Gears of War. Representations and junk.

So I am slightly conflicted when it comes to the Gears of War series and the structure of the character and whether they are positive or not.
since Gears of War is a MANLY GAME FOR MANLY MEN! it is pretty obvious if I were to talk about the masculinity of the characters, having necks the size of elephant feet, biceps bigger than a 13 year old, and voices of gravel in a wood chipper.

Just to clarify, I love Gears of War, but I haven't finished the third game yet, I do know of all the spoilers since all the people I follow on Tumblr are ass-buckets.

So I am talking bout Female and Race representations.



Ladies first: The leading lady Anya, basically the brains behind most operations within the game, Delta squad will also ask Anya for advice and help, she is a good support role, In the third game she continues this except she is then a playable character, Within the game characters question why she is so dedicated to the military, Dom answers is because she cannot have children. So in one way you can think of her as a helpful strong and competent woman, but on the other hand its almost as if the game is saying "if woman can't have kids, what else are they good for?" To be honest I don't find her overly sexualised, she has the same uniform as the other characters, not looking like a chainmail bra.

Also the 'Doms Beard' easter egg applys to her and every other character in the game, not just the men.

I could keep going on about female characters in Gears, But lets move to Race.

So Gears of War has a wide variety of ethnic characters.
Domonic Santiago - Hispanic
Marcus Fenix - White/ Caucasian
Mihn Young Kin - Asian (Korean I believe)
Tai Kaliso - Samoan / Pacifika
Augustus (The Train) Cole - Black / African decent.
even an Australian woman, Samantha.

Of coarse the focus is around Marcus Fenix, being the main protagonist, but to be honest, he isn't the most likable character compared to the other three main support roles on Delta Squad being Dom, Cole and Baird. Dom, brings a lot of emotion and depth to the story, while Cole and Baird go hand in hand as both a comic relief pair, and real partners, almost like an opposites attract kind of way (seriously, its weird, search them in goodle images and the partner comes up as a suggested search).

to be honest, if the characters were consistant to their race, and had only white characters, the game would be extremely worse. the writing would be terrible, it would be this big serious gruff game. While character like Cole Train bring a lot more colour to the game.
wow, what a terrible joke.
What I find is unique about the Cole Train is that he may have certain stereotypes written with him. but in all honesty, he is one of my favourite characters in all shooter games, he is hilarious and loveable. If I play with friends, its always a race to see who can play as Cole Train.

It's almost as if, his blackness.. isn't a bad thing! fancy that! a black character people love, because he's the ironic kind of black. He's not the 'token black guy of the series' No, that would be Jace, that character brings nothing to the table.

CAN'T STOP THE TRAIN BABY!