Author Archives: margotmagowan

Disney says its sexism is all in your pretty little head

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Responding to the furor over the sexist comments made by the head animator of “Frozen,” Disney makes this statement:

Animation is an intricate and complex art form. These comments were recklessly taken out of context. As part of a roundtable discussion, the animator was describing some technical aspects of CG animation and not making a general comment on animating females versus males or other characters.

OK, here’s the comment again:

Historically speaking, animating female characters are really, really difficult, ’cause they have to go through these range of emotions, but they’re very, very — you have to keep them pretty and they’re very sensitive to — you can get them off a model very quickly. So, having a film with two hero female characters was really tough, and having them both in the scene and look very different if they’re echoing the same expression; that Elsa looking angry looks different from Anna (Kristen Bell) being angry.

What context alters the belief that female characters need to be pretty and that it is diffuclt to make two females look different from each other? The “context” that Lino is speaking in is actually a biased and sexist one where the poor guy is stating a common belief in the industry. Lino is a scapegoat only for his honesty. Since Lino’s comments, I’ve put several posts on Reel Girl on the “differences” between drawing female and male characters. There is Christopher Hart who instructs,

With male comic characters, you can mold their bodies into many different shapes, producing a wide range of cool characters. It’s not so easy with women. Women in comics are, by and large, attractive—even the villains.

 

There is Marc Crilley’s video how-to featuring famous female characters and showing how their bodies get distorted. There are also artists who show the sexism in clothing and in pose of male versus female superheroes.

Want a little more context? In animated movies for children, there is a pattern of male protagonists while female characters get stuck in supporting roles. Not only that but females, who are half of the kid population, are presented in movies for children as if they were a minority.

Animator has been commenting on Reel Girl in defense of Disney and Lino. It is from him that I heard today about Disney’s response. After posting a link to Disney’s quote, Animator writes:

So my suspicions are confirmed. This is all controversy for the sake of controversy.

Could Lino have chosen his words more carefully since he’s being interviewed for a website where most of the readers have never animated before and don’t understand the terminology?

Yeah, probably.

Now I’ve learned, if you work for Disney, WATCH WHAT YOU SAY or you’ll be branded and eeevvvviiilll sexist pig if you say something that can even slightly be taken out of context.

Disney is an easy target for some good ‘ol fashioned “outrage” and fabricated controversy after all.

 

First of all, I could not be less interested in controversy for the sake of controversy. I get accused of this all the time, I’m trying to get eyeballs to my blog, making a big deal out of nothing. Sexism in children’s media is a really big deal. Sexism in children’s media is a repeated pattern kids are exposed to that shapes who they are and who they become. There is no good reason for the fantasy world to be sexist. It is a made up world, anything can happen, yet the sexism of the real world, where males star and females support, is echoed here. I wish children’s media were not sexist. I love movies and books and TV. I love stories. Whenever I find examples where females are heroes, protagonists, and celebrated, I blog about it.

As for Animator’s next comment, I am actually glad that Lino did not choose his words more carefully. He spoke honestly, and I’m grateful for that.

Animator is not the only one upset with me. I got this Tweet from Allie Molina:

Your post on how Disney allegedly “Undermines Women” is absolutely idiotic and misleading. Read this:http://akaito.co.vu/post/64020438666/on-frozen-and-misconceptions-floating-around-tumblr

 

I went to Molina’s Tumblr. Here’s what she says:

Frozen got a name change because it is NOT the Snow Queen. It’s loosely based off of it just like Ponyo was loosely based off of the Little Mermaid. Was there secondary thoughts of changing the title to something ‘unisex’ because of little boys? Most likely, yes, but unlike Tangled which had no reason to drop “Rapunzel” as the title at least this name change made sense.

 

Agree! The movie is NOT The Snow Queen, it’s no longer the story of a heroic girl who saves a boy from the evil Snow Queen, and the changed title reflects that. That’s what my whole post is about. Also, glad you brought up “Ponyo” by Miyazaki,  one of the few movies with a female protagonist and female in the title.

So why else am I an idiot?

