#what a genre considers acceptable female rage sometimes feels So Hollow compared to what i might let myself feel irl

[the-everqueen]

for the AMA: what compels you most in a fictional character!

rage as a trauma response.

it compels me when a character spits in the face of god. when the response isn't "why did you let all this happen" but "how dare you let this happen." something about the assertion of agency in the wake of un-meaning. something about "there was never a Purpose, the point is what you make of it." this is undoubtedly because i was raised evangelical and continue to struggle with what i believe vs what i want to be true. pero also i think i was denied anger for so long (and even now my reflex when i'm hurt is to divert/repress/hide/sublimate anger) that it's cathartic for SOMEONE to get to be mad at the powers that be.

misogyny means it's usually (white) male characters who get these narrative arcs. this is evident in my blorbos: astarion from bg3, the corinthian from sandman, will graham from hannibal. (my immediate first thought was actually emilio sandoz from the sparrow, very literal autistic brain serving me well here lmao, what does it mean to be god's whore.) but my favorite female and genderqueer characters have this, too. saga anderson from alan wake 2 (LITERALLY tells both the in-game narrative force and the meta "fuck off, i'm done with other people writing my story"). essun from the broken earth trilogy (everyone who says they can't connect to her...i need you to examine yourself for misogynoir). vic from nos4a2. eurydice from hadestown. erica slaughter from something is killing the children. jade from my heart is a chainsaw.

(horror is obviously a huge medium for this...the final girl is a figure of righteous anger, the avenging angel, the woman who mows down the ultimate horror with a baseball bat or a butcher knife and she's right, she's in the right, she's the monster slayer, fuck you fear me.)

#ask games #AMA #crimeronan #this was SUCH a good ask thank you #also i'm not gonna write a whole essay here in the tags but i think part of why i adore horror #and why i have a hard time connecting to ''literary fiction'' women IS that allowance for rage #what a genre considers acceptable female rage sometimes feels So Hollow compared to what i might let myself feel irl #i like my trauma-rage bloody and awful #SOMEONE needs to pay in flesh #weirdly stephen king is really good at this when he lets himself do it? beverly from IT and arguably It from IT are peak #Women Should Do Crimes Actually #unfortunately most of the time Stephen King sucks at letting women be people #SO INSTEAD i recommend Stephen Graham Jones who just consistently does this #i ALSO don't think it's a coincidence that my favorite queer and women creators who write these arcs are also not white #nonwhite queer and female rage is Threatening To The Status Quo