Female villains and latent sexism. Or, why it’s okay that I unironically love Cersei from Game of Thrones as a character.
Basically, if you ask most people, you’re allowed to think male villains are “awesome” and you’re allowed to enjoy female villains if they’re male gazey as fuck. They won’t come right out and say it, but you’ll quickly discover this to be the case. But a female character with her own motivations who happens to be brilliant, scheming, and power-hungry? Whoa, hold on there a second. What do you, hate America?
The thing is, plenty of male villains who have literally committed genocide are considered fair game for fan followings. So there’s really no high ground here. So what’s going on? Well. I really think it’s telling that the reactions you hear to Cersei sound almost identical to the reactions to Skyler from Breaking Bad, who wasn’t even a villain. So, what do these two have in common? For one thing, they’re both on a show that’s so popular it seems like finding someone who doesn’t watch it is less common than finding someone who hasn’t seen last night’s episode and admonishes you to be careful about spoilers.
But why the similar reactions? One is a devoted wife who finds out her ailing schoolteacher husband has become a powerful, murdering drug dealer. She’ll stand up to her husband when she can, she’ll resent the hell out of him when she can’t, but despite the rather terrifyingly sexist fan reaction to her she’s a basically good, relatable person. She could be any of us. The other is a Machiavellian sadist who uses the powers of legitimate royalty to try to gather more and more power around herself and her children. She’ll scrape and claw her way to every additional rung on the ladder, but she can also order her guards to murder you for looking at her wrong. And she will. They’re both their own people with fully developed character psychologies and clear motivations, that’s for sure. But on the surface, they couldn’t be any more different. Except for this one thing…
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They aren’t submissive. They aren’t seductive. They aren’t intimidated. They don’t need you.
They don’t stay in their lane.
When people resent Skyler, it’s for not being “grateful” to Walter for exposing her family to dangers both legal and mortal. He’s out there being an “awesome” drug dealer (hey, remember how male villains are allowed to be awesome??), and she has the nerve to have a problem with it. Doesn’t she know she’s supposed to be a good wife? With Cersei, it’s more clear. But people can hide behind the idea that they hate her because she’s a “bad person.” But wait a minute, what about all those male villains we’re allowed to root for and buy action figures of? Also, I think it’s beyond insane that Cersei as a villain is considered out of the bounds of good taste when, I don’t know, look how brutal the “heroes” on this show are.
Which brings us right back around to the general consensus being male villains get to be “badass,” female villains get to be fetish objects at best. And all I’m saying is, y’know, how ‘bout no? Give me more villains like Cersei, please and thank you.
(P.S. Cersei is also played by an amazing performer, by the way. Seriously. The acting on Game of Thrones is incredible in general, but Lena Headey can act circles around all of them, and I’m terrified she isn’t going to find it easy to find work after this because of all the backlash against her character.)
