I have ranted many times in these pages and on my podcast and on Twitter and on Tumblr about the dearth of women-led stories that can be found in movies these days. However, there is a bright spot, and that bright spot can be found on television.
The sad reality is that movies have become increasingly risk averse, and risk averse means we have franchises, remakes, reboots, and sometimes someone throws the Wachowski siblings money to make something completely off the wall (Seriously, Jupiter Ascending has Channing Tatum with wolf DNA and Mila Kunis is a janitor that finds out she’s alien royalty, so basically this going to be the best movie ever). And for some reason, despite being proven otherwise (Hunger Games, Divergent, Lucy, God help me, Twilight), studios consider female-led projects to be risky. It’s ridiculous.
However, where the risks in storytelling are being taken is on TV. Not just on cable, but even on networks. Ad we’ve had a number of really fantastic woman-centered shows recently that are doing really well! So lets celebrate some of those. This list is not exhaustive.
Drama:
Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries: WE LOVE THIS SHOW. We have a whole post about why it is awesome.
Orphan Black: Tatiana Maslany (nominated for a SAG award for her role(s) as “Various”) plays at last count 12 different clones in this conspiracy thriller from BBC America. It’s amazing, and there are instances where Tatiana punches herself, pours herself a drink, gives herself a hug, shows clones pretending to be other clones (AND YOU CAN TELL) while being supported by Maria Doyle Kennedy and is one of the better written, most tense shows on television. (Does it pass the Bechdel Test if the two named female characters talking about something other than men is played by the same actress?)
Agent Carter: We tell you every week why to watch this show. Well, not THIS week. Female secret agent protects democracy and fights the patriarchy in perfect lipstick.
Orange is the New Black: Netflix women’s prison series. You know it’s doing something right because there have been complaints that this show does not fairly present the viewpoint of men. Ensemble 90% woman cast, with a very good proportion of characters of color, explorations about what brings women to federal prison, and one of those rare instances of a transgender actress playing a transgender woman.
State of Affairs: This is not an objectively good show, but it’s got Katherine Heigl as a CIA operative? Analyst? Something? And Alfrie Woodard as POTUS, so it counts.
I kind of hope Jeffrey Dean Morgan shows up and Heigl kills his character, as revenge for that horrible Grey’s Anatomy plotline (which one? Either? both?)
How to Get Away With Murder: Viola Davis kicking ass, taking names, and being allowed in courtrooms with bare arms. Also being on screen without her wig and make up and being a natural African American woman in private.
Scandal: Shonda Rhimes goes to Washington. Kerry Washington.
Yeah, it’s soapy and Shonda Rhimes seems to have a lot of worrying things to say about what she idealizes in a relationship as shown by Olivia and Fitz, but it’s one of the few shows to feature a powerful black woman as the lead character.
Madame Secretary: Tea Leoni as the Secretary of State. I haven’t watched this show yet (it’s on the list for summer binging) but the cast is stellar and it’s been renewed for a 2nd season.
Reign: This show is not good. It’s ridiculous.
But Meagan Follows as Catherine di Medici of Green Gables and terrible costuming choices that it’s at least consistent about, that blends Mary, Queen of Scots with Gossip Girl sensibilities? Props for knowing your audience, CW.
Bletchley Circle: BBC series about women who were former code breakers at Bletchley Park solving complex mysteries years after WWII. In addition to smart, savvy women, it explores how women were expected to just go back to business as usual after the war was over, and the costs of the work that they did.
Call the Midwife: Midwives in the 1950s in the East End of London. It almost never passes the reverse Bechdel test- there are almost never two named male characters talking about anything other than women.
It treats women’s work and women’s stories as profoundly important, and has explored topics like illegal abortion, developmentally disabled people being pregnant, and the stresses of poverty.
Comedy:
Jane the Virgin: CW has been knocking it out of the park with this show, that is delightfuland owns its nutty and telenovela conventions while acknowledging the ridiculousness of them. Golden Globe winner Gina Rodriguez is super charismatic and just so adorable.
Plus it’s one of the very few mainstream American shows that feature a predominatly Latina/Latino cast. Really, everyone should watch this show.
Parks and Recreation: This show is almost over (sob), but the story of Leslie Knope, determined public servant for whom her true loves are her career, her Ann Perkins, her Ben, and the family she built out of love, determination, and waffles will forever be in our hearts.
