Wait until you tell extremist, right-wing Christians that Jesus wasn’t a white guy! Oooohhh boyyy!
Also, I think it’s important to not forget that in the internet age, a very small minority of hateful asshats can appear to have a very large voice. They are still a very small, minority group of asshats.
The only one of these that is remotely acceptable, to me, is Tilda Swindon, because they explicitly detached themselves from the character to avoid getting shat on by the CCP for casting a Tibetan and from Americans for casting a Chinese person.
The others are all crap, IMO.
Every time a character is <color>washed we lose the chance to be exposed to global actors that would fit their profile.
The only one of these that is remotely acceptable, to me, is Tilda Swindon, because they explicitly detached themselves from the character to avoid getting shat on by the CCP for casting a Tibetan and from Americans for casting a Chinese person.
That makes it worse tbh
Eh, they weren’t happy about it but were caught between a rock and a hard place, I can sympathise.
More like a revenue loss and a bigger revenue loss place.
The entire point of making a movie, yep.
Because there’s not enough diversity in marvel, nope
Earning less money is haaaaaaard
The people who made the casting choice were told by Disney they couldn’t cast either, it was that or get replaced by someone else who would play ball.
It’s ridiculous to expect them to remove themselves from a multimillion dollar project that would get done anyway with or without them.
My problem is her eyes not sharing the same postal code.
Like Anya Taylor-Joy
I swear Hollywood has an addiction to those big eyed weirdos because they are a kinda pretty that isn’t exactly normal pretty and it makes you remember their face for triggering your uncanny valley reflex.
if you’re making fun of her looks, I’d like to see the women you pull.
ones with eyes where you can’t project a film between.
pics or you’re a eunuch living in a relatives basement.
Nah, I’m not giving you pics to jack off to you weirdo.
deleted by creator
She’s great in The Boys too.
I also thought Liam as ra’s al ghul was a really bizarre pick during the movie, too. But I guess I got over it quickly enough, because Liam Neeson.
Am I the only one who thinks the Ra’s Al Ghul in the Arrow series was perfectly cast?
Most people realized it was done mostly to skirt the Chinese market. I think the major problem with the other groups is the lack of major starpower. I don’t think I can even name a Romani actress.
that’s a self-reinforcing problem
I suppose, then again it appears the main reason race was changed is to increase star power in a prominent role. Which is not the case in The Little Mermaid, as Halle Bailey is not a star. Doesn’t matter much now since the movie is bad.
I don’t think I can identify a Romani phenotype. Which just goes to show how little representation they get on mass media.
I thought they were just slavicish. I know Romanian is different but the archetypical gypsy in my mind is a black haired slavic woman.
From what I read, there’s a North Indian ethnic component, especially their language. But that’s what I remember from reading Wikipedia years ago, so 🤷♂️
deleted by creator
They could’ve still got someone vaguely Asian.
No I think people would have been more angry if they got someone Asian but not Tibetan to play the character. Changing an Asian Male character to a White Woman makes it more obvious and direct.
I don’t think anyone had an issue with Benedict Wong as one of the head monks so I think your theory is bad.
Supporting character
They have talked about that, and said they fucked up. The went with a white chick because they didn’t want to make it seem like Asian is just interchangeable
Considering most Americans lose their shit at the slightest hint of an accent, it’s not really surprising.
I think that this is making fun of the people who were upset at Ariel being black in the remake. The people this is making fun of don’t care about recasting race until it’s done from a white character to a black one. It’s pointing out hypocrisy.
True, but it is not done in a very genuine way. Each role had people complaining about the changes, the only real difference is the few times a white character is casted black the movie ends up being bad anyways.
I’ll say that when people notice the white character is recasted as black, it generally means the source material was absurdly popular and any follow up is likely to be pretty meh. The live action disney adaptations. of their biggest animated properties have been generally bad.
Rinse and repeat for almost any reboot/remake of some iconic movie or show. The chances of getting it at least as right the second time around are slim. Even slimmer than bolted on sequels that generally do poorly even with the benefit of the original creative teams at the helm.
They could have preserved the race of every character and it still would have sucked.
You’re probably correct, however I believe Disney and everyone else knows this and are choosing to cast black actors in order to claim the movie failed due to racism and not a weak script.
I’m fully onboard with the “mean people are offended” smokescreen when they produce bad product that also is very visibly “progressive”. It also works because a lot of people do fixate on that when it’s the least of the problems in a reboot/remake.
only real difference is the few times a white character is casted black the movie ends up being bad anyways.
Shawshank Redemption. In the source novel, Morgan Freeman’ character was a white irish guy. The reasons nobody complained were probably that a. there was no Xitter when the movie hit theaters and b. nobody knows it’s an adaptation anyway.
