Warcraft’s Racism and Sexism Problem – Part 2 (Women of Warcraft 3 - Intro and Tyrande)

I would like to give a shout out to noted author and velociraptor expert Emmett Scout for conversing with me on this topic on Twitter and helping shape some of these thoughts. Emmett is an editor for The Next, a blog that gets deep and brainy with games and all sorts of nerd media.

Before proceeding onto reviewing the manifold sexist and racist missteps of World of Warcraft, I thought it was worth noting four female characters that Blizzard introduced in Warcraft 3 that were written particularly well. Lest people get the impression that I believe Blizzard did nothing right in terms of feminist or racial sensitivity, I should also point out what they did well, right?

Tyrande Whisperwind, Maiev Shadowsong, Sylvanas Windrunner, and Jaina Proudmoore were all introduced as key figures in the Warcraft 3 series. They were all strong female characters that accomplished their goals through the point of an arrow, the keen edge of a glaive, or good leadership and diplomacy. These characters had their own stories outside the context of any man’s story. They were fully realized and heroic – each in a unique and interesting way.  

Despite how well these characters were written, however, Blizzard artists did not always present them visually in a way that followed their empowered characterization. All of them, save Maiev, have occasionally demonstrated a reckless disregard for their midriff’s safety, for example.  Depending on the artist, they are often abundantly endowed in the chest to the point of gravity defying absurdity.

Sylvanas evolves in World of Warcraft from "Suitable but Night Elf" to "There's the Dark Ranger!" to "I'm only cold on my head, shoulders, and legs. My torso strangely feels just fine."

Apparently this is the only the context in which many players and artists understand female power. “Sure, they can murder you, move like the wind, spray knives in every direction, and control the elements, but will they still be arousing and able to nurse many babies?” seems to be the pressing question in some people minds.

Nevertheless, despite the occasional mismatched art, I have to give credit where credit is deserved. Here they are in detail one by one, starting with…

Tyrande Whisperwind:

We are first introduced to Tyrande at the start of the last chapter of Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos. She leads an army of night elf fighters, all of whom are women. The night elf men are asleep at this point, because apparently druidism (which only men practice at this point) is really exhausting. Tyrande overlooks her beloved Ashenvale Forest and sees it threatened by newcomers – orcs and humans.

"Just checking out my dominion from a cliff like a boss, Shandris."

We saw the night elf women previously in Warcraft 3 during the orcish campaign when they began skirmishing with the orcs harvesting lumber. The orcs in response have murdered the night elf demi-god Cenarius. Diplomatic relations are not great among the different mortal species at this point.

Imagine how many worker units and demi-gods would still be alive, if anyone in Warcraft just tried *talking* to each other before starting a fight?

Tyrande, however, recognizes the greater oncoming threat of the undead and their demon overlords. These Burning Legion guys are old news to the night elves... 10,000 years old old news. Tyrande is brave, but she is also prudent. Unlike a stereotypical video game hero character might, Tyrande does not dive face first into conflict. Tyrande exhibits real leadership and seeks out support. This is clearly out of wisdom rather than weakness.

Tyrande and her army awaken the male druids. This includes Malfurion, Tyrande’s lover.

Malfurion and Tyrande exhibit a pretty healthy and believable relationship for characters in a video game. They are both independent types, but they are genuinely caring towards each other even if they do not agree 100% of the time.

For example, they have a disagreement about freeing Malfurion’s brother, Illidan. This is a disagreement with possibly cosmic implications.

Illidan sought out demonic power for himself is the problem… Malfurion thinks freeing Illidan invites more trouble than help. Tyrande thinks that Illidan is precisely the kind of trouble the demons need to halt their advance. Malfurion considers this reckless and even tries to “forbid” Tyrande from freeing Illdian.

Tyrande effectively tells Malfurion to get lost, and does what she thinks is best. After Tyrande has freed Illidan, however, she and Malfurion are still affectionate with each other - even if they are cross. Furthermore, despite their flowery language, neither Tyrande nor Malfurion really strike me as being creepily enthralled by each other. Tyrande’s story is not eclipsed by her love interest’s. Instead, Tyrande’s story is her own, and sometimes is shared with Malfurion’s. It's a pretty good example of how two people in a relationship should interact.

Whether Blizzard did this consciously or not, the power couple’s relationship offers some lessons often lost to real life guys (especially nerds) when contrasted with the relationship Tyrande has with Illidan. Illidan is obsessed with Tyrande, and claims to fight only because she wishes it. Tyrande’s cold polite rebuttal to Illdian is a beautiful crushing of Illidan’s all too familiar “But I really really like you and am willing to do all this stuff” case for romance.

