A WALL-E question

[hongi]

I haven't seen WALL-E in quite a while and I was hoping you guys could refresh my memory. In what instances is WALL-E identified as a 'male' and EVE as a 'female'?

[Darth Wong]

I haven't seen WALL-E in quite a while and I was hoping you guys could refresh my memory. In what instances is WALL-E identified as a 'male' and EVE as a 'female'?

Obviously, neither of them have genitalia, so the implication is made based largely on the tone of their voices.

[hongi]

Obviously, neither of them have genitalia, so the implication is made based largely on the tone of their voices.

WALL-E didn't sound all that masculine to me to be honest. And I know that sounds stupid, but I really thought he sounded...more robot-like than male. See vid.

[edit] I just called WALL-E a him. That was wierd.

[Solauren]

Out of universe: Their names are what are the indicators

Wall-E = Wally - Generally considered a male name
Eve = (well) Eve - Generally considereda female name

And come on, don't tell me Wall-E doesn't look a little like the sterotypical bug-eyed nerd.

[hongi]

Wall-E = Wally - Generally considered a male name
Eve = (well) Eve - Generally considereda female name

I'm thinking about why Pixar gave gender associations to WALL-E and EVE. Did Pixar try to make Wall-E and EVE male and female when they set out? If they hadn't, would it have been a more interesting movie?

I guess they did it for us, because the audience might find gender-neutral characters strange. But I think they left enough wiggle room in there for us to interpret it differently if we so chose. In-universe of course, they have rather more ordinary names e.g. Extraterrestrial Vegetation Evaluator.

[Mobiboros]

Obviously, neither of them have genitalia, so the implication is made based largely on the tone of their voices.

WALL-E didn't sound all that masculine to me to be honest. And I know that sounds stupid, but I really thought he sounded...more robot-like than male. See vid.

[edit] I just called WALL-E a him. That was wierd.

My 3 year old daughter calls WALL-E "He" and EVE "Her". So there's obviously cues based on voice and behavior that even kids can pick up on. I also agree with Mike, the voices are definitely "gendered". WALL-E has the deeper voice, EVE is higher pitched.

Plus, WALL-E plays all the "Traditionall Male" roles in their "Romance". He's the one using the hubcap as a hat during the dancing. He's the one rowing the boat across the oil lake.

Most of the robots in the movie seem to be gendered based somewhat on "Looks" and more on voice (The makeup robots all sound like stereotypical female stylists, etc...)

[hongi]

WALL-E has the deeper voice, EVE is higher pitched.

Disagree. Check the vid. EVE has the deeper pitch. WALL-E sounds like me at 12.

Most of the robots in the movie seem to be gendered based somewhat on "Looks" and more on voice (The makeup robots all sound like stereotypical female stylists, etc...)

Why did they? We can cope with R2-D2, who is for all intents and purposes, gender-neutral. I've certainly never thought of him (it, whatever!) as male.

[Samuel]

I thought Eva was male and Wall-E was female. After all, which one had the gun and which one was a home-maker?

Seriously, they are sexless robots who have been given a large number of human traits, but gender isn't one of them. Eva might be feminine and Wall-E masculine, but neither is male or female. It is just Pixar trying to manipulate our responses to achieve an emotional reaction.

Extraterrestrial Vegetation Evaluator.

Earth isn't Extraterrestrial.

[hongi]

Earth isn't Extraterrestrial.

I'm thinking EVE was constructed to go planets other than Earth.

[Ghost Rider]

I'd say it was purely tonal. I mean no one thinks of the Auto Pilot as a she, or the security bots, or MOE, and a few of the others that had maybe half a second screen time. The creators gave gender roles in that format.

Plus in the extras, they pretty much say EVE as female and WALL-E as male.

[Bedlam]

WALL-E has the deeper voice, EVE is higher pitched.

Disagree. Check the vid. EVE has the deeper pitch. WALL-E sounds like me at 12.

Most of the robots in the movie seem to be gendered based somewhat on "Looks" and more on voice (The makeup robots all sound like stereotypical female stylists, etc...)

Why did they? We can cope with R2-D2, who is for all intents and purposes, gender-neutral. I've certainly never thought of him (it, whatever!) as male.

Thats odd, to me R2 has always seemed male even though he has no gender characteristics.

[Oskuro]

Besides the visuals, EVE has the typical (movie) female attitude, beign independent, giggling, screaming at the male character, and being oblivious to his advances. Also, she's an iPod, and those are either female or fa-bu-lously gay.

[Bounty]

Thats odd, to me R2 has always seemed male even though he has no gender characteristics.

Probably because characters consistently referred to him as being male.

[Mobiboros]

Disagree. Check the vid. EVE has the deeper pitch. WALL-E sounds like me at 12.

I disagree. Maybe it sounds different when you watch on Blue-Ray player looped through a surround sound system? Wall-E definitely has a masculine tone where as EVE is distinctly female. Granted you could probably say WALL-E sounds like a male going through puberty and EVE is a post pubescent female. But there's definite gender especially in contrast to one another.

