Film This Chick Stuff! Part One: A Call for Aid

[pigmy wurm]

I think one of the issues is that female centered toys and shows tended to be both anti conflict and more focused with real life. You could make a movie using creepy crawlers as a premis (a mad scientist invents an ooze that can he can use to create mutants) but what would and easy bake oven movie be about? What would a cabbage patch kids movie be about?

While not strictly "pink ale" You could argue that The Smurphs movie sort of counts as it had more crossover appeal than GIJoe or transformers (not that I am happy about it being maid).I could see Fragile Rock fitting in a similar gender "nutrual zone."

 

[vid87]

My staples were TMNT and Power Rangers, so I wasn't much for the chick stuff. I did watch Sailor Moon for a while when it was on Toonami, and I thought Power Puff Girls was fun (even though the first time I saw it I was honestly convinced it was some kind of joke instead of an actual show), but for the most part I never really knew that much about girl-centered shows until many years later. That said, here are my thought the possibilities:

-There IS a live-action Barbie movie in development, but not much is being said.
http://www.comingsoon.net/news/movienews.php?id=59406

....more later

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

I don't think you're going to get too many girls in here saying their favourite "girly" toys and so forth. Why? Because you're asking kinda the wrong demographic. This website is a home for geek and gamer culture. They aren't the sort of people who played with Barbies at a young age regardless of gender.

 

[DayDark]

I used to buy toy soldiers and toy monsters, than I would clip them apart, and do transplants to make super mutants.

Today I'm studying biology...muhaHAHAHA!

 

[EmeraldGreen]

They already turned one of my favourite childhood toys into a media franchise. Littlest Pet Shop Pets. In the mid-90s, they were cutesy-kinda-realistic animal toys, with the gimmick that each had a "trick" or special function of some sort. Like a puppy with a magnetised nose, so that it could "hold" its magnetic bone. Or a pony that pawed the ground when you stroked its neck. There was a TV show back then, too, and I think some books? but I was only interested in the toys. Anyway, the franchise was killed off at some point - late 90s, early 00s? - but a few years ago it was relaunched. Now the toys are funny-looking bobble-head creatures, and they have cutesy video games and board games and I don't know what and oops, I just vomited all over my keyboard. As far as I know, there's no Littlest Pet Shop movie, but if/when there is, I will have nothing to do with it.

Honestly, I don't think I'd have any interest in a movie based on any of the girly toys/books/TV shows I used to watch as a kid, because they were all pretty stup-- actually, a movie based on the Trixie Belden books might be okay. Horses, mysteries, good-looking young people, frequent holidays (it's so nice having a best friend whose parents are richer than Croesus and who is spoilt rotten). A bit of romance, but never getting in the way of having adventures. I don't expect a movie based on Trixie's exploits would be good, but it might be entertaining. I'd see it out of curiosity, anyway...

 

[tl333s]

Holy crap, Small Wonder, I remember that.

Jem was also the first thing to pop into my mind. I never actually watched it, being a boy and all, but I always saw the end credits because it was on before something I did watch. It's an outstandingly 80's property, and it had a catchy as hell theme song. Plus, I really like movies about bands, and I might very well be willing to see it (without my girlfriend, even!) if someone did pick it up.

 

[theamazingbean]

(The big exception here is anime/manga fandom, which is quite frankly light-years ahead of any other fandom subculture in terms of its ability to both welcome and absorb fans both across racial/gender and sexual orientation lines.)

*Smiles beamingly, goes back to reading yaoi.*

Sorry I can't give any help for girls toys.

 

[Shadow_Kid]

Gumby and Pokey hands down.
i work at a pet store and we sell more gumby and pokey dog toys than any other kinds of toys
No joke.
http://www.entirelypets.com/gumbypokey6.html

and everyone else who saw them nostalgia'd so hard.

