wait. what?! it's almost Thanksgiving?L!KJ@!?
So before we discuss NaNoWriMo I just wanted to wax poetic about Xena. For a bit. Because I haven't done that in a while.
I was watching with my sister because we are desperately trying to get to the musical episode and I realized something. Almost all of Xena's significant relationships in the show are with women. By significant I mean people who had a deep and lasting impact on her life. There are three men of note: Borias, Caesar, and Ares. Borias was by far the most positive influence (after first being one of the most toxic). The rest are all women. There's Alti, Lao Ma, Gabrielle, Callisto, M'Lila (the slave girl who taught her pressure points), her own daughter Eve, Grinhilda (a story arc in around season 5 or 6), an Akemi (season finale). Her mother of course is also a recurring character. It's really interesting because while Xena has sexual and obviously pleasurable relationships with men, her truly deep loving and lasting bonds are with women. I've always believed that Xena was bisexual. While she enjoyed the company of men and women she only really truly ever loved women.
But what I find interesting is how these days TV shows and movies always pair female heroes with men. Olivia from Fringe has Peter and Walter Bishop. Astrid is there but they don't interact nearly as much as they should. All their adversaries are men and all the mentors who influenced Olivia are men. Sarah from Chuck has the same issue. Studios recognize that they need to create an illusion of gender equality but then maroon these fantastic female characters in a sea of men. There really aren't enough female interactions in media. That's why it's so remarkable what Xena: Warrior Princess did. Xena's most influential mentors were women, powerful women of different philosophies and ethnicities. Xena's greatest enemies were women and Xena's greatest friendships were with women. Why can't more shows do that? It really doesn't make any sense.
Thank God for Parks and Rec and Community but sadly those two shows don't get great ratings.
So anyway. NaNoWriMo. Word count is doing ok. I have 1,000 words to hit the quota for today but I'm hoping to get past that at least by a few hundred. I think I'm having issues because I didn't write a thorough outline so I'm not 100% sure what I'm doing. It's not as thrilling as you'd think. It's going slow because I don't want to meander and write a bunch of useless crap. I want to keep the plot moving forward. It's sort of working? I don't know. I was going to write something more meaningful about the process of writing or something but actually I'm not going to because I mostly wanted to talk about Xena.
I suck.
Oh but here's an excerpt I guess:
“Ok so you do realize that if we fail any of the portions to this test the unit could explode right?”
Val nodded. “Yes, I know that.”
“So uh…how do you plan on getting Alex’s hand print?”
“I’m going to go to the morgue and steal her right hand.”
Pratt narrowed his eyes at Val. “That’s not funny. I really can’t tell if you’re kidding or not.”
Val replied with a sideways grin and a shrug. “It probably won’t come to that. I believe I have a copy of her hand prints on file.”
“What? Why do you have that? Do you have mine too?”
Val shrugged again. “Maybe I do. Maybe I don’t.”
“Seriously, Val. Do you? I didn’t sit down for that.”
“I’m a master spy, Pratt. I don’t need you to sit down and make finger paintings for me to get one of your hand prints.”
Pratt stared down at his keyboard, then over at the mug of cold coffee sitting to the right of his keyboard. Then he looked back at Val, frowning. “Sometimes I hate you."
I was watching with my sister because we are desperately trying to get to the musical episode and I realized something. Almost all of Xena's significant relationships in the show are with women. By significant I mean people who had a deep and lasting impact on her life. There are three men of note: Borias, Caesar, and Ares. Borias was by far the most positive influence (after first being one of the most toxic). The rest are all women. There's Alti, Lao Ma, Gabrielle, Callisto, M'Lila (the slave girl who taught her pressure points), her own daughter Eve, Grinhilda (a story arc in around season 5 or 6), an Akemi (season finale). Her mother of course is also a recurring character. It's really interesting because while Xena has sexual and obviously pleasurable relationships with men, her truly deep loving and lasting bonds are with women. I've always believed that Xena was bisexual. While she enjoyed the company of men and women she only really truly ever loved women.
But what I find interesting is how these days TV shows and movies always pair female heroes with men. Olivia from Fringe has Peter and Walter Bishop. Astrid is there but they don't interact nearly as much as they should. All their adversaries are men and all the mentors who influenced Olivia are men. Sarah from Chuck has the same issue. Studios recognize that they need to create an illusion of gender equality but then maroon these fantastic female characters in a sea of men. There really aren't enough female interactions in media. That's why it's so remarkable what Xena: Warrior Princess did. Xena's most influential mentors were women, powerful women of different philosophies and ethnicities. Xena's greatest enemies were women and Xena's greatest friendships were with women. Why can't more shows do that? It really doesn't make any sense.
Thank God for Parks and Rec and Community but sadly those two shows don't get great ratings.
So anyway. NaNoWriMo. Word count is doing ok. I have 1,000 words to hit the quota for today but I'm hoping to get past that at least by a few hundred. I think I'm having issues because I didn't write a thorough outline so I'm not 100% sure what I'm doing. It's not as thrilling as you'd think. It's going slow because I don't want to meander and write a bunch of useless crap. I want to keep the plot moving forward. It's sort of working? I don't know. I was going to write something more meaningful about the process of writing or something but actually I'm not going to because I mostly wanted to talk about Xena.
I suck.
Oh but here's an excerpt I guess:
“Ok so you do realize that if we fail any of the portions to this test the unit could explode right?”
Val nodded. “Yes, I know that.”
“So uh…how do you plan on getting Alex’s hand print?”
“I’m going to go to the morgue and steal her right hand.”
Pratt narrowed his eyes at Val. “That’s not funny. I really can’t tell if you’re kidding or not.”
Val replied with a sideways grin and a shrug. “It probably won’t come to that. I believe I have a copy of her hand prints on file.”
“What? Why do you have that? Do you have mine too?”
Val shrugged again. “Maybe I do. Maybe I don’t.”
“Seriously, Val. Do you? I didn’t sit down for that.”
“I’m a master spy, Pratt. I don’t need you to sit down and make finger paintings for me to get one of your hand prints.”
Pratt stared down at his keyboard, then over at the mug of cold coffee sitting to the right of his keyboard. Then he looked back at Val, frowning. “Sometimes I hate you."