Why I shake my fist when Netflix whacks a woman we never see
January 3, 2024 12:50 AM Subscribe
My dead sister-in-law was a human being. She could not emulate a Hallmark movie mom. Nor can her humanity be flattened into a corny hologram smiling over the people who miss her. She isn’t some straightforward Saint Mary watching over all of us. Rachel was complicated and messy and so was her life and her relationships. She gave with her whole heart and, even as her body failed, strived to carry the crushing weight of trying to do it all. It’s exactly this nuance and pressure that dies with these wife-mom characters. from ’Tis the Season to Kill the Dead-Mom Holiday Movie Trope
Wait till they hear about the girl in the fridge...
posted by gible at 4:31 AM on January 3 [4 favorites]
posted by gible at 4:31 AM on January 3 [4 favorites]
When we’re suffering grief these tropes definitely hit hard. The summer after my daughter died I did a one-week writers’ workshop where it seemed like every third person was “birthing a novel” or editing was “like labour pains.” But of course, the grief was mine.
Like the similes and metaphors above tropes can be lazy. But that’s the thing about rom coms…they are usually designed like morality plays, so the rightful universe (monogamous pairing, usually heteronormative) is maintained. I think there’s a place for them for sure. It’s just maybe a smaller place.
Another thing I did after my daughter died was watch Sex and the City up to just before Miranda got pregnant, because I knew I could stick to an equally fantastic world of no babies. Sometimes it’s a matter of picking your poison.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:06 AM on January 3 [10 favorites]
Like the similes and metaphors above tropes can be lazy. But that’s the thing about rom coms…they are usually designed like morality plays, so the rightful universe (monogamous pairing, usually heteronormative) is maintained. I think there’s a place for them for sure. It’s just maybe a smaller place.
Another thing I did after my daughter died was watch Sex and the City up to just before Miranda got pregnant, because I knew I could stick to an equally fantastic world of no babies. Sometimes it’s a matter of picking your poison.
posted by warriorqueen at 5:06 AM on January 3 [10 favorites]
Just watched the series finale of Hilda last night and was impressed at how that show allowed its young heroine to have an appropriately protective mother AND adventures.
posted by rikschell at 5:08 AM on January 3 [6 favorites]
posted by rikschell at 5:08 AM on January 3 [6 favorites]
My dead sister-in-law was a human being. She could not emulate a Hallmark movie mom. Nor can her humanity be flattened into a corny hologram smiling over the people who miss her.
It sure can't with that kind of attitude, Werner Herzog. Authentic engagement with grief and loss has no place in trite holiday movies. They are literally there to help make the season merry and bright. Maybe also sell an ornament or two.
posted by cupcakeninja at 7:59 AM on January 3 [7 favorites]
It sure can't with that kind of attitude, Werner Herzog. Authentic engagement with grief and loss has no place in trite holiday movies. They are literally there to help make the season merry and bright. Maybe also sell an ornament or two.
posted by cupcakeninja at 7:59 AM on January 3 [7 favorites]
This writer is looking for what they need in absolutely the wrong places. You don't go to Le Cigare Volant and ask for a whopper junior. It's not a fair ask.
But I do have some sympathy... it's hard when you've suffered such a deep loss, and you just want to turn on an easy pleasant holiday movie that won't ask you to think any deep thoughts, and suddenly get confronted with a personally triggering trope of the genre. Now you're spiraling into heavy grief again, and you feel cheated, because that's exactly what you were trying to avoid, goddamnit. I get that.
posted by MiraK at 9:40 AM on January 3 [11 favorites]
But I do have some sympathy... it's hard when you've suffered such a deep loss, and you just want to turn on an easy pleasant holiday movie that won't ask you to think any deep thoughts, and suddenly get confronted with a personally triggering trope of the genre. Now you're spiraling into heavy grief again, and you feel cheated, because that's exactly what you were trying to avoid, goddamnit. I get that.
posted by MiraK at 9:40 AM on January 3 [11 favorites]
Anime even has a dead mom hairstyle.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 11:50 AM on January 3 [3 favorites]
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 11:50 AM on January 3 [3 favorites]
Hallmark features a guy whose wife ran off and he seriously hasn't bothered or tried to get a divorce for seven years, apparently?
