![]() Deciding that that's the point of it misunderstands the test. 'Passing' the test doesn't mean a movie's good, or even treats women fairly, and not 'passing' doesn't mean it's bad or treats women unfairly. The rest of the movie could have no women or treat the one(s) it has horribly, but it would still 'pass'. It doesn't measure characters' importance, because a two-line exchange two random characters have that's just "wow, nice weather today" "isn't it?" could pass as long as they're both women. It was made to highlight the minimal roles / some of the tropes women are/were subject to and to point out the incredibly low bar of "is there more than one token girl and do they interact in a way that doesn't revolve around a guy?" (the Mako Mori test and Sexy Lamp test cropped up later on to comment on other tropes). There's no 'point' to the test - like was trying to explain before, it's sheerly descriptive. That's a mistake, in my opinion.Ĭlick to expand.That's the thing, though: that's not the point of the test. When you look at Rey and see that she's strong, fast, resourceful, capable, and stoic, and then say she might just as well be a man, you're saying the aforementioned traits are male and not female. The truth is, both men and women run the entire spectrum of what we consider traditionally male and traditionally female, and often that can vary in a given person depending on context. When someone points to a female character having traditionally male traits and criticizes that character, they're buying into patriarchal notions of what characteristics are "male" and what characteristics are "female." What we see with Rey is a character who has traditionally valued characteristics being criticized as not being female enough because people have adopted the narrative that her characteristics are male, not female. It can change from characterization to characterization, but there are basically a whole slew of traits considered traditionally male, and valued, as opposed to those considered traditionally female, and undervalued. What you have over hundreds of years of patriarchy are a set of traits that are valued as male - strength, resourcefulness, stoicism, etc. ….The criticism of female characters not being female enough is an insidious form of sexism (unintentional product of patriarchy). With a multicultural cast, Tokyo used as the main setting instead of New York or L.A., the only real star being a Black Brit many Americans had never heard of, and a storyline full of borrowed tropes that many anime fans felt were ripoffs rather than homages, the sci-fi action flick has fought an uphill battle to draw attention.īut despite what seems to be an infatuated, deeply loyal fanbase-last weekend saw an entire online fan convention, JaegerCon, complete with an appearance from del Toro himself -Pacific Rim has encountered trouble from an unexpected source: the Bechdel Test. It’s no secret that Pacific Rim, Guillermo del Toro’s $200 million love song to Japanese pop culture, was a risky venture from the start. The Bechdel Test has long been the barometer of women-friendly films, but Pacific Rim fans say it doesn’t give the movie’s female lead enough credit.
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