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Posted
Monday, February 02, 2009 10:54 AM
| By
Willa Paskin
In the Sunday New York Times, Ginia Bellafante praised USA's sleek and cheeky Miami spy show Burn Notice as a "winning post-feminist revenge fantasy." Why? The series' leading lady, Fiona (played by Gabrielle Anwar) has zero respect for the He's Just Not That Into You meme.
Unlike women following the advice of the aforementioned self-help book, Fiona refuses to accept her super spy, ex-boyfriend Michael's frequent rejections, regularly engaging in jealousy-inducing, bikini wearing antics to win him back (while, simultaneously, helping him blow things up, shoot people and clear his name). In Bellafante's reading, this shameless behavior doesn't make Fiona pathetic, it makes her a badass who has tapped into her own masculinity. Instead of feeling powerless and mortified because she loves someone who doesn't love her in return, Fiona won't "regard her romantic pursuit as a pitiable behavior in need of reform."
While Bellafante might have reserved the "post feminist revenge fantasy" compliment for a character who doesn't spend her time "interrupting stakeouts and shooting sprees and manhunts to ask Michael for a key to his apartment," she's got a point: He's Just Not That Into You may be common sense, but it's also based on a woman's (supposed) total powerlessness in starting relationships.
If he's into you, he'll call. Doing anything proactive would be a waste of time, not to mention, pathetic. (As the trailer for next week's film version of He's Just Not That Into You makes abundantly clear, that one extra, unsolicited phone call could be really, really embarrassing.) God forbid, you should pursue some one you truly liked; you might get rejected to your face, which would be so much harder to bear than getting passively rejected by an unanswered voice mail. If the prospect of a real-time dismissal seems worth the risk in certain, obviously rare!, cases, He's Just Not That Into You can't help. Fiona could. Maybe she should write her own book (if she can find time between all the fire fights). It could be called He's Just Not That Into You: Who Cares?
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