paper dolls and meme (days 2, 3, 4 & 5)

[anghraine]

It turns out that that awesome paper doll maker has an even awesomer version in beta, or something like that. Anyway, the colours are much more manageable and the costumes are even more involved than before. *glee*

I don't know about you all, but when I embark upon a genderswap, I always begin with two crucial steps:

(1) Ten facts fic, and
(2) Virtual paper dolls of the genderswapped character and/or his/her wardrobe

I'm still working on the Ten Facts fic, since I ended up incorporating one of the facts into the prologue. However, I am not slacking on Step 2 at all. No, sirree! I offer:

Lucy's outfit as a farmgirl and Jedi apprentice:




Lucy's outfit as an Alliance pilot:



Lucy's outfit for the celebration of the Death Star's destruction, wherein she was able to indulge her own tastes for once:




I can't be the only one who thinks Luke's celebration outfit is adorably flamboyant. Girl!Luke would totally go for shiny colours and ruffles and curls and everything.


Day 2: Who is your favourite supporting female character?

I'm a little torn, since a lot of my favourite female characters are supporting characters, but I think I'll go for Romana. I and II, I love her in all her permutations. I love that she fiddled around with the TARDIS and called the Doctor on his shit and bossed people around, that she was stiff and straitlaced and occasionally terrified out of her wits, yet clearly having the time of her life -- and even, ENDLESSLY TRAGIC though it was, that she when she left, it was to go be an awesome Time Lord on her own. (In retrospect, I also love that she's safe in a parallel universe. Really, she could come back at any time and it would be so epic and joy-making. Hey show Time Lord isn't actually a synonym for "evil.")

I also love that even when she was veering dangerously close to damsel-in-distress and 'what do you mean, Doctor?' she was still pretty kickass. Even when she got captured and the evil space princes or whatever are drawing chainsaws across her throat, it's never too frightening -- hey, she'll just regenerate! Also, I love that she went from being snooty about everything to befriending a robot dog.

Oh, and I love the casual regenerations too. I don't care that it's this massive continuity gap and people still can't make any sense of it. Romana is too awesome for continuity.

Day 3: Who is a female character you hated, but grew to love?

ELIZABETH BENNET.

There is absolutely no doubt about this one. Yes, she's witty and admirable and plucky and all of it -- but not too much, she's wrong about some things too -- but not too much, not enough to make her less than charming. Maybe it's that nothing she thought made any sense to me. Maybe it's that I was eleven years old, quiet and stiff and withdrawn, and hearing her rail against someone like me, largely for being someone like me, was not particularly endearing.

Her dismissal of Charlotte was aggravating (Charlotte, incidentally, was a serious contender for the above slot), her cheerful superiority grated, her inability to see REALLY REALLY OBVIOUS things while just making others up to suit her biases was just annoying, and lines like "there was truth in his looks" or everything she says at the Netherfield Ball made me want to fling the book at the wall.

ELIZABETH: *is charming* *yet terribly mistaken* *yet witty with it*
ME: SHUT UP, ELIZABETH.

Honestly, I could hardly wait for her to get her comeuppance. I didn't really expect it would happen, though -- Plucky Young Things are always right. About everything. Elizabeth was obviously right about almost everything, and probably wouldn't be blamed for her misunderstandings because it was out of humility or the goodness of her heart or some crap like that.

Except ... it didn't work out that way. Elizabeth not only got her comeuppance, it was infinitely worse than I expected. She actually did shut up and listen to people, she started using conversation to do more than show off how very clever she was, and the narrative made less than no attempt to dismiss her mistakes. It's not "she has flaws except they aren't really, she did things wrong so she's imperfect but can't actually be blamed for them," it's "all that nasty crap she's been going on about, that's not on, and it's going to have real consequences for her." Yet it never felt like she was being punished for being clever and outspoken, either. Just that the narrator was calling her on her shit.

I liked her much better then, but the thing that made me love her was ... oddly trivial. It's when she tries to get Mr Bennet to reign in Lydia, he ignores her, and she's intensely disappointed ... for about half a minute. Then she's like "hm, can I do anything more about this? Nope! Okay, then, ON TO THE FUNTIEMZ!"

