Three faces of bitch
Feb. 7th, 2011 04:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seriousficI've noticed of late that there's been some devaluation of the term "HBIC." Just like how over on TV Tropes (I should warn you, don't go to that website, one of the tropes is named "m*nd r*pe," so you'll be browsing and see that term and then... I'm not sure what happens then, but I think it involves dread Cthulu and the sunken city of R'lyeh), the term Crowning Moment of Awesome has become so overused that the live-action Alice In Wonderland has one. Newsflash: If it's in the live-action Alice In Wonderland, it's not awesome.
I'm not laying blame for this. HBIC is a good and useful term, and in many cases its use is apt. Then you have people calling Adam Lambert a HBIC. Ahem. Adam Lambert was on American Idol and he lost. If he was in charge of not winning American Idol, then he'd have a shot, but that slot already belongs to William Hung.
Now, to fix the overuse of HBIC, we must first define it. To be a HBIC, you must be A. In charge. B. A bitch. C. Head. Which is really the same thing as in charge, so clearly this term was coined by someone who hated editors. So we must separate HBIC from two other, equally important categories of bitch.
1. The "basic bitch."
Note: This is also what the Winchesters mean when they call each other "a little bitch." They're saying, subtextually, "You are Emma Stone's character from Zombieland." A dire insult.
Okay, I had to scour a bit for a female character I actually loathe who isn't Lana Lang, because that is so played out, so I'll go with Emma Stone's character from Zombieland. Now, I like the actress, but good god, is her character a bitch. Okay, set-up: She's introduced asking for help from our good-natured heroes, needing their guns so she can put her zombie-infected sister out of her misery. But then it turns out to be a scam so they can get the guns off their prospective saviors, take their vehicle, and strand them in the middle of... well, Zombieland. Because they can't trust them. Need I point out the flaw in this plan?
Scenario 1--
Wichita: Mister, mister, help me, my sister's infected!
Trustworthy man: Don't worry, I'm sure I can take a moment from bringing kittens to the orphans I watch over to help you two in your hour of need.
Wichita: Ha ha! Sucker!
Scenario 2--
Wichita: Mister, mister, help--
Untrustworthy man: Suck the fuck up and get in the rape van!
And they've apparently done this multiple times, so there could be dozens of good Samaritans left defenseless in a zombie-infested wasteland because of our heroines. But hey, it's for a good cause... they want to go to an amusement park.
Everyone who doesn't look like Emma Stone, try committing a string of negligent homicides to get to Disneyland and tell me how that works out for you.
So, she and her sister as set up as being, you know, these badasses who can make fools out of the heroes, and yet every time we see them, they need to be rescued. First, the initial scam, then the perfectly functional vehicle they just stole breaks down and they need to hijack the heroes again. Finally, they split from the heroes and go to their beloved amusement park, where they attract a million zombies and have to be rescued yet again. So, really, they're pathetic, and them repeatedly outwitting the heroes doesn't make them comedically superior, it just makes the heroes look even more pathetic.
It seems I've somehow made a habit of hoping Emma Stone characters get thrown off bridges.
Tl;dr - A basic bitch is the commonly used derogatory meaning of bitch.
2. The "fierce bitch."
If you're co-starring with Lucy Lawless, it's a safe bet you're not the HBIC.
A while back, feminists started reclaiming the word, with the popular definition changing to "Bitches get stuff done," as said by Tina Fey. Now, several of those miscategorized as HBIC are really fierce bitches. There's no shame in this--every HBIC once started out as a fierce bitch. But you can only have one HBIC in acanon ensemble. (This isn't a democracy, it's a cheerocracy.) So, for instance, we might say Jubilee is a fierce bitch. She gets stuff done and doesn't care what people think about her, but she isn't really in charge of the X-Men. That brings us to...
3. The "head bitch in charge."
Emma Frost has a little captain in her. No, she has ALL the captain in her.
Obviously, this requires no explanation, but remember: a HBIC must be in charge. If she can be ordered around as a matter of course, she isn't one.
Thank you for your time, and remember: HBIC > Fierce bitch > Basic bitch. Because the last thing a real HBIC would want is for just anyone to get to share the spotlight.
ETA: I.e. "I'm so worried about the next Batman movie. Catwoman is such a fierce bitch, but I'm worried that Anne Hathaway playing her will come off as a basic bitch. I wish Eva Green had gotten the part. EvaGreen!Catwoman would've been such a HBIC."
I'm not laying blame for this. HBIC is a good and useful term, and in many cases its use is apt. Then you have people calling Adam Lambert a HBIC. Ahem. Adam Lambert was on American Idol and he lost. If he was in charge of not winning American Idol, then he'd have a shot, but that slot already belongs to William Hung.
Now, to fix the overuse of HBIC, we must first define it. To be a HBIC, you must be A. In charge. B. A bitch. C. Head. Which is really the same thing as in charge, so clearly this term was coined by someone who hated editors. So we must separate HBIC from two other, equally important categories of bitch.
1. The "basic bitch."
Note: This is also what the Winchesters mean when they call each other "a little bitch." They're saying, subtextually, "You are Emma Stone's character from Zombieland." A dire insult.
Okay, I had to scour a bit for a female character I actually loathe who isn't Lana Lang, because that is so played out, so I'll go with Emma Stone's character from Zombieland. Now, I like the actress, but good god, is her character a bitch. Okay, set-up: She's introduced asking for help from our good-natured heroes, needing their guns so she can put her zombie-infected sister out of her misery. But then it turns out to be a scam so they can get the guns off their prospective saviors, take their vehicle, and strand them in the middle of... well, Zombieland. Because they can't trust them. Need I point out the flaw in this plan?
