Feminism has never been a perfect concept. You had Susan B. Anthony back in the day throwing a fit because black men were going to get the vote. There was the phenomenon of "not like other girls" feminism which still persists today. And now, feminism is nothing more than a character aesthetic, drifting between the dark violence of Gone Girl, and the bright pink performatism of Barbie.
If you've ever read or seen Gone Girl, you know all about the Cool Girl Monologue. It's essentially a mini-dissertation on how many women may feel pressured to be the cool girl - someone who doesn't complain or nag, doesn't have any problems being walked all over, lets men do and say whatever they want - just to be accepted and even loved by men.
The monologue itself is an interesting introspective on gender roles and expectations in society, but overall, neither the book nor the movie can really be considered a feminist story. I enjoyed reading and watching Gone Girl as a thriller, and I certainly don't see why some people consider it misogynistic, but not once did I think, "Wow, Amy Dunne is a total girl boss," the way many people seem to believe.
In fact, Amy Dunne was such a landmark character that she spawned an entire generation of people who stan terrible women in fiction. This most prominently includes Love Quinn from Netflix's YOU, a murderess people love to defend under the popular slogan, "I support women's rights but also women's wrongs."
You can hear more about Love Quinn in the video above (starting at 3:50).
As for Amy Dunne, characters like this are not feminist icons. To start off, this woman successfully framed multiple people for crimes they didn't commit, and most notably attempted to frame her husband. Nick Dunne was no saint, but getting revenge on your cheating husband by framing him for your murder isn't feminism, it's just deranged behavior. Ultimately, she doesn't even go through with the frame job because Nick goes on TV being the exact husband she wants him to be. Of course, he's faking it, and they both know it, but she still decides to not only return to him, but also to impregnate herself with his semen.
Like...what???
Trapping your cheating husband in the marriage and having his child is really just ridiculous, especially since Amy's not some underprivileged woman either. So many women are unable to leave cheating or even abusive spouses for various reasons, including the fact that they have kids together. And here's Amy with the full ability to leave — no kids tying her to this man, just some cool girl expectations — and she concocts this entire plan to frame him.
A cheater, mind you. Now, cheating is bad (really bad), but first of all, it's never gonna be as bad as it was in the show Obsession on Netflix, and second of all, you have the ability to leave. The privilege to leave. Maybe you could've caught him cheating and exposed him somehow, via pictures or videos. And yeah, maybe some people would've been like "Oh, she must've done something to make him cheat."
But Joel Maisel cheated on Midge in the pilot of Amazon's The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and they used that as a character growth point for both husband and wife and a scope for social analysis in the way society defaults to blaming women for separation and divorce. Amy Dunne is a modern day white woman in her 30s with really rich, successful parents, and when she finds out her man is sleeping with some 20-year-old, her first instinct is to frame him for her murder.
It's a tad excessive.
The thing is, Amy Dunne doesn't have to be some logical, broken hearted, regular woman, and Gone Girl doesn't have to be some theoretical dissection of feminism. She's allowed to be an unhinged villain and the story's allowed to be just a thriller, as long as we acknowledge that Amy is not some sort of girl boss icon whose actions are justified because a man was bad and that the ending where they stay together straight up sucked. I'm also not a fan of female villains that lie about facing violence from men (see Dexter season 2 for reference) because women are usually called liars regarding abuse and especially sexual abuse, so I'd prefer if writers got out of the habit of creating villainous women that lie about these things.
Gillian Flynn, author of Gone Girl, literally said this:
"I particularly mourn the lack of female villains — good, potent female villains. Not ill-tempered women who scheme about landing good men and better shoes (as if we had nothing more interesting to war over), not chilly WASP mothers (emotionally distant isn’t necessarily evil), not soapy vixens (merely bitchy doesn’t qualify either). I’m talking violent, wicked women. Scary women. Don’t tell me you don’t know some. The point is, women have spent so many years girl-powering ourselves — to the point of almost parodic encouragement — we’ve left no room to acknowledge our dark side. Dark sides are important. They should be nurtured like nasty black orchids."
First of all lady, you need therapy. Second of all, this quote literally screams "I'm the only person ever to write about an evil woman." And third of all, you can have violent, wicked female villains that don't lie about rape. And even those who do can be crafted well.
