"Strong" Females, Again

[mark_asphodel]

I was planning to write about pie but this has been bugging me.

So today I was thinking about what specifically grates me about Phila. I have downright negative feelings toward her-- not merely "meh," but more like, "Sucks." As in, I feel kind of slighted when people do like her. Stupid but true.

I mean, I understand liking an underdeveloped character; witness my soft spot for Norne even before FE12 came out and gave her a bit more dialogue. I have headcanoned Norne to a crazy extent. Her brief turn on FE11's stage charmed me. So yeah, I completely get latching onto a character regardless of development or dimensionality.

But then I circled back to an essay on Disney characters that I read a few days ago and mostly did like but had some misgivings about.

I didn't see Tangled and was excited to see the essay writer referring to Rapunzel as an "astronomer"-- y'all mostly know that's my hobby, and what a cool hobby it is for girls, with a centuries-long list of females who made excellent contributions to the science. But then the writer indicated this "astronomer" business was a bit of a stretch:

"She makes an off-hand mention to tracking star patterns… even though she’s spent almost her entire life in a tower, very probably without any proper schooling.

In other words, she very well may have had to invent astronomy for her own purposes."

Off-hand mention? Very well may have? So, in other words, you (the writer) kind of... made it up? Like, it wasn't actually developed in the script, but it could've been inferred from a throwaway line, so you said "Good enough" and called her an astronomer?

Well, hooray for strong female characters then. :/

Same thing with Ariel. Again, from the tumblr essay:

"Going back to Ariel, I cannot stand the ‘joke’/criticism that Ariel abandoned her home and family ‘just for some guy.’ NO! There’s an entire fracking musical number about her desire to experience the surface world! She’s not just following a guy, but the movie seems to forget this just as the detractors do. Ariel has to be reduced by the need of the story to focus itself on a romantic plot and nothing else."

Welp, if the script and the creators dun dropped the ball, it's hard to expect consumers to give Ariel her due credit for being a halfway decent character.  I mean, I saw that film once, when I was... eleven?  Ariel sure as hell didn't make the kind of impression on me that, say, Gadget Hackwrench did.  I was mostly impressed she wasn't a glob of foam at the end of the film while Prince Eric boned some human lass.

Look, we have whole internet campaigns arranged around the idea that, say, shitty one-dimensional comic book women do NOT count as "strong characters" just because GRRL POWER labels on get slapped on a picture.  If Rapunzel isn't actually any sort of credible astronomer, slapping text on a picture doesn't make her one.  If Ariel is a potentially good female character who gets hosed in the script of her own film, well...

And that brings me back to Phila.  Aside from the sad fact that Mahnya, her predecessor from the SNES era, was better developed, Phila comes to us not in a primitive console game with limited dialogue options, or a lean remake of an ancient game, but in a new shiny game with oodles and oodles of text.  And the best IS could do with this badass competent female knight-- a leader, a key pillar of the Exalt's court-- was...

Not.  A.  Fucking.  Lot.

Even her death scene was shitty.  Mahnya got a drawn-out battle to the death with one of her fellow Angelic Knights, a rival turned traitor, and then got shot down by the scuzzball brother of two of your playable characters.  Phila... got popped by Risen.  And that was it. 

There's no resonance to getting popped by Risen.  Like a lot of FE13, it felt lazy and sloppy to me.  I felt I was supposed to care because The Mahnya died, not because a character I was actually given any reason whatsoever to like or connect with was now dead.  

Not good enough.  Rapunzel's kinda sorta maybe an astronomer off-screen in a way we don't see?  Not good enough.  Ariel's an anthropologist up until the script forgets it?  Not good enough.  Any more than the comic-book "STRONG CHARACTERS!!" I have repeatedly seen reviled on tumblr count as Good Enough.

Strong female character, yeah.  Guess I'll sit here admiring Norne, who doesn't pretend to be a damn thing more than the cute little nothing she is.  She gets more lines than half the cast in FE11 does anyway.

:/

Comments

[butthefuturerefused]

I've never understood what people like about Phila. I mean, there really isn't a lot to say about her. Hell, I just looked up the script and CTRL+F'd my way through it.

