UNOFFICIAL ASEXUAL & AROMANTIC ICONS IN POP CULTURE, PART 3

 

Don't worry, I won't be speaking about this topic forever, however close to my heart it might be. The blog won't transform into an activism site; it will still deal with the usual film stuff. But I really wanted to give a space to something that not many people talk about. There will only be one more entry after this one and I'll close the mater for now.

If you want to read the previous two parts, click on the corresponding Spade below:

 PART III:

 

Katniss Everdeen (The Hunger Games):

 

Is there really a full love triangle at the center of The Hunger Games? For some of us it’s clear that something is missing in there, namely that the female member of this triangle doesn’t seem to reciprocate the feelings of any the two males. At least not in the way they do.

Because it’s a cliché of the young adult genre, and because this series happened to be released around the time that Twilight was popular, we somehow had the preconceived notion that Katniss was in love with two guys and had to choose one of them.

Except that’s only what appears to be happening. Katniss -who has impressive survival skills- is shown to play along with the Games’ audiences in order to gain their favor. That includes, as she soon learns, to share fake feelings and to involve the public into non-existent love affairs. This works, but maybe she plays the role so well that absolutely everyone ends up believing in this at different degrees -the readers, the Games’ watchers and, worst of all, the boys in question. Even Katniss herself gets a bit confused, which is understandable. It’s not that easy to separate yourself from a character you’re always portraying.

But since the novels show us the full chain of thoughts and reasons behind Katniss’ every decision, I think many readers will conclude that though she does care for both boys, it’s not necessarily in a romantic or sexual way. Katniss concrete actions -which start by sacrificing herself to save her little sister, her one true love-, come as very platonic.

Real life audiences, of course, much like the fictional watchers of the Games, do love a sordid love entanglement, and tend to look at everything under that prism. I’m not saying that Katniss is necessarily asexual or aromantic, but the fact that she doesn’t spend her time pining after her suitors sets her apart from most YA heroines, and gains her a place in the Ace Pantheon.

 

 

Every incarnation of The Doctor (Doctor Who):

 

I already talked about this in an earlier article, but I think The Doctor as a character worked much better when he completely lacked a romantic life. That is, all seven Doctors of the classic era.

It was not like there weren’t plenty of eligible choices near him, but his relationship with his Companions was always platonic and somewhat paternal, even at those times in which he didn’t look to have much of an age difference with them (if only in appearance, of course).

Then the Eight Doctor movie came and of course, updating the franchise for a modern audience meant that the character had to be sexualized. The trend continued in the 2005 revival of the series (which other than that I think is superior to the original run) and was at its highest during the David Tennant years. It toned down a bit during the Twelfth Doctor tenure, but it didn’t vanish entirely. Luckily, we’ve had a completely romance-free Thirteenth Doctor so far. Please don’t mess that up.

Other than personal preferences, the thing is that the Doctor hitting on a Companion is very creepy. They will all be invariably young for him, and even if you disregard that, there’s something that feels illicit about the whole thing, like a professor or mentor having an affair with a student or ward.

Now, I know that I must mention that one element about the classic series that could potentially prove that even the earlier Doctors weren’t aro/ace: his very first companion was his granddaughter Susan.

Well, for one, that whole business was never explained in the least, and there could be several factors. We didn’t know exactly how those time traveling aliens reproduced, or even if Susan was biologically related to him at all.

Also, asexuals can (and many do) have descendants. Adoption aside, many of them do have sex in order to procreate. The fact that they don’t have sexual desire doesn’t mean they’re infertile.

On the brighter side, even I should admit that The Doctor’s romances in the new series have led directly into some of the best episodes and storylines in the franchise.

 

James P. Sullivan (Monsters, Inc.):

 

“Sulley” gets mentioned frequently in ace discussions, and even though there’s no hard evidence to either side of the argument, it is true that he remains romantically unattached, which is not common even in animated films: every other grown-up main character -excluding Merida if she counts as one- has at least referenced a past relationship. The only other one is Remy, who only loves food, but Linguini does get a girlfriend in Ratatouille (she’s played by a real-life asexual, Janeane Garofalo, curiously).

Sullivan lives as a bachelor with his roommate and platonic partner Mike Wazowski, who is clearly heteroromantic and dating Celia. A couple of moments in the original film show Sulley having the same kind of vaguely annoyed reaction to his colleagues’ relationship that many aromantics feel in the company of allo couples.

