You know what? I needed to hear this today. Thank you Scott and @MysteryExec!

Hear, hear, Debbie. And I am a shiny new #bethechange follower. Thanks for the post, Scott.

Reading that gave me a little lady wood. Now I totally wanna drench myself in Scotch and blare every single girl power CD I ever owned, quickly followed by some Tool, Eminem, and Rage (to balance out the ‘mones) and yell FUCK YEAH off the roof in the middle of my cookie-cutter suburban neighborhood. Cuz, I mean, Fuck Yeah! Here’s my beef, though, and I don’t know who/where to direct it. When I think of badass femme fatale types I automatically think of a certain handful of women: Michelle Rodriguez, Gina Carano, Milla Jovavich, and Kate Beckinsale (I know I’m missing some there, but for brevity’s sake…) and they always deliver in one way, shape, or form (mostly their ladypart forms highly highlighted), but who the fuck tells them to keep their femininity in check? Is that a screenwriting glitch? A director living out their hot, sweaty chick fantasies? The studio suits burping “MORE BOOBS!” from the corner offices? I’ve seen Michelle Rodriguez in interviews and she is actually very feminine and pleasant and well-spoken (when given the chance and not asked asinine questions). Same with Gina Carano, who could probably kill you with an eyelash, but she's super feminine in her interviews. And yes, she has boobs. Lord knows she has boobs. Let's all highlight the boobies on tough girls to balance out the masculinity that *must* come with being a badass, right? Heaven forbid a tried and true girl straight up kicks some ass and then has a good frustrated cry over a cracked nail and a dickhead boyfriend. “Oh noooo… she’s emoting. Stahp.” Is there no possible way to balance out the crazy Carrie types (Homeland) with someone who has feelings AND could and would kick some ass on the side? I see it all the time in this here real world - hell, I live it- but where are all the non-Butch, non-Damsel in Distress, non-psycho ex-girlfriend female characters/roles? Is it because no one’s writing them? Or writing them well? Or because they won’t sell? I’m working on a screenplay right now with a tough (yet girly) female lead and half the time I feel like I’m right on track with her description, action, and dialogue (keepin’ it on the real, yo), and half the time I feel like somewhere along the line she’ll be rendered butchy or girly or fucking cray cray and throw the character way off. So… I can imagine there are plenty of underwritten pubescent-boy-fantasy-porn star-characters out there, but outside of writing them well, how can we be sure they’ll be portrayed well and as intended? I would love some examples of successful female asskickers. Honestly, I would. Jennifer Garner’s Sydney from Alias is the first that comes to my mind as setting the bar...

Buffy was buff, and pretty, and kicked butt. A superhero, yes, but aren't all our characters doing something heroic? 'Cause they should be. :)

Okay so first who has been watering down MysteryExec's Chivas 18? Eyeballs y'all. And second Despina couldn't agree with you more. That's something I feel gets lost all the time in this conversation. For the most part women are...feminine, there is a difference, they're not just inversions of male characters. There are plenty of superhero women in everyday life that we can relate to who are fully rounded individuals, why not in film? I ask male writers to do a bloke pass of my writing, because at the end of the day, I don't think in the same way as a man, why wouldn't writers do the same for female characters? Having said that I do love the examples you've given Despina and my favourite supermom Sarah Connors and Ripley.

