I don't see Saellys trolling at all, Zero Angel.
Mindfire trolls a bit, and he basically admits it.
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Women in fantasy
- Thread starter Chilari
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I don't see Saellys trolling at all, Zero Angel.
Mindfire trolls a bit, and he basically admits it.
C
Chessie
Guest
I agree, Chilari, romance isn't the only way to a woman's heart. 
I would love to see more female characters in fantasy use less sex or sex appeal to get what they want. GOT is one example (someone will spear me for this I just know) of females in fantasy going the wrong way. Even Dany, who becomes BA in her own right, went through this "I must reach my womanhood through sex" with her husband.
I love a good romance too even though its not necessary to show where a woman's strength is. Granted, fantasy cultures are derived from historical ones where women haven't had many rights since the dawn of time. That part I get, but it is fantasy because we can change what we choose to tell our own story.
I would love to see more female characters in fantasy use less sex or sex appeal to get what they want. GOT is one example (someone will spear me for this I just know) of females in fantasy going the wrong way. Even Dany, who becomes BA in her own right, went through this "I must reach my womanhood through sex" with her husband. I love a good romance too even though its not necessary to show where a woman's strength is. Granted, fantasy cultures are derived from historical ones where women haven't had many rights since the dawn of time. That part I get, but it is fantasy because we can change what we choose to tell our own story.
Garren Jacobsen
Auror
Here is a question how do market forces play into these tropes and things. Like with Legend of Korra, I am willing to bet that during the making of this story there was a tone of market research done to decide the story line before the show was created in earnest.
Mindfire
Istar
Mindfire
Istar
Yeah, I do. But I do my best to keep it tasteful.
Zero Angel
Auror
We've really got to look at this from an economical viewpoint. Big companies do what makes them money, and love triangles and the like makes them oodles of money.
Must be semantics then, Devor, and I believe I included Mindfire with my trolls-feeding-trolls bit.
Again, we're back to the economics of the issue. Has anyone read "Freakonomics" or watched the documentary? The viewpoint is basically that human nature is ruled by the rules of economics and in order to understand why people do what they do, we just have to look at the incentives behind their actions.
saellys
Inkling
I agree, Chilari, romance isn't the only way to a woman's heart.
I love a good romance too even though its not necessary to show where a woman's strength is. Granted, fantasy cultures are derived from historical ones where women haven't had many rights since the dawn of time. That part I get, but it is fantasy because we can change what we choose to tell our own story.
Game of Thrones the show, or ASOIAF the books, or both? Because Martin is guilty of this to an extent, but the show is a million times worse.
I think it's also important to note that you can write a fantasy culture based largely in our roundly not-women-friendly history, but still write great female characters.
C
Chessie
Guest
Saellys, I've never seen the show. I read the first book and the way women used sex to advance in their lives or just plain survive was one of the things that turned me off about the story. I like Martin's writing but most of the women were next to clueless harlots. I didn't vibe with GOT.
Ninja'd: Chesterama, I think if you stuck with the story, you'd see they are anything but "clueless harlots."
I think Dany and Cersei are two of the best women characters in all of fantasy. It's not because they're perfect, shining beacons of virtue and are badasses to boot. It's because they feel like real people with real ambitions. In their world, they have to use what they've been given to get what they want. You could go a whole other route with Cersei often lamenting her womanhood because it prevents her from being what she thinks she's destined to be. Cersei is a horrible human being regardless of her sex, the same way Joffrey is. However, like any great villain, Cersei thinks what she's doing is right for her family. Her short-sightedness and impatience are what often cause her problems. Joffrey, who is a demon seed ten times worse than his mother, amplifies Cersei's bad traits.
In my opinion, Cersei is great character period. I think if she didn't have her flaws, she'd be just another character.
I find it interesting that the character who is least "lady-like" in the sense of Martin's world, is often considered the strongest female character: Arya.
Anyway, to avoid spoilers, I won't go too in depth. But I think Martin probably does one of the best jobs in all of fantasy when it comes to making women a key part of his story.
I think Dany and Cersei are two of the best women characters in all of fantasy. It's not because they're perfect, shining beacons of virtue and are badasses to boot. It's because they feel like real people with real ambitions. In their world, they have to use what they've been given to get what they want. You could go a whole other route with Cersei often lamenting her womanhood because it prevents her from being what she thinks she's destined to be. Cersei is a horrible human being regardless of her sex, the same way Joffrey is. However, like any great villain, Cersei thinks what she's doing is right for her family. Her short-sightedness and impatience are what often cause her problems. Joffrey, who is a demon seed ten times worse than his mother, amplifies Cersei's bad traits.
In my opinion, Cersei is great character period. I think if she didn't have her flaws, she'd be just another character.
I find it interesting that the character who is least "lady-like" in the sense of Martin's world, is often considered the strongest female character: Arya.
Anyway, to avoid spoilers, I won't go too in depth. But I think Martin probably does one of the best jobs in all of fantasy when it comes to making women a key part of his story.
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I think it might be past time to stop with that, Mindfire.
