If Zara was a dude, no one would give a shit about them dying or how they died. I think she was the first named female character to die in any Jurassic film, so I understand the backlash. People just are uncomfortable with seeing a female character get hurt in a film, unless they "deserve it".
Perhaps not, and her being female
is a major contributing factor, but importantly it is not
the reason.
Her death is in
large part problematic
specifically because of the film's depictions of women. Her suddenly becoming a man removes the contextual issues surrounding her character and thus dramatically changes how the death is perceived.
The character is presented as unsympathetic and deserving of the death (one that's ostensibly intended to be a crowd pleaser), due to facets of her character that involve traditionally problematic depictions of working women in Hollywood and her (rightfully) being more concerned with her own issues than with babysitting her boss's nephews (who should be able to take care of themselves at their respective ages). And it's the fact that
this character receives a death so clearly supposed to be a crowd pleasing punisher, for
those reasons, that causes it be so damn questionable.
To go a few steps further, combine the above with:
- Claire's character leaning heavily on Hollywood tropes regarding working women that date back nearly a century (tropes that have very real world origins in actual beliefs that have negatively impacted women in the workplace for decades), such as being presented as being incapable of simultaneously living life as a functional human and being a successful businessperson (and having to have men
constantly point it out), as well as:
- the sister constantly telling this extremely successful businessperson that her life can't possibly have meaning until she becomes a mother, a stance which is validated by the movie itself, specifically through Claire's character arc (she grows as a character specifically by learning to develop maternal instincts towards her nephews and by ceasing to be so business-minded)
- and finally, the fact that the only other major female really only exists to 1) give the audience emotional cues and 2) to be Lowery's crush, which is made exceptionally clear when she leaves the movie at the
exact point it's revealed he has no chance with her
(there's smaller elements as well, but you get the gist of it)
When you look at it all together it just feels
really gross. So it's because of all that context that changing it to a male would in fact diminish the problem.
(for what it's worth though, to me it would
still feel pretty out of place with a male character, assuming they weren't specifically shown in a sympathetic light, because it's so damn lengthy and cruel - it felt like outright torture porn)
As an aside, though very much on topic, I think it's also worth noting that:
1) There is only one death in the franchise with the same level of brutality and lengthiness - Dieter Stark's death by Compies in The Lost World, which everyone would probably agree is supposed to be a deliberately
punishing death, enacted upon an explicitly deserving character. Stark is never presented sympathetically - he takes joy in electrocuting a small animal for no reason, starts an unnecessary fight with a protagonist, and is shown to be incompetent at his job. None of these unsympathetic depictions are rooted in problematic elements, and they "justify" his lengthy, excruciating, and horrific death, hence why no one takes issue with it. Had Zara been depicted in the same way, or at least if her death-justifying aspects not had a base in sexism, you would have heard much less about it.
(Edit: mind you, I'm not saying that this is the only way to "fix" the scene, just providing an example in which the same scene with a female character would be read differently with different context)
2) Colin Trevorrow
himself has some pretty clear issues with sexism, which further solidifies arguments into these sorts of readings into Jurassic World and its scenes. He has stated that he believes the reason women aren't directing blockbusters is because they don't want it enough (a common excuse to explain away lack of women in any and all fields of work), as well as his other works showing deep problems, such as Home Base (the two-line Wikipedia summary alone is
grating as fuck).