Oh, Elizabeth.

Also, she has the most adorably spastic falling-in-love ever. One minute it's "well...I don't know...he's awfully nice, and brilliant and for some inexplicable reason I can't think about much else when he shows up...but I have to be absolutely sure," the next it's "OH NOES I totally could have fallen in love with him eventually!" and then it's "...wait. Uh. Oh shit I already am whyyyyyyyy" and then it's "OMG HE HAS TO BRING BACK HIS COFFEE OR THE WORLD WILL END!!! I am such an idiot" and then it's "hey auntie, I'M GETTING MARRIED IT'S GOING TO BE THE MOST AMAZING THING EVER COME AND VISIT IT'LL BE AWESOME I'M SO HAPPYYYYYY!!!"

<3

Day Four: Who is a female character you relate to?

Mary really covered that for me. Um. Oh, I know! Nita Callahan, from Diane Duane's Young Wizards series.

Nita first shows up as a bullied, nerdy bookworm who becomes part of the most important thing in the universe via a book she happens to pick up at her local library. Really. Her mind blanks out when she loses her temper, but she's probably the calmest person around and tends to hold things together. She's not shoved down our throats, but neither are we beaten over our heads with how very not special she is and then supposed to accept her being the focus of everyone's existence. Nita is special: she's sensible, kind, intelligent, valiant, loyal, if careless and fatalistic, and determined to do the right thing at any cost.

I'm not all that. But if I were like me, only better, I like to think I would be. I could never be Elizabeth Bennet, but when I read the Young Wizards books, I feel that I could be like Nita Callahan, this quiet, calm girl who regularly saves the universe.

Incidentally, she's the only American girl I've ever identified with. I don't know why -- I'm American, but American literature always seems so removed from my experience. I first fell in love with the Young Wizards books, before Nita even picked up So You Want To Be a Wizard, because suddenly there was an American girl in a book who was like me. I was thirteen then and I'm twenty-five now, but she's still the most -- approachable heroine I've ever come across.

Also, she has darkish hair and grey eyes, which makes it even better.

Day Five: Who is your favourite female character on a male-driven show?

I don't watch much in the way of TV. Bones, which is not a male-driven show by any stretch of the imagination, Castle, which is -- I don't know, not the feminist extravaganza of Bones but I don't think especially male-driven either. Lie to Me? That does tend to feel fairly male-driven to me, despite the prominence of several female characters; I think it's because, despite the ostensible duo of Lightman and Foster, she doesn't feel as central to me; it's really a vehicle for his personality, while partners like Booth and Bones (whatever the failings in plotting) are narratively balanced. Lie to Me is much more House-ish, though I like Lightman better.

Okay, so I'll go with Lie to Me, and Gillian Foster. I love her. I love that she's able to be strong without being brash -- I can like those characters too, but that's not the only kind of strength. Foster stands her ground, she relies on her expertise and expects others to respect it as well, she's supportive -- until the point when it becomes toxic to her, and then she has to break things off. Like Romana (a comparison I never thought I'd make, heh), she's perfectly willing to tell Lightman when he's being an asshole. I also really like that she is very clearly the others' superior; she's friendly and kind, but she doesn't feel the need to be buddy-buddy with their employees.

I love her relationship with Emily; whatever her issues with Zoe, she doesn't do anything to push them apart. Emily is her best friend's daughter and she treats her as such. Emily wants her to be her stepmother, but Foster herself keeps the boundaries very well-marked. She does in pretty much anything.

Incidentally, for all the will they/won't they, I don't care if she gets together with Lightman or not. There's something wonderful about their easy camaraderie; sex would be nice, but it's perfectly nice the way it is, too. I don't think we often get to see a relationship between men and women that is that genuinely affectionate and respectful. For all of Lightman's shenanigans, there is no doubt that he has a very healthy respect for her, which she fully deserves.

Also, I love her consideration, her obstinate insouciance, her bright sparkly dresses that she wears because she wants to (best justification ever), that she gets upset, horrified, even devastated without ever being comprehensively demoralized. She's an amazing character and easily one of my favourite women on television.