Missed Femslash Opportunities (Part 1)
Femslash February is winding down, but before it goes softly into the night, I think we should talk about the wasted potential of certain femslash ships. Too often, the latent f/f pairing glares at me like a restless goddess, demanding sacrifices of fake dating fanfiction and gifsets of soulmate AUs.
In no particular order, here is the first part of a list of femslash ships that would have been a superior option to whatever hetero nonsense was happening at the time.
Velma x Daphne (Scooby Doo): Much has been said on the queer coding of Velma Dinkley, aka the lesbian role model you never even knew you had. For your consideration, imagine how much better your life would have been with out of the closet butch babe Velma and her fabulous femme girlfriend Daphne. While we’re at it, we can pair the spares and get Shaggy and Fred together–each couple a delightful mix of counter- and mainstream culture, solving cute gay mysteries with their cute gay selves and cute gay dog. Groovy.
Korra x Asami Sato (Seasons 1 & 2 of Legend of Korra): If we could have skipped the love triangle nonsense with Mako in the first two seasons of Korra, the entire show would have been greatly improved. The daughter of the equalist and the Avatar herself, meeting as teenagers at the top of their game, only to have their world overturned by Amon! What if they got a meet cute like Mako and Asami did, or had chemistry like Mako and Korra had. I mean, I give Bryke full credit for letting fandom figure out for them that Korrasami would be amazing for their show, and Nickelodeon even let them hold hands into the proverbial sunset[1], and I have shed a lot of tears and read a lot of words and felt a lot of feelings about that moment and this show and these wonderful ladies. I love Korrasami. But there were scheduling and budget issues that pecked at the writing quality of Legend of Korra. Luckily it seems cartoons are learning from it and planning the queer representation and romance earlier and intentionally.
Andrea x Michonne (Season 3 of The Walking Dead): I quit The Walking Dead in season five. The only thing I cared about was Richonne. And now it’s canon, and I’m writing this article about femslash but I have to mention it because, omg, Richonne is canon! Besides, Richonne would not have interfered with the brilliance of Michonne x Andrea in season three while Rick and Lori were busy being terrible at each other, and I will contest to this day Michandrea[2] is implied by canon and/or the chemistry between Danai Gurira and pretty much anyone. They spent eight months together. Just gals bein’ post-apocalyptic pals. I’ve written fanfiction about this one too.
Beca x Chloe (Pitch Perfect): I have all the makings of a rabid Pitch Perfect stan, and I do like these movies, but I’m actually not an aca-superfan. I bring this up because I could not tell you who Beca’s canon love interest is–the least offensive looking Workaholics dude was my best guess before Google told me it’s “Skylar Astin.” I’m sure he’s a very nice boy and a talented singer, but I care 100% more about Chloe making innuendo to Beca while they lay inches from each other in a tent, or even Beca making eyes at Euro-bombshell Birgitte Hjort Sørensen. Heck, make it an ot3[3]. I’m a multishipper.
Clarke x Raven (Season 1 of The 100): Technically this could yet be canon. But I would have liked to see it happen Korrasami-style in season one, whereby Clarke and Raven realized what a butt Finn was and started dating each other. They wouldn’t have had to be together forever, they’re teenagers for goodness’ sake, but I think the low-key snugglebuddy best friend vibe could have done wonders for their characters overall.[4]
Leela x Amy (Futurama): I can’t in good conscience say I would have wanted this pairing to be endgame–I love Fry and Leela too much. But the methods taken to get there echo a lot of what I hate about hetero pairings in fiction–Fry spends seasons irritating Leela despite her clear rejections before his character evolves into a person Leela would be interested in. What if, instead, Leela and Amy got together for a little while–we know that they make a great and sexy team, the brains and the brawn, the Martian millionaire and the unioccular orphan. Then maybe they split because they both have strong, clashing personalities–but become peaceful co-parents when Leela impregnates Kif. Maybe Leela expands Amy’s privileged horizons, and maybe Amy was the one who helped Leela realize that she could fall for someone who was radically different than her.
