Women of Borderlands

The video game industry gets a lot of hate being called sexist, especially since Anita Sarkeesian came to public attention with her Youtube series, "Tropes vs. Women in Gaming". Now this woman is a cancer to both the gaming and the feminist community, but this is once again something we will address later. For now I want to go a more positive route. Here are some of the glorious strong women cast in the borderlands series. All of these characters are either playable, get significant screen time, or are otherwise extremely relevant and important women at some point in the series as something other than a damsel in distress role.

1. Mad Moxxi
The only sexualized character in the entire series, and the great thing of it was that she was written in a way where while she may dress somewhat provocatively, she makes the calls sexually and knows how to say no. She isn't sexualized in the way of just falling over any man, she simply isn't ashamed of her body. She is a passionate mother, a bisexual woman, and a pure badass.

2. Janey Springs
The strong, capable, commanding, and hilariously condescending open lesbian introduced to guide you in Borderlands the Pre-Sequel. Not to mention, she writes children's books!

3. Gaige the Mecromancer

A high school girl who created a giant robot to combat her bullies. She is incredibly awesome and also incredibly smart and obviously goof with robots. She is one of the most diverse playable characters as with the tank aspect of her robot, Gaige is an excellent choice from the Borderlands 2 DLC for either a melee and a range class.

4. Athena the Gladiator

A former member of an all female assassins force hellbent on avenging her sisters death. That in and of itself is plenty to brand her as an excellent example of a strong female because how many all female assassin cults can you think of? Not to mention while her actions are driven by compassion for another person, it's vengeance and family, not romantic love and a man.

5. Maya the Siren

One of my favorite Borderland's characters, monks identified her as a siren and raised her to better hone her skills to be become held in high regard as their goddess and savior. She left the order of the monks to explore and have adventure because she refused to be tied down and let anyone but herself dictate who she would be and what she would do. Also though it was not written in the game outright, Anthony Burch has come forward and said he wanted to see more of Maya so it can come out that canonically, she is written to be asexual.

6. Nisha the Law Bringer

She is a sherif and a woman of color. A coldhearted killed with a bloodlust unmatched by any other vault hunter, Nisha has no sympathy or remorse for anyone.

7. Tiny Tina

At only 13 years old, an explosives expert. She and her parents were sold as test subjects which resulted in the death of her parents, but Tina being the brilliant and resourceful little girl that she is, escaped a similar fate by way of grenade she had hidden in her dress.

8. Patricia Tannis

A brilliant researcher, scientist, and archeologist with severe social anxiety and who displays behaviors of that with a person with Aspergers. She is dependent on repetition and her comfort zone as well as has a hard time experiencing empathy. And while these traits are present, what we really focus on about her is her impeccable intelligence. She is arguably the smartest character in the series, regardless of gender.

9. Ellie

The plus sized, car loving, daughter of Mad Moxxi that you would be wise not to mess with. She left the care of her mother because she was tired of hearing her advice to slim down because Ellie is happy with the size she is at and didn't care what anyone, including her mother, had to say about it.

These are just some of the prominent women of Borderlands. We have another lovely leading lady, Fiona, from Tales from the Borderlands, the telltale game that released last November which I regretfully have not yet played.