American Girls?

I grew up reading the American Girls books. I loved the different perspectives on American history that I learned about from Felicity, Kirsten, Addy, Samantha and Molly, each sharing their stories from widely different eras and backgrounds, from colonial days to the Civil War, to WWII.

Over the years more characters were introduced, including stories from Hispanic and Native American backgrounds, as well as more modern times. And now the company is making a new doll each year, complete with one or two books to legitimize her as a character. Instead of teaching girls history, the company has moved to modeling their characters after current events and trends. It's now a numbers game, as they invent more and more characters and encourage young girls to collect them all, mass producing thousands of dolls with the same face, differing only in skin tone, eye color and haircut.

But the purpose of this post is not to bemoan the capitalistic trend eating away the historic heart of the company. I had actually almost forgotten about this piece of my past (hard to believe, considering I own a Girl of Today doll and quite a large box of accessories for her) until tonight in my archives management class someone mentioned that a new doll just came out and caused quite a buzz.

The new girl is Gwen, and she is homeless. Well, technically, she and her mother only live at the homeless shelter for a few months, but the point of her character is to portray the realities of life in 2009. Although, looking at the doll's smiling, cherub-like face, long blond hair and pristine white sundress, I can't picture her sleeping in the back seat of a car. You can read more details and some reactions to the new doll here and here.

But Gwen is not the new star of American Girl. In fact, she is a minor character in the books about the 2009 Girl of the Year, Chrissa. The real purpose of the homeless girl is to give the true star someone to stand up for, someone for the well-off girl to look after. This theme was first touched on by the historical girl Samantha befriending the poor girl Nellie, but the current situation seems to be taking it further. The doll Chrissa actually has two friends you can buy, Gwen and Sonali, who both need to be defended from the school bullies. They make the perfect accessories for the strong, middle-class girl, adding spice to her life, just like her pet llama, which is also for sale.

I'm not sure what to think about Gwen. The general reaction to the character seems overboard. What should really cause a stir and be impressive would be if the main character were facing the very real trials of day to day living instead of simply having to face down bullies. If the American Girl company wants to teach young girls about current societal evils, they should showcase them, not make them sideplots that serve to frame less meaningful battles.

And if they're going to sell a homeless doll to raise awareness, they should publicize ways to help as well. What good is it to tell us that there are children sleeping on the street, if in the next breath you ask us to cough up nearly $100 for yet another doll instead of encouraging us to give it to those who need it? They tell us to be noble in heart and accept and protect our friends from bullies, whether they have a house or not, while teaching us to be selfish in action, spending our money on more and more of their products.

I miss the good old days.

On a related note, some of the older, Classic dolls are disappearing. Samantha and her friend Nellie have already gone into the American Girl Archive (it's unclear what this means, but I imagine it's like the Disney Vault, and the dolls may be available again in the distant future for limited time offers), and apparently Kirsten is next. It's sad, because these girls were the heart and soul of the company for years. Also, Kirsten, being the Norwegian immigrant, was always my mom's favorite, and it's sad to think that the next generation of girls may grow up without this piece of the historical landscape, traded instead for the glamor of more recent times.

Is the American Girl company still in the business of teaching history? Or has their widening range of dolls, modern mini-eras and ethnicities all about politics? Maybe the two really do fit together. After all, what could be more American than capitalism?

-Kim

To Glee, or not to Glee?

The pilot of the new Fox show "Glee" aired last spring. I ended up watching it on hulu and actually enjoyed it. It looked like an un-Disney High School Musical for TV. I know that doesn't actually sound cool to most people, but it was. It was fun to see a show that highlighted the arts in high school. And the show choir numbers they did were pretty sweet. Their version of "Don't Stop Believin' " still gets stuck in my head.

So I was looking forward to the fall premiere of the show last night. I wanted to see more cheesy show choir dance moves and get excited over the loner "weird" kids finding their place and being accepted through the unifying power of music.

But the show failed to deliver. There were several musical sequences that were relatively well done, but there was none of the power from the pilot. The fact that all the characters are incredibly stereotypical was longer funny after the second hour. In fact, I no longer feel animosity toward the antagonist cheerleading coach; instead, I pity the actress who is stuck playing her for the duration of the series. Although, if the last teacher show, "Guidance," is any indication, it won't be on the air long.

One of the main problems to my mind was that the writers couldn't decide whether the main characters should be the teachers or the students. The teacher who runs glee club is the narrator, but he shares about equal screen time with the awkward diva. I'm all for making sure everyone gets their turn, but it felt more unfocused than anything else. Manic shifting between scenes and storylines that are all trying to be funny can only be kept up for so long. It's a device better suited to half hour shows than something in an hour long prime time slot. "Scrubs" uses the technique amazingly well; "Glee," unfortunately, did not.

The content also makes me wonder just who the writers perceive their audience to be. Maybe I'm just out of the loop on popular culture trends, but don't most shows try to get a couple episodes into the season before bringing out the sex episode? Or has entertainment and society gone so far downhill that sex is the only thing people want to talk about? I realize it's a big issue, but it's not the only one teenagers face. And after the diva's outburst in the cheerleader-run celibacy club (an ironic twist, which would have been more effective if they hadn't overplayed it), it seems like this is the issue the writers want to stick with. I don't think I can handle an entire season of awkward teenagers talking about things they don't understand.

As a side note, it also seemed that every female character was presented as being insane in one way or another. Actually, most of the characters, but especially the women. I find it terrible that the audience is being set up to root against the main character's wife, but she embodies everything that's wrong with America, specifically the sense of entitlement that has lead to our current economic troubles. I find nothing sympathetic in her.

I may still watch next week's episode to see if it gets better, but I'm not very hopeful. The whole thing feels like the writers are trying too hard to do something big, making everything completely over-the-top, and focusing on gimmicks instead of real, embraceable characters and a story that makes sense.

But really, I didn't need a new show to watch this season anyway, not with House, Castle and Dollhouse all returning and more than enough classics available on hulu to keep me distracted. It just seemed like such a fun concept last spring...

-Kim