Same with Samuel L. Jackson playing Nick Fury or whatever The Boys is doing with characters. When the adaptation is good no one really cares.
I have a feeling Hollywood companies intentionally do this to stir discourse and interest in the film when they know the script is weak. You never hear about these things when the movie is good, only when it’s the Ghostbusters reboot or The Little Mermaid.
Ultimate Nick Fury came first and was openly based on SLJ, so people actually liked it.
Wasn’t it not just the casting of one character, but that they recast the movie to be all black? When I see something that looks like “recast the movie to be X”, I don’t expect very much and usually don’t bother watching. If this was one my favorite movies, I can see being upset that they would remake it just for race or gender (although now that I mention that, it could be hilarious to remake for gender)
That includes “recast the movie to be white”, now that we’re getting lots of well done videos that don’t start as white.
But I suppose it’s white privilege that I never saw an issue with most of these (but wtf, Johnny Depp?). They’re close enough and generally the character is not written overly specific anyway. Ms Marvel must be correct because the entire movie was based on her culture, ethnicity, history. If the movie was written about “generic American teenager” declared to be something other than white, would we care? Should we? Meanwhile, who cares about Scarlet Witch? Aside from”European”, there was nothing in the movie to make her anything specific. From the post about the comics, the source material is horribly muddled
So what is white if Romani isn’t? I really do not understand the American concept of race, for me they are all humans.
Roma people have historically been very persecuted because of racism and ethnocentrism. Case in point: the holocaust killed up to 500,000 Romani people, but the actual figures are not known. Roma people are among the groups that are rarely talked about when the Holocaust is mentioned, despite losing up to 50% of their total population at the time.
Arab and North African folks are usually considered white on the US census but that isn’t really an accurate picture.
Race is a social construct that doesn’t have clear borders. Racial categories mostly exist as a way of creating division and limiting access to resources, to flatten the diversity of individual cultures represented by a racial category… or to inflict direct and systemic violence. The experience of being a racialized person is entirely the creation of the society that a person lives within; for example, African folks usually don’t self-identify as “black,” within Africa, but that’s an important racialized experience that people can speak to in a place like the US.
Holocaust killed Russian and Jews as well, which are white. In fact I would say the Holocaust killed mainly white people.
Racism is not limited to skin color
That wasn’t the point. It’s not the suffering Olympics.
Yes, the point I’m trying to make is that people’s color is only tangent is racism (but of course it helps to highlight differences between different group of people). That’s why Roma, even if white, are still discriminated against. Sorry if I misunderstood your point, or not made mine clear
Okay well if you want to get into that, the concept of whiteness is very selective to racists. Roma, Jews, and (until recently) Russians are not considered white. The very fact that they were targeted the way they were tells us that. They may have white skin but that doesn’t matter to the concept because they aren’t in the club.
Whiteness, at least from a racist perspective, isn’t really about skin color, it’s more like a club for ‘approved’ ethnicities. There’s many Italians with darker skin than Mexicans, but Italians are considered ‘white’ and Mexicans are not. Same for large parts of the Middle East and Asia.
Romani are white skinned Europeans, but they’re not ‘racist approved’, so they make up rumors they’re actually from Egypt and omit them from the White Club.
The determination for what counts as white is highly inconsistent. Before the 1700s Germans were not considered white. Before the 1800s Irish were not considered white. For a time in the 1900s Finnish people were considered Asian (while many Finns were striking for better working conditions, what an odd coincidence). Italians weren’t considered white until about a hundred years ago. It goes on and on.
Other people have longer explanations which are great. I just wanted to point out Romani people are not Romanian even though many Romani people have settled in Romania. It’s just a coincidence.
The American concept is deceptively complex. At first it’s just literally skin color. The Simpsons meme with the cop holding the color swatches is absolutely true. Then it’s about stereotypes. So yeah your skin is light, but are you anything they have a stereotype about? Their entire concept of self relies on stereotypes being true. Otherwise they can’t be smarter just because they’re of pure European descent.
deleted by creator
Hah, don’t know how I switched that one up.
Hating Romani is more a European thing.
Romani people are Indo-Aryan, more closely related to modern day Indian people than Europeans. They typically have darker skin than Europeans as well. It’s not really an American concept either; I’ve generally seen a lot more anti-Romani sentiment in Europe than the US.
So what is white if Romani isn’t?
Race science is less a formal science and more a series of excuses for doing social murder and war crimes.
“Not white enough” would be my guess.
I feel like there’s a lot of cherry picking here too, because if we take the MCU, it also does some race swapping that nobody has a problem with.
Nick Fury is one, but Samuel L Jackson is so cool in that role, it doesn’t matter.
Heimdal is another one. Norse mythology, probably not a lot of black there, but Idris Elba is also so damn cool in the role that it does not really matter, and I’ve never heard anyone complain about these people.