Ophiucha
Auror
I won't comment on Arya since I'm still unspoiled in regards to the details but I'm spoiled enough to know she's going to get some character development. But I will say that my favourite character (up to half-way through SoS) is Sansa Stark, because she is a perfect lady, right down to sticking with her fiance despite him being the absolute worst, and yet she is still such a strong character. I love her because it's something we see so rarely - the perfect lady who doesn't fight it unless it's for her life, yet we see has so much more inside of her, we see her hatred of Joffrey and her love of her siblings and her joy at her friendship with Margaery and her (misguided) crush on Loras. We see that despite acting the perfect lady, despite being what anyone else would see as the very typical bland background character who gets to say 'yes milord' and little else in every other fantasy story, GRRM lets her be a perspective character and a Stark. And while I love Brienne and Arya for being fighters, and Cersei for being subversive, I appreciate that he lets us see a very typical woman and still show that she's more than just curtsies and corsets.
I also love Olenna and Margaery, for similar reasons, though Margaery is more manipulative than Sansa she still never really tries to exceed her station (unlike Cersei who actively desires to be in the 'place' of a man in her world) and Olenna... well, who doesn't love Olenna? Particularly if you're aware of one particular spoiler. Plus, Diana Rigg? Flawless. And on the subject of the actresses, another show I want to bring up that isn't really fantasy (unless you regard wildly unrealistic deduction skills as a sort of magical power), Elementary. The girl who plays Margaery also happens to play the lovely Irene Adler. A very difficult character. In the source material, she wasn't even really a villain, just a damn cunning woman. "The woman." The one who got away. There was a lot of sexist overtones with the whole thing, 'not like the other girls' at best, but it was Victorian so not expecting much. Modern adaptations sometimes fail to really advanced the character, and indeed often make her worse by reducing her to part of the rogue's gallery and almost always just a lackey for Moriarty.
So here's the HUGE MASSIVE SPOILER ALERT WARNING.
I also love Olenna and Margaery, for similar reasons, though Margaery is more manipulative than Sansa she still never really tries to exceed her station (unlike Cersei who actively desires to be in the 'place' of a man in her world) and Olenna... well, who doesn't love Olenna? Particularly if you're aware of one particular spoiler. Plus, Diana Rigg? Flawless. And on the subject of the actresses, another show I want to bring up that isn't really fantasy (unless you regard wildly unrealistic deduction skills as a sort of magical power), Elementary. The girl who plays Margaery also happens to play the lovely Irene Adler. A very difficult character. In the source material, she wasn't even really a villain, just a damn cunning woman. "The woman." The one who got away. There was a lot of sexist overtones with the whole thing, 'not like the other girls' at best, but it was Victorian so not expecting much. Modern adaptations sometimes fail to really advanced the character, and indeed often make her worse by reducing her to part of the rogue's gallery and almost always just a lackey for Moriarty.
So here's the HUGE MASSIVE SPOILER ALERT WARNING.
Irene Adler, in this show, is Moriarty. And wow. Talk about a subversion! I mean, god damn. And that's a tough thing to do, because you have to work both with Irene's character - 'the woman', the one who defeats Sherlock - and work with Moriarty, the one just as cunning, but twice as sinister, his match. She defeats Sherlock, but is defeated by Joan Watson - arguably his human side, in a way. His grounding, his pathos, his protegee. And let's not ignore that in this canon, also a woman (of colour, at that). Very well done, and I don't just say that as someone who didn't like BBC's take on Moriarty. I say that as someone who's favourite character in anything ever created is Moriarty. I was very pleased.
Ophiucha makes a great point about Sansa. She's everything that is always characteristically considered wrong with female characters in fantasy. She's demure, does what she is asked, is emotional, and hopelessly devoted. However, she IS a strong character that changes and develops. It's as if Martin is dumping the cliche' on its head. While Sansa isn't a badass or physically strong, she is almost super-human in her emotional strength. Something interesting about A Song of Ice and Fire is that it does take some female characters who look conventionally flat and stereotypical on the surface and molds them into some of the most remarkable characters in the books.
So overall the point of this thread is "How do we improve representation of women in fantasy?" I think the best answer, in my estimation, is to take these cliches that exist and remold them. Same goes with fantasy characters in general.
So overall the point of this thread is "How do we improve representation of women in fantasy?" I think the best answer, in my estimation, is to take these cliches that exist and remold them. Same goes with fantasy characters in general.
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saellys
Inkling
All of this. Sansa is one of my favorite characters in anything ever.
Also, the last three episodes of Elementary were some of the finest television I've ever seen, and Natalie Dormer is a boss.
Mindfire
Istar
Why did you dislike BBC's Moriarty? I found him incredibly entertaining, like if someone mixed one of James Bond's enemies with a Batman villain. While Elementary's take on Moriarty was interesting and innovative, I like BBC's version better. But then again, I like Sherlock just a bit more than Elementary overall.
Mindfire
Istar
Done with a light hand, it's a useful way of making a point, or getting people to say things they might not otherwise. But if you insist.
