optimisticturtleco submitted:
I recently found a TV show that does so many things right and wanted to share! First of all – the costumes are awesome AND practical! Yes, even female ones! These are not metal armors but most of the characters fight in them so I think that counts 🙂
Also, this show has LOADS of really amazing female characters, and the plot of the show is driven mostly by the actions and decisions of the female cast. The women of the show are interesting, complex, some of them are sexy, some not, some are smart, some are mean and annoying and do very very bad things, but ALL of them have very understandable goals and motivations (beyond “sexy” or “evil” or “good”).
For example, in the screenshot there’s three bad-ass female characters, two of them are warriors and two are leaders of their people. SO COOL. Especially since it’s sci-fi which is still plagued by sexy background decoration female characters, who have little to none influence on the plot.
Another thing is that there is no gendered violence in this show! No one is getting raped, cat called, put down or discredited because of their gender! Female characters are not being punished for initiating sex, being in a position of power or anything like that. It’s like, what our society could have looked like if there really was gender equality. There is still a lot of violence, people are getting hurt and killed, some have higher standing than others, but it has nothing to do with gender. Female characters do not sit out a battle, they are not sheltered or protected, they fight and get hurt alongside men. All the characters – male or female – get to make good, bad and absolutely terrible decisions, and influence the course of events.
Lastly, such a prominent cast of female characters does NOT overshadow the male characters – there are tons of amazing male characters with different backgrounds and motivations! There’s a lot of characters to like and hate, and just because a lot of them are female doesn’t mean that they have to cut back on the male ones – BOTH can exist at the same time (shocker, I know).
I really liked the quote of one of the creators. When asked if it’s a show about feminism he said that it’s not the theme, and “..we just write people doing crazy stuff. Some happen to be women.” (http://www.enstarz.com/articles/84719/20150506/the-100-season-3-is-feminism-a-major-theme-of-the-series-series-creator-explains-video.htm) Which is basically what I want from a female character – for her to be first of all A PERSON!
The one possible turn off of this show could be the first few episodes – they look like a chiched teen drama and there’s even a stupid “sexy” bathing scene in the first ep :/ But it looks like the creators quickly understood that they’re doing it all wrong and made a 180 degrees turn into a more “survival” type of show which made it so amazing that I’m terrified now that it’ll all go downhill in season 3…Of course maybe if you dissect it episode by episode maybe some problematic stuff can be found, but compared to other shows this one is many steps ahead I think.
So sorry for rambling! >_<
Some sources about the show:
http://the100.wikia.com/wiki/The_100_Wiki
http://girlreporter.blogspot.co.il/2014/10/feminism-and-100-part-one.html
I feel like Octivia (the character in the bottom most image)’s look was inspired at least in part by Lagertha – and I’m so okay with that. This show does look pretty amazing, and so far from what I’ve seen (just the first few episodes) is awesome for representation all around.
– wincenworks