A portrayal of villainous woman with a cheating husband who did lie about sexual violence that I would actually consider feminist would be Victoria Grayson from ABC's Revenge. Gillian Flynn may hate chilly WASP mothers and bitchy vixens, but Victoria Grayson is both of those and so much more. When Victoria found out her husband cheated with her best friend in the pilot of this show, she handled it in a much more fascinating and logical way that displayed her cunning nature, social power, manipulative prowess, and public persona, all of which have been carefully cultivated so she can survive this world.
Victoria Grayson is probably one of the worst people in the world of fiction television set in modern times, and her husband was probably worse, but seeing their post-revelation dynamic and their history as they stayed together was really interesting and impactful to the story. It didn't feel like this fake postmodern feminism, and when she lied about being raped by David, it didn't fall into the same trap as Amy Dunne or Lila from Dexter 'cause one, it was a minor plot point in the grand scheme of things, two, Victoria's husband told a much worse lie about that same man, and three, they were both, unbeknownst to them, in opposition to a woman.
And speaking of this woman, if there's one woman's wrongs that I support, it's Miss Emily Thorne. In her quest for vengeance, she makes mistakes and she's not perfect, but that's okay. She's the white girl who actually deserves the feminist icon status over murderers who would let a man ruin their lives and everything they stand for.
Chicago is also quite a feminist movie that features murdering women but embroils it within gender norms, the nature of fame, the sensationalism of crime, and the world of entertainment, all of which are still relevant today. Neither Roxie nor Velma are exactly good people, but this film (and the musical it was based on) showcases how these women get away with their crimes by commodifying those crimes and themselves and playing to the men in charge all around them.
It's also one of the most innovative musicals out there, featuring the brilliant "Cell Block Tango" which showcases murderous women whose wrongs are too entertaining for you to actually tell them that they were wrong.
On the other end of the spectrum, we have 2023's uber-successful Barbie film, which had fans around the world praising it for its supposed Feminism 101 lessons. Unfortunately, these people were blinded by the bright pink color palette and couldn't actually differentiate between feminism and the easily marketable girl power aesthetic that coated this Mattel commercial.
Now look, there's nothing wrong with Mattel using this film to sell more dolls. But did they have to do it in such an insufferable way with such bad storytelling? I've gone into further detail about it in my Barbenheimer episode here:
In essence, what this film does is throw in some buzzwords, oversimplify the concept of patriarchy, revert to matriarchy, and ultimately contributes nothing more than making a bunch of privileged women in their 20s and 30s sitting in the theater in their all-pink outfits feel like activists for an evening.
Those who see Barbie as the height of feminist storytelling should sit down and watch The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, which is an actual feminist work that shows rather than tells of women's struggles and dismantles patriarchy by demonstrating the way it negatively impacts everyone, including men.
A movie that actually presented the struggles of women in a way that really sold Feminism 101 to men was White Chicks. And no, I'm not kidding. People can't see beyond the premise of two black men dressing up as white girls and think it's just some dumb comedy. But this film at its core is about two men that, while pretending to be women and being friends with women, actually learn about what it's like to be a woman. They learn about women's insecurities and relationships with men, which ultimately helps with their own romantic relationships in the end.
The very first time Kevin and Marcus debut as Brittany and Tiffany Wilson, they get disgustingly cat-called by men and instantly flip out, rightfully so. It's short bit, but it immediately shows how when men are on the other side of harassment, it becomes obvious that it's harassment, and it's much more effective than Barbie going to jail for retaliating after a guy inappropriately grabbed her, which just felt like the writers trying to jam themes down your throat.
White Chicks is able to succeed because it incorporates the hilarious premise into the theme, while Barbie gets stuck carrying out an aesthetic from script through production design. Legally Blonde also featured pink to show that feminine women could still be smart and crafted a very feminist story by focusing on the iconic character of Elle Woods. Elle's passion and hard work got her through the prejudices and problems she faced as a feminine woman, or a woman in general, in an intellectual environment, and she portrayed a much more relatable portrait than the Barbie film could even attempt to.
This video above is an excellent dive into how else the film deviates from the Feminism 101 status people are claiming it to be. But I'd also like to add one thing I often feel is missing from feminist content and the feminism discussion at large and that is: great male characters.
