She’s a product of her times

I remember reading somewhere that Antonia Fraser created Jemima Shore to be the opposite of herself as well as representative of feminism in the 1960s and 1970s, wherein such women want to be liberated from motherhood and domesticity and to be very independent themselves. It’s unsurprising that the stories the character appeared in mostly appeared between the 1970s and 1990s, though it seemed she hasn’t appeared in any further stories until now. It seems the character’s brand of feminism resonated with a number of women of a certain mindset, ideology and time period, these stories the character appears in still get reissues every now and then, but at other times she hasn’t appeared in any further adventures because I suppose by the time the 1990s rolled in she risked being kind of outdated in some regards.

She’s not necessarily this irrelevant as her stories do get reissued but I feel one possible reason why the character doesn’t appear in any further stories, perhaps until now, is that she seems way too tied to a certain ideology or school of thinking that was popularised in the period she first showed up. I’m pretty much running around in circles but I feel it kind of limited what else Antonia Fraser could do with her once that school of thinking went out of vogue as time went on, whereas characters like Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple as well as Nancy Drew not only continued to appear in further written stories, but also get to constantly appear outside of prose fiction. Like I feel the way Jemima Shore’s characterised is way too tied to this time period, that of a professional woman who does whatever she wants to do.

Whilst the earlier Nancy Drew stories do have some dated elements, yet the titular heroine continued to appear in further adventures well onto the 21st century. Miss Marple might also be seen as belonging to a different time period, but I feel the way she’s characterised feels less dated. Actually in general, the ways both Miss Marple and Nancy Drew are characterised feel less dated than Jemima Shore is, the latter would also get into romantic relationships herself and even has the same hair colour but the vibe isn’t that of an independent, liberated woman who does whatever she wants to do. As with these two, the overall characterisation is simply that of a female citizen sleuth, though it is simplistic it’s also more timeless than say a liberated woman who does whatever she wants to do.

In fact to the extent that there were still Nancy Drew books being written in the 1990s and 2000s, not just short story anthologies but also full blown novels. In this same period Jemima Shore would appear sporadically but not necessarily appearing in full blown novels, so it seemed as the feminist school of thought went from wanting to be super liberated to embracing femininity and rectifying negative attitudes to it, at any point where Jemima could’ve reclaimed traditionally feminine pastimes like sewing and even homemaking as feminist activities she continued to be characterised in the mold of 1960s-1970s feminist thought. It’s not that these stories she appears in went out of print at all, but it’s kind of hard writing further stories with this characterisation in mind.

If both Nancy Drew and Miss Marple are any indication, sometimes a relatively simpler characterisation is what it takes to make a character practically and truly timeless. Social trends and phenomena do have a way of influencing the way people write characters and stories, sort of like how Jemima Shore’s a byproduct of second-wave feminism. But as feminist thought continues to change, the way Jemima’s characterised practically keeps her stuck in that time period, in fact to where Antonia Fraser couldn’t write further stories with her, maybe until now. Even then it’s not hard to see how certain stories and characters remain painfully dated, whereas others continue to feel fresh and timeless.

Battle for intellectual property

When it comes to seeking intellectual property to be adapted for film and television, rather than developing original brands and franchises entertainment companies often buy other entertainment companies or authorial estates. It’s sort of like what Netflix did to Roald Dahl’s estate, Roald Dahl being the author of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and The Witches. Dahl’s books have been adapted for film before, especially before the time Netflix bought his estate’s entire catalogue of his stories.

The last film to be adapted from a Roald Dahl book, 2020’s The Witches, appeared almost a year before Netflix bought Dahl’s entire catalogue and estate. Similar things have happened to both Agatha Christie’s and Wilbert Vere Awdry’s estates before, like they’re all battling for intellectual property and to seek profit from it. They seek an intellectual property so that they have something to adapt into like films and television, as far as I can make of it based on my modest business knowledge.

But at other times it does feel like corporate greed, in the sense that you have companies buying authors’ estates. Money that should’ve gone to their heirs, if they have any family members at all, go to those companies instead. That’s why Netflix bought the entirety of Roald Dahl’s estate, even though his heirs could still benefit from those. Even if they don’t buy the entire catalogue and estate, there’s an unmistakably greedy air to this whenever entertainment companies buy authors’ estates.

Iconic

There’s a Twitter thread made by somebody where he said that the most iconic cartoon characters of the 2010s were actually from Internet memes, though I might add the rage comics characters since they appeared in the early half of the 2010s and later half of the 2000s. This got me into thinking which sort of fictional characters (in general) and celebrities are more iconic to the general public, the normies among us geeks. I have a relative who didn’t know who Harley Quinn is until recently, so it’s not a stretch for other people to not know who Felicity Smoak is either.

Harley Quinn is a clown-themed villainess while Felicity Smoak is a hacker and computer programmer, I suspect that since most people (including myself at times) don’t regularly follow and consume superhero media especially as time passes either they don’t know them, mistake them for another character (my father did this with Jon Lane Kent, Superman’s son when he came out as bisexual) or pretty much forget about them. While it could be said there are celebrities that also get forgotten with time, except that when it comes to regular exposure you’d have to guess who still makes the headlines when they hit them.

They might be relevant for all the wrong reasons, like whether or not Johnny Depp abused Amber Heard, but they still carry far more weight than whatever Stephen Amell’s up to. More people have watched Johnny Depp’s movies (including Pirates of the Caribbean) than they do with Arrow, so more people know who Depp is than they do with Mr Amell. As for fictional characters, if we were to exempt memetic ones like Pepe, Forever Alone, Virgin and Chad, we’re left with the likes of Dracula, Bugs Bunny, Mickey Mouse, Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. They belong to the upper echelon of iconic fictional characters.

Felicity Smoak’s way too cult to ever achieve Miss Marple’s heights, no amount of piracy will make her anywhere as famous as Marple is. The Winchester brothers of Supernatural are nowhere as iconic as Hercule Poirot and the Tuppence couple are. Most people don’t watch Arrow, let alone on a daily basis and obsessing over it that much and if they did have something to obsess over it would most likely be either a popular celebrity (like say Dua Lipa for instance) or something in general that’s popular with the masses. It could be football for most countries, it could also be any other popular sport.

I still don’t think Felicity Smoak’s anywhere as iconic as say Miss Marple is, well perhaps outside of her fandom and even then the number of Felicity Smoak fans is smaller than the number of Agatha Christie fans. While piracy does lead to greater accessibility, now with the Internet it’s possible to find a pirated copy on the go but when it comes to media that are proven bestsellers, blockbusters and ratings hits there will be more people who know those stories better than they do with something that’s not that popular. Online piracy helps but to an extent since there wouldn’t just be books that lack readily available pirated copies and not just due to copyright laws.

But also because sometimes the books that become bestsellers are also the books that get pirated a lot and that there will be things people prioritise over, it could be personal preference but sometimes it’s got to do with having something important to do. It might be possible to take a break from parenting and having a job, even two jobs, to watch something like Arrow but even then not everybody has the time for Arrow. They don’t the time to stream Arrow or pirate it in any way, even on YouTube they’d watch (or listen to) something else instead if they ever did. So Felicity will never be as iconic as Miss Marple is.

While there are characters who are iconic to some people, only a handful are truly iconic to many more. Sometimes they might not even have a single creator/author and they may even have anonymous authors like any memetic cartoon character around.