The destigmatization of "evil woman": Hulijing as a modern Sphinx in the "Good Hunting" of Love, Death & Robots (2019)

The hulijing (狐狸精) is a typical stigmatized example of "evil woman" in the history, religion, and culture, which serves as a scapegoat of man under the traditional patriarchy in China. This paper aims to explore the image of hulijing and the destigmatization of "evil woman" in th...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Cogent arts & humanities 2023-12, Vol.10 (2)
Main Authors: Peng, Anqi, Tao, Shilong
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
"evil woman"
"Good Hunting"
Colonialism
ethical literary criticism
feminism
film studies
Good & evil
hulijing
Love, Death & Robots
modern Sphinx
Citations: Items that this one cites
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The hulijing (狐狸精) is a typical stigmatized example of "evil woman" in the history, religion, and culture, which serves as a scapegoat of man under the traditional patriarchy in China. This paper aims to explore the image of hulijing and the destigmatization of "evil woman" in the episode "Good Hunting" of TV series Love, Death & Robots (2019) from the perspective of feminism and ethical literary criticism, so as to provide ethical reflections on women"s gender and identity in contemporary society. In the "Good Hunting", the hulijing is presented as a modern Sphinx to destigmatize the "evil woman": (1) being a half-human and half-animal Sphinx, the hulijing Yan, hunted by Taoist priests, is forced into prostitution for survival; (2) being a half-human and half-machine Sphinx, she, transformed by the colonial governor, is forced to be a sex slave, but with the power of modern technology, the hulijing becomes the hunter from the hunted, asserts the sovereignty of her body, and finally realizes both economic and spiritual independence. By setting the story in Hong Kong under colonial rule and depicting such a modern Sphinx, the "Good Hunting" subverts the stereotype of hulijing in traditional myths, breaks the gender and power relation between the man and the woman, and answers the way out of contemporary women. Besides, as a resistance towards racialism and colonialism, the metamorphosis of hulijing's identity and image in the "Good Hunting" reflects the original writer Ken Liu's identity consciousness as a Chinese American and shows his attempts to move from the margin to the center.
ISSN:2331-1983
2331-1983
DOI:10.1080/23311983.2023.2289249