Everyone loves a warrior girl. She's tough, skilled in a variety of weapons and always ready with a suitable sarcastic remark. And she's been appearing more and more frequently in movies, TV and books. In many ways, the rise of the warrior girl is something to applaud - an opposing force to the damsels in distress who bat their eyelashes and wait for a man in a superhero suit to save them. But is she truly a warrior? And are we only drawn to her because she exhibits traditionally masculine traits?
Sometimes a warrior girl isn't all she appears to be. Black Widow of "The Avengers" may be a trained assassin, perfectly capable of taking down alien and human foes, but she never assumes or even tries to assume a leadership role in "The Avengers." True, Black Widow might not have even been in "The Avengers" 20 years ago, but simply giving female characters a sword or a gun and some witty dialogue doesn't equal character development. Even worse, these characters often seem designed to add sex appeal instead of depth. For instance, Wonder Woman's costume aims to expose the maximum amount of skin, and Black Widow's corset surely can't be practical for crime fighting. Is a warrior girl still a warrior if she's only there to stave off criticism or serve as a sex object?
Sometimes a warrior girl gives up being a warrior. The movie "Mulan" refuses to let its heroine stay in a place of power, having her return to her family and traditional feminine role. Even KatnissEverdeen, one of the best written and most formidable warrior girls, ends her story by having children and settling down with Peeta. Warrior men go on to have more adventures, but warrior girls seemingly have to be domesticated and married off. Shouldn't our entertainment reflect the facts of our world, namely that more and more women have a career as well as a family?
Finally, popular culture often seems to assume that in order to praise warrior girls, it has to attack any other kind of girl. Tessa Gray of the "Infernal Devices" trilogy, despite being a complex, resourceful and intelligent female character, received a huge amount of Internet hate for the fact that she loved and became involved with both of her love interests, instead of instantly choosing her one true love. So often, female characters are attacked for caring about their appearance, having difficulty choosing between two love interests and exhibiting other stereotypically feminine behaviors and traits. Yet, at the same time, warrior girls are sometimes attacked for being too masculine, called annoying and bitchy and despised for daring not to forgive instantly a beloved male character for his every flaw. Will female characters, even warrior girls, never be allowed to be good enough without being absolutely flawless? In a culture as wide and diverse as ours, there should be room for all kinds of female characters: strong ones, weak ones, ones who like to shop and ones who like to fight, warrior girls and reader girls.
Of course, the warrior girl can be a powerful force when done right, like Buffy Summers of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," one of the original warrior girls. She can be funny and smart, inspiring and powerful, masculine and feminine, and above all, uniquely herself. So, let's hope for a media and a culture that presents and loves all kinds of girls and women, let's see a girl who saves the world by slaying zombies and a girl who saves the world by baking a pie, and let's see a fictional world that reflects the truths of our world today.
Natalie Girshman is a sophomore who has not yet declared a major. She can be reached at Natalie.Girshman@tufts.edu.