Interesting as @MysteryExec's conversion on the road to Westwood is, I hope the conversation opens beyond "strong female characters." There are lots of things not seen on the big screen. "Female characters" are, I am sorry to suggest, just the cause celeb of this quarter. What's a "strong female character" anyway? One who is interchangeable with a butt-kicking male character, ie. The Heat? One who is interchangeable with a butt-kicking male character but with boobs if the kicking stuff doesn't work out, ie. the Charlie's Angels style films, or a little Jolie adventure action? 'Cause all that is soooo reflective of women's lives, right? :) Not saying it isn't fun, or that there isn't a place for butt-kicker movies with either gender of butt being kicked or doing the kicking, but... Anyone who saw Marigold Hotel can understand that there's drama - and comedy - in every age, gender, ethnic background, and circumstance. I can't say it'll get bought - that's a whole 'nother universe, but, as writers, there is a diverse world of dramatic, engaging, and memorable characters out there that don't kick anything, unless they do. Get it? :) The real mistake is, I think, of including, for example, older characters in a script and trotting out the stereotype of "old" in the mistaken belief the inclusion *alone* is enough to make the script "diverse." Read one just yesterday and the older character is introduced buying Depends. No moment of embarrassment in the aisles or at the cash - which could at least have been a character-building moment a la a young person's first attempt to buy condoms. Just to tell us the character *is* older? Tell me, how many 20-something characters do we open with buying tampons or toilet paper or soap? What a wasted introduction! Not surprisingly, the rest of the script around that character was dull and pointless too. As writers, it isn't up to us to figure out what someone else is going to do with our older, younger, female, or Cree character after it's out of our hands. That's an unfortunate, condition unique to this writing craft unless we're going to be our own production companies. As writers, it's up to us to make all our characters whole people with dramatic situations. Just make the buggers human - all beautiful and grubbby, and make them true to themselves! Also, in tribute to Elmore Leonard, leave out the boring bits. Whoever your character is, find the centre of that unique personality and run with it. The rest sort of falls into place. Hopefully, if we do it right, when it does fall into someone else's hands - as it will, we'll have done our jobs so well that the actors, directors, and suits will *want* to embrace those characters.

Yes. After my rant I went and gave it a good think and I did recall some additional female asskickers - I know they're out there. I was more frustrated and focused on the Action/Thriller genre in particular because I've got 2 in the works and I often wonder if, on a marketability scale, they'd ever see the light of day should someone actually like them enough to pass them along. It's not to say there aren't a bevy of extremely well written (or directed? portrayed?) female characters in every other genre - there are - I'm particularly annoyed with and questioning the female action roles. Should have specified that in the beginning.

Great wakeup call. Despite being female, I have been finding my female leads a bit lame lately (somehow find it easier to write male leads - too much male-centric reads for me) - going to get to work making my gals more awesome. thanks Scott and Mystery ex.

The Mary Sue, the Quirky Girl or the Action Heroine are all cliché character types. They are all too perfect, too clean. The exact opposite of those types is the passive, indicisive male character. Using them means creating a story without an honest or in any way profound conflict. Of course you can use them as starting points, but you have to make them deeper in some way and have a good explanation as to why they are this way.

Thanks for all your comments. Obviously we're not going to solve the issue of gender representation in movies here, but good to keep airing the subject to heighten awareness of it. This whole idea of a "strong female character" is a double edged sword. On the one hand, we'd like to see more roles for females in which they play the central character. But is the idea of a "strong" character delimiting? The writer of this article, who by the way is a woman, thinks so. While short term the idea of "strong" may help as a bridge, aiming higher we really should, I think, be going for multidimensional characters. Besides not all stories work with a typical Hero's Journey ethos, many are more internally driven, what some have called a Heroine's Journey. Food for thought...

Need to modify @MysteryExec's post: *Listen* to actual women, male writers. ;) I love you guys, guy writers. Don't hesitate to ask your sister writers questions about gal culture, we'll spill. :)

Maureen Murdock offers an alternate Jungian view re: Joseph Campbell's Hero Journey. http://www.maureenmurdock.com/heroine.html

Jewel, thanks for that. I believe I noted Maureen's book in this 4-part series I did last year on the Heroine's Journey which you can read here.

Dear Scott, You are such a well respected and known presence in the Hollywood community. The MysteryExecutive and the other mystery people are those out of work who spend their days making fun of others in the business and do nothing all day. Did you ever notice how they all follow each other and favorite each other? It is the same person. The #bethechange is ridiculous as someone who knows one of the Mystery people knows that he is the least progressive person around and just uses twitter to vent his anger. You are giving face time and blog time to people who are not behind any cause and don't work any job.

[…] pretty common in Hollywood. So, we knew to expect some of that (and, boy, did we get a lot of that! MysteryExec was obviously anticipating some of our entries). Beyond that, however, we did come across a number of racist, homophobic, and sexist scripts […]