"I worship you like a goddess. That means you HAVE to love me back, right?"

Sorry Illidan. No amount of infatuation or labor can obligate Tyrande to love you. Thanks, but no means no… now go fight a demonic army.

That's the essence of Tyrande in Warcraft 3. She's tough and focused on her job. She is a hero who fights for the forest and her fellow night elves. The Blizzard team wrote her as an exemplary leader and warrior by any measures regardless of gender. She knows when to use diplomacy and when to be forceful. Despite her art being sometimes oriented through the male gaze, her writing, for the most part, is well done. She comes out of Warcraft 3 as a true hero that people want to be like rather than simply be with.

Tyrande's only big fault in Warcraft 3 was her casual beating of Illidan's jailers. I was never quite clear how Maiev evaded Tyrande's notice, but Illidan's prison warden does not give up on her job that easily...

Next installment: Maiev Shadowsong.

Ready and equipped for the job.

The Unconscionable Carving of Beverly Katz

A little over a week ago an episode of Hannibal aired that really threw the series off its rails for me. I still enjoy the show and its antics, but the show has done little so far to undo the harm it has done in Episodes 4 and 5 of the 2nd Season.

I am writing specifically about the entirely needless and narratively clumsy elimination of Beverly Katz, the show’s only Asian principle character, and one of a diminishing number of women in the show.

  

In fact, if you look at the female principles we have seen so far in the show, all but Alana Bloom have been murdered or are slated to be murdered (if they follow the novels Freddie will be killed.) To be fair, a great many people have gotten murdered throughout the show, and maybe Freddie will get to live in the TV series. Ms. Lara Jean Chorostecki, after all, has done brilliant job making the character both sleezy and powerful at the same time. The male Freddies that have gone before her were kind of oafish characters, while Ms. Chorostecki’s characterization is alarmingly adept, albeit still a lower tier tabloid journalist.

Nevertheless, we’ve had two recurring principle characters die for what seems to be the exact same purpose: Man Pain.

The trope is sometimes called “Fridging.” A female character dies, usually in a horrific manner (but stuffed into a refrigerator is what the trope is named for), in order to provide motivation, Man Pain, for the male protagonist to soldier on and take revenge or win the day. It’s an old trope in a lot of movies, comics, TV shows… any media really.

Murron in Braveheart?  Good example. That’s William’s wife, by the way… you don’t recall her name, but you recall William being pushed by her death though, right? Exactly.

I recently went to Emerald City Comic Con in Seattle, and there panelist Cora Walker mentioned Beverly Katz as an example of “Fridging.” It didn’t even hit me until then: In Beverly’s case it was quite literally *fridging.* She is killed, fridged, and put on horrific display to motivate Will Graham and Jack Crawford.

It should be pointed out that in these Fridging Scenarios the woman’s death usually had nothing to do with her personal narrative, but everything to do with the man’s. Murron in Braveheart, going back to our archetypal example, has no narrative outside her connection to William Wallance. Her death is inconsequential to her arc, but crucial to his.

Beverly’s death is even worse in some ways because she was a well-developed character on the show and she had an arc to work with. It’s always offensive when the woman or person of color has no development and serves exclusively to die in service of telling the white male protagonist’s story. There’s something especially offensive about building up a character that *could* have her own arc, but then has that thrown aside in service of getting the audience attention back to “real protagonists.”

A lot of viewers really identified with Beverly Katz. She was smart, scientific, proficient with firearms, comfortable with incredibly creepy murder scenes, strong instinct, and willing to take chances. She was an interesting, well-rounded, and realistic character. Do you know how difficult it is to find non-ninja Asian women on TV? It’s really tough. You know how easy it is to find women, Asian and otherwise, who are just normal people capable of doing extraordinary things in the real world? Very easy. Why can’t art just reflect reality?  

That’s, after all, the essence of beloved relatable characters. In a TV show or movie or game, we usually  want to see someone like us or the people we know, who, through some narratively justified events, is in a place to do something amazing. Beverly Katz was accomplishing exactly that. She was a well written character that made the world of Hannibal feel more real because we don’t only see men accomplishing amazing things every day. With her gone, the audience is only stuck with an increasingly simple Alana Bloom as the only female principle character in the show. Alana is literally used as a sex object in Episode 6.

