Being Geek Chic is a blog about one woman navigating the male-dominated industries of production and tech. It's written by Elizabeth Giorgi, Founder, CEO and Director of Mighteor - one of the world's first internet video production companies. Learn more about Mighteor here.
I started this blog when I still felt like a girl. It was five years ago and despite having a lot of grown up things: a respectable job, a handsome grown man for a partner, a regularly operational vehicle and a healthy collection of high heels. For some baffling reason, I had this vision in my mind that one day I would feel like the woman in Weird Science, who somehow oozes femininity and strength and self-awareness without fear. It was only in the last year or so that I realized that being a woman wasn’t a feeling or an age or an object or even an identifiable trait. It is a decision.
Here’s what I mean. Being a girl is just about the hardest thing a living creature can be on the planet. Short of an endangered species or a blade of grass, the dangers to your life and your soul are constant. You’re constantly being projected on by the world. Rarely do we hear messages that say: “You! You get to decide who you are. You get to decide what happens to you.” This is especially prevalent in other places in the world, but it’s present here in subversive, sick ways that are hard to ignore or forget.
There are literally thousands of ways we could break this down: rape culture, misogyny, unequal pay, the impossible beauty standards, the Welfare system - pick a problem and it doesn’t matter how old you are - the little girl you were at 6 or 11 or 14 was standing in a minefield of dangerous emotional time bombs before she even got her period.
And so feeling “grown up” is impossible. By the time you are objectively old enough to be considered a woman, you’re so beaten down by the world’s expectations that you almost don’t want to be one. At least, that’s what happened to me. Until I started to redefine what being a woman meant to me.
So I started compiling a list of quotes that remind me that being a woman is a choice we make every day. It’s sort of like how Olivia Pope wakes up every morning and chooses to be a warrior. Same idea. Wake up tomorrow and say to yourself: I am a woman. I choose this. And it’s happening on my terms.
“I’m tough, I’m ambitious, and I know exactly what I want. If that makes me a bitch, okay.” - Madonna
“The thing women have yet to learn is nobody gives you power. You just take it.” - Roseanne Barr
“We still think of a powerful man as a born leader and a powerful woman as an anomaly.” - Margaret Atwood
“Bitches get stuff done.” - Tina Fey
“Because I am a woman, I must make unusual efforts to succeed. If I fail, no one will say, “She doesn’t have what it takes.” They will say, “Women don’t have what it takes.” - Clare Boothe Luce
“People think at the end of the day that a man is the only answer [to fulfillment]. Actually a job is better for me.” - Princess Diana
“I’ve yet to be on a campus where most women weren’t worrying about some aspect of combining marriage, children, and a career. I’ve yet to find one where many men were worrying about the same thing.” - Gloria Steinem
“I can’t think of any better representation of beauty than someone who is unafraid to be herself.” - Emma Stone
“When you love and accept yourself, when you know who really cares about you, and when you learn from your mistakes, then you stop caring about what people who don’t know you think.” - Beyonce
““What’s the worst possible thing you can call a woman? Don’t hold back, now.
You’re probably thinking of words like slut, whore, bitch, cunt (I told you not to hold back!), skank. Okay, now, what are the worst things you can call a guy? Fag, girl, bitch, pussy. I’ve even heard the term “mangina.” Notice anything? The worst thing you can call a girl is a girl. The worst thing you can call a guy is a girl. Being a woman is the ultimate insult. Now tell me that’s not royally fucked up.” - Jessica Valenti
I think we can all agree on this one thing: Women on television are getting better. Some shows are making crazy brilliant strides towards progress: see Orphan Black, Agent Carter, Orange is the New Black - name your favorite here. Sure, there are plenty of others that are just stuck in the past, but the fact is that there has never really been a better time to be a woman in television.
So colored me surprised that I’m saying this: It’s time for more women on Elementary. The foundational change of John to Joan Watson was a brilliant start that firmly cemented the show as a forerunner in challenging gender and relationships between men and women. It’s still doing that too, by the way.
