{"id":34826,"date":"2011-04-02T10:54:53","date_gmt":"2011-04-02T15:54:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/?p=34826"},"modified":"2013-11-11T03:40:30","modified_gmt":"2013-11-11T08:40:30","slug":"anita-sarkeesian-on-the-manic-pixie-dream-girl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/2011\/04\/02\/anita-sarkeesian-on-the-manic-pixie-dream-girl\/","title":{"rendered":"Anita Sarkeesian on the Manic Pixie Dream Girl"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Feminist Frequency<\/a>‘s Anita Sarkeesian has released the first of her series of short videos examining the roles women<\/a> are often assigned in movies and television. \u00a0In this one she goes after the “manic pixie dream girl,” or the female side character who helps the male main character find himself, love life again, or overcome some obstacle. \u00a0This character, Sarkeeisan argues, is problematic because she “perpetuates the myth of women as caregivers at our very core”; her main role is to “‘fix’\u00a0these lonely sad men, so that they can go ‘fix the world.'” \u00a0The women themselves? \u00a0They’re too busy being adorable.<\/p>\n

<\/object><\/p>\n

(Transcript after the jump.)<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

A trope is a common pattern in a story or a recognizable attribute in a character that conveys\u00a0information to the audience.\u00a0A trope becomes a cliche when it\u2019s overused.\u00a0Sadly, some of these tropes often perpetuate offensive stereotypes.<\/p>\n

In the world according to Hollywood men are often written as the great protectors, the heroes, the creators and the inventors, but sometimes all that pressure of running the\u00a0entire world really gets them down.\u00a0Enter the Manic Pixie Dream Girl, the shining beacon of child like joy that will rejuvenate our fallen hero.<\/p>\n

The Manic Pixie Dream Girl is a term coined by Nathan Rabin to describe the female character\u00a0whose written to help the usually white, and definitely straight male hero loosen up and enjoy life.\u00a0Rabin writes, \u201cThat bubbly, shallow cinematic creature that exists solely in the fevered imaginations\u00a0of sensitive writer-directors to teach broodingly soulful young men to embrace life\u00a0and its infinite mysteries and adventures.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Manic Pixie Dream Girl is a supporting character used to further the storyline of the male hero.
\nShe really has no life of her own, she has no family or interests or much of job that we ever see.
\nShe is as the AVclub describes, \u201cOn hand to lift a gloomy male protagonist out of the doldrums,
\nnot to pursue her own happiness.\u201d<\/p>\n

All of these male characters find a Manic Pixie to help them out of their depressed, uptight\u00a0and doom and gloom state so that they can be happy functioning members of society again.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s start with Kirsten Dunst\u2019s character from Elizabethtown who is the catalyst for Rabin naming this trope.\u00a0Drew Baylor played by Orlando Bloom has just lost his job, his girlfriend and he decides he wants to\u00a0kill himself. So just at that very moment he gets a call from his sister saying\u00a0his father died and he needs to go handle the family affair.\u00a0Drew gets on a plane and meets Claire, a flight attendant who talks to him throughout\u00a0the whole flight even though he\u2019s clearly not interested in interacting with her.\u00a0Claire eventually guides Drew on a personal journey of self exploration, growth and embracing fun.<\/p>\n

CLIP:\u00a0Elizabethtown<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m checking out this cute guy.\u201d
\n\u201cWhy are you telling me that?\u201d
\n\u201cHow could I leave you in distress?\u201d
\n\u201cI\u2019m taking you out.\u201d<\/p>\n

You might remember Zooey Deschanel in 500 days of Summer, the non-committing\u00a0love interest of the film\u2019s star Tom Hansen played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt.\u00a0The story follows Tom on his journey of falling in and out of love with Summer Finn.\u00a0They have the classic Manic Pixie Dream Girl scene where they are frolicking around in the world\u00a0and the Manic Pixie teaches the uptight star how to embrace his inner child.<\/p>\n

