Brian

Most men don't have a problem with strong female protagonists. A perfect example is the Alien franchise. Ripley is my favorite protagonist of all time, beating out all other male protagonists from all other movie franchises. They can make a tough and believable female lead without making her a Mary Sue. They can make her strong without making sure to highlight and theb down previous patriarchal ideals. Think, Alien released in '79 and Aliens in '86 and still managed to do it. The writing treated men and women equally. There was no need to highlight that she was a woman. She was simply awesome.

So now that we have established that a strong female lead can be created in a genre whose consumers are still largely male, can we just accept that Rey was very poorly written without yelling, "PATRIARCHY!" At the top of our lungs. We all know why she was written this way. Writers need to spend more time creating believable and endearing characters and less time focusing on political ideals to check a box.