The truth is that Elementary’s real value in the canonical adaption sphere is that it has systematically challenged the role of women in Sherlock Holmes’s world. Women largely don’t factor as anything other than victims or daughters or wives in the original stories, with rare exception. But on this show, we get a veritable sampler platter of good women, bad women and somewhere in the middle women all solving crimes, committing them, being central to them and occasionally, yes, as victims. The writers have never been afraid to talk about the gender of their characters and what that means for virtually every part of their lives. Whether that is their work, their relationships, their sex lives, their hobbies or even their approaches to solving a problem. This honesty means we don’t get women who are stereotypes, we as viewers are treated to women who represent real people, which is all we can truly ask for in storytelling. MORE. REAL. WOMEN. PLEASE.
This observation is both self-serving and built out of a real desire to see a show that is usually pretty great and occasionally mind-blowingly good to serve the things that make it the latter. As we slide out of season 3, I’ve noticed something incredibly important: when the women of Elementary serve more prominently to the story, the stories are better.
Season 1 we spent so much time getting to know Joan as Joan that it was impossible not to fall in love with her. She was a thought out, deep, and meaningful character, so adjusting to her point of view from time to time felt natural. I should say, not just for women, either. So many people will argue pointlessly that men don’t want to see a women’s perspective on screen. I’d point to Joan Watson for proof that this argument is void.
Just as we started to get used to her dynamic with Sherlock, we were introduced to Natalie Dormer’s take on Irene Adler. This ending arc was powerful, beautiful and emotional and it was largely because of Dormer’s deft and smart handling of her double agent status. The emotional resonance comes from Sherlock’s reaction to her and discovering new things about their relationship. When “the woman” is “the one” - in all its possible Holmesian iterations, it’s a lot of fun for viewers. Also, Natalie Dormer is just a genius, so there’s that going for you.
Arguably, season 2 was weak. As much as I loved Rhys Ifans as Sherlock’s brother, his in and out relationship with Joan just felt like an unbelievable distraction. And it didn’t serve the Joan we got to know in Season 1. Beyond that, it didn’t create many opportunities for Holmes to be more than an awkward bystander in a relationship that he wasn’t all that excited about. I’m just going to say it: Season 2 was weaker than Seasons 1 and 3.
What made Season 3 excitingly unmissable? Miss Kitty Winter, that’s what. Her story, again, brings out a new dimension in Holmes and draws us closer to him as a man. Add in Joan’s personal struggles to work in a new system and suddenly this is a story about power, weakness, growth and demons. That mix is undeniable, especially as we get closer to understanding Kitty’s past and her quest to find the man who harmed her. Her storyline did feel like it came to a natural close at the mid-point of season 3, but her departure has left me wanting ever since. Not necessarily for Kitty’s return, but for this sense of progress, growth and challenge.
Which brings me to the point, it’s time for another amazing woman to get a chance to tell her story. Mrs. Hudson is the obvious choice. After all, we already know that she is transgender, which seems full of potential and beauty and awesomeness. But just in case, here are a few more suggestions.
Characters Elementary Should Consider Bringing to the Show:
- Mrs. Neville St. Clair: Don’t mistake this woman as just some dude’s wife. She is the instigator of basically all the madness in The Man With the Twisted Lip.
- Beryl Stapleton: The Hound of the Baskervilles is one of the most adapted stories from the Holmes Canon, which is why Beryl is one of the most common characters we see in screen adaptations. She’s played differently nearly every time, sometimes helping Holmes, sometimes deliberately getting in the way. Either way, she’s got plenty of potential.
- Sergeant Sally Donovan: Fans of BBC’s Sherlock will recognize this name. It’s the Scotland Yard cop who often distrusts everything Sherlock has to say, in large part because of how he handles himself, not necessarily because of his lack of insight. On Elementary, we rarely see cops challenging Holmes. It might be a nice time to bring a new character like Sally to the plot.
