Though there are plenty of problems, I generally like what Marvel and the Marvel Cinematic Universe are doing with female characters. Admittedly I am the worst comic book reader ever (I read Hawkeye and I’m terrible about keeping track of when a single title comes out), but the comics are doing great things with Kelly Sue DeConnick’s run on Captain Marvel, and I’m very excited about Kamala Khan, the Muslim teenager from Jersey City who’s headlining the new Ms Marvel title.
The Marvel movies have also been doing pretty good things with the female characters in that universe (lack of a woman-fronted superhero movie notwithstanding; I’m looking at you and your side-stepping that question, Kevin Feige), and I was for the most part pleased with where they went with the women in Thor: The Dark World.
This post will have SPOILERS, so if you haven’t seen Thor: The Dark World, read no further! (Unless you don’t mind being spoiled; in that case, read on!)
The first Thor movie was… not great. It was entertaining enough, but the story was a little weak for my taste, and I have to confess, I felt like Natalie Portman was just phoning it in half the time in her performance as Dr. Jane Foster. I wanted to love Jane, but her sometimes-flat performance and the shoehorned-in romance with Thor put me off. I did love Darcy and Sif and Frigga, and it was great to have four significant women in a superhero movie, and despite its flaws, I do like Thor a lot.
Thor: The Dark World is a much smoother film than the first, with a straightforward action plot that requires our heroes to save the universe from the dark elf Malekith, who wants to ruin everything for everyone everywhere. (As a side note, did anyone else notice the star on Malekith’s armor when he’s getting all charged up with aether? It looked like the Kree star on Captain Marvel’s uniform to me.) I liked the movie a lot, overall, but I particularly like the expanded roles for pretty much all of the women (not including Sif, and I am very sad about that).
The Bechdel test is an important aspect of looking at how women are portrayed in film. From Wikipedia:
In a 1985 strip titled “The Rule”, an unnamed female character says that she only watches a movie if it satisfies the following requirements:
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It has to have at least two women in it,
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who talk to each other,
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about something besides a man.
There’s been a lot of attention brought to the Bechdel test lately, with Swedish cinemas even incorporating it into their movie rating system, and holy crap, is this great. We most definitely need more movies that feature female characters who aren’t just there to talk about the male heroes. But a movie that fails the Bechdel test can still feature wonderful, complex female characters; The Avengers is a good example of this. There are two major female characters (Black Widow and Maria Hill) in that and two supporting characters (Pepper Potts and Beth the waitress), and unfortunately none of them talk to each other about… well, anything. But the three major characters (sorry, Beth) are still well-developed and complicated women who emphatically do not exist to further the character development of their male counterparts.
Natalie Portman as Jane Foster
Thor: The Dark World, on the other hand, passes the Bechdel test with flying colors. Sure, there’s some lighthearted ribbing between Darcy and Jane about both Jane’s efforts to date other guys and about Thor, but between discovering the strange phenomena that precede the alignment of the different realms and figuring out how to stop Malekith with science, Jane and Darcy function as much more than Thor’s girlfriend and the girl who says “guuuuurl you gotta get you some of that” about Thor.
Let’s talk about the ladies themselves. As I previously mentioned, Jane kind of fell flat for me in the first film, but I really, really liked her in the second one. Portman’s performance was much more enthusiastic, I guess would be the best way to put it, and it’s obvious that she is invested in playing a woman working in a STEM field. She even worked with Marvel to promote a contest for girls looking to enter STEM professions, and it’s awesome that she’s both enjoying playing a scientist and wants to encourage more young women to consider the fields.
Jane is Thor’s love interest, but both in the first film and in this one, she does so much more than sit around and simper. When we meet her in The Dark World, she has been depressed about Thor not showing up for, oh, two years or so. Is that something to be criticized? I personally don’t think so. You’d be hard-pressed to find a woman who hasn’t moped because she got dumped, and let’s be real. If your potential boyfriend is a superhero and he up and disappears on you, only to show up to save the world and then disappear again, wouldn’t you be pretty depressed about that?
I love that she is flustered by Thor. I mean, what woman who’s even vaguely attracted to men wouldn’t get a little giddy at the idea that this guy (and his arms) is in love with her?
I’ll be in my bunk.
I’ve seen some people claim that this is a fault in Jane, but I really like it. It makes her a realistic character for me, not just Lady Scientist who does nothing but SCIENCE!
