Do you gravitate toward particular body types?

[Finchbearer]

Your answer to the prompt would be, presumably, "I wouldn't." That's fine.

"Damsel -not- in distress," in 2024, is as common a trope as the one it subverts.
Some people will never tire of one, some the other.
I respect that you would avoid ever having a male save a female in your own writing.

This is only one (hypothetical) scene in an entire (hypothetical) book, which may contain many other strong, independent female characters that don't need no man.

Not only did I prioritize presenting her as a very competent character, I even justified her danger by suggesting the people she works for are purposefully trying to put her in a situation outside of her wheelhouse in which she would die.

I think I officially change my (EDIT: hypothetical) outline. No more eunuch! Poof! Gone! Now it's a female were-gorilla. I don't wanna hear another word about the eunuch, he's been officially redacted.

Although I will note that your comment

Is very telling.
Doesn't EVEN have balls.
Not everyone has the same storytelling priorities as you do.

1. No character in a good story should be perfectly competent, that's bad storytelling, even (is everyone sitting down?) If she's a woman.

2. If a woman is dressed provocatively, make sure she's doing it on purpose and for a plot-reason. If the character isn't purposefully sexualizing herself, please don't have a man overtly and openly sexualizing her unless he isn't a good guy. That's when the "male gaze" actually does get really annoying.

3. If your MC is a boy, he can save a girl. That's okay. Just don't over use it.

You reject my feedback, and that’s okay.

We’re on different pages in terms of the subject at hand and that’s also okay.

I mean, do we need to get into the definition of a eunuch? A eunuch is literally a castrated male, a male without testicles. Technically my pet cat is a eunuch, but he’s still male.

Character flaws I agree can create a powerful arc, but if every female in your story does not have agency, every male does, then you don’t have a balanced gender positive story.

If a woman is dressed provocatively there could be 100 varying reasons for this, and it really IMO depends on what genre you’re writing in, and is also dependent on the context, but if it’s only used as a plot device in a non-erotica / romance genre of story then I would ask if it really needs to be there.

In my own writing I do have male characters look after or influence my female characters, taking on that ‘caring’ or ‘chivalrous’ role, but there are always reason for this beyond driving the plot or over relying on common ‘tropes’ or stereotypes, or at least that’s what I hope is the case.

 

[Jackarandajam]

You said you wrote it off the cuff, so in fairness to you I was critiquing something not fully formed, and you did go on to say you weren’t happy enough with it. However there are moments within the original outline where you do in fact change the perspective to that of the males, and you do go back and forth a bit with it, which is where I offered up the opinion that I thought it would become more of what you wanted it to become if you kept strictly to the POV of the female character.

Here is where you chop and change POV;

Meathead busts in, there's a brief exchange and he kills the eunuch. < this becomes a passive / omniscient or a change of perspective to the male character. If it were still in the female POV it might read something more like; she watches as a man enters the room, observing him skilfully kill the eunuch.
Meathead turns to her. < passive / male POV. She's enraged at her failure and ready to cut her way out. She forgets how she's dressed until she notices a smile playing at the corners of his mouth and his eyes flitting up and down. < whilst this is from the female characters perspective, it’s clearly more a representation of how the male is observing her, because if you flip this again to the male POV, it would actually make more sense. ‘He watches her clearly enraged at her failure, and, forgetting how she is dressed, he takes the opportunity to take a long look at her body.’
He says he has to turn her in, < male POV. even they seemed like they had the same goal.
She attacks, he defends and eventually throws her off. < male POV.
He's really serious for a sec and then laughs a little, eyes darting down and up again.
"It's just. This is not what I was expecting. Please excuse me. Again?" Brandishing the sword. < male POV

She realized that this guy wants to talk and relaxes a little. This is more up her alley.

I know you said that it’s too tropey, and that’s fair enough, you’d approach this differently, but as far as subversion goes, it’s done the complete opposite and has reinforced the common stereotype that women can only use their sexuality to get by in life and even in the face of not one but two male characters, (including one who doesn’t even have balls) the female character is still helpless and needs to be saved akin to a damsel in distress.

Lastly, just for the sake of my pride as a writer:
I hope this doesn't ACTUALLY have to be said, but this was an outline that shoved a bunch of parts in at random.
There is no clear POV, other than what could only logically be from the female characters perspective. Once guy busts in, it's just notes on aspects of the story. I wasn't submitting that jumbled mess for style points.

 

[Jackarandajam]

We’re on different pages in terms of the subject at hand and that’s also okay.

