you don’t want complex female characters

Skyler White, Amy Dunne, Villanelle: they are all hated but what do they have in common?

image via Pinterest

Recently I’ve noticed something that made me lose my sleep. Well, not literally, but you get what I mean. One of my all-time favorite franchises follows the story of a (male) serial murderer, who’s very complex, has a very layered personality and I love this about him. He was wrote to be unique and complicated, and the creators did a great job. But, like every single one of my favorite things that revolves around male characters, I couldn’t help but imagine how things would work if he was a woman. I know this may sound kind of odd for some people, but I enjoy doing this because I feel like it’s a way for me to be closer to the narrative of the movie, show, book or whatever.

The main thing is that I realized that there are barely any female characters that follow this same line. And, when it happens, they are not accepted or understood like the male characters are. Male characters can be crazy, off putting, murderers or anything because the public — or most part of it — will always love them. The public will always pray for that they thrive, will always support them, even if their actions are extremely condemnable. And for the record, I know it sounds controversial for me to be saying this because I just said that I love a franchise that goes on this same way, however, that doesn’t change the fact that this is a real thing. Female characters are constantly misunderstood, judged and condemned, mostly because they weren’t on the male lead’s side or just because they are not men. I know this doesn’t seems like something that needs to be talked about, but the point is that the way people see these female characters is a reflection of how people see real women. Media itself is a reflection of our society and of our relationship with it’s norms and values.

It’s funny to watch people fighting and discussing for hours over a character’s personality, explaining how they are “not evil, just broken”, when you know they would NEVER do that if the character in question was a woman, because, in those cases, they will just assume they’re bad people. There’s no discussion, just a bunch of guys on Reddit or any other place of the internet, calling a character some slur, even if she didn’t do at least 1% of the things other male characters they love have done. There are no moral debates when it comes to praise a guy who killed thousands of people, but there’s always a problem with a woman that doesn’t want to stay married to a drug dealer. Those characters are not supposed to be loved, but they always — somehow — end up in a pedestal with lots of devoted people on their feet. I get the thing behind loving a crazy character, not because you agree with the things they did, but because it’s good to see a well-written character and it’s easy to relate to their human parts, I really do, but it doesn’t makes sense to love them, if you hate the exact same trope when it’s about a woman.

To break that cycle of women getting attacked just for being reasonable, there is Amy Dunne. Our light at the end of the tunnel. She is intelligent, crazy, vengeful: she is complex and that’s the thing about her, that’s why we love Amy Dunne. And that’s also why men hate Amy Dunne. Seeking for revenge over a stupid guy? I can’t really tell if they’re afraid or intimidated — probably both —, but it doesn’t really matter, because they’re going to attack her anyway. She’s just like every other psycho character who’s done bad things, the only different thing it’s the fact that she’s a woman. Which means she’s going to be judged, hated and everything by the same people who adore Joe Goldberg. It’s stupid. I can’t describe it in any other way or with any other words that not stupid. Some of them will try to hide their misogynistic tendencies by saying things like “she did bad things”, and most of them will not even try to play the role of good guy.

They say that the reason why they don’t like female characters is because they’re shallow and poorly written, but this is bullshit. They don’t hate female characters because they’re shallow, they hate them because they can only understand men. They can only feel bad for a man, support a man, cheer for a man’s win. They don’t hate to see women in those positions because they’re “not used to it”, but because they don’t want to see them like this, cause that means that there is going to be less of them on screen. It’s the need to be seen and loved and to see some crazy guy doing the things they always wanted to do.

The complexity is a privilege that only men can afford. The controversial behavior and lack of morality it’s a men-exclusive type of thing. The problem of it all is because these guys are not just wandering around the internet, they’re making films. They’re writing stories — male-centered stories —, airing shows where not a single woman gets more than just one line on script. There is a barrier between what people think it’s a woman’s mind and a man’s mind, so just like it used to be back when we were kids, there are the boy things and the girl things. Psychopath With a Mysterious Background Story And a Weird Sense of Self is for men, Supportive and Loving Romantic Interest With Literally No Personality is for women. Once again, we find ourselves in these suffocating boxes and definitions that we always end up outgrowing. A woman cannot chase someone with an axe because that would not be very feminine of her. She cannot seek for revenge against her best friend abuser, and if she does, she’s going to die in the end by the hands of the very same guy.

Television and big productions seem to represent and perpetuate the same old pattern that we’re all tired from seeing: the girl is too weak, she dies in the end because she wasn’t built to be a killer. And for the socially awkward man: he thrives because he was born to do it. Because he’s a man and he’s wild, it’s on his genes. No woman could ever compete with him, so why should they even try?

---

I was going to end the post here, but Sarah Jessica Parker said something very similar this week about how people treat male characters and female characters differently, so I’m leaving the quote here :)

---

thank u for reading! feel free to leave a comment about today’s topic or any other subject :)