 

[pixiejedi]

I loved The little mermaid as a kid and Jem, the Last Unicorn, Rainbow Brite and Raggedy Ann and Andy. I guess I was pretty girly but also played video games and with my brothers X-men. Ultimately I can't help but push for a REAL Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie. One without the company influence. I know it was 90's but I started at the first episode in 5th grade and it totally changed my life (I even got a klagdah tattoo on my back to commemorate it) that or maybe a retool of Labrinth, good times.

 

[JunebugJuJuBee]

Honestly? With the exception of She-ra, girl toys and shows were shit. My Little Pony could be okay and a kirby movie aimed at younger girls/children (with Miyazaki the helm and gibli doing animation shut up a girl can dream) is something I would push for as a hollywood exec. As far as girl geek stuff? Look no further than girl's books.

If they were to make anything for girls that would be viewed as empowering and could be turned into an all out nostalgia fueled franchise, hello American Girl. http://store.americangirl.com/agshop/static/home.jsp

This was huge when I was growing up. The premise: girls throughout history (Victorian era/prairie settler era/WW1 etc) going through problems and trials, using their wit and unique strengths to pull through. Each girl had multiple books and dolls, along with tons of clothes and accessories. There are even stores that let you customize your dolls to a finite degree. FYI, Kirsten was my favorite

The Eloise books have already been made into a movie so that's off. Hmm...

Actually, the more I think about it, the more I want to see a movie franchise made from these. There's a girl for every ethnicity and tons of culture and history to be gleaned and believe me, girls still geek out of these dolls.

If I come up with more I'll be sure to post it.

 

[omegawyrm]

I've heard that Gail Simone's Birds of Prey comics are pretty popular among women. Not exactly nostalgic as it's a pretty recent comic, but they really are quite excellent. A few of the story arcs don't even have to be passed off as super-hero stories, though if you lose too many of the depth and fantastical elements of the characters backstories, the stories could lose some of their charm.

Same goes if they could just adapt one of her Wonder Woman stories, but fat chance of that.

Also, Ouran High School Host Club is an excellent comedy anime aimed at women and it probably wouldn't be hard at all to adapt into a movie or live action series. Though of course, when we're talking about these foreign properties, the licensing issues would probably be too ridiculous for anyone to even think about releasing an American adaptation.

 

[Allison Chainz]

Honestly? With the exception of She-ra, girl toys and shows were shit. My Little Pony could be okay and a kirby movie aimed at younger girls/children (with Miyazaki the helm and gibli doing animation shut up a girl can dream) is something I would push for as a hollywood exec. As far as girl geek stuff? Look no further than girl's books.

If they were to make anything for girls that would be viewed as empowering and could be turned into an all out nostalgia fueled franchise, hello American Girl. http://store.americangirl.com/agshop/static/home.jsp

This was huge when I was growing up. The premise: girls throughout history (Victorian era/prairie settler era/WW1 etc) going through problems and trials, using their wit and unique strengths to pull through. Each girl had multiple books and dolls, along with tons of clothes and accessories. There are even stores that let you customize your dolls to a finite degree. FYI, Kirsten was my favorite

The Eloise books have already been made into a movie so that's off. Hmm...

Actually, the more I think about it, the more I want to see a movie franchise made from these. There's a girl for every ethnicity and tons of culture and history to be gleaned and believe me, girls still geek out of these dolls.

If I come up with more I'll be sure to post it.

I think this might be the best idea yet.

Oh, and for the love of all that is good and holy please, please, please don't use Josie and the Pussycats as an example for anything that might be made in the future. That movie was so horrible and an example of how to trash an IP and waste your license. Besides, just because it's mainly a comedy won't make it necessarily any less gender aimed. I don't think anyone is going to accuse Sex and the City 2 of being gender neutral. Likewise, something like Due Date seems much more aimed at men.

