It's About Time: Women Take Over 'V'
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(Mild spoilers below: All the following information on "V" has been stated in press releases. Also, it's based on a miniseries that ran 16 years ago.)
WHEN YOU THINK "sci-fi heroes," who comes to mind? Maybe Captains Kirk and Picard, or Dr. Who, Buck Rogers, Ralph Hinkley, Superman, Will Robinson, Steve Austin, Sam Beckett or Flash Gordon?
It's a sad state affairs that ass-kicking females like Xena, the Bionic Woman and Sarah Connor make up maybe 5 percent of those heroes. With the exception of NBC's "Heroes" and the beloved "Star Trek: The Next Generation," even ensemble casts overwhelmingly favor male leads: "Stargate SG -1," "Babylon 5" and the original "Star Trek," for example. There's no lack of strong female leads in science fiction if you look hard enough, but most shows have been giving the shaft to the fairer sex since television's inception (even the Cryptkeeper, Rod Serling and Mike Nelson and his robots are dudes).
Props are due to the SyFy channel, which is way ahead of its time at producing great shows that often present women in positions of power, notably the new "Battlestar Galactica." Also exceptional are the sci-fi shows on the WB/UPN, including "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," "Star Trek: Voyager" and even "Roswell." But network television for the most part has been predictably Y-chromosome heavy.
Fox's long-running and indisputably awesome "The X-Files" focused pretty much equally on its male and female leads, but the channel's treatment of other lady-friendly sci-fi shows — "Firefly" (canceled after one season), "Dark Angel" (canceled after two seasons), "The Sarah Connor Chronicles" (canceled after two seasons) and "Dollhouse" (relegated to the Friday night death slot and as of this writing very much in danger of cancellation) — make it among the worst offenders. OK, there's AnnaTorv on "Fringe," too, but everyone knows John Noble is the real star.
ABC's report card is a little better than Fox's: It has "Lost," which at least features a few interesting if somewhat annoying women, and "Alias" (which lasted five seasons), but though it picked up "Wonder Woman" and "The Bionic Woman" in the '70s, it backed off after the first couple of seasons because the shows attracted an undesirable demographic (CBS and NBC, respectively, picked up the shows to finish their runs).
So what's the phobia about ladies in science fiction? Sci-fi has been a niche market since its inception, marketed mainly to the stereotype of the nerdy man-child, which explains the strong male leads and sexy eye candy. Women fans have been wrongly viewed as the exception to the men-only rule, but fortunately for everyone, this is changing. Shows such as "Battlestar Galactica" and "Lost" are attracting a wider audience that even includes self-proclaimed non-science-fiction fans, and that's leading networks to take more risks with their plots and casts. Advertisers and writers are slowly learning that women play video games, read fantasy novels and, yes, watch science fiction.
Which brings us to "V," premiering Nov. 2 on ABC, a show that appears unique in that it features not one but two heavyweight female leads, Elizabeth Mitchell and Morena Baccarin: "Lost" fans will recognize Mitchell as Juliet, and Baccarin was featured in "Firely" and "Stargate SG-1" as Inara and Adria, respectively.
On "V," Mitchell plays FBI agent Erica Evans, a member of the resistance against a mysterious group of aliens, the Visitors, led by Baccarin's Anna. "V" is a remake of a miniseries from the 1980s, but it has a few notable cast changes. For one, Anna's corresponding character in the '80s version played second fiddle to the male leader of the Visitors, but in this version, she calls all the shots (and apparently exhibits some powers of the mind-control variety). A woman FBI agent butting heads with a female villain? And this is the main plot? It's about time!
Even if it does utilize the practically age-old conflict of human vs. alien, at least "V" has the opportunity to make huge strides for women in science fiction, especially with such acting chops as the ones on Mitchell and Baccarin. Only time will tell if ABC will use this pairing to its advantage or back off and ignore the interesting conflicts that will no doubt arise.
And even if all they do is kick each other's asses, well, that'll still be something worth watching.
Written by Express contributor Afton Lorraine Woodward
Photos courtesy David Gray/ABC
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I haven't seen this remake yet, but I will do it tonight and I'm a woman who loves sci-fi! I loved the original series, one of the things I loved was that the resistance members where ordinary people facing extraordinary situations. A doctor as Juliet (in the original series) wouldn't face the same problems as a FBI agent, they wouldn't aproach a situation on the same way, they wouln't take the same actions. That part, I don't like. I'm tired of the USA cowboy/Rambo complex. We, the ordinary people, want to believe that we'll rise to the ocation. Aren't you tired of dady always coming to the rescue?
By MAF , Posted November 4, 2009 2:52 PMI gave up on Lost because I felt it was too male-dominated. It seems 80% of the characters are male and the few female characters like Kate and Juliet usually take a backseat to Jack and Sawyer. I became interested in V after reading that Elisabeth Mitchell's character is the lead and Baccarin plays another female character in a leadership position. Not many shows would give both roles (or even one of them) to women. I enjoyed the premiere and hope this show does well in the ratings, it would send a strong message that audiences do want to see women driving the action.
By Alicia , Posted November 4, 2009 5:01 PM