Women in The Orville and sci fi

[Graham Kennedy]

Hey, anybody notice that the Orville has lots of really good strong female characters? And I don't just mean physically strong like Alara, lol.

You look at Alara and Kelly and Claire. All three are strong women, all three are exceptionally competent in their work. Kelly is brave and tough. She handles authority well, she brings out the best in the people who serve under her - see how she has brought out the best in LaMarr, for instance. Alara, she stepped up and took command of the entire ship when she had to. Claire is regarded as one of the best Doctors in the fleet.

So my question is, where is all the 'toxic masculinity' that is reported by certain other actresses? Nobody is abusing them on twitter or facebook, or at least there are no reports of such. Fandom isn't hating on them - people seem to like all of these characters! I've seem many people cite Alara or Claire as their favourite on the show.

I'd suggest it's a combination of two factors.

One, these characters aren't perfect. Kelly is brave and tough, but she also has 'day drinks' and pot brownies, and breaks the rules in serious ways sometimes. Alara is smart and competent, but she's young and inexperienced and hampered by a lack of self confidence. Claire is uber-competent, but she struggles with motherhood and often can't control her kids.

And two, the Orville has never advertised itself as some feminist cheerleader, never claimed that it deserves credit for giving women strong roles, never crowed about what it's doing with these ladies. It just gets on with giving us good actresses in good roles and lets the results speak for themselves!

[Atekimogus]

So my question is, where is all the 'toxic masculinity' that is reported by certain other actresses?

Granted, I do not follow it that closely but could you eleborate? I haven't heard/read anything in that regard. Is orville being accused of having toxic male characters? Or maybe not everybody on set are close friends to put it mildly?


Anywho...for anybody who even claims "toxic maculinity" is a thing, I assume every instance where not every male character is a complete idiot and/or asswhole and every female character is a Mary Sue Ultimate is just completely sexist and unacceptable.

It is stupid...it will pass. Give it some time.

[Graham Kennedy]

So my question is, where is all the 'toxic masculinity' that is reported by certain other actresses?

Granted, I do not follow it that closely but could you eleborate? I haven't heard/read anything in that regard. Is orville being accused of having toxic male characters? Or maybe not everybody on set are close friends to put it mildly?

Sorry, I wasn't clear enough. I'm talking of the supposed toxic masculinity that is said to come from fans and be directed at actresses, especially in sci fi.

As for example, Kelly Marie Tran and Daisy Ridley were said to have had to quit social media platforms because male fans abused them for being women in a sci-fi movie. As was Anna Diop for being a black woman playing an orange character. Sonequa Martin Green and Jodie Whittaker too.

Now I'm sure this is a thing, to some extent. There are racists and sexists out there, certainly, and they're no doubt displeased that women get to be on TV.

So my question is that if sci fi fandom in general contains this huge river of woman hatred, why does nobody seem to dislike the female characters on The Orville? Where's the 'toxic fan backlash' against Alara, or Dr. Finn, or Kelly? Why are they instead three of the most popular characters on the show?

There's some suggestion that the companies involved are using this toxic fans thing as cover. For example, the Ghostbusters remake/sequel/whatever suffered a lot of complaints because it looked (and was) awful. Lots of negative comments and downvotes on the trailer when it first appeared on youtube, for instance (in fact it was the most downvoted thing in youtube history or somesuch).

But allegedly the company took to deleting those negative comments that focused on how unfunny and lame the whole thing looked, whilst leaving comments of the "why aren't these women making some man a sandwich somewhere!" type there. This let them craft a narrative that people who disliked the movie were a bunch of sexists. When the actresses appeared on TV to promote the movie, they'd often get the question "what about the backlash?" and answer with how awful sexism was, as if that was the only reason anybody complained about it. Similar things happen with the Star Wars movies, and even Discovery. It seems to me that most people around here don't care for Discovery much, but none of those that dislike it do so because Michael Burnham is black, or a woman, or that Georgiou is asian, or a woman. Yet articles like this focused on the fact that idiots were sexist and racist.

Like I say, those people are certainly out there, but focusing on them gives the companies a handy way to avoid real criticism of the dreck they're putting out.

[Atekimogus]

So my question is, where is all the 'toxic masculinity' that is reported by certain other actresses?

Granted, I do not follow it that closely but could you eleborate? I haven't heard/read anything in that regard. Is orville being accused of having toxic male characters? Or maybe not everybody on set are close friends to put it mildly?

Sorry, I wasn't clear enough. I'm talking of the supposed toxic masculinity that is said to come from fans and be directed at actresses, especially in sci fi.

As for example, Kelly Marie Tran and Daisy Ridley were said to have had to quit social media platforms because male fans abused them for being women in a sci-fi movie. As was Anna Diop for being a black woman playing an orange character. Sonequa Martin Green and Jodie Whittaker too.

Ah..this is what you meant. I think this has a VERY simple explanation. We just need to accept three truths.

1. No one has anything against women in Sci Fi or women in generall. The very notion is ridicolous.
2. Fans complain about bad products. (Star Wars) and do not complain about good products (Orville)
3. Never in the history of ever where people such pussies and unable to deal with critique. Pair that with companys probably trying to cover up their shitty product with a distraction campaign of racism, sexism or any othe rform of -ism you can think of....there is your explanation. (People in general are seemingly getting off on being offended. Idiots)

So from what I could gather...people were upset because Star Wars was shit. Fans of the teen titans where upset because every cosplayer with a 10 dollar budget is able to cobble together a Starfire look that is closer to the source material than the hooker looking character that they got.

