8 Simple Rules for Surviving Sci-fi
Girls have a rough time in sci-fi. It’s bad enough that they aren’t taken seriously until they shave their heads, but it seems like only the most virtuous and honorable get to live. Girls who bend societal standards get knocked off. The next time you find yourself stuck in a sci-fi situation, here are Pink Raygun’s Eight Simple Rules for surviving through the closing credits.
1. Keep your panties on.
Girls who have sex get killed, that’s all there is to it. On Battlestar Galactica, Cat had sex with her ex, then died of radiation poisoning. Starbuck slept with everyone and now she’s dead. Ellen Ripley of the Alien films made it through two movies with hardly a bruise. In Alien 3, it’s implied that she had sex with one of the prisoners, and what happens? She dies.
On Lost, Shannon had sex with Sayid and Ana-Lucia had sex with Sawyer. Are they in the credits anymore? No. Following that logic, Kate is next to go.
2. Get married.
However, you can have sex within a marriage. Callie and Dualla of BSG have both been under the gun and threatened: Dualla in a hostage situation on Cloud Nine, Callie at the hands of a crazed officer on Kobol and at the hands of Admiral Adama in a recent episode. But, they’re nice married girls, so they get to live.
3. If you get married, don’t sleep around.
Starbuck was married to Sam, but she cheated with Apollo. Sam said there were others, too. Dualla has been a good, faithful wife and she survived her encounter with the racist doctor.
4. Have a baby.
Because in sci-fi, a reproductive woman is a useful woman. Not only did Callie have multiple opportunities to get shot, she got thrown into open space without a suit or a helmet or anything. But, she’s a mommy so she doesn’t have to freeze to death. She gets to have a full recovery and nag her husband about the privileged ruling class.
5. Stay away from the Enterprise and her captains.
At the very least stay away from James T. Kirk and William Riker. You’ll pick up space syphilis or something from either one of them.
6. Don’t tell lies or be a sneaky bitch.Padme Amidala was married and pregnant, but she kept her marriage to Anakin a secret. Padme had to die. On Lost, Libby wasn’t honest with Hurley about how she knew him. Libby had to die.
7. Try to act like a lady. And that includes keeping your panties on.
Don’t smoke cigars, don’t get drunk, don’t cut your hair too short. If possible, wear a skirt. Ripley was a survivor until she shaved her head. Ana-Lucia didn’t act like a lady, and neither did Starbuck.
President Roslin survived terminal cancer. She was standing in front of a row of Cylon Centurians ready to execute her. How is she still alive? Because she doesn’t look or act mannish. She wears skirts, has long hair, doesn’t sleep around. The naughtiest thing she does is flirt with Admiral Adama.
8. Be written by Joss Whedon
The women from Firefly and Serenity broke all of these rules and managed to live. Inara is a sex worker. Zoe could kick Starbuck’s ass. Kaylee works with criminals. And yet they were all alive at the end of Serenity.
It looks like the best way to survive sci-fi is to be this woman:
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Yup. Science fiction – particularly tv – is full of steretypical women. Most of them are poorly characterised and probably written by unwitting women haters. As mentioned above, the exception to that rule is Joss Whedon (yay!). Though James Cameron also does a strong women – note that Ripley in the second Aliens movie was tough and also survived the film, despite mothering Newt and flirting with Hicks. Too bad the misogynistic hacks got their claws into her in Alien 3.
One of my favourite characters in sci-fi is Sarah Connor, from the Terminator. She was one tough momma. She slept with some dude, had a baby and didn’t die! Well, eventually from natural causes but I try to blot that last movie out of my mind.
Wait, didn’t the Fremen priestess die, also?
I think your comments have some merit. Look at Tasha. She acted tough like a man and slept with Data, and she died for nothing. Deanna wore a skirt and said obvious things like, “Our enemy is hiding something, Captain.” (No kidding – remember the whole ENEMY thing???) And she hung around FOREVER!!
Deanna hung around forever, and it only took twelve years or so for her to get Riker to marry her, breaking Worf’s little Klingon heart. I remember the skirt gave way to that weird purpleish unitard thing that gave her camel toe for seven years.
Farscape~
Chiana: Ho. Lived
Aeryn: Couple of minor crushes, then true love. Lived
Zhaan: Classy lady. Died
Sikozu: Affair w/ Scorpi (ew). Lived
Actually Sikozu died in the movie towards the end.
Also Starbuck might still be alive. But other than that good points.