Hermione x Ginny (Harry Potter): If you’re looking for a Hermione Weasley headcanon but you don’t like Romione, look no further. If you are irritated that protagonist men get the girl regardless that she is way too good for him, look no further. If you like jock and nerd, introvert and extrovert, laid back and neurotic ships, look no further. Hermione x Ginny has everything you need, and you never even knew you needed it.
[1] On the internet. Not that I’m bitter.
[2] This was my first guess at this ship name and the fact that I was right says some things about how much time I spend thinking about various f/f ships and/or my ability to relate to real, not fictional people ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
[3]There is exactly one Chloe/Kommissar/Beca fic on ao3. It’s smut, so I won’t link to it. It’s a BDSM threesome, so pretty tame by fanfiction standards. I read it for research.
[4]Fun fact: every The 100 ship I could find has a ship name amalgam (FinnPoe instead of StormPilot), except Clarke x Raven. Theirs is only “Princess Mechanic.” I guess because their options are Rarke or Claven.
I have a lot of ships prepared for this series, but I’m always happy to add more! Let me know some of the missed femslash opportunities you think about in the comments.
Author: K-K Bracken
K-K Bracken grew up overseas and in the Washington, DC area, went to the Ohio State University to get her BA in English, and has been in Columbus, Ohio ever since. She is currently querying her first novel ORCHESTRATION under the name Bracken Beveridge. She is the founder and organizer for the first Steven Universe exclusive fan convention, Beach City Con.
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I like Korrasami most. The story legend of Korra was not that great compared to Aang’s story, but the thing I love about this show is two strong women to be together. I don’t usually find a strong chemistry between two female characters in TV shows interesting, but this one is a stand out one that if they’re gonna continue the story, they better explore this couple. It is way better than giving Korra a nonsense battle due to the new era, Avatar’s power is not as important as before. There should be something like how an avatar would fit in this new world.
Korra and Asami are an amazing relationship…ignoring the Mako debacle that also happened…would’ve been even more amazing if they had started giving Korra/Asami since the start of S1…sigh…but at least we got it in the end ^^
And compared to Hermione/Harry or Hermione/Ron, I was all for Hermione/Ginny when I started reading the books…those two ending up together would’ve been awesome.
“Velma x Daphne”
…As far as I know, we never get THAT in any of the Scooby-Doo shows, but Velma’s clearly written as a lesbian in Scooby-Doo: Mystery Inc. Going into more detail would spoil things, but it’s there, it’s deliberate, and it’s undeniable.
And much as I hate the amount of time spent on the Mako/Korra/Asami love triangle nonsense in Korra’s first two seasons, I think they were able to pull more out of the whole mess than just Korra and Asami’s relationship, and I genuinely don’t know whether I’d scrap the love triangle, in hindsight. I’d definitely scale its’ screentime WAY back and cut out some of the worst moments, but the way things played out, Legend of Korra wound up doing something very interesting, more or less by accident – it wound up deconstructing the idea of love at first sight, and the “we’ve met and said five words to each other, we’re different genders, so now we’re soulmates!” crap that’s pretty common in fiction.
Korra, Mako, Asami and Bolin all have “love at first sight” relationships….and NONE of them work, partially or entirely BECAUSE of how immediate the attraction was/relationships were. Mako winds up causing his relationship with Asami to implode thanks to his indecisive nature and lack of emotional maturity, the Korra/Mako relationship similarly went down in flames because they couldn’t communicate effectively and didn’t have a pre-established foundation of trust to fall back on, and Bolin’s various “infatuation at first sight” subplots all ended very badly for him. The relationships that actually WORKED developed slowly and were built upon an already existing foundation of trust and respect (Korra/Asami), or required constant work and communication to stay afloat (Bolin/Opal). It’s pretty damn refreshing, especially for a kids’ show, and getting rid of the love triangle would lose that element of the story.
Why are people focusing on those horrible anime ships when you could be focusing on Ginny x Hermione? Um, hello, Ginmione is one of the best ones here.