[ SECRET POST #3586 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #3586 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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[Katya Zamolodchikova/Rupaul's Drag Race ]


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09. [SPOILERS for Stasis]



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10. [WARNING for discussion of underage (fictional) porn]


















Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 52 secrets from Secret Submission Post #512.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 1 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[ariakas]

This is my least favourite trope of all time.

It is to the point where if the plot of a game/show/book is "dude's (female relative or significant other) is (kidnapped/killed) and now he must (save/avenge) her" I quite literally won't read/watch/play it, no matter how good or fun it supposedly is.

Of course if it's a subversion of that like John Wick out to save is fucking dog I will watch the hell out of it.

And before "wah wah what about the inverse you sexist": SHOW ME AN EXAMPLE OF THE INVERSE. Seriously. Ever. Anything. In which the focus of the plot not some inconsequential side story or one-off episodic event that will be reversed in the coming episodes to assure you that all is still heteronormatively correct in the world is that a woman saves/avenges a man. SERIOUSLY. NAME ONE. (And she has to succeed, none of this Salt-esque 'saving him would be emasculating for the audience, so he ded.')

[(Anonymous)]

It still remains to be seen but Dishonored 2 seems like it'll have some version of this when you play as Emily (after the first game fit this trope a little too well, though.)

I think Fallout 4 might have this when you play as a female character? But I haven't played it, so idk...

There are several horror games with mothers searching for their sons as well.

[ariakas]

Oh lol Dishonor took one look at the save/avenge trope and was all WHY NOT BOTH?!?

Vague spoilers for Fallout 4, I guess, but no it doesn't. (Hard spoilers if I tell you why, though.)

But do they succeed? And is one of them ever a teenager or - god forbid - an adult male?

[(Anonymous)]

Kill la Kill, maybe? Teenage girl wants to avenge her father and she succeeds in the end. Maybe too goofy for what you are looking for, though?

[(Anonymous)]

Well, Kill Bill has a woman going on a murderous rampage to avenge her husband and child.

[ariakas]

I give Kill Bill part marks because she never mentions the guy, just her kid. And her kid is female.

OP

[(Anonymous)]

I once saw a platformer on Steam where your husband is horribly murdered in the trailer and you become a werewolf and seek revenge. The reviews were pretty mixed.

[(Anonymous)]

SHOW ME AN EXAMPLE OF THE INVERSE.

Kill Bill, as the above anon already mentioned.

Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky dedicates a large portion of the plot of the second installment to the heroine trying to get her boyfriend back from the sinister organization that's been using him as a puppet. (She succeeds.)

The entire storyline of the Alexander raids in Final Fantasy XIV. Mide taught the goblins how to summon Alexander in the first place in the hopes of rescuing her lover, who was absorbed by its core. The ending doesn't explicitly say what happened but it is highly implied that she succeeds.

The plot of Final Fantasy X-2 is set into motion by Yuna trying to find a way to bring Tidus back. She succeeds if the player achieves a certain level of completion of various game events.

Saving her parents and turning them human again is a large part of Chihiro's motivation in Spirited Away.

The Secret of NIMH is all about a mother mouse trying to find a way to help her sick son.

The plot of Orange is all about a girl trying to prevent a boy from committing suicide after receiving letters from herself from ten years in the future.

I can't recall the title because I read it probably 15 years ago, but I distinctly remember a YA novel that was about a female ham radio operator trying to find and get help to her male friend who was injured and lost in the woods.

Mariel of Redwall is about a mouse girl trying to rescue her father from an evil pirate.

Kill la Kill stars a teenage girl on a quest to find her father's killer.

While it's not the entire plot, Tales of Berseria's protagonist is a woman who wants to avenge the murder of her little brother.

The latter part of Slayers Next involves Lina trying to save her love interest Gourry.

Pick a magical girl series, any magical girl series and I can almost guarantee you that the plot will involve the heroine rescuing her love interest at least once during the course of the series.

That's just what I can think of off the top of my head out of things I've read/watched/played. It's not as common a trope as "man saves/avenges woman," no, but it's hardly a non-existent one.

[ariakas]

Is it weird that this is virtually all children's stuff/YA and anime/JRPGs? Or is that just the media you usually consume?

[(Anonymous)]

Oddly enough, I consume about equal amounts of Western and Eastern media, but I had a much harder time trying to come up with Western media that featured women saving men than I did Eastern media. I honestly can't think of any LA TV shows I've watched in the past few years where that's been a thing, yet I can name at least two anime that have featured it.

sa

[(Anonymous)]

Oh, I forgot another Western example - King's Quest IV is about Princess Rosella trying to find a magical fruit to save her father. But beyond what I listed... nope, I'm drawing a blank. I see women saving or avenging far more often in Eastern media than I do Western.

[(Anonymous)]

DA

I'm not that anon but they raise a good point, I see far more of the headstrong girlfriend/woman rescues boyfriend/man trope in eastern media than western media.

Of course there are far fewer hypermasculine grizzled musclebound 30-40something men o' war as main characters in eastern media to begin with, so it may be the elevation of that particular kind of character that's crowding everything else out. If that's supposedly the male ideal, can't have men being rescued, that's unseemly!

[(Anonymous)]

Reminds me of how Nier had two versions of the protagonist, one for Japan and one for western audiences. Shit's gotten meta.

[(Anonymous)]

You're doing an awful lot of goalpost moving here so you don't have to admit that there actually are several plots with your specifications...

[ariakas]

Wait, what? Where did I refuse to admit that these were indeed examples of the opposite? I asked you if you saw the same pattern in same examples as I did.

[(Anonymous)]

anon listed a dozen examples of women rescuing or avenging men and your immediate response was "they're all ya or anime" as if that somehow invalidated them. if anything, i would say that's pretty big indicator that western audiences have trouble with the concept of a man needing to be saved.

[ariakas]

No, it wasn't "as if that somehow invalidated them", it was a salient observation that they shared a common theme. A theme which has persisted throughout the other examples given, even. It wasn't a denial that they were valid; in no possible way or reading was that even remotely implied.

Holy christ on a cracker people read whatever the fuck they want to read into any given statement on the internet, eh?

DA

[(Anonymous)]

It's probably because your "Is that the media you usually consume?" comes off as more than a little judgey, whether you meant it that way or not.

Re: DA

[ariakas]

How in the fuck is that "judgey" and not a relevant question when trying ascertain the origin of a common theme? If it's just the media they usually consume, then it might not be an East-West thing. If they consume media from a wide variety of sources, yet all of the examples they can come up with are from a narrow set of genres, then genre is more relevant.

I reiterate: Jesus fucking christ on a cracker.

I don't give a single flying shit if people like anime and JRPGs and YA. I enjoy the first two myself.

Stop being so defensive about what media you like read words.

[ariakas]

Even more interestingly, the other examples offered below are all anime/JRPGs too.

[(Anonymous)]

Trails in the Sky was awesome for that. Powerful heroine with her own flaws and vulnerabilities that ends up kicking everybody's butt while growing as a character.

[(Anonymous)]

A bit part of Final Fantasy XII is Ashe avenging her husband and taking back her kingdom.

[(Anonymous)]

Oh, Samurai Girl, which is awful (the book, anyway) but plays the avenging part straight.