Fangirls Around the Web: March 24, 2013

This edition of Fangirls Around the Web starts off with the latest Her Universe news. Kudos to Nanci Schwartz of Tosche Station for reporting yesterday that the new Rogue Squadron dress and tank will be on sale in May, including at Star Wars Weekends. This weekend Ashley also shared a sneak peek of the upcoming second Padme Nouveau shirt.

The latest featured fangirls in the Year of the Fangirl are Andrea, Jenn, Makenna, Erica, Sloane, Rachael, Savanna, Zoe, Kara, and Jen. The first two columns of Ask Ellen are also published. The first talks about how to deal with bullying, while the second discusses dealing with boys at conventions and with troubling emotions.

Sheryl Sandberg, the COO of Facebook, is making news with her new book Lean In, which was featured on a recent 60 Minutes. Exclusive 60 Minutes Overtime content talks about the importance of mentoring to women’s success. These topics were also discussed on a recent roundtable on Meet the Press, as well.

Along similar lines, The Huffington Post article “Callie Khouri, ‘Nashville’ Creator, On Taylor Swift, ‘Having It All’ & Why TV Beats Film For Women” is worth a read, too.

I also realized that if I wanted to see women represented in a way I found true, respectful, honest and more like women I actually know, I was going to have to write them myself. That doesn’t mean I want to write only perfect, heroic characters by the way. I like writing flawed women, and being one, it’s something I feel I can write with some veracity and authority.

Congratulations to Katie Lucas on her film’s selection for the Tribeca Film Festival (via Amanda Lucas).

In Star Wars news, Consetta Parker wrote a really fun blog post for Star Wars Wife, discussing how she met her trooper husband. At Star Wars Blog, John Booth writes about “Leigh Brackett and Small Town Star Wars.” Leigh Brackett wrote the original screenplay for Empire Strikes Back, which underwent rewrites by others after she died from cancer in 1978.

Susana Polo at TheMarySue has a great article called Why Wonder Woman Should Carry a Scrunchie Around, featuring art from Kevin Warren. Any woman with long hair knows that it’s impossible to win a fight with hair in your eyes. Hopefully, The Hunger Games movie’s success, where Katniss’ braid didn’t seem to hinder her appeal, helps prove that fans will engage with female characters without flowy, unrealistic hair.

Also from Polo at The MarySue is the incredible story of Maria Toorpakai Wazir, who pretended to be a boy to play squash in Pakistan.

On the movie front, io9 featured some amazing cosplay of Vanellope and her kart from Wreck-It Ralph. And MTV.com Splash Page had an interesting article about Kevin Feige, head of Marvel Studios, talking about Gwyneth Paltrow’s role in Iron Man 3. Particularly liked this comment:

“In this movie [Iron Man 3] we play with the convention of the damsel in distress. We are bored by the damsel in distress. But, sometimes we need our hero to be desperate enough in fighting for something other than just his own life. So, there is fun to be had with ‘Is Pepper in danger or is Pepper the savior?’ over the course of this movie.”

Fangirl

Fangirl

Tricia Barr took her understanding of brand management and marketing, mixed it with a love of genre storytelling, and added a dash of social media flare to create FANgirl Blog, where she discusses Star Wars, fandom, and the intersection of women within Star Wars fandom. She is co-author of Ultimate Star Wars and Star Wars Visual Encyclopedia from DK Publishing, a featured writer for Star Wars Insider magazine with numerous articles on the Hero's Journey. Her FANgirl opinions can be heard on the podcasts Hyperspace Theories and Fangirls Going Rogue. Tricia Barr's novel, Wynde, won the 2014 Independent Publisher Book Award Gold Medal for Best Science Fiction/Fantasy/Horror Ebook. She was also part of Silence in the Library's successful all-female creator science fiction and fantasy anthology Athena's Daughters, which is available now. For excerpts and tales of her adventures in creating a fictional universe, hop over to TriciaBarr.com.