 

[Dangerious P. Cats]

As much as I agree with the principle it's going to be difficult since you're running up against a few really major stummbling blocks from the get go. First off Gril's toys rarely translate to narrative, and secondly there are few if any girl francises from the golden age of he-man and thunder cats that still enjoyed on a minor level.

First off the problem is that to do with a girl's show what was done recently with G.I.Joe and Transformers you're not so much looking for a t.v series as a francise. I suspect part of the reason thinking of subjects is so difficult is that it's rarer to find something for girls where they played with the toys, watched the T.V show and read the comic in the way you get with Transformers, G.I Joe, He-Man and numourious others. You get popular t.v shows and popular toys, but never both. I mean how many people remember the various efforts at a Barbie cartoon, and who's trying ever so hard to forget? If you want something with the same notelgia value you're going to be more lenient on how you define it. Popular books are probably a better start since they overcome the next major problem;

Girl's toy rarely have an obvious narrative. Children are effectivly playing roles with the toys they like. Boys are playing soldier and girls are play mother. O.K this is not universily true, boys sometimes play construction worker and girls play fashionable teenage girl, but during the period we're looking at it was still mostly true. The problem with this (well out of the many problems with) is that only boy's toys have an intrinsice narrative. To be a soldier you need a conflict, to have a conflict you need at least two sides and reason for them to fight, which is pretty much the basis of a story. To be fashion adept teen or a mother you need either clothing or a child, neither of which have stories intrinsically linked to them. This makes it harder to adapt girl's toys period, and will often make the adaptation more ham handed or at least foriegn to the initial toy line. Meaning that there's all the more reason why girls' don't get franchises.

The other problem is the demografic. While male nerds carry on the loves of their childhood into adult life, she geeks tend not to. She geeks tend to switch over to either traditionally male interests, or feminaised versions of them as they reach adolesance, meaning that you don't have the same nostelgia factor. Finding something that carries the same weight is going to be difficult. Geek culture is simply devided into things boys like, and things both genders can enjoy.

To my mind the best canidate is She Ra. Outside of being well within geek territory it's one of the few things that works as a full franchise that was aimed primarily at girls. I really wish that the early 2000's he man effort had lasted long enough to include She Ra (though it would have been odd since they were building up Hordak as this big powerful evil that He Man might not be able to defeat, if She Ra regually beat hm would that make her more powerful?). Also addapt the Tamora Pierce books, prefferably by peter Jackson. Seriously, nearly all female roleplayers and re-enactors (at least re-enactmors into the more geey activies such as combat) were all massive Tamora Pierce fans. An adaptation would be gold plated candy laced with crack for female geeks.

 

[VanityGirl]

Honestly, there's no girl toy I'd want made into a movie. Guys had transformers and the ninja turtles, both of which made great shows or great movies.

I would NEVER want to see a live action Barbie movie or anything of the sort.

You know, the time to make a full length Wonder Woman movie is NOW! I know they plan on making a TV show out of it, but in my opinion, it's not the best move.
Women are forced to sit through movies with strong male characters constantly saving the weak female characters, so a movie with a strong woman would be a very nice change of pace for women.

And a Sailor Moon movie would be awesome, but if it ends up like the Dragon Ball Z movie, I may stab someone. I think it may not make a good live action movie since Hollywood can't seem to do justice to anime shows.

However, a think Totally Spies! could make a good movie. The show is pretty corny and silly, but it could translate into a goofy movie

You know what a really good idea would be? Make another Kill Bill-esque movie.
Kill Bill featured a strong, badass woman character and she kicked the living crap out of everyone that got in her way.
This was a movie that girls with strong stomachs (because of the gore) and guys could enjoy.

 

[Rational-Delirium]

I remember getting the obligatory Barbie for Christmases and Birthdays when I was younger from people who assumed what I liked based on my gender. Eventually I had a large collection of them, and without exception they would all end up headless, naked and ignored a corner of the basement. Sure, they'd sometimes get SOME play time, but usually these sessions were short-lived, because in my opinion, you couldn't really do anything interesting with them. Barbies were static.