- Chapter 1: She apologizes to Chrom for failing to intercept the Plegian brigands as they crossed the border.
- Chapter 2: Absent.
- Chapter 3: Absent, but Sumia mentions that Phila taught her that pegasi are weak to arrows.
- Chapter 4: She brings the news to Emmeryn, Chrom and co. that Maribelle has been taken hostage by Gangrel and his troops after they get across the border (again). She also tries briefly to convince Emmeryn not to parley with Gangrel, knowing how pointless a move it is.
- Chapter 5: Absent.
- Chapter 6: Apologizes to Chrom for failing in her duty and allowing Plegian troops to get into the castle. Um...
- Chapter 7: Talks to Cordelia about the deaths of her fellows, tries and fails to convince Emmeryn not to walk into a trap (again), and turns out to have told Sumia that slapping people solves problems.
- Chapter 8: Absent.
- Chapter 9: Dies to some random zombie archer after being freed by Basilio.

So, really, what is there to say about Phila? She comes across as appropriately cynical with regards to politics but uniformly incompetent when it comes to her job. ...And that's it. We don't know anything about what her relationship with Emmeryn is like -- her interactions with Emmeryn are limited to telling her when she's about to do something stupid -- and she only speaks to Chrom when she's apologizing for her or her organization's latest slip-up.

The game doesn't give me a reason to care about Phila, beyond feeling vaguely sorry for her. She's a character so forgettable, and ultimately insignificant, that she's the only character who dies in FE13 and isn't subsequently revived by the wonders of Spotpass, apart from Validar, and he's the villain.

[raphiael]

Yeah, I'm with this post. I think the only thing actual-canon-Phila has going for her is that she doesn't get resurrected to fawn over Robin, which is less that she's too strong for that and more that she's not important enough.

I like the idea of an awesome lady knight protecting her strong, independent queen. But I couldn't possibly raise Phila or Emmeryn as remotely close to good representation. Phila's a one-note pretty face who gets offed to demonstrate just how bad Gangrel is, and that's pretty unfortunate. Emmeryn gets all this setup of awesome queendom, but what she's recovering Ylisse from is flat out ignored, and the bulk of her is those awful Robin supports with a big side of Chrom sads.

There's definitely this movement of latching onto any agency or capability outside flat-damsel for female characters. And, I mean, I get it. But I feel like when things cross from wishing things were more pronounced to praising these grasps at straws as actual progression, that's when you have to take a step back.

(Do people actually seriously praise Phila for these things? I've seen her raised as "proof that Awakening isn't sexist", I guess?)

[the_geek]

Wait, people give a shit about Awakening's story? News to me.

I honestly get pretty fed up whenever someone brings out the "Strong Female Character" card. Maybe it's because I'm a guy and I just don't understand the desire for a female character to look up to, I don't know. I definitely appreciate strong female characters, and they do usually become some of my favorite characters in a series, but I don't feel utterly devastated when there isn't a strong female character there.

I would like to point out that what seems to be the ideal of a "Strong Female Character" seems to basically be a guy with a vagina (ie: Sully). So, for calling themselves feminists, they sure do seem to be intent on stamping out femininity.

Edit: I apologize if this post makes me sound pretentious, I assure you that I have nothing against the feminist movement.

[mark_asphodel]

Maybe it's because I'm a guy and I just don't understand the desire for a female character to look up to, I don't know.

I'd say that's part of it.

I would like to point out that what seems to be the ideal of a "Strong Female Character" seems to basically be a guy with a vagina (ie: Sully)

Sadly true, which was why a character like Gadget Hackwrench was so revelatory when I was in elementary school. She was brilliant but not a snot about it, kind but definitely capable of being angered, resourceful but sometimes impractical, wore pants but wasn't afraid to wear them in nice pastel lavender, and was admired by men but never defined by them. When I put on my purple workboots every day, in a sense I'm still honoring Gadget.

Edit: I apologize if this post makes me sound pretentious, I assure you that I have nothing against the feminist movement.

I would hope not. I rather prefer a world in which I get to work and maintain my own identity to one in which a company could fire me for simply being married and I turn into "Mrs X" the moment the papers get signed.

