flemmings | (no subject)

Back in the days when I still had hormones, Day 1 was always a write-off, so if I had the leisure (ie if it was a weekend) I simply called it a write-off. Lay on sofa with hot water bottle and Johnson cocktail and a good manga, had occasional recourse to electric cramp-removal device, assumed I'd accomplish nothing, nado nado. This made the experience much pleasanter and occasionally allowed me to accomplish stuff.

I shall adopt the same approach to July. To be survived, not utilized (even when, as this year so far, it hasn't pulled any ten-day 37+C endurance trials.) Thus your external link for the day:

Here. Mostly about live action women, fandom being as it is.

And this from the comments, succinct statement of common knowledge

I suppose the problem overall is that if a man has a flaw then he's a flawed character, while if a woman has a flaw she's a flawed woman. So maybe in fandom we feel like we can't afford to tolerate "weak" female characters, because there is a tendency for a character who's a woman or member of a minority to be seen by people who are not women or members of that minority as standing for the character's whole perceived group.

But people actually liked Troi and Crusher? That live action staple, the fraught thin woman, is so not my thing. Down-to-earth Drinks-With-Klingons Pulaski all the way for me. Thing being, Syrtis in her own (Australian I believe) voice is marvellous, but as Troi she went all tight-voiced and flat, as though being strangled. I kept wanting to tell her to breathe from the diaphragm and put some resonance in there. It's my quarrel with American TV: the tight white female voice that speaks from no lower than the upper throat. Thin, scratchy, incapable of taking a deep breath-- you don't have to take a voice like that seriously. Black women don't do that; even white British women can speak from the diaphragm and French women always do. So what's with the American WASP thing?

(Western female VAs are another problem. Not always thin and gaspy, no, but the Disney 'warm' richness gives me hives. Hate it with a passion.)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Dunno about Star Trek, but interesting always mattered more to me than male/ female/ strong/ weak. Stock modern-liberated-female!! types tend not to be.

(though of course likeable is a very different matter from interesting, and does not always overlap.)

Ya Yu still the best.

Ya Yu still the best, and I weep that you guys think there's only one of her in the vast body of wu xia and historical TV.

Oh, she's quite unique. I wonder if her actress knows quite how unique she is; gave no indication in interviews, certainly.

Are Chinese actors and actresses generally as wishy-washy/ uninformative in their comments as Japanese ones? (and Japanese writers and mangaka and you name it.) As in, the performance/ work speaks for itself, it would be superfluous to talk *about* it, therefore I won't ~~I'll just thank everyone instead~~. (Whereas western actors and writers love to talk about their own work, far more than many of us want to hear.) I think it was you who said Uncle Ming was much the same? Or is there a tradition of analyzing one's work, just that these guys don't?

Dunno, I never wanted to know about HK/Taiwan actor's interpretations of characters the way I do with Woxin. So I really can't say. But generally Woxin's actors make very conventional, superficial remarks about their characters which are anything but.

How maddening.

When people do that over here I figure they're playing games (because here you can't say 'It's all in the work/ performance, go look at that.) Then I met an American who couldn't analyze what was happening in things or what she liked about a series, or anything: literally, could not analyze, could only say Wasn't that great? and never why. Then I realized that nonanalytical people do genuinely exist. So maybe the Woxin actors can't say what it is with their characters; they play them the way that seems right but can't say why it's right.

Uncle Ming, depending on his mood, will either say something that's shocking or amazingly provocative and usually both, or will clam up and say nothing. For example his snarky remarks about Zhang Yi Mou and his comment on his role as a "silk-like emperor". His protege Jia Yi Ping is given to ramblings about nothing and an occasional outburst like "the relationship between Gou Jian and Fan Li is like that between a shield and a sword."

Now I'm curious; what's in a Johnson cocktail?

I object to women having to be 'strong' to be good characters. Why are so many of the 'strong' female characters given masculine traits? That doesn't seem like promoting real women as heroes. Or they are 'strong' because they endure horrible events and make large, personal sacrifices. wtf? A good character doesn't have to be put through the wringer or become a martyr.

Annoying. And now I'm wondering if my character of Miss Red is overly masculine with her wood cutting axe...

3 parts gin, 2 parts dry *white* vermouth, 1 part sweet *red*. Shake with ice. Deadly. (Edited for confused portions)

Something else said in the comments, to the effect that the kick-ass women all made good traditional men ie their characteristics wouldn't feel different or inappropriate if they were actually trad heroes. Thus our rudimentary grasp of gender equality and human complexity.

I figure, write from a positive stance ('She's like this') not a reactive stance ('She won't be that'), and let the chips fall where they will.

Edited 2008-07-11 16:11 (UTC)

*waves hand* -Is guilty of liking the Troi. Hmm not because she was 'kickass' I thought as a character she was ok and quite funny. I actually didn't think she was that thin really... in fact I thought she was nice and curvy. Now Wilma Deering(from Buck Rogers) was stick thin and I am of the opinion that that uniform had to have been spray painted on her.

I have never thought about the voices thing and I didn't know that she was Aussie.

Oh I do not like the Disney 'princess' mould. The only one I come close to liking is Mulan.

The Disney mould is hive-inspiring too, but even Mulan had The Disney Voice. I do not like The Disney Voice. I don't like western VAs in general, but if they'd at least let themr ecord together in a studio where they could hear the line before theirs some of the wood might evaporate from their performances...

Sister creature is TNG nut and major Deana fangirl. In fact, many years back she dragged me along on a ninja mission to slip into some hotel in Indy for the sole purpose of seeing Marina omg! live and in person omg! Although I am also fond of her character, I'd no interest in pilgrimaging for the sake of. ^_^;