Postmodern Medusa: The Monstrous-Feminine in StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm

Abstract

This article explores the representation of monstrous-feminine agency through the character of Kerrigan in the StarCraft series with emphasis on StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm. Kerrigan’s subjectivity as a player-character complicates her in ways that require a different application of the monstrous-feminine from those characters from literature, film, and video games that position them as enemies to overcome. The article begins examining Kerrigan through the lens of the monstrous-feminine and the abject before discussing how her hypersexualization ostensibly contradicts her monstrosity as an empowering force. The author then explores the obstacles Kerrigan must overcome and how this struggle reifies her disruption of and resistance against the symbolic order. The discussion concludes that Kerrigan’s connection between the player and monstrous-feminine character is a significant paradigm shift for the female monster and how agency and empathy allow players to understand the monstrous-feminine in a new perspective.

Angel Anxiety: Alice Angel as the Uncanny Presence in Bendy and the Ink Machine

“…While Creed's (1993; 1999/2020) work on the monstrous-feminine has been mostly associated with film and cinematic narratives, it has found a growing use within other media forms such as video games. Scholars such as Stang (2018), Harkin (2020), Spittle (2011), Blomquist (2021), and Stang and Trammell (2020) have all completed analyses of the monstrous-feminine figures and their use of abjection in various video games. As Stang (2018) argues, the monstrous-feminine, particularly in video games, is an important site of analysis for the fear and anxiety that they induce.…”