A film studies professor decided to rank each of the Star Wars films based on how much screen time women get in the movies.
Dr. Rebecca Harrison, a lecturer at the University of Glasgow for film and television studies, tweeted the results, which showed the recent The Last Jedi and The Force Awakens films have the most screen time for female characters.
You can view the full results in this tweet.
Last Jedi led the way with 43 percent of the film having female screen time, with Force Awakens and Rogue One right behind with 37 and 35 percent, respectively.
Conversely, A New Hope sits dead last with 15 percent. Revenge of the Sith and Attack of the Clones which are both in the prequel trilogy that told the story of the rise of Darth Vader rested near the bottom with 17 and 18 percent, respectively.
According to Screen Rant, Harrison spent 48 hours watching and editing every "Star Wars" film to create cuts that only included the female characters. She then figured out the percentage of time women spoke on screen.
Solo was not included in the rankings because it just hit theaters. But Harrison said the film will be added to her list once its available for purchase, Screen Rant reported.
Harrison told Mashable the results show a historic problem with the franchise.
"I think the franchise has historically had an enormous gender problem, and a race one, too," she said. "The fact there are so few women with speaking parts in the original trilogy means Leia has to do all the work (although of course Carrie Fisher is marvellous) and the prequels are actually worse for women than films made in the '70s and '80s! (...) Leia has far more autonomy than Padm, for example, which shows progress is slow and not necessarily straightforward."
She pointed out that recent Disney-era films have more screen time for women, which is a sign of progress for the franchise.
She said the Star Wars franchise is becoming more diverse for women, too.
"It's really important that in the last four films there has been an increase in major speaking parts for women of colour, with Rose Tico (Kelly Marie Tran) in 'The Last Jedi,' and Val (Thandie Newton) and Enfys Nest (Erin Kellyman) in 'Solo,'" said Harrison. "I hope that trend continues because the Galaxy can't keep being populated by white women who all look like clones of Leia."
Star Wars has worked to put an emphasis on female characters in recent years. It launched an animated web series called Star Wars: Forces of Destiny in 2017, which put an emphasis on female heroes, such as Princess Leia, Queen Amidala (also known as Padm), Rey, Jyn Erso and others, according to the Deseret News.
Dr. Rebecca Harrison, a lecturer at the University of Glasgow for film and television studies, tweeted the results, which showed the recent The Last Jedi and The Force Awakens films have the most screen time for female characters.
You can view the full results in this tweet.
Last Jedi led the way with 43 percent of the film having female screen time, with Force Awakens and Rogue One right behind with 37 and 35 percent, respectively.
Conversely, A New Hope sits dead last with 15 percent. Revenge of the Sith and Attack of the Clones which are both in the prequel trilogy that told the story of the rise of Darth Vader rested near the bottom with 17 and 18 percent, respectively.
According to Screen Rant, Harrison spent 48 hours watching and editing every "Star Wars" film to create cuts that only included the female characters. She then figured out the percentage of time women spoke on screen.
Solo was not included in the rankings because it just hit theaters. But Harrison said the film will be added to her list once its available for purchase, Screen Rant reported.
Harrison told Mashable the results show a historic problem with the franchise.
"I think the franchise has historically had an enormous gender problem, and a race one, too," she said. "The fact there are so few women with speaking parts in the original trilogy means Leia has to do all the work (although of course Carrie Fisher is marvellous) and the prequels are actually worse for women than films made in the '70s and '80s! (...) Leia has far more autonomy than Padm, for example, which shows progress is slow and not necessarily straightforward."
She pointed out that recent Disney-era films have more screen time for women, which is a sign of progress for the franchise.
She said the Star Wars franchise is becoming more diverse for women, too.
"It's really important that in the last four films there has been an increase in major speaking parts for women of colour, with Rose Tico (Kelly Marie Tran) in 'The Last Jedi,' and Val (Thandie Newton) and Enfys Nest (Erin Kellyman) in 'Solo,'" said Harrison. "I hope that trend continues because the Galaxy can't keep being populated by white women who all look like clones of Leia."
Star Wars has worked to put an emphasis on female characters in recent years. It launched an animated web series called Star Wars: Forces of Destiny in 2017, which put an emphasis on female heroes, such as Princess Leia, Queen Amidala (also known as Padm), Rey, Jyn Erso and others, according to the Deseret News.