There was no narratively justifiable reason for Katz to die. Abigail Hobbs had already died earlier in the show to provide exactly the Man Pain that they are now trying to give Will Graham through Katz. At least when Abigail died it was believable and felt like it fit in with Abigail's own arc as a character. She played a dangerous game Hannibal. She brokered some deals with the devil and ended up over her head. (Faustible!) Moreover, she had a relationship with Will Graham that was not wholly appropriate. Will was warned about his paternal feelings towards Abigail and that made her death even more dreadful. Will had a tragic flaw of caring for a person whom he should have kept some professional distance from and it was exploited to demonstrate a point – this is how good drama is to be written.

Beverly Katz, however, made uncharacteristically stupid decisions that lead up to her death. Why would she ruin all the evidence against Hannibal by searching his house without a warrant? Why would she leave no trace of what she was following up on or consulting her colleagues? If she were willing to share what she suspected with Jack Crawford, why not leave him a note or write a report to alert him of what she felt needed investigating? Why did this previously quite capable FBI agent suddenly become like a drugged do-do slowly wandering into her doom?

"No, wait! This is all wrong! My character would never be this dumb... there's a man behind this, I know it!"

Oh that’s right… it happened just so we are doubly sure that this show is all about him. Doesn’t matter where her narrative was going, or what her character growth was heading. Let’s break narrative and all we know about this character just to keep the male protagonist reaching for the stars.

What really saddening is how this contrasts to the film that made the Hanniverse a household name. Silence of the Lambs on the surface is a story about the capture and escape of two different very creepy serial killers, but, more deeply, the movie is mostly about Clarice moving her way through a man's world and coming out a victorious woman. 

In comparison, the trajectory the Hannibal TV series is taking seems to bear the subtext of the feminine being literally killed and eaten for daring to wander into the male domain. The murdered characters we've spent much of any time with so far are Beverly, Abigail, Georgia Madchen, Marissa Schurr, Dr. Sutcliffe and Franklyn Froidveaux. With the exception of Dr. Sutcliffe and Franklyn, all of these characters were female, and Franklyn's character was such that one might as well lump him in as being a characterization of the feminine.

Most disappointing. I hope that this was just a hiccup in the show and that we can steer more towards competent female character in the series rather than very worn out and old tropes, but I'm not holding my breath. Maybe though? Who knows with Hannibal! An earless Abigail may be fighting her way to freedom right now.

Warcraft’s Racism and Sexism Problem – Part 1 (Warcraft: Orcs and Humans through Warcraft III)

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Fannibalism : Introduction

Earlier this year, my wife introduced me to the TV show Hannibal. Cass has been a Fannibal for a long while now – long before the TV series was created. We’ve both read Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs. We’ve both watched Anthony Hopkins perform as the infamous Hannibal Lector in the movies of the same name, and have seen Brian Cox inaugurate the role on screen in Manhunter.

We’ve both watched the aesthetically dubious Hannibal Rising about how the Sexy Murder Baby Hannibal became the Sexy Murder Man Hannibal in a Sexy Murder Bildungsroman.

Cass even read the Hannibal Rising and Hannibal books. Only a couple of weeks ago we finally watched the hilariously absurd Hannibal movie. (Why did Gary Oldman decide to use his Jimmy Stewart voice impression for the role of the deformed child molester Mason Verger?)

The new TV show stars Mads Mikkelsen in the title role, and he does an amazing job with the character. He adds a certain quiet subtlety to the role that allows something as outrageous as a cannibalistic serial murder machine carry through a TV series with some gravitas.

In an interview Mads Mikkelsen states that he is basing his interpretation of Hannibal on Satan, and you can definitely detect touches of Mephistopheles in his characterization.

I think in some ways it is the best performance of the character seen thus far. Hopkins’ performance of the character was perfect for Hannibal’s limited exposure in Silence of the Lambs, but in a TV format it would become unsustainable and silly. Mikkelsen’s lower-key performance has a believability about it. You despise Mikkelsen’s Hannibal, but you do not feel entirely alienated from him. There’s a sense that you could almost understand him – until he eats someone’s organs.

Despite Hannibal more closely resembling a human being, the show is not without its absurdities. The show exists in an alternate universe where the FBI deals with an outrageously ostentatious serial killer on a regular basis. Human corpses are played with by the show’s special effects team like they were Lego blocks to create morbid fine art sculptures almost every week. A human totem pole  or corpse marionette theater are so mundane they barely warrant attention as anything more than background noise for the real story of Hannibal’s Mephistopheles interacting with Will Graham’s Faust.  

I’ll get more into the details with the Faust analogies later.