 Anna does NOT go to “save her sister”. Elsa runs off on her own because she doesn’t want to hurt anyone and they discovered her secret. She creates her own castle and lives up in the mountain, happy she is finally free to be herself. Anna decides on her own to go tell Elsa that her magic isn’t a problem and that she wants her to come home and help Anna melt the ice coating her kingdom. In the end there is some shit that goes down, but both sisters save each other. Also, Kai was NOT Gerda’s brother. And here we are again with the idea that Disney has never done a film with “role reversal” of a woman saving a man. Sleeping Beauty (Fairies save Phillip from Maleficent), Little Mermaid (Ariel saves Eric TWICE), Mulan (even when facing some serious misogyny she pulls through and saves not only Shang and her fellow soldiers but also all of China), Pocahontas (saves John Smith and stops a war), Hercules (Meg saves Herc from being killed) etc etc

Kai is not Gerda’s brother, as I wrote in my post, but her male friend. That is the only thing that makes sense to me. I didn’t write females never save males, but it is rare, and “Sleeping Beauty,” “Little Mermaid,” and “Hercules” are the best examples you can come up with? “Pocahontas,” I agree, is cool.

Reason #3 I am an idiot:

Kristoff just takes on the role of the Robber Girl from the original story, complete with Reindeer.

So according to Molina, Kristoff is not completely made up, but replaces the robber girl from the original. Do you see that’s the same thing– strong girl replaced by love interest/costar? Flynn Ryder from Rapunzel/ Tangled is based on the prince. His role was expanded to give him screen time and he is marketed in the PR as a star in the movie as well. That’s the problem here: a female in children’s media is rarely allowed to carry her own movie.

Reason #4:

What the fuck is going on here. That poster is not being used what so ever, in fact I have never seen it before. Aside from the posters featuring Olaf, every poster for Frozen has the girls on it. In fact, here they are on the fancy versions, like the older Disney posters

When I did my annual post analyzing PR for kids’ movies, the poster of the Snow Queen with a shadow of a female is all I could find. I believe that image was the first one released, but not knowing that for certain, I wrote “early” instead of “first” in my post. I was really bummed out that this pathetic image was being used. I collect cool movie posters that highlight female protagonists. I buy them and frame them and put them up in my children’s room. I hoped “Frozen” would give me that opportunity but it didn’t, and isn’t it interesting that I can no longer find that original image either, yet there it is, on my blog.

Still part of reason #4, Molina goes on:

as for the Olaf/Sven trailer. It’s a fucking teaser aimed at children with the “funny sidekicks”. This would be more telling if the teaser had been Kristoff and Hans, except it featured no humans at all.

The funny sidekicks are male! This is a movie that is supposed to be about at least two powerful females, and it is introduced with no females. The lack of females in animated movies for kids is part of a repetitive pattern where females go missing.

Moving on, still part of #4:

Secondly, I’ve also seen the quote from Lino DeSalvo about “animating women” and Tumblr doing it’s thing of twisting that for something else. He is NOT responsible for Anna or Elsa’s designs, their models and nor is that the reason most of the female characters were dropped from the film. We were never given a reason for the latter besides a small interview with John Lasseter from D23 on why they expanded Elsa’s role. Should Disney have differentiated more with Anna or Elsa’s faces to avoid Tangled comparisons? Yes and all they needed to do was change the shape of their eyes to match the 2D versions. (mediocre edit below by myself)

Lino is not the bad guy here. Lino is speaking honestly about a sexist industry.

Commenters on Jezebel are also upset with me, mostly for my statement that it’s become extremely rare for a female to be referenced in the title of an animated movie for children. One commenter makes this list:

Shrek was 2001, so let’s start around there (and we’ll include Disney tv and dvd movies since they are the company in question). In addition we’ll include female gender specific title like girl and princess, since that was the original argument about “Snow Queen” getting changed to “Frozen”

The Princess Diaries
The Princess Diaries II
Cadet Kelly
Lilo & Stitch
My Fair Madeline
Powerpuff Girls the Movie
Kim Possible the Movie
Mulan II
The Lizzie McGuire Movie
Ella Enchanted
Sharkboy and Lavagirl
Ice Princess
Charlotte’s Web
Nanny McPhee
Wendy Wu: Homecoming Warrior
Aquamarine
Miss Potter
Cinderella III
Kitt Kettridge
Hannah Montana
Little Mermaid: Ariel’s Beginning
Nim’s Island
Ponyo
Tinkerbell
Coraline
Princess and the Frog
Alice in Wonderland
Ramona and Beezus
Gnomeo and Juliet
Mars Needs Moms
My Little Pony: Equestria Girls

