Fictional Friday :: 5 more women I’d love to invent an alternate canon for

5. Trudy Campbell (Alison Brie, Mad Men)
I think Trudy is the absolute cutest.  I fully recognize that we don’t really ever get to see a whole lot of Trudy’s personality; she exists largely to provide a happy family life that is a source of angst for perpetually dissatisfied Pete (Vincent Kartheiser).  But this is why I want something more for her: Trudy deserves a life that does not include and has never included Pete.  I’ve always believed this and it’s just getting worse: I want a world where she gets to be her own woman and hey, if she wants to have a husband and children, that’s her right, but I want her to have a husband who is not a jerk, not a perpetual sleaze, not Pete.  I want her to be happy, and though I don’t see Trudy and Pete’s marriage actually falling apart, I think season 5 showed that socially speaking, Pete is subconsciously attempting to turn into a dangerous shade of Don.  And Trudy does not deserve that.

4. Shilo Wallace (Alexa Vega, Repo! The Genetic Opera)
This is one of those situations where yes, I love her canon as a whole, but wow, babygirl has been dealt the absolute worst hand of life cards that can be.  Although Repo! is kind of a canon where every single character’s life is in one way or another (and probably more than one way) terrible, so I actually sort of want alt-canon for… well, some of them.  Shilo, though, I feel like any of her personal failings are because her life is utter crap and, you know, she’s been locked in a house for seventeen years, perpetually poisoned by her father, and people keep dying right in front of her, and essentially, she just needs a new life where nobody dies or poisons her and she gets to breathe fresh air and maybe kick some ass (literally or metaphorically) or something.

3. Magdalene “Blind Mag” DeFoe (Sarah Brightman, Repo! The Genetic Opera)
I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned before how irrationally attached I really am and always have been to Mag.  And her life?  Her life is also a pile of crap.  It was all oh yay friend!  Oh yay bionic eyes!  and then oh no dead friend.  Oh no bionic eyes = life-ruining contract with a man who is actually a huge bastard, wow, I will never be free again.  Oh no I guess all I can do is stab my bionic eyes out.  And that sucks.  Mag strikes me as a fairly decent woman who deserves to get to sing opera in a world where body parts are not routinely harvested under protection of the law.

2. Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams, Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes films, or Lara Pulver, Steven Moffat’s Sherlock)
BECAUSE ORIGINAL CANON IRENE WAS JUST FINE.  Original canon Irene was the woman who bested Sherlock, and that was that.  She could go on her merry and be awesome.  The Ritchie films’ Irene was sassy, but what was up with the love plot with Sherlock?  They were never romantically involved.  Also, she had the worst ending.  Such an insult to her talent.  And okay, I love BBC Irene.  I love the Irene who loves ladies and is a dominatrix and does her lipstick all bright red.  But wow, I do not like her ending either.  I like it even less, actually, because it turned into this hideous damsel in distress thing.  The one woman who almost bested Sherlock, had way too much sexual tension with him despite being sexually attracted to women, and then needed him to rescue her?  Gross.  I want a modern Irene who is allowed to be her own white knight for crying out loud.  

1. Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence, The Hunger Games)
Okay so I’m all for ladies leading action films.  I’m a big fan actually.  And I can generally deal with Katniss as a character.  But wow, I wish she got to live in a different world that didn’t force her to un-introvert and get wrapped up in dumb love triangles that she specifically said at the beginning that she didn’t want.  I want her to have a world where she’s allowed to be by herself when she wants and where she’s allowed to not have any romances if she wants and where she doesn’t have to save the increasingly ridiculous day all the time and where she is just allowed to be herself for goodness’ sake.

–your fangirl heroine.

Fictional Friday :: 6 more real life faces for more Disney princesses

The term “princess” being used loosely, and to define basically any Disney heroine.  (Anyway, the ones that aren’t properly royalty are often the most badass.  Mulan.  What.)

6. Alison Brie (Snow White, Snow White and the Seven Dwarves)

Much like how I imagine Reese Witherspoon can speak to mice, I imagine Alison Brie can in fact understand birdsong and whatnot.  She’s just the cutest ever.

5. Elle Fanning (Alice, Alice in Wonderland)

We wanted an Alice who was actually close to Alice-age.  Because Mia Wasikowska was a rad grown-up Alice, but Alice isn’t grown up in the cartoon.  (Not that most of our other casting choices aren’t grown up, but Alice is younger than the others, so it works.  Okay?  Also, Elle would just be a fantastic Alice.)

4. Jennifer Hudson (Tiana, The Princess and the Frog)

She’s a good fit.  She’s triumphed over professional adversities and stuff, like Tiana.  She didn’t win American Idol, but she kept at it, and then she won an Oscar.  So.

3. Liza Lapira (Mulan, Mulan)

So technically, she’s part-Chinse, part-Filipino, part-Spanish, but I think she’s adorable, and I love her, and I think she could be a super badass.

2. Moon Bloodgood (Pocahontas, Pocahontas)

A lot of Hollywood actresses have some Native American heritage.  But a lot of the are the ones who look like Cameron Diaz, who have some, but it doesn’t count for much.  I’ve only seen Moon Bloodgood in the most recent Terminator, really, but she does have the most awesome name of all time, so that counts for something.

1. Lara Pulver (Meg, Hercules)

Meg is my favorite.  Meg is my girl.  We’d originally discussed Maggie Siff as Meg, which I thought would have been equally brilliant, but my friend said “OH!  What about the girl who’s Irene on Sherlock?”  I hadn’t yet watched this season (and I’ve only watched the first episode, so don’t spoil me, I don’t have a good excuse, but I haven’t got around to the other two yet, I’m a busy girl) so I made a mental note.  Then I watched it.  And I went holy hot damn.  Irene is also my girl.  It makes perfect sense.  (And I didn’t realize until right now that Lara Pulver also played Sookie’s fairy godmother on True Blood, so that’s irrelevant, but my mind is still a little blown.)

–your fangirl heroine.