But speaking of SCIENCE!, I love that Jane’s one true love is astrophysics. When Darcy interrrupts Jane’s date with a new guy, she can’t help but dash out on the poor dude because SCIENCE! When they go investigate the weird goings-on with physics in London, Jane’s excited because SCIENCE! Even when Thor whisks her off to Asgard to deal with her aether infection, she’s completely flabbergasted by the awesomeness of all the SCIENCE! around her.
And in the end, it’s really Jane’s scientific knowledge combined with Erik Selvig’s and with Darcy and Ian the Intern’s determination that stop Malekith. Thor’s muscle is just the thing that distracts Malekith enough to let Jane’s plan work.
Hell yeah, Jane. I love you, girl.
Let’s talk for a moment, though, about the aether. Jane is the person who sets it free, albeit accidentally, but I like how that was dealt with. She’s curious, and there’s not a damn thing wrong with that. She’s suddenly whisked away to another world, and like any good scientist, she’s going to at least look at that weird, glowy thing that’s pretty much the only thing around. It’s not Jane’s fault that the aether was released, and I like that she worries about that. Like Thor tells her; by being curious and finding the aether, she actually kept it out of Malekith’s hands for longer than if she hadn’t found it. I like that she’s conflicted about that. Part of me wishes that she had been able to be more proactive in getting rid of the aether herself, but when it comes down to it, she’s the fish out of water in this movie. She has absolutely no idea how to get it out of herself, nor does she have the knowledge or experience required to move between the worlds.
And finally, Jane does this:
That’s my girl.
I love Loki, but HELL YEAH, PUNCH THAT JERK, JANE!
Kat Dennings as Darcy Lewis (with Darcy’s intern, Ian, played by Jonathan Howard)
So next we have Darcy Lewis, played by Kat Dennings. In the first film, Darcy served mostly as comic relief, tossing in sarcastic comments (that were often surprisingly insightful), taking camera phone shots of Thor eating pancakes, and generally being cute and quirky. And she was so freaking awesome at it that fandom fell in love with her, and luckily Marvel realized that they should give her a bigger role in The Dark World. All hail Darcy!
Darcy may not be an astrophysicist like Jane, but she is obviously an intelligent person who brings some common sense insights into Jane’s very science-centered viewpoint on events. The thing I think I like most about Darcy, though, is that even though she’s technically Jane’s intern, she’s also Jane’s friend. It’s obvious that Darcy is invested in her friendship with Jane as well as the work that they’re doing, because why else would a smart young woman like Darcy stick with an internship that’s not in her field when she could go and try to find a better-paying gig elsewhere?
Female friendship is something that I love seeing in fiction and that, frankly, I don’t see enough of. Considering that the vast majority of movies on the American market don’t pass the Bechdel test, it’s pretty obvious that there’s a huge lack of female friendship in Hollywood that doesn’t center around one of the women getting a man. Jane does, of course, get the man in the Thor movies, but her friendship with Darcy is more centered on their work and general emotional support. Darcy’s ribbing about Jane taking a shower (“You smell good”) while bringing her news of science afoot helps kick Jane out of her depressive funk and back into her usual science mode. When Jane goes missing, Darcy is extremely worried and even calls S.H.I.E.L.D. for help, which is pretty amazing considering they confiscated her beloved iPod in the first movie.
And, of course, Darcy is still the comic relief. The aforementioned teasing along with Darcy’s budding “relationship” with her intern, Ian, brings laughs to an already funny movie, but let’s look at that for a second. Darcy is a funny woman. And she’s not funny in the usual way that Hollywood likes to make women funny (“Oh noooo I got dumped again, I’m going to eat ice cream and make jokes about my ass getting fat!”). She’s sarcastic, witty, and has wonderful deadpan delivery that works really well for Darcy’s outward personality, the disaffected hipster kid. But within that exterior, Darcy is an intelligent, determined woman who does what she needs to do to help Jane save the day.
And she’s the one doing the dipping when she smooches her intern. Aw yeah. Get it, Darcy.
Rene Russo as Frigga
Even though we unfortunately didn’t get to see a whole lot of her in either of the Thor movies, I’ve always liked Frigga. Odin is the distant, authoritative parent, even with Thor. Frigga, on the other hand, is still powerful when it comes to her sons, but she’s the more approachable parent, the parent who is comfortable showing affection even after Loki royally screws things up.
So I just have to say that I’m pretty damn disappointed at what happens to her in The Dark World. I actually read a spoiler for this months before the movie came out and was really dreading it, since let’s be honest: killing the hero and his dastardly brother’s mom seems like it would be a classic case of fridging.
