I’ve ranted against fan service many a time in my life. I watch enough TV shows with loud internet fandoms and writers who are intimidated by them. I’ve seen well-developed ships get shoved to the side because screenwriters are too scared of backlash from the loud minority who were angry that their OTP wasn’t canon. I've seen plots reversed because the public thinks they know better about how a story should end. I think an author ought to be true to their original vision, even sometimes when it doesn’t match my own.
But I witnessed a moment of ultimate fan gratification that will make me eat my words. It turned the term on its head, considering "fan service" is usually applied to adding scantily dressed female characters to a scene to please male fans. Instead, I’m thinking of an army of well armed female characters who are pleasing the female fans.
I’m referring to a moment in Avengers: End Game that got some of the best audience reaction when I saw it opening night in a crowded theater. When Captain Marvel turned to take the gauntlet past a horde of faceless alien creatures, and the entire female Marvel heroes lineup got ready to back her up. A moment echoing Black Widow’s “She’s not alone” from Infinity War, but tenfold. Valkyrie, the Wasp, Shuri, Okoye, Scarlet Witch, Nebula. Even Gamora, who’s from another timeline and has no idea who these people are.
This moment, speaking as a writer and a filmmaker myself, was probably the most contrived moment of the entire film. (Which might be saying a lot. Who knows. I liked it.) Captain Marvel didn’t need this backup. There was no reason for all of them to be there; Scarlet Witch was just beating up on Thanos and the Wasp was busy starting up a time machine. But the fans awaited, and the female Avengers (The A-Force?) arrived.
This contrived moment could be a time to address the fake feminism that the media has been forcing on us since Captain Marvel came out. I could complain about how I found a complex female superhero I related to, only to have "feminists" (including the actress herself) misuse her image to push their agenda. Using a movie that was surprisingly subtle about its feminism, no less. (Unless you had the misfortune of reading reviews before you saw it.) If you want to ask me why I feel this way about the feminism they're pushing, please ask. I don't want you to think I hate my fellow women. Because believe me, as a woman, I do believe in real feminism, but that ain't it.
That's not why I'm blogging. I know this scene was uncalled for and preposterous. But I have cried at it both times I’ve seen the movie. Excessively. I’ve cried without really understanding why, so of course I had to diagnose it.
The answer came to me from writer’s group; turns out we can be useful. A friend has been reading through my X-men comics, and I’ve had the great pleasure of watching her enjoy them. These are large volumes of X-men comics from the 70's-80's, more or less, and they’re my favorite comics of all time. Apart from some Spider-Man, they were the first comics I read, back in 2005 when I was 12 years old and supposed to be studying quizzing. This friend, who’s pretty new to superheroes as a whole, expressed a dislike for Kitty Pride, who’s been a favorite of mine for the past 14 years.
I looked at it objectively and yeah, Kitty’s kind of an obnoxious teenager. She’s both too realistic, as an emotional 13 year old, and too idealized, as a kid genius, ballerina who joins the X-men before even starting high school. As someone who uses the term sparingly, an argument could be made that she starts as a Mary Sue.
But I read those comics when I was 12, and all I saw was a girl my age who got to be on a team with my favorite superheroes. I knew nothing about feminism, or fanboys objecting to female superheroes stealing the spotlight. I just knew I was one step closer to seeing myself in a fictional world I desperately wanted to be a part of.
I read and watched a lot as a kid. I regret to say I read less now, but still watch plenty. But all I wanted when I was 12 was to find a character who looked and acted like me. In all my consumption of media, I hadn’t found one yet. There were some I almost related to in books, and practically none in movies.
More than plot, more than cool magical creatures, more than secret worlds, what I wanted out of my fiction was a character like me. Kitty Pride wasn’t that character. Not yet. But she gave me hope, and she gave me someone to want to be like.
So I didn't cry at that scene because of the statement it was making. I cried because I finally, fully understood why representation is important in movies, after years of vaguely nodding along with people who are passionate about it. I don't mind relating to male characters. Most of the characters I cosplay are male because it's hard to find a female character who acts much like me. Until I saw it on screen, in all the glory of more female heroes than you can count on one hand saying, "We got this," I didn't realize what I was missing.
I cried for my 12 year old self who just wanted to join the X-men. I cried for my 15 year old self who saw the X-men and Fantastic Four movies and realized Hollywood still couldn’t give me a superhero role model I could relate to. For my 22 self who claimed the CW Supergirl before her show even aired, because finally I had a female hero who didn’t need to be sexy. Who started to cosplay Supergirl and go visit kids in the hospital so I could feel like a real superhero sometimes. And I cried for my current, 26 year old self, who saw Captain Marvel and thought - thanks to her personality, not her feminism - “Finally. I can really see myself as a superhero.”
There's nothing wrong with relating to both male and female characters. Humans are deep, and being able to relate to all kinds of different people is a positive thing. For the moment, I don't mind the fact that in general, a sci-fi or action film will usually have a male protagonist, because Hollywood is still figuring out how to write female heroes and make them more than "A Strong Female Character." But maybe it's an exciting thing that the finally ARE figuring it out, and my younger sisters and nieces will have those role models to look up to.
In the meantime, I've got 14 years of aspirations to be a superhero behind me, and I’m ready to take that gauntlet and beat Thanos to a pulp, because I have plenty of my own real life female superheroes to back me up, even if it takes a contrived moment of glory for Hollywood to acknowledge that we actually exist.
