It's official!

http://www.amazon.com/WOMENS-MURDER-CLUB-COMPLETE-SEASON/dp/B00NTSK1DQ/ref=sr_1_2?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1411831433&sr=1-2&keywords=women%27s+murder+club

Remember we have a special surprise for today’s Women’s Murder Club Day. Usually, Cindy Thomas is the one who’s asking the questions--you have the opportunity to turn the tables: Aubrey Dollar has graciously agreed to participate in a Q&A for this year’s WMC Day. If you have a question for her, tweet to @aubreydollar with the hashtag #wmcday.

~ ~ ~

Finest detectives in #Battlecreek @aubreydollar @edgrapevine @kalpenn @lizalapira. Love seeing this great cast today pic.twitter.com/bNpjv5VEjd

— Sharon Bialy (@SharonBialy) April 3, 2014

Cindy Thomas back at the scene of the crime: Aubrey Dollar as Holly in the upcoming crime drama Battle Creek

In the past years, I’ve talked about the origin of the Women’s Murder Club Day, the reasons to keep it going, and my personal story. It’s been six years since the cancellation. We’re still here, and for a reason.

Each year I’ll come back and give you the same task-- find me a show that can compete. You know, a TV drama in which more than two women interact with each other in a cooperative way rather than competitive. Ensemble casts where the guys get equal time, don’t count. As long as you won’t be able to come up with that show, there’ll be a WMC Day, and maybe beyond, because pioneers deserve to be remembered and celebrated.

Hollywood has been slow to acknowledge that women viewers pay for DVDs and movie tickets, and they want to see women interact in a certain way.

The Heat, Catching Fire, Frozen, and now, The Other Woman--we wonder how many “flukes” it takes for TPTB to make the connection.

Rizzoli & Isles, Season 5 promo

Back in 2008, USA Today conducted a poll regarding which show “on the bubble” most people rooted for. Women’s Murder Club made it to #4, with over 70% of the votes cast by women. Those voices obviously weren’t heard.

I’ve always been interested in the representation of women in the media, and how it impacts the perception of women in general. Ask yourself what message you’d like to see, to be given to your daughter(s)? I think of those women, getting the job done, supporting each other professionally and in their private lives, and I can’t think of anything better.

In his review of the pilot episode, Tim Goodman had to say this: “Two women wrote the first episode. That it portrays women so poorly and one-dimensionally and manages, in the end, to set up a serial-killer story line in which the female victims' mouths are sewn shut is both disturbing and sad.” (Bonding over Crime, sfgate.com). Let’s take a moment to absorb this, everything in and in between those lines. It’s a bit awkward if a male critic tries to “mansplain” to a female audience how they should feel about TV created by women about female characters. This statement misses the mark completely. The metaphor here is how patriarchy has always worked to silence women’s voices. Change and progress could happen when women refused to enter a ridiculous competition against each other, but connected and organized instead.

Try again.

For now, we’re celebrating an exceptional show and the women who made it great on the 6th Women’s Murder Club Day.

(Here's Paula Newsome in the Pepsi commercial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCXr7ECpGQg, and you might have seen that Laura Harris has joined twitter recently).


PS -->
Find us also on twitter https://twitter.com/wmcday1
and Facebook https://www.facebook.com/pages/Womens-Murder-Club-Day/190648451088796?ref=hl

Like & follow away!

PPS: Now we only need to win the lottery and Go. All. Veronica Mars. Because our story is epic, too.

Welcome everyone to the 5th annual Women's Murder Club Day! It's the all online celebration of our favorite show, and we keep going, because it has lost nothing of its relevance since the short run Oct. 2007-- Mai 2008. The idea of women in power, and women who can collaborate in a private and professional setting, without backstabbing or competing for a man is still rare in the TV landscape--this is why we remember. WMC is about a group of women, but not a comedy. Women aren't just part of the team, they are the team.

