If you were to count up all the significant women in the initial Star Wars trilogy, you’d get Princess Leia. Leia is a fantastic character, sure, and Carrie Fisher is amazing, but surrounded by a sea of men (and male non-humans), whatever she does for empowering females is lost amongst a further lack of representation, and a gold bikini. The prequel series adds Natalie Portman to the list of Star Wars females with Padme, but she continues to drown in all the testosterone. Now, with the announcement of only one new female lead in the next addition to the franchise, we have to wonder, where are all the women?
But this is an issue far greater than Abrams. Why is it that Star Wars, and the science fiction genre, are so reluctant to give us women? It can be argued that the original trilogy was made in an earlier time, when audiences were less receptive to females in genre films. But we must remember that this was the era of Ripley in Alien, and Princess Leia’s own popularity should have heralded the way for progress. And in a modern world, shouldn’t genre films embrace female characters as strongly as the men? The young adult audience is lapping them up, with the success of The Hunger Games and Divergent, while few would argue with the popularity of Arya Stark and Brienne of Tarth on Game of Thrones. The Hobbit added the character of Tauriel for the films, as the source material also under-represented women, and she turned out to be one of the most awesome characters in The Desolation of Smaug. Women won’t alienate the Star Wars audience. If nothing else, it will bring in more viewers.
But there is hope. Rumours are circulating about the fabulous Lupita N’yongo as a reported Star Wars - Episode VII casting. Even if this dream doesn’t sadly become a reality, the fact that there are more cast potentially to be announced, and that some of that cast may be female, means we shouldn’t judge Episode VII on its representation of women just yet. We got Carrie Fisher back for Episode VII. Having more than one other woman to join her is our New Hope.