[mark_asphodel]

So, really, what is there to say about Phila? She comes across as appropriately cynical with regards to politics but uniformly incompetent when it comes to her job.

Yeah, that's the other thing. I'd forgotten how badly she sucks at her job. At least (again) in Mahnya's case you see her saving Sigurd's own ass before Pamela/Andrei do her in.

[raphiael]

The "Strong Female Character" term has come to mean, in common parlance, a woman with traditionally masculine traits. Like Sully. But the problem is more than "strength" in the traditional sense. It's actual development. When all the men in a work have motives and goals and ideals and arcs and the women are just sort of there, or have none of those things that aren't around a man, that's when the trouble starts. And it's not just trouble for women who want to see themselves; it's trouble for anyone who appreciates decently written characters in general.

The reason it gets focused on women isn't just arbitrary Because Feminism, or trying to "eliminate femininity". Nobody's saying "feminine" characters are inherently bad. It's characters who exist only as accessories for men, which is often the only way women end up in a work at all. And often those "masculine" women end up getting the exact same result, but with some lip service about punching things slapped on top.

[butthefuturerefused]

I would have been fascinated if this was actually build into her characterization as a recruitable character. I'm a little fuzzy on whether there's a knight-who-failed-their-lord archetype in the series, but I don't particularly care; her past failures would have made her human and made for some interesting if predictable supports with Chrom and Lissa. She certainly would have been a damn sight more interesting alive than dead.

[mark_asphodel]

When all the men in a work have motives and goals and ideals and arcs and the women are just sort of there, or have none of those things that aren't around a man, that's when the trouble starts.

And this is part of why many (including the essay-writer) aren't pleased by Merida in Brave. Okay, she doesn't want to be married according to custom. What does she want? What role in society does she want to fill? Does she want anything? Apparently not? It's not as if she didn't want to be married because (gasp!) she wanted to become, say, take religious vows. I don't expect to see that in a Disney flick any time this quarter-century, but at least that would be a goal.

[mark_asphodel]

I'm a little fuzzy on whether there's a knight-who-failed-their-lord archetype in the series

Kind of. You have Abel betraying Marth in FE3, you have Harken's spectacular mess of a life in FE7, and those are both knights to your own Lord character and not, you know, turncoat invading wyvern knights.

You also have knight-type characters who didn't quite *fail* so much as they beat themselves up over things that happened because the plot said so-- there's Fiora in FE7, and FE11/12 Cain comes to mind, as does the way Oifaye and Finn both express regret over not being with Sigurd and Cuan respectively when the apocalypse happened. Since FE13 is awfully bad at acknowledging the actual failures of its characters I'm sure Phila would be treated more like the latter group.

Hell, Cordelia gets that exact treatment in-game as it is, and it's crap and I hated it from the moment they started playing that card.

[butthefuturerefused]

The whole thing about Cordelia's dead unit that was threaded throughout some of her supports bothered me quite a bit, since it's addressed in her introductory chapter (arguably the one thing Phila does right). Obviously she wasn't going to just "get over it," but it bothered me that it ended up being one of the three legs of her character (unrequited love for Chrom, good at everything, and this).

It leaves me wondering how Cain's situation would be addressed if FE11 had featured supports. Would he have waxed tragic about having failed his king on the field of battle, or something? I'm willing to bet that, at the least, survivor's guilt would have been one of his defining character traits.

[the_geek]

I'm sorry, I was a bit brain fried at the time when I made that post. I think your post helps me understand the problem much better, thank you. I hadn't really thought about the whole "women as accessories to the men" angle before.

Again, I didn't mean to sound anti-feminist when I made that comment, I just have trouble explaining myself in these situations.

[the_geek]

I would hope not. I rather prefer a world in which I get to work and maintain my own identity to one in which a company could fire me for simply being married and I turn into "Mrs X" the moment the papers get signed.

Hey, I grew up in a household consisting of me, my sister, a working mom, and a stay-at-home dad, so I always support women's right to work.

I was born a little late to fully appreciate your Gadget Hackwrench reference (I know who the character is, but I only watched very little of the show) but I get what you're saying. Something like that's rare even in male characters.

