the_rck | (no subject)

You're viewing

the_rck's journal
Create a Dreamwidth Account Learn More

Reload page in style: site light

I’ve been seeing all sorts of things talking about the Wonder Woman movie poster and how great it is. I just— I look at it, and all I can think is, "Wait. They cut off her head." To be fair, you can see part of her head, from the nose down, but cutting off part of it tells me what the designers think we care about.

I mean, it’s a pretty poster, and having her holding a sword says something, but… I’d really like her whole head.

Am I overreacting? I can't tell.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

alexseanchai

That was pretty much my first thought too.

I mean, my first exposure to the poster was a Facebook share that cut off at about the neck and knees until I clicked through, and I had that thought before I clicked through. But yeah. It is a valid thought. I mean look at it. Her face is pretty much silhouette, but her breasts are well lit? Really now?

From:

the_rck

Yeah, there's definitely that, too.

I just keep seeing people going on about how wonderful it is that Wonder Woman's getting a movie (which it is) without addressing stuff like this. It's as if they're afraid that, if they complain at all, the movie will be snatched away.

From:

alexseanchai

--that sounds like a plausible fear actually. Not wrt this movie, there's too many dinglehoppers in motion to bring the whole edifice to a crashing halt at this point, but wrt the next movie. And the one after that. And the one after that. If Wonder Woman flops because its promotional campaign is insufficiently capable of refraining from sexism, that's evidence that female-led movies do poorly and therefore there might not be a next female-led movie out of this studio for a while, you see?

Of course, if this movie does well, in the studio's eyes it will be despite, not because of, the gender of its lead and whatever commitment to feminist storytelling its artistic and marketing teams display. (Just like Hunger Games and, apparently, 2016 Ghostbusters.) Nobody said this was supposed to be logical.

From:

the_rck

True, and a very depressing thought.

From:

alexseanchai

Yes :(

From:

dingsi

Of course, if this movie does well, in the studio's eyes it will be despite, not because of, the gender of its lead

This you-can't-win situation is so aggravating. Movie doesn't make money? Yeah told you so. Movie makes tons of money? A FLUKE. Arrgghh.

From:

alexseanchai

ACCURATE

From:

untonuggan

ALL OF THIS HAS BEEN SAID SO WELL

From:

edenfalling

I was thinking less 'they cut off her head' and more 'why is the lighting focused on her boobs instead of her face?' but it comes to more or less the same thing. :/

From:

the_rck

For some reason, I passed over the lighting problem, but it's definitely an issue, too.

From:

james

You are not over-reacting. This is a Thing that happens with book covers all the time when the protagonist is female. You almost never see the woman's face which provides the message that it isn't her face that is important.

I am worried that a) they're going to make a romance between her and the dude or b) there will be some kind of rape scene which "becomes the motivation for Diana's actions." Like every other strong-action-female in all of fiction.

Are there any women in charge of creating this movie? At all? Because I'm 210% sure men are going to ruin it because they don't understand why we like Diana.

From:

the_rck

I think that, at least when books are romances, part of the marketing logic for cutting off women's heads on covers is the idea that readers want to be able to self-insert (and I kind of suspect there's a side order of 'This way, we can use the cheapest available model and not care about whether or not she looks right').

According to the IMDb, the writers are all male and include Zach Snyder. The director listed is Patty Jenkins.

Sadly, the romance with Steve Trevor is a pretty traditional part of Wonder Woman's origin story. It's noteworthy when a version omits him altogether and even more noteworthy when they're just friends. Even the JL/JLU animated series threw him in during a time travel episode.

I really, really hope there's no rape in this.

Interestingly, it looks, judging by the trailer that just came out, like they're putting her into WWI instead of WWII.

From:

james

I'm talking about SF/F books with female protags, though. When there's no romance to self-insert - and if you contrast it with books with male protags, the covers have the man's face. I think book marketing is just so used to thinking of women as boobs/ass that they don't realise women have faces. ;-)

I have to say I'm not familiar with the WW books, so I am actually glad to hear the romance is canon and not shoved in to make it a romance for the sake of "but women only like romance" schtick.

I am very excited about the time period it's in! I am glad they aren't rebooting her backstory to have her show up for the first time in modern times.

Basically, I am very excited about the movie but I am afraid that men will fuck it up, then say "wow it didn't do very well see we shouldn't do movies with female protags." That would enrage me.

From:

kyrielle

Nope. I can't find it now but I saw an image on FB that is the poster, with an arrow pointing up toward where her forehead ought to be that says, "Yo, my face is up HERE" or something close to it.

...yep, that pretty much covers it.

From:

tropicsbear

I think it's a valid critique. I think what they were going for was focus on her logo but then they realized it's on her boobs so ... this is the weird compromise they ended up with.