Advise From Nowhere

I was watching ‘The New Girl’ last night and the one critique from my good friend that stuck with me was “I think a chick wrote this.”

Now before you start hounding on him about being sexist let me explain. The Main character, played by Zooey Deschanel, was more 3 dimensional than the rest. The three (male) roommates were witty but could have used more depth. (They also did things that a woman would want them to do in the end.) The critique basically states that the writer, supposedly a female, wanted to portray her female lead in a brilliantly bright light over the rest of the characters.

There’s plenty to not like about this method but Jess is so much like me that I couldn’t help but like her. I say give it a couple more episodes to delve further into the other characters.

Back to my topic: The critique is that the men needed to be more realistic in writing and in television. I’ve been struggling with my newest character for some time now and this made me realize that he was a little too feminine in some of his actions. He needs to be more himself and that is why I haven’t tapped into him well. I’ve been struggling to make him fit into the shell my heroine already established. (Another problem is he’s related to her so it’s hard to cut the personality ties.)

I just need to write him like he is: male. There’s not need for him to be sappy without need. I also need to tap into my separate sexes linguistic knowledge.

Happy Wednesday!