We're all familiar with tropes in fiction. Whether it's through movies, books or TV shows, we've all been exposed to tropes. Love triangles, damsel in distress, the fish out of water, these are all concepts we've seen.
Most of the time when we talk about tropes, we refer to them as a bad thing. And yes, while there are some tropes I wish would die in a pit of fire, there are good ones too. For example, I'm a sucker for the friends to lovers trope.
But I'm not here to talk about the good ones. Recently, there's been a particular trope that's really been bothering me: the jealous female.
Quick disclaimer: I'm not saying characters aren't allowed to be jealous. It's a perfectly normal human emotion that we all feel from time to time, and learning a healthy way to deal with it is an amazing thing we should see more of. What I'm talking about is the "crazy jealous female character," who seems to get jealous, usually of another girl, and takes it way too far.
We've all seen at least one teen movie with this type of character. It's usually the pretty popular girl that gets jealous of another girl (bonus points if she's the new girl), and acts out against said girl. What's wrong with this set up is that the jealous popular girl isn't given any depth what so ever, she's just jealous and mean for the sake of being mean. If we actually got a glimpse into this girl's head, understand why she's acting the way she is, then we would get a three dimensional character, rather than just a copy and paste "mean girl" that makes it feel like the writers were being lazy.
What's even worse is when there's jealousy between two friends. There are very few stories where the main relationship is a platonic love between two women, and nothing's worse than that getting ruined by jealousy, especially over a man. I most recently saw this in the book "Unhooked" by Lisa Maxwell (spoilers ahead).
The book starts with Gwen and her best friend Olivia being stolen away to a dark twisted version of Never land. Based on that description alone I thought the book was gonna be about two best friends teaming up and fighting to get back home. Well, I was greatly misled. Gwen and Olivia are separated for at least half the book to give more room for Gwen to bond with sexy Captain Hook (who's name is actually Rowan). There's also a love "square" I guess since Pan kind of has a thing for Gwen and Olivia falls under a spell and things she's in love with Pan.
Part of Never land's magic is that is causes you to start to forget your past. Gwen starts to even forget Olivia for a bit, and it's only because of her fey blood she's able to fight it. Olivia, however, spends most of the book being charmed and manipulated by Pan, so instead of being Gwen's friend, Olivia is instead jealous of Gwen and now sees her friend as a threat. While it's not entirely Olivia's fault, it still really irritated me.
At the end of the book, Olivia seems to snap out of it after Pan is killed by an evil fairy queen (long story) and sacrifices herself so Gwen and Sexy Hook can get out of Never land. It's clear this is supposed to be an emotional moment, but to be honest I felt nothing other than disappointment.
We're supposed to believe that Olivia is sacrificing herself for her friend, but I never actually believed they were friends. We're told throughout the whole book how close they are but we're never really shown it. And it's not even really that clear if Olivia was doing if for Gwen, or to avenge Pan, so the sacrifice isn't even that powerful.
I think it would have been better if Sexy Hook sacrificed himself and Olivia made it home with Gwen. Then the book would have gotten a 3/5 stars from me rather than a 2/5.
Having a jealous female is old and frankly weakens the story. Not only is it a sign of lazy writing, it's just tiring to constantly see females at each other's throats over petty things rather than forming strong, healthy relationships with each other.
