#neutopia | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

just-another-frender-blog · 1 year

Note

Would you call Futurama a feminist show? I probably would with some exceptions. Leela and Amy are strong women, but it's so obvious that men are writing for these characters. They're nice to each other 90% of the time, but Amy makes occasional digs at Leela to remind us "haha lolz women hate each other for no reason!!" I hope the revival drops that bullshit. Also, they've been obnoxiously sexualized, and we've all seen the misogyny in "Amazon Women in the Mood" and "Neutopia" (admittedly, those episodes were misandrist, too.) In fact, "Neutopia" was one of the episodes that sexualized them, lmao. What tf was Leela wearing in that photoshoot?

But they're still strong female characters with their own agency and storylines. Amy is silly and goofy but in an endearing way, not in a "lol girls are so dumb" way. I feel like one of the Comedy Central revival's strengths is that it gave Amy more to do? She had multiple episodes centered around her. And Leela is obviously the badass starship captain. The way she defies Zapp's bullshit is hilarious, lmao. "Our love has had to endure your constant hatred!" The show never acts like she should "give him a chance" or whatever.

Leela also never takes any shit from the guys, and the joke is usually on them for being lazy idiots. I actually saw a guy on a Futurama forum (this was back in 2013) complaining that some episodes basically said "Women are better than men at everything." I wouldn't go that far, especially with the issues that I mentioned above, but Leela's definitely above it all, lmao.

Would I call Futurama a feminist show? That's an interesting question, and I don't have a straightforward answer. I know that Futurama mainly had male writers, though it did have a couple of female writers. I don't know if any of them returned for the Comedy Central reboot. There is only one episode where a woman is credited as the head writer: "Leela's Homeworld." It was written by Kristen Gore (Al Gore's daughter), and she did not return as a writer for Futurama when it was brought back. Disclaimer: everything I say in this essay is my personal opinion and my personal takeaway from the show.

I see male writers say that they can't write female characters well because they don't understand the "female heart" or some bullshit. That's not true because there are plenty of male writers who can write them well. Hell, a lot of female authors are shit at writing female characters too. The majority of shows, movies, books, etc. have terribly written female characters. To the point where it's a big deal when I watch something that doesn't have terribly written female characters. I also see people praise shows they like for the bare minimum.

The problem with female characters that writers of all genders seem to have is that they write them as women first and characters second. Male characters are written as characters first; they are allowed to be complex. They are not defined by terms such as "strong male character" or "male love interest." There are a number of reasons why this is an issue when writing women, but the core of it all is that many people do not view women as being human, or as unique individuals. This has been a problem with gender constructs throughout history, and it affects the media we watch.

For a feminist show, the most important thing to me would be well-written female characters. There are a number of things that need to be considered when defining a well-written female character:

Does she have a defined personality?

Does she have flaws? What are her strengths?

Does she have a character arc with character development?

Does her character arc revolve around her relationship with another man (usually romantic)?

Is she written consistently? Is she written out of character to suit the plot?

Does she have meaningful relationships outside of her male love interest?

Does she have meaningful relationships with other women?

How often is she sexualized? Is that deconstructed or commented on in any way?

Does she have agency? Does she have control over the plot?

I think a lot of people get confused about this and think "oh physically strong female characters who beat up the bad guys." With these types of female characters, you get very bland "sexy, strong" types who end up with an unremarkable male protagonist. This is defined as the "girlboss and malewife dynamic," which is often handled very poorly in my opinion. With this type of dynamic, I generally see the male character get meaningful development, while the female character is there to be the love interest (but disguised with a feminist coat of paint). The issue with dynamics like these is that they are written to be power fantasies for male viewers at the expense of quality.

Movies and shows in more recent years have a problem where an unremarkable (but secretly really special) male protagonist is handed a femme fatale or a manic pixie dream girl on a silver platter. Think Emmet from the Lego Movie or Johnny from Hotel Transylvania. Thankfully, Leela and Fry's relationship tends to avoid this for the most part. I think the biggest reason is that David X Cohen said he really didn't want Fry to end up with Leela initially, but reconsidered later in the show. Leela was not created to be a female love interest for the male protagonist; as such, she was allowed to be her own character.