This year some amazing victories for sister fandoms happened: Congrats to Veronica Mars fans for breaking all kinds of records with the Kickstarter campaign, and Nikki & Nora fandom for funding their IndieGoGo campaign for a web series.
We feel with The Selection fans where the pilot has been passed over again by CW, especially since it's the work of the fabulous duo that gave us The Club we love.
We thank Rizzoli & Isles fandom for helping with strength in numbers, and for making the femslash-loving section of fandom a little more visible to the world.



That being said, May 13th is all about Women's Murder Club, the best TV show that ever lived (hopefully you don't mind if we're a little partial around here :) ) -- Lindsay, Cindy, Claire and Jill.

This is how you can participate: Post your blogs, fan art, fan fiction,...everywhere on the net, but come here and leave a comment. Tell us about how you became a WMC fan, about your favorite episode, character, how you felt about the cancellation and more. You can sign in with FB and other accounts if you don't have a livejournal.

You can even win something, a signed copy of this book (no, it's not WMC ;) ). Leave your comment and or link to your own WMC related post here until Tuesday 12 (noon) EST in order to go into the drawing.

There's a song for each WMC Day. This year is kind of a milestone, so we thought Beyoncé's "I Was Here" is very fitting. Check out those lyrics.




More Club:

WMCDAY on Facebook

@wmcday1 on twitter

The WMC Virtual Seasons

Angie Harmon, Aubrey Dollar, Paula Newsome, Sarah Fain & Elizabeth Craft are on Twitter--these days, the best way to keep up with everyone's projects.

Without further ado, let the festivities begin!!

Don't forget the little giveaway in case you plan to make a contribution in form of a fanfic, fanvid, graphic, blog, etc. Learn morehere.

HEY HEY HEY!

Women's Murder Club Day has a Facebook page now!!!

This wasn't planned at all, but kids keep voting for Best Actress on a site named Faxo, and in order to submit the names of Paula Newsome and Aubrey Dollar, you needed to like the Faxo network. Oh well, what's one more social network, right?

Come right here on the 13th for the annual discussion post - follow us on Twitter @wmcday1 - and like our new FB page. Most of all, have fun reminiscing!

This was a club we'd all love to join.

I'd like to remind you that every. single. entry counts. Fan art, fics, blogs, discussion is all encouraged for one big part with old schoolers and every new fan we can possibly lure into this fandom! The usual discussion post will be on this community. I'll throw in a signed copy of my book here. Good luck, and I hope to see you all on May 13th. Yes, I know it's a Monday. Let's make it great!

Do you remember the Women's Murder Club episode of the Virtual Seasons in which Nikki and Nora came to town? Well, they might come to your computer or fancy TV. I know this is not directly WMC-related, but since we can't do the same for WMC, why not help a sister fandom out?

The campaign - only a few days left!

You have a few more days (9) to contribute to Aubrey Dollar's run for elephants.

I'll try to update this community more often in the future--see you all on Women's Murder Club Day May 13, and don't forget to follow us on twitter, @wmcday1.

The Case For Women’s Murder Club: Relevance

( Find out more about Women's Murder Club Day here. )

I wrote this long ago, but with the 5th Annual Women’s Murder Club Day approaching, and Veronica Mars fandom celebrating an amazing victory, I thought it’s time to put this out there. Women’s Murder Club still matters. This is one of the many reasons why:


You might say: Okay, I get it. Your favorite show was cancelled, big deal. So you like tough chicks on TV, but there are many now, aren’t there? Why, after five years, can’t you just get over it?

This is why. I’d ask you to name me just 1 show that focuses on women--

-- No problem, you say, you’ve got a long list.


Dollhouse
Lie To Me
The Good Wife
Lost Girl
Glee
The Chicago Code
Chase
Lip Service
Scandal
Missing (Ashley Judd)
Rizzoli & Isles
Against The Wall
Once Upon A Time
Commander In Chief
Sex And The City
Desperate Housewives
GCB
Pretty Little Liars
PanAm
The Playboy Club
Bomb Girls
Nikita
The Sarah Connor Chronicles
King
Guiding Light (Otalia)
Venice
Prime Suspect
Harry’s Law
2 Broke Girls
CSI & Franchises
Law & Order & Franchises
Criminal Minds
Castle
Dr. Who
Grey’s Anatomy
House
The Vampire Diaries
The Secret Circle
Missing (Vivica A. Fox & Caterina Scorsone)
The Killing
Legend Of The Seeker
Dark Angel
Xena
Cagney & Lacey

(In Italics: All shows of which I have seen more than two episodes, in most cases, all of them. Tumblr, Twitter & Google Search have given me extensive knowledge of the others.).


