4 Reasons Zooey Deschanel Can Stop Pretending She's a Dork
If you're anything like me, you track rising movie starlets through a patented system of chicken bone voodoo and Precog upkeep. It's a good system but sometimes people fall through the cracks. Like when the lil' water baldies began rolling out the name 'Zooey' over and over again, I had to consult other sources to get a reading of what was up. Turns out there's this girl that everyone is love with. This is her:
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She doesn't even know how she can be so adorable.
Her name is Zooey Deschanel (sounds like Da' Chanel, which is coincidentally what I call my perfume when I'm feeling sassy) and she's the new 'It' girl. Or old 'It' girl, depending on how quickly you get tired of 'It' girls. If 'cute' was a commodity Zooey would be the Federal Reserve. Scratch that. She'd be China and the rest of us girls would be used food stamps that once doubled as Clue scorecards. THANK GOD cute is not a commodity is what I'm saying.
"HEY GUYS, WHAT'S UP?"
Do you remember back when Friends was big, and every girl you knew had Rachel's haircut? (AC)ZD is the Rachel of girl people right now. If you're of the female persuasion and you don't want to dress like syphilis in a tube top, this is who you're probably getting some fashion cues from. And if you're a guy, a reasonable facsimile of this girl is who you're trying to meet, not to have dirty, filthy sex with, but to marry and make babies and dirty, filthy noodle casseroles with.
But you never, ever will. Everevereverever. You have a better chance of meeting a meatball lady and making SpaghettiO babies with her. Here's why.
Setting Up the Myth: Zooey's Accessibility
Every generation gets a couple of sex symbols, and most are as accessible as riding shotgun on a mission to Mars; Marilyn Monroe, Audrey Hepburn and Mary Lou Retton, for example. But Zooey, we're told, is one of us. She's goofy. She's awkward. She doesn't dress like a hooker. She's a Polaroid snapshot of your mother back before the saddlebags and nipple-high jeans ate her body. Watch this and tell me you're not in love. I'm in love and I don't even like girls unless there's a chance I can get a friendship bracelet out of the relationship. The best part? About ten years ago Sweet Zee was an altogether different person:
A dye job and a trip to Goodwill transformed Zooey into an indie darling.
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PS, 'indie' doesn't mean what it sounds like!
If some vintage clothes and a bucket full of bangs were all it took for Zooey to capture America, anyone could do it, right? Sheeewwwwwt, I have access to a Goodwill. Here's what I look like after I shop there:
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The clothes compel me to sleep between trash cans under a blue light. This vintage stuff is harder than it looks. Speaking of...
Myth BUSTED: Looking Like That is Harder Than it Looks
Clear your booths, padres, because I've got a confession: I've been trying to get my hair to look like Zooey Deschanel's since the mid-2000s. It turns out when you have a cowlick on the widow's peak of your hairline, your bangs will never lay flat and indie. Here's a picture of me after attempting to get bangs:
Disco Music
Talkin' 'bout a sad girl.
Here's a picture of me and my girlfriends at the club in 2006 after attempt number two:
Zooey Ramone! Ha ha, sorry.
The point is that there's a specific formula to looking like you just walked out of a Mad Men audition and Zooey's found it. And unfortunately, If you don't follow the formula or a slight variation of it you just end up looking like you walked out of Mama's Family reunion party instead. Accessorizing with a sweet potato pie probably didn't help your case, either. Here's how Zooey pulls it off:
Got all that? It's the clothes, plus the hair, plus the very round eyes that have been stapled open by a cruel and terrible god who had no idea how adorable his creation would turn out:
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Joke's on you, Omnipotent Creator!
It's a very hard thing to pull off. But don't tell that to all the girls and grown women who are trying to look like this as we speak. Or all of the famous lookalikes out there, not counting Katy Perry, because I'm probably going to make that joke later. There are Zooey make-up tutorials and hair lessons and heartbreakingly obsessive fashion guides. There are fan sites, obviously, but not just the run of a mill, too-much-time-on-your-hands kind. This poor girl has a Facebook page dedicated to her eyeballs. I'm starting to wonder how she sleeps at night.
Zooey Deschanel's Eyes
Not in a creepy way. I mean, I'm not thinking about her sleeping. Not really, I mean, wait -
What's really easy for her isn't so easy for everyone else, is what I'm trying to say without sounding like a creep.
That;s kinda the vibe I get from her... she's too fake. Don't like her.
Replyi hate zooey.
ReplyBy the number of comments here it's safe to say someone already mentioned this so, with my apologies for repeating it, here goes:
ReplyThe vast majority of guys have accepted that the super hot, Katherine Heigl/supermodel beautiful types are out of reach for them, but that the really cute girl-next-door type is within reach simply because she's not as in-your-face hot as the first group of girls, and thus, somehow, attainable. It's this premise upon which the Leonard and Penny relationship on 'The Big Bang Theory' rests, and at the same time perpetuates. If Penny had been Marissa Miller hot, it wouldn't have worked on the show, b/c it's assumed that for a large segment of its viewers Penny is definitely a possibility for Leonard: that with a little luck, the really pretty but not super hot chick is attainable.
super *hot* chick
I don't get the whole MPDG thing. Sure, they might appear fun to be around in movies, but God forbid you ever have to put up with one in real life-all that free-spirited crap stops being awesome the instant she's calling you at three in the morning on a work day to drive her to an auction in Philadelphia selling the original Chucky Doll so she can have something to help film the next time you're having shower sex. Hell, that s**t even got addressed in 500 days of Summer. You don't invite your crushed-and-broken-but-still-wants-to-get-back-with-you ex to dance with you at a wedding, if you know he doesn't have any chance of fulfilling that dream. That's just bitchy.