Let's talk about Leela, who really surprised me as a character. I didn't know anything about her before I watched Futurama other than her having one eye and that she ended up with the MC. When I started watching the show, I found that I really liked Leela; I liked her character design, I liked her voice, I liked her friendship with Fry and Bender, and I loved her personality. I was impressed that Leela had a very meaningful character arc that wasn't defined by her relationship with a male love interest (the bar is on the ground), and instead focused on self-discovery.

Leela is written to be a deconstruction of the "strong female character" archetype. She's the pilot, she's level-headed, she's intelligent, and she's talented. In addition to being Fry and Bender's boss, she's generally the one rescuing both of them from danger. She's the only one out of the trio who can fight, and come up with escape plans. The show also respects this aspect of the status quo; Leela's job is never taken over by a male character, whereas this would be the case in other shows.

Despite Leela's tough exterior, she has a soft side. She cares deeply about protecting the innocent, particularly animals and children. She cares a lot about fighting for the rights of oppressed groups and gets involved in politics. Out of all the characters, Leela fits a classic heroic archetype the best, a role rarely given to female characters. However, she's a flawed individual as well; she has a temper and a darker side. She can make bad decisions that occasionally harm others. This is why I think Leela is a deconstruction of the strong female character archetype because you don't often see these complexities with such characters.

Leela's character arc and character development are great. She's been made to feel insecure about her appearance and status as a non-human her entire life. Throughout the show, she learns to accept that part of herself and even embrace her uniqueness, learning not to change who she is (especially for shitty men). Leela unraveling her past, the circumstances of her birth, and finally reuniting with her parents is beautiful and is one of the strongest moments in the show. Leela struggles to develop a familial relationship with them as an adult and make up for the lost time.

I think my biggest issue is that I wanted more of this. I wanted more episodes about Leela's past, her childhood, her parents, her struggles, etc. because she is such an interesting character to me. In the CC revival, we got a couple of interesting Leela episodes but didn't get enough. And I noticed a lot of episodes about Leela weren't written with the same amount of care as the earlier episodes. Another thing I noticed about Leela's character in the CC revival is her relationship with Fry. She was written out of character to create relationship drama, and I personally never got a sense of what she really wanted out of that relationship until the very end of the show.

In the Fox era, a lot of episodes about Fry and Leela's relationship are very well written. In episodes like "Love and Rocket" or "The Sting," you get a sense that Leela does reciprocate, but she's not ready for a relationship with Fry, who seems to respect that. I really liked this a lot because Leela had a traumatic past, maybe needs to work on herself, and doesn't need a partner as immature as Fry. In the CC era, their relationship felt more one-sided on Fry's end. I wanted to know more about how Leela felt; I wanted her to have more agency. The CC era started slipping into the issue where Leela started to be written less as a character and more as a plot device for certain episodes.

Now, I want to talk about Amy. I really like Amy as a character as well. You get the sense that she is feminine, yet tomboyish. She's very intelligent but dorky and clumsy. In addition, she seems to be very comfortable with her sexuality, which is a welcome choice. She's adorable and I've always liked how she seems to be a foil for Fry. Amy is the second most prominent female character after Leela, and I think she has a lot of potential as a character. The problem is that potential is never utilized. I’ve noticed it’s common for authors to write female characters (a lot of minorities as well) with a lot of potential, only to waste that potential.

I started showing one of my best friends Futurama right before I started writing for it. Amy quickly became her favorite character and she asked me which episodes were Amy-centric episodes. I had to tell her that there were barely any of them in the entire show despite Futurama having 140 episodes. Many episodes where Amy is centric to the plot are barely about her and barely develop her as a character. They are mainly about her relationship with other men as well. “Put Your Head On My Shoulders” is about her affair with Fry and “Proposition Infinity” is about her affair with Bender. “Where the Buggalo Roam” is about Kif’s insecurities.

