Martin Zeller-Jacques

Delivered to the 2nd CISSGE Postgraduate Conference, on Sexuality, Textuality and

Image, University of Exeter, 12th of September 2008.
Sex, Power and Transgression: The Girl Villain in the Girl Hero Genre

In the pilot episode of the 2007 television series, The Bionic Woman, a child
watches as the newly empowered Jamie Sommers blurs past her mothers car. When
accused of making things up, the girl replies, I just thought it was cool that a girl
could do that. Among the many failures of the show, this delusion that it was
offering something surprising and new was the greatest. With Buffy, Alias, and Xena
still fresh in our memories, and foremothers stretching back to Wonder Woman,
Charlies Angels and The Avengers, weve known that a girl could do that for a long
time. To simply celebrate these texts as examples of female empowerment, as Bionic
Woman asks us to do, is to ignore the other ideological work these programs do. And
while much of the academic work on texts with female heroes has questioned the way
these women use their power, few have considered the role of the other strong women
who often populate these texts.
In shows like Wonder Woman, Charlies Angels, Xena: Warrior Princess, and
Buffy the Vampire Slayer, female heroes often, in some cases almost exclusively,
combat female villains. While we may first suspect that this is something inherent to
a genre which can be accused, often rightly, of serving up soft-core girl on girl
violence for a scopophilic male audience, I will contend that Girl Villains serve a
more subtle purpose. They provide simulacra for the Girl Heroes, enabling the
potentially disturbing or disruptive elements of the Girl Hero persona to be associated
with Villainy and thus making the Girl Hero a figure both less subversive and more
potentially accessible to a mainstream audience.
The generic label Girl Hero which I have chosen to use refers to Susan
Hopkins 2002 book of the same name.
1

Hopkins traces the changes in the

Martin Zeller-Jacques
Delivered to the 2nd CISSGE Postgraduate Conference, on Sexuality, Textuality and
Image, University of Exeter, 12th of September 2008.
presentation of female heroes, but also explicitly links these to developments in
popular music, fashion and celebrity, arguing that throughout popular culture, The
helpless heroine has been replaced by the new stereotype of an ambitious dynamic
tough girl seeking self-advancement and self-actualisation. (Hopkins, p. 108. My
emphasis.) It is Hopkins conception of the Girl Hero as a new stereotype which I
wish to invoke with this generic label. Viewing the Girl Hero through her shadow
double, the Girl Villain, I will suggest that the stereotype being developed is a new
binary construction of good and bad femininity, with normative sexuality and
conservative exercise of power expressed in the Girl Hero, and non-normative
sexuality and unrestricted exercise of power in the Girl Villain.
Yvonne Tasker was among the first to examine the increasing prominence of
female heroes in the action genre in the Eighties and Nineties. Her work already
captured some of the contradictory nature of the Girl Hero, who, according to Tasker,
represents, a response of some kind to feminism, emerging from a changing political
context in which images of gendered identity have been increasingly called into
question, while also borrowing from, well-established images such as that of the
tomboy... (Tasker, p. 15) Taskers invocation of the tomboy places the female
action hero in a desexualised context, making her a girl who has not accepted the
responsibilities of adult womanhood. (ibid.) Ten years further on, Jeffrey Brown
examined the contemporary female hero through the lens of a very different
construction of femininity, that of the dominatrix. In Browns view, both the action
heroine and the dominatrix ...combine disparate signs: male and female, subject and
object, powerful and powerless, pleasurable and punishing... [thus] demonstrat[ing]
the frailty of binary opposite cultural categories. (Brown, p. 69) Unlike Taskers
tomboys, Browns women are both powerful and sexual.
2

