Alex: The character of Bo follows a long traditions of strong female leads in genre shows – Xena, Buffy, Echo. Can you tell us how Bo both relates & differs from them?

Michelle Lovretta: She certainly shares some traits with each of them – she’s guilt stricken over her previous kills and trying to repair her karma by using her abilities to help others, like Xena. She has Buffy’s sense of both loss and wonder, when she realizes she’s not the “normal girl” she thought she was. And Bo shares Echo’s determination to live outside the “system”, and possibly bring it down.

A key difference would be Bo’s complicated relationship with sex. For Bo, “sex is power” isn’t an idiom, it’s a very tricky and inconvenient fact of life.

Alex: Buffy, Xena, Dollhouse, all created by male creators and writers. How will Lost Girl differ from those shows, with a woman as the creator and writer?

Ms. Lovretta: Well, clearly none of those series suffered in any way from having male creators. I’d love to be able to claim some unique moral highground or creative edge here as a woman creating a female heroine, but the truth is …I’m not sure there is any? Television is full of empowered, three dimensional female characters that just so happen to be created by men.

The difference here, if there is any, is what stories I might be more drawn towards telling. One of the dynamics I enjoy exploring most in Lost Girl is just that of female friendship. I get a little tired of the portrayals of shallow, catty, competitive girlfriends, the type who ditch one another when anything with a functioning penis walks in the room. That just hasn’t been my experience. I’m not those girls, I don’t like those girls, and I’d sooner not spend an entire season writing them.

I have no doubt that Kenzi and Bo would kill or die for one another, although there’s nothing sexual between them to be gained. I love that about them, and that platonic loyalty was very important for me to protect throughout the development process: that Bo and Kenzi are sisters, not love interests. I didn’t want to feed into the stereotype that because someone is bisexual (as Bo is) that they’re sexually available to, or interested in, everyone. I love me my Bo — so, I don’t want to paint her as a Walking Hungry Crotch, or someone’s fantasy fulfillment.