Female Characters on Five-0

[kapuahi]

So thats a subject line that is going to get me all sorts of nasty isn't it?

I'm kind of fond of Malia. Reiko was absolutely perfect in the scene where Chin was fixing his 'mistake'.

This led me in turn to a question or an observation of sorts.

What the fuck did they do? Why did they deliberately set Lori up for a fall? Because I can think of no other explanation for what they have done to that character.

Look at all the other regular and semi regular women on the show. Kono is kickass and adored. Catherine serves a purpose isn't pushed in our faces and is for the most part loved. Jenna might have been in the first wave of fandom hate, but she seemed to have overcome that and I at least loved her. We all seem to love Malia. Same for Governor Jameson. We may be split over Rachel but she's at least accepted for the most part. Mary can be contenious but she's accepted for the most part. Gabby has been there for what two episodes and and we're all making grabby hands to see more of her. Have I missed anyone?

And then there is Lori. They've jammed her between McDanno, used her to replace Kono, tried to push her on to Steve, given her the non existant babysitter role, made her an honest to God superwoman, and generally done everything they can to turn fandom against her. As a consequence 90% of fandom wants to push her out of whatever moving vehicle we see her in. They can't be that stupid, and they can't have lost their writing mojo over the last hiatus.

Why have they done this? Purpose?

Comments

[gyri.livejournal.com]

You won't get any nasty comments from me.

It's a puzzle for sure. The only thing that makes sense to me is that the Lori character was only brought in (forced in), by network bigwigs who wanted the bromance toned down. Because to me, the biggest change this season is the change in dynamic between Steve and Danny. It seems to be getting a bit better now, but there is still a difference.

I realize the Fab Four may need a little less workload than last season (although Alex seems to be working just as hard, if not harder), and as far as I'm concerned they could have done this with the expanding cast roles of Max and Kamekona, along with the addition of Joe White (whom I actually can't stand, really, but at least there is a reason for him to be there), and fabulous guest stars like Greg Grunberg. OR they could have just introduced a similar character the way they did all the others---slowly, over time, all the while adding life to flesh out the character and make her human and three-dimensional. AND they could have hired a better actress. Surely there are more of them out there who would have been available?

I also like the other female characters to varying degrees---even if I'm not thrilled with the character, the actors themselves made their roles believable. They are/were all very talented. Larisa, in particular, knocked her scenes out of the freakin' park last night.

But notice at first, viewers had trouble with Jenna, too, because SHE came off as forced and also as a Mary Sue. She didn't start to get interesting until it became evident she might be playing both sides, and there was conflict present in her character. (Here I have to admit that she also became interesting to me because of how some fanfic writers wrote her---they enabled me to see the character in a way that differed from how she was being written on the show).

So that leads me to believe that in general, the (mostly male?), show writers just don't know how to handle female characters who aren't attached in any way as love interests to one or more of the leading men. The only one they got right was Kono.

[simplyn2deep.livejournal.com]

NOW I kind of wonder that about Lori too.

I like all of the women who've been regulars/semi-regulars with the exception of Lori, and Gabby...well IDK what it is about her but I'm not liking her too much, but no where near as much as I'm not liking Lori. and Jenna, I totally waffled between liking her and not liking her, but as a whole is was SO MUCH BETTER than Lori. And like [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com], I liked her more, the more I read of her in fics

[kitmerlot1213.livejournal.com]

I was not impressed by the Jenna Kaye character, but the minute the show added a shade of gray to her character, all of a sudden I found myself interested.

For me, a lot of her actions regarding Josh had a two-fold motivation: I have no doubt that she loved him, but she also felt guilty that it was her intel that led to his getting captured in the first place so now she was doing everything in her power to help free him. I'm not apologizing for her, just trying to see things from her point of view.

And this brings me back to the Lori problem. She needs to have some sort of conflict to make her interesting because just having a crush on Steve is not cutting it. The show needs for her to come into opposition with the team in some fashion or other--maybe reveal she's been a spy for the Gov. all along. Something needs to happen to the character because right now, we're 8 episodes in and she is just as boring and monotonous and personality free as when she first appeared.

