Buffy

I never really watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I was more of an MTV person. I found it extremely hard to watch Buffy due to the fact that all I could think about was Alyson Hannigan in American Pie and Sarah Michelle Gellar in Cruel Intentions. As everyone knows both of those movies are pretty dirty and clips from both of them kept running through my head while watching Buffy. It was slightly weird to see those two women playing the role of teenage girls. Even though Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Graceling don’t have much in common the two main characters do. Katsa and Buffy are both teenage girls who are lacking a “normal” life. Katsa kills or harms people when the king orders her to and Buffy kills vampires. They are both young but very mature in certain ways for their age. In society it is unusual for females to play to role of the protector but both of these girls do it as if it’s their duty to do so. Because of this they escape the stereotypical views of women and that gives the teenage viewers a sense of empowerment. Most importantly both Katsa and Buffy have a massive amount of physical strength and could harm whoever they’d like but they control themselves.

Graceling

Thank god Left Hand of Darkness is over, Graceling is like a breath of fresh air. Being a teenage girl Katsa has some major gender and identity issues. Things are quite different for her because she leads a life that is anything but “normal,” she is a trained killer and works for the king. Imagine being 16 again and dealing with all of the crazy day to day things and to top it off, being forced to carry the bourdon of being a killer.
Its strange, typical teenage girls love to get dolled up and they dream about getting married, having kids, and raising a family. Sadly, she has no real role models in her life to help her face the issues she has to deal with. She was never even taught what is like to be a women, what to expect. Thankfully Helda kind of took Katsa under her wing and is playing the “mother” role in her life. Even though Helda is around to help her with basic things Katsa still has no idea what to do with her emotions and feelings. On the up side she seems to deal with her anger in a healthy way, she doesn’t hurt people, she releases stress through escaping. You can’t escape someone who can read your mind though and when she found out that there was a child graced with mind reading she became upset. Not only did she not want the mind reader to know what she does but she also probably didn’t want her to know what goes on inside of her head, after all she cant even really deal with her emotions.
Everyone she encounters typically fears her but Po isn’t staying away. It seemed as if he was almost flirting with her while she was kicking his ass. He was laughing while they were fighting. Hopefully their relationship will turn into something and Katsa will open up more. He said he trusted her and she seems to have trust issues. Maybe Po will be good for her.