If I Were a Network Executive...

I recently watched Miss Representation, a documentary about how limited and disparaging portrayals of women in mainstream media hurt society. While I agree with most of the documentary, I do think it skips right over a number of amazing female characters both past and present (I started to list my favorites, but I think that’s a whole other post.) Obviously individual portrayals can’t make up for the overall patterns of representation, which tend to feature young, white, thin, able-bodied women playing out tired tropes. There is plenty of room for criticism there. But for me, personally, what I want even more than better female characters on my television, is explicitly feminist shows.

In the spirit of being part of the solution, I came up with three premises for feminist shows that I would watch the hell out of (but which probably need better titles):

The Clinic

The Premise: A show set in a Planned Parenthood-esque clinic located in a conservative town, following the lives of those who work there and those they help. A bit of a medical drama, it explores the many different types of services beyond abortion that such clinics provide, but also focuses on the deep and sometimes dangerous hostility people feel towards the clinic and its staff because they perform abortions.

The Characters: Main characters would include: the clinic’s doctor, who has been the target of increasingly serious threats, and whose marriage is disintegrating as her husband insists she stop performing abortions in order to protect their family; an idealistic sexual health counselor moving from a radical community to this small town, adjusting to culture where her kinky, bisexual, polyamorous lifestyle is not just unacceptable but unspeakable; an underage patient from a very religious family who becomes pregnant and wants to get an abortion secretly, but can’t because of parental notification laws; and a strongly anti-abortion receptionist who works at the clinic because she/he believes that the best way to prevent abortions is to support and empower women so their most pregnancies are wanted ones.

The Vote

The Premise: An ensemble show spanning the decades of the US Women’s Suffrage movement. Explores many of the controversies and milestones of the movement, including: the early partnership of women’s suffrage and abolitionism, and the schism that resulted when the 15th amendment promised suffrage regardless of race but not of gender; the tension between conservatives and radicals within the movement, as exemplified by Victoria Woodhull’s obscenity trial; Elizabeth Cady Stanton delivering the first address of a woman before Congress; Lucy Stone’s feminist marriage and fight to keep her last name; and the rise of the temperance movement.

The Characters: Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B Anthony, Victoria and Tennessee Woodhull, Lucy Stone, Sojourner Truth, and many others.

Fury

The Premise: A reimagining of the mythological Greek Furies, who were goddesses of vengeance. Here, Furies tend to be born and raised like normal humans, but as they attain adulthood they discover a magical power: when sufficiently outraged, they cry tears of blood and can painfully drain the life from their target. The show would follow a female police officer coming into her identity as a Fury and would explore questions such as: Is vengeance ever just? Is anger ever healthy? At what point do you go outside the law, when the law fails you? What does it mean for your relationships with others, to have this kind of power?

The Characters: The lead character would be a female police officer who works a difficult beat where she is often confronted with injustice, including police failing to protect domestic violence victims, attorneys failing to prosecute crimes against sex workers, transgendered women, and women of color. Her constant conflict would be between handling cases as an instrument of the law, or as a Fury. Another main character would be the officer’s niece, who was born male but comes out as transgender and must deal with the transition to womanhood at the same time as she is coming into her powers as a Fury. Other main characters could include Furies who seek inner peace or ignorance as a way to avoid activating their powers, or Furies who embrace their powers and seek vengeance with little hesitation.