[tarnishedangel2.livejournal.com]

Hi, Kapuahi

This is an interesting subject. Thank you for broaching it. : )

Thus far, I've loved four female characters on this series, and I've liked all the others with the exception of Lori. The four I have loved are little Gracie (at least until she hits that annoying teenage rebellion stage...heehee), Rachel, Jenna, and Catherine. In regards to Rachel, her complexity and Claire's chemistry with Scott won me over. I really expected to hate this character especially after the events of ep 1.03 with Danny begging to keep custody at Rachel's intercom, but her introduction in ep 1.10 still remains my favorite character introduction in the first season. As for Jenna, I loved her mix of academic competence and personal naivety and emotional bumbling. I found it adorable and endearing from the get go. The idea of making her character a Wo Fat minion just made me angry with TPTB and frankly, with fandom. I feel their displeasure is part of the reason Jenna was killed off last night and part of the reason we are stuck with Lori. I'll elaborate on that in a minute. I am relieved that my "Jenna acting under duress to save her fiance" theory was accurate, but I'll still miss Jenna. *sniffle* It took me a little time to warm up to Catherine, but eventually all of her cute snarky remarks to Steve when he called to ask her for his satellite favors won me over, and I began to love this character. Borth and O' Loughlin have a nice playful chemistry too.

As for the other females, I like Kono, Mary, Malia, Laura Hills, and I'm leaning to the like side with Gabby. I need to see more of her before I'm firmly on the like side. I also liked Gov. Jameson right up until the time she was shown to be a villain in league with Wo Fat. But, I do give the series' writers points for fooling me with her. So far, Gov's Jameson's betrayal has been my only surprise with this series. To date, I've figured out all the other plots and where they were headed. As much as I enjoy being right, it's also nice to be fooled every now and again. : )

Now to Lori, I have a theory, and I admit that it is an awfully far fetched theory. But here it is: I think Lauren German's acting is terrible, and I've made no secret of that. I believe this character is paper thin because German hasn't breathed any life into her unlike the actresses who portray the other H50 females. Writers can only do so much. At the end of the day it is the actor who lends credibility to any character. In addition, I find it more than a little strange that TPTB dropped the ball with their casting of Lori Weston when they have had so many other casting successes. Did they just suddenly forget how to cast people?!! No, I don't think so. I think TPTB are sending a message to fandom. Fandom has complained about every other female character on this series. I've watched them do it...from Catherine to Mary to Rachel to Laura to Jenna. None of them have been accepted by the majority of fandom. And, although, they all have pockets of the H50 fandom that like them, these rarely overlap. I think that the message that TPTB is sending to fandom is stop complaining about these good female characters or we will really give you something to complain about. Now, again, this theory is far fetched, but I can't help wondering if that is what is going on here. Personally, as much I hate Lori, there is a part of me that wants TPTB to ignore fandom's hate. It sets a BAD precedent when fandom gets their way all the time. It's like giving into a child's temper tantrums. If parents do it enough before long they have a spoiled, selfish, and Holy terror of a child.

This is just my two cents worth on this topic.

Tarnished

[bluebeard.livejournal.com]

I don't get it either. *sigh* I just want her to be gone. I've never been so against a female character. Most of them I've liked more or less, 'cept for Jenna which I kinda disliked at first but I got over it eventually since she wasn't shoved into my face nor into Steve's, plus she can actually act and I believed her having the skills she apparently does, etc. XD

[azziria.livejournal.com]

I too find it hard to believe that a group of professional showrunners and writers could get it so badly wrong with a character as they have with Lori.

I don't know who's idea it was to introduce a fifth team member (and five doesn't work, it means either breaking up a partnership or always having someone tagging along) and a love interest for Steve, whether it was Lenkov or someone higher up, but I do know that we ended up with a pinup blonde because Steve's love interest had to be white (no cross-racial relationships here, no).

So they cast a good-looking blonde and paid more attention to looks than to acting ability or chemistry. Then when it became clear that the love interest angle wasn't going to fly, they didn't know what to do with Lori. She has no story if she's not sparking off Steve, they've failed to develop a character for her, and they're stuck with an actress who doesn't have the emotional range, power or gravitas to do anything interesting with. So I think a big part of this mess is that they're floundering - she can't fulfil her original purpose, and she's not talented enough for them to give her a new and more compelling purpose (I mean, can you actually imagine her playing a double game like Jenna, or standing up to Steve in any way other than treating him like a naughty little boy?). So they're resorting to dressing her up in tight clothes and having her attempt to show her caring side by making googly eyes at Steve. She has a contract that would cost to break, so they've been trying desperately to find a way to make her fit in - hence the lame attempts to make us like her by putting her into carguments with Danny, be good at everything etc etc. Which, as you say, has just made us dislike her more.

It's really sad that the best I can say about Lori is that she was more ignorable in the last couple of episodes. What should have happened is that they wrote a strong independent character who took no shit from anyone, started off by reporting to the Governor with all the attendant friction that would cause within the team, and who then gradually began to see things the 5-0 way until she was forced into conflict with the Governor herself and earned her place on the team by sticking up for them. Now that would have been a character I could have believed in and got behind, and there would have been no need for any of this 'love interest' crap. But hey, could you actually imagine Lauren having the skill to play that role with the necessary amount of strength and subtlety? Sadly I can't, and nor I think can the writers.