We need more male characters that unlearn patriarchy like Joel Maisel and Abe Weissman from The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. We need more male characters that are compassionate rather than toxic or misogynistic despite filling historically male roles such as fighting battles, like Uhtred and friends from The Last Kingdom. We need men that are devoted to their partners despite embodying traditionally masculine traits like Prince Charming from ABC's Once Upon A Time. We need male characters who aren't afraid of being emotional and loving their male friends like in The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.
Characters like Aragorn do a greater service for feminism than characters like Ken from Barbie, especially when the film ended with Barbie apologizing to Ken after everything he did.
But honestly, with the attitudes towards feminism today, I don't think many feminists would be interested in seeing better men in the media. Sometimes it feels like women, especially white women, aren't fighting for feminism and equal rights; they're just fighting for the right to be as violent and unfeeling as men are allowed to be.
It all comes back to this Susan B. Anthony quote:
"The old anti-slavery school say women must stand back and wait until the negroes shall be recognized. But we say, if you will not give the whole loaf of suffrage to the entire people, give it to the most intelligent first."
When it came down to it, she immediately threw black men under the bus. Both those who argued for the provision of gender and those who argued for the provision of race, ignored how either would impact women of color. Feminism, to some, is simply acquiring the privileges of white men at any cost, rather than encouraging reform across all counts for a better society.
There was a film I had the misfortune of seeing called The Lost Daughter, in which the main character is a woman that left her children and family behind for three years 'cause she didn't want to be a mother anymore and chose her career instead. On the surface, that's not a terrible topic to explore, but the film doesn't even chastise her for that decision. It pretends to portray an uglier side to motherhood and the expectations of women, but really, it's a movie about a creepy woman who guiltlessly abandoned the children she was responsible for as an adult who had them and after coming back she now takes vacations to steal dolls from little girls to cope I guess.
Being a bad parent, or an "unnatural mother" as this movie puts it, is not feminist. Sure, not everyone's meant to be a parents, and society much higher expectations for women. So then dissect that. Craft a story around managing and coping with these expectations without forsaking the children. Just because men are allowed to be detached parents and abandon their kids doesn't mean women should strive to do the same. Instead, we should be elevating stories of men and women navigating parenthood as a critical responsibility that intersects with other aspects of their lives.
More films should depict parenthood, motherhood specifically, as a non-requirement of adulthood. It's okay to not want to be a parent. But if you already are one, it's not revolutionary to abandon your children for the feminist aesthetic. The Barbie film also fails to discuss the topic of motherhood in a meaningful way, while Maisel is able to thoroughly depict the struggle between being a mother and having a career. Midge is someone who fell into motherhood because it was expected of her as a woman in 1950s New York, but as she pursued her career in comedy, being a mother sometimes fell by the wayside, and it eventually became secondary to her own career growth.
Boston Strangler also presents a main female character whose responsibilities are torn between her family and her job as a journalist. This film is a great feminist work that respects female victims of violence in a way I really never see on screen and compassionately conveys the dangers of living as a woman during that time period.
Feminist entertainment doesn't always have to be dark and gritty or about the struggles of women to be feminist either. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is one of my all-time favorite films, depicting a strong female friendship and two women who exemplify strong womanhood in their own ways.
Played by Jane Russell, Dorothy is a girl waiting for love to walk into her arms, and she's not shy about it either. She's constantly flirting with the men's swim team, and even has a whole musical number where she dances around these scantily clad men musing about what kind of man she wants, which is a great reversal of the typical "man surrounded by scantily clad women" trope. Not once does the film attempt to slut shame her or even have other characters looking down on her. She's simply allowed to be this person.
Her best friend Lorelai, played by Marilyn Monroe, prioritizes wealth because she believes if she doesn't need to worry about money, then she can be happy in her relationship, and if the relationship turns sour, at least she'll still have her diamonds to pay her rent, all of which is exquisitely expressed in this film as well as the iconic song "Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend." On the surface, she's just a dumb blonde, as the actress was known to play. But don't be fooled, because, as she says herself, she "can be smart when it's important, but most men don't like it."
This is a line that was written by a man, mind you, and it does more for feminism than the entirety of Barbie, which was in fact co-written by a man. (The original book and musical that GPB was based on was respectively written and co-written by a woman, but both varied greatly from this film adaptation and neither contain the following scene or revolve around the core theme of friendship to the best of my research.)
