Trends in Gender Portrayal in the Avengers Series: A Conventional Content Analysis

Abstract

The Bechdel test, used to examine the frequency and portrayal of women in film, consists of three criteria – (1) a movie must represent two or more women, (2) who have names and speak to each other, (3) about anything other than a man. In order to answer the research question “Based on the Bechdel test, how does the Avengers series portray their female characters compared to their male characters?”, this paper utilizes and extends beyond the Bechdel test by performing a conventional content analysis of same-gender conversations in four top-grossing superhero films – Marvel’s The Avengers (2012), Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), and Avengers: Endgame (2019). By combining the simplicity of the Bechdel test with a qualitative approach to code dialogue, this paper illustrates the underrepresentation of female characters and specific differences between the portrayal of men and women in modern Marvel films. While the films improved in the amount of female characters and female-to-female conversations over time, there is still a small amount of female-to-female conversations in these films compared to male-to-male conversations. Furthermore, while male characters rarely spoke to each other about women, female characters spoke to each other about men very often. Some common elements of dialogue for both male and female characters were worries about danger, discussions of violence, and insulting others. Implications regarding this portrayal’s impact on female viewers are discussed.