Their combination of

Martin Zeller-Jacques
Delivered to the 2nd CISSGE Postgraduate Conference, on Sexuality, Textuality and
Image, University of Exeter, 12th of September 2008.
strength and sexuality makes them transgressive figures capable of undermining
common constructions of gender. However Browns choice of the dominatrix as the
avatar of the new female hero is deliberately provocative, and based on an analysis of
the hyperbolic female action film Barb Wire which clearly does invoke the dominatrix
in its heros dress and demeanour. In general, however, Girl Hero texts are less
extreme than Barb Wire, and to focus too heavily on the dominatrix is to risk
overshadowing the diegesis of these texts. Though like the dominatrix the Girl Hero
is often sexualised, unlike the dominatrix, she does not exercise her sexuality to
achieve her purposes. The Girl Hero evokes fetishism, but she rarely enacts it.
Almost without exception, the sexuality of Girl Heroes is entirely normative, and any
forays into the literal territory of the dominatrix are coded as dangerous ground, more
often the province of the Girl Villains with whom this paper deals.
Like the Girl Hero, the Girl Villain is often sexualised in her appearance. Yet
unlike the Girl hero, she wields her sexuality as a weapon. In more recent Girl Hero
texts the sexual lines between Hero and Villain are blurred, and one of the defining
features of the contemporary Girl Hero is that she combines sexuality with agency
and power. As Brown points out, people of either gender can fight, shoot, and blow
things up. But... only women can combine these tough skills with the threat of
seduction. (Brown, p. 66) Yet in the Girl Hero texts we will examine, the Heroes,
though they are frequently sexualised in their appearance, rarely use seduction as a
weapon.

Just like the masterful sexuality of the dominatrix, seduction, and the

promiscuous sexuality that it implies, is ordinarily the province of the Girl Villain.
In what follows I will discuss two Girl Hero texts: Wonder Woman, identified
by a Hopkins as a fore-mother of the contemporary Girl Hero genre, and Buffy the
Vampire Slayer, unquestionably one of the genres most emblematic texts. I intend to
3

Martin Zeller-Jacques
Delivered to the 2nd CISSGE Postgraduate Conference, on Sexuality, Textuality and
Image, University of Exeter, 12th of September 2008.
examine some of the different ways in which Girl Villains are presented in these texts.
The first of these is the most familiar they function as extra eye-candy and their
battles with the Heroes as soft-pornographic violence.

Often they also serve a

political function, displacing the Heros violence onto a subservient female target
instead of a dominant male one, making it less potentially subversive. What nearly all
Girl Villains have in common, though, is their position at one end of a binary which
helps to define the nature of the Girl Heros role. The trope of a villain who mirrors
the hero is not unique to the Girl Hero genre, but it does have important consequences
for the presentation of women on these shows. If the Girl Villain is often presented as
sexually promiscuous or deviant, as I will contend that she is, then her position as the
Heros opposite helps to reify normative notions of female sexuality as passive and
monogamous. Thus the Girl Villain functions as part of a wider strategy through
which, according to Rosie White, Popular television... works to contain disruptive
images and ideas, rendering the new and the radical as safe and traditional in an
attempt to attract viewers but not to disturb them. (White 2007, 86.)

Sex, Politics and Villainy

Wonder Woman, the older of our two texts, provides the clearest difference in
the sexualisation of the Hero and the Villain. Played by former Miss USA, Linda
Carter, Wonder Woman appears dressed in a red-white-and-blue swimsuit with
golden armour emphasising her breasts. The armbands she wears, and the golden
lasso with which she binds her foes, as every commentary on the character is quick to
point out, clearly suggest the well-documented bondage fetish of the characters
creator, the psychiatrist Dr. William Moulton Marsdon.
Robinson 2004, 43-53.; DiPaolo 2007, 153.)
4

(Reynolds 1992, 34;

