Trek's catsuit problem with female actresses

[somebuddyX]

You know, I'm rewatching Babylon 5 for the upteenth time and they didn't have any of these catsuit issues. So it certainly seems to point out to Trek in particular. If anything, quite the contrary with Delenn wearing really loose robes like Inara on Firefly. And Ivanova had a normal uniform like her male counterparts.

Does anyone recall other scifi of that time having this type of dress for women on their shows?

Yeah Voyager/Enterprise were kinda outliers I feel. Like look at Devon Adair in Earth 2 or Shane Vansen in Space Above and Beyond. The crew of Seaquest had Navy style outfits. Sam Carter wore an Airforce jumpsuit. You could maybe put Andromeda in with Trek based on pictures but I never watched it so I don't know.
And yeah maybe this feels like an old thread from the 2000s for you really old posters that have been here since then but maybe it's more fresh in the mind of new viewers/posters and still worthy of discussion. I know it only started to annoy me recently when I looked up the ratings and realised that the UPN executives had been talking out their ass.

 

[Lord Garth]

And yeah maybe this feels like an old thread from the 2000s for you really old posters that have been here since then but maybe it's more fresh in the mind of new viewers/posters and still worthy of discussion. I know it only started to annoy me recently when I looked up the ratings and realised that the UPN executives had been talking out their ass.

It's all good. You all can talk about it while I go make a post on MySpace about how they should pull troops out of Iraq. I'll have my JNCOs on (I never wore JNCOs, but we've got a theme to go with here!) and I'll keep my flip-phone handy. But first I'll have some freedom fries!

 

[somebuddyX]

It's all good. You all can talk about it while I go make a post on MySpace about how they should pull troops out of Iraq. I'll have my JNCOs on (I never wore JNCOs, but we've got a theme to go with here!) and I'll keep my flip-phone handy. But first I'll have some freedom fries!

Okay cool.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Lexx made all of this look tame.

 

[Forbin]

Yeah, the last character to wear a catsuit went off the air almost 18 years ago?

Timely stuff.

Good lord, person, we're on this forum to discuss aspects of a franchise that premiered over 56 years ago!

 

[Forbin]

Why do we have the word 'actress' when we don't have 'pilotess'? I suppose there weren't any females who flew planes back then for the word to exist since it was a very male dominated career up until quite recently.

Not so. There were a small cadre of women in aviation from the beginning. The gendered noun through, say, the 1940s, was "aviatrix."

 

[Forbin]

You know, I'm rewatching Babylon 5 for the upteenth time and they didn't have any of these catsuit issues. So it certainly seems to point out to Trek in particular. If anything, quite the contrary with Delenn wearing really loose robes like Inara on Firefly. And Ivanova had a normal uniform like her male counterparts.

Does anyone recall other scifi of that time having this type of dress for women on their shows?

I was just watching 1993's short series "Space Rangers." Marjorie Monahan is wearing a black corset over an otherwise normal-looking uniform. Like they just sort of said, ya know what that uniform needs...?

 

[1001001]

Good lord, person, we're on this forum to discuss aspects of a franchise that premiered over 56 years ago!

Thank you for telling me.

In the meantime, please use the multi-quote function, rather than post three times in a row.

Thanks

 

[Orphalesion]

Lexx made all of this look tame.

From what I've seen Lexx wasn't exactly a "sexy" show though. Unless your fetish happens to involve toilets with tongues.

 

[Forbin]

Thank you for telling me.

In the meantime, please use the multi-quote function, rather than post three times in a row.

Thanks

I know, I know, but no way I was going to remember all the posts I wanted to respond to over four pages.

 

[1001001]

I know, I know, but no way I was going to remember all the posts I wanted to respond to over four pages.

Fair enough. Not a huge deal.

 

[Sim]

This whole thing about use of words is super messy. There are social, age, political, cultural, educational, etc....aspects to it. Some people are intentional about using them. Some are not. Some people might be using certain language as putdowns. Others are not.

Why do we have the word 'actress' when we don't have 'pilotess'? I suppose there weren't any females who flew planes back then for the word to exist since it was a very male dominated career up until quite recently. But we have 'actress' because females(girls and women) have been acting in some form for at least a century in the cinematic world along with their male counterparts. Was it used to belittle females from its inception? Was it created to do so and to somehow separate males from females in that profession? I don't know.

I do know the word is part of our language and I totally get how some folks want to erase the word because one word should suffice. Like 'pilot' or 'electrician'. I also understand the 'actress' is part of our vocabulary and people use it without meaning any offense.

This makes me wonder how many feminized(?) career words are in the English language. I can only think of actress.

Waaaaay off topic with this but interesting to discuss.

To make it even more confusing for German native speakers like me, is that the attempts of introducing non-sexist language take the exact opposite approach over here: People with feminist sensitivities insist on using a female form (of professions) or even invent female forms for job descriptions that didn't exist before, because "using the male form creates the wrong image in the minds of the speakers that women are not fit for these jobs as men".

So... English speakers feel it's inclusive to only use male forms, in order to avoid the notion women in a given job are somehow "less than men", while German speakers feel using male forms gives the impression "women cannot do that job".

 

[valkyrie013]

Yeah, the last character to wear a catsuit went off the air almost 18 years ago?

Timely stuff.

Last time a character to wear a catsuit was 2022.
Captain Angel in SNW.

Also, Rebecca insisted she wear the skirt uniform in SNW.

Nothing wrong with looking sexy on tv, many girls and fuys have no problem with it. But it's bad if the producers insist on putting you in a suit that's hard to pee in though.

 

[Citiprime]

Nothing wrong with looking sexy on tv, many girls and fuys have no problem with it. But it's bad if the producers insist on putting you in a suit that's hard to pee in though.

And insist on it when (it seems at least from most comments I've read) the fanbase doesn't even like the supposedly "sexy" suit they're putting them in.

For example, with T'Pol, I even liked the Vulcan robe costume she wears in "Broken Bow," and thought it looked better than the catsuit.

 

[1001001]

Last time a character to wear a catsuit was 2022.
Captain Angel in SNW.

If we’re going to count any random character, then sure.

The rest of the discussion has centered around main characters, especially ones dressed differently than their peers (Troi, Seven, T’Pol).

Including a one-off villain dilutes the point, I think but whatever.

 

[Finn]

The TPTB better not dare make Captain Angel an one-off character. I found them more interesting than many of the "main" characters over the years (no, not because of how they were dressed). I think they'd make a good recurring character.

 

[Paul755]

If we are talking “catsuits” in sci-fi…let us not forget Erin Grey in Buck Rodgers. The stuff she wore was as tight or tighter that what Ryan, Sirtis, et al wore.

as for the T’Pol casting thing…does that really surprise anyone? I don’t doubt decisions like that still happen. It sucks but it’s not all that surprising.

 

[Jinn]

The TPTB better not dare make Captain Angel an one-off character. I found her more interesting than many of the "main" characters over the years (no, not because of how she's dressed). I think she'd make a good recurring character.

*them and *they

 

[fireproof78]

Nothing wrong with looking sexy on tv, many girls and fuys have no problem with it. But it's bad if the producers insist on putting you in a suit that's hard to pee in though.

Unless you're a part of a uninformed service and your "sexy" outfit makes no sense. Then whatever supposed sex appeal is lost in ridiculousness.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

It's one thing for someone to think you or somebody else looks particularly fetching in the uniform; even if it makes everyone look better/stronger/authoritative/professional.

Quite another if it's supposed to give certain characters something unprofessional that's really only about the audience, who doesn't exist in-universe.