A Look at the Enduring Legacy of Lisbeth Salander

Scene from The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)

While director Fede Alvarez's The Girl in the Spider's Web will be the fifth time that the cyber-hacker Lisbeth Salander character is seen on the big screen, it's also a momentous moment for another reason: it's the first in the series to not be based off of the original Stieg Larsson series known as the Millennium Trilogy. Speaking as the entire series has been released posthumously, it's quite strange that "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" and the subsequent sequels have all had a strong cultural resonance to the point of a 2011 American adaptation that landed actress Rooney Mara her first Best Actress nomination, and earned the film a Best Editing award. Still, there's a lot to love about the franchise, even if the early reviews for the latest suggest a sharp decline in quality, and it's mostly Salander. She isn't just a compelling character on the page, but thanks to Mara and previously Noomi Rapace in the Swedish versions, she has become something grander, more interesting. She is one of the few literary characters of the 21st century so far that's worth remembering, and it helps that she's got a great family story to boot.

In some ways, Salander would read more as a novelty character given the general treatment of her type of characters. She knows her way around hacking into a computer, managing to become a mysterious figure who exists on the fringes of society. She's "edgy" in that she's punk, rides a motorcycle, and is very gender fluid. However, the dicier detail is probably her creation, which Larsson claims was based on a personal experience of noticing a woman getting assaulted. His guilt lead him to create a character who, in the original novel, was raped by her legal guardian Palmgren. It's taboo to have this plot device in any work of fiction, but Larsson uses it as motivation for her to seek revenge against the sexist patriarchy. She's fighting against the "men who hate women" with help from journalist Mikael Blomqvist, a quasi-love interest that makes for the series' perfectly odd pairing. They're affectionate in their antagonism, but most of all they're efficient in uncovering stories of abuse towards women. 

To a certain extent, this does sound like a pretty generic character in a conventional crime thriller. To some extent, "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" is just another crime novel with some clever twists tying to biblical themes. Even using rape as a point for revenge is maybe a bit contrived. However, there's a lot more to Salander than one tragic act. She is this compelling rebel who doesn't work within a system. The fact that she teams with Blomqvist is alone a perplexing matter that shows more a desire to solve a crime that deeply concerns her. She is far less elegant and formed to conventions like crime novel icons Jack Ryan or Alex Cross. She does things her way and in the process introduce audiences to a seedy underbelly. In the Larsson sequels, her backstory is given further depth which makes her all the more compelling. Sure, it veers into soap opera by the end, but Larsson's vision of a woman surviving in a hostile world is always fascinating and creates a protagonist worth rooting for in the Me Too movement. In that way, she was ahead of her time and makes The Girl in the Spider's Web all the more exciting - even if the David Lagercrantz novel it's based on misses the magic of Salander entirely.

Noomi Rapace as Lisbeth Salander

The film adaptations are a bit more interesting when put into context of the general phenomenon. When considering that the original series became best sellers, it's more interesting that the original trilogy of films became an international success to the point of temporarily launching star Noomi Rapace's American career. The films, shot in Swedish, are faithful adaptations down to minute detail, albeit slower than what an American filmmaker would bring to the material. There's no denying that Rapace's performance was the main draw of the series, creating a stern and tough Lisbeth Salander that became so appealing that despite the trilogy's quick subsequent releases, they all had the charm. To this date, Rapace is the only actress to portray Salander more than once, and Niels Arden Oplev is the only filmmaker to direct the entire original series, including sequels The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest. 

Rapace's Salander was iconic immediately, creating a thriller that was accessible to American audiences and helped to establish her career stateside. It helped that she was predominantly unknown and brought with her a confidence to the role that was necessary. She could look as punk as the character called for, and even her boyish face played into the fact that Salander wasn't conventionally attractive. She was someone that could be a cyber-hacker, and she was far more stern than later adaptations. Again, the American versions were more sensationalist and quick moving, which in some ways takes some of the character's meticulous charm away. Even then, the 2011 American version, directed by David Fincher, would work well enough even if the film wasn't financially successful to warrant the sequels that ardent fans were hoping for.

From the beginning, Fincher's version was clearly an American interpretation. After an abrupt opening, the film's opening credits feature an aggressive reimagining of the Led Zeppelin hit "The Immigrant Song," as sung by Karen O (the score would be by industrial music icon Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross). It was aggressive, loud, and in Fincher's own words meant to be seen as an immigrant take on the story. Every detail was of Sweden from an American perspective, and in its own ways makes the approach a tad brilliant. Still, there was a desire to make Salander more sensationalized. Her outfits were more garish at points, and there was a sense that Mara was playing with verbal and physical tics more than Mara. It lead her to an Oscar nomination and a very solid performance, causing a strong debate of whether Fincher or Oplev's version was superior. It just so depends on your taste of thrillers, which Fincher has always been unapologetically more aggressive about, even if he's equally cold and meticulous to properly pull a story like The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo off.