I just don't see it. I haven't seen the show, but she has to be at least a little different in the show because in the book, there's a point where she forgot to even ask about Arya, and we never see any follow up or much time spent worried about her siblings. She hates, she fears, she tries to plan, but mostly I find her the typical female character without agency, everything happens to her...
Even her big escape attempt at Joffrey's wedding, which she thinks was her idea, turns out to have been someone else manipulating her.
I mean, I don't really fault GRRM for it because it's not unreasonable in the circumstances, and it's one weak character out of a cast of so many strong ones. And she still might be going somewhere cool and we just haven't seen it yet. But I just don't see it yet, and yet people say they do.
C
Chessie
Guest
Devor, I'm with you on Sansa. I can only judge her character by the first book though. She seemed stuck up to me and not necessarily interested in her siblings...which in a world like that it would have been nice to see her bond with Arya more. Out of all the Stark children, she resembled Catelyn the most to me in character. I've read a lot of bad rep about Catelyn but I think she's all right. She definitely seems not to make the wisest of choices or stand up for herself but again, it makes sense with the world she lives in.
I've been reading Joe Abercrombie's "Best Served Cold" and I'm in love with the way he's dished (pun intended) out Monza. I love a fierce heroine that can also swing a blade like the best of them. I prefer such heroines over ones like Sansa or Cersei, for instant. Not fantasy but for anyone who has read "Gone With the Wind", Scarlet was fierce in her own right and was not bashful about protecting herself or her family, which she did have in mind despite it being mostly forced upon her. Perhaps its just my tastes, but women like this rock my literary world.
Although I can see why some would consider Sansa strong, perhaps because she sticks to her morals and manners despite everything. But I don't think I've read enough to judge her.
I've been reading Joe Abercrombie's "Best Served Cold" and I'm in love with the way he's dished (pun intended) out Monza. I love a fierce heroine that can also swing a blade like the best of them. I prefer such heroines over ones like Sansa or Cersei, for instant. Not fantasy but for anyone who has read "Gone With the Wind", Scarlet was fierce in her own right and was not bashful about protecting herself or her family, which she did have in mind despite it being mostly forced upon her. Perhaps its just my tastes, but women like this rock my literary world.
Although I can see why some would consider Sansa strong, perhaps because she sticks to her morals and manners despite everything. But I don't think I've read enough to judge her.
I like Monza Murcatto as well.
I had the same view of Sansa, initially, but I think she's become more complex than that and she's really exhibited some strength and resourcefulness in her own way. At least, that's what I remember. The books came out so far apart it has been a while since I read the last ones.
I had the same view of Sansa, initially, but I think she's become more complex than that and she's really exhibited some strength and resourcefulness in her own way. At least, that's what I remember. The books came out so far apart it has been a while since I read the last ones.
saellys
Inkling
Keep in mind that Sansa is in a situation that robs her of agency. She's a hostage, occupying the classic damsel in distress position without any hope of being rescued, and even when she thinks she's about to be free, she ends up in the same straits (being stuck with Littlefinger is only marginally a step up from being stuck with the Lannisters). Brienne was in this situation, lest we forget, and Jaime came and scooped her up, but no one seems to draw any parallels there.
In the midst of all this, Sansa is slowly accumulating the knowledge she needs to be the one manipulating rather than the one who gets manipulated. Her femininity/womanly wiles/sexuality are only a small part of that package. She's a strong character because she's growing into more than the whiny, lemon cake-loving little girl from the first book.
I believe Martin is taking her somewhere awesome and I don't think it's hard to see the progression, and where she'll end up if it continues. Conservatively, I predict that she'll independently control the North by the last book.
In the midst of all this, Sansa is slowly accumulating the knowledge she needs to be the one manipulating rather than the one who gets manipulated. Her femininity/womanly wiles/sexuality are only a small part of that package. She's a strong character because she's growing into more than the whiny, lemon cake-loving little girl from the first book.
I believe Martin is taking her somewhere awesome and I don't think it's hard to see the progression, and where she'll end up if it continues. Conservatively, I predict that she'll independently control the North by the last book.
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To understand the hidden depths of strength in Sansa's character, you must take her training into account, the Lady she was taught to be. Remember this life lesson we heard her being instructed on, early in her story?
"A Lady's armor is her courtesy."
No matter what has been heaped upon the poor girl she has maintained a quiet strength, keeping a level of composure & self-control that's almost inhuman. How many people could tolerate her circumstances? I feel that her inner strength, in the face of terrible coming events, is going to be a major factor in the future.
The only person that recognizes that strength is Tyrion.
"Lady Sansa, I do believe you'll survive us all."
"A Lady's armor is her courtesy."
No matter what has been heaped upon the poor girl she has maintained a quiet strength, keeping a level of composure & self-control that's almost inhuman. How many people could tolerate her circumstances? I feel that her inner strength, in the face of terrible coming events, is going to be a major factor in the future.
The only person that recognizes that strength is Tyrion.
"Lady Sansa, I do believe you'll survive us all."
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