Supernatural Episode 7x3 and Misogyny

[rabid1st]

I liked this episode. I think S7 is going much better than S6 so far. I enjoyed Jensen Ackles as a director. And I liked that he didn't lean so much on guest actors this time. Young Sam is my favorite flashback character, because I feel he's very talented.

And here I imagine he gets his first on-screen kiss. The young version of Amy Pond (yay for DW shout out) was very well played, too. In some ways I liked her more than Jewel S. I'm not sure that I believed adult Amy and so I didn't see misogyny as everyone else seemed to have seen in Dean's actions. I think Dean's decision to kill the monster is directly in line with say...his power saw treatment of vampires when Sam was buddying up to the nest queen in an early episode. I think what we are seeing here is typical Dean. Dean isn't a shades of grey character in the slightest. This is part of what made the entire Sam as Anti-Christ story so compelling, because Dean isn't really one to cut monsters some slack. He killed this woman because he didn't see her as a woman. And, to me, that is consistent with his character. Another thing that is consistent is that he doesn't believe Sam can make smart decisions. I think that is what is going bite Dean down the road.

We, the audience, believe that Sam was right about Amy. But Dean did not believe in Sam and so he simply kills the monster. The dark side of Dean isn't woman hating, but is simply that he identifies himself as a hunter first and a compassionate human being second...or fourth...because Sam's keeper probably out ranks humanity, too. I think this episode had a lot to say about the inevitable circle of life with hunters and monsters. They aren't on the same side, even if they give each other some temporary leeway. And in flashback we see that, too, Sam knows that the young girl had to leave before his father arrived. Just as young Amy knew that her mother would kill Sam. She kills her own mother to save Sam, but I don't think Sam would have turned on his family. I think he would have felt bad about Dad killing young Amy, but he wouldn't have stopped Dad. Here, Dean simply feels that Sam is soft-hearted and wrong about the woman killing again, because she has already proved she would kill if she needed the brains. This is a little different from the vampire woman who refused to kill for a time...but when she killed...she died. Simple and black and white for Dean.

I enjoyed the Leviathans in this. I liked that they are tracing the aliases, which is going to make Sam and Dean have to work or come up with another way of scamming the system. And I enjoyed the suspense of the hospital scenes.

Comments

[rusty_halo.livejournal.com]

I think people can reasonably disagree about whether Dean the character is a misogynist, but that it is unambiguous that Supernatural the show is deeply and profoundly misogynist (in premise, narrative focus, dialogue, recurring tropes, etc etc).

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

I do agree that the show is misogynistic, though many of the sited examples I think occur accidentally because they use women as monsters. I believe their thought process is more along the lines of "What is seductive to two healthy males?" WOMEN! So we will make the monsters women and then have them attempt to seduce our heroes. Our heroes then react to the evil slimy seductress as whore figure and the message is sent out over and over that women seduce and destroy and it is okay to beat the crap out of them. Still lots of men get the stuffy beaten out of them on SPN, too.

I am more alarmed by the treatment of the REAL women than the monster ones, myself. To me the misogyny in SPN arises around the treatment of Mom, Jo and Bella and the casual hound dog behavior of Dean with assorted twins and waitresses and angels. As well as the not so subtle idea that women make men weaker that we see show up with Jessica and Ruby and whatever the name is of that woman Dean took up with...oh, how quickly I've forgotten...Lisa? Anyway, why we couldn't have some disinterested females who still contribute to the work of saving the world is beyond me.

[liliaeth]

Kathleen Hudak, Nancy, Sheriff Mills, that cop from the Usual suspects, Ellen, Jo, ...

Lisa never made Dean weaker, she made him stronger.

Ruby was a total and utterly magnficent bastard(and yes that's the biggest compliment a villain char can get), far more interesting than Crowley imo.

Jo was given a chance to grow and a heroic sacrifice, more so than many of the male hunters who died. Same with Ellen.

The women Dean sleeps with are well aware that he's a one night stand and as we see in the first ep with Lisa, they get to objectify Dean just as much as he does them. Nothing wrong with a one night stand, if both parties know what they're getting into.

As for Mary Winchester, let's see, how bad a treatment did she get. Yes she died, but we then see her back story, we see her get explored and made just as multidimensional a character as John was. In some ways even more so.

So sorry, I just don't see it.

[rabid1st.livejournal.com]

Ellen does stand out for the most part as a woman on equal footing. And Mary is a notable exception to the rule, well, except she does want traditional family values and pays the price for that. Women as sacrificial motivation for manly deeds is a standard narrative trick. Jo might have been something special if not for the 'little sister' vibe they took with her. And if she'd been allowed to grow along with them like, say, Cas. But again, we see that women are there for the men to protect them. So, we can't really count Jo, much as I enjoy her.

While I do agree with your point about the fans being more misogynistic than the show, there is a tendency to have some fairly brutal sexist appearing attacks on women. The waitress in the coffee shop that Dean clocks is a good example. We can say that she's a very smart mouthed demon and asking for trouble, but there's still a certain joy in his belting her and little attention paid to the real woman inside as the character Meg points out in the Witnesses episode.

I do agree with you that the show is brave in casting so many strong female characters. And I think it is inevitable that Sam and Dean are going to kick the stuffing out of any female villain eventually, simply because they are the baddies. But it is often disturbing to watch and often includes sexist commentary. Dean isn't viewed as less moral because he sleeps around, but a woman in the same position would be and these women are set dressing which I think is what people find objectionable. It is not that they are happy to objectify Dean but that he uses them and we have very little idea who they are as people. They are rather like condoms, disposable.

