For my Film Studies AS, we briefly touched upon the 'Final Girl' theory whilst studying the Slasher films Halloween (1978) and Scream (1996). The Final Girl theorist Carol J Clover noted that this figure within the Slasher genre is typically: intelligent, maternal, androgynous, insightful and has equal masculine/feminine traits. Many would interpret that the final female survivor as 'empowering to women'; I find it quite the opposite. The 'Final Girl' often dresses masculine, has an ambiguous name and is afraid of sex- quite often they are a virgin. Now, if we look at the typical MALE protagonist they generally resemble the highest, optimum idea of masculinity. They do not require feminine traits to allow them to survive or out run a psychotic murderer. So, this leads me to ask: why is an assumption made that a female is somewhat 'incomplete' if they embrace their femininity? Why do they require equally masculine traits to live whilst a male does not require any sense of femininity?
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