This is not toxic masculinty....this is just fans being upset because they love a franchise and then get served subpar bullcrap. And if you have to QUIT your twitter or instagram account because of "mean" tweets or comments....WTF is wrong with you? Someone on the internet calls you names and is mean to you? Why does anybody care? If you cannot take this form of "abuse" from the internet, how the hell are they surviving in the real word? Imho this are just very calculated marketing stunts to distract from bad products.


And that is why there is no "toxic masculinty" about the Orville in that regard. True...they have strong female characters...but they are three dimensional, as you said. They are not Mary Sues but real characters also dealing with issues, be that parenthood, inexperience or something else. Nothing really to complain about, no?


So in short. I agree with you.

[McAvoy]

I can only respond about Daisy. The problem with her isn't her really but her character in Star Wars. Fans are upset about how she is portrayed in Star Wars. The consensus is that her character is a Mary Sue.

Basically she learned how to use the Force on the fly, beat trained bad guys who had years to train to fight and she beat them. Kylo Ren in the first film. Snokes bodyguards in the second and was able to have a tug of war with Kylo Ren with Anakins lightsaber. Kylo who has had years of experience.

There is more also than just Daisy. The Last Jedi developed alot of flak.

[Mikey]

If i’m reading him correctly, I believe that GK isn’t lending credence to the idea of criticism being based on “toxic masculinity,” but rather critiquing the idea of claiming such to refute critics.

[Graham Kennedy]

If i’m reading him correctly, I believe that GK isn’t lending credence to the idea of criticism being based on “toxic masculinity,” but rather critiquing the idea of claiming such to refute critics.

Yeah. Whilst I've no doubt there are some asshole critics who just don't like women or minorities on the screen, I think these are a tiny minority. But the industry acts as though all criticism of women or minorities is that, as a way of negating the actual criticism.

"Rey is badly written. She's too perfect at things she should be bad at, with no explanation."
"Well you obviously just hate women!"
"Rose Tico is an awful character who adds nothing of consequence to the story."
"You racist sexist!"

That's basically how it goes.

[McAvoy]

If i’m reading him correctly, I believe that GK isn’t lending credence to the idea of criticism being based on “toxic masculinity,” but rather critiquing the idea of claiming such to refute critics.

Yeah. Whilst I've no doubt there are some asshole critics who just don't like women or minorities on the screen, I think these are a tiny minority. But the industry acts as though all criticism of women or minorities is that, as a way of negating the actual criticism.

"Rey is badly written. She's too perfect at things she should be bad at, with no explanation."
"Well you obviously just hate women!"
"Rose Tico is an awful character who adds nothing of consequence to the story."
"You racist sexist!"

That's basically how it goes.

That's pretty much what I said. Rey is a Mary Sue. Doing things without training better than those who have been training for years. Rose is a useless character especially in that final battle on the Salt Plains. Heaven forbid you criticize them.

I don't even think toxic masculinity even applies to any of that. If you don't like Rey because she is a woman and not because you don't like her character then you are sexist. Toxic masculinity is more of a society thing on how men 'should' act versus not to act. Like act like a man and not a fairy.

[McAvoy]

Also popped in my head, the all female Ghostbusters has similar problems. Meaning, fans of that movie think men don't like it because of the all female cast. But when reality that was a poorly done movie.

You can look on YouTube about its director basically insulting fans.

[Mikey]

Also popped in my head, the all female Ghostbusters has similar problems. Meaning, fans of that movie think men don't like it because of the all female cast. But when reality that was a poorly done movie.

You can look on YouTube about its director basically insulting fans.

Exactly GK’s point - rather than shoulder the blame for a movie that can’t suck enough, they attempt to negate criticism as “toxic masculinity.”

[Bryan Moore]

Also popped in my head, the all female Ghostbusters has similar problems. Meaning, fans of that movie think men don't like it because of the all female cast. But when reality that was a poorly done movie.

You can look on YouTube about its director basically insulting fans.

Yes, this is a perfect example. That Ghostbusters
A) Did not need to be made/did nothing to expand the universe
B) Cast some horribly unfunny actors (Leslie Jones was on SNL because she is large, black, and loud, and SNL faced criticism for being not diverse enough - she brings no dimension to her roles and her stand-up is also about being large, black and loud. Kristen Wiig is weird. Melissa McCarthy is a different kind of large and okay at toilet humor)
C) The script sucked

There is nothing misogynistic about these statements - "Female Empowerment" has nothing to do with just throwing in females in roles so there can be females in roles. No one is suggesting Lawrence of Arabia would be better served with more females - it would do nothing to further or add to that story.

Kelly Marie Tran's character in Episode 8 was basically the same way - "Oh, better get a female of a different race in there, because diversity!" The character was poorly developed and does little to provide to the sum of the Star Wars Universe. Hell, I'd even classify Boyega in the same way - NO issue with him as a person or the use of a minority in that role, it makes sense, but so much of the hate that character got is extremely well deserved - that character was terribly written and his heavy breathing, constant surprise or fear, and jerky body movements were some of the most distracting acting I have ever witnessed in a major role.