I was a tremendous fan of the original trilogy (I’ve written before about how I try in my own novels to capture the feeling of this one scene), completely disinterested in the newer three (they did not do any of the things that I liked about the original trilogy), and was passively interested in the existence of The Force Awakens.
I saw TFA on opening day, and it rewarded my optimism by giving me nearly everything I loved about the original trilogy, plus some things I loved that the first three lacked. I left the theater quite happy. To my jaded and cynical amazement, I found myself actually dreaming of tie-fighters two days later.
Once I climbed onto the internet, however, that happiness turned to sand in my bra. In a fit of frustration I unfollowed 42 accounts on Twitter and 11 on Tumblr. Their crime: excessive posting of Poe gifs. No. That was not really their crime. Their crime was: excessive posting of Finn gifs. No. That was not really the reason, either.
The reason why I’m frustrated with much of the dialog I’ve seen about TFA online is because we have, for the first time, been given a really incredible heroine who does not fall into the Tomb Raider-leather-pants-wearing-mentor-to-the-ordinary-dude mold, and yet, all of these folks I followed were posting 90% Poe/Finn gifs and fanart and screenshots, 10% links to academic articles about how great it was that Rey existed. These were feminists I really looked up to, critical thinkers and savage speakers of a better world. And yet: I had just seen a movie that was overwhelmingly focused on a woman, and I was once again looking at a feed full of men whose arcs were vastly less emphasized by the actual movie. The conversation was not about Rey. The conversation was about whether or not Poe and Finn would hook up in some distant future, and even if they didn’t, talking about how hot it was to imagine anyway.
These accounts twisted themselves in circles to defend why it was fine to talk about and post about the men more. Acrobatics like that normally place you as an Olympic hopeful.
Here’s what I wanted, really. I wanted just one of them to say it out loud:
“Academically, I’m really pleased that we got a character like Rey, because I’ve been demanding characters like her in movies like this for years. But I have to admit that because of the cultural cess that I grew up in, a cultural snotpocket that shits on the accomplishments and values of women in all sorts of subtle ways, I find myself more emotionally invested and excited by the men in this movie despite myself. I’m noting this bias now and remaining optimistic that more movies like this will mean that this bias of mine becomes less true each year.”
But none of them did. So I set fire to my follow list and moved on.
Which is to say, I really liked TFA and I think everyone who likes any of the Star Wars movies should go see it and continue to show with our almighty buck that movies like this are what we want to see. I’m now more than passively interested in the next movie. I just simply can’t read anything about it online, or I want to throw a droid through a wall. Now that I know these things about myself, I am fine.
jacobvanloon
gummygunk
titsay
izzy806
vaporwave
turnnoffyourmind
