Barbie Sounds Like Another Woke Lecture

Movies

Hollywood isn’t just ruining boys’ fun; they’re coming for the girls now, too. In an interview with Fandango, the cast of Barbie talked about what audiences can expect from the new movie based on the iconic Mattel doll. It’s one of those things that’s simultaneously surprising and not surprising.

First, Margot Robbie said of the film:

“It’s not just that the movie is unexpected; I think it’s that Greta kind of pushes it in directions that I didn’t think they would let us go in. And I think a big part of that was acknowledging the things that people find problematic about Barbie as well as the things people love about Barbie, and being able to do both while having a relevant conversation about where the world is at today, and then also be acknowledging this long, sixty-plus-year history.”

America Ferrera added:

“By the time I was done with the script, Greta [Gerwig] and Noah [Baumbach]… took Barbie, and they addressed so many of the positives and the not-so-positives of what she’s meant in culture, how she started as a revolution, but as time went on, not so much. How do we bring Barbie into the 21^st century and make her relevant, the standard of beauty and aspiration, and the icon of a woman? How do we make that relevant to girls today who did not see themselves represented in that story?”

Kate McKinnon spoke about her reaction to reading the script:

“But then I read it, and it was sort of about how gender roles deny people half their humanity, and how we just need to be ourselves, and it’s a very powerful message.”

But what about Ken, Barbie’s boyfriend? After some talk about “spotting a Ken,” which, according to Robbie, means a guy who talks about Bitcoin or plays golf, Issa Rae says:

“The Kens are just supplemental characters to these Barbies. The Barbies can do anything; Kens are there to kind of support, and don’t necessarily have their own story. And I think that’s not necessarily a negative thing; I think it’s incredibly strong for men to be in supportive roles and to support the greatness that is women/Barbie.”

Doesn’t this sound like fun?

First off, I don’t care about the Ken stuff (inasmuch as I care about anything in a Barbie movie). Barbie is for girls and women, and those characters should be the driving force in the film, with Ken taking a backseat to them. Not everything has to be made for me, and Barbie is something that shouldn’t be. It would be nice if some things intended for men and boys were still made for men and boys, but Barbie isn’t the battlefield for that.

But the rest of it… good God, can’t anything just be fun anymore? Are these freaks so desperate to proselytize that they have to suck the fun out of Barbie and turn it into an instruction manual on diversity and body image and gender roles and whatever else is pissing them off this week? I want men and boys to have fun movies for self-serving reasons, but women and girls should have fun movies too, and if anything of theirs should be fun, it’s Barbie.

This reminds me of what happened with the new Pixar movie Elemental; there’s apparently (I didn’t see the film) a character who is non-binary and uses plural pronouns, but that wasn’t advertised, so parents would think they could take their kids to see it without any gender-sexuality stuff from Disney. Remember when Amy Schumer was going to play Barbie in this movie, and she left over “creative differences,” which really means that the backlash clued in the clueless studio to Barbie fans liking Barbie as she is and not as some statement by feminists about body positivity? Well, after she left, in came Margot Robbie, a stunningly beautiful woman who is as dead-on casting as anyone could be. After hearing what was said in that Fandango interview, Margot Robbie is starting to sound like a Trojan Horse, as is the light and silly trailer; they’re getting people in the door by promising a fun movie celebrating Barbie, but once the lights go down, the lecture starts.

Folks, No Hard Feelings is in theaters right now; my advice is to see that movie and relish that one got by these sanctimonious loons.

Thanks to Bounding Into Comics for the heads up on this.