It happened, and I still haven’t really
accepted it – although I swear to goodness MTV if this is all an elaborate
trick I will hurt you, I don’t know how I am going to hurt a faceless
corporation but I will figure it out and it will suck for you. Anyway, as you
can tell I’m a little upset by what happened to Allison Argent, and I wanted to
vent share my feelings with you.
Can I tell you how much I loved Allison
Argent? Because I loved her a lot. She wasn’t my favorite character (alas Lydia
and Derek are the ones that stole my heart) but there is little doubt in my
mind that she was THE BEST character on this show. She defied all my
expectations and I really hope that a whole generation of girls see Allison and
realize that just because they hero falls in love with you doesn’t mean you
can’t be a hero in your own right.
If you want to know more about my love for
Allison Argent please check out this post I wrote for The Geekiary: What’s
so Special About Allison Argent?
Anyway because Allison Argent was so
amazing, and because she was part of our pack, it’s understandable that Teen Wolf fans took her loss pretty
hard. If you weren’t upset I am side-eyeing you right now. Allison telling
Scott that she loved him as she died in his arms? That shit is heartbreaking.
Tears were shed. Most of them were my mothers, she’s old, these things make her
emotional (sorry mum).
Now when something like this happens there
are always going to be people that say we are overreacting. People who think
it’s ridiculous to mourn a fictional character. You know what, screw those
assholes. Mourning Allison’s death is a sign that we cared, and caring about
something passionately is not a bad thing. In fact I kind of feel sorry for the
people that don’t understand the emotional loss of losing a character you love
because it means they have never experienced the joy of being invested in
fiction.
The thing about loving fictional characters
is that a lot it happens in side of our heads. The television show – book,
movie, comic, whatever – gives us a glimpse into these characters lives and
we’re expected to fill in the blanks. So in a way every time we invest in a
character we are giving them a piece of ourselves. When that character dies,
it’s like losing that part of ourselves and it hurts. So much.
We’re not overreacting we’re expressing
healthy emotions over the loss of something that was important to us. Anyone
that tries to make you feel bad for mourning Allison Argent is an asshole.
On the flip side of things there has been a
bunch of discussions about the problematic trend of killing female characters
in Teen Wolf. This upset a lot of the
people who were just trying to deal with Allison’s death. So there’s this
argument happening that assumes you have to pick a side. Like you can either
appreciate Allison and everything that happened to her or you can complain
about the treatment of female characters. But it’s a little more complex than
that.
Look here’s the thing – there is definitely
a problematic trend of killing more significant female characters than male
characters. For details check out this
post by Tumblr user apriki and this
article at The Daily Dot. This is a thing that is happening and
Allison’s death adds to this trend, as well as diminishing the number of female
characters on the show and losing THE ONLY female relationship on the show. It’s
a problem.
BUT we also know that Crystal Reed chose to leave Teen
Wolf because, as she told EW,
“I love the art. And I felt
like, creatively, there were things I wanted to do differently, and I wanted to
explore other avenues of film and TV. I wanted to jump into different
characters. You know, I’m 29. So I think the age difference was something I
wanted to change as well because she’s 17. I love the show so much. So I went
to Jeff and talked about it and he said, ‘We’ll write you a great ending.’”
And you know what, it was pretty great
ending. If Allison was going to go she had to go down fighting because there is
no way she would leave her friends or her father voluntarily and I would have
hated to see Allison fade into obscurity forgotten like Jackson or Cora. Allison
died to save her best friend and it was beautiful. It’s not like Jeff
consciously decided to kill of one of only two lead females because he hates
women. Crystal WANTED to leave, and he gave Allison the farewell she deserved.
The thing is though, none of that alters
the discrepancies I discussed above. Just because they are not consciously
trying to kill more women than men, doesn’t mean they’re not doing just that.
Because they are. And the reason they are doing that is institutionalized
privilege. Our subconscious is geared to favor straight white men, so we do
that without even noticing that that’s what we’re doing. In order to combat
that underlying imbalance we have to acknowledge the problem and make a conscious
effort to change it.
Allison’s death is not in itself
problematic. She wasn’t fridged, she died because the actress wanted to leave,
it was reasonably well done considering Jeff’s not great at hitting those
emotional beats. But her death didn’t happen in a vacuum, it effects and is affected
by the world around it. So you look at her death and go: hey Teen Wolf, I don’t know if you’re aware
of this but you actually have a habit of killing strong female characters and
now that Allison has gone there is an even bigger gap in representation. What
are you gonna do about it?
And they should do something because more
female characters sticking around for longer could never be a bad thing. No
doubt they will bump Kira up to the main cast but just means Teen Wolf is the same as it was before
Kira was introduced. It doesn’t actually do anything to combat the problems. And
as much as I love this show, I still want to see women better represented.
The hard line is this: it is possible to
love Allison Argent, respect Crystal’s decision to leave, enjoy the show and
still acknowledge the problematic aspects. Check out this FANTASTIC blog on How
to Be a Fan of Problematic Things and then go back to weeping over the loss
of one of the best female characters ever.
