Tired old SF clichés

[vilakins]

Some further thoughts and a rant about the script of the Farscape episode Coup by Clam.

I was surprised to find this was written by a woman, Emily Skopov. There were some very good bits--the shellfish containing neurologically-linked bacteria which gave the people who ate them the same symptoms, and Crichton in drag which had me laughing out loud--but we had [rolls eyes] yet another society which oppresses women. Just what goes on here? Do writers think to themselves, "I know! I'll write about a culture in which woman don't count. That'll be original--it's only been done 5000 times, and it's not like it happens on this planet."

Bloody hell, why not write something really different, like a race with several sexes, all of which are needed for procreation, or one with a hive-mind? Or confound our expectations: I loved the garbage-collecting alien, Staanz, in The Flax who appeared male but was actually female, though he was cancelled out by the bloodhound couple Rorf and Rorg in Till the Blood Runs Clear who regarded females as inferior and owned by males. I think I've read only one or two stories in which females were dominant and usually this 'unnatural state' has been corrected by the end. Not that I approve of that sort of society either, but it would have been much more original, and also fun to see Aeryn and Sikozu in drag.

Sexist societies appear in every SF show I can think of. Hey, script-writers, how about a little more thought and invention and a lot less tired and offensive cliché?

Comments

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

I rather like "Coup by Clam," just because it's so funny in a way that, I admit, appeals to the 12-year-old buried inside of me. :)

I don't mind the sexist society per se. Yes, it is a cliche, and a rather tired one, but Farscape has used a lot of other tired cliches and done interesting new things with them, or used them as good springboards for humor or character drama, or whatever. (And it's not like an extremely sexist society is a really out-there SF plot device, sadly.) It really isn't very well-developed in that ep, though, so as anything but an excuse for some goofy humor, it's really not very satisfying. You know what actually bothered me about it? The "drag" thing. Because, yes, Crichton in drag is priceless, but my suspension of disbelief snaps painfully at being asked to believe that the standard of dresses, long hair, bright colors, and makeup for women vs. short hair, trousers, and sober colors for men are galactic universals.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes. The men were even dressed rather like SS officers, hardly a style of dress that would occur to a lot of alien cultures (SG1's done that too, with military gear and business suits). Actually, women's clothing in Farscape can annoy me a lot. You usually get sensible or inventive clothes on most characters but the impractical and probably very uncomfortable hooker outfits Jool and Sikozu have to wear are obviously just for the drool-factor. Give me Aeryn's gear any day.

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

Well, I do understand that costuming in SF shows is aimed at evoking certain associations in human audiences, and black uniforms say "evil police-state society" pretty effectively to a contemporary human audience. I can forgive that, generally. But, y'know, the female dress thing was a plot point, which makes it much harder to shrug off. I think it's less the lack of alienness that bothers me, though, as the assumption it seems to make that 21st century American gender norms are, well, norms, period. But that's a bit of a pet peeve issue with me.

It does actually seem fairly in-character to me for Jool to wear ridiculously impractical high-fashion clothing. It makes slightly less sense for Sikozu, although I guess her leather gear, although scanty, is actually pretty serviceable. Aeryn, IMHO, tends to leave a bit too much skin showing for a soldier, but given that she's a Sebacean and probably tends to overheat easily, it's forgivable. :)

[kerravonsen]

And having a different clothing design can do absolute wonders for a story, sometimes. The classic example of this is the Doctor Who story "Robots of Death", which, when you look at the bare plot, is another tired cliche -- the "robots run amok" story. But making the robots look like Art Deco creations and the humans all dressed up in confections that scream "decadent society" and it was transformed. If the humans had been wearing military uniforms it would have been deadly dull.