On the other hand, my brothers had these G.I.Joe knockoffs, and I would play with these all the time, climbing trees with them and making them survive the evils of the jungle in my backyard. These toys were implicitly dynamic, looking like they were able to solve problems, even ones that they started themselves. Compare this to Barbie, who looked like she could barely survive a clogged toilet. She's probably have to get Ken to fix it for her, and even then, he's such a wuss that he'd have to wash his hands for a good ten minutes afterwards.

This is the difference between boy's and girl's toys: are they static or dynamic? It's been said before, but I'll reiterate that girl's toys have a sense of blank-slatedness around them, and a lack of real conflict. Boy's toys don't have that problem.

Now, as far as cartoon and such, I was born in 1990, and can really only relate to 90's shows. Powerpuff girls were great, because they kicked butt. Sailor Moon kind of embarassed me, for unknown reasons. I secretly really liked watching Yu-Gi-Oh, Digimon and Pokemon with my brothers - though you'd never get me to admit it at the time. But most 'girly' shows would make me cringe and change the channel, because deep inside I felt that they were mocking me, telling me what I was supposed to feel and value.

 

[Brutal Peanut]

-Wall of Text-

I always liked boys toys the best, but I wasn't really allowed to play with them. I went to a Catholic pre-school, and spent eight years in a Christian school after that. Anything I wanted to do, that wasn't something a little girl would do, I was 'corrected' by being lectured, and thought of as strange by faculty, and other little girls for having so many friends who were boys and wanting to play football. Rather then have snide, vicious, little girls for friends, who seemed to make fun of you more then they actually played with you. Of course, the term 'lesbian' was thrown around (when they always think they are out of ear-shot), but I wasn't attracted to girls and I didn't grow up attracted to them either, I just didn't want to be treated like all the rest of them, because I didn't have the same interests.

It was a constant conflict in the way I grew up. I'm my Father's only child, and he raised me with AC/DC, "girls don't cry, they wear combat boots", lets watch sports, shoot this gun, do you want a sip of my beer?, lets play video games, mentality. My Mother was always trying to beat that away with dresses, mary-janes, pop-music, 'plucking and waxing is fun' (shudder),Barbie, and shopping trips. And you know which one was/is way more fun? MY DAD'S! Derp.

Girls toys were forced on me, and I had them and I eventually played with them, because well, what else did I have? But mostly it was dumbed down mimicking of what I was told girls are supposed to do AND enjoy: Shopping, "Do you think that hot guy will ask me out?" stuff, it didn't really spark anything creative. I usually just hung out with imaginary friends I conjured instead. My Mother forced me to mature. When she thought I was too old for something, she'd simply swoop into my room when I was at school, put everything she thought I was too old for in a box, and give it away. I'd come home to a cleaned out room, where only a few stuffed animals survived. Then again, she was also the type of person to make me fold my pants over and over again until I got it right.


Personal opinion: The pink aisle is not imaginative. It's all about materialism, having and caring for babies,play kitchens, and shiny diamond-like baubles. Honestly (yeah, it's all coming to a close. Sigh with relief), girls toys don't make great movies, and they already make movies (animated and live-action) about all of the items intended for girls anyway. They may not be huge movies (or blockbuster), but they are there. There is nothing memorable, or worth a huge production where 'girls' toys are concerned.

 

[kementari]

As a guy, I can say proudly the the Ghostbusters and TMNTs were staples of my childhood fiction diet. I know of no adult girl who will so proudly laud Gem. ..... In short, chicks (on the mass) either don't want the pink aisle revisited or are utterly apathetic towards it.

I don't think you have probably talked to a whole lot of girls about this subject. Plenty of us fondly (and proudly) remember our "pink aisle" cartoons (and it's Jem and the Holograms, by the way).

