WARNING: SPOILERS BELOW! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK, IDJIT!
Supernatural is back with a bang… well, more of a whimper. Even though I haven’t been Supernatural’s biggest fan in the last few seasons, I still thought the premiere would be exciting, somewhere under all the misogyny and white characters. But the premiere ended up raising more questions than it answered, and not in a plotty way, either. Spoilers after the jump!
Watch out, world. In just one short week, Supernatural will be returning to a television or computer near you for its tenth season. “But how?!” I hear you saying. “How did they get a tenth season?!”
Nobody knows how. They probably made a deal.
I often revisit old columns to get ideas for new posts, and Lady Geek Girl’s post on the magic in Welcome to Night Vale is one that’s stuck with me for a while. The strange and popular podcast Welcome to Night Vale makes the abnormal normal, and uses it to critique some of the ideas we have about our society. If you’ve heard any of the Night Vale episodes, you’ll know that Night Vale is the weirdest place ever, full of carnivorous librarians, dog parks with no dogs, and strange floating cats. (Also, actual diversity in its cast. Hah.) Possibly the only normal thing about Night Vale is Cecil and Carlos’s relationship, and the storytelling focuses on this more than it does the abnormal, things. The audience thus gets the reinforced message that yes, the entire world is crazy, but this gay relationship is normal, disabled people should be treated with respect, pronoun choice should be followed, and racism shouldn’t be tolerated. It’s really shockingly effective. And the interesting thing is, when you take this idea and turn it around—when you make the normal abnormal—you can teach lessons and explore characters just as effectively.
Spoilers for Supernatural and Doctor Who below.
WARNING: SPOILERS BELOW! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK, IDJIT!
This week’s episode started off with probably the most awkward conversation between Dean and Sam (and Ezekiel) to date, so it could really only go up from that point. Spoilers after the jump.
When I get a break and can sit down and actually enjoy myself on Tumblr, I often find myself getting angry at many of the things that are posted and reblogged in my fandoms. There are many things that piss me off, but recently it’s been the extreme gender roles and sexism against certain male characters. That’s right—the feminist is going to talk about sexism against men.
I have always believed that sexism affects men as much as women, but in very different ways. Men, just like women, are forced into gender roles and societal expectations that they don’t necessarily want. When teaching feminist theology to my college students, I tried to point out to the men (because I always felt no one else was) that they should be just as insulted by sexism and gender roles as the women. After classes, many of my male students approached me to say that they were angry about the gender roles men were placed into. They felt they had to always be tough—not necessarily physically strong, but that they always had to act macho and unaffected by everything. They felt threatened and uncomfortable by ideas that claimed men couldn’t be loving or nurturing as fathers; that they shouldn’t say anything about it if they felt (or were) sick. They felt pressured to avoid asking for help or working toward peaceful compromises, but rather, felt that they must always be the aggressive loner who does his own thing. These are all roles that greatly influence men’s lives today.
So what does this have to do with fandoms? Well, masculine gender roles often results in stereotyped male characters like Dean Winchester, Batman, Derek Hale, and Wolverine, whom fandoms love and think are awesome. Now, granted, many of the characters I just listed have a lot of depth. Dean, for example, really grows and develops as a character (at least in the first five seasons), so it’s not that I think these characters are necessarily negative stereotypes. What bothers me is how fandom reacts to other male characters that don’t fit the typical male stereotype.
For this post I’m going to talk about the three male characters I see picked on the most by fans: Sam Winchester, Superman, and Scott McCall. I always said these three characters need to sit down and get a drink together because it really makes no sense that the fandom hates them as much as they seem to. Of course, none of this means that the entire fandom hates a certain character, but that enough people hate a character that the rest of the fandom starts to notice it and see it as a problem. (I really should point out that characters like Superman, Sam Winchester, and Scott McCall are also male stereotypes of a different sort, but that is a post for another time.) For now, let’s look at why these characters are so hated.
WARNING: SPOILERS BELOW! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK, IDJIT!
Let’s just get into it, shall we? Spoilers after the jump.
WARNING: SPOILERS BELOW! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK, IDJIT!
Okay, so for all that this episode was above and beyond upsetting to all of my feels ever, it was also really good. Remind me to shake Robbie Thompson’s hand if I ever meet him—he’s not written a crappy episode yet.
WARNING: SPOILERS BELOW! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK, IDJIT!
Howdy, y’all! Saika here, filling in for Lady Geek Girl’s usual weekly Supernatural review.
This week’s episode was chock full of interesting stuff, both for plot-development reasons and for our boys’ characters. What happens when Henry Winchester, John’s father, jumps out of your closet? Well, apparently a hell of a lot of backstory falls out after him. Continue reading
WARNING: SPOILERS BELOW! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK, IDJIT!
Well, Supernatural is back and so are my reviews. I’ll admit it I was excited for tonight’s episode. So far season eight has been excellent, but now the reviews are going to get harsher. Why?
Before the mid-season finale, I tend to give the show the benefit of the doubt. I assume that things I’m on the fence about will be fixed in the second half of the season. When things don’t appear to be headed in that direction I start to get pissed.
My current concern is Supernatural‘s female characters and the direction they’re headed.
Now here we are at the last and final installment of this little series. I looked at the accusations that Supernatural is sexist and racist, and now it’s time for the last question: is Supernatural homophobic?
Supernatural has been accused of being homophobic by fans and non-viewers alike. This is sometimes because of the actual portrayal of gay characters in the show, but sometimes because of fan pairings. Fans have also accused Supernatural of not being daring enough with certain characters’ sexualities when they have the opportunity to. So let’s take a look at homosexuality in Supernatural to figure this all out.
Lady Geek Girl and Friends 