What Happened to the Knight in Shining Armour?
Once upon a time a love story involved two things, Hero’s and romance. The fairy tales all tell of the gallant knight that rescues the princess from certain death, or in some cases the princess who rescues the handsome prince (looking at you froggy).
The characters of a traditional romance were not necessarily as two dimensional as the hero’s and heroines of children’s tales but the archetypes were still somewhat similar, though a bodice ripper would not be complete without a strong independent woman in situations beyond her control, unlike the hapless princess who waits for her rescue.
But somewhere things have gone a little haywire. I call it the “Edward Cullen Effect” (ECE) for though Eddy was certainly by no means the first he is the most obvious caricature of the decline of the strong male lead into an emotional wreck of mental illness and emotional scaring. We are no longer presented with a masculine hero who can protect and love the heroine but rather an anti-hero that the heroine and the heroine alone is able to fix or not, after all if you can save the hero from his haunted past he would have no reason to stand around looking broody.
I have long had an obsession with what we call bodice ripper romance novels and whilst I have not read nearly the quantity as Tracey, I get the formula and I know where it is going. I consider myself to be somewhat knowledgeable in the tragic soft core erotica that is historical and fantastical romance novels. The formula is thus, take a strong independent and beautiful woman who for whatever reason does not wish to be in a relationship with anyone, insert strong male lead, play game of cat and mouse, end up together in the end. Sure there is generally flaws on both sides but they aren’t insurmountable – and within 200 or so pages those problems have generally been resolved and the problems are now from an outside villain trying to keep the new loving couple apart.
As many of you know I have become somewhat obsessed with a computer game called Dragon Age made by Bioware. It has everything I love about stories – corny romance, and the ability to play a woman who kicks ass and fells the enemy by the bucket load. But I am concentrating on the romance options for the moment and how the ECE has taken effect in this particular place. I could write epic pages on the selfishness of Alistair in Origins, or the emotional detachment of Morrigan, the abuses suffered by zevron that make him sexually available but never truly emotionally stable and then there is Leiliana – don’t even get me started on the god bothering lesbian with mummy issues. However I prefer to illustrate my point by taking a look at the Dragon Age 2 love interest Anders.
Anders is a mage, and apostate to be correct which is an illegal mage, and to boot you also find out at the beginning (SPOILER ALERT) that he has merged with a fade spirit which also makes him an abomination. Hawke (thats me) in this playthrough is a human female rogue. You have options to flirt with Anders from very early on and whilst some of the “basic” flirt options turn into quite weird actual conversation (you should stay somewhere else – becomes don’t tell me these things or I may just have to lock you up) and there is many a reference to Hawke being a bit of a bondage queen (2 options so far that have reference liking to be hurt in addition to the lock you up comment), there is alos an indication of a not so healthy obsession with the “possession”, begging the question is it ever not a threesome with Anders and if so what cause does he have to be so damn grumpy. Further he keeps informing me that as an apostate our lives will never be normal, he will always be hunted, we would always have to avoid the templars (which we have successfully done with little effort for 6 years now – oh did I mention I come from a family of apostates you douchebag – that is NORMAL for me.)
To be honest I chose that I would romance Anders in DA2 before I even started the game. The same character in DA:A was light hearted, fun the perfect partner. Not so in DA2, where he has become a romantic option and somehow been injected with the ECE. He is dark, broody, broken beyond repair and also selfish.
So leave him you say, but then what are the other romance options, the tortured Elf bent on revenge against his former slave master that keeps him emotionally distant with body issues due to his forced lyrium tatoo’s? The former ship captain thief who game says carries STD’s like others carry copper peices, possibly able to be emotionally attached but doubtfully ever physically monogamous? Or perhaps the overly innocent Dalish elf who reminds me of a wide eyed child? Lets not forget I can pay some extra $$ to unlock the stable but celebrate Human.... oh the choices.
Where is the good guy, the one who will stand beside me as an equal and take on evil like in the tales of old. Not the whiny anti-hero that needs me to prop them up emotionally whilst simultaneously taking on the forces of evil single handed.