I think in general it’s more about if the people in the roles do a good job or not. Tilda Swinton did a great job. Johnny Depp… Maybe not so much, but I also do remember people were mad about that one.
Valid point. Although I bet there would have been some outcry if they had cast anyone without red hair TBH. Some people are just obsessed with red hair.
But there would definitely have been less outrage if they casted a blond white lady instead of a black lady. Still relevant point.
Did anyone actually care about the casting?
I thought the movie was just bad.Yes. A shit ton of conservatives.
I think in case of Ra’s Al Ghul in Nolan movies, the title is passed from one leader to another. He’s not a 1000 year old warrior.
No, I don’t thinking would work since his daughter’s called Thalia Al Ghul, indicating Al Ghul is a family name.
Also,we don’t need to make up apologies for whitewashing.
-
He literally says 'we have been around for 1000 years and since Nolanverse is devoid of any fantastical elements, passing the torch is the only possible explanation.
-
Her name is Talia Al Ghul from Doylist perspective but not from Watsonian.
For all we know, she doesn’t have any last name/family name in-universe and uses the alias of Miranda when she’s globetrotting for a bit of terrorism.
- He literally says 'we have been around for 1000 years and since Nolanverse is devoid of any fantastical elements, passing the torch is the only possible explanation.
I always thought he meant the League of Shadows, not a single position.
- Her name is Talia Al Ghul from Doylist perspective but not from Watsonian.
She calls Ra’s Al Ghul her father. It may be an interpretation that Al Ghul is a name, but so is the title interpretation. And imho the name is far less of a stretch.
Yes. He is referring to League of Shadows. However, very early in the movie he says “If you make yourself more than just a man, if you devote yourself to an ideal, you become something else entirely” so it seems obvious in hindsight that this applies to Ra’s as well as if applies to Batman.
Hell, I always thought Ken Watanabe was Ra’s Al Ghul and the title passed on to Liam Neeson after the former died.
However, very early in the movie he says “If you make yourself more than just a man, if you devote yourself to an ideal, you become something else entirely” so it seems obvious in hindsight that this applies to Ra’s as well as if applies to Batman.
But that doesn’t mean Henri Ducard became a Ra’s Al Ghul or Ra’s Al Ghul became the League of Shadows. It’s like a religious thing, like christians consider themselves reborn after baptism.
Hell, I always thought Ken Watanabe was Ra’s Al Ghul and the title passed on to Liam Neeson after the former died.
I can see where you’re coming from, I’d expect some quote like “I am Ra’s Al Ghul now” or something.
Again, I can see your interpretation, but I think Ra’s Al Ghul simply being a name is far less a stretch and requires fewer assumptions.
Ra’s al Ghul translates to demon’s head. Do you still think it’s just a name?
-
I really don’t think it would have hurt to cast an Arab actor as Ra’s Al Ghul. And then you wouldn’t need a convoluted explanation like that.
Ghassan Massoud (the guy that played Saladin in Kingdom of Heaven) would have been perfect
That’s true. But I wonder if the creative team thought it would be in bad taste to have an Arab guy as head of global terrorist organization so soon after 9/11
In that case, maybe choose a different villain.
Why?
For the same reason the excuse of a white character being named Mitsimu Hashimori is that it’s just a title being passed down is something people might find offensive.
I think artists can make whatever they want (within the bounds of the law) and that it’s up to the consumers to decide whether they like it or not with their wallets.
When did this become about what people can do and not about whether or not they’re being highly offensive?
It is legal to make and distribute a movie where a guy just yells the N-word for 90 minutes. I assume you would find that offensive. Most people would.
Bruh. Since it is a title, it doesn’t matter who is holding it. Even comics Ra’s Al Ghul doesn’t mind that considering he wants Bruce Wayne to be his heir.
Yes, again, you can come up with that convoluted after-the-fact explanation that wasn’t in the movie or you can not piss off Arab people.
I don’t think not being typecast as terrorists pisses off arabs
Good thing the character isn’t a terrorist then. The head of a cult of assassins is not a terrorist. Assassins target specific people for specific reasons, not to create terror.
Can I be upset at all of them? The little mermaid should probably be
DutchDanish, and all the rest should be their canon ethnicities. White Disney princesses don’t bother me because most of those stories are European folktales, but that cuts both ways.Yeah it’d be a similar reaction if Jasmine & Aladdin were recast as northern Europeans. Sure it’s a fantasy tale, but the story is set in a fantasy version of Arabia.
Isn’t she a fucking mermaid who comes from the ocean? Why should she be any real nationality/ethnicity?
Trace her back to her origins, and she’s literally based on a Danish folktale. I can guarantee you no one in Denmark when the story first was told was thinking of her as black.