However (and I'll be discussing this in more detail in an email to you, MovieBob), this discussion is overlooking an uncomfortable fact that is no less true for being uncomfortable: "Pink aisle" shows in the 80s and 90s had less funding, lower attention to quality, and less interesting writing than their male-oriented counterparts.

I'm gonna blow your mind here. Are you ready?

The gender crossover we're all aware of - girls eagerly sitting down in front of Transformers or G.I. Joe - as well as the one we know didn't happen - little boys adoring My Little Pony (pre-FiM, hush) or Rainbow Brite - didn't occur because of cultural stereotypes telling girls it was okay to be boyish but not allowing boys to be girlish. It happened because the girls' shows were crappy, and discerning members of both genders realized it.

Do I go back and watch my copies of the 1985 run of My Little Pony? Sure, when I'm babysitting or in a nostalgic mood, yeah, I do. But would I ever, for even a minute, consider the show to be even remotely in the same ballpark as G.I. Joe? Sorry, no. And short of a complete visionary revamp (the likes of which none of the "boy aisle" movies have had to endure), I can't imagine a single one of those intellectual properties making a good movie.

 

[Anacortian]

As a guy, I can say proudly the the Ghostbusters and TMNTs were staples of my childhood fiction diet. I know of no adult girl who will so proudly laud Gem. ..... In short, chicks (on the mass) either don't want the pink aisle revisited or are utterly apathetic towards it.

I don't think you have probably talked to a whole lot of girls about this subject. Plenty of us fondly (and proudly) remember our "pink aisle" cartoons (and it's Jem and the Holograms, by the way).

However (and I'll be discussing this in more detail in an email to you, MovieBob), this discussion is overlooking an uncomfortable fact that is no less true for being uncomfortable: "Pink aisle" shows in the 80s and 90s had less funding, lower attention to quality, and less interesting writing than their male-oriented counterparts.

I'm gonna blow your mind here. Are you ready?

The gender crossover we're all aware of - girls eagerly sitting down in front of Transformers or G.I. Joe - as well as the one we know didn't happen - little boys adoring My Little Pony (pre-FiM, hush) or Rainbow Brite - didn't occur because of cultural stereotypes telling girls it was okay to be boyish but not allowing boys to be girlish. It happened because the girls' shows were crappy, and discerning members of both genders realized it.

Do I go back and watch my copies of the 1985 run of My Little Pony? Sure, when I'm babysitting or in a nostalgic mood, yeah, I do. But would I ever, for even a minute, consider the show to be even remotely in the same ballpark as G.I. Joe? Sorry, no. And short of a complete visionary revamp (the likes of which none of the "boy aisle" movies have had to endure), I can't imagine a single one of those intellectual properties making a good movie.

I understand that you were attempting to refute me, but I think you just supported my position.

...thanks.

 

[kementari]

I understand that you were attempting to refute me, but I think you just supported my position.

...thanks.

Nope. The only thing I was refuting was the idea that girls are somehow embarrassed of what they watched as kids. The rest of the post was directed at MB.

 

[MB202]

I only read the first line. That's all I really wanted to read.

If you dont' do research for your shows you're only going to piss more people off that way, and you'll end up losing respect in some areas. Not to mention, it makes me feel bad for believing you and supporting you.

Maybe you should at least read the second line. The whole point is when you work in a certain field long enough, you generally don't have to. I'm sure if an auto mechanic with years of experience started talking to you about cars, you wouldn't complain about him not having researched what he was saying. Bob's recognizing that he lacks knowledge in this area and is asking for others' experience and opinions.

Wait a moment, that is a form of research.

I bring that up because sometimes in his videos, especially his Game Overthinker videos which are much longer and all about looking into details, people keep picking out things wrong with his arguments, and I'm wondering if he knew about that stuff and just chose not to mention it or genuinely didn't know about it. Because if he did know about it and didn't mention it, it might be for the sake of proving his own argument, which is kind of cheap, really...