On August of 2013, I wrote a blog entry on Princess Peach, where I made the argument that she isn't so much an object for Mario to rescue as much as she is a fairly realistic depiction of a brave woman in a hostage situation. A link here: http://vidgameanalysis.blogspot.com/2013/08/princess-peach-versus-feminism-is.html. However, when I shared that blog with a Facebook group I've long since abandoned, I was accused of being sexist, idiotic, and cherry picking. In hindsight, I should have really known better than to share a blog entry with a Facebook group that had become little more than an echo chamber for Third Wave feminism, atheism, and champagne socialism, but hindsight is 20/20. However, a mod from that group said something that had stuck in me ever since: "I didn't find much argument." And I asked myself, did I really make an argument? Since then, I've taken many moments to read and re-read my entry, and I said to myself "I can do better." And that's what today's blog is all about: a second analysis of Princess Peach and her role in the Mario games.
Who is Peach? She is the princess of the Mushroom Kingdom, and she gets kidnapped a lot by Bowser. That's the bare minimum anyone needs to know about Peach. According to her critics, she's just a Damsel in Distress: a pushover, a woman without a voice, lacking any autonomy or agency. She's a doll, an object to be acted upon by either the villain or the hero (to be kidnapped, and to be rescued). But the burning question is: is that truly all? Is Peach just someone to be rescued, potentially replaceable with any other object there is? Or is there more to her that her critics are unaware of, or ignore?
To answer this question, we need to look at Peach's roles in the games. For brevity, on this entry only a handful of games will be considered: the first three Super Mario Bros, Super Mario World, Super Mario RPG, and Super Princess Peach. References will also be made to other games, where applicable.
Consider Super Mario Bros, the first game in the series. In it, Princess Peach is kidnapped by Bowser, and it is up to Mario to rescue her. Period, the end. Not much to go on by itself, is it? Back in the year 1985, video games didn't have much in the story department, and if there was any, it'd be hidden in the game's manual. So, why did Bowser kidnap Peach? The answer is in the manual: He invaded the Mushroom Kingdom and cast a spell on its inhabitants, turning them into inanimate objects, and only Peach could reverse the spell. What we see here is the revelation of what Peach can do: she can cast magic powerful enough to counter a curse of this magnitude. That means that Mario rescues Peach not for personal reasons, but for a greater goal: to save the citizens of Mushroom Kingdom. It is for this reason that every Toad you rescue in castles 1 to 7 ALL make it a point to say "Thank you Mario, but our Princess is in another castle!" Peach's importance to the Kingdom is established early and unequivocally: only she can reverse Bowser's spell, and doing so is of utmost importance.
And yet this raises an important question: if Peach is strong enough to reverse the spell, why can't she use her magic to repel Bowser? My research has yielded no satisfactory In-Universe answer, and the Out-of-Universe justification (if she did, there'd be no game) has to be disregarded. I do have a theory, however: Peach might not have easy access to her magic, and she'd need time to concentrate on her spells. But why didn't she break free by herself? That is, of course, assuming she's capable of doing such a feat. One consistent thing about the Mario world is that Magic A is Magic A; a Fire Flower, for instance, will never give Mario the ability to fly. In the games, Peach is not shown to possess any offensive abilities. Just because Peach has the magic to undo Bowser's spells does not mean that she has the magic power to defeat Bowser one on one.
In fact, to understand Peach's skills more, we need to look at games where she takes an active role. Unlike a certain online critic, we can not disregard the way Peach is portrayed in the spin off games, such as Super Mario RPG. In this game, Peach is, physically speaking, the weakest character, and yet her skills may well be the most useful: she heals. In an RPG, the healer is, arguably, the most important character to have in the party. In comparison, however, Bowser is a tank who can take a lot of damage; he's survived being thrown into lava dozens of times, while Mario can die if the same were to happen to him. It's clear that Bowser simply outclasses Peach in terms of strength and resilience; add to the fact that Bowser has a large army capable of overwhelming the citizens of the Mushroom Kingdom, and we have ourselves a recipe for disaster.
All this merely helps to understand how Bowser is able to continuously kidnap Peach, but this does not address the major criticisms against Peach: that she's an object to be acted on, not a person. Consider the notion that, in Super Mario Bros and Super Mario Bros 2 (Japan version) her role could be replaced with a simple magic object that can undo Bowser's curse. This argument is not entirely wrong; if you can think of a perfect counter argument, you are more than welcome to make it in the comments section below. However, does that apply to ALL the Super Mario games where Peach is kidnapped?
