The Clone Cast is back! Circumstances and things have gotten in the way of their Clone Wars watching and Clone Cast podcasting. But they're still alive, still love you guys, and are still enamored with their own voices. So listen in as Nic and Josh talk about the big news in Star Wars, the announcement of J.J. Abrams as the director of Episode VII. They also talk about Star Trek (big surprise).
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Runtime: 2 hours, 25 minutes, 7 seconds
All right, guys, I have a little bit of a bone to pick with this episode. It has to do with something we all know, and I don't think being "enlightened" has anything to do with it, though I'm sure there are those who feel they are simply because they voice their opinion on this issue.
ReplyDeleteBut, yes, it would be a major step if the ST had a female protagonist as its lead. Because, let's face it, women are underrepresented in Star Wars, at least in the six movies.
Before I get into that, I do have to say that Nic, you have a point about those with physical and mental handicaps also being underrepresented in the media in general. Most of the physically disabled were paralyzed in some way. Very few characters are born with physical disabilities in the media. The one that comes to mind is Geordi LaForge, who you note has sensory disability, a handicap that we see more frequently when that population is represented at all. On the mental side, individuals with Down Syndrome seem to be the go-to. Outside of them, our disabled population needs to have more characters to represent them.
With respect to all of you, though, women make up half of the world's population and over half in the U.S. if I'm not mistaken. It should be a given that they're playing a larger part in fiction, and in this case Star Wars as well.
It's true that the six films have a handful of capable female protagonists that are themselves great characters. Leia and Padme are obvious. Padme's handmaiden Sabe played a key part in TPM, Schmi was a wonderful mother the way Beru seemed to be to Luke, AOTC gave us a female bounty hunter with Zam, and Mon Mothma has a single scene where she leads the Alliance. But you have to think about those characters to remember some of them. How easy is it to just rattle off major male characters? Try is: Luke, Han, Anakin, Ben, Mace, Yoda, Palpatine, Nute Gunray, Panaka, Typho, Jar Jar, Boss Nass, Dooku, Jabba, Boba Fett, Jango Fett, Lando, Chewie, Threepio, Qui-Gon, Grievous, Watto, Wedge, Biggs, Dack, etc, etc, etc. I honestly couldn't even think of a non-Padme speaking role for another woman in ROTS. Maybe you guys can fill me in on that one.
And the thing is, it doesn't even need to be a deal. There's no reason to even call attention to it. I think The Clone Wars has shown that easily. Ahsoka, Sugi, Bo-Katan, Aayla, Shaak-Ti, Luminara; All characters who could have easily been male, where attention is not in any way paid to their species or gender, they're just there. And there's no reason this can't be done with the ST, with the protagonist and/or multiple major, supporting characters.
It's not about being enlightened or modern or progressive. I just think that little girls should be able to watch a Star Wars movie and see characters they can look up to, they can play as and pretend to be. They deserve a Leia, an Ahsoka, a Mara, and even yes, even an Aurra and Ventress in the new films.
See you out there,
Mr. X