"Action Girl" Characters in Anime (Are they still sexist?)

[Archon_Wing]

Originally Posted by asaqe

How about series with the only worthwhile fighters being women then? Isn't that technically empowerment? In fact they are as averse to men as possible with the setting design to eliminate Male Presence. You can't do that in Hollywood, in Hollywood there must be a male lead like Akatsuki from Hagure.

That would be sexist against men.

Also, it would be catered to male audience's desires. That's not necessarily bad; it depends on degree.

[lordkas]

Spoiler for lol japan:

and that is why most people think Japan is sexist and the WSJ too, bear in mind "the mangaka" helped on this for the uncoming movie so yeah

[asaqe]

Originally Posted by Archon_Wing

That would be sexist against men.

Also, it would be catered to male audience's desires. That's not necessarily bad; it depends on degree.

Still more progressive than America's action heroines. Japanese Action Heroines have outgrown the need for manly male support to come in and help out.

[brocko]

Originally Posted by asaqe

How about series with the only worthwhile fighters being women then? Isn't that technically empowerment? In fact they are as averse to men as possible with the setting design to eliminate Male Presence. You can't do that in Hollywood, in Hollywood there must be a male lead like Akatsuki from Hagure.

They did that, it's called Queens Blade

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by NinjaRealist

This post pretty much sums up the entire the thread.

These are sure to rub someone the wrong way but here are some examples using this logic.

ex. #1

Madoka = Strong female character

Nanoha = Weak character with strong powers.

I'm a big magical girl anime fan, and hence I'm very familiar with both of these characters, and I like both of them a lot. That being said, I'm at a real lost to understand how someone could consider Madoka a "Strong female character" while considering Nanoha a "Weak female character".

Madoka is every bit as much the archetypal magical girl as Nanoha is - In fact, I think a strong case can be made that Madoka captures that archetype even more than Nanoha does. Just because Madoka Magica is a genre deconstruction doesn't mean that Madoka herself is anything unusual for magical girl leads. In fact, I would say that the whole point of her character at a meta level is capturing the essence of "the magical girl" as well as any one character can (and to Madoka's credit, I think she does achieve this). But being strong at a meta level doesn't necessarily mean you're strong at a narrative level.

Nanoha is a much more proactive character than Madoka is - IOW, Nanoha drives the plot and displays agency in her show much more than Madoka does in PMMM.

I don't want to be insulting, but given your listings of Nanoha and Saber as supposedly "weak characters", I have to wonder if you have a bias against "lawful good" characters that's overly influencing your take on whether or not a character is a strong character. If you are, I wouldn't worry too much about it - A lot of people today sadly seem to think that a character has to reflect modern cynicism in order to be a strong character. But I don't see any good reason whatsoever for that position. Cynicism is hardly the only way to display strength, and in fact cynicism can showcase weakness if it goes to a certain paralyzing extreme.

Anyway, Nanoha is actually my favorite anime character of all-time, and I did a write-up of her here.

Perhaps that can change your mind. Perhaps not. But either way, I would be interested in getting your take on it.

[DonQuigleone]

Haven't watched Nanoha, but Madoka is an interesting character. She wants to help all the people around her, but the people who she wants to help, don't want her to help them.

She has to watch all this terrible stuff happen while being powerless to do anything about it. Madoka channels the despair of the show, because the viewer can't do anything either...

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by asaqe

How about series with the only worthwhile fighters being women then? Isn't that technically empowerment?

It is as much empowerment as allowing a woman to ride through the Tour de France on a motorbike while leaving men riding kick scooters. Not something to be proud about on the writer's side.

[Kaioshin Sama]

Originally Posted by DonQuigleone

Haven't watched Nanoha, but Madoka is an interesting character. She wants to help all the people around her, but the people who she wants to help, don't want her to help them.

She has to watch all this terrible stuff happen while being powerless to do anything about it. Madoka channels the despair of the show, because the viewer can't do anything either...

Yeah she's a lot like a character from Victory Gundam right now who I actually consider a stronger female character than she appears to be simply for watching all these horrible things happen to the people around her caused by people she's related to and manages to not only break (though she comes close a couple times) but handle it with grace and try to find a solution. Being Shakti is suffering too.

[asaqe]

Originally Posted by Sheba

It is as much empowerment as allowing a woman to ride through the Tour de France on a motorbike while leaving men riding kick scooters. Not something to be proud about on the writer's side.

