Superheroine Influence pt.2

To continue on the theme of the earlier post about my favorite female superheroes, here are a few more superheroines I have loved over the years.

Sailor Moon

“I am Sailor Moon, champion of justice! On behalf of the moon, I will right wrongs and triumph over evil, and that means you!”

Sailor Moon, the Japanese Anime tv show based on a manga, aired in North America in the mid nineties. The story centers around a character named Serena, who lives a superficial but relatively normal life until the day she meets a talking cat named Luna who tells her she has a sacred duty as defender of the moon crystal to fight evil as Sailor Moon. Unlike Jem or She-ra (as highlighted in my previous post), Sailor Moon is the reluctant heroine, who does not initially want to take the responsibility thrust upon her by her destiny. Of course, like pretty much all superheros, she eventually warms up to it.

Queen Beryl of the Negaverse

Every episode Sailor Moon, with the help of the other Sailor Scouts and their cat guides Luna, Artemis, and Diana, defeats the bad guys from the Negaverse. While the female empowerment aspect of the show is sometimes flawed – Serena is constantly obsessing over her crush Darian and more than once his superhero alter ego Tuxedo Mask must comes to the rescue all the sailor scouts by throwing a single rose at the bad guy (!?) - the show remains at its root the story of a diverse group of girls fighting together for the greater good.

Sailor Scouts

It again provided an example of a female superhero surrounded by powerful allies, a theme that still resonates with me today. And I recently learned that Sailor Moon actually comes from a long line of magical-girl anime from Japan. An earlier form of this is Princess Knight (1953).

While the show is full of awkward dubbing and at times confused plot lines, the campiness and the ridiculous character names make it incredibly charming. What’s more, the original manga is actually quite expansive and has some cool canonical elements that gives these stories an edge. So basically, I liked Sailor Moon a lot!

In fact, I liked it so much that at 14 I dressed up as Sailor moon for halloween. I made a costume by hand, glueing star and moon shapes on a piece of cardboard to make her broach. I even borrowed my 8 year old sister’s official plastic toy Sailor Moon Crescent Moon Wand (tripling my dork factor!). In full sailor gear, I walked around a Montreal neighborhood, trick-or-treating while sometimes breaking out the Sailor Moon catchphrase “I will right wrongs and triumph over evil, and that means you!“. Awesome!

Xena Warrior Princess

“In a time of ancient Gods, Warlords, and Kings, A land in turmoil cried out for a hero. She was Xena, a mighty princess forged in the heat of battle. The power. The passion. The danger. Her courage will change the world.”

As a pre-teen, I loved reading stories of ancient mythology and greek history. So the first time I saw Xena, I was psyched. I thought I had found a historic tv show with a tough female lead. But as anyone who has seen the show knows, Xena is to history what McDonalds is to health food. It is a ridiculous mash-up of historic characters and mythological ones, real events and pure fiction. The show defies all logic, and sometimes the rules of storytelling, for the sake of silly episodic television. It absolutely throws historic accuracy out the window. Throughout the 6 seasons on the air, Xena (played by Lucy Lawless) encounters Hercules, the Amazons, Boewulf, King Jason, the Greek gods Aphrodite & Ares, the Norse gods Loki & Thor, and Julius Ceasar. Its really just silly.

But Xena was not made to educate, it was made to entertain. Which is clear by the trashy attention-getting tactics the shows creators employed week to week: beautiful women with very little clothing, cartoon-like action scenes, buff guys in leather pants, slapstick humor, stereotypical characters, simplistic story lines with simplistic conflict resolution and, far too often, rubber chicken-style sound effects. And yet it became a cult classic.

Gabrielle and Xena (and Argo)

Part of this success was due to the lesbian subtext between Xena and Gabrielle (Renee O’Connor). While not explicitly stated (but so very often hinted at), Xena and Gabrielle were lovers. They were also best friends who together travelled around ancient greece helping the helpless and righting wrongs. This was one of the first times in tv history that a show depicted this type of love between women and as a result attracted a huge cult following.

But I think the attraction to these characters was also due in large part to the independence and freedom they exhibited. The story follows Xena and Gabrielle as they roam through the villages of ancient greece. During the day, they help people solve problems or fight the gods, by night they make camp where they are and sleep on the ground in the woods. They don’t follow the traditional roles assigned to women (neither historic nor contemporary) and have no one to impress but each other.

The fact that the entire show was shot in New Zealand also helped to give the show some absolutely breathtaking backgrounds.

For me, the show was appealing because it offered a live-action heroine with godlike superpowers. Xena is striking and tough, confident and powerful. And she gets to throw a cool disc weapon thing around and do full 360 fighting flips at least once an episode. Oh and don’t forget her battle cry “Ayiyiyiyiyiyi”.

