Change of plan - an amended outlook
After the initial realisation of having to change topics, I was pointed into the direction of a book which illustrated how to go about drawing robots. This book contained 50 robots and step by step tutorials of how to draw them with hints and tips throughout.
After numerous hours and testing the tutorials I was able to complete some rough sketches on my tablet, however before I was able to upload them my new tablet had frozen completely during a new software update and I spent the remainder of the day at PC World trying to get it fixed. Only managed to recover one of the images as shown below which was just identifying basic shapes to outline the character.
It wasn't until I skimmed through all the robots within the book and noticed that when it came to the female robots, that there were only a limited selection. This limited selection were referred to as 'robot maids, cleaning robot' etc.
This then led to an inquiry regarding female robots in not just games and drawings but movies as well.
Over the past few weeks, I have been engaged in watching movies such as Red Planet, Chappie and many others to list.
My very short findings of two of the movies:
Red Planet, released in 2000, contained a military robot programmed to guide the crew whilst on mars called AMEE (Autonomous Mapping Exploration and Evasion), apart from the feminine sounding name 'Amy', there was no indication that the robot was female. The movements of AMEE were impressive with the fluidity or each step and turn and AMEE did not get a lot of screen time within the movie.
Chappie, released in 2015, contained various robots used to enforce the law, except one of the robots - 'Chappie' used was an experiment for its creator to enable Chappie to learn as a new born and have it's own mind. Towards the end of the movie, Chappie's "Mommy" YoLinda gets seriously injured and they attempt to transfer her mind to a robot, however, they chose a female robot with boobs. Granted that the 'human' version in the movie was portrayed this way also, yet the male version when created didn't have the male anatomy that one associates with being 'male'.
This led to looking at a wider variety of movies, some old and some very current. The majority of movies related to robots/androids etc, all have a distinct theme in relation to giving them human qualities, with the humanistic appearances. Yet this varies from male to female and the extent at which they would tell them apart.
This article posted by The Guardian talks about movies such as Austin Powers and Eve of Destruction of which I have watched both, including the various movies they mention.
An extract from the article:
"Being literally objectified women, female robots have traditionally been vehicles for the worst male tendencies. Invariably, inventors’ ideas of the “perfect” woman translate into one who is unquestioningly subservient and/or sexually obliging. A Stepford wife, to cite the best-known example. Or, as Blade Runner dismissively labels one female replicant, a “basic pleasure model”. The trashier end of sci-fi movies is littered with these basic pleasure models: they cater to wealthy males’ urges in Westworld, they’re traded like used cars in Cherry 2000, they go-go dance in gold bikinis and prey on wealthy men in Dr Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine, which inspired Austin Powers’ fembots, with their weaponised breasts. They’re all programmed to flirt" |
| Austin Powers' Fembots. |
Researching further I came across literature reviews and reports documenting the objectification of women through female robots.
Such as:
By Burgees and Stermer
Other research looked into where the newest form of storytelling began with the introduction of video games like Donkey Kong, released in 1981, portraying the female 'princess' as the damsel in distress and never being the center of the action. Then introducing female versions of existing games such as Ms. Pac-Man.
1990's saw a change in female characters in video games and introduced Samarus Aran, a bounty hunter in the Metroid series, was considered one of the first major touch female protagonists in a video game, followed by Princess Zelda, Lara Croft and others.
All of which was an interesting read into the insights of where it all began and how it came about, through the Education Amendments Act that was passed and to prohibiting sex discrimination in educational institutions.