Probably less than you might think. I don't watch anime and, while I think beefy guy/buxom lady is at this point an almost endearingly campy retro-trope, It ain't in my wips. I'm personally too scavenger/grimdark/grit for anything that clean cut.

I go for more of the Furiosa/Max vibe.

 

[Queshire]

So the prompt is a swordswoman fighting a guy distracted by her appearance? Let's see... I've been on a Xianxia kick lately. Let's use an event from there.

~~~

It had been six months since Snowblossom entered the Mountain & Rivers Painting. Six more months and the preliminaries for the Conclave of Immortal Destiny would end. She sat in the lotus position on top of a pond frozen into a mirror sheen by her icy qi. With each breath motes of silvery moonlight gathered to her and were drawn into her dantian.

"You shameless woman!"

The force of the shout caused the ice to shatter beneath her and Snowblossom stepped into the air rather than letting any of the exposed water touch her.

"You won't ensnare me in your bewitching art," Said the owner of the voice with his nostrils flaring. He was dressed like a monk, but his tanned skin gleamed with a metallic reflection under the moonlight. He chuckled and slapped himself on the chest, "But worry not. I am a magnanimous lord. Turn over all your talismans and I will let you depart this Mountain & Rivers Painting in peace."

"The Heavenly Bell sect?" Snowblossom said after recognizing the combination of the man's outfit and body refinement technique. She sighed, "Troublesome."

Eighteen flying swords emerged from her storage ring and arranged themselves into a trio of snowflake shaped formations behind her back. Icy blue light from the formations flowed into her hand and condensed into a pure white blade in her hand. As soon as it appeared clouds gathered overhead and snow began drifting down.

~~~~

Eh, plenty trope-y in it's own right, but pbbbbht.

 

[Jackarandajam]

So the prompt is a swordswoman fighting a guy distracted by her appearance? Let's see... I've been on a Xianxia kick lately. Let's use an event from there.

~~~

It had been six months since Snowblossom entered the Mountain & Rivers Painting. Six more months and the preliminaries for the Conclave of Immortal Destiny would end. She sat in the lotus position on top of a pond frozen into a mirror sheen by her icy qi. With each breath motes of silvery moonlight gathered to her and were drawn into her dantian.

"You shameless woman!"

The force of the shout caused the ice to shatter beneath her and Snowblossom stepped into the air rather than letting any of the exposed water touch her.

"You won't ensnare me in your bewitching art," Said the owner of the voice with his nostrils flaring. He was dressed like a monk, but his tanned skin gleamed with a metallic reflection under the moonlight. He chuckled and slapped himself on the chest, "But worry not. I am a magnanimous lord. Turn over all your talismans and I will let you depart this Mountain & Rivers Painting in peace."

"The Heavenly Bell sect?" Snowblossom said after recognizing the combination of the man's outfit and body refinement technique. She sighed, "Troublesome."

Eighteen flying swords emerged from her storage ring and arranged themselves into a trio of snowflake shaped formations behind her back. Icy blue light from the formations flowed into her hand and condensed into a pure white blade in her hand. As soon as it appeared clouds gathered overhead and snow began drifting down.

~~~~

Eh, plenty trope-y in it's own right, but pbbbbht.

I think part of the prompt was the understanding that the male in the scene was the not-completely-nauseating main character of the story.
But your piece does have some for real campy charm.

 

[Naruzeldamaster]

Well. please write it up and post if you feel it needs some looking at.

I am not sure where the anime vibe appeared in this thread, is it supposed to have an anime feel?

Yeah I'm about a third of a way through the chapter already and I'll be chipping away at it more tonight.
It's hard to describe but I'm not trying to emulate anime itself (as in, like the kinds of plots they have and stuff) just the 'feel' if that makes sense?

 

[Mad Swede]

Well, I am sorry for that. I fear that some forms of entertainment that may remain elusive to you.

But you are right, All I notice is her sword....

My point is that there is no real need to risk offending readers. Sometimes implying something about someone or some situation or event is far more effective than writing a detailed description. Our readers usually have quite active imaginations, they can picture the scene and turn themselves on (or off) as required.

If you think about the example I quoted from one of my novels you'll realised that Torbjörn must have given the Lady Anneli the once over, and that certain things about her have stuck in his mind. Yes, you the reader get to see her eye and hair colour, and the rest of the description tells you a bit about her size and shape - if you think about it. If you want to picture her in a certain way then that's up to you. That's fine by me, and more than that isn't needed in the text in my view.