Let's Talk Bros.

Yeah. You read that right.

So I just got back from viewing X-Men: Days of Future Past. It was actually a really good movie--well written, well acted, just all around impressive. Thank you Marvel, for creating some seriously legit superhero movies in the last few years. I don't have any complaints about it. Just an observation.

I've noticed a trend in Hollywood and filmmaking. Not specific to sci-fi films. Films in general. And I'm not the first person to have noticed this trend. I'll tell you more about it in a sec.

I'm going to share a few pictures and see if you can tell what I'm talking about.

There are lots more examples. But if you haven't yet seen the trend, I'll just say it.

There are so many movies with these meaningful male friendships. There are a few movies where meaningful best friendships between women are explored, but not really on the scale of superheroes, sci-fi, or drama. Best friendships between women are usually explored in rom-coms, and they generally don't get quite as much critical acclaim as some of these movies have.

There's actually a test for this. It's called the Bechdel Test. It's a pretty straightforward test. Its rules:

1) Two named female characters who
2) talk to each other
3) about something besides a man.

Now I know some of you might write this off as feminist b*tching, but I want you to think about it. How many sci-fi/superhero movies have you seen about female cohorts? How many dramas? When was the last time you saw two female characters playing a game of chess together, talking about mutant rights, or commanding the Starship Enterprise, or uplifting an entire nation and giving them hope?

I can't even count a full handful of fingers for plots like that. The closest I can think of is the trio of Poison Ivy/Harley Quinn/Catwoman from the DC world, and they definitely haven't been in a movie together about how Poison Ivy and Catwoman are disagreeing about the extent to which they should commit crimes or not commit them, ethically.

It just doesn't happen. Not to say that I don't think it couldn't happen. I think it's entirely plausible. I think that Hollywood just needs to realize they've got a whole mine of untapped potential sitting right under their noses, and I'm pretty sure that there's an audience for those kinds of stories. But there's this  sentiment that no one wants to see those stories. That no one cares about female friendships.

And maybe they don't. Maybe I'm just the one person who'd like to see a film about a relationship between two best female friends. But just based on the response to the strong solo female protagonist films like Hunger Games and Divergent, I don't think it's that much of a stretch to say that people would be interested in watching movies about meaningful friendships between two strong women.

We are half the population, after all.

But seriously. Go see Days of Future Past. It's a good one. And yes. The friendship between Magneto and Charles did make me get a little misty. I'm not saying I don't appreciate a good male friendship.

I'm just saying I think people would appreciate a movie about a good female friendship, too.