IN a world of damsels in distress and scantily clad super heroines, there exists one girl above the rest. One girl with a big. freaking. scythe.
Maka Albarn, of the series Soul Eater is a typical school girl, whose teachers instruct her not in the subjects of algebra and English, but in how to fight evil and defeat madness personified. In essence it is a school for super heroes, but what I found most interesting was the fact that there are two categories of student. Those that are masters and those that are weapons.
Maka Albarn is the wielder of her best friend named Soul, who has the ability to transform himself into a scythe. As you may or may not know, scythes are notoriously hard to wield, and even worse for defending oneself. Yet
Maka shows a proficiency beyond her years and she, along with Soul, are star students of their year. To me,
Maka and Soul's relationship is the epitome of equal partners. A sword cannot wield itself, and a master cannot fight without his/her weapon. But even though
Maka is a strong, confident, and somewhat conservative girl, her friend/weapon Soul often teases her about her
lack of sexuality, and constantly compares her to their mutual friend Blair, the witch cat, who, while sexy, ends up being one of the weaker characters in the series. Does a high sexuality equal less power and vice
versa and are Soul's teasings the manifestations of sexism or simply a schoolboy crush?
Episode 1:
Notable Moments:
00:00-2:53 the opening
04:25-05:46 the fight
06:50-7:37 the flat chested joke
09:10-09:30 the witch cat Blair (NSFW)
16:06-19:40 the resolution/anti-climax
P.S. feel free to watch the whole episode. Its a great way to procrastinate :3
I think you bring up a very good point in your first question: “Does a high sexuality equal less power?” In my opinion, high sexuality equals less super hero power, but equals more publicity power. From what I saw in the Femforce clip, the more attractive and more naked the girls were, the less skills they had. For example, Ms. Victory, who has wavy blonde hair and wears a tiny and revealing leotard, is in charge of making American soldiers super-strong. General Roberta Strock who quite contrarily has a crew cut, a stern face, and wears a suit and tie, is “a strong, intelligent and capable African American woman” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wU2n2O1U8BE 2:37). As commented above, the more sexual and attractive super heroines, although they have less power, sell more comics.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with what Liz said. It seems to be the case that women who are less sexualized in their depiction have greater strength and power in the world of the pop culture. If you take this idea out of the world of pop culture and into everyday life, the statement still pretty much applies. Obviously not with super human power, but girls who are very athletic, for example, softball players, are typically described as "butch," not sexy. That said, they carry more physical strength (usually) than the 'sexy' girl who would stereotypically be the one all the boys lust after. Wonder woman poses an interesting situation in that she portays a little bit of both. She is absolutely muscular and different than the other ladies around her, but she is still dressed in skimpy clothing, completely unrealistic for fighting crime. She takes elements of both sides and brings them together in one.
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