Despite her eroticised appearance,

Martin Zeller-Jacques
Delivered to the 2nd CISSGE Postgraduate Conference, on Sexuality, Textuality and
Image, University of Exeter, 12th of September 2008.
however, Wonder Womans behaviour is almost asexual, expressing little romantic or
sexual interest in anyone. She never tries to accomplish her purposes through her
sexuality by charming or seducing opponents. In fact, Wonder Womans strength is
coded as directly related to her chastity, since she informs us that, On Paradise
Island, her home, there are only women. Because of this pure environment we are
able to develop our minds and our physical skills unhampered by masculine
destructiveness. (1.3 Fausta, The Nazi Wonder Woman) The purity invoked here is
at least partly sexual purity, which offers the Amazons of Paradise Island fantastic
strength and even immortality. Indeed, Wonder Womans mother suggests that a
romantic relationship with a man could cost the hero her eternal life.
The Girl Villains of Wonder Woman, on the other hand, nearly always use
seduction as their primary weapon, corrupting the men around Wonder Woman, and
resorting to force only when cornered. When fight scenes between Wonder Woman
and these villains do occur, they are often eroticised as well Wonder Woman tends
to wrestle her female opponents, tearing their clothing in the process, while men are
typically flung across the room without ceremony. Although these girl-on-girl fight
scenes are clearly coded as titillation, they do serve a further purpose. Wonder
Womans chief weapon is her physical strength, which she can only exercise while
wearing the golden belt which is part of her costume. Likewise the chief weapon of
the Girl Villains is their seductive charm, which they can only exercise while
immaculately dressed and coiffed. Just as these women could render Wonder Woman
relatively harmless by removing her belt, she renders them harmless by dishevelling
their appearance, robbing them of the props of their performance of feminine allure.
Of course Wonder Woman nearly always wins out in these combats, offering the

Martin Zeller-Jacques
Delivered to the 2nd CISSGE Postgraduate Conference, on Sexuality, Textuality and
Image, University of Exeter, 12th of September 2008.
viewer the repeated spectacle of the seductive, promiscuous sexuality of the Girl
Villains being physically subdued by the chaste, normative sexuality of the Girl Hero.
Early in the second season of Wonder Woman, the scientist Dr. Solano
attempts to steal a nuclear reactor from the American government.

In order to

accomplish this he deploys his secretary and lover, Gloria, to seduce and kidnap the
intelligence officer, Steve Trevor. Typically of the Girl Villain, Glorias appearance
is conventionally sexualised, but unlike the chaste Wonder Woman, she utilises her
appearance with confidence and aplomb. Within moments of meeting Steve Trevor
she has dropped hints which have piqued his romantic interest, and plants a firm kiss
on his lips before leaving his office. She is also capable of demonstrating physical
power,

defeating

in

combat

Wonder

Womans

alter-ego,

Diana

Prince.

Clip Wonder Woman vs. Gloria

This fight reverses the shows usual dynamic, as Gloria is masked while Diana
appears out of costume. Both women have their clothing torn and dishevelled, but
Gloria retains her all important mask, and uses a compact filled with knockout gas to
escape, the device acting as a neat encapsulation of a superheroic trope (a la Batmans
utility belt) and a feminine accessory, just as Wonder Womans bracelets and tiara are
both jewellery and weaponry. Gloria then, is coded as Wonder Womans equal,
adopting a costume and the other trappings of a superhero, differing only in her
willingness to deploy sexual allure as well as physical strength. Yet of course, by the
end of the episode, Wonder Woman emerges victorious. I would argue that the
cumulative effect of Wonder Woman repeatedly fighting and defeating women like
Gloria, is to emphasise Wonder Womans moral right to exercise power because of
her chastity, and the Girl Villains lack of fitness to exercise power because of their
promiscuity.
6

Martin Zeller-Jacques
Delivered to the 2nd CISSGE Postgraduate Conference, on Sexuality, Textuality and
Image, University of Exeter, 12th of September 2008.
A later show like Buffy the Vampire Slayer may relax the rules for the Girl
Hero, just as our society has relaxed the rules for real women. Normative sexuality
now allows for premarital sex and offers more lee-way on promiscuity than in the era
of Wonder Woman. However, the Girl Villains role remains to demonstrate the
inherent wrongness of non-normative sexuality. In Buffy the Vampire Slayer, this is
most clearly demonstrated by the rogue Slayer, Faith. From the moment of Faiths
introduction to the show she is hyper-sexualised, telling stories about wrestling
alligators in the nude and how slaying makes her hungry and horny, stories which
emphasise Buffys relative prudishness. This early association of Faiths power as a
slayer with her sexuality becomes a major plank of her character, and though she is
always coded as promiscuous, she increasingly develops a sado-masochistic element
in her performance of sexuality.

