An important part of character design is gender representation. Gender can generally be defined as:
“The behavioural, cultural, or psychological traits typically associated with one sex”
To understand how gender is positively or negatively represented, you have to look into different characters and their presentation in the media. The first example I did a quick investigation on was the film Moana.
I chose another film to study, but this was actually a difficult decision. I want to show both good and bad examples of gender representation, but also of both genders. I found that most articles and websites talk about stereotypes placed on women and their negative representation, and there were hardly any about men. This is of course because there is a greater amount of negatively represented characters who are women in the media, but I wanted to find a game, or film, that represents men in a stereotypical light as well, and in the end, I settled on Fallen.
Fallen is a 2016 American romantic fantasy drama film which circulates around Lucinda Price, who ends up in a new school because of hallucinations and finds herself in a love triangle between two angels named Daniel and Cam. The reason I chose this film isn’t just because it’s glaringly bad, but also because I think that all three main characters are represented poorly, in terms of their gender. First, let’s begin with Lucinda, or Luce, who is portrayed as your average teenage girl (except for the supernatural experiences) and we get to see her deal with her new life in the school. Now, it’s understandable, that in tween romance films, the protagonist has to be basically interchangeable, so that any girl could put herself in her place, however, even with that in mind, it is still within complete reason to present her as a strong, independent character.
The film leans heavily on old-fashioned stereotypes, with her personality being mostly non-existent. She is also shy, quiet, yet really smart, and of course, beautiful. Yet, despite her having knowledge that she shouldn’t really have (we see this quite a bit in the film through memories and flashbacks), she is still put in a dangerous situation multiple times, where she cannot save herself and has to rely on one of the male protagonists to come and save her! We see Luce doubt herself all the time, and pine for the attraction of someone who repeatedly shows that he isn’t interested, and instead of trying to take things into her own hands and understand the situation, she more often than not, ends up following the men and making bad decisions. At one point, she actually tries to commit suicide to prove a point and unmask the identity of her brooding boyfriend! That simply stretches things to the extreme, especially since she was built up as reserved throughout most of the film.
Overall, she is quite an empty character and is strongly stereotyped with the perspective that women are weak, fragile and not self-sufficient, and since she is supposed to be relatable, this puts an idea into young girl’s minds, that this is how they are supposed to be to gain the attention and devotion of a man; a girl who neglects her studies, is attractive and smart, shy yet crazy, get’s into danger constantly only to be saved by someone else, and completely revolved around her admirers.
Sadly, the situation does not improve with her admirers. Daniel, the ‘good’ angel, and the one who has been her true love through all her past lives, embodies all of the expectations and stereotypes thrown towards your classic male love interest. He is shown to be artistic at the beginning, which is the only attempt made to give him some personality other than ‘Luce’s boyfriend’. This, however, does not redeem him of his other conventional traits; he is absolutely horrible towards Lucinda through most of the film! Yes, there is a reason for his distance, which is explained hurriedly towards the end – the idea of protecting Luce by keeping her in the dark, which only adds to the implication that she cannot handle herself and needs to be protected, essentially reducing her character to an innocent, naive, little girl. But of course, he always saves her from death, just in the nick of time, and continues acting cold towards her anyway, offering no explanation.
Throughout the film, he is popping up wherever Luce is, and any interaction they have ends with him basically telling her to leave him alone. But, the few times that he does approach her and wants a conversation, she complies and is still the one left hanging in the end. He treats her terribly and is also seen hanging around with another girl who is rumoured to be his girlfriend throughout some of the movie. All of this always surmounts to him giving her some attention, and then snatching it away, like dangling bait for a fish. And Luce falls for it every time. She is made to look stupid and he is always the one in control. Somehow they end up in love in the end though!
Daniel is the ‘good’ guy, but he treats her horribly and is made to conform with the ‘hero’ role anyway, always saving the damsel even though this clashes with almost every single interaction they have ever had.
Ironically, the one who is nicest to her is the ‘bad boy’, Cam. From the very start, Cam shows an interest in Lucinda even as he is introduced as the ‘bad boy’ type. He is continually in trouble, gets detained by the police, is friends with people who are cruel to Luce, wears a leather jacket and has a motorcycle. Yet, he gets our girl coffee and doughnuts, treats her with way more respect than Daniel and actually lets her make her own decisions. He is portrayed stereotypically as wild, untamable and fun even though his attitude is the opposite of Daniel’s. So, not only is he the conventional ‘bad’ boyfriend, but he also fails at this because is behaviour clashes with his outlook. Again, these overly used cliches only put the wrong ideas in the minds of teens, making them feel like they need to be a certain way to be in a relationship. They shouldn’t be like Cam, the delinquent of the school who steals, runs away and gets arrested frequently, nor should the be like Daniel, who is indifferent and moody and keeps the truth from his ‘love’ for almost the entirety of the movie.
To conclude, Fallen is a perfect example of negative gender representation and only utilises bad stereotypes and banalities to portray the characters.
*I applied this understanding to the brief by creating an iteration of one of my characters, Kreo. The work will be on the post I create specifically for him when it is updated*