 

I am referring to MOVIES, not straight to DVD or made for TV which is where girl protagonists are allowed to go. I have been tracking titles on Reel Girl for the past three years. Try making a list of animated movies for kids– and you can include Pixar, Sony etc, that feature a male protag in the title and then make a list of titles with females. And speaking of Disney and Pixar, lots of commenters also write, it’s not just Disney. Agree! It’s not just Disney. It’s a sexist industry where girls go missing.

 

Reel Girl recommends ‘Kat McGee and the Halloween Costume Caper’

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My kids and I just finished Kat McGee and the Halloween Costume Caper, the story of a courageous girl who teams up with Jujitsu Princess and Candy Cane Witch to save Halloween from the evil Snaggletooth.

kat

There are some very cool things about this book:

(1) Three girls share an adventure. It always drives me crazy when they say girls like stories about “friendship” but boys like stories about “adventure.” A ridiculous premise in the first place, but what are “buddy movies” for goodness sake? Adventure stories are, often, about friendship, yet in children’s media, we don’t get to see girls taking big risks together as much as we should. In Halloween Costume Caper, we witness a trifecta of heroines, “Team Kat” facing their fears and working together to save the world.

(2) All kinds of other cool, female characters show up. Not only do we see the three awesome girls just mentioned, we meet so many more. Gram is magical, powerful, and wise. Dolce is a “Maker of Magic and Mischief” who helps Kat on her quest. Costumes who makes cameos in the story include Merida, Goldilocks, Bride of Frankenweenie, Tinkerbell, Wonder Woman, Red Riding Hood, American Girl Dolls, and more. You can’t read this story an miss that there are so many things that girls can be.

(3) All about Halloween. From Dr. Seuss’s Grinch Who Stole Christmas to “Yes, Virginia, there really is a Santa Claus,” there are lots of narratives about saving Christmas, but I’ve never read one about Halloween, and we desperate for some female-centered Halloween narratives. I just posted a list of girl-centered monster movies for little kid sto watch this Halloween and you know how many films made that list? Only 9. Last Halloween, no less than 3 movies– Frankenweenie, Hotel Transylvania, and ParaNorman– all featured male protagonists.  Here’s to hoping Halloween Costume Caper becomes a movie.

(4) Kat McGee makes her own costumes. Not only is Kat brave, she is creative. Every year she wins the contest for the best costume. She takes pride in her work, and if your kids read this book, it’s a good bet you can talk them into making their own costume, just like Kat.

(5) Published by In This Together Media. Though I interviewed the new publishing company, In This Together Media, a few months ago, Halloween Costume Caper is the first book the company put out that I’ve read. ITTM is dedicated to producing “better quality books for and about girls– stories where the main character’s whole reason for being isn’t to be kissed, or the other extreme, to be some kind of superchick. We wanted to broaden the narrative possibilities, and that comes from more layered, nuanced characters.”

After reading Halloween Costume Caper, I’m excited to get more of ITTM books for my kids. You can learn more about ITTM and order books here.

 

 

Reel Girl book rec: ‘Soma So Strange’

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With the fabulous book, Soma So Strange, not only did I read a cool story starring a fascinating girl, but I finally got past my ebook block. YAY. I’ve been trying to liberate myself for years, and Soma is only an ebook, so if I wanted to read it, I had no choice but to break free of paper.

cover

Soma lives is a dull, small place, “on a map, it’s the size of a sixth of a pea” where “all the villagers obey ancient, old rules/ Like walking on tip toes and eating fish and gruel.” Soma loves sushi, “she can’t stand fish and gruel!” For this, and many other “strange” attributes, Soma is mocked. “She can’t help but make noise at her school. Asking how and why are quite natural for her. Tip toe around? Stompin’s what she prefers.”

