thetopher
Member of the Church Of Faith
Almost all BtVS characters start off as recognizable (pop) cultural stereotypes, its a good shorthand to have an impactful memorable character in a brief amount of time- but all the main characters grow beyond that and reveal layers.
I think people get hung up on 'outdated' stereotypes because they perceive them as some kind of writing commentary, whereas actually they're a simple narrative trick so the audience can quickly connect positively or negatively with a character. Snappy dialogue helps too, obviously.
This tends to be much more effective with US stereotypes than the broader brushed foreign ones, and certainly a lot of todays audience gets hung up and prissy about 'representation' a lot more.
Firstly, Kendra is Jamaican, hence the bizarre accent, and secondly the reality of her having one (fighting) shirt is more to do with her strict upbringing than anything else.
And, in her defense, Kendra did get killed off by one of the three 'Big Bad' vampires of the season, I wouldn't say that her death was easy...but it probably wasn't as impactful as the writers hoped, perhaps because a lot of the audience didn't connect to the character that strongly.
Ironically that might be because Kendra didn't get that much time to develop and since she isn't any kind of recognizable cultural stereotype then she comes across as too flat.
I think people get hung up on 'outdated' stereotypes because they perceive them as some kind of writing commentary, whereas actually they're a simple narrative trick so the audience can quickly connect positively or negatively with a character. Snappy dialogue helps too, obviously.
This tends to be much more effective with US stereotypes than the broader brushed foreign ones, and certainly a lot of todays audience gets hung up and prissy about 'representation' a lot more.
Firstly, Kendra is Jamaican, hence the bizarre accent, and secondly the reality of her having one (fighting) shirt is more to do with her strict upbringing than anything else.
And, in her defense, Kendra did get killed off by one of the three 'Big Bad' vampires of the season, I wouldn't say that her death was easy...but it probably wasn't as impactful as the writers hoped, perhaps because a lot of the audience didn't connect to the character that strongly.
Ironically that might be because Kendra didn't get that much time to develop and since she isn't any kind of recognizable cultural stereotype then she comes across as too flat.
hoponlilmama
Wish we had more time with Kendra, I liked her!
Plasma
Appreciate the correction on Kendra. I haven’t watched season 2 in years
