Numerically, there are more named male characters than female characters in the Silmarillion. When we get to the Hobbit, there's only Bilbo's late mother, the fabulous Belladonna Took, getting a name drop, and no actual named female characters at all. So, naturally, we will be inventing our own and fleshing out characters who are only names on a family tree from time to time. And we're fairly comfortable having this story be mostly about guys, the way it's also mostly about elves.
But I ran across this great image today, and thought I'd share:
With this addendum added by a friend of mine:
"Just Friends":
The central male and female characters work together as equals, and there is no forced/contrived romance, they are just good friends.
Basically, these are all different ways of looking at the strength of writing applied to female characters in a story (especially a story in which most of the main characters are male). You have to work harder when you have fewer characters to work with .
Not every episode is going to pass the Bechdel test; we'd have to go out of our way to make that happen, as many of our female characters are geographically scattered. But if we go an entire season without having women talk to one another (about something other than a male character), then we would be dropping the ball. So far, I think we're doing well with this, but the point of having that criteria to refer to is to make sure we're continuing to make use of our female characters as women who are relevant to the plot, not just on the periphery or only interacting with male characters. In Season 4, our best opportunity is with Melian, Lúthien, and Galadriel in Doriath, but of course we also have Díriel and Edhellos in Angband. Aredhel and Idril will continue to interact in the isolation of Gondolin.
For the Mako Mori criteria, we have been pinning our hopes on Galadriel. She is the character with the longest arc among our current elven cast, and we are trying to develop and show her growth as an independent storyline, not 'simply' as part of the overall story of the Noldor. Haleth will likely be a mini-example of this next season, but she's not likely to live for more than 3 episodes.
I doubt we're in danger of writing any Sexy Lamp characters. We are trying to counter a lot of expectations about how love/sex/marriage are going to be handled in this story.... Silm Film isn't going to have any Bond Girls (and even Bond girls can be written as more interesting characters than simply window dressing at times). Our intent is to portray relationships as being lifelong marriages with families and such. So, you know, very wholesome and the opposite of a girl running around in skimpy clothes to be ogled at in most cases.
Anti-Freeze is going to be tough. We're in a position to kill off and torture a *lot* of female characters. And, oh look, we don't have very many female characters, so...it's a fairly high percentage of the ones we have. So, if we're committed to the deaths we've already plotted out (and we are), then I think what we have an obligation to do is to write those women as real characters, so that the audience knows them. It's not going to be 'fridging' when we get to Aredhel's death scene...even though her death will most certainly have an impact on Maeglin. And the reason it won't be fridging is that we've known Aredhel for 3 seasons at that point, and we have a much better handle on her character than Maeglin's. Her death is the end of her story, but it isn't the only part of her story we're telling. I think we are handling Edhellos fairly well, even if most of the 'getting to know you' scenes are torture leading to death. Earwen and Elenwë both had scenes prior to their death scenes, but it's fair to say we didn't spend a lot of screen time developing their characters. So, yeah, accusations of fridging are more likely to 'stick' there than with, say Míriel, who was a main character throughout the season leading up to her demise.
"Strength is Relative" is so important to understand, and the entire reason I chose to post this, actually. Sometimes, people think that writing a 'strong' female character means writing a badass female warrior type. She has to be able to fight to be strong! But, really, what people are looking for here is strong characterization. We want to know this woman and have her be a well-written character who seems alive and real. Her strengths and weaknesses can be whatever they need to be in the story we are telling. It's fine to have flawed female characters. It's more disappointing to have flat one-dimensional characters. And it's super simplistic to think that fighting is the only thing of importance happening in the story . Writing characters who aren't passive but aren't fighters either takes a bit of creativity, but it can certainly be done. I think we're off to a good start with introducing the herald role as a non-fighter military position. And we're introducing besain in Season 4 as well, which shows another important role in elven society unrelated to who is king or who is leading the army. But obviously this is something we will have to continue to work on.
As for 'Just Friends' - do we have any examples of a male and female close friendship? We sure do - Daeron and Lúthien (though, oops, he falls in love with her, so it becomes a love triangle later). And Aredhel and Celegorm. We don't necessarily need a ton of these (I'm fine with most good friendships being male-male or female-female), but it's good to have this from time to time, too. I think we'll have elf-dwarf and elf-human friendships that will fulfill the spirit of this rule as well - that they work together as friends.
