Little miss murder has been around since the black and white days of noir but what do you as a writer more importantly as an audience member think of the way this cliche is handled in the modern day? Is an attractive and murderous women in a tight leather suit a worn out scene or still cool. A good influence or a bad one on society and younger girls especially. Do you think most sexy combatant female characters are one denominational and only there for sex appeal or an icon of empowerment?
I'd love to hear your thoughts and when and how you have or haven;t employed this archetype.
(also I don't mean simply a woman who is a fighter or solider, I mean one that is intentional made to be very seductive)
The problem I have with traditional femme fatale is that there is no personality or motivation beneath the surface. They're just there to be sexy and try to murder some dude. Sometimes they get the motivation which boils down to the a woman scorned thing or a broken heart. It's tiring and uninteresting.
It's fine to have a good looking murderous woman in your story but they need a personality as elaborate as any other character. A more interesting goal than murdering the dude and a life that isn't depending on a man.
The thing about the femme fatale is that on paper, she sounds like just your basic archetype, that anything can be done with. The problem with the trope is that no one takes the time to develop her outside of the basic "sexy, mean, leather" personality. As with any character trope, she can be developed. Giving her proper motivation and humanizing her would add a fresh twist to the otherwise lifeless and frankly offensive trope.
You see my biggest problem with this archetype is a bigger problem altogether. I don't mean to come off as prudish but I've never been very fond of the idea or writing murder, violence, and hurting people as something so casually sexy. Even if the people being killed and beaten are the "bad guys", it always rubs me the wrong way when the character that is the "hero" or is at least on the hero's team is so nonchalant about causing people pain and seems to be having a bit of fun with it, it's just a bad vibe for team good guy. I guess that different genres have different moods and morals but this one seems pretty common in all action ya know?
It can be good but many times there is no personality behind the character or backstory behind the character for the reason they act the way they do because unless they have some mental disorder, people don't just choose to have a life of seducing and killing. But if they are doing it because, say, they are forced to kill because their family would be killed otherwise, that makes them seem like an actual person. It's even better if they regret every time they kill someone, and it slowly swallows them up whole.