8 Simple Rules was written back in early March of 2007 – at the time, Starbuck was blowed up real good.
Another exception: Sam Carter from Stargate. Short hair, military, good fighter, has had pre-marital sex without babies. She’s sexy. She’s smart. She’s independent. She’s even the only one of the original SG-1 team to never have been married. Yet she’s died less often than the rest of them.
Lost isn’t scifi
Remember the babe with the ultra short skirt in Lexx? Don’t remember her name but she was ultra sexy and lasted long enough!
You forgot the women on Babylon 5: Delenn even survived her husband and Lockley got a whole station under her command. And even Ivanova had the cool feature to get revived by her admirer
I love this comment from Amy:
“Yet she’s died less often than the rest of them.”
Says it all about Sci-Fi really, I mean how can you die less often than someone else! lol
Thumbs up all round; Sci-Fi rocks
lol actually its easy to die less often than someone else… however it -is- hard to die more than once which is what I think you were implying
First rule of SciFi is if you have sex then you die..
Everybody knows this..
It must be something from our Id, that sex and death are interwoven or sex and violence then death..
Good sex is in a way a form of death isn’t it don’t we only lose ourselves and meld into one another at the moment of perfect orgasm..
It’s also got something to do with the sex/guilt imprinted on us by society for now hundreds of years…
I never comment about stuff like this, but …
Don’t you people read?
Try “Cordelia’s Honor” by Lois McMaster-Bujold (or any of the rest of the Vorkosigan series.
Or maybe the “Honor Harrington” series by David Weber probably more than a dozen books about a female space captain, but way more realistic than Kirk.
Cordelia Naismith got married and had a baby (deformed though he was). She gets to live.
What about Leeloo from “The Fifth Element”? She got naked, had sex with Corbin Dallas, had short hair, kicked major ass, and still lived till the end!
I don’t remember the Leeloo sex bit, but really, this is like conjugating verbs in French. There’s always a wacky exception.
Having a woman or alien female in a science fiction novel, movie or TV program can be a tricky thing these days. Still, I found it interesting and somewhat challenging to have an alien female as the principal alien character in my own novel.
I felt that having a female protagonist who is about to plunge her entire planet into civil war over her father’s murder offers a refreshingly different perspective in science fiction. Her ferce battle with her planet’s most powerful corporation is raising a lot of interest in various sci-fi discussion forums.
Of course, being a male author writing about a female protagonist has its challenges as well. Fortunately, my wife gave me a lot of tips on this particularly aspect.
I think a lot of this comes from a sub-conscious place. I doubt many writers are sitting at their desks, rubbing their hands together thinking, “Hmmmm. I have to kill her for not adhering to the current archaic stereotypes regarding women! HAHAHAHAHAHA!”
But, on a societal level, people still have a problem with women who aren’t married or don’t have (or want) kids or are somehow visibly “unfeminine”. So, that will leak over into this area.
I love #8 that is great!!
I realize I’m jumping in here really late (darn interlinking of articles), but…
@Amy: “Yet [Carter]’s died less often than the rest of them.”
Well, that’s not hard, considering that Daniel has died almost as many times as Kenny from South Park. And she may not have been killed much, but take a look at the tally of her lovers and admirers who have died horribly: Jonas Hanson, Martouf/Lantash, Narim, Orlin (twice), Joe Faxon, Fifth, even Jack O’Neill in at least two alternate realities. The only men to have survived her “black widow” curse are Doctors McKay and Felger (who didn’t really have a chance with her, not being cool enough), Agent Barrett (who doesn’t have a chance because the writers keep implying that she’s still mooning over O’Neill — blech), and Pete Shanahan (who ran away because he saw she was still mooning over O’Neill — still blech).
Don’t get me wrong. There are a lot of things I like about the character of Samantha Carter, but her daddy issues and doomed love life are not among them.
Anyway, this was a frighteningly accurate list, and one I hope will become obsolete in the future.
There have been some plot developments since March 07, but I think the rules still hold up. An addendum or 2009 update may be in order.
Hate to criticize your post, but the baby rule does not work. Claire (from Lost) had a baby on the island, but that didn't stop her from being killed.
Claire's story isn't quite finished, yet. Last we saw, she was still stuck on Craphole Island and hanging with some sort of dead guy/spirit/whatever the hell it is in a shack that is neither here nor there.
Also, take note that this was originally written back on March 7, 2007.
Perhaps an update is in order. Lisa?
Claire's story isn't quite finished. Last we saw, she was still stuck on Craphole Island and hanging with some sort of dead guy/spirit/whatever the hell it is in a shack that is neither here nor there.
Also, take note that this was originally written back on March 7, 2007.
Perhaps an update is in order. Lisa?