It’s an uphill battle, to be sure. These women are amateur gangsters, and director Andrea Berloff doesn’t gloss that part over . They don’t suddenly turn into Rambo, guns blazing, but neither are they bumbling or ditzy, their ignorance used for laughs. Instead, we follow them down the rabbit hole of violent crime, and watch them slowly learn the tricks of a trade that requires them to harness and wield their darkest impulses. And that’s part of the appeal of the movie. It’s rare to see women put in situations where we might actively dislike them for the kind of actions they’re taking. And though they might originally have done this as a matter of survival, it’s soon clear that they’re enjoying watching the fruits of their labor yield an empire that they can work to expand. In other words, they’re ambitious for the sake of their own success.