Why did they? We can cope with R2-D2, who is for all intents and purposes, gender-neutral. I've certainly never thought of him (it, whatever!) as male.

1) they did because it's a kids movie and kids don't really grasp gender roles on a philosophical level. They know "Boy" and "Girl". "It" doesn't work for them as it's nothing they can relate to. Same with a wider audience really. People want characters they can relate to and they have a gender.

2) First I've always thought of R2 as a he. Maybe that's my own gender biases but R2 and C3PO as a comedy side-kick duo, like laurel and hardy or abbot and costello. That said, you could make the argument that R2 is "Ok" because he doesn't play any kind of romantic part. Wall-E and EVE are in a romantic relationship so the audience needs to feel it cen relate through gender roles.

[Vympel]

R2 is definitely a he. Anakin specifically says "he's trying" to Obi-Wan in RotS.

[Hawkwings]

And here we see the results of Pixar's work. I guarantee you that they had a "How do we tell the audience that WALL-E is a guy and EVE is a girl, without telling them?" meeting. Their genders are defined by their actions and voices. For those audience members that have seen romantic movies of any sort before, WALL-E takes on the traditional male roles, and is portrayed as a sort of ignorant, earnest and hardworking "teenager" looking for some companionship. And this is obviously helped along by the clips of "Hello, Dolly" that we see. And really, after listening to EVE (hint hint) for about three seconds, could you really dispute that she was meant to be female?

[Oskuro]

More proof of EVE's girlyness (or gayness, why not):

[Serafina]

1) they did because it's a kids movie and kids don't really grasp gender roles on a philosophical level. They know "Boy" and "Girl". "It" doesn't work for them as it's nothing they can relate to. Same with a wider audience really. People want characters they can relate to and they have a gender.

I disagree with that, at least somewhat. Children (age 3-5) can easily call something "it" and still treat it like a person: i.e animals. They only pick a gender for "it" when someone else uses it (refering to the cat as female) or "it" has an obivious gender characteristic (as with EVE and WALL-E).
You do not see that very often under normal circumstances, because nearly EVERYTHING in our society has some kind of gender-stamp, and children are nearly never without adults influence for long.
But other than that, children can easily refer to individuals as "it", at least in a phase where there are still learning language concepts (age 3-5, more or less).

[Fr33ze]

In the movie, I believe few people would have gender-confusions no matter what backgrounds they have, as the "typical" features they add into WALL-E and EVE are universally accepted.

I'm thinking about why Pixar gave gender associations to WALL-E and EVE. Did Pixar try to make Wall-E and EVE male and female when they set out? If they hadn't, would it have been a more interesting movie?

Robots are known as "neutral", but with genders in a movie or a book, it appears more vivid and interesting. It's the same as "personification" you learned from writing classes.

[Ted C]

Don't the names -- "Wally" and Eve -- make the assigned genders pretty obvious?

[tim31]

And come on, don't tell me Wall-E doesn't look a little like the sterotypical bug-eyed nerd.

Ignoring the obsession with Hello, Dolly!, WALL-E is obviously Woody Allen and EVE is Diane Keaton.

[Mobiboros]

i.e animals. They only pick a gender for "it" when someone else uses it (refering to the cat as female)

Uhm, animals have genders. I have 3 cats. 2 girls and a boy and my daughter calls them by their gender. As do all her friends that are roughly the same age. In fact the opposite of what you say may be true. Most of the kids i've seen DON'T treat animals as living things until they identify it with familiar characteristics. When kids are still calling them "it", that's often when they pet animals too hard or pull their tails, etc... until they can empathize with it.

But other than that, children can easily refer to individuals as "it", at least in a phase where there are still learning language concepts (age 3-5, more or less).

Yes, they can. That's why I said they don't relate to "it", not that they don't use "It". It is for "things", not people to kids. Having two "It's" in a movie showing romantic feelings (the only model for which the kids have is their parents, which have genders) is confusing. So, they gender the robots.

[Serafina]

Of course animals have genders - but they are not obvious, thus, i have often seen children refering to them as "it".
They are normally not able to assing a gender to the animal on their own, thus, they do not use it unless someone tells it to them.
I have never observed a correlation between the usage of gender-pronoms and the handling of the animal - some childs are just rough (including to other children), some are not.


Of course, all of this is just my personal explanation for personal experience (working in a kindergarden), and not solid scientific data.

[Zor]

The big thing according to the Audio commentaries on the DVS is there designs.

WALL-E is Boxy, Industrial, Mechanical in his design, and the creaters likened him (and yes, Andrew Stanton, the creator refered to WALL-E as Him) to a Tractor.

EVE is sleak, ovular, rounded, fast and advanced, and the creaters likened her (again, EVE is refered to as her on the commentary) to a Porsche.

Zor