Something that has become all too apparent in today’s media is the women’s loss trope. A woman, who is typically the heroine of the story, will sacrifice something valuable to her—be it her significant other, her powers or her life. This recurring idea in entertainment has the female character make the sacrifice, either to go through a metamorphosis or to achieve her goal. This usually ends with the audience understanding that the heroes won and anyone good has received a happy ending. 

However, the happy ending for the woman, if she is alive at the end, is superficial and reinforces the lesson that happiness comes with a price.

This trope doesn’t exist for men because the male protagonist doesn’t usually have to sacrifice in order to win, or there is a resurrection where he gets whatever he lost back. Many have credited this trope to the new age of more “realistic” and “gritty” storytelling of today, but male directors and writers are the root of it for their incorrect and misogynistic storytelling. After all, most male heroes still “get it all” at the end of stories today, unlike their female counterparts.

To explore this concept in a popular series, let’s look at Star Wars’ Rey. Starting out as a scavenger mentally chained to a desert planet by herself, she learns of her newfound powers and seeks teachers and belonging. Throughout the sequel trilogy, she blossoms into a strong jedi, toughened by her parents’ abandonment and subsequent years of fighting for her freedom and her life. By the final movie, she has found a family in her friends and a rocky romance in Kylo Ren, also known as Ben Solo. In order to beat her final foe, she and newly-redeemed Ben Solo must somehow slay the evil Palpatine. By the end of the battle, both Palpatine and Rey have died and Ben is slowly making his way to his dead soulmate. He uses his power to bring Rey to life but dies shortly after. Rey then flies to another desert planet and her story ends there, alone. 

Rey is a 2-in-1; she sacrifices both her love and her life, albeit temporarily. It is made out in the film that Rey was satisfied with this ending and was happy. This, coupled with Rey’s loss, plays into the woman’s loss trope and explains why her “happily ever after” felt a bit hollow. How can we expect Rey to be happy when someone who is described as her other half is dead? Director JJ Abrams attempts to remedy this sadness by having Rey join the Skywalker family, but they are also all dead. The sequel trilogy may boast female empowerment, but if they deny the viewers a glimpse at the sadness that Rey must feel after losing so much, then it only enforces the misogynistic stereotype that stoicism is a trait that all heroines must have if they are to be taken seriously.

This trope can be seen in many action movies, especially when they are male-led, and it’s hypocritical of their ‘girl power’ stance, which is usually performative, by simply having a heroine in a male-dominated group. Directors and studios will take one step forward by including a powerful woman, then take two steps backwards by having her emotionally stunted or sacrificed for the greater good, a la Marvel’s Black Widow. 

This type of storytelling should be stopped and corrected because of the misogyny, and it’s simply bad writing. An easy solution would be to include female writers, which are often missing from this kind of media. Unfortunately, not many mainstream heroines are female-written, the few exceptions being Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel. Until modern media breaks free of these misogynistic writing styles, little girls will mostly look up to sad and one-sided heroines.