As for Lisa making Dean stronger, I have to disagree with that. And I liked her, too. I just knew she was disposable and she was. She is presented in the end as a liability to his hunting, his edge, and unable to compare to the bond he has with his brother. Did he do the right thing leaving her and Ben? Morally speaking, I think he did and I think he showed personal strength in letting go of his dream of a normal life, but I don't think there is much to show she made him stronger.

So, basically, I think that a lot of the complaints about SPN have more to do with the circumstances of the show than blatant sexism. The guys are heterosexual and so the people that seduce them are female and the monsters take on female form. The guys must hunt those monsters and show a certain level of contempt for them. I don't think Dean was killing a woman or mother in this episode. He was killing a monster that had killed other people and which he believed would kill again given motivation to do so.

I think a better thought would be how many of the male demons/monsters are referenced in the same sexist fashion. And that leads us to ask are there casual sexists terms for asshat men? Pricks? Wankers? Surely Dean did get some digs in at the angels. Anyway, as I said, I don't think this action by Dean in killing Amy was motivated by his feelings about women. And I personally doubt that Sam or Dean hate women, but I think the show does go too far sometimes when it comes to objectifying and labeling. And I wonder why Dean doesn't just slap the stuffing out of Crowley when he mouths off.

[liliaeth]

I actually deeply disagree about the show being misogynistic.

In fact, Supernatural is one of the few shows that honestly dare to use women as villains. Showing them as the equals of the men they fight and in many cases, their superiors.

I am sick and tired of shows where the only female villains you get are the scheming behind the scenes kind, and where the heroes won't even hit a female villain, even if she's stronger and more powerful than them. I'm just sick and tired of fake chivalry.

When Dean hits female demons and monsters, imo this shows his respect for them, because he sees them as just as dangerous as the ones in male meatsuits.

Killing Amy, wasn't about killing a woman. It was about killing a monster before it killed again. (because he made the mistake of letting a monster go with Lenore and her people, and as a result, who knows how many people were killed by those same vampires him and Sam spared the lives of) Because Dean has always valued human lives more than he does those of monsters. Even if the humans are bad guys and even if the monsters try to fight their nature.

[rusty_halo.livejournal.com]

http://thingswithwings.dreamwidth.org/145564.html

[liliaeth]

and that proves what exactly?

the Winchesters are constantly called on things they caused that wasn't their fault. And yes, characters die, male as well as female and this has an effect on the leads. But notice that their deaths are just as important for their own storylines as they are for the two leads.

When Ellen and Jo die, they don't just die to make the boys suffer, Jo dies saving Dean's life and her death is about her storyline, about her courage. Dean's mourning of her, is in respect to who she and Ellen were, not just to what their deaths do to the Winchesters.

Do you know how few female characters get the whole 'defiance during torture scene'?

Most of the time, if women get tortured, it's just to make the men who love them suffer. Yet in SPN, we get both Ruby and Meg tortured and the both of them turn said torture on their torturers.

Ruby using Alistair's desire to conflict pain against him, to stay alive and use him to fend off the angels. (and at the same time her strength in hiding that she's on his side, because she's also using him to earn the Winchesters trust)

Meg basically humiliates the demon possessing Christian while he's torturing her.

That's the kind of behavior that shows them as utterly bad ass and it's rarely given to female characters.

Mary's death might have started out being about causing her husband and sons pain, but as we find out more about her past, we realize that she wasn't a helpless victim. She's the one who made the initial deal with Azazel, she's the one who was the Hunter and who was trying to protect her husband and children. And then her death becomes not about her sons, but about her, and who she is as a woman, as a Campbell and as a Winchester.

In fact, if you take a deep look at Dean, it's clear that he's actually clearly his mother's son. He's the stand in for the mother in the family, the caretaker, the one who helped raise Sam. Seriously, for a character who seems so overtly masculine he's over and over again shown as being a female perspective. it's one of the reasons I like the guy so much.

[rusty_halo.livejournal.com]

http://sisabet.livejournal.com/365275.html
http://apocalypsos.livejournal.com/1618164.html
http://like-neon.com/index.php/2009/09/supernatural-i-wish-i-could-quit-you/
http://theangryblackwoman.com/2009/09/09/an-open-letter-to-eric-kripke/

[liliaeth]

I've already read most of those. But what's your opinion, rather than other people's opinions?

Thing is, the show itself is not mysoginistic, even if fandom at times is.

In fact, I will admit that if Ruby had been male, he'd probably have been a regular. And if Castiel had been female, she'd have died in s4. Because fandom is more accepting of male characters than they are of female ones. But that's not the show's fault.

[rusty_halo.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry you're in denial, but I'm really not interested in restating analyses that have already been articulately made for 7 years now.

[liliaeth]

I'm not in denial, I just watched the actual show, before listening to people's rants about misogyny. As such I made up my own mind, instead of having it made up for me. the advantage of not starting to watch a show until the middle of s4.

[ladypeyton.livejournal.com]

I agree with you completely. No one in this show survives except the big three of Sam, Dean and Bobby and even they die occasionally (and to be honest I still keep expecting Bobby to die someday).

Everybody gets treated badly no matter their gender.

And it's had two of the strongest, most brave female characters I've ever seen on television in Ellen and Jo.