Vasquez - Nooo!

The whole time we've been watching "Aliens" I've been hoping that Vasquez would make it through the movie without dying. But nope! She died. I do have to admit, though, that I was pleased with how her character expired.  I think it was nice to have her and Gorman ( I can't really remember all the minor character names, but he's the guy that went back to help her, right?) have a bonding moment - even if it only lasted ten seconds before they blew themselves up - while sacrificing their lives to save the rest of the team.  I’d hoped that Vasquez, being the strong, independent female role model of the film, would have been able to survive the alien terror and chaos and redeem women’s stereotype for being helpless and unable to fend for themselves.   However, as I said before, I did like that she went out with a bang (no pun intended, I swear), and certainly didn’t go down without a fight.  I also noticed that throughout the search, it looked like she carried the biggest weapon out of the whole group, which I liked and thought was kind of cool.  Typically we don’t often see women in films being allowed guns or weapons, especially a flamethrower/machine gun/ grenade launcher combo.  ;)

Aliens

*** FYI, I thought I'd posted this on Friday, but it looks like it didn't post after all :( I hope this still counts for credit! ***

During Thursday's viewing of "Aliens", I tried to pay close attention to how the female characters interacted with the male characters, and there were some things that caught my eye. 

When Ripley is telling her account of what happened to her crew, and as it was made clear that her story was being perceived as completely implausible, I couldn't help but feel like the board members were dismissing her as some emotional, angry crazy lady who just woke up from half a century of sleeping. Even though it is reasonable for her to be emotional, I don’t think it was actually the case, nor was it fair for them to dismiss everything she said. I believe she was overly concerned and intent on figuring out what to do about the aliens she encountered.

Another thing I noticed was how the movie portrayed Vasquez’ character.  She was depicted as a strong, fierce, brave woman who wasn’t afraid to take the lead and step out of the stereotype of the “helpless, damsel in distress” female character.  While at one point in the film she was posed the mocking question of whether she’d ever been mistaken for a man, she fired the inquiry right back at the male who asked her, standing up for her own individuality and that of women everywhere.