so for part two of our deep dive into
gender and transformers how's that for a
phrase you never thought you'd say that
adult it's time to look at that most
misunderstood of all film studies
concepts the male gaze male gaze is not
just when a male character physically
looks at a female character and the
camera takes on the male characters
point of view although that is certainly
an aspect of the theory male gaze was a
concept first developed by Laura Mulvey
in her 1975 essay visual pleasure and
narrative cinema it is important to note
that the term originated as a film
studies term and was expanded upon in
the following decades in media studies
communications and cultural theory in
its original iteration the term male
gaze relied heavily on the way
cinematographers photographed women in
movies and if you think Michael Bay's
bad
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week
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let's just say putting words to the idea
of male gaze was a little more on the
nose in 1975 than it is in today's
mainstream media and it is still pretty
on the nose today maldis idea of male
gaze holds that women on film are
objects for male fetishistic gazing with
men as the de facto subject and what
about female gaze retorts the internet
strawman according to Moldy the language
of film was made by male filmmakers for
male audiences female gaze isn't really
a thing because even if say a female
filmmakers tries to invert the idea of
male gaze by fetishizing male bodies it
still uses the same language and
techniques that male filmmakers use to
create it to gaze upon female bodies
just substituting male bodies with
female bodies so according to the Moldy
in viewpoint Magic Mike XXL still falls
under the purview of male gaze gaze has
come to be defined not just by a house
and a Matar AFER's shoot bodies within a
frame but also describes how one group
season portrays another group that's why
it's not uncommon for for instance just
Whedon's affinity for kick-ass fragile
wastes or Tarantino's use of girl fights
or even Spielberg's use of beleaguered
but powerless mother figures to fall
under the purview of male gaze but gaze
does not only apply to members of one
group portraying a different group it
can also describe how a group sees and
portrays itself therefore the reason why
Sam Witwicky and Cade Yeager are the way
they are aggressive hostile abusive self
entitled insecure overcompensating
paranoid lazy to feed a stand obsessive
affront of yours I'm not a romantic
friend romantic friends do this your
core
that is all a part of male gaze
so in today's discussion I am NOT going
to talk about how Michael Bay's form of
male gaze applies to his female
characters no no no no today I'm going
to talk about how Michael Bay sees the
men's there is a fascinating discussion
of non-human masculinity to be had in
these movies bumblebee oscillates
between being a sapien thinking war
machine and like a dog who keeps
squirting his fluids on people he
doesn't like there's a lot of sexual
coding in the Transformers that you
don't see in other Transformers media
like Nokia bot has a dick cannon wheelie
humps Mikayla's leg and in the third
movie when Mikaela mysteriously
disappears he calls her a [ __ ] before
leering at Sam's new girl toy and of
course dog humping other dogs but with
regard to applying concepts like male
gaze to male characters I'm more
interested in the two mains protagonists
of Transformers is 1 through 3 Sam
Witwicky and protagonist of Transformers
is 4 and 5 Cade Yeager sure court-like
I think Michael Bay kind of hates them
for what it's worth I think he hates
Wahlberg's character way less but there
is a staggering amount of baseless and
secure aggression between the male
characters I'm about one second away
from knocking you out taking the bomb
and just leave you here yeah we got a
rule about people messing with people
from Texas it's a freaking spaceship you
go get insurance on a freaking spaceship
good luck with that buddy pick any
random scene in a Transformers movie and
if it's not like a soldier thing it's
probably two male characters being angry
at each other over nothing sir do you
want to see the property sure I'd be
more than happy to give you a tour I'll
show you through other buyers I got
buried up back then I'll crack your head
open like an egg in the forest movie the
central character conflict is between
Cade and his seventeen-year-old daughter
dating an older boy
what daddy doesn't like babies new
boyfriend one I punch you right in the
mouth and you call the police on me this
is a pretty common character motivation
for older male characters in Hollywood
movies unselfconsciously hating
daughter's love interest because he
suspects that the boyfriend doesn't
respect women because he's projecting
him because he doesn't respect women and
assumes new boyfriend is like him and so
the two are basically fighting over
their object daughter lover the whole
movie this character arc usually ends
with the dad dying so the breeding pair
can go forth unfettered that doesn't
happen in age of extinction but the
movie does add in some next-level creepy
by having the boyfriend be four years
the seventeen-year-old senior and having
him carry around a card with some
obscure Texas law that means it's not
statutory rape if I should up your
underage daughter Mark Wahlberg got a
pre-existing juvenile foundational
relationship statute to 7:05 - three but
really it's all about Sam
dear Sam Sam the ultimate worthless male
protagonist mr. Matsumoto so worthless
that the fourth movie doesn't even
mention him and the fifth movie implies
that he died off-screen somewhere
probably slipped in the shower and
choked on a bar of soap or something
that is how little respect Bay has for
his own protagonist that is not to say
necessarily this Sam is worthy of
respect should say he is more or less
defined by his own inadequacy
let's go call your mom I don't need any
money for lunch
I have money from yesterday's lunch
another moralizing is they've saved the
world twice the groveling for jobs and
inadequacy that he never really
overcomes they try to give him a
character arc in the first movie
something about sacrifice and victory