ReplyI just want to know how the writer of this article could write about the manic pixie dream girl and then not link tvtropes.
ReplyWhen I saw the words "geek sex symbol" I was expecting, well OK, Alyson Hannigan is pretty obvious there, but in addition, probably Jessica Chobot and Felicia Day. I think that's probably Mila Kunis just above Daniel Radcliffe, but I have no idea who the girl in the middle or the guy in the suit at the bottom are.
ReplyWell the difference is that Alyson really is a geek and in "real" life she would not be a sex symbol. I never realised Mila was a geek and I just don't get why Zoey can't be herself, she has always been this way.
Don Draper. HOW DO YOU NOT KNOW THIS.
I really liked this article. I didn't get the feeling you hate her, and I despise articles that do nothing but b***h about someone. You made some nice comparisons and the bit about the bangs was awesome. I actually got bangs once so I could look like Zooey and tried many times to mimic her to no avail. Oh well lol
ReplyI always assumed that she was seen as (slightly, maybe) attainable because she seems unpretentious and non-judgemental. She rarely is seen dressed sluttily, and apparently she has a personality to boot. Not a bully, in other words (which is why Katy Perry, far from being Zooey's long-lost twin, is actually her evil alter-ego. No nerds really fancy Katy Perry because she's the opposite of all those things I just listed).
Replyoh god, I have the same cowlick. It's so depressing.
ReplyWait-- Katy Perry and Zooey Deschanel are two different people?
ReplyOh, and Audrey Hepburn was in fact a Manic Pixie Dream Girl. There's a whole movie about how she was funny-looking until a professional photographer figured out how to photograph her from the right angle. Then, of course, she developed confidence in her appearance, and, well, it's the same story as a couple hundred movies, and a least one episode of every TV show with a teenaged girl on it.
the film's called funny face and she was adorkable!
"It turns out when you have a cowlick on the widow's peak of your hairline, your bangs will never lay flat and indie"
Replydo i have to be female to know WHAT THE f**k that means?
I'm female, and I had to read it three times before I got it. Don't worry, you're fine.
phew :) i thought i was having a mild stroke or something when i read that.
No Sh!t? She's a geek icon of faux awkward cuteness? So what? Should I drool over a talentless bimbo instead of a girl who can sing, act, play music, be a little awkward and imbue a likeable style that the type of women I like might emulate. Could it be that her standard goto roles are a reflection of her personality? Being a dork and being attractive are not mutually exclusive.
ReplyOh, literal san!
come on, we've all seen elf - she acted appallingly in that. She was fine in 500 days of summer, I think 'new girl's acting is supposed to be a bit hammy, but seriously, elf.
Article of the year, hands down. Simply the best. Funny and sharp. More KH please.
ReplyNGL, I hate the f**k out of Zooey Deschanel. I hate that manic pixe dreamgirl trope. That said, beauty and awkwardness aren't mutually exclusive. I've known plenty of strange, awkward people of both genders who were gorgeous and plenty of well adjusted, social butterflies who were ordinary, plain or hideous.
Replyman i though judging someone’s personality based on appearance would make you a bigot. also how are there no good looking nerds on this site? no one was offended, by being told that the reason you read comics wasn’t because you liked them but because you were too ugly to get a date to the prom? wtf cracked how have you not ripped this prejudice a*****e a new one yet?
ReplyI love her. LIKESOMUCH. New Girl is amazing. I can't explain it. I think she implanted an alien microchip in my brain that tells me when I can stop wanting to be her. Which is never. I'm just lucky I didn't get the microchip that told me to make a fanpage about her eyes.
ReplyShe did drown her sick cat in Winter Passing and then proceed to bone Will Ferrell. I'd call that grotesque.
ReplySo, basically all but one of your arguments boil down to: "Because she's good-looking."
ReplyTry again.
Where is my fricken comment????? Where is my Avatar? OK again, then. So Kim Kardashian is famous for doing nothing (true), then we have the sluts and the whores then we have Zooey who is pretending to be a nerd. As much as I love you cracked, who do you really like? What is the correct, real woman? One who lays in bed with her mouth shut waiting for her man? Maybe you removed my comment, I said I love you.
ReplyPreeeettty sure there's a middle ground between Kim Kardashian and Zooey Deschanel.
Ok so on one hand Kim K is annoying because she is all just about posing and being famous for nothing. Then you've got the sluts and the whores. Now Zooey is annoying for being nerdy. Sorry but as much as I love you cracked, what do you like? Why are women always "pretending"? What constitutes the Real woman? A body laying in a bed with her mouth shut?
ReplyOK its back. whatever
Thanks for the thumbs down :-(