Scenario 1--
Wichita: Mister, mister, help me, my sister's infected!
Trustworthy man: Don't worry, I'm sure I can take a moment from bringing kittens to the orphans I watch over to help you two in your hour of need.
Wichita: Ha ha! Sucker!
Scenario 2--
Wichita: Mister, mister, help--
Untrustworthy man: Suck the fuck up and get in the rape van!
And they've apparently done this multiple times, so there could be dozens of good Samaritans left defenseless in a zombie-infested wasteland because of our heroines. But hey, it's for a good cause... they want to go to an amusement park.
Everyone who doesn't look like Emma Stone, try committing a string of negligent homicides to get to Disneyland and tell me how that works out for you.
So, she and her sister as set up as being, you know, these badasses who can make fools out of the heroes, and yet every time we see them, they need to be rescued. First, the initial scam, then the perfectly functional vehicle they just stole breaks down and they need to hijack the heroes again. Finally, they split from the heroes and go to their beloved amusement park, where they attract a million zombies and have to be rescued yet again. So, really, they're pathetic, and them repeatedly outwitting the heroes doesn't make them comedically superior, it just makes the heroes look even more pathetic.
It seems I've somehow made a habit of hoping Emma Stone characters get thrown off bridges.
Tl;dr - A basic bitch is the commonly used derogatory meaning of bitch.
2. The "fierce bitch."
If you're co-starring with Lucy Lawless, it's a safe bet you're not the HBIC.
A while back, feminists started reclaiming the word, with the popular definition changing to "Bitches get stuff done," as said by Tina Fey. Now, several of those miscategorized as HBIC are really fierce bitches. There's no shame in this--every HBIC once started out as a fierce bitch. But you can only have one HBIC in a
3. The "head bitch in charge."
Emma Frost has a little captain in her. No, she has ALL the captain in her.
Obviously, this requires no explanation, but remember: a HBIC must be in charge. If she can be ordered around as a matter of course, she isn't one.
Thank you for your time, and remember: HBIC > Fierce bitch > Basic bitch. Because the last thing a real HBIC would want is for just anyone to get to share the spotlight.
ETA: I.e. "I'm so worried about the next Batman movie. Catwoman is such a fierce bitch, but I'm worried that Anne Hathaway playing her will come off as a basic bitch. I wish Eva Green had gotten the part. EvaGreen!Catwoman would've been such a HBIC."
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no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 11:02 pm (UTC)~points at icon~ She's a hostage/recent helicopter crash victim in that scene. She escaped using a cup of tea.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-08 08:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-08 08:15 pm (UTC)"Our Keepers will find them wherever you take them."
"Your Keepers are dead all over my house. Do you have any more?"
no subject
Date: 2011-02-07 11:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-08 02:18 pm (UTC)Emma Frost vs. Mystique. I rest my case. (Okay, in comics I don't think they have ever fought. Also, in comics, Mystique has never teamed up with Magneto. Actually she fought him, and her team, under her leadership, kicked his ass, and he had to be rescued by the X-Men, so by definition Mystique is an HBIC. Thus, Emma Frost vs. Mystique would be HBIC vs. HBIC. And also, something that needs to happen, yesterday.)
I would also imagine that Captain Janeway is (or can be) an HBIC, despite being part of a chain of command and having people who can give her orders, because 90% of her canon involves her being so far away from anyone who can give her orders that she is solely in charge. Admiral Necheyev is not the top brass head of Starfleet and even if she was Starfleet takes its marching orders from the civilian leader of the Federation, but she is most definitely an HBIC, because every time we *see* her she is a bitch who is giving orders (that being said, about half the time her orders are stupid. The other half the time, they are much smarter than whatever it was Picard or Sisko wanted to do instead.) T'Pau of Vulcan is totally an HBIC, but so is the fanfic version of the Romulan Commander (the actual version got pwned by Spock because she wanted some hot Vulcan lovin', which disqualifies her).
So while I do mostly agree with your categorization strata, the fact is that just because Woman A is at the top of her own hierarchy and cannot be given orders by anyone does not invalidate the existence of Woman B at the top of *her* own hierarchy. They just can't be both part of the same hierarchy. And whether a woman is HBIC or not varies depending on where she is in her own canon, also; Emma has taken marching orders from Charles Xavier and from Sebastian Shaw, at various points in canon, and lets her husband tell her what to do on occasion, due to the fact that he is not a moron and she wouldn't have married him if he was. (Actually, are they married? Scott and Emma are so much better for each other than Scott and Jean ever were, I assume they're married, but given how long it took Scott and Jean to tie the knot it's quite possible they never got married.)
no subject
Date: 2011-02-08 05:32 pm (UTC)here from metafandom
Date: 2011-02-13 01:35 am (UTC)\0/
no subject
Date: 2011-02-13 05:23 am (UTC)If you're co-starring with Lucy Lawless, it's a safe bet you're not the HBIC.
In general, no. But Laura Frakking Roslin is. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laura_Roslin) Cylons. Out the airlock.
Also, what's your beef with the live-action Alice in Wonderland? There's one pretty big Crowning Moment of Awesome in it that stacks up to CMOAs in any other fandom you could name. It's a great movie. Is it as good as the original books by Lewis Carroll or the Disney movie? No, but it's not horrible and a lot of people like it.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-13 08:16 am (UTC)The devaluation has really irked me sometimes. "How is Rose Tyler a HBIC? How?" It's good to have the standards spelled out like this.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-14 03:41 am (UTC)