In one word: no. Consider Super Mario Bros. 3, the second game where Peach takes an active part in the story (first if we discount Super Mario Bros. 2 USA Version). In this game, Peach is Mario's Mission Control, for lack of a better term. She entrusts Mario to aid her in rescuing the kidnapped Monarchs of the neighboring kingdoms, who have all been taken by the Koopalings, elite minions of Bowser. Peach is the one who directs Mario to which kingdom he is to go to, and sends him some aid in the form of a power up, like the P-Wing (which allows Mario to fly indefinitely for one whole level). Peach herself gets kidnapped by Bowser once the other kings are safe. After she is rescued, she plays a lighthearted joke on Mario ("Thank you Mario, but our princess is in another castle...just kidding!")
Super Mario Bros. 3 offers a great insight into Peach's psyche. She's a strong willed individual (getting kidnapped doesn't break her), she's light hearted and a bit goofy (cracking a joke as soon as she's rescued), but when the chips are down, she's all business (directing the missing monarchs rescue). Peach also demonstrates sound judgement, trusting the rescue of the missing monarchs not to any soldiers she has under her disposal (the Toads aren't exactly warriors) but the one person in the world she personally knows is capable of performing the task: Mario, the man who braved 8 worlds and stormed 8 castles to save the Mushroom Kingdom from Bowser. It is this game that really helps paint a clear picture of who Peach is, turning her from a plot device (the Damsel that needs to be rescued) into a character (the heiress to the Mushroom Kingdom throne who sends her best hero to aid the world, while offering some personal help as well).
But she still gets kidnapped constantly. This can not be ignored, and is in fact the biggest reason why Doug Walker gave her the "honor" of being the second biggest "Dumbass in Distress". Yet again we need to look at the person doing the kidnapping: Bowser.
Who is Peach? She is the princess of the Mushroom Kingdom, and she gets kidnapped a lot by Bowser. That's the bare minimum anyone needs to know about Peach. According to her critics, she's just a Damsel in Distress: a pushover, a woman without a voice, lacking any autonomy or agency. She's a doll, an object to be acted upon by either the villain or the hero (to be kidnapped, and to be rescued). But the burning question is: is that truly all? Is Peach just someone to be rescued, potentially replaceable with any other object there is? Or is there more to her that her critics are unaware of, or ignore?
To answer this question, we need to look at Peach's roles in the games. For brevity, on this entry only a handful of games will be considered: the first three Super Mario Bros, Super Mario World, Super Mario RPG, and Super Princess Peach. References will also be made to other games, where applicable.
Consider Super Mario Bros, the first game in the series. In it, Princess Peach is kidnapped by Bowser, and it is up to Mario to rescue her. Period, the end. Not much to go on by itself, is it? Back in the year 1985, video games didn't have much in the story department, and if there was any, it'd be hidden in the game's manual. So, why did Bowser kidnap Peach? The answer is in the manual: He invaded the Mushroom Kingdom and cast a spell on its inhabitants, turning them into inanimate objects, and only Peach could reverse the spell. What we see here is the revelation of what Peach can do: she can cast magic powerful enough to counter a curse of this magnitude. That means that Mario rescues Peach not for personal reasons, but for a greater goal: to save the citizens of Mushroom Kingdom. It is for this reason that every Toad you rescue in castles 1 to 7 ALL make it a point to say "Thank you Mario, but our Princess is in another castle!" Peach's importance to the Kingdom is established early and unequivocally: only she can reverse Bowser's spell, and doing so is of utmost importance.
And yet this raises an important question: if Peach is strong enough to reverse the spell, why can't she use her magic to repel Bowser? My research has yielded no satisfactory In-Universe answer, and the Out-of-Universe justification (if she did, there'd be no game) has to be disregarded. I do have a theory, however: Peach might not have easy access to her magic, and she'd need time to concentrate on her spells. But why didn't she break free by herself? That is, of course, assuming she's capable of doing such a feat. One consistent thing about the Mario world is that Magic A is Magic A; a Fire Flower, for instance, will never give Mario the ability to fly. In the games, Peach is not shown to possess any offensive abilities. Just because Peach has the magic to undo Bowser's spells does not mean that she has the magic power to defeat Bowser one on one.
In fact, to understand Peach's skills more, we need to look at games where she takes an active role. Unlike a certain online critic, we can not disregard the way Peach is portrayed in the spin off games, such as Super Mario RPG. In this game, Peach is, physically speaking, the weakest character, and yet her skills may well be the most useful: she heals. In an RPG, the healer is, arguably, the most important character to have in the party. In comparison, however, Bowser is a tank who can take a lot of damage; he's survived being thrown into lava dozens of times, while Mario can die if the same were to happen to him. It's clear that Bowser simply outclasses Peach in terms of strength and resilience; add to the fact that Bowser has a large army capable of overwhelming the citizens of the Mushroom Kingdom, and we have ourselves a recipe for disaster.
