30 Day Female Character Challenge Day 1

[uberreiniger]

I've tried these 30 day memes before and I haven't lasted to the end of one yet but this one really excites me so I'm going to give it another go.

30 Day Female Characters Challenge

Day One: Favorite lead female character
Day Two: Favorite supporting female character
Day Three: A female character you hated but grew to love
Day Four: A female character you relate to
Day Five: Favorite female character on a male-driven show
Day Six: Favorite female-driven show
Day Seven: A female character that needs more screen time
Day Eight: Favorite female character in a comedy show
Day Nine: Favorite female character in a drama show
Day Ten: Favorite female character in a scifi/supernatural show
Day Eleven: Favorite female character in a children’s show
Day Twelve: Favorite female character in a movie
Day Thirteen: Favorite female character in a book
Day Fourteen: Favorite older female character
Day Fifteen: Favorite female character growth arc
Day Sixteen: Favorite mother character
Day Seventeen: Favorite warrior female character
Day Eighteen: Favorite non-warrior female character
Day Nineteen: Favorite non-human female character
Day Twenty: Favorite female antagonist
Day Twenty-One: Favorite female character screwed over by canon
Day Twenty-Two: Favorite female character you love but everyone else hates
Day Twenty-Thre: Favorite female platonic relationship
Day Twenty-Four: Favorite female romantic relationship
Day Twenty-Five: Favorite mother/daughter and/or sister relationship
Day Twenty-Six: Favorite classical female character (from pre-20th century literature or mythology or the like)
Day Twenty-Seven: A female character you have extensive personal canon for
Day Twenty-Eight: Favorite female writer (television, books, movies, etc.)
Day Twenty-Nine: A female-centric fic rec
Day Thirty: Whatever you’d like!

Day One: Favorite lead female character I actually had to think about this one for a minute. It's always a bad sign when you have to think about what your favorite is, right? In my case though it's because there are so many female characters I admire rather than too few. In the end I think I'm going to have to give the credit to Ellen Ripley of the Aliens franchise. I haven't been an obsessive Aliens fan in a long time but Ripley stuck with me at an early age and I firmly believe carried the DNA which all my other favorite heroines are imparted with and maybe a little Alien Queen DNA too.

Ripley is just such a subversion, she's really a very transgressive character in terms of the conventions of fiction. She's a nobody with nothing to recommend her for saving the day yet she manages to keep her head while the trained, manly leader types are losing theirs and just knuckles down and does what needs to be done. I saw Alien at a time when a woman being the ultimate hero in a science fiction piece just wasn't done, or at least not done quite like that. In the final scene she is battling a literal walking rape metaphor in her panties yet there is no attempt to eroticize the situation. And there isn't any need to. She remains a real person even against the most surreal of odds.

Ripley follows a truly mythic arc in the films. In Aliens she is a benevolent mother figure to the Queen's entropic subversion of womanhood. She descends into the nether realms and even comes back as a sort of resurrected god-figure. And she does it all without losing her wry, sarcastic blue collar attitude. She'd really like to just go home and have a beer but these damn aliens just keep fucking up her day.

It goes without saying that what makes Ripley so powerful is 1% good writing and 110% Sigourney Weaver's portrayal. She was the right actress at the right time to make that character happen and as an artist I'll always be grateful to her. Her work has impacted me more than I probably realized.

Comments

[lucretiasheart.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah. I totally agree. I LOVE Sigourney Weaver as Ripley. And I've always admired that character and how she portrayed her. I think you hit it perfectly here.

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

I believe she's said she won't return to the role because "no one wants to see a sixty-something Ripley." I would!

[lucretiasheart.livejournal.com]

I know! Seriously.

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

Very much depends on the role/story. I actually very much liked parts of A:R, but there were parts that didn't need to be there. I can see them REALLY screwing it up.