Not only do the townspeople, the Meanies, treat Soma terribly, but her own mother “can’t stand her.” I love this aspect of Soma’s story, because, though lots of children’s narratives refer to mean kids, fewer refer to the feeling of being a stranger in your own family which can be more common than kidlit lets on.

Soma’s physical differences match her mental ones: “Her glasses are funny, she won’t brush her hair/ When she walks into town, you can’t help but stare/ Soma’s so messy, so odd-shaped, so strange, the Meanies say Soma is simply deranged.”

Soma goes on to meet a talking cat who gives her a magical potion allowing her to turn the Meanines into pies. How cool is that?

The lyrics in Soma are beautiful and well, strange. Reading this story, I felt like I’d found a feminist Dr. Seuss or Shel Silverstein. I love look of Soma, too, with her billowy dark hair, striped shirt, and big glasses. The black and white illustrations pop. Not to mention, reading an ebook is really fun. The pages turn beautifully. My kids loved the story and reading it on my ipad too. Here’s to hoping author, Carrie Rosten, writes many more.

Click here to buy Soma So Strange and use the code SomaFam to get a dollar off.

Read more about Soma So Strange and author Carrie Rosten here.

Reel Girl rates Soma So Strange ***HHH***

 

‘Soul Surfer:’ Great movie for the whole family?

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For the past couple of years, people have been recommending I see “Soul Surfer,” the real life story of champion girl surfer, Bethany Hamilton, who resurrected her career after her arm was bit off by a shark.

Soul-Surfer-PHOTO_13325106_190205_30776885_ap

I delayed seeing the movie because I wasn’t sure at what age my kids would be ready to see a shark attack. I remember being traumatized by “Jaws,” and it’s hard enough to get them in the ocean. But I was in a store– I think it was Office Depot– and there was the DVD, and I bought it.

I told my oldest daughter Bethany’s story, she is 10, and planned to watch it with her. My husband, who is into surfing, sat down with us. My two younger daughters, usually not interested in what my 10 year old is watching, couldn’t resist seeing their parents captivated by something and joined the party.

I love the movie. It’s all about competition, winning, excelling, resilience, faith, and love. The montage at the end showing real life Bethany Hamilton will make you cry. It is so amazing. Here she is in real life.

bethany_hamilton1-1024x6831

But watching the montage won’t be the first time you cry during this movie. My babysitter texted me when my kids were seeing it for the third time: “I’m in tears!”

So what age do I recommend “Soul Surfer” for? My 4 year old daughter can’t get enough of the movie. Her favorite part is the shark attack– which is very quick. I actually think it’s scarier waiting for the attack then the actual attack. My 7 year old daughter kept glaring at me through the whole movie, furious that I “made” her watch it, but she never left the couch. She has watched it twice since but says she hates it. My 10 year old daughter likes it as well, but not as much as my 4 year old. I don’t really know what to say, except to tell you our experience. “Soul Surfer” is the first movie that my whole family has watched together, fro beginning to end, and all of us were into it. That was so much fun, by the way. I loved everyone sitting together, watching a movie. It is the best feeling.

Reel Girl rates “Soul Surfer” ***HHH***

 

 

Reel Girl’s Halloween list of monster movies starring females

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Last Halloween when no less than 3 movies came out starring males– “Hotel Transylvania,” “ParaNorman,” and “Frankenweenie”– I made a list of monster movies starring females. This list is pathetically small! I have not seen “Hocus Pocus” or “Journey to the Center of the Earth” or “Series of Unfortunate Events” but Reel Girl fans recommended all 3. Let me know if you have any movies to add.

coraline_ver22

kikibig

corpse_bride_ver6

my-neighbor-totoro

wizardofoz

series_of_unfortunate_events_ver3

monsters-vs-aliens-poster

centerofearth

hocus_pocus

Check out the DVD for ‘Epic,’ what’s wrong with this picture?

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Yesterday, my 7 year old daughter and I were shopping at Whole Foods when we saw the DVD  for “Epic” in the check out line. What’s wrong with this picture?

epic-dvd-cover-72

Out of 21 movies for children in 2013, “Epic” is one of only 4 to feature a female protagonist. But if you look at the art, who is in front, with the big face and the big sword? Who, from this picture, would you think is the star of the movie?

