A Call For A Moratorium On The Average Guy/Hot Girl

Everywhere I look there are posters of Seth Rogan: a doughy redhead with an expression that suggests he just knocked into a table stacked with China. Above his head it reads, "What if this guy got you pregnant?"

Well, what if? He's kind of cute, he looks like he'd be funny, kind of like most of the guys I date. I guess it wouldn't be such a bad thing. Sure he's not a male model, but who says they make good fathers, anyway?

But the poster isn't addressing me, it's addressing the eight-foot tall Latvian model who's tired of jet-setting racecar billionaires and is surprised to find herself attracted to such a schlubby average Joe. Sure, he's ugly but she can't help it. She tells her other model pals over brunch, "He just makes me laugh."

Even the posters for this new brand of hybrid romantic-frat-boy-comedies alienate the normal girl who might actually find a guy like Seth Rogan attractive and not after he's made some heroic or excessively puppy-doggish gesture three quarters of the way through the film.

I'll admit I haven't seen the movie, but judging from the reviews and my general tastes, I'll probably love it. But this isn't a movie review: It's a call to arms for regular girls.

It all started with the fat guy, hot wife sitcoms of the 90's. It's a stretch but I can almost buy that Kevin James was really hot in high school or that Jamie Gertz got knocked up at prom and ruined her life. I also recognize that sitcoms with protagonists like Jim Belushi aren't targeting my urban twentysomething demographic.

But big budget romantic comedies are. So how did the cool, funny, less than drop dead gorgeous girl (re: Molly Ringwald, even Wynona Ryder) get muscled out the picture? In the late 90's Adam Sandler grossed billions with his frat boy comedies. And it somehow made sense that his leading lady would be golden blond and bare the name "Veronica." His movies were designed to fulfill the fantasies of college-age stoner boys.

But somewhere between Zoolander and Old School, Owen "eye candy" Wilson and Ben "sensitive" Stiller, frat-boy comedy and romantic comedy began to merge. In some way this was a huge step for mankind: some of the low-brow slapstick of Sandler and lobster slipping guffaws of, say, Julia Roberts were replaced by earnest, obscure references by Will Farrell and the showman's musicality of Jack Black.

All of a sudden the frizzy-haired, pot-bellied, back hair-iffic guy became a palatable leading man on a mainstream scale. Such was not true for the ladies.

Take away all of the smart comedy, a large draw of these films is that you're supposed to relate to these guys. They're offer promise to the slacker sitting on his mom's couch dripping mayonnaise on of his boob flaps. They're totally accessible superheroes. Unless you're a girl ...who's not insanely hot.

And as a girl who's not insanely hot, I'm frustrated that off-screen average Joes of the world are being encouraged to raise their standards way too high. Why would they date a normal girl when their boyish humor can spread the legs of a supermodel?

What's more: I'm frustrated that the kinds of girls they're instructed to be attracted to aren't just hot, they're utterly humorless. Some of them are written to not really speak English and others are just giggle factories who looooooove sports! Do funny men not want funny women? Is it a turnoff when a women cracks a joke even if she is dynamically gorgeous? Is it all about power?

As a female audience member short of 11 dollars, I don't know where to lay my hat. On the funny guy who's humor and normalcy I relate to, but who wouldn't give me the time of day if Katherine Heigl was my plus one? Or the hot girl who's clearly self-conscious about the fact she's not that smart and is attaching herself to guy who she feels substantiates the only side of her that's lacking (the inside)? I know that these movies are just fantasy, but where's my fantasy?

It's time the ladies were acknowledged as paying movie-goers. And no, we (okay, I) don't want an equally gorgeous beefcake man to parade around onscreen. How about a just slightly above average attractive girl with Ginzu-sharp wit that Seth Rogan types go nuts for? Say, Sarah Silverman for starters.

I'm sick of the Katherine Heigls, the Shannon Elizabeths and the Kate Beckinsales of the film world. In fact the only female ingénue I'm not sick of is Pamela Anderson. Borat had it right: The scene in which the titular character literally sacks the Baywatch uber-babe and then chases her bagged body around a parking lot in an effort to make her his leading lady, is a far more accurate expression of what such mismatched love-making would entail.