CLIP:\u00a0500 Days of Summer<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cPenis\u201d
\n\u201cPenis\u201d
\n\u201cPenis\u201d
\n\u201cPenis\u201d
\n\u201cThere\u2019s kids around.\u201d
\n\u201cThere are no kids around.\u201d
\n\u201cPenis\u201d
\n\u201cPenis\u201d
\n\u201cAre you having fun?\u201d
\n\u201cYa\u201d
\n\u201cThis is the kind of thing you did with the Puma?\u201d
\n\u201cNo\u2026 we rarely left the room.\u201d
\n\u201cPenis!\u201d
\n\u201cSorry tourettes, you know how it is.\u201d
\n\u201cPenis\u201d
\n\u201cShe has it too.\u201d
\n\u201cPenis\u201d
\n\u201cPeeeennnniiiisssss!\u201d
\n\u201cShhhhhh\u2026.\u201d<\/p>\n

And this list would not be complete without an appearance from Natalie Portman.\u00a0Her young and bubbly child like character in Garden State just might be the quintessential Manic Pixie Dream Girl.\u00a0She\u2019s here to guide angsty, emo Andrew Largeman played by Zach Braff out of his depressed\u00a0state and general gloominess all with traditional Manic Pixie child like glee.<\/p>\n

CLIP:\u00a0Garden State<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cAny way\u2026 ah\u2026 I\u2019m talking too much, you gotta fill out your forms.\u201d
\n\u201cWhat are you listening to?\u201d
\n\u201cThe Shins, you know em?\u201d
\n\u201cNo\u201d
\n\u201cYou gotta hear this one song, it\u2019ll change your life I swear.\u201d
\n\u201cOh I\u2019m sorry, you have to, ah, fill out your forms. \u00a0Conundrum. Think you could uh, maybe listen while
\nyou fill out-\u201d \u201cYa I think I can handle that\u201d \u201cYa?\u201d<\/p>\n

The list of Manic Pixies kind of goes on and on and on.\u00a0There\u2019s Kate Hudson\u2019s character in Almost Famous,
\nMeg Ryan in Joe Versus the Volcano,\u00a0Charlize Theron in Sweet November,\u00a0and what about Winona Ryder in Autumn in New York,\u00a0Rachel Bilson in The Last Kiss\u00a0and Elisha Cuthbert in My Sassy Girl among others.<\/p>\n

The Manic Pixie perpetuates the myth of women as caregivers at our very core, that we can go \u201cfix\u201d\u00a0these lonely sad men, so that they can go \u201cfix the world\u201d.\u00a0The Manic Pixie Dream Girl is really a muse who exists to be the inspiration for the troubled,\u00a0tortured man. \u00a0In fact we should talk about this whole idea of a muse which is the foundation for this trope.\u00a0For centuries male filmmakers, writers, painters, artists of all kinds have often cited women as the\u00a0inspiration for their brilliant masterpieces.<\/p>\n

I swear if I hear one more story like this I\u2019m going to scream.\u00a0Or puke.\u00a0Or both.<\/p>\n

Women are not here for men\u2019s inspiration or celebration or whatever else.\u00a0We are musicians and artists and writers with our own brilliant and creative endeavors.\u00a0But you wouldn\u2019t know that from the Manic Pixie Dream Girl trope.<\/p>\n

Needless to say, the Manic Pixie, not so great for women\u2019s representations.<\/p>\n

So Hollywood writers, let me remind you that women are not here for your inspiration,\u00a0celebration or to coax you out of your troubles.\u00a0You might not know this but we\u2019re full and complete human beings with our own\u00a0troubles, interests and creative endeavors.<\/p>\n

So how\u2019s about your stop using us as your muse and start writing us as real people.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\nLisa Wade, PhD<\/a> is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of <\/em>American Hookup<\/a>, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender<\/a>; and a forthcoming introductory text: <\/em>Terrible Magnificent Sociology<\/a>.\u00a0You can follow her on Twitter<\/a> and Instagram<\/a>.<\/em><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Feminist Frequency‘s Anita Sarkeesian has released the first of her series of short videos examining the roles women are often assigned in movies and television. \u00a0In this one she goes after the “manic pixie dream girl,” or the female side character who helps the male main character find himself, love life again, or overcome some […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[55,2096,343],"class_list":["post-34826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-gender","tag-gender-femininity","tag-tvmovies"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34826"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34826\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58941,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34826\/revisions\/58941"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}