There’s a great deal that I loved about the show’s first season. I identify strongly with Will Graham on several superficial levels:

• I do have a tendency to end up with the local stray becoming part of my household.

• I have a very strong sense of empathy. 69/80 on the somewhat dubious Baron-Cohen test. It doesn’t help me solve crimes unfortunately. I think you need at least a 75 and some manner of X-gene to get to that point.

• I hate looking people in the face. Maybe not to the extreme Will Graham exhibits, but looking anyone I am not very familiar with in the face is uncomfortable on visceral level.

• I clean up nice, but there are times that I just devolve into a scruffy looking bum looking nervously around at my dogs and not at your terrifying face.

• I have had seizures where I have lost time. This is due to diabetes, not encephalitis, and it has never led to me being force fed a human ear… that I know of. But still! When this became an important factor in the show, I started to wonder how much more they were planning to draw on my experience for this show.

Yup! So much of this show was just great in the first season for me. I had a character I could watch that was essentially me, even the secondary characters were really interesting and believable in their own right, all the characters – including the primary hero and villain had flaws and made mistakes. All of this made for a very believable show about a largely fantastical world filled with artful horrors.

The second season has started strong on some points, but some of the show’s strengths have started to fray. The second season starts off very quietly looking at Hannibal’s loneliness. This is contrasted beautifully with Will receiving much greater variety of company in his struggles to find himself even though Will is imprisoned.

Unfortunately, the 3^rd-5^th episodes of the season have gotten increasingly clichéd. That’s not to say that the show doesn’t still have magnificent moments, but  there has been a flood recently of tired “women invading male space” tropes that leave me… well… tired.

More on that in a future post! Stay tuned!

Reboot, Re-focus, Reload

I’ve decided that I want to give this whole blogging thing another go. After a few more years getting into tabletop gaming and greater exposure to gamer culture online, I feel that I have more to say and more background to speak with insight.

There are a few geeky topics of varying intensity that I would like to blather about here including tabletop and online gaming, comic books, geeky movies or TV, and opera. A common thread that continues to come up in conversations with my wife and friends, however, is the state of nerd communities and our media.

What has happened in terms of my nerdvolution in recent years? I’ve played some new table top RPGs: Pathfinder, Numenera, and a game developed by a friend of mine called Valor. I’ve played oodles of MMORPGs in a desperate quest to replace the increasingly problematic World of Warcraft. For one of these games, Star Wars: The Old Republic, I helped start and lead a guild, which turned out to be an interesting window into a whole host of issues about bullying, personal identity, and nerdly social dynamics that I would never have guessed would come up.

I have also read a great deal more of the quintessential nerd books and comics including some of the Drizzt series, Harry Potter, Star Wars novels, The X-Men’s Phoenix Saga, and the Forgotten Realm’s Avatar series… which similarly brought up a whole host of feminist and racial identity issues. Go figure.

I really enjoyed these games and this nerdy media most of which I have only consumed in the past 2 or 3 years or so. My experience with gamers has been largely great and I have met people from different background that I would have never met otherwise. Nevertheless, something about these experiences sometimes fires up my sociological eye.

Maybe nerd media and communities are no more backwards or troublesome than the general populace and mainstream media. Like the general populace and mainstream media, however, nerd demographics are thankfully diversifying more and more. As this happens the troublesome aspects of gender and racial tropes and acceptance (or lack thereof) within this diversifying group become more and more apparent and demanding of investigation and challenge.

Kobold "special shots" are clearly kobold eggs.

In my last post I briefly discussed the hypothesis that the "special shots" used by Kobold Slingers are, in fact, kobold eggs. After a few further conversations and scientific testing I think we can upgrade this from hypothesis to theory.

Just to clarify for those who are wondering what the heck I'm talking about, kobolds in Dungeons and Dragons are tiny lizard people. Along with goblins they are a typical threat to small villages that new adventurers somehow find themselves in service to.

In 4th edition, kobold slingers (along with a couple of other types of kobolds) can sometimes use a special shot for their slings. There are three varieties:
1. Glue pots - These special shots cover the kobold's opponent in a sticky goo that leaves the adventurer (the opponent) immobilized.
2. Stink pots - These special shots emit a smell so horrific that the kobold's opponents becomes distracted and inaccurate in their aim.
3. Fire pots - These special shots set the kobold's target on fire.

At first you may think that these are actual pots the kobolds are using, but keep in mind that the tiny lizard folk are not known for being remotely intelligent or civilized. The idea of a kobold working at its tiny potter's wheel is far fetched.

