The concept of the Jungle Queen predates Tarzan of the Apes by roughly eight years with William Henry Hudson’s Green Mansions‘ publication in 1904. In 1938 Fiction House immortalized the concept of the Jungle Queen in popular culture with Will Eisner and Jerry Iger’s Sheena, Queen of the Jungle comic book. The character of Sheena isn’t just the ultimate Jungle Queen, inspiring hordes of imitators across numerous mediums, but she was also the first female character to get her own comic book. Sheena was a cultural phenomenon and a trailblazer, paving the way for Wonder Woman and other female comic book heroes.
In the 1984 film Sheena (Tanya Roberts) is the lone orphan of two explorers, raised by a Zambouli shaman (Princess Elizabeth of Toro) and given the power to communicate with any animal. Sheena is the protector of the Zambouli people and defends their lands from being plundered by the wicked Prince Otwani (Trevor Thomas). It’s the basic premise of any Jungle Queen or Tarzan inspired story, it’s a white savior narrative. These narratives about white European orphans raised in Africa stem from a desire to reckon with the end of European imperialism.
Yet on the other hand Sheena the character was for a long time one of the few representations of women as heroes in popular media. John Guillermin’s film never portrays Sheena as weak or emotional, a stark contrast to other heroines appearing in film during the eighties that were targeted at kids. If you compare Sheena to any Disney Princess at that time there’s no question who is more badass. Sheena talks to animals, rides a Zebra, crashes helicopters with Flamingos and kills the bad guys with a bow and arrow. Having an army of animal side kicks is the coolest super power to a little kid.
Still, Sheena is also a film that trades on and exploits the sex appeal of the late Tanya Roberts. No matter what John Guillermin and screenwriter Lorenzo Semple Jr., re-teaming again after King Kong (1976), do with the character they cannot escape the white savior narrative nor the pervasiveness of the masculine gaze. So Sheena exists today as a tangle of contradictions. It’s a curio of a time gone by. An update of Sheena could very easily remedy these issues that would trouble audiences today but that is not what we have. We have Tanya Roberts, out beasting the Beastmaster (1982), in a film that is as campy and odd as it is visually beautiful.