Unfortunately that is common.
posted by The_Vegetables at 12:27 PM on January 3 [5 favorites]
Unfortunately that is common.
posted by The_Vegetables at 12:27 PM on January 3 [5 favorites]
> Unfortunately that is common.
Yeah, as a divorced mom who is currently dating, this is sooooo common.
posted by MiraK at 1:00 PM on January 3 [7 favorites]
Yeah, as a divorced mom who is currently dating, this is sooooo common.
posted by MiraK at 1:00 PM on January 3 [7 favorites]
Yes its shocking being ambushed by your TV set.
posted by Narrative_Historian at 2:13 PM on January 3 [3 favorites]
posted by Narrative_Historian at 2:13 PM on January 3 [3 favorites]
I always heard that the trope comes from the fact that like 30% of women used to die in childbirth, so it really wasn't uncommon to have a deceased mother. Now though, it's just a lazy hold-over and easy writing?
posted by LizBoBiz at 4:25 PM on January 3 [1 favorite]
posted by LizBoBiz at 4:25 PM on January 3 [1 favorite]
I cannot remember where (possibly linked from the blue?) I read an article in the last few months about how the audience for Hallmark romances where the girl living in the big city settles down with the dude from her home town isn't actually millennials or Gen Z. The actual audience is apparently boomer/Gen X parents (moms) who live in small towns and have the fantasy that their kids (daughters) will move home and provide them with grandkids.
The widowers with kids waiting for a wife/mom to make an insta-family probably look to this audience like providers of immediate grandkids to imagine enjoying, with less competition for fun grandparent stuff, since there's no division of custody as there would be with a divorce.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 4:58 PM on January 3 [2 favorites]
The widowers with kids waiting for a wife/mom to make an insta-family probably look to this audience like providers of immediate grandkids to imagine enjoying, with less competition for fun grandparent stuff, since there's no division of custody as there would be with a divorce.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 4:58 PM on January 3 [2 favorites]
The actual audience is apparently boomer/Gen X
Has the target audience for Hallmark ever been anything but the retirement age crowd?
posted by kjs3 at 5:32 PM on January 3 [2 favorites]
Has the target audience for Hallmark ever been anything but the retirement age crowd?
posted by kjs3 at 5:32 PM on January 3 [2 favorites]
Has the target audience for Hallmark ever been anything but the retirement age crowd?
The point implicit in the comparison of the "small town" grandmas vs the "city" daughter-moms is that the Hallmark audience is of a particular cultural stripe as well as old enough to have college grad daughters.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 5:54 PM on January 3 [1 favorite]
The point implicit in the comparison of the "small town" grandmas vs the "city" daughter-moms is that the Hallmark audience is of a particular cultural stripe as well as old enough to have college grad daughters.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 5:54 PM on January 3 [1 favorite]
... I see that the thread includes an essay about Hallmark Movies being fascist propaganda, actually.
Never change, MetaFilter.
posted by MiraK at 4:07 AM on January 4 [3 favorites]
Never change, MetaFilter.
posted by MiraK at 4:07 AM on January 4 [3 favorites]
Yeah, as a divorced mom who is currently dating, this is sooooo common.
@MiraK: Back when I was a divorced father dating, it became de rigueur to clarify "So are you 'judge has signed paperwork' divorced, or something short of that?". Far to many "well, actually..." responses.
posted by kjs3 at 10:48 AM on January 4 [3 favorites]
@MiraK: Back when I was a divorced father dating, it became de rigueur to clarify "So are you 'judge has signed paperwork' divorced, or something short of that?". Far to many "well, actually..." responses.
posted by kjs3 at 10:48 AM on January 4 [3 favorites]
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Hallmark usually has a ton of dead relatives in someone's past. If it's not a dead partner, it's a dead parent. They're all about "don't let your past grief make you unable to celebrate! You can find new love!"
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:51 AM on January 3 [5 favorites]