Now scratch:

- The comedies

Some might get the female friendship right, but what if you’re really into cop drama?

- The ones that have two women or less as main characters

Some might be great characters, but you won’t see women interacting as a group.

- The ones that take place in the past, in space or a fictional mythological setting or feature vampires

What if you want your tough chicks not in a spaceship or messing with vampires, but in an everyday real life setting that you can almost identify with?

- The ones with the mainly underage characters

It’s fine when you’re underage, or even if you’re not, it’s good to remember sometimes, but as a grown woman, you might want to see those on TV too.

- The ones where women are part of the team or main cast, but are not the focus

Many examples, many great characters, but you will have to go through episodes with very little of the characters/pairing for which you are watching in the first place.

- The ones where women are supposedly friends but never cease bitching about each other behind each other’s back

I let you decide this one.

- The ones that have wonderful women characters but give equal time to equally great male characters. It’s not a bad thing. Of the list, these might be the shows I enjoy most at the moment. It is, however, not the same as a main cast consisting of women, and men clearly being supporting characters.

The Good Wife.


Now go over your list carefully again. Some shows qualify more than others. Some I have tremendously enjoyed and still do. There is none to check all the boxes. You could say I have high expectations. I won’t disagree.

Wow, this year's WMC Day is less than 3 months away! What's going to happen?

(Why are we even doing this, still? WhatTH is Women's Murder Club Day?)

I'll try to keep it short and nice and answer these question for every fan, old school and new kid on the block, who might find their way here.

Women's Murder Club Day is the annual celebration of our beloved show. It was created and held for the first time in 2009, one year after the cancellation. Not that ABC cares, or ever did care, but we chose to exact day to convey a certain image. Fandom rising from the ashes like the mythical phoenix--not that we ever were in ashes. After we realized that writing letters and sending chocolate would not convince TPTB to hold on to this fabulous show, we weren't idle. A group of fans created the Virtual Seasons, 2 years and 21 virtual "episodes" of epic fanfiction, in order to tie up the loose ends we were left with after the original showrunners were replaced for the last 3 episodes. In 2009, we were making plans to wrap up the seasons. What would happen after the final episode? In order to have a place to come together at least once a year, the WMC Day was started.

What it means: all over the internet, we share fanfiction and other works, conversation, memories and generally party. In five years, there have been many changes. Yes, I'm talking about young kids who don't even know that livejournal exists. Facebook hasn't been a great place for WMC Day so far (I'm hopeful that can be changed), but Twitter took over. We even got a "thank you" tweet from Aubrey Dollar last year. So yes, there is still a reason to do it. There's a different theme song every year, and you bet that there's cake.

Why a celebration of a show that has been cancelled 5 years ago?

Because it matters. Even if you don't know about livejournal, or you're never on twitter, you have probably heard about the war on women. You like to watch TV shows with strong female characters, but can you name one in the present with 4 female leads who are this connected in their private and professional lives, women in power? I dare you to name me one. As much as we love The Good Wife, R&I, PLL, Nikita or Glee, there is none that fills all the requirements. With what we've seen back in 2007/2008, we can be fairly certain that WMC would be more than a worthy peer, if still in the hands of Sarah Fain and Elizabeth Craft. And we know that in the present political climate, they'd tackle some tough subjects, because they did dare to do so years ago.

WMC matters--that's why we loved it in the first place, that's why we still celebrate it. Oops. That wasn't very short, but I'm not sorry. You are all invited to the party though!

I was just wondering if anyone had a link to the unaired pilot of WMC. I've been looking for it for nearly two years now and have had no luck. Lemme know! Thanks!

Have a peaceful time. See you at the beginning of next year, when we start to plan the next Women's Murder Club Day. Happy Holidays to all fans, and everyone who made this show so special.