“Kif Gets Knocked Up a Notch” is also about her relationship with Kif, but it’s still a fantastic episode for Amy. It’s actually quite progressive for the time (and for being an mpreg episode), and says quite a bit about how women are pressured into motherhood. We see how Amy doesn’t truly want that, and the show doesn’t demonize her. Instead, it sends the message that women should wait until they’re ready, or they don’t need to have children at all. I think Kif being the one to get pregnant is a nice touch in my eyes, rather than forcing the burden of pregnancy onto Amy.

“That Darn Katz!” is a very mediocre episode, and it made me wish that there were more episodes about Amy like the one where Kif gets pregnant. I really enjoy Kif’s relationship with Amy a lot because he really respects Amy as a person. And then Amy truly loves Kif even if he isn’t a “conventionally attractive” guy. Their relationship feels queer to me due to the interspecies aspect and that Amy and Kif aren’t defined by rigid gender roles in their relationship. It’s honestly quite refreshing, even though the CC reboot messes up their relationship from time to time.

For the final part of this analysis, I really want to address Amy and Leela’s relationship with each other. I also think their relationship has a lot wasted potential, especially because we see how well this show writes male friendships. There are a lot of episodes about Fry and Bender’s relationship, and a great episode about Zoidberg and Farnsworth’s relationship. There is only a single episode about Amy and Leela’s relationship, and it’s a writer’s poorly disguised fetish episode: “The Butterjunk Effect.” This episode does a huge disservice to Amy and Leela’s characters by fetishizing them and turning them into abusive people.

Amy and Leela are at each other’s throats for petty and shallow reasons. Amy is constantly making fun of Leela’s appearance (something that Leela is very insecure about as I noted earlier), and Leela is incredibly jealous of the fact that Amy can get guys easily. Leela also makes some... interesting comments about Amy being more sexually active, as well as Amy’s race. I think it’s clear that Amy and Leela are both jealous of each other for one reason or another, which could be explored and developed, but it’s not. It’s merely used as a gag that gets old over time.

Instead, the audience is told that this is just what female friendships are like. Women are mean to each other and constantly fighting for the attention of guys, and are naturally shallow. The nature of to Amy and Leela’s relationship is not true to their characters at all. Amy isn’t a shallow woman, as shown through her relationship with Kif. Leela is gentle and strong-willed at heart, showing kindness to others even if it’s against her better judgement. See what I mean by female characters being written as women first and characters second? Amy and Leela’s relationship was the most disappointing thing to me when I watched Futurama.

I know that Futurama is older, but it’s not insanely old. There are plenty of ways Amy and Leela’s relationship could’ve been given a lot more depth. They could’ve had Amy look up to Leela. Leela is an older, cooler career woman who doesn’t take shit from anyone and outperforms her male coworkers. However, Amy is so starstruck around Leela that she constantly says the wrong thing, or she’s too flustered by Leela. Thus, Leela just assumes Amy hates her. Amy eventually overcomes her shyness and slowly forms a bond with Leela, who starts to mentor Amy in return. Leela begins to appreciate her relationship with Amy, as she didn’t have many close friends growing up due to the constant bullying.

I’m not saying that’s the right way to fix their relationship, but I personally think something like that is more accurate to them as characters. And it’s not a perfect relationship at first, but they start to develop nice chemistry during the show's runtime. So my answer to the initial question about Futurama being a feminist show: it could be worse. Amy and Leela are great female characters and enjoy quite a few of the minor female characters. However, I also think that Futurama really fails its female characters as well, which is a shame. I’ve seen far more misogynistic shows, but I also think people settle for the bare minimum when it comes to female characters because it’s so common for them to be poorly written.

I have faith that these issues can get fixed in the revival. First, both Amy and Leela need individual episodes. Second, maybe they could actually examine Amy and Leela’s relationship, and help them come to terms with one another. Matt Groening’s current project, Disenchantment, has a great female lead. My other favorite adult cartoon, BoJack Horseman, has wonderfully written female characters. I resonated so much with Diane; it’s very rare for me to be able to relate to a female character. All of this gives me hope for future adult cartoons and Futurama’s revival episodes. They already have the groundwork laid out with Amy and Leela, they just need to be written with the proper care they deserve.

#futurama #asks #analysis post #long post #women in writing #turanga leela #amy wong

19 notes · View notes