Still more progressive than Western Action Girl Films. The only one I know of that is more in line with the Action Girl Anime was Sucker Punch.

[NinjaRealist]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

I'm a big magical girl anime fan, and hence I'm very familiar with both of these characters, and I like both of them a lot. That being said, I'm at a real lost to understand how someone could consider Madoka a "Strong female character" while considering Nanoha a "Weak female character".

Madoka is every bit as much the archetypal magical girl as Nanoha is - In fact, I think a strong case can be made that Madoka captures that archetype even more than Nanoha does. Just because Madoka Magica is a genre deconstruction doesn't mean that Madoka herself is anything unusual for magical girl leads. In fact, I would say that the whole point of her character at a meta level is capturing the essence of "the magical girl" as well as any one character can (and to Madoka's credit, I think she does achieve this). But being strong at a meta level doesn't necessarily mean you're strong at a narrative level.

Nanoha is a much more proactive character than Madoka is - IOW, Nanoha drives the plot and displays agency in her show much more than Madoka does in PMMM.

I don't want to be insulting, but given your listings of Nanoha and Saber as supposedly "weak characters", I have to wonder if you have a bias against "lawful good" characters that's overly influencing your take on whether or not a character is a strong character. If you are, I wouldn't worry too much about it - A lot of people today sadly seem to think that a character has to reflect modern cynicism in order to be a strong character. But I don't see any good reason whatsoever for that position. Cynicism is hardly the only way to display strength, and in fact cynicism can showcase weakness if it goes to a certain paralyzing extreme.

Anyway, Nanoha is actually my favorite anime character of all-time, and I did a write-up of her here.

Perhaps that can change your mind. Perhaps not. But either way, I would be interested in getting your take on it.

After reading your write-up, which clearly comes from the perspective of someone who is extremely well-versed in Nanoha, I can see that any criticism of Nanoha (the character) I post will probably seem inadequate and poorly-researched to you. Honestly, I have never been the biggest Nanoha fan so maybe I my opinion is biased.

But I loved both Berserk and Fate/Zero so maybe I can try with the Caska-Saber example.

Spoiler:

Whereas Saber (until the awesome, mind-bending, ending that made Fate/Zero so great) was depicted as not only fearless, but also superhumanly strong and immune to pain (I mean she fearlessly fought Caster's demonic hordes even while having the tendons in her left hand perpetually severed by Diarmuid's attack, uuggghhh!). In this way, Saber seems less like a person and more like the inhuman personification of an ideal.

Conversely, while Caska is certainly an incredible warrior, who survives dozens of intense life or death battles throughout the course of the show, she is shown in both big and little ways to be nonetheless, extremely human, and prone to the physical weaknesses that her gender and her humanity impose upon her. For example, in one climactic scene, she loses a battle against a sexist pig who sexually harasses her on the battlefield and it is later revealed that she only lost because she was on her period. Later in the show, after Caska finally kills this same asshole, she clutches an arrow wound on her chest that is still bleeding and says aloud to Guts: "It's nothing serious...I hope."

So it's not to say that Saber was a bad character, and like I said I really loved both of these anime, but the difference between Caska and Saber to me is that Saber seems to effortlessly summon the courage to face her problems, whereas, Caska succeeds only in the face of the severe mental and physical hardships that such a scenario would impose on anyone but the toughest and most fearless of superhuman badasses.

I think this is what I mean when I say Caska is a truly strong female character.

Oh, and you are totally right about me being biased against "Lawful" character types. I just can't relate to them like I can relate to Neutral/Chaotic Characters.

[Vexx]

Heh, its hard to call "beat them senseless until they're your friend" weak.

Decent characters should be hard to pigeon-hole though.

[n120cky]

They need some appeal come from the character as it's one of selling point, for example is Kozuki Karen she is look sexy when in action using plug suit riding robot with a right camera angle.

[Guernsey]

You know some fans hate Madoka for being passive and uninvolved int he plot but I kind of consider to be mostly like Yuna from Final Fantasy X. Yuna may be the typical princess character wearing miko garbs and she may not necessarily be kicking ass and taking names in that game but she grew as a character nonetheless. I kind of hated what they did to her in FFX-2 but it was nice to see to progress from a passive character to an active force. Madoka didn't rush into things like Sayaka but only after she got the information she needed that she was able to make a well informed wish.

