guy's balls are the size of his home state, can't we use a slightly more
gender neutral insult? It's 2014. Bitches can (and do!) kick ass, and I don't
just mean the female dogs.
What did
our 7 year old girl go home thinking about, when the movie was over? F@$*ing
OPTIMUS PRIME RIDING A FIREBREATHING TREX ROBOT. But besides that... That it's
okay for her to graduate high school and lie to her dad about dating when he
told her not to date? That she doesn't have to be smart, just let someone else
save her? That her dad can insult that same boyfriend as long as they both
laugh?
There are a
hundred other things that I "lovingly" picked apart with my
Transformer fan friends, but these things stuck out to me as the type of things
we shouldn't be seeing in movies today, especially movies that we want to take
our kids to. If we want to make our culture better, we need to get rid of the thinking
and attitudes that make these slurs and insults commonplace. Noticing them, and
making sure we don't just wave them off as "oh it's just a movie" can
go a long way. We need to be better than this as Americans, and as humans. What
does the world think of us when this junk gets screened around the world? It
shames me, when I think of it. We should speak up about it. Change the way we
talk and the assumptions we make. Maybe when art imitates life, next time, we
can get something a little better for our 7 year old.
And once in
a while, can we get a heroine in a summer blockbuster who makes smart choices
while wearing chic clothing? The two aren't mutually exclusive.
If you made
it to the bottom of this post, you're a champ. Thanks for reading my rant, and
I hope I have inspired you, just a little, to challenge the status quo in your
own life and thinking. And if you feel my ideas are too oldfashioned or
nonsensical? Sorry, but...get off my lawn before this bitch delivers an
oldfashioned ass kickin'!
Ruth
For more on
Mr. Ken Watanabe click here.