and how he learns the value of sacrifice
but this doesn't make sense because Sam
never sacrifices anything this is the
closest any of the movies get to having
a character arc for the main character
by the by so Sam's faults numerous
though they maybe do not build to
anything except a quiet removal and
off-screen death
Sam is by no means unique in terms of
his particular brand of character flaws
the last time I ate shrimp my throat
closed up and I went into convulsions
shrim but there's an important
distinction be drawn between a character
like Sam and a character like star-lord
in the guardians of the galaxy movies
who has a lot of the same character
flaws as Sam does look I'm gonna be
totally honest with you I forgot you're
here the key difference here is that
Peter coils character flaws formed the
basis of a character arc for star-lord
his immaturity nearly gets the group
killed and Guardians too if what's
between my legs had a hand on it
I guarantee I could have landed this
ship his casual sexism is the least part
of the reason Gamora doesn't want to
settle down and as narcissism almost
leads him to going along with destroying
the galaxy only you carried the
connection
to the light I don't want there to be
confusion or misrepresentation of what
I'm saying along the lines of oh so men
aren't allowed to have character flaws
now either no that's not the point
but if you have a shrieking cowardly
abusive overcompensating compulsive liar
as your protagonist maybe you want to I
don't know do something with those
character flaws like have there be a
consequence of some sort but there never
is with Sam because the character flaws
aren't framed as character flaws
they're jokey jokes to make him
relatable to the audience
in short Sam is the audience avatar this
is how Michael Bay sees you the viewer
and this is a part of male gaze my
friend by his money his power his good
looks none of the above
check sam is shitty ineffectual a
materialistic but that's okay because
the audience is shitty ineffectual and
materialistic Sam's involvement in the
plot of the first two movies has no
bearing on discoveries or decisions he's
made but objects he had in his
possessions he's my grandfather's
glasses he inherited the glasses his dad
purchases bumblebee for him and then
during the final boss battle
bumblebee gives him the MacGuffin and
tells him to run around with it in a
circle for five minutes
Sam is a little more active in the third
movie where he spends a lot of time
trying to figure out why the Decepticons
are killing astronauts and Russian
cosmonauts but again those character
flaws are just kind of tacked on that is
the difference between a character like
star-lord and a character like Sam
star-lord flaws and jokey-joke lovable
misogyny are meant to be relatable yes
yes I prefer to make people the
old-fashioned way but there is comment
on these flaws in the film and there are
consequences in the narrative there is a
reason why Sam always gets the girl
despite not deserving her and Peter
doesn't Sam just sucks because this is
how Michael Bay thinks the straight
white male audience sees itself and will
respond to and apparently he's not wrong
before we go I want to talk about one
under discussed character John Tudor
Rose Reggie / Seymour Simmons
I say slash because mr. Simmons had an
unexplained name change between movies 1
& 2 Simmons from the get-go is
identified as delusional and pathetic
compared to actual soldiers and actual
Robo soldiers getting peed on by them
and displaying an ignorance about both
robots and warriors and the military and
movie 2 he's back now manager of the
deli of racist screeching but he joins
our ragtag group from the first movie
and also this guy who was here for some
reason don't be suck in the sack and
helps organize the strike all wild
narrating himself like the hero of his
own story then there is the third movie
where he has now capitalized over his
involvement with the Transformers by my
book spending the last half of the movie
putting Francis McDormand in her place
because they had sex at some point you
ever say a word to anyone about what
happened that night in Quantico I cut
your heart out
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Jesus Christ dude
Simmons is in command posturing
oblivious full of false confidence and
denigrating towards most people but
especially women you in the training
brother do not test me what somebody got
started what the hell's going on who are
you yet the more amoral he behaves the
more Fame and money he gets down
Turturro has gone on record several
times to say that he based his
performance of this character on Michael
Bay Simmons reflects the way Bey sees a
certain type of masculinity which then
Turturro flips around to be a reflection
on how he sees Michael Bay I could do
whatever I want and get away with it
bench
Sam Kate and Simmons are all reflections
of how the filmmakers see the audience
and not the reason people go to the
movies in the first place this matters
because it reinforces a very narrow view
of masculinity like a male gaze ception
this is called reflexive media and there
are a lot of studies that show
statistically speaking that media is not
great at necessarily shaping behaviors
if you see robots blowing up the Lincoln
monument you're not statistically more
likely to go out and try to blow up the
Lincoln monument but media is great at
shaping worldview usually in ways that
you the viewer are completely unaware of
men continue to exist and emulate this
narrow view of masculinity because media
pushes it as normal and relatable the
men in the Transformers movies are
denied authenticity they are the subject
of ridicule and in constant desperate
need to affirm their masculinity there
is a modicum of sincerity allowed in the
first movie and sometimes in later
movies and usually only in scenes with
Optimus Prime but for the most part
sincerity and vulnerability in men is
viewed with disdain
the only acceptable form of mail
authenticity is the soldier kind so it
is a common even cliche refrain now that
Michael Bay doesn't respect women but as
far as representations of whole groups
go he doesn't have much respect for men
either
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