Xena and Callisto

Xena Warrior Princess is different from the previously mentioned superheros in that she is a reformed hero. Xena begins her story as a violent warlord, pillaging and hurting innocent bystanders in her way. At the beginning of the show, with the help of Gabrielle, she reforms and decides to change her ways. She fights the good fight for the remainder of the show, but always is haunted by her guilty past. The character of Calisto is this guilt embodied (Xena killed Calisto’s family in a raid during her warlord days) and their rivalry is one of the most exciting in the show.

While the show made good use of T&A and wouldn’t really be considered 100% empowering to women, there is something refreshing about the confidence Xena instills in the audience. Plus 90s tv is so wholesome when you compare it to contemporary gore/porn fests like Sparticus:Blood and Sand (which coincidentally also stars Lucy Lawless) or Game of Thrones.

Xena is another powerful female leader, but unlike the previous 3 examples, she has the qualities of a real-life leader. She is not a victim of fate nor was she simply granted her authority. She is a woman who has claimed her own power, one who tries to use it responsibly and understands the impact her actions will have on the people she cares about. Lucy Lawless’ stature and the way she plays this character with such directness and toughness, brought Xena to life and made her seem almost plausible. This image still inspires me today.

Next up: The best female superhero ever, the one that I still adore today: Buffy. And some other contemporary greats. 

Resolutions, then and now.

Last year, I wrote out my New Year’s Resolutions on this very blog. Here is a quote from that post:

“I would like to accomplish 3 concrete things: program an app, develop a project around a webseries, co-create a food & photo project.”

So with 2012 now firmly behind us, how did I do?

1. “co-create a food & photo project” Well my partner and I started and have been consistently updating a food/photography blog. We have had a few recipes picked up by a few bigger blogs, and have a solid following. Food Photo Project: check.

2. “develop a project around webseries”. As mentioned in the previous post, I made that webseries. 8 Episodes and a cast of 7. Blog, website, twitter, fb page, vimeo and youtube channels. A true labor of love. It was a great experience, and I got the chance to work with some interesting people. Webseries: done.

3. “program an app” Okay, this one is a little more tricky. I began the year by attending coding workshops and searching for a technical partner to develop said app. But it did not go as smoothly as I had hoped. After a few frustrating months, I decided to focus my attention more onto producing the webseries. However, this fall I got the chance to build an interactive video website for a documentary. I got a team together and we are set to be finished at the end of january. I almost made it to completing this resolution, so lets give me a partial score. Program an app: 70%

Bonus points: I crowdfunded the webseries successfully and raised 5 grand!

This year, I did pretty well. While I didn’t get everything I had wanted done in time (damn app), working toward these goals was fun. I guess they also helped me to figured out just a little bit more clearly where I want to go next.

So what does 2013 hold?

Despite what the picture above suggests, my resolutions do not consist of “tasty cocktails”, “gingerbeer” or “beef pie”!

Rather in 2013, I want to again set out 3 clear goals to work towards. I would like to finally establish a company around the work I have been doing over the last year. I would like to update and expand on the food blog, possibly including some video work. And to add a new challenge to the mix, I would like to play music on a stage in front of a small audience and record one original song.

Time to get cracking…

Superheroine Influence pt1

From She-Ra to Buffy, I have always been attracted to the warrior women archetype in pop culture. I admired their strength, their confidence in the face of danger and their defiance of the social norms. Female superheros provided me with an early example of women defying the standard and taking charge. These ladies were not docile “good girls”. No, these fictional women kicked ass, spoke up, lead teams, and often had really cool superpowers. Most importantly, they were accepted but their peers and even encouraged to continue their fight.

There have always been always plenty of cartoons and shows depicting a male character acting as a leader. And I think our generation was lucky to have grown up in a time when TV offered us a couple shows with female characters doing the same. Possibly without realizing it, the creators of these shows provided many young girls and women with a vision of what could be if we led the charge instead of following the crowd. And this has been a very good thing.

The Superheroines of my Childhood

As a kid in the 80s and 90s, I was exposed to some phenomenal children’s programming. While the presence of female superheros in these shows was still at the time a little bit sparse, there were a few good options available. I sought out those shows that featured strong female characters and every week I would visit these pastel bubble worlds within which they lived.

She-Ra: Princess of Power

“For the honor of Greyskull…I am She-Ra!”

The absolute queen of the 80s cartoon superheroines was She-Ra: Princess of Power. She was a spin-off character of the already successful He-Man and the Masters of the Universe cartoon franchise. But unlike He-Man, her beefy half-brother, She-Ra immediately hit a chord with me.

She-Ra is the appointed leader of the Great Rebellion, a group of good guys fighting to free their homeworld, Etheria, from the evil of Hordak. I mostly remember her flying around on a colorful unicorn/horse, visiting her friends, and fighting the half man, half machine Hordak. She was my absolute favorite cartoon character during my early elementary school years. I loved She-Ra so much in fact, I dressed up as her for Halloween a number of times.

