Girl Power!

Today I ran across the article "Meet the Woman Who Made History With Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy" , read it, and thought, "My God! She's like a way cooler version of me I'd like to be! She's 33 and admires Ray Bradbury and SIR Kenneth Branagh, both of whom she's met. (I want to be her friend! Please let life work out where we can be friends!) However, the article did stand out for many other reasons.

Let's just start with the fact that a woman is behind the spark that became the awesome movie Guardians of the Galaxy. I love that she chose the "lesser [property]" that most people weren't sure was the best one for the direction of the cinematic part of the franchise. Woman's intuition! Ha! This says a lot about going with one's gut. Even though we like to rely on reason many times before taking a risk, there are moments when that nagging feeling in the pit of the stomach must be acted upon. I like that.

I also love, love, love the two year program Perlman was part of. It didn't seem like a usual intern program where Marvel just found a bunch of comic fanatics and tricked them into sorting through all the properties saving the higher-ups time. Instead, Marvel seems to take great care of those chosen for the program. I mean, Perlman's job at one point was to just read comic books! Then she was pretty much left alone to develop her idea. I cannot remember the last time I was left alone to develop ANY idea. There are always "rules" that have to be followed. I admire Marvel for allowing creativity to develop like that.

Then of course there is the class and humility with which Perlman accepted someone else would rework her original script. She understands how things work, and my frustration sits more with Gunn's "[downplaying] Perlman's involvement." I get it is probably all tied up into screen credits and money, but c'mon. Would it have killed Gunn to admit that Perlman's hunch about Quill and the gang is somewhat responsible for the film that scored 100% on Rotten Tomatoes?! Oh well. At least Marvel still treated her well letting her come on set and stuff.

So my favorite points: Marvel seems to know how to treat its people, Guardians is on the big screen because of a woman, and Perlman maintained her composure instead of going total fangirl when she got to work with SIR Kenneth Branagh (I totally would have giggled the whole time he was in front of me).

This is just an inspirational article. Not to mention it is a step towards changing many ideas about what a comic book fan and screenwriter looks like. Nicole Perlman-YOU GO GIRL!