The good girl. Think Lara Jean Covey from To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, Daphne Bridgerton from Bridgerton, Betty Cooper from Archie Comics, and Sarah Cameron from Outer Banks. She’s innocent, and probably enjoys baking, reading, and/or volunteering at a pet shelter in her free time. These positive characteristics are so often drowned out by her other more negative traits, though. She is sheltered, innocent, and, in the eyes of many critics, boring. 

On a basic level, the good girl is an pure and moral girl from suburbia with little experience romantically, sexually, and in life overall. She dresses in pale pink and pastels and longs to live life to the fullest. Thinking of any characters yet? 

The origins of the trope date back to the beginning of film television with the classic 1950s housewife. A perfect example is Barbara Billingsley from Leave it to Beaver, a TV sitcom airing from 1958–1963. Barbara was a loving and smart mother who cared for her family in a feminine and graceful way, filling all the duties of the classic housewife.  It was from this idea of the perfect housewife that the good girl was created: a female character easily digestible to audiences of all genders, who didn’t cause any scandals or break any rules. This trope set the standard for female characters on television and in much of our modern media.

In more modern years, the basic code of the good girl hasn’t changed much. She’s still the happy-go-lucky girl next door, and she is still criticized. A quick Twitter search can bring up countless examples of Lara Jean, Betty Cooper, and other “good girl” characters being called “boring”. Why do we think they’re so boring when they’re often the main characters of their respective films and series? Surprise! It’s rooted in misogyny. Any female character is almost guaranteed to be subjected to extreme internet critiques in which she is picked apart and criticized to a greater extent than male characters. She’s always too loud, too quiet, or has no opinions. She's fat or she’s too skinny. She’s boring or she’s annoying. This is evidenced by decades of scrutiny of real women in the spotlight. Taylor Swift has been fat shamed and told she was too skinny in the same article. Selena Gomez has been told she has no talent despite her having over 5 billion song streams and sold over 6 million albums. 

Female characters are separated into different groups based on whatever extreme they seem to fit into best, such as the “bad girls”, “mean girls”, and “good girls”. These tropes offer little except empty criticism to be applied to any girl who fits the trope. If she’s the “bad girl'' she's a s**t, the “mean girl” is a b**ch, and the “good girl” is boring and a prude. 

A common trope in modern media is the “bad boy x good girl” romance. In this romance, the good girl falls in love with the bad boy, and she brings out a softer side in him, while he teaches her how to break rules and escape the good girl side of herself—which was previously her defining character trait. This is exemplified to a T by Hardin and Tessa from After. One of the major changes/shifts (or some other word with a less positive connotation than “progressions” of the good girl in media, This trope promotes the idea that a woman needs a man to be interesting because she doesn’t have a personality on her own. 

As our society evolves, so does this trope, although the character still faces an extreme amount of criticism even after all this time. The majority of this criticism is unwarranted and given simply for the sake of being given. The trope is outdated, and doesn’t offer much depth to characters. Female stories deserve to be more than just the girl next door who likes the idea of falling in love. This trope is an unfortunate reminder of the past that needs to retire to the Hollywood vault.