Perhaps the most feminist aspect of this film is that these two women are ride-or-dies who choose to protect and defend each other without question, not letting a single man come between them, with absolutely no backstabbing or catfighting as is commonly stereotyped, and it's the men who have to change their attitudes to earn the acceptance of these girls.
Why can't we have more movies like this instead of useless Mary Sue feminism like in the Marvel Cinematic Universe? Some people say that misogyny is the reason Captain Marvel gets so much hate, but the character is ridiculously overpowered with no interesting characteristics, no internal struggles, no flaws, no nothing.
You can have powerful women who still feel like real people. Just look at the female characters on ABC's Once Upon a Time. Emma Swan is the first female hero who's not a teenager and is a mother that I think I've ever seen. Regina the Evil Queen and Zelena the Wicked Witch are terrible people with magical powers and complex internal lives, and Regina even gets to unpack it all to become a better person.
OUAT's Snow White manages to be both powerful and feminine: finding her true love, being a compassionate person, and kicking ass with a bow and arrow. This makes her ten times more interesting than any Snow White has ever been, including the dumpster fire that I know Greta Gerwig wrote for her upcoming Snow White film.
This show is another example of how you can make feminist content about women that aren't simply female remakes like Ocean's 8 and the 2016 Ghostbusters film. While I haven't seen either of these films and have no doubt that they're probably decent, why can't there be original franchises starring women in similar roles?
Of course franchises like Pitch Perfect exist, the first of these films being a modern classic, but why can't Hollywood greenlight all-female or female-led movies about heists and ghost hunting and other shenanigans without piggybacking off existing male franchises? (And no, Barbie doesn't count.) There was 2018's Hustlers which was pretty good and 2017's hilarious but heartfelt Girls Trip, which gave us the raunchy comedy that Bridesmaids completely failed to deliver. Both films are standalones but there's proof that these types of movies and franchises would succeed if only given the opportunity and the marketing.
Even movies that center on and even heavily feature a male cast can still have well written female characters. Both Lord of the Rings and Hobbit trilogies have been criticized for overwhelmingly male casts but despite this, both have great female characters. Tauriel from The Hobbit is a great subversion of the damsel in distress trope, with her constantly having to save her male love interest. And though he's not incapable himself, he in no way feels threatened by her skill or stature, and is rather taken with her in part because of these things.
Characters and movies like this don't need to actually tackle feminism to be good representation of women. The Mission: Impossible movies all feature really good female characters that are simply allowed to exist but also have the same depth as their male counterparts.
But if Hollywood would rather go all in on female remakes rather than original stories featuring well written women, then they should do something that mandates one. I would love to see a female-led film adaptation of the funny and satirical musical How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. While the original is set in the 50s/60s era of male businessmen and female secretaries, I can envision a fantastic modern update following a young woman wishing to scale the corporate ladder of, say, Hollywood, in a much more challenging and gatekeepy world. This type of remake would work because a modernized version automatically calls for brand new ways to explore the original story, now that we live in a world with more women in business, modern technology, and different ways of life.
There are a few more films and movies I want to highlight for those who want genuinely feminist content over those that pretend to be so. The classic teen comedy She's The Man features a great theme about expectations of and discrimination against girls from an early age.
If you want something more blockbuster, look no further that the first three Pirates of the Caribbean films. Played by Keira Knightley, Elizabeth Swann escapes the confines of women's expectations and class boundaries and subverts the damsel in distress trope by not only rescuing the man who came to rescue her, but going on to become a sword-fighting extraordinaire and leader of pirates herself.
Knightley also stars in Pride & Prejudice (2005) which is an excellent dive into the world that women of lower class status had to navigate in the 1800s. And if you want a film showcasing women navigating not only gender and class but also racial discrimination, Hidden Figures is a great movie following the true journeys of three black women who were instrumental to John Glenn's launch into space.
As I said earlier, feminism has become an aesthetic succinctly surmised by the likes of soft colors, Taylor Swift, and paying for your own daily Starbucks, or any other palette you can create by swapping these out. You pick your aesthetic and that's how you engage in feminism. It's not about actually achieving equality in opportunity and perception; it's about feeling like an activist or a revolutionary without actually doing anything in your life to supplement that.
But with more films, shows, and characters like those I've highlighted in this article, I hope that we can achieve a status quo in Hollywood that represents women and men in a way that benefits us all.