At first glance, this looks like a great moment for women on television. Many smart and confident female characters have paraded onto the small screen over the past few years. But I'm bothered by one persistent caveat: that the more astute and capable many of these women are, the more likely it is that they're also completely nuts.
I don't mean complicated, difficult, thorny or complex. I mean that these women are portrayed as volcanoes that could blow at any minute. Worse, the very abilities and skills that make them singular and interesting come coupled with some hideous psychic deficiency.
On "Nurse Jackie," for example, the main character is an excellent R.N. in part because she's self-medicated into a state of extreme calm. On "The Killing," Detective Linden, the world-weary, cold-souled cop, is a tenacious investigator in part because she's obsessive and damaged and a pretty terrible mother. And then there's "Homeland," on which Carrie Mathison, the nearly clairvoyant C.I.A. agent, is bipolar, unhinged and has proved, in her pursuit of an undercover terrorist, to be recklessly promiscuous.
These aren't just complicating characteristics like, say, Don Draper's narcissism. The suggestion in all of these shows is that a female character's flaws are inextricably linked to her strengths. Take away this pill problem or that personality disorder, and the exceptional qualities vanish as well. And this is not always viewed as a tragedy — when Carrie undergoes electroconvulsive therapy, we breathe a sigh of relief and draw closer. Look how restful it is for her, enjoying a nice sandwich and sleeping peacefully in her childhood bed.
You'd think the outlook would be sunnier on some of the lighter TV dramas and comedies, which have also lately offered several strong and inspiring (if neurotic) female protagonists, from Annie Edison of "Community" to Leslie Knope of "Parks and Recreation." Yet here, too, an alarming number of accomplished women are also portrayed as spending most of their waking hours swooning like lovesick tweens — whether it's Emily on "Emily Owens, M.D." (a knowledgeable doctor who loses focus whenever her super-dreamy crush enters the room), the title character of "Whitney" (a garrulous photographer who is nonetheless fixated on her looks and her ability to keep attractive romantic rivals away from her man), or Mindy of "The Mindy Project" (a highly paid ob-gyn who's obsessed with being too old and not pretty enough to land a husband). Even a classical comedic heroine like Liz Lemon on "30 Rock" is frequently reduced to flailing and squirming like an overcaffeinated adolescent. The moral of many of these shows doesn't seem so far off from that of those fatalistic female-centric magazine features that seem to run every few months; something along the lines of, "You can't have it all, ladies, and you'll run yourself ragged if you even try."
We could take heart that at least women are depicted as being just as reckless and promiscuous and demanding and intense as their male counterparts, if their bad behavior weren't so often accompanied by a horror soundtrack and dizzying camera angles that encourage us to view them as unhinged. The crazed antics of male characters like Don Draper, Walter White or Dr. Gregory House are reliably treated as bold, fearless and even ultimately heroic (a daring remark saves the big account; a lunatic gesture scares off a murderous thug; an abrasive approach miraculously yields the answer that saves a young girl's life). Female characters rarely enjoy such romantic spin.
Their flaws are fatal, or at least obviously self-destructive, and they seem designed to invite censure. Time and again, we, the audience, are cast in the role of morally superior observers to these nut jobs. At times we might relate to a flash of anger, a fit of tears, a sudden urge to seduce a stranger in a bar, but we're constantly being warned that these behaviors aren't normal. They render these women out of step with the sane world.
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