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Firstly, one of the representations in Desperate Housewives represents women as an 'image'. Laura Mulvey's theory of the 'male gaze' can support this where men do the looking and women are to be looked at. The 'male gaze' pervades over Gabrielle as she is seen as the 'sexiest' character. Gabrielle is almost always dressed in tight fitting clothes, usually dresses and high heels. Also, her make up consists of heavy eye make up and dark red lipstick to show that she is aroused. She also dresses to fulfil the male fantasy as she once dressed up in a kinky nurses outfit which consisted of a nurses hat, white bra and skirt and red suspenders. This is obviously to attract the opposite sex which she does successfully. During Season one of Desperate Housewives Gabrielle gets bored of her husband and finds satisfaction with her seventeen-year-old gardener. This supports the 'male gaze' because teenagers would watch this programme and envy John because they would want to be in his position, as she did once tell him that all her teenage fantasies had come true. This represents Gabrielle as extremely 'desperate' because she is having sex with someone who is not even legal. Overall, this represents women as sexually frustrated and in need of constant attention. In one clip she tries to act maternal when John hurts his finger and she slowly and seductively kisses it better. Here the finger can be seen as a phallic symbol representing the lack of action/attention Gabrielle is receiving from her husband, Carlos. Greer quotes: "every woman knows that regardless of her other achievements, she is a failure if she is not beautiful." Gabrielle takes advantage of her good looks and her irresistible model figure when John tries to get out of the situation of having sex with her but cannot seem to resist when she undoes her blouse. Here, she uses her looks to get what she wants, as does Carlos for business purposes: "If he wants to grab your arse, you let him." Carlos says this with a snigger after Gabrielle complains to him that a businessman whom he makes a lot of money from is constantly trying to "grab her arse". Again, this supports Laura Mulvey's theory that women are represented as 'objects' and passive.


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Edie is also a character who can be seen as a 'spectacle'. Edie=promiscuous is constantly trying to seduce men, in order to do this she wears very revealing tops which show a lot of cleavage, for example when she was washing her car she wore short shorts and a shirt with only a few buttons done which meant most of her stomach was on show and a lot of cleavange . can be seen as 'man-devouring monster; because she tries it with everyone, like Gabi once did with Tom (season 2)( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7xsptPexJ0&feature=related ). This is the idealistic view men have of women washing cars, for example in the song 'My neck my back' by Khia(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fd4PtXKPH04 )and one of Jessica Simpson's video too. This is for the obvious reason that the woman is doing a lot of bending over. Also, Edie is a blonde and fits into the stereotype of a blonde= obsessed with sex. This could be linked to Fatal Attraction, Alex=blonde, single and obsessive(bunny boiler). Another link is that the rest of the women feel intimidated by Edie, like Alex. Edie goes with Susan's ex and Gabrielle's ex. She could also be seen as similar to Samantha from 'Sex and the City' who is also blonde, single and the most sexual out of all of them, when she meets a nun she is horrified: "So you haven't had sex? Never had sex?...have you ever masturbated?"