The ECE in short takes mental illness and glorifies it as something “sexy” I dread the generation of tweens now growing up who will no doubt think comparing their particular brand of crazy is more likely to get them a date then a nice smile and good conversation.
The characters of a traditional romance were not necessarily as two dimensional as the hero’s and heroines of children’s tales but the archetypes were still somewhat similar, though a bodice ripper would not be complete without a strong independent woman in situations beyond her control, unlike the hapless princess who waits for her rescue.
But somewhere things have gone a little haywire. I call it the “Edward Cullen Effect” (ECE) for though Eddy was certainly by no means the first he is the most obvious caricature of the decline of the strong male lead into an emotional wreck of mental illness and emotional scaring. We are no longer presented with a masculine hero who can protect and love the heroine but rather an anti-hero that the heroine and the heroine alone is able to fix or not, after all if you can save the hero from his haunted past he would have no reason to stand around looking broody.
I have long had an obsession with what we call bodice ripper romance novels and whilst I have not read nearly the quantity as Tracey, I get the formula and I know where it is going. I consider myself to be somewhat knowledgeable in the tragic soft core erotica that is historical and fantastical romance novels. The formula is thus, take a strong independent and beautiful woman who for whatever reason does not wish to be in a relationship with anyone, insert strong male lead, play game of cat and mouse, end up together in the end. Sure there is generally flaws on both sides but they aren’t insurmountable – and within 200 or so pages those problems have generally been resolved and the problems are now from an outside villain trying to keep the new loving couple apart.
As many of you know I have become somewhat obsessed with a computer game called Dragon Age made by Bioware. It has everything I love about stories – corny romance, and the ability to play a woman who kicks ass and fells the enemy by the bucket load. But I am concentrating on the romance options for the moment and how the ECE has taken effect in this particular place. I could write epic pages on the selfishness of Alistair in Origins, or the emotional detachment of Morrigan, the abuses suffered by zevron that make him sexually available but never truly emotionally stable and then there is Leiliana – don’t even get me started on the god bothering lesbian with mummy issues. However I prefer to illustrate my point by taking a look at the Dragon Age 2 love interest Anders.
Anders is a mage, and apostate to be correct which is an illegal mage, and to boot you also find out at the beginning (SPOILER ALERT) that he has merged with a fade spirit which also makes him an abomination. Hawke (thats me) in this playthrough is a human female rogue. You have options to flirt with Anders from very early on and whilst some of the “basic” flirt options turn into quite weird actual conversation (you should stay somewhere else – becomes don’t tell me these things or I may just have to lock you up) and there is many a reference to Hawke being a bit of a bondage queen (2 options so far that have reference liking to be hurt in addition to the lock you up comment), there is alos an indication of a not so healthy obsession with the “possession”, begging the question is it ever not a threesome with Anders and if so what cause does he have to be so damn grumpy. Further he keeps informing me that as an apostate our lives will never be normal, he will always be hunted, we would always have to avoid the templars (which we have successfully done with little effort for 6 years now – oh did I mention I come from a family of apostates you douchebag – that is NORMAL for me.)
To be honest I chose that I would romance Anders in DA2 before I even started the game. The same character in DA:A was light hearted, fun the perfect partner. Not so in DA2, where he has become a romantic option and somehow been injected with the ECE. He is dark, broody, broken beyond repair and also selfish.
So leave him you say, but then what are the other romance options, the tortured Elf bent on revenge against his former slave master that keeps him emotionally distant with body issues due to his forced lyrium tatoo’s? The former ship captain thief who game says carries STD’s like others carry copper peices, possibly able to be emotionally attached but doubtfully ever physically monogamous? Or perhaps the overly innocent Dalish elf who reminds me of a wide eyed child? Lets not forget I can pay some extra $$ to unlock the stable but celebrate Human.... oh the choices.
Where is the good guy, the one who will stand beside me as an equal and take on evil like in the tales of old. Not the whiny anti-hero that needs me to prop them up emotionally whilst simultaneously taking on the forces of evil single handed.
The ECE in short takes mental illness and glorifies it as something “sexy” I dread the generation of tweens now growing up who will no doubt think comparing their particular brand of crazy is more likely to get them a date then a nice smile and good conversation.