I was… well, I don’t want to say pleasantly surprised because it certainly wasn’t pleasant, but I was at least happier with how they handled Frigga’s death than I expected to be.
Instead of being murdered in some sort of helpless situation, Frigga kicks some ass on her way down. She’s tasked with guarding Jane when the dark elves invade Asgard, and Frigga proves herself to be both clever as hell and a sharp fighter. She hides Jane elsewhere and uses her magic to project a copy of Jane into the room with her, and when Malekith demands Frigga hand Jane over, Frigga actually gets the closest to outright killing Malekith than anyone else in the film.
Let’s take a moment and let that sink in. Thor, for all his physical might and magical hammer, has to face Malekith when he’s charged up with the aether. Frigga, on the other hand, literally has her sword at his throat. The only reason she isn’t able to kill Malekith and put a major cramp in the Dark Elf plan to ruin the universe is that Kurse shows up.
Frigga’s death is definitely meant to provide a catalyst for Thor and Loki to work together, but that’s not its only impact. It shows that she is both a warrior as much as her husband and sons (in fact, her fighting style looks very much like Loki’s, and now I really want to see Mama Frigga teaching her little adopted son to fight) and that she is willing to sacrifice herself for the greater good, to protect someone who can’t protect herself. I’m still not happy that she died to create man-sadness, but at least it wasn’t something like what happens to practically every woman Wolverine loves in the comics, or what happens to the ladies in Nolan’s Batman movies.
Frigga is a hero. I hate that she dies and actually got very choked up during her gorgeous funeral scene, but she dies a hero, and that is much better than I’ve been trained to expect from a superhero film.
So when are we starting the #FRIGGA LIVES campaign?
Jaimie Alexander as Sif
And finally, let’s talk about Sif.
I love Sif, guys. And there was just not enough Sif in The Dark World. I get that at some point, you have to start trimming characters back. The Thor movies have a lot of characters, both from Earth and from Asgard, and while I was disappointed that Hogun got dropped off on his home world, I can understand that in order to streamline the story, you have to minimize some roles. (That doesn’t mean I didn’t want more Hogun, dammit.)
But Sif. She’s an awesome warrior, someone that Thor obviously respects and likes, and… there just wasn’t enough of her. She fights baddies on Vanaheim, trades snarky remarks with Thor while she’s at it, tries to talk Thor out of his funk over missing Jane, and then helps Thor escape with Loki and Jane at the risk of being punished for treason.
*sad trombone*
I liked seeing Sif in battle again and I really love her interactions with Thor. These are two people who have obviously known each other for a very long time and who obviously have a lot of fondness and respect for one another. (I am putting away the part of me that ships Sif and Thor really hard because now is not the time, Pamela, keep it cool.) I wanted to see Sif play a bigger part in Thor’s life and in saving the universe.
Despite the lack of Sif in the film, there’s one thing I’m glad didn’t happen with her, and that’s the love triangle that the trailers and tv spots seemed to be playing up. They focused heavily on Sif looking at Jane as she walks by, and it really felt like they were trying to set up a love triangle between Sif, Jane, and Thor.
Cue much groaning and gnashing of teeth on my part. I hate love triangles, and I was very worried that they would reduce Sif to a jealous harpy pitted against Jane.
Thankfully that’s not the case at all. There’s only a hint of Sif’s feelings for Thor, and those are mostly put aside for the action storyline of the film. I’d definitely like to see more of Thor and Sif’s relationship, but I emphatically do not want her to be reduced to the Other Woman in a love triangle.
But you know what I would like to see? Sif and the Warriors Three, an action/comedy television series featuring on what Sif and her boys get up to while Thor’s hanging out on Earth, doing Avengers things. It would be epic, Marvel. Epic. Call me, we can talk deals, okay?
While Marvel Studios has a lot of work to do to make fangirls like me happy (I want Black Widow and Captain Marvel movies, dammit, and Natasha and Pepper having drinks and talking about saving the world all the damn time), they still have the best female characters in superhero movies. The women of the Thor movies are just part of the cast of fabulous women in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and while there have been some hiccups (sorry, Jon Favreau, but you had no idea what to do with Black Widow in Iron Man 2, did you?), these ladies are still the best.
And since women like the fangirls here at TDF are more and more vocal about watching and loving the Marvel movies, Marvel will hopefully give us even more of the women that we love. And by that I mean a Black Widow solo movie, not just “watch Captain America: The Winter Soldier,” Mr. Feige. Hell, even Chris Hemsworth wants it. So stay vocal and keep shouting for awesome women in your Marvel superhero movies, my fellow fangirls.
