30 Days of Criminal Minds Day 1 - Favorite female character
30 Days of Criminal Minds
Day 1 - favourite female character.
Elle Greenaway.
Yes, you read that right. I said favorite, not least favorite. Because she is fierce, awesome, and generally badass in every sense of the word. But she's also anything but one-dimensional. She will kick your ass and you will love every minute and beg for more. Yeah, she's not warm, friendly, immediately relatable, and frankly she's something of an enigma. She's not one of those characters that you immediately warm up to and want to take out for a beer although if said beer-taking-out-for involves getting one of us drunk and the other taking advantage, I'm all for it. I know ~*mysterious*~ tends to be a fandom buzz word for "thinly characterized/writers don't know wtf to do with her" but in this case it actually applies. You have to work a little to figure her out, because her characterization is one that relies on subtleties and nuances. It's not poor development; it's assuming an audience that pays attention.
By being among the most "alpha male" of CM's characters (and this includes the guys), Elle challenges our perceptions of gender roles and the usual tropes associated with female characters. She's not a love interest, she's not anyone's mother or wife, she's not the "chick" who's always in peril, and she's sure not the nurturing, motherly, or sensitive "heart" of the team (not that there's anything wrong with that, but this role, in every series I've watched, is always delegated to a woman). She just gets shit done and doesn't talk about her feelings. But at the same time, it doesn't make her cold or lifeless. We see several moments of genuine warmth in her interactions both with victims and fellow team members--she clearly respects Hotch and Gideon, and she has a great friendship and rapport with Morgan. We don't see as much bonding with the girls, but keep in mind that JJ and Garcia had micromini roles in S1, and were usually relegated to the office while Elle was out in the field with the guys.
It shouldn't be surprising that I'm a bigger fan of HBIC!Elle in S1 than damaged!Elle in S2, but I love me some dark, twisty, morally ambiguous characters, and I still believe she's ultimately redeemable. I have to say her final two episodes constitute an arc that guts me more than pretty much any in the whole series. It's hard to watch, and it's painful, because it's just this train wreck unfolding seeing one of the toughest characters on the show just fall apart in a spectacular explosion. This will not happen again until Hotch in "100" and it's just has heartbreaking there. I will never see Elle's final episodes on the show as being about weakness; they're about strength. Because it takes strength to see when you've lost your perspective, that you're damaged, that you're no longer able to fulfill a responsibility that relies on that perspective. Her decision not to turn herself in is significant (despite her awareness of the wrong in what she had done), because it wasn't giving up--it was recognizing she needed to walk away, to heal, that she still had something left to give. She hadn't lost sight of her goal to do something good, something important--but she knew she wasn't in any shape to do it, not now. Of all the characters' responses to trauma, I found Elle's the most realistic--and ultimately the most affecting. Thomas Gibson made me into his emotional bitch during "100" and "Slave of Duty" but the writers ultimately dropped the ball after that by going right back to status quo. To say I was disappointed in the lack of follow-up is an understatement. In fact, CM writers are pretty notorious (at least to me) for shitty follow-up to arcs placing characters in peril, and Elle's was the only one in which I saw them having the balls to commit. Sadly, it was probably only because Lola was leaving the show.
Not since Cordelia Chase have I been this affected by a fictional character. I wish that Elle could have her own "You're Welcome" to redeem herself and make all that subtext with Hotch into really hot actual text, but it'll probably never happen.
And finally, I'm just a liiiiiiittle biased here, but she is sexy, OK? And I don't just mean being more gorgeous than any human being has any right to be. It's everything. The swagger, the confidence, the look--you know the one--her ability to go from intimidating as hell to adorable in zero to sixty and alksjdfkl;sajfa;fafsd (ik, I'm so articulate). Hey, it's me. I had to finish this off with some shallowness.
Day 1 - favourite female character.
Elle Greenaway.
Yes, you read that right. I said favorite, not least favorite. Because she is fierce, awesome, and generally badass in every sense of the word. But she's also anything but one-dimensional. She will kick your ass and you will love every minute and beg for more. Yeah, she's not warm, friendly, immediately relatable, and frankly she's something of an enigma. She's not one of those characters that you immediately warm up to and want to take out for a beer although if said beer-taking-out-for involves getting one of us drunk and the other taking advantage, I'm all for it. I know ~*mysterious*~ tends to be a fandom buzz word for "thinly characterized/writers don't know wtf to do with her" but in this case it actually applies. You have to work a little to figure her out, because her characterization is one that relies on subtleties and nuances. It's not poor development; it's assuming an audience that pays attention.
By being among the most "alpha male" of CM's characters (and this includes the guys), Elle challenges our perceptions of gender roles and the usual tropes associated with female characters. She's not a love interest, she's not anyone's mother or wife, she's not the "chick" who's always in peril, and she's sure not the nurturing, motherly, or sensitive "heart" of the team (not that there's anything wrong with that, but this role, in every series I've watched, is always delegated to a woman). She just gets shit done and doesn't talk about her feelings. But at the same time, it doesn't make her cold or lifeless. We see several moments of genuine warmth in her interactions both with victims and fellow team members--she clearly respects Hotch and Gideon, and she has a great friendship and rapport with Morgan. We don't see as much bonding with the girls, but keep in mind that JJ and Garcia had micromini roles in S1, and were usually relegated to the office while Elle was out in the field with the guys.
It shouldn't be surprising that I'm a bigger fan of HBIC!Elle in S1 than damaged!Elle in S2, but I love me some dark, twisty, morally ambiguous characters, and I still believe she's ultimately redeemable. I have to say her final two episodes constitute an arc that guts me more than pretty much any in the whole series. It's hard to watch, and it's painful, because it's just this train wreck unfolding seeing one of the toughest characters on the show just fall apart in a spectacular explosion. This will not happen again until Hotch in "100" and it's just has heartbreaking there. I will never see Elle's final episodes on the show as being about weakness; they're about strength. Because it takes strength to see when you've lost your perspective, that you're damaged, that you're no longer able to fulfill a responsibility that relies on that perspective. Her decision not to turn herself in is significant (despite her awareness of the wrong in what she had done), because it wasn't giving up--it was recognizing she needed to walk away, to heal, that she still had something left to give. She hadn't lost sight of her goal to do something good, something important--but she knew she wasn't in any shape to do it, not now. Of all the characters' responses to trauma, I found Elle's the most realistic--and ultimately the most affecting. Thomas Gibson made me into his emotional bitch during "100" and "Slave of Duty" but the writers ultimately dropped the ball after that by going right back to status quo. To say I was disappointed in the lack of follow-up is an understatement. In fact, CM writers are pretty notorious (at least to me) for shitty follow-up to arcs placing characters in peril, and Elle's was the only one in which I saw them having the balls to commit. Sadly, it was probably only because Lola was leaving the show.
Not since Cordelia Chase have I been this affected by a fictional character. I wish that Elle could have her own "You're Welcome" to redeem herself and make all that subtext with Hotch into really hot actual text, but it'll probably never happen.
And finally, I'm just a liiiiiiittle biased here, but she is sexy, OK? And I don't just mean being more gorgeous than any human being has any right to be. It's everything. The swagger, the confidence, the look--you know the one--her ability to go from intimidating as hell to adorable in zero to sixty and alksjdfkl;sajfa;fafsd (ik, I'm so articulate). Hey, it's me. I had to finish this off with some shallowness.