My three daughters and I loved “Epic.” When I reviewed it on Reel Girl, I gave it two Hs which is almost the highest heroine rating you can get. In that review, you know what I wrote was one thing that bugged me about the movie? The scene pictured above. In fantasy movies for kids, while it’s common to see males steer and fly all kind of beasts, it’s a rarity to see a female riding solo on a creature, not to mention riding a female creature with a male positioned behind her. The female rider is, almost always, in the passenger seat.

I found out there is a term for this position, riding bitch, and you see it all over children’s media and adult media. Look how Tina Fey, the star of her sitcom, was put in her place on the cover of Rolling Stone.

tinalois1

So why, out out of all the images they could chosen for the DVD cover, do they pick the one that shows the female star behind the supporting male? I was talking about this with my husband, and I said, it’s like a social reflex, everyone is so scared to show a female in a power position. It’s like we’re protecting the egos of little boys the way women are supposed to protect the egos of men. But instead, we’re fucking up a new generation of kids. It is not OK to continually and repeatedly marginalize girls and force them into supporting roles, in the imaginary world and in the real one. It limits all kids.

 

 

Malala asks: ‘Why should I wait for someone else? Why don’t I raise my voice?

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Jon Stewart asks Malala Yousafzai, the 16 yr old activist for girls education who was shot in the head by the Taliban, how she found the courage to speak out. She replies:

Why should I wait for someone else? Why should I be looking to the government, to the army, that they would help us. Why don’t I raise my voice? Why don’t we speak up for our rights? The girls of Swat, they spoke up for their rights. I started writing daily. I spoke out on every media channel that I could, and I raised my voice on every platform that I could. I said I need to tell the world what is happening in Swat.

 

Malala didn’t wait around for someone to else to tell her story for her. She rescued herself through the act of writing and speaking. She risked telling the truth about her life and telling it publicly, and in doing so, she is changing the world. Please show this video to your children and teach them to do the same. I can’t wait to get Malala’s book and show it to my daughters as well.

malala-book-cover

‘Her breasts are much too small and do not have the lift that superhero women should’

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Who decides what narratives we see and if they are good or bad?

This artist of Batwoman received this critique from a company she chose not to name. (via Escher Girls and goodcomics.comicbookresources.com.)

batwomansketch-620x958

Her breasts are much too small and do not have the lift that superhero women should have. Her jawline is fat and her neck much too long. The style of her hair is clunky and does not flow in a sense that a super human would. Her hips, waist and thighs are too big and she honestly looks fat. No one is going to want to read a comic with a fat female protagonist. I honestly recommend looking at issues of Sport’s Illustrated to get the right anatomy. Those women are the peak of human perfection, and that is what we want in this industry.

“That is what we want in this industry?” Who the fuck is “we?”

Here is my three year old daughter last Halloween as Batgirl.

(If you are offended by my older daughter dressed as a Native American, she was studying the Miwok tribe at school, you can see a blog/ discussion about her on Cherokee Writer.)

halloweeen

Who is thinking about my kid, and girls like her, and what they want when making these “artistic” decisions?

You know what happened to my daughter on Halloween? Everyone called her Batman. At first, my daughter said nothing back to them but asked me: “Why do people keep calling me Batman?” Then, she started to quietly correct them: “I’m Batgirl.” By the end of the night, she was shouting; “I’M BATGIRL!”

I know Batgirl doesn’t have five major motion pictures about her, all featuring famous movie stars. There aren’t Batgirl toys or Batgirl clothing or Batgirl comic books everywhere you look. Why is that? There is princess shit everywhere. But, I guess, when you try to get Batgirl, or Batwoman, out into the world, you encounter some asshole in charge who tells you to make the character look like a Sports Illustrated model, because that’s what “we” want. And after all that, all the limitations put on little girls and who they are supposed to be and what they get rewarded for and recognized for and celebrated for, people actually say, time and time again, “Girls just love princesses. Go figure.”

Argh. It drives me crazy. I am grateful for DaSilvo’s comment. I am so sick of pointing out the obvious and having people still not see it and deny it exists.

