The "Good For Her" film is a recently developing subgenre of horror and thriller films as a new iteration of the rape revenge trope in which scorned women are seeking out retribution through morally ambiguous means, leading them to a fate of self destruction. These female protagonists, despite their questionable actions, have garnered respect and adoration across online forums as female audiences appreciate their indulgence in violence. This thesis endeavors to understand how this subgenre has developed alongside other similar but distinct subgenres within television. This is, in part, to explore how neoliberal feminist ideologies have permeated these genres that hail the personal success of white women as emblematic of feminist success. The bulk of analysis focuses on two films, Pearl (West, 2022) and The Witch (Eggers, 2016), as these films are frequently included in online lists and compilations of "Good For Her" media. The comparison of these two films demonstrates how the destruction wrought by the female protagonist is in direct response to gendered forms of oppression and their violent behavior can be read as a resistance to their coercion into the nuclear family. I argue that criticisms of the neoliberal influence on the "Good for Her" subgenre are warranted but films such as those mentioned above do radically resist foundational aspects of patriarchal control and online appreciation of such resistance is indicative of a wide variety of political attunement present in the subgenre.
Olivia Tenoglia (Sat,) studied this question.