[kyusil]

Re: Brave, this is an essay I always like to bring up when the film gets put under the gun over not being feminist enough. The marriage issue got played up big in the trailers but it's really not a huge part of the movie. I'm a little disappointed that Brave was never given credit for having its female protagonist actually make a mistake completely of her own volition and have to fix it herself.

(ETA: I thought about this a little bit and I guess the same argument could be made for Ariel, sort of? But at the same time, you don't really get a recognition of responsibility with Ariel. Whatever, that essay says everything way better than I can.)

It's not a flawless movie by any means, and it seems like its development had a lot of problems, but I honestly think a lot of the reviewers were just bummed that Merida wasn't Katniss.

[thenicochan]

I think Emmeryn is pretty interesting, in her own way. She's got the whole Martyr Queen thing going for her, but I always felt the game was pushing that she was trying to keep up that "mask" so she would serve her people well.

[thenicochan]

On that article: Never saw Brave, but I fully agree with the thoughts on Tiana, who is one of my favorite Disney characters. Ever.

Rapunzel shows an interest in astronomy, kinda. I think she’s a good character, and her biggest desire isn’t to get a man, but to be free of her (literal) ivory tower prison, and get away from her “mother”’s oppressive reign. I like the character. I think she’s interesting as a “female character”, but yeah…calling her an astronomer is kind of a stretch.

Ariel…well, she’s the kind of character I think is likable and very charming, but I am in the camp 100% of selling herself for a generic dude she barely knows.

I actually had to look up Phila, because I couldn’t remember who the hell she was.

…Yeah.


On a slightly related note, I hate that we even have to argue about "Strong Female Characters" I wish we could just...have...them. Y'know what I mean? And then people argue exactly what traits constitute as "strong" and just...yikes. Though I guess all our ladies can't be badass in battle, politics, and still retain their femininity like Remake!Ceada.

[raphiael]

Oh, Emmeryn's interesting, for sure, but the game just doesn't do anything with her. It sets all of it up, but then throws it out and never really goes back to it. And the whole barely-speaking amnesiac thing is just unforgivable. They had that opportunity to flesh her out more, to actually explore her, and instead they rob her of every scrap of agency and authority she had in order to make her dependent on Robin for recovery.

[mark_asphodel]

On a slightly related note, I hate that we even have to argue about "Strong Female Characters" I wish we could just...have...them. Y'know what I mean? And then people argue exactly what traits constitute as "strong" and just...yikes.

Well, I think most people would actually be satisfied with "well-developed" female characters and we can't even get that. If the need was being met on a visceral level, I doubt AS many people would be arguing over the details of what we're not getting. Some people ain't never gonna be happy but there you are.

[mark_asphodel]

It's not a flawless movie by any means, and it seems like its development had a lot of problems, but I honestly think a lot of the reviewers were just bummed that Merida wasn't Katniss.

Really couldn't care less about Hunger Games, but as far as Brave goes, the trailers were so off-putting in every conceivable way that there was no way I'd consider spending money on it, Pixar be damned. Honestly, even the puff pieces around the time of its release seemed to be more focused on what went into making Merida's hair realistic than anything else, which wasn't much of an enticement.

[mark_asphodel]

but it bothered me that it ended up being one of the three legs of her character (unrequited love for Chrom, good at everything, and this).

I think it was all in the execution. The Chrom angle was not done well or convincingly. The "perfect" angle was not done well. And the lone-survivor angle was done even less well and was the very first thing that got on my nerves. Cordelia felt cobbled together from tropes we'd already seen in more sympathetic characters.

It leaves me wondering how Cain's situation would be addressed if FE11 had featured supports. Would he have waxed tragic about having failed his king on the field of battle, or something? I'm willing to bet that, at the least, survivor's guilt would have been one of his defining character traits.

I think so. That's what made his demeanor in FE12 so bizarre to me at first, though apparently if you do get to his A-support with Kris, it's finally addressed. The C and B supports showcase him in a totally different light (a Training Freak one, alas), but I guess Cain turns out to be an example of a "failed" knight eventually who moves on with his life... and I suppose we should be happy about that.