UPDATE: It’s been years since I blogged on Reel Girl but I am ashamed to see this photo of my daughter’s Halloween costume. I apologize to Native Americans for my offensive insensitivity and ignorance. It seems my reason, stated above, was that she was studying the Miwok tribe in school which is an absolutely ridiculous explanation. First of all, who knows how the Miwok dressed? I know for certain they did not dress in anything like this cheap, synthetic “costume” I bought my daughter. I perpetuated a white supremacist idea that Native Americans are a monolith that all dress alike and then I acted as if I was being culturally sensitive. My hypocrisy is shocking. And of course, even if I had some perfect replica of how a Miwok truly dressed, this is a culture, not a costume. No white person should ever “dress up” as a culture, especially not one white people slaughtered. I am so sorry to the Native American people, to everyone who read this blog, and to my daughter. Also, I want to thank Cherokee Writer for her empathy. She was a reader of the blog and blogged that my intent was not ill and so she couldn’t be mad, she referenced my daughter studying the Miwok tribe. That I did not intend to be racist does not mean that I was not racist. In fact, not intending the racism is almost worse because it can be harder to call out and identify. Also, my whole blog is about pointing out sexism that often people didn’t intend. So here I am pointing out sexism and being blind to racism, like so many white women. I hope to keep learning every day how to be a better person and to become more aware of my racism and how I perpetuate it.

Hollywood, what’s the difference between drawing male and female characters?

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Since Lino DaSilvo’s sexist comments about how female characters are hard to draw because they’ve got to be pretty, he’s had many defenders comment on how much this artist cares about his movies and characters.

No one is saying DaSilvo doesn’t care about his art. No one is even saying that “Frozen” isn’t a good movie. “Ratatouille” is a great movie, and it also follows the same sexist pattern of most children’s movies where females can’t be heroes. Unfortunately, this sexism is entrenched in our culture, the stories we tell, and the heroes we create. Abnoba makes a great comment about all this on Reel Girl:

And female characters are even more difficult to differentiate because, as he says, they have to be pretty. And pretty, for Disney and other companies, has a very narrow definition. I think that we all know how Disney tried to change Merida. Disney is not only selling a movie. The Disney princess are used to sell clothes, toys, party supplies, make up…and that’s not based in how adventurous or smart they are, their beauty is a big selling point…Maybe Lino DiSalvo is not sexist, maybe he is just too frank for his own good about what that industry require from him, but I think that the comment is pointing to a very big problem in the female representation of women in animation.

 

You can be frank and sexist at the same time. As I blogged, I don’t think DaSilvo intended to be sexist. He thought he was stating a fact. And he actually is, but the fact is not about real differences between females and males, but about how they are represented in narratives for children in 2013.

Here’s something I wrote a while ago on the differences between drawing females and males:

Whenever  I blog about the exaggerated breasts or ass of a female cartoon character, commenters respond that I have nothing to complain about: all cartoons are caricatures.

There’s a difference between exaggerating muscles and exaggerating someone’s butt. Here’s artist Kevin Bolk’s take on “The Avengers.”

avengers

Of course, “The Avengers” model, with its pathetic 5: 1 male/ female ratio and then sexualizing that lone female, is not unique to that group of superheroes.

Check out the Justice League cover. Notice any similarity?

justiceleague1

Here’s the artist Coelasquid’s “If Superheroes Posed Like Wonder Woman.”

pose1

I love Coelasquid’s art because it shows so clearly that it’s not only the clothes put on female characters but the poses they are in.

Though of course, the clothes don’t help much. Here’s Theamat’s “If I Don’t Get Pants, Nobody Gets Pants:”

wonderwoman3

Wonder Woman with no pants was created by (and for?) grown-ups but it leads to Wonder Woman with no pants showing up as a LEGO minifig.

wwww2

Females are half of the population, yet because they are presented as a sexualized minority in so many movies for adults, they are also presented as a sexualized minority in movies for kids. Those roles are then replicated in kids’ toys and most tragically, in kids’ imaginary play.

Female characters account for only 16% of all characters in movies for kids.

Here’s an interesting coincidence: across the board in all professions, women at the top don’t make it past 16%.

Do you think limiting females in the imaginary world limits them in real life? Unfortunately, your kids do.