Actual DVD release of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)

Though what Fincher did best was marketing, which started with the Tumblr account called Mouth Taped Shut. It's still a pinnacle of the form, as it weaved in the story's mystery elements by sending account users through a series of cryptic images and clues that were beautiful as well as mysterious. It was like as if Salander was sending them down the dark web while finding patience as a virtue. Readers of the book had it easier, as they could piece together what some of the videos, such as a shot of a car driving across a bridge, actually meant. Fincher was antagonistic in the best ways possible, making the character feel interactive in ways that actually mattered. Sure, by the end they were all just ways to entertain users without much gain, but Mouth Taped Shut was memorable and indicative of what made the franchise so enduring. Even the subsequent DVD release had a lot to adore, as the artwork appeared like a burned disc and not a professional cover and lead Redbox users to complain that somebody misplaced the actual disc. As underwhelming as the bonus features wound up being, this gag still holds up.

"The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" graphic novel adaptation

Salander has even made it into comic book form, as DC Comics and Vertigo published a graphic novel version of the original story. There's a lot of love for the character, and it shows in how well her punk aesthetic mixes with the modern mentality. It veers away from Hot Topic mall look and manages to just be cool in the process. Considering that the author wasn't alive to sanction most of this, it's interesting to see where Salander resonates in pop culture, especially given that up until this weekend she has only ever had two iterations, of which the American version is often considered, rather unfairly, "a flop." Those looking for a character who stands up to the system and solves her own problems her way have a lot to admire in Salander, and it's in large part because of the empathy and humanity that Larsson gave Salander on the page, making her actions cool and an acidic with that played well with Blomqvist.

Scene from The Girl in the Spider's Web

While I cannot comment on the accuracy or appeal of Claire Foy's interpretation yet, it's interesting that she was cast in the first place. Whereas Rapace had the gift of being unknown and already physically boyish, and Mara had a scrappy charm, Foy has established herself thanks to The Crown as a more elegant performer. Even her work in First Man gives a sense that she's more of a sensitive and nuanced performer. Maybe it's what Salander needs in 2018 to be more than the aggressive stereotype that some can see her early incarnations as. Still, it's a lot to live up to, in part because "The Girl in the Spider's Web," the Lagercrantz novel whose existence is mired in controversy due to not being properly sanctioned by people who care about The Millennium Trilogy, misses the point entirely about what makes Lisbeth Salander so enduring.

To a large extent, Salander is absent from her own story. It's because Lagercrantz is more interested in the legality of Blomqvist's Millennium newspaper in a digital world. It's a fair topic to explore, but the joy of the series has always been the balance between Blomqvist's order and Salander's anarchy. While mentioned in conversation, Salander doesn't factor into the plot until about 100 pages in. Even then, her big story beats are often done in expository research by people other than her. She is created into a mythological creature, whose story is now that of a superhero whose hacker details are linked furiously to Marvel Comics imagery. In one of the books' more egregious passages, someone explains that Salander's hacker name, Wasp, is related to Ant-Man sidekick The Wasp and that she's fighting hackers who are named for villains in Marvel Comics, including Thanos. It's this detail that almost suggests that The Girl in the Spider's Web was only released this year because Avengers: Infinity War and Ant-Man and the Wasp came out, and it's the only time audiences will know these references.

She is docile most of her own plot, which is oddly absent from the commercials. Even then, the scenes that the ads do focus on are of Salander in action, which is fine. Audiences come to these stories for Salander being awesome. The only issue is that in the process, Lagercrantz's artistic choices removes the humanity of Salander in favor of banal action beats that, as the previous paragraph would allude, makes her a superhero more than a realistic fringe criminal. One can only hope that Alvarez has latched onto the elements of the novel that work and makes a film that captures what has been endearing about Salander for most of the 21st century. 

With all things considered, Salander is both one of the greatest literary characters of the century as well as one of the most predictably doomed. With Larsson out of the picture, there's no way to guide the character beyond the trilogy. One can only hope that Lagercrantz dedicates precious ink to exploring her fascinating back story with her corrupt family, the Zalachenkos, and less about how awesome she is as a concept. By robbing her of personal story, it's hard to say that she has any interesting depth. Still, only time will tell if this adaptation exceeds the novel. Still, it will take more than one bum story to take this icon down. Hopefully it doesn't happen, but there will be plenty to talk about if and when that happens.