[amielleon]

Brave's main storyline is about a mother-daughter reconciliation which imo is a pretty big deal. Her refusal to marry is framed in terms of defying society's and her mother's wishes. She doesn't particularly have ambitions other than wanting to continue to fuck around with a bow, but the interesting thing is that Brave doesn't play Princess Jasmine with her, but rather reminds us of why society's expectations existed in the first place and the important role her mother fills that she will have to succeed--while maintaining that doing so doesn't necessarily mean submitting to every sexist detail of protocol. It's an interesting arc. (I don't think the story was told very well, but the story itself is interesting.)

[amielleon]

Ironically a lot of feminists themselves rebel against the (Masculinely) Strong Female Character ideal. Ever seen that Hark! A Vagrant comic?

Incidentally I think Tellius did an excellent job of including female characters who transgressed expectations in a number of ways while retaining their femininity. (Ammie likes Tellius, what else is news.)

[amielleon]

My reaction to reading about astronomer Rapunzel in this post was ???? And then: oh RIGHT she whips around her room on her hair, something about the stars, connected to her secret bloodline reveal somehow....

(It's really never important beyond "oh cute girl being adorable about her own unknown plot-importance." From what little I can recall, she displays some impressive knowledge, but it never matters.)

And I think that's the key thing here. Phila could say she has a sister and we wouldn't necessarily care, unless said sister showed up to mourn her death. Phila could indirectly save our lives, but unless someone connects the lines for Chrom no one notices. I think it's really significant that Mahnya is mourned on-screen by other people. It's like a laugh track effect, except for Phila it's an apathy track. No one really reacts when Phila dies except for a brief "Nooo, Phila!" reaction shot and people forget about her pretty quickly. Meanwhile Mahnya's remembered clear into the second generation by way of Fee's pegasus.

If--say, Cordelia--had shown themselves more affected by Phila's death I think we might have cared more. But then, I think having to pace the supports in a FE8 style (dissociated from the chapters of the game) while also not having base supports really hurt their abilities to have non-main characters remark on plot events of personal significance.

I mean, I'd still like to know what Henry and Tharja think about setting out to kill God.

[samuraiter]

(Maybe it says something that I'm impressed Phila got a unique character portrait, given how little she has to say and do in the game?)

[mark_asphodel]

(It's really never important beyond "oh cute girl being adorable about her own unknown plot-importance." From what little I can recall, she displays some impressive knowledge, but it never matters.)

Meh. Sounds like Merida isn't as bad as the OP bad her out to be and Rapunzel isn't nearly as good. Now, one might have been more satisfying than the other, but the whole reaching-for-straws thing on Rapunzel the Astronomer is... meh.

I think it's really significant that Mahnya is mourned on-screen by other people.

I almost brought that up but I haven't read all Cordelia's supports and didn't know if it came up in DLC somewhere. (Not that this would help with the actual game experience.) I'm not saying Cordy should've named her daughter "Phila" so we got the point, but yeah, a little detail like Fee naming her pegasus for her heroic aunt just resonates in a way the whole Phila business does not.

while also not having base supports really hurt their abilities to have non-main characters remark on plot events of personal significance.

Yeah, I think so. I mean, I'd still like to know what Henry and Tharja think about setting out to kill God.

Hah! Indeed.

[amielleon]

It's possible, but to my recollection this is the only mention:

Frederick: I was just thinking how little you have changed from when I knew you in Ylisse. Back when you served the royal pegasus knights. Always working harder than everyone and finding some task that needs doing... Phila once confessed to me that she'd have been lost without your help. I'm convinced it was her intention to eventually name you her successor. Cordelia: Phi-Phila said that?! Frederick: I envied her, in truth. I've often wished that I possessed a successor of your caliber. Cordelia: Come now, Frederick, sir! You go too far. People will get the wrong impression if they overhear such flattery. - C support

"oh phila said this, what a genius!" "s-she thought I was a genius!?"

Now this support does have to accommodate for the fact that Phila can be well and alive at the time, but if Phila is dead this certainly makes Cordelia seem apathetic and/or vain. Tellius had better solutions to references to dead people.