Milly Alcock in 'Supergirl.' Warner Bros./Courtesy Everett Collection Logo text Supergirl star Milly Alcock gave an interview to Vanity Fair and — at first glance — the actress played things so safe that, if anything, one feels for the interviewer.
Take this quote from Alcock about her character in the upcoming DC Studios release: “She’s not trying to save the world—she’s just trying to save her own. This film is an excellent reminder that the world can be crumbling around you, but you can be the hero of your own story” — which sounds like a studio PR talking point drafted by ChatGPT.
Or the way she handled being asked if she had spoken to other actresses who had played Supergirl, such as Melissa Benoist and Sasha Calle. Alcock said she hadn’t because, “They’re just people living their lives. It’s not like we have this blood bond.” Deftly handled.
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Then came this exchange. The interviewer asked the former House of the Dragon star: Has the famously fickle Game of Thrones fandom prepared Alcock for the inevitable backlash she’ll face? Alcock replied, “It definitely made me aware that simply existing as a woman in that space is something that people comment on. We have become very comfortable having this weird ownership of women’s bodies. I can’t really stop them. I can only be myself.”
Her statement seems inarguable. Alcock was 21 years old and playing a teenager on the first season of the HBO fantasy drama. Fans made all sorts of (sometimes gross) comments about her (as they did about Maisie Williams and Sophie Turner on the original Game of Thrones). If anything, Alcock seems rather Zen and non-reactive about this.
But the response to Alcock in many online corners has been as if the actress went on a militant feminist rant slamming all male fans and threw a massive pity party for herself. Sample: “Alcock signaled to everyone that this film is going to be garbage … if anyone had any doubt, she has dispelled them” and “Your movie isn’t even out and you’re already a victim of nothing happening to you, shut the fuck up” and “they know their movie’s gonna suck, we know they’ll blame men as always” and “she’s Rachel Zegler-ing [the] film” and — in a response to a tweet pleading with fans to stop mocking Alcock’s looks — “She’s facing ridicule because she preemptively attacked the fans … she deserves [the bullying], and she deserves the much much more that is coming.”
It’s all so ironic that it almost seems too obvious to point out how ironic it is: Alcock says women in fantasy franchise IPs get backlash and rude comments about their looks and the result is backlash and rude comments about her looks.
One gripe being made by some fans is that whenever a project isn’t successful and has a female or Black lead — especially titles made by Disney — that those creatively responsible suggest fans were too sexist or racist to appreciate their efforts. But Alcock never even suggested Supergirl would get backlash, only that she expects to get personally objectified and trolled (which … she is).
Others counter that some female action icons in the past have universal acceptance, like Sigourney Weaver in Aliens and Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2. But it’s rather easy to cite legendary performances from decades ago and say: Look how accepting we are. It’s true that the quality of Supergirl and Alcock’s performance will determine its legacy more than anything else. But Alcock was mainly talking about the downside of her experience on House of the Dragon — where her performance and the first season were acclaimed, yet she still endured plenty of trolling.
Attempts out there to lump in Alcock with Snow White star Zegler and ousted Scream franchise star Melissa Barrera are interesting because they speak to something broader: Young women in franchise roles tend to receive outsized “STFU” backlash.
This isn’t to defend Barrera or Zegler’s controversial comments. Their remarks were newsworthy and tactically unwise. Same goes for Wednesday star Jenna Ortega, whose comments about her Netflix hit’s writers became a major controversy while she was promoting the first season.
It’s about proportionality: The level of vitriol that seems to accompany young female actors not saying precisely the “right” thing, and how such backlash often gets weaponized along with critiques about their looks. Another young fantasy franchise lead, The Last of Us star Bella Ramsey, has managed to not say anything particularly controversial, yet still received a level of online bullying during season two last year that was outright grotesque (one might say they were ridiculed for “just existing”).
This isn’t a “right wing fans are all toxic” argument, either. While not a fantasy franchise star, the most bashed actor last year was Sydney Sweeney for being presumed to be conservative, all while insisting she’s “not a political person” and otherwise trying to avoid saying anything controversial at all. Sweeney was even labeled a Nazi by some on the left for appearing in a wink-wink jeans ad (“MAGA Barbie” read a USA Today headline). Did her looks play a role in this? Of course. Has Chris Pratt — who likewise seems to lean vaguely conservative — ever received the level of nuclear blowback Sweeney did? Not at all.
It’s a circular trap: Studios want young female stars to be hugely popular on social media and seem relatable and authentic. But you can’t be popular, relatable and authentic and also be boring. But to not be boring, you have to say or do interesting things that won’t please everybody. But if you say or do things not everybody likes, you will get backlash from … somewhere. And if you’re a young woman — particularly one navigating comic or fantasy franchise IPs — that backlash is likely going to be loud. (And heaven help you if you happen to be remotely feminist or political, in either direction, and express that).
And the idea that a young actress doing dozens of interviews promoting a project and also interacting with fans on social media might say one thing that could spark outrage? That’s not something that’s merely possible, but inevitable. Just how boring, exactly, do we want our stars to be?
This isn’t to say that young male actors get a free pass and never get pounced on — Timothée Chalamet’s epic opera and ballet flub comes to mind. But for young actresses in franchise films, they can have super powers and bold sass on screen, while in real life, the message seems to be: You better act perfect, look even more perfect, and STFU.
Supergirl is released in theaters June 26. Below is the latest trailer:
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