All this merely helps to understand how Bowser is able to continuously kidnap Peach, but this does not address the major criticisms against Peach: that she's an object to be acted on, not a person. Consider the notion that, in Super Mario Bros and Super Mario Bros 2 (Japan version) her role could be replaced with a simple magic object that can undo Bowser's curse. This argument is not entirely wrong; if you can think of a perfect counter argument, you are more than welcome to make it in the comments section below. However, does that apply to ALL the Super Mario games where Peach is kidnapped?
In one word: no. Consider Super Mario Bros. 3, the second game where Peach takes an active part in the story (first if we discount Super Mario Bros. 2 USA Version). In this game, Peach is Mario's Mission Control, for lack of a better term. She entrusts Mario to aid her in rescuing the kidnapped Monarchs of the neighboring kingdoms, who have all been taken by the Koopalings, elite minions of Bowser. Peach is the one who directs Mario to which kingdom he is to go to, and sends him some aid in the form of a power up, like the P-Wing (which allows Mario to fly indefinitely for one whole level). Peach herself gets kidnapped by Bowser once the other kings are safe. After she is rescued, she plays a lighthearted joke on Mario ("Thank you Mario, but our princess is in another castle...just kidding!")
Super Mario Bros. 3 offers a great insight into Peach's psyche. She's a strong willed individual (getting kidnapped doesn't break her), she's light hearted and a bit goofy (cracking a joke as soon as she's rescued), but when the chips are down, she's all business (directing the missing monarchs rescue). Peach also demonstrates sound judgement, trusting the rescue of the missing monarchs not to any soldiers she has under her disposal (the Toads aren't exactly warriors) but the one person in the world she personally knows is capable of performing the task: Mario, the man who braved 8 worlds and stormed 8 castles to save the Mushroom Kingdom from Bowser. It is this game that really helps paint a clear picture of who Peach is, turning her from a plot device (the Damsel that needs to be rescued) into a character (the heiress to the Mushroom Kingdom throne who sends her best hero to aid the world, while offering some personal help as well).
But she still gets kidnapped constantly. This can not be ignored, and is in fact the biggest reason why Doug Walker gave her the "honor" of being the second biggest "Dumbass in Distress". Yet again we need to look at the person doing the kidnapping: Bowser.
Disregarding Bowser's massive army of ghosts, skeletons, flying turtles, and chestnuts that bite (It's a video game geared towards a young audience, people, not Metal Gear) we need to look at the beast himself. Bowser is bigger and stronger than Peach or Mario. He can breathe fire, crush rocks with his hands, and I repeat, he can survive being thrown into lava. Many critics point out that Peach should invest in some increased security. My question is: what can stop Bowser? He can punch through rock, he commands a ghost army, and I repeat for a third time, he can SURVIVE LAVA! Rock can't stop him, lava can't stop him, ghosts can't stop him. And he can turn giant. Mario has never given Bowser a decisive defeat, with good reason.
Peach is scared of Bowser. And yet, does she cower and cry in the corner whenever she is kidnapped? No. In Super Mario World Peach takes an active role in her rescue, giving Mario a Power Mushroom at every opportunity she can. In Super Mario RPG she is willing and able to set aside her own feelings on Bowser in order to save the Star Road from the Smithy Clan. And in Super Princess Peach she takes matters into her own hands and goes save Mario and Luigi herself when Bowser takes them prisoner. Peach isn't helpless, she's just outclassed.
So, why all the criticism, why all the hate? Peach is one of the most visible women in gaming, appearing in more games than any other female character in the industry. And she is most well known for getting kidnapped and held against her will. Because of this, and the fact that the other most famous women in gaming are known for their sexy designs (like Lara Croft) it paints an ugly picture of women in gaming...for people who are not involved in gaming. But gaming has millions of different female characters, including witches, queens, mercenaries, knights, among many many other roles. The beauty in gaming lays in diversity; there is no other industry in the world that is THIS diverse in regards to the products it sells and how they are presented. Many people tend to forget that. Some people with an agenda DISREGARD that.
The problem with critique of Peach lays in an inability, or unwillingness, to let go of certain preconceptions: that the Damsel in Distress trope is misogynistic in nature, that feminist cultural values are universal, that feminism can do no wrong, and that a work that portrays women in passive roles is misogynistic. Many people forget that Japan, the country where Mario games are made, has different cultural values than America or Europe, and that these cultural differences must be kept in mind when analyzing anything made in Japan. And yet you'll find no shortage of critics who will ignore these cultural differences, or use them as a justification to chastise Japan's patriarchal values.
Princess Peach is a damsel in distress rather often, that is true. She's also a brave woman, a healer, a caring soul. She's someone who isn't afraid to get her hands dirty, but leaves the heavy work to the people best able to handle it. She's far from being a "dumbass in distress", she's a well rounded character with flaws and strengths, like all good characters should be. Keep that in mind next time you hear someone disparate her.
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