One of the interesting things about She-Ra: Princess of Power is that the female characters in the show are truly at the forefront. The women on the show, more so than the men, take authority and responsibility. And it is the women who fight and win the battles against the antagonist. It was the first image I had of a warrior woman on tv, and I am certain this had a profound impact on me. She-Ra was the start of my admiration for this type of female depiction in movies and tv. And since that time, I have repeatedly sought out the powerful female leader archetype in the media I consume.

Jem and the Holograms

“Jem is truly outrageous, truly, truly truly outrageous … “

Jem and the Holograms is pure, unadulterated 80s. All the values and styles of the day are in this show, and seemingly on steroids. Neon pink is used to an extreme and graphics are so synth, you’ll feel your eyes dissolve in their sockets.

But I must say, the pure ridiculousness of the premise and design of this cartoon has keep me fascinated by this show to this day.

The plot of Jem is the following: Jem is a good-hearted millionaire’s daughter named Jerrica by day and a superhero rockstar by night. Early on, she befriends a talking computer called Synergy which her father had built for her. Synergy helps guide Jem to use her magical power for good. With her high-tech earring hologram device (?), Jem can change outfits really quickly and project herself in hologram form all over the place to confuse and distract her enemies. This whole process led to odd plot holes and logical fallacies in the storytelling. But this was not shakespeare, people! It was cotton candy for the soul.

In each episode, Jem defeats her enemies, the bad girl rocker band The Misfits managed by Eric Raymond (the main villain of the show), by winning singing competitions (I swear there may have been at least one every episode ) or securing record contracts her enemies desperately wanted. Jem/Jerrica also owns The Starlight Foundation, a foster home for girls, which is always in financial trouble. Most of her triumphs somehow benefit the foundation, thus giving Jem a clear moral motivation to rock out for.

The show ran from 1985 to 1988 and was extremely popular. However, when re-watching the show today, its hard to ignore the excessive value placed on celebrity, wealth, consumerism and material goods. Within the lines of the opening song, Jem sings enthusiastically “Glamour and glitter. Fashion and fame… Jem, she’s truly outrageous!”.  All this spilled into their successful merchandizing campaign, which released a whole range of dolls (with different outfits or accessories) connected with the show. That can’t have been good for my impressionable childhood mind.

Jem herself is kind of a bland superhero, but in contrast to the sleazy, immoral and ruthlessly ambitious antagonists the Misfits, Jem comes across as a righteous and triumphant heroine. Plus the show encouraged girls to head up bands, which at the time was actually pretty rare.

Despite the superficiality of the show, it still offered girls a model for leadership that was in its own way cutting edge.

My next post, Superheroine Influence pt2, will be about some of my favorite pop culture superheroines of my teenage years. In the meantime, feel free to let me know a bit about the shows you liked when you were a kid.

Clouds Over Cuba: A New Way to Recount History Online

About a month ago, a friend sent me the link to this documentary www.cloudsovercuba.com about the cuban missile crisis. I was immediately inspired. The doc itself is quite good, but it is the experience of watching it in this format that has really impressed me. It seems I have found a prototype of the type of media I want to be making next.

Take a look if you have time:

This documentary was created for the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library by The Martin Agency and directed by Erich Joiner and Ben Tricklebank at Tool. Running two-hours, this project exists primarily as a full browser video player. It has an interactive timeline and seamless links to additional information along the way. This additional info consists of scans, images, archival audio and video recordings –  all from the JFK institute itself – as well as expert commentaries from historian Sheldon M. Stern, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s son, Sergei, author Eric G. Swedin and professor Timothy McKeown. For more info about the doc, check out this review.

I think that this format has amazing potential for the future of online video and visual storytelling. You could totally use a similar framework with a creative project or a tv show. It encourages people to stay involved and focused on the project, but gives curious people a chance to leave the linear narrative of the doc to learn more about specific themes without losing their place.

While interactive video isn’t really anything all that new, I think what really got me excited is how much more accessible the technology used to build this site has become. This site is built like a website using html5, javascript and css. However it feels almost like an app. It also uses the interactivity subtly, without relying on flashy gimmicks. Transitions between pages is so beautifully seamless (one of the perks of html5) and the pace of the web experience matches the pace of the documentary. The unified design of the page and textures on the video result in an overall product that feels dynamic, yet totally unified.

It seems to be time to re-think video (again). We have all become used to youtube and vimeo as our primary video platforms. But if you think about it, the formats in which the videos are presented remain somewhat standard. You watch the video without really interacting with it, other than leaving comments under the video or by closing the incessant pop ads (on youtube).

But what if you could actually click inside the video, get more info when you wanted. As it stands, when I watch a doc, I often like to find out more about the info being presented, or I want to verify the legitimacy of certain statements. So I tend to open another browser window to do some additional investigation on the side. But this is awkward and distracting. Sometimes I get so caught up with another article I am reading that I lose my place in the doc, or lose interest in the original documentary entirely.

Whats great about this documentary, is that you are expected to dig deeper into the topic. And they make it extremely easy and fun to do it. It encourages interaction and curiosity, yet keeps you on the site, and on topic. But I think we could take this even further.

Imagine the possibilities…