But then I think all of those examples were bad and should never have been cast that way. A black Anne Boleyn is exactly as bad a choice as a white Mansa Musa, for example.
Her ethnicity should be Innsmouth.
Oddly enough, the Harry Potter franchise handled this well.
I could be convinced that mermaids should have dark backs and light bellies
Dutch not Danish?
Danish would be my guess
Some of these might have been to avoid blatant racial stereotypes, particularly with Tilda Swinton and Liam Neeson. Johnny Depp, not so much.
Well Liam Neeson being white was explicitly part of the story and a play a play on blatant racial stereotypes, he had an asian stand in who “looked like” ras al ghul would so he could hide his identity. In fact because it’s a rather “realistic” take on the superhero it’s implied that Ras Al Ghul is not a single person, it’s always just a cover for the current leader of the league of shadows or whatever they are called
Scarlet Witch wasn’t originally Romani… she was originally still Jewish. You know, since she was Magneto’s daughter. The Romani thing came later. So that’s kind of a mischaracterization. The Johnny Depp as native american was super wierd, like the black face RDJ in Tropic Thunder. It was cringe @.@.
You had a point then you said something incredibly stupid, so now I disagree with your existence.
Scarlet Witch wasn’t originally Romani… she was originally still Jewish. You know, since she was Magneto’s daughter. The Romani thing came later.
She could still be both from each parent’s side?
That would make her… Jewmani? Rowish?
Never play Jewmani, you can get sucked into the game and it’s like WWII or smth
BTW I checked Wikipedia and it’s hilarious how often her ancestry changed
The character’s in-universe backstory and parentage have changed more than once. During the 1960s, she and Quicksilver were said to be the mutant twin offspring of two unnamed parents. Later, it was said the children were given to the geneticist called the High Evolutionary, leaving their true parentage a mystery. In 1974, it was said their parents are Golden Age heroes Bob Frank / Whizzer and Madeline Joyce Frank / Miss America. Wanda then refers to herself as Wanda Frank for a time. In 1979, they are revealed to have been raised by human Romani parents, Django and Marya Maximoff. In 1982, Magneto concludes he and a human Sinti woman named Magda are Wanda and Pietro’s parents. In 2014, the AXIS crossover revealed Pietro and Wanda are not related to Magneto. In 2015, the twins discover they are not mutants and their superhuman traits are the result of the High Evolutionary’s experiments combined with Wanda genetically being a Witch, born with natural magical abilities. The 2015–2017 Scarlet Witch series reveals that Wanda and Pietro’s adoptive parents, Django and Marya Maximoff, are biologically their aunt and uncle. Their real mother is confirmed to be Natalya Maximoff, the previous Scarlet Witch, a Serbian Roma sorceress whose father was the Scarlet Warlock.
Fucking comics smh
It does seem that she usually has 1 parent who is Romani since 1979 though.
I don’t know how people got that take from Tropic Thunder when they explicitly make reference inside the movie to how messed up and wrong it was. Like, that was the joke. RDJ was playing a character so full of himself that took method acting to it’s extreme. Am I missing something? Id love to be educated
No, you’re not, people are taking good intentions too far like usual. The entire joke of that character was that he crossed the line
No, you’re right. RDJ’s role on that movie was a joke/commentary about both method acting and black face.
Wouldn’t her being Jewish depend more on her mother?
No wonder they changed her to Romani, they got tired of all the questions from The Tribe asking for her mother’s geneology to prove she was Jewish.
Probably so.
Every aspect of Tropic Thunder was absolutely hilarious and if you found that movie offensive or cringe then clearly the jokes of that movie flew wayyyyy the fuck over your head.
like the black face RDJ in Tropic Thunder. It was cringe @.@.
Did you actually see Tropic Thunder? It’s pretty good. His character is meant to be looked down on and the movie makes that clear. It’s more of a criticism of actors doing things like black face and playing disabled characters to chase awards.
I did! I will admit I don’t remember as much of it as I should have as I was not paying full attention at the time. Might give it a more genuine watch again sometime.
Fun fact about the Lone Ranger, the most likely real world basis for the protagonist is a man named Bass Reeves. He was black, and an escaped slave. The misrepresentation has been present since the beginning, if I’m not mistaken.
“You will not replace us!” shouted the white supremacists after centuries of erasing a multitude of other cultures, histories, and societies.
It has always been about power.
Really shows you that their worldview leaves no room for multiculturalism lol. As soon as brown people are let into their country’s borders, bam, suddenly their whole identity and culture ceases to exist somehow, despite still being the majority.
Multicultural is different from multiethnic. One is clothing and holidays and norms, the other is just skin.
How was Highlander not included?
Spanish and Scottish accents are basically identical.
deleted by creator
