Noah Berlatsky

Maddie & Tae's new hit both indicates and subverts country's long history of sexism.

To understand this debate, it's important to consider historical context.

For a second, it looked like the rabid hordes of gamergaters would be joined by metalheads. But #metalgate was never meant to be.

It's not the gender that's the problem: It's the oppression.

Feminist dystopia at its finest. Joanna Russ imagines a world in which the elimination of gender hierarchy leads to freedom, strength, and power.

Action movies don't usually bother much with romance. The trailer for The Transporter: Refueled certainly doesn't. The hero is cool — sexy women, plural, throw themselves at him, or at least stand near him and things blow up; there are fights and revenge and high production values. Romance is, at best, a secondary concern.

With the death of Leonard Nimoy, it's a good moment to pay tribute to (and question) his most famous character.

Fans of Batgirl are fans of Batgirl. They buy her comic to see her being heroic, not to see her being a slasher movie victim.

Last year there was much excitement at the announcement that Lupita Nyong'o was going to play a major role in Star Wars: The Force Awakens — the first Black woman to star in the franchise.

Katniss is the voice of conscience and morality in the film, and in The Hunger Games series as a whole. In the just released last film in the series, she tries repeatedly to avoid unnecessary deaths. She insists that refugees from an attacked base be given an escape route, for example, and exposes herself in an effort to help them.