We do know, however, that kobolds are reptiles. Reptiles lay eggs. We also know that koblds are rather careless with their lives AFTER they have hatched, so we can only assume that they wouldn't have much of a qualm using their unborn progeny as ammunition.

Furthermore, the three varieties of "pots" follow a clear system correlating with egg freshness:

A few days after being laid a new kobold egg has a fresh and sticky yolk making it the perfect "glue pot."

Both immobilizing AND super-gross.

After a few days the once fresh yolk starts to go bad and smell putrid. The once mighty kobold shell may become cracked releasing an unholy smell.

While the kobolds may be accustomed to the stench, their foes are not.

Lastly, the rotting yolk eventually completely rots away leaving only an empty shell. These empty shells are strong enough to carry a rag and some flammable oil, but are still fragile enough to explode on impact sending deadly fuel everywhere.

It's a kobold-style Molotov cocktail. Also, still super-gross.

And there we have it. Proof that kobolds WILL throw their own flamming eggs at you and drench you in the gooey substance that might at one point have become their children.

Enter Xolok...

... the Terrible.

As I related in my last post, our group had emerged victorious against a young black dragon living in the sewers of the town. The battle, however, had cost the lives of both our bard (whom I think I forgot to mention actually) and my very first D&D character, Iannan Cluelacker, Cleric of the Raven Queen. Eventually the bard was stabilized. Iannan still could not save out of poison or death. It was a sad couple of minutes for everyone.

A lot of blame for both deaths could be pretty squarely placed at the feet of the kobolds who guarded the dragon. The creatures managed to keep me (and other party members) immobilized with "glue pots" thrown from their slings for most of the battle, which allowed the dragon to just engulf us in its horrible acidic breath repeatedly.

Following this battle, broken and disgusted, we had a little discussion with the DM:

Alan (Player): So these glue pots are like the best thing ever. Can we gather some for ourselves?

Loran (DM): No.

Alan: What do you mean? They all just happened to use their last glue pot?

Loran: Well, you can gather them. You can't use them though.

Alan: How can we not use them? They're pots with glue in them. How can a kobold figure out how to use them, but not people?

Loran: They are a special technology that only kobolds can use.

Me: What if I rolled a kobold?

Loran: Yeah, well maybe if you were playing a kobold.

Me: I'm bringing a kobold next week.

Loran: Fine, but he has no glue pots.

I didn't even know what stats or non-glue pot related advantages a kobold might have, but I went ahead and rolled a kobold rogue. Kobolds don't get any race-specific feats like the regular player races do, but they do get to shift as a minor action, which gives them a huge advantage as rogues. Mechanically I could already see myself enjoying this character over poor Iannan. Rogues with their bonuses to attacks with daggers, kobolds with the bonuses to being sneaky and thievy, shifting as a minor, bonuses to dexterity... this was going to be fun. 

The first issues we needed to resolve, of course, was the introduction of Xolok, why he would join the party, and, of course, what to do about the glue pot situation.

Xolok first encountered his party making their way back to town through the sewer. He had slept through the commotion of the rest of his tribe rushing out to meet he intruders and dying in defense of their beloved dragon. He awoke to find the quarters empty and hearing the sound of his fellow kobolds perishing in the distance. Gathering up all of the various shiny things he could find in the room, he took the off down one of the sewer hoping to get in on the action.

With a loud crash, Xolok dove out of the sewer pipe with what he considered amazing and cat-like agility wielding two very shiny (and therefore good or magical in Xolok's mind) butter knives.

He was confronted by a very battle-weary band of adventurers covered in kobold blood and carrying one of their own back to town. Rather than being upset that the adventurers had wiped out his entire tribe, Xolok seemed mostly upset that he has slept through the entire battle. Crestfallen, Xolok offered to help the adventurers find the quickest way to the surface in exchange for being permitted to accompany them on their journeys and to collect any shiny objects he might find along the way.

It was never quite clear why the adventurers accepted this little kobold into their group. Maybe they thought his tiny size and skill with locks would come in handy... or more likely they were just tired and bored of battle and wanted to reach town quickly for a well-deserved rest.

The topic of glue pots soon came up though. The dragonborn paladin, perhaps the least anxious to let the little pest into the group, asked if Xolok was carrying any glue pots and if Xolok was adept at using them.

Xolok reacted as if he was disgusted and surprised by the paladin's ignorance of glue pots...

I'm a male kobold, buddy. I can't lay those.

Thus the mystery of the kobold-only glue pot technology was solved. Next time: Xolok and the Paladin of Bahamut discuss religion.