By Roshni Aruna Gupta, 17, Mallya Aditi International School, Bangalore, India
Damsels in distress? Not here. Roshni Aruna Gupta, 17, recommends “Ocean’s 8” and two other works where female antiheroes “command the plan.”Credit...Barry Wetcher/Warner Bros.
The vault that cracks with 0.03 seconds to spare. The blatantly obvious disguises crafted to fool us (they don’t). If you’re a crime fiction fanatic, you’ve seen these plot twists coming from miles away.
But the worst offender? A perfectly orchestrated crisis situation, when the masterfully concocted plan inevitably flies off the rails. We’re SO familiar with the leading woman turning toward her male antihero with wide-eyes and visibly trembling panic — “What do we do now?,” predictably designed to prove his superior criminal dominance to us. If this stereotype was any more outdated, it would come embedded in a VHS cassette.
Have we all been privy to this? 100 percent. Do I subscribe to it? No. Here are three characters who have redefined female antiheroes into powerful, ingenious women that command the plan rather than being its damsel in distress.
Debbie Ocean (“Ocean’s 8”)
Remember Danny Ocean pulling off three mind-boggling Las Vegas casino robberies in 2001? Meet his younger sister Debbie — more calculated, strategic and in a committed long-term relationship with grand larceny. Fresh out of prison, her first introduction is thieving designer couture with the ease of scheduling her next dentist appointment. THE CONFIDENCE. Her blueprint? Not her brother’s sidekick. Rather, masterminding a heist photographed on the most fashion-forward red carpet — the Met Gala. Playing puppet-master, she snatches a $150 million Cartier necklace from right under our noses, all in stilettos, a sparkly-embroidered gown and a side dish of handcuffs served cold to her ex-boyfriend. You may think you’ve left her in the dust … but she’s so far ahead, her master plans are criminally invisible. If you can still visualize a jewelry heist without Ocean’s all-female Toussaint-thieving team, then you’re clearly still trapped in the Met’s bathroom stall (IYKYK).
Harley Quinn (DC Comics)
Harley is Debbie’s polar opposite — mayhem personified with a swinging baseball bat, toeing the line between insane and even more insane. Entering the criminal underworld as the Joker’s punchline, her identity was devoted cries of “Mistah J!” A switch-up later, she breaks up with him. The next divorce: with her worshiping “ditzy” characterization. Her new center of gravity is a performative persona that hides a lethally instinctive intelligence we didn’t uncover soon enough. Don’t get me wrong, Harley is every bit emotionally unstable as the stereotypical female sidekick (heavily sprinkled with madness of course). The divergence? She commands her psychiatric genius, forming powerful alliances and choreographing DC’s most thrilling jailbreaks that live rent-free in our heads. If you dig up old Halloween memories, I’m sure you’ll come across parades of blue and red-dyed pigtails — a nod to her proving that emotionally unstable and wildly chaotic can exist in the same “squad” as nefariously independent and maniacally powerful.
Inej Ghafa (“Six of Crows”)
Assassin Inej Ghafa wields her knives to slash through female antihero stereotypes with the same precision as she does her enemies. A sidekick? Perhaps. A frazzled hindrance? NEVER. She may not sketch the map — we’ll leave that to her ally Kaz Brekker — but she’s the blade that silently pirouettes as Death. Without her? The duology would’ve been half a chapter of a criminal master plan … zero execution. Striking down conventions of being the male lead’s shadow with deadly intention, Inej operates according to her OWN moral code, accessorized with blades carrying the names of her Saints — all grounded in the Suli faith. “I will have you without armor, Kaz Brekker, or I will not have you at all,” she grounds, refusing to dismantle her principles to fit his comfort. If you weren’t squealing and kicking at 3 a.m. as she embodies the queen, not the pawn, then you’ve sorely missed out!