Mom: Allison Janney is the Queen of the Universe, as far as I’m concerned, and her chemistry with Anna Faris is off the damn charts. My mom loves this show.
2 Broke Girls: I tried to give this show a shot, because Kat Dennings was one of the best parts of the Thor movies, and because we have two women seizing their destiny in their own hands, which is awesome. Less awesome is the often racist humor used.
Broad City: I have not watched this show, but PCHH just did an episode talking about it- it’s produced by Amy Poehler, is about two single women living in New York, and all that entails, with a lot of pot. Ppyajunebug describe it to me as: “Basically it’s ladies being friends and boning dudes while having weird adventures and getting stoned.”
Girls: Yeah, this show has a lot of problems, based mainly on representation, and claims that it’s a universal depiction of what Millennial girls experience, but a show that is run by women, stars women, and is unashamed of showing non-conventional naked bodies? Whoomp there it is.
Veep: Julia Louis Dreyfus is trying to run the world, with Anna Chulmsky texting at her side, in sharp, fast, hilarious dialogue.
The Mindy Project: Mindy Kaling’s sitcom that’s only the first American show run by a Indian woman, so no pressure.
New Girl: I think this started out as a deconstruction of the Manic Pixie Dream Girl trope that Zooey Deschanel gets pigeon-holed into- what happens to the girl after the guy says “You changed me and now I can go off into the world as a better human!”
Also if I can get the rest of the Bitchery drunk enough, there might be a game of True American at RT. Just saying.
Transparent: Amazon’s Golden Globe winning show about a transwoman who transitions late in life. There are legit concerns about having a trans character played by a cis actor, but Jeffrey Tambor (and, I believe, the showrunner) has been extremely sensitive to those concerns.
Other shows mentioned on Twitter that I haven’t seen any of: Bad Judge, The Mysteries of Laura, Cristela. Some arguments were made for Masters of Sex, Grey’s Anatomy, and Once Upon a Time. I’m sure there are others, and in the interests of keeping this article a manageable length, I stuck with current shows. Otherwise we’d have Ally McBeal, Mary Tyler Moore, Murphy Brown, Buffy the Vampire Slayer… this list could go on and on and on.
In addition to this admittedly incomplete list, we also have a sea change in female directors and writers for other shows like Outlander, Mad Men and (up until last season, and it really shows) Game of Thrones. We’ve seen some fruits of those labors with Michelle Maclaren, who directed several episodes of Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad, and she’s now directing the Wonder Woman movie. I don’t believe there’s been a director announced for Captain Marvel yet, but I hope Marvel takes this cue and hires one of the amazing female directors available. (now if we could get a damn Black Widow movie….)
It’s true that this list is pretty white, and there’s really only a tiny handful of showrunners of color. I hope that the success of the Shondaland shows, Jane the Virgin, and The Mindy Project demonstrate that there’s an audience for shows about women of color. Hollywood doesn’t seem to want to learn this lesson in movies, but I am feeling guardedly optimistic that they’ll let television take that path.
I feel like we’re on an (admittedly very shallow at times) upswing of female led shows, female show-runners, and an increasing number of shows with complex, fully-realized female characters. The establishment is slowly recognizing the women of color leading some of these shows with the wins of Gina Rodriguez at the Golden Globes and Viola Davis and Uzo Aduba at the Screen Actors Guild awards (seriously, y’all. Jane the Virgin. It’s the best) So I feel like we’re going in the right direction.
What shows did we miss? Which ones do you love? What are you watching right now?
Finally, someone in a position of ‘power’ raving about Jane The Virgin! I can’t understand how everyone isn’t hooked yet on this show. So silly and ridiculously over the top, but you know what – that’s exactly what was missing in TV-Land. Ugly Betty had some of the same vibe, but Jane knocks it out of the park to.ta.lly!!
1. Castle (Stana Katic).
2. Bones (Emily Deschanel).
Can you tell that I wach TNT all day?
Where’s Outlander????? Smart, tough heroine driving the plot and Helllloooo, female gaze.
Also, The Honorable Woman (as previously mentioned) and also The Fall. Both on Netflix, both driven by interesting, intelligent women.
I Love The Fall! I’ll watch Gillian Anderson in anything.
Wire in the Blood is dark and bloody and will creep you right iut but has a strong woman (Hermione Norris and later Simone Lahbib) in a starring role along with Robson Green. It been a long time on that one and it’s entirely possible she’s less central than I remember.