[Lord of Fire]

Originally Posted by Guernsey

You know some fans hate Madoka for being passive and uninvolved int he plot but I kind of consider to be mostly like Yuna from Final Fantasy X. Yuna may be the typical princess character wearing miko garbs and she may not necessarily be kicking ass and taking names in that game but she grew as a character nonetheless. I kind of hated what they did to her in FFX-2 but it was nice to see to progress from a passive character to an active force. Madoka didn't rush into things like Sayaka but only after she got the information she needed that she was able to make a well informed wish.

But it still required intervention from Homura to make sure Madoka got that far. I can name at least two situations in the TV series where Homura not intervening would have surely resulted in Madoka making a wish prematurely.

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by Guernsey

You know some fans hate Madoka for being passive and uninvolved int he plot but I kind of consider to be mostly like Yuna from Final Fantasy X. Yuna may be the typical princess character wearing miko garbs and she may not necessarily be kicking ass and taking names in that game but she grew as a character nonetheless. I kind of hated what they did to her in FFX-2 but it was nice to see to progress from a passive character to an active force. Madoka didn't rush into things like Sayaka but only after she got the information she needed that she was able to make a well informed wish.

Honestly, I don't think it's fair to say that Sayaka "rushed into things".

Spoiler for Minor PMMM spoiles:

Kyubey (and Mami) made the Puella Magi pitch to Sayaka (and Madoka) in Episode 2. Sayaka didn't choose to become a Puella Magi until Episode 4. That's not what I would call "rushing into things". Keep in mind that people can sometimes make the wrong decision even when they do take a lot of time to carefully consider their options.

Anyway, the Madoka/Yuna comparison is a pretty good one. Madoka is a very good character, but I just don't think she's a stronger character than Nanoha.

[Guernsey]

You know I keep thinking that Madoka is too girls as Shinji is to boys, she just seems to passive for most people's tastes. I may oversimplifying things but Madoka seems to irritate a lot of viewers and I am not talking about sex appeal. There is a trope on TVTropes called 'Real Women Never Wear Dresses' and I even though I cannot link to the trope page, it kind of speaks volumes about this phenomenon. That is not say that women who wear dresses cannot be badass, it just that some people don't seem to like passive characters like Madoka who just sit back do nothing to impact the storyline. Orihime gets this trope from Bleach fans who hate that Orihime doesn't kick ass like Rukia, Rangiku and Yoruichi although it isn't limited to her as Momo gets this despite showing competency when Aizen isn't around.

[Sheba]

More and more people are forgetting that strong female characters doesn't mean "women who can kick ass", but that they 1. have their own agenda. 2. can handle the bad with grace and/or dignity. And a couple of other qualities that I cannot remember right now. To be with a boy doesn't demean the girl and her strenghts. To get married is NOT the end of the girl's... career, as an anime character. I can think of Frederica and Hildegard from Legend of Galactic Heroes as example of STRONG female characters. You will never see them in boarding parties or leading battles. But they carries that kind of gravitas that many of the Action Girls can only envy.

About Madoka, her strength lies in the fact that while she was scared, cowering and crying and getting her view of the world and what it meant to be a magical girl challenged by Kyuubey and the grief endured by her friends, she, in the end, have NEVER given up on what it meant to be a magical girl. Her wish is a triumphant affirmation of her own definition of a mahou shoujo.

I'll add that I believe in a STRONG female character more when she is getting challenged in the core of her morale and values, and come out stronger out of it, and also when I have seen her flaws and weaknesses.

[SeijiSensei]

To get married is NOT the end of the girl's... career, as an anime character.

One of the more impressive married characters in anime is Fee Carmichael of Planetes. She's off piloting a space craft while her husband and son are back in Florida.

[Kirarakim]

Originally Posted by Sheba

I can think of Frederica and Hildegard from Legend of Galactic Heroes as example of STRONG female characters. You will never see them in boarding parties or leading battles. But they carries that kind of gravitas that many of the Action Girls can only envy.

I am not finished the series (finished through the 2nd season) but I definitely agree with this.

LOGH is somewhat lacking in female characters but I am very impressed with the ones that are there.

[jdennis007]

A recent trend, hardly, you probably just noticed it, but it goes all the way back to Jun from Gatchaman at least, and up.