June 14, 2012

What’s Wrong With The Women of AMC?

Filed under: Gender,Media — Tags: , , , , , — Rachel @ 10:46 am

clockwise from top left: Lori Grimes (The Walking Dead), Betty Francis (Mad Men), Sarah Linden (The Killing), and Skyler White (Breaking Bad)

 

This post contains spoilers for the four AMC shows being discussed.  All spoilers are contained behind the jump.

As a fan of AMC’s original series, I’ve begun to notice a strange trend when it comes to the way people have reacted to the women on these shows, specifically:

The Walking Dead’s Lori Grimes, Zombie Apocalypse Survivor

Mad Men’s Betty Francis, Homemaker

The Killing’s Sarah Linden, Homicide Detective

and

Breaking Bad’s Skyler White, Homemaker

This is how these women have been described by various recaps and reviews:

Sarah Linden is: “a bad mother” and “the worst police officer on earth”.

Lori Grimes is: “incredibly stupid”, “irritating, self-righteous, hypocritical”, and “annoying.”

Betty Francis is: “selfish”, a “vicious, terrible mother”, and “the least sympathetic character” on the show.

and the actress who portrays Skyler White, Anna Gunn, discussed that she is found to be an “annoyance” on the show, in an interview with Vulture.

If you haven’t watched some or any of these shows, you might be wondering what awful behaviors and actions have lead to such strong hate among viewers.  To very briefly recap the storylines of each of the women listed and pictured above: (SPOILERS Within)

 

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