Spooks / MI$ has all sorts of estrogen and is kick-ass. They do have a tendency to kill people off so be warned. Hermione Norriss, Jenny Agitur, Nicola Walker, Miranda Raison, Gemma Jones, Anna Chancellor…
Speaking of Anna Chancellor, The Hour. Two strong women (Romola Garai stars) in news during the cold war. Really good. Really, really good.
Island at War is great too. It’s been forever but I know it was a group of women left behind when the Nazis took over The Channel Islands.
And New Tricks Has Amanda Redman as the lead and is awesome. A bit less dark, quite funny.
Sorry, that’s full of typos. I’s had no caffeine!
MI5
Eva Green knocked it out of the park in “Penny Dreadful” (Billie Piper was pretty good too). And it’s returning, yay!
As everyone’s raving about the CW, I’ll just throw in my two favorite CW shows: Flash and Arrow. Obviously the lead of each is a male, but both shows (ESPECIALLY Arrow) have a lot of strong, nuanced female characters. Unfortunately on both shows I feel like the one they want to be the love interest is the weakest in terms of personality, but are generally portrayed as being strong and independent. The two shows are full of other female characters who don’t fit typical woman character modes. Some of the most powerful people on the show are women, some traditionally DC (Amanda Waller, The Black Canary) and some made up by the writers (Thea Queen, Felicity Smoak). While the main characters aren’t female, I think there is enough of a focus on females to interest the Bitchery. Also, hot men, really angsty love plots…
And I think the fact that men and women get equal screen time is good. Like, that’s a huge step in comic book worlds. I think that Arrow/Flash both have a better/wider representation of females than Guardians of the Galaxy, or The Avengers. Not to fangirl or anything!
I’ve yet to try Nashville but here’s an excerpt from a Pop Matters article about the show http://www.popmatters.com/review/190253-nashville-womens-bodies-womens-lives/
Nashville is a feminocentric, even feminist show. From its female creator (Callie Khouri), showrunner (Dee Johnson), and this episode’s director (Jan Eliasberg) and writer (Debra Fordham) to its protagonists, this is a woman’s world. Women are the backbone of the series and the objects of our moral allegiance; it offers no black and white heroes and villains. Even label boss Jeff Fordham (Oliver Hudson) turns out to have a softer side in his attachment to Layla. But the men we care most about, like Deacon and Avery, earn our affection through their relationships with our heroines. Indeed, Deacon’s illness both makes him vulnerable and allows him to display the integrity he shares with the female leads.
I watch Nashville and it is female led, but uneven a bit.
Two Broke Girls is awful and honestly I think the main people watching are straight men who like looking at the two “girls” especially Kat Dennings (who is awesome).
The Good Wife
Also I have really good things about Playing House. I was watching Benched which was awesome, but launched and dropped rather abruptly.
The last episode of Miranda aired in January of this year, but I’m still recommending it for fans of Call the Midwife who loved Miranda Hart as Chummy. Miranda is Hart’s sitcom based on her stand-up comedy and her love of old-fashioned ’70s comedy (think Morecambe and Wise and Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em). Although there’s a long-running storyline about Miranda and her gorgeous uni-friend-turned-love-interest Gary, I think the real centre of the show is Miranda’s relationships with highly-driven business partner and friend Stevie, Miranda’s mother Penny (“such fun!”), and her Sloane Ranger school friend Tilly. The style is broad and replete with slapstick and definitely not what I ordinarily find funny, but Miranda is so charming, sweet and warm-hearted that one critic referred to the show as “the comedy equivalent of a onesie”.
Being Mary Jane with Gabriel Union on BET is very good.
I was just reading an article about how good season 1 was, and that season 2 just started. In related news, I’ll be on the treadmill for days watch tv at this point!
I have to add my votes for “Once Upon a Time” even though the swordfight between Mary Margaret and Regina was seriously pathetic even for Stage Fighting 101 (ok, the actress who played Mary Margaret was still hugely pregnant, that didn’t help…). I also have to add a vote for both Sleepy Hollow and Gotham (Jada Pinkett Smith continues massively awesome as Fish Mooney).
Irrelevant Smart-Ass Remark–is it just me, or is Oswald Cobblepot’s Tom Riddle’s Weird American Cousin? Just sayin’. Of course it would be wrong to write crossover fanfic about this.