Slayers in the refrigerator

[seriousfic]

Okay, this feels slightly like throwing chum into the water while there's already a feeding frenzy going on. Certainly, there are people more worthy of getting this kind of umbrage than Joss Whedon, but I'm a firm believer that if there are rules, they have to be across the board. "He's Joss" isn't a defense or an excuse (for that matter, neither is "Padalecki and Ackles are hot," Supernatural fandom).



It's been a while since I've watched either BtVS or AtS, and I haven't kept current with either of their epilogue comic books, so feel free to correct me if I get something wrong. But with the recent fridging of Penny, let's have some fun and rehash old stuff that has probably been stated better elsewhere! However, I'm probably not as pretentious as those better-staters, and any excuse to be unaccountably bitchy snarky, right?

Now, believe it or not, I do agree with Joss's reasoning on Penny. There's a reason people are called supporting characters after all (although in a series that really has only three characters, coming from a well-known creator of shows with ensemble casts seven-strong, you could ask why they're not all main characters... someone like Moist would be a far more classic example of a supporting character). And the point of the original WiR list wasn't that bad stuff happened to women, it's that it happened so fucking often. But even by my own caveated standards, BtVS has some pretty whole-sale fridging.

At first glance, the Buffyverse has the classic "but EVERYONE has bad stuff happen to them, not just women!" defense. Sure, Tara dies, but Angel didn't have a picnic either, what with getting resurrected and going off to have his own show. And yeah, Anya died, but so did Spike... it took a whole hiatus for him to get better!

Hmm...

See, it seems like when men leave the show, they get to do it with their head held high, but when women leave the show, it's in body bags. Oz and Riley and Giles all get dignified exits, while Jenny Calender and Kendra and Cordelia die and stay dead.

Of course, this being sci-fi, you have some examples that are hard to categorize... in Angel, Lilah dies and is "resurrected" as a ghost, but then she disappears... mmm-kay? And Fred dies (and has her soul eaten up so she can't possibly be brought back... ouch), but the actress continues playing the character who usurped Fred's body. Now I feel like Wall-E trying to decide whether to put that spork with the spoons or with the fork.

Fun note: Yes, Wesley dies in the finale... then he comes back in Angel: After The Fall. As does Warren in Season Eight, surviving being flayed alive. Seeing a pattern?

Now yes, I know, I know, had the show not been cancelled, Fred would've cropped up in Illyria's personality. But if that counts, then what about the episode of Firefly where Inara was supposed to get gang-raped? And from the description, it's so that Mal can be the sensitive Cap'n with the heart of gold who learns that calling people whores is bad. No description is given of how Inara reacts to GETTING FUCKED BY AN ARMY OF PSYCHO CANNIBALS, ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME HERE? (Really, that whole idea is so strange I'm tempted to write it off as Minear trolling his own fandom. In which case, sir, you have nothing on gay Dumbledore.) If I learned one thing from the theme song to The Facts of Life, it's that you have to take the good and take the bad. That, and you'd be surprised how long people will femslash a show. Seriously, fics are still being written. To be that memorable, Jo and Blair must've been eyeshagging 24/7.

But I digress (frequently). There's also Joss Whedon's somewhat infamous plan for Tara to return if Amber Benson hadn't been such a big meanie about her character getting killed off so that Willow could become the Psycho Lesbian. So, has she shown up in the Buffy: Season Eight comics yet?

To be fair, this isn't true across the board. Buffy dies, twice, and comes back (although her name is in the title, so take that as far as it goes). And when Faith is put on a bus, it's through a coma so that she can later come back and (say it with me now) redeem herself. But I think there's a distressingly large ratio of men who go off to be awesome versus women who die tragically.

Before I get hate mail, I promise that the next time I do meta, I'll say some nice things about Serenity. Pinky swear.

Comments

[axolotl-lan.livejournal.com]

*snicker* trying to get in before the hate arrives. I well had issues when Angel and Buffy were first airing I loved it with such hatred. Basically, I would constantly need to remove myself from episodes of a certain nature, it took me three false starts to watch the evil willow season, because it seemed so excessive.
I loved the group dynamic and a good portion of the show I mean if you were to do a statistic of liked versus disliked episodes Joss' shows go pretty high on my list but there is something in parts of his execution I have a great distaste for that mostly appear in later seasons.
I sometimes think Joss has the same problem I found with the post OMG ROWLING IS QUEEN OF THE WORLD popularity thing where editors and such no longer question or edit as fully as they would have and instead bow and scrape to the superior genius and perfection of the creator.

and as the old adage goes absolute power corrupts absolutely and in the case of writers they can go overboard and or fall unto old habits without regard to their audience or that they are being repetitive and/or self-indulgent.

[hilandercs.livejournal.com]

High five amigo. Well said. Excellent points. For a guy who's known for his pro-women characters, there are some glaring issues with the way women exit his shows.

It's likely it's about Joss dealing with his mom dying when he was young. Writing out his issues and whatnot. ::shrug:: But that is speculation.

[sinanju.livejournal.com]

Aside from Jenny Calendar, who died in S1 or S2, I'd point out that the worst of what you complain about in BtVS happens post-S4. It's only after that big, honking sign of creative bankruptcy called Dawn is introduced that things get really awful. That's when Tara gets pointlessly killed, Willow gets "addicted to magic" and goes evil, Spike dies but comes back, Illyria kills Fred, that second magical groinfruit who instantly becomes the hero's raison d'etre Connor is introduced, and Cordelia killed off (all this happening in the same time frame as the post-Here's Dawn! era of Buffy.

When the writer has to introduce Cousin Oliver Dawn and Connor to give the hero/heroine a reason to live (because just saving the world, or their long-time friends at least, just doesn't do it anymore), you're in serious trouble.

[prozacpark.livejournal.com]

See, it seems like when men leave the show, they get to do it with their head held high, but when women leave the show, it's in body bags. Oz and Riley and Giles all get dignified exits, while Jenny Calender and Kendra and Cordelia die and stay dead. .

YES. I've been saying this forever, forever being around when Angel started. And, you know, it's sort of the case with every universe. People who complain and say, "Oh, but men die, too!" aren't reading into the gendered ways that the deaths themselves happen in these texts. Men die or get to leave as heroes; while women die the deaths of victims.

This last season of BSG with its many dead women hasn't pissed me off as much as Joss does for the simple reason that Joss claims to be a feminist. And, you know, I believe he is. But...he is also a male writer writing in a tradition of metanarratives where women have, for the most part, been given very limited types of roles, and his writing reflects that. It just...frustrates me that someone like Joss, who seems to be aware of feminist issues in the outside world, can be so blind to them in his own works.

[guestyperson.livejournal.com]

Whoa... I hadn't heard about that planned firefly ep. I'm sure it's hard to pass judgement, considering it'll never be actualised on screen, but I can't imagine how Joss could possibly have thought that would have been a good idea.

Also, it's kinda irritating how everyone seems to assume that all of Joss' works are feminist because he's a feminist, and they assume he's a feminist because all his works are. The fandom dogpile that results from anyone daring to question either of those two premises is astounding.