But I ran across this great image today, and thought I'd share:
With this addendum added by a friend of mine:
"Just Friends":
The central male and female characters work together as equals, and there is no forced/contrived romance, they are just good friends.
Basically, these are all different ways of looking at the strength of writing applied to female characters in a story (especially a story in which most of the main characters are male). You have to work harder when you have fewer characters to work with .
Not every episode is going to pass the Bechdel test; we'd have to go out of our way to make that happen, as many of our female characters are geographically scattered. But if we go an entire season without having women talk to one another (about something other than a male character), then we would be dropping the ball. So far, I think we're doing well with this, but the point of having that criteria to refer to is to make sure we're continuing to make use of our female characters as women who are relevant to the plot, not just on the periphery or only interacting with male characters. In Season 4, our best opportunity is with Melian, Lúthien, and Galadriel in Doriath, but of course we also have Díriel and Edhellos in Angband. Aredhel and Idril will continue to interact in the isolation of Gondolin.
For the Mako Mori criteria, we have been pinning our hopes on Galadriel. She is the character with the longest arc among our current elven cast, and we are trying to develop and show her growth as an independent storyline, not 'simply' as part of the overall story of the Noldor. Haleth will likely be a mini-example of this next season, but she's not likely to live for more than 3 episodes.
I doubt we're in danger of writing any Sexy Lamp characters. We are trying to counter a lot of expectations about how love/sex/marriage are going to be handled in this story.... Silm Film isn't going to have any Bond Girls (and even Bond girls can be written as more interesting characters than simply window dressing at times). Our intent is to portray relationships as being lifelong marriages with families and such. So, you know, very wholesome and the opposite of a girl running around in skimpy clothes to be ogled at in most cases.
Anti-Freeze is going to be tough. We're in a position to kill off and torture a *lot* of female characters. And, oh look, we don't have very many female characters, so...it's a fairly high percentage of the ones we have. So, if we're committed to the deaths we've already plotted out (and we are), then I think what we have an obligation to do is to write those women as real characters, so that the audience knows them. It's not going to be 'fridging' when we get to Aredhel's death scene...even though her death will most certainly have an impact on Maeglin. And the reason it won't be fridging is that we've known Aredhel for 3 seasons at that point, and we have a much better handle on her character than Maeglin's. Her death is the end of her story, but it isn't the only part of her story we're telling. I think we are handling Edhellos fairly well, even if most of the 'getting to know you' scenes are torture leading to death. Earwen and Elenwë both had scenes prior to their death scenes, but it's fair to say we didn't spend a lot of screen time developing their characters. So, yeah, accusations of fridging are more likely to 'stick' there than with, say Míriel, who was a main character throughout the season leading up to her demise.
"Strength is Relative" is so important to understand, and the entire reason I chose to post this, actually. Sometimes, people think that writing a 'strong' female character means writing a badass female warrior type. She has to be able to fight to be strong! But, really, what people are looking for here is strong characterization. We want to know this woman and have her be a well-written character who seems alive and real. Her strengths and weaknesses can be whatever they need to be in the story we are telling. It's fine to have flawed female characters. It's more disappointing to have flat one-dimensional characters. And it's super simplistic to think that fighting is the only thing of importance happening in the story . Writing characters who aren't passive but aren't fighters either takes a bit of creativity, but it can certainly be done. I think we're off to a good start with introducing the herald role as a non-fighter military position. And we're introducing besain in Season 4 as well, which shows another important role in elven society unrelated to who is king or who is leading the army. But obviously this is something we will have to continue to work on.
As for 'Just Friends' - do we have any examples of a male and female close friendship? We sure do - Daeron and Lúthien (though, oops, he falls in love with her, so it becomes a love triangle later). And Aredhel and Celegorm. We don't necessarily need a ton of these (I'm fine with most good friendships being male-male or female-female), but it's good to have this from time to time, too. I think we'll have elf-dwarf and elf-human friendships that will fulfill the spirit of this rule as well - that they work together as friends.