- Baker Street Irregulars: In Elementary, they regularly use Irregulars to solve cases, but surprisingly not often in their most common form: as street children. In the original stories, these homeless kids often served as Holmes’s eyes and ears in dark alleys, so why not bring a few female youths to the show?
For those that aren’t aware, I’ve been reviewing Elementary for years for the Baker Street Babes, a fantastic organization for all the ladies of the Holmesian fandom. You can read those reviews here.
Editor’s Note: This is a RERUN from the Being Geek Chic archives. I’m taking a bit of a break this week, so please enjoy these classics from the BGC archives while I’m away.
I just finished watching the Special Features on the new Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, part 2 BluRay and I’m now obsessed with an extra behind the scenes feature called, “The Women of Harry Potter.”
Here are some of the best quotes:
“What’s interesting about the wizarding world is when you take physical strength out of the equation a woman can fight just the same as a man can fight, a woman can do magic just as well as a man can do magic.” - Jo Rowling
On the incredible character, Molly Weasley: “It comes from her womb, that feeling of defense, defending her child, because she’s already lost one. So it’s the mother, the lion, the female lion defending her babies, so it’s unstoppable. … I doubt that would have taken place had it been a man writing it.” - Julie Walters
True story: I really like Pink.
Truly. It’s not a sarcastic statement and I’m not even trying to be funny. I genuinely think she kicks ass.
There’s nothing more judgy and shitty than when you’re sitting in the bar and a song comes on that you just love so you begin to hum, maybe even belt out the lyrics karaoke style, until, you realize that your social circle doesn’t approve of certain things, AKA pop music. Suddenly, you have to watch just how earnestly you sing lest you become the target of unkind chuckles.
We’re all drawn to different things for different reasons. With music, it may be a lyric or a guitar riff. It’s not necessarily something you can explain in a blog post. For me, that’s always what drew my heart to geek culture in the first place.
And this applies to a lot of shit. It isn’t just music.
I have been acting like a superior jerk about Fifty Shades of Grey. I will wholeheartedly admit that now. There’s really no good reason for it. In my mind, I’ve justified it because “there’s other great books to read,” but just because it’s not my taste doesn’t mean it isn’t helping someone else. I call a great book, “literary therapy,” and perhaps the Grey books are just a different variety. Whatever your prescription, right?
But let me bring this back to music. If you were to run through the tunes on my iPhone, you’d find a bizarre mix of people and taste. Beyonce next to Bob Dylan. Vince Guaraldi next to The White Stripes. One area of life where my obsessive mind has a wider starting point is music. My reading tastes, movie preferences and design leanings can be so narrow. It’s probably a positive sign that my mind is a bit broader in an area or two.
And come on, you have to admit when you’re driving home from work and you hear that refrain… “I’ve had a shit day…” it all feels better.
A movie written by women starring two women about women running their own business? And that business happens to be a naughty, dirty phone sex line? Yeah, hilarity is all over that.
Incredibly, the two make a cocktail of awesome for this giveaway.
For a Good Time, Call… is written by Lauren Anne Miller and Katie Naylon and chronicles Lauren’s real life experience running a phone sex line out of her college dorm room. In this fictional take, two ladies are forced to move in together and when they can’t pay the bills, well, they turn to the oldest trade in the world. Yeah, sort of. Via telly. Well, you know.
Here’s the trailer:
The movie is out in select theaters across the U S of A, so go look for it now. In the meantime, let’s win a prize.
For a Good Time, Call Prize pack includes:
So what do you have to do to win? It’s simple:
You must Tweet by this Friday, September 7th. The contest closes Friday, September 7th, 10AM CST. Winner will be announced Friday, September 7th in Being Geek Chic’s This Week in Geek wrap-up.
NOTE: THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.
Love it!
*The fine print: I was not compensated to run this giveaway. All prizing and samples provided by the publicity team from the movie. The total value of the prize pack is $50. The giveaway also includes the cost of shipping to one address in the continental United States via the United States Postal Service. Only open to US readers. The views expressed here are my own and are not those of Focus Features, staff, actors, etc. or their publicists. Please follow the rules and be kind to one another.