Moreover this new side of Faith emerges

simultaneously with her accidental killing of an innocent man and her subsequent
slide into outright villainy.
In the third season episode Bad Girls, Faiths view that as a slayer she and
Buffy are above the law leads Buffy to skip tests in school and to get arrested.
Nevertheless Faith exercises a powerful fascination for Buffy during this episode
because of her free exercise of power, both physical and sexual. This finds expression
in their nightclub celebration after killing a nest of vampires, as they dance
provocatively with half a dozen men, and with each other, in a scene redolent with
overtones of promiscuous and lesbian sexuality. As Faith and Buffy become closer
their growing recklessness leads them to accidentally kill a civilian. Buffy retrenches
to her default position of reserved, normative sexuality and cautious exercise of power
within the limits of the law, while Faith, in her first steps towards becoming a villain,

Martin Zeller-Jacques
Delivered to the 2nd CISSGE Postgraduate Conference, on Sexuality, Textuality and
Image, University of Exeter, 12th of September 2008.
does not. In the next episode Faiths sexuality is coded even more explicitly as
dangerous and as linked to her power.
Clip Faith and Xander I See, I Want, I Take
When Xander, often the voice of simple human kindness in the show, comes to Faith
to talk to her about the accidental killing, Faith mocks his attempt.

Then, to

demonstrate his powerlessness, she flings him on her bed, telling him, I could do
anything I want to you right now and youd enjoy it. I could make you scream. I
could make you die, and in a rare scene approximating a female on male rape,
proceeds to choke him nearly to death before he is rescued. (3.15 Consequences)
The most explicit treatment of the connection between Faiths sexuality and
her villainy comes in the fourth season episode, Who Are You? (4.16), where she
switches bodies with Buffy. Faiths experiences in Buffys body reveal the shows
construction of non-normative sexuality as wrong and of normative sexuality as a
stabilising, healthy influence. The most telling example of this comes in Faiths
seduction of Buffys boyfriend, Riley. Unaware of the body-switch, Riley is confused
when Faith asks, What do you want to do to this body?, and encourages him to hurt
her, to try out every nasty little desire. Riley seems repulsed by her suggestions, and
instead shares with her the same ordinary sex he normally has with Buffy. This,
combined with his declaration of love, actually frightens Faith, and causes her to flee.
The episode goes on to suggest that Faiths brief experience of normative,
monogamous sexuality with Riley is one of the things that causes her to aid a church
full of people under attack by vampires instead of making a getaway in Buffys body.
Faiths non-normative sexuality is thus coded as a sign of her mental instability and
self-hatred, and only once she has experienced normative sexuality does she use her
power in a way of which the show approves. This pattern is further reinforced by the
8

Martin Zeller-Jacques
Delivered to the 2nd CISSGE Postgraduate Conference, on Sexuality, Textuality and
Image, University of Exeter, 12th of September 2008.
shows final series, in which Faith returns to Sunnydale to aid Buffy and her friends
and is rewarded for this appropriate use of power with a normative sexual
relationship with the High-School principal, Robin Wood.
In both of these texts, then, the figure of the girl villain acts as more than eyecandy for a scopophilic gaze. She is othered in relation to the normative sexual
practices prevalent at the time of each shows production. In the case of older texts,
such as Wonder Woman, this makes the girl villain a seductress, opposed by the
chaste virtue of the girl hero, while in more contemporary girl hero texts, the girl
villains sexuality is increasingly violent, promiscuous and uncontrolled, in opposition
to the serious-minded monogamy of the girl hero. Throughout the genre, the figure of
the girl villain helps to contain the transgressive potential of the power present in a
girl hero, who could otherwise do anything she chose.

Martin Zeller-Jacques
Delivered to the 2nd CISSGE Postgraduate Conference, on Sexuality, Textuality and
Image, University of Exeter, 12th of September 2008.
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Hopkins, S. Girl Heroes: The New Force in Popular Culture. Pluto Press: Anandale,
AUS. 2002
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1992.

University Press of

Robinson, L. S. Wonder Women: Feminisms and Superheroes. 2004. Routledge:

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