Girls Who Kick Butt

Whether you love Twilight or loathe it, there are two things almost everyone can agree on: One, Twilight is fun to blog about. Two, Bella is about as exciting as dry, self-absorbed white toast.

It’s unfortunately all too common for books and movies to feature bland, constantly sighing women, and leave all the high-speed chases, flamethrowers, and werewolf transformations to the male characters. But it is kind of weird for a book marketed mostly to girls to make its female lead so uninspiring. As an antidote, here’s a list of butt-kicking, name-taking females who would never be caught sitting out of the action:

Ellen Ripley – Alien Series
Lt. Ellen Ripley broke tons of gender barriers for female movie characters, but none more important than the carry-a-flamethrower-into-a-nest-of-homicidal-aliens barrier. Repeatedly forced to take control of the situation when her (mostly male) superiors screw things up, Ripley is the killer queen of movie heroines.

Lyra Belacqua – His Dark Materials
Preteen heroines tend to be obedient and well mannered to a fault (think of the Chronicles of Narnia). Lyra Belacqua, on the other hand, is a fighting, swearing, disobedient liar, which is exactly what you’d want from someone who has to save the world from its own authority figures.

Beatrix Kiddo – Kill Bill Parts 1 & 2
Life is rarely easy for the strong-willed heroine, and nobody has it much harder than Beatrix Kiddo, who has to carve out a life for herself in the most literal sense after waking from a years-long coma. Extremely violent hijinks ensue.

Nancy Drew - Many Books
It might have been a while since you cracked a Nancy Drew story, but the young sleuth has been the go-to character for mysterious old clocks, velvet masks, and whispering statues for generations of readers.

Buffy Summers – Buffy the Vampire Slayer Series
Buffy Summers is the polar opposite of Bella Swan in more ways than one, but if we had to choose one trait that most sets them apart it would have to be all of the vampire slaying.

Think most female main characters are too washed out? Who are your favorite butt-kicking heroines?

Related post: Blogging New Moon: Part 16