Not even in Monsters University, where a younger Sulley is depicted as a bit of a bad boy, is he shown to be a ladies’ man, which could have suited this portrayal.

 

Illustration by Nagashima Rika

Luna Lovegood and other characters (Harry Potter):

 

The word itself didn’t figure in her declarations, but J.K. Rowling basically confirmed that the concept of aromanticism applies to one of the characters in the Harry Potter series: Charlie Weasley.

Now, I love the Potter books. I know more about that universe than probably any other, and the notion of having representation in this franchise should make me extremely happy… Except I’m not.

Let’s be frank: out of all the characters in the series, Charlie is one of the less important. He’s a non-entity. We hardly ever see him, and his function is minimal. He’s only there to supplement a couple of Dragon-related plot points, but that’s it.

Every other surviving character in the younger generation is stated to have an amatonormative married life post Deathly Hallows. That is a bit ridiculous on itself, but if we had to get only one character… did it have to be Charlie? I have nothing against the guy. It’s just a matter of his utter irrelevance.

Particularly because there was another character who resonated a lot with the aro / ace community, and who would have been a much better icon, considering how popular she is: Luna Lovegood.

Now, within the novels themselves, Luna seems entirely apathetic towards the romantic drama the rest of the group gets into in the latter half of the series. What she really valuates is friendship -leading to that sweet moment when Harry sees her bedroom’s walls.

Like most of this data, the details of Luna’s post-school life come from outside the books but from the author herself, and thus are equally canonical: like everyone else, Luna has a couple of kids and is married to Rolf, the grandson of Newt Scamander (another character who would have made a great aro, except we knew from the start that he was married).

And thus, we lost Luna. Let's not even mention that awful part in the film adaptation where it's implied she'll get coupled with Neville. Terrible.

But wait, did you know that one of the most famous characters in the series is a confirmed asexual, but not aromantic? Rowling had this to say about Albus Dumbledore’s love life after his infatuation with Grindelwald:

"He lost his moral compass completely when he fell in love and I think subsequently became very mistrustful of his own judgement in those matters so became quite asexual.”

So, Dumbledore is canonically a homoromantic asexual. This is nice, except here she paints asexuality as a conscious choice, not an orientation, which is not how it really works. I can forgive that detail, though, because there is little information on asexuality available to the general public (and the interview is from 2008). The fact that she even knows the word is surprising enough.

We can infer that the exact same case is true of Severus Snape, except he would be a heteroromantic asexual. I doubt it very much that he ever pursued anyone else after not getting Lily, which means he can even be what is called a demiromantic, but maybe that’s too complex for today.

Another Harry Potter character who is often seen as a possible asexual by the fandom is Helena Ravenclaw.

 

 

Abed Nadir (Community):

 

I talked about Abed in a previous article, and I mentioned how he’s a cartoonish character who somehow avoids becoming unbearably ridiculous. In the same vein, I will be defending him as an ace icon today, while in PART IV I’ll be criticizing the portrayal of another sitcom character who at first glance could be seen as similar. The distinction is that Abed has a nuance that the other person, in my opinion, couldn’t achieve.

Unlike most characters presented so far in this list, Abed is almost explicitly in the asexual spectrum. He is clearly not a sex-repulsed ace, and I think it’s easy to argue that he could have an intimate encounter out of sympathy towards an allo partner or because it’s part of one of the roles he plays in his mind. But on the other hand, he doesn’t seem to experience sexual desire on his own initiative either. He’s a sex-indifferent ace, if you ask me.

The thing about Abed is that he is constantly living in a fantasy world in which he has the need to stick to certain predeterminate tropes and behaviors. We have seen him being flirty at certain times, like when he courts Annie by playing Don Draper or Han Solo, or when he gets into a walkie-talkie relationship with a Secret Service woman.

Abed does get a semi-regular girlfriend played by future Captain Marvel Brie Larson, who apparently indulges him in his role-playing, but unlike with the other main characters, sexuality and romance isn’t much of a factor for him. Instead, he depends strongly in his platonic friendship with Troy and later, Annie.

 

 

PART IV will be the final one of this series, at least for the moment. It deals with something a bit different: characters who are actually canonically asexual. Click on the Ace of Spades below to read it: