[ SECRET POST #5199 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5199 ⌋

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


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 31 secrets from Secret Submission Post #744.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

06. https://i.imgur.com/Ohtur0M.png

[sparklywalls]

Wait, I thought MPDG was more a male fantasy of how a dream woman should be and that was the issue? Maybe I misunderstood it all these years but I don’t see a problem with any of what you said for yourself. I thought the criticism of the trope was usually down to the character not feeling genuinely themselves, and more existing to serve a man’s (usually romantic) plot?

[(Anonymous)]

That is my general takeaway about the trope as well fwiw, but I also have seen some people criticize it from the angle OP is talking about as well

[type_wild]

No, that IS the main criticism.

[kamino_neko]

Yeah... The Manic Pixie Dream Girl, like the Magical Negro, doesn't exist for herself, she exists to be the catalyst for the male protagonist's growth. (Swap in 'white' instead of 'male', for the case of the Magical Negro.)

At least that's what the term was coined to mean...it fairly rapidly mutated into 'random quirky girl'.

[sparklywalls]

Guess going by everyone’s comments here I wasn’t misunderstanding but I’m being stubbornly traditional in using the term the old way!

It’s pretty frustrating that it feels like a lot of female fans seem apologetic for identifying with a female character just because “positive and quirky” when that’s not necessarily an issue by itself - I get the “oh I’m so random” people in real life can be annoying but sometimes...that’s just how some people are. Especially younger people.

[(Anonymous)]

That's my understanding of the trope, too. I'm not familiar with what OP describes at all, most of the criticism isn't directed at the character for not "dealing with her own shit", it's because she's not really anything but a prop for a man's fantasy.

[(Anonymous)]

Is that not implied by that? Like... they are props because they are not shown to have their own lives, desires or struggles, aka not shown to have their own shit to deal with.

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah, it comes originally from a genre (which never gets called a genre because the writers were mostly "literary" in spite of writing a large volume of collective work using the same tropes and plots) someone called "bad penis confessional." A synopsis, (ahem):

"Oh, woe is me, I'm a hugely successful artistic figure but I've lost my will for life. My wife and children are distant from me. (Because I stopped doing any emotional labor for them after the honeymoon.) My career has become a grind of producing the same derivative work. But wait! Who is this comely underpaid avant-garde muse half my age! Look at how creative she is! (Because no one values her work.) In becoming infatuated with her, I feel new creative juices (in my shorts)!"

In other words, authors were getting woodies writing as if they were Woody Allen. And there was a fuckton of this back in the 80s and 90s that ended up produced into movies.

(Last Tango in Halifax has a nice takedown of this trope with John/Judith.)

[(Anonymous)]

The coiner of the term has an interesting article on disowning it about a year after:
https://www.salon.com/2014/07/15/im_sorry_for_coining_the_phrase_manic_pixie_dream_girl/

[(Anonymous)]

*7 years after coining it

blame this coffee

[(Anonymous)]

That's... Not a MPDG because she doesn't exist for a man.

[meadowphoenix]

I'd agree with you if I knew there wasn't a real-life projection of women happening previously to their depiction in media, which that depiction exacerbated.

but yeah, I think there are a lot of people who want one-sided relationships, hence their depiction.

[(Anonymous)]

Not in real life, but even as a woman, some of my fantasies involve very one-sided relationships. I don't think it is always bad unless it filters into real life. I do think it can, and it often does with especially men. But I don't think all one-sided fantasies are bad.

[(Anonymous)]

Strongly agree. I think the fantasy of someone who loves you (the hypothetical you) unconditionally no matter how much you suck is extremely common and understandable. And it's a perfectly fine fantasy as long as you don't expect that kind of thing from real people in real life.

[meadowphoenix]

I think they're interesting because I think that again a lot of people fantasize about one-sided relationships (this might be the main aspect of the most common fantasies no matter what other more specific aspects abound), and I actually think human beings are not that good at naturally balancing investment in other people with the investment they're getting (and then misogyny exacerbates this). I think people are already doing the one-sided thing in real life, without needing a fantasy, in order words, so while I think the fantasy is useful for a lot of reasons, I couldn't say it's good either.

[(Anonymous)]

Your example here is a good one, because Ramona was a deconstruction of this trope - she seemed to be the Manic Pixie Dream Girl (literally, in the case of the dream part) and cool and fun and had no problems and would be here for the guy...but that was super not true.

[(Anonymous)]

Idk, Ramona never felt like a MPDG to me since she immediately came with baggage and wasn't even initially interested in Scott. I think most people just see the wacky hair colors and go yep, that's a manic pixie dream girl.