She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is set to release later this week, with the Disney Plus series’ first episode debuting on the streaming platform on August 18. Ahead of its release, lead actress Tatiana Maslany has already denounced the title of “strong female lead” that has been attached to the superhero, saying that it removes the “nuances” of the character.
She-Hulk’s Tatiana Maslany calls ‘strong female lead’ archetype ‘reductive’
For some time, Maslany has found the “strong female lead” archetype annoying, rather than celebratory (via The Guardian). “It’s reductive,” she explains. “It’s just as much a shaving off of all the nuances, and just as much of a trope. It’s a box that nobody fits into. Even the phrase is frustrating. It’s as if we’re supposed to be grateful that we get to be that.”
The She-Hulk actress has had some lofty experience in being a show’s lead, who just so happens to be a woman. She played a group of 11 clones during her tenure in Orphan Black, picking up an Emmy for her performance, and starred in the movie Destroyer alongside the likes of Nicole Kidman and Bryan Cranston.
Maslany is hopeful that when people watch She-Hulk, they will focus more on the story being told. She also recognizes that the writing of Jessica Gao has allowed for a “girliness” and “celebration of female friendship” unlike anything we’ve seen from the MCU before. “She suddenly has this value in terms of optics,” she says of her character. “She becomes tokenized for her superhero-ness… But I do think there’s been this paradigm shift. It takes time and it’s about finding new ways to tell stories.”
Mark Ruffalo, Tim Roth, Benedict Wong, Ginger Gonzaga, Jameela Jamil, Charlie Cox, Josh Segarra, and Griffin Matthews also star.
In other news, the She-Hulk episode 1 runtime has been revealed ahead of its Disney Plus premiere, and MCU fans have wondered if I Am Groot is canon or not and if so, where it fits into the MCU timeline.
