The problem is that it’s commercial driven. They want the big stars who just happen to be white. But then want to sell inclusivity for profit that lead to questionable creative decisions.
The rage is misdirected but not wrong. Representation is important but is being exploited by soulless corporate robots.
But one of the points is those big stars don’t just happen to be white. Throughout the years, a variety of conditions made it more likely that big stars would be white. Continuing to cast them for their star power instead of fitness for source, is pretty much the definition of “systemic racism”
Yeah the “happen to be” was meant to be slightly sarcastic. The only answer is to make conscious and smart decisions to be more inclusive and representative instead of profit motive. Unfortunately there seems a lot of pushback with hatewagons that will make producers more conservative.
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.
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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.
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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 Ghoul 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?
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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.
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.
Ghassan Massoud (the guy that played Saladin in Kingdom of Heaven) would have been perfect
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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.
Let’s not forget this simple aspect:
Interesting character - Seasoned Actor
Interesting character - Seasoned Actor
Interesting character - Seasoned Actress
Interesting character - Seasoned Actress
Interesting character - Just some Chick
In the end studios want money above anything else. And big names rake in bigger money.
Thank you for sharing this. I never know why I feel so annoyed at people who are mad about it, but this is it.
This is why “All lives matter” makes no sense
Some folk annoyed you posting, I hope they have a mildly bad day scrubbbles.
To be fair casting for both Tilda Swinton as The Ancient One and Johnny Depps as Tonto were both criticized when the movies were released. Probably not to the level Halle Baileys casting was, or by the same people, but both were definitely seen as whitewashing.
Its also likely The Ancient Ones casting got as much attention as it did due to the political nature of the change (seen as to appease China over its history regarding Tibet).
We have a movement in Canada called “Every Child Matters” due to indigenous history. The most annoying thing to experience is the same idiots who complain about BLM commenting on this one. “Black Lives Matter? What the hell dude, ALL lives matter!” then 5 minutes later saying “Every Child Matters? No shit, what a stupid movement name!” Can’t win with these folks.
I like to think of it like a broken bone. Yes, your overall health is important; no one is questioning that. But if you go into the ER with a broken bone and the doctor tells you that they’re going to ignore your injury in favor of telling you to take your vitamins, they’re an asshole who doesn’t care about your pain or healing your injury.
Systemic racism is the broken bone. No one (except, perhaps, assholes and billionaires) disagrees that all lives have value. Saying “all lives matter” in response to “black lives matter,” though, is saying “let’s wilfully ignore the problem because I am clearly okay with the status quo.”
Edit to fix typo.
My favorite analogy for this, and the one that really made me ‘get it’, was posted on Reddit a number of years ago, and was something to the effect of:
Imagine you’re sitting around the dinner table with your family, and your dad is passing around a bowl of mashed potatoes. However, instead of handing it to you, it gets passed right by you to your sister. And you speak up and say, “I should get some, too!” Your dad looks at you and says, “Everyone should get some,” and the family continues passing the bowl around as before. And you’re thinking, yes, that’s true - everyone should get some, but only one of us is not getting any right now and pointing out that everyone should get some doesn’t make me any less hungry.
“All Lives Matter” is like a Narcissist trying to bring the spotlight back to them. They can’t stand not having the attention, and will do anything to get it.
Marketing does matter. For whatever reason, they interpret “all X matter” as “only X matters”, and “X matters too” is not a memorable phrase
Most of the people who say “all lives matter” in that context don’t actually think that black lives matter.
TBH I think the bird and in general the music score ruined TLM more than anything
But I’m against the very concept of using Live Action films to perpetuate Intellectual Property rights while skirting any requirement to pay royalties to the original teams who made the animated films from which the remake was adapted 1:1 script and scene composition.
A lot of the other examples here did give really weak or bland performances, I even think the Lone Ranger would have been better without Depp in it.
Personally I think a large part of the lack of outrage over the first four is that no one who watched the movies had heard of the source material. People who watch Marvel movies don’t tend to read the comics, but Ariel was a Disney movie (one of the most famous of all time) remade as another Disney movie.
Personally, I think the lack of outrage is because the people who get outraged by black people being cast for roles that were previously white characters, aren’t concerned when it’s white people being cast no matter the source material.
Personally, I think you are correct, but the person you replied to might also be correct. One likely amplified the other.
“Personally, I just want to chalk this up to racism so I can be upset about it”
“Personally, I just want to chalk it up for people being mad for no reason so I can feel safe in my view that racism is over because Barack Obama or something.”
Could this be because people don’t tend to get mad over things they don’t know exist? Naaaaah, must be racism. Anyone who disgagrees that racism is the most likely explanation thinks racism is fake.
What is it with leftists and making mountains out of molehills?
I am a silly little ignorant guy therefore everyone else is a silly little ignorant guy, I am the very model of a modern human.
I’d pull up statistics on movie ticket sales versus comic book sales and point out that the movie outsold the comics by (conservatively) 200 to 1, but there’s no point bringing facts into an argument against a troll.
Most of the media, leading the charge on the outrage, are people who consider themselves fans of the material, and claim they aren’t racist for being upset over the change, just mad that they didn’t respect source. Then you look over their channel and there is not one single video, where they do this, when source material is whitewashed. Even though there is plenty of that, in the stuff they claim they are only upset over, because the source material wasn’t respected.
These are the people who stoke this outrage, they often started as straight fan media, but found out ranting about people of color, and gay people, being in media made a lot more money. Communities centered around the fanbase, for these things, are hotbeds of this behavior. There is no way you can make this argument, about these people. The people introduced to the media, by the movies, get mad because of these people.
I don’t know how you can not know this, and claim enough familiarity with audience statitics to make your argument. So I agree with others saying you are likely going out of your way to make this seem not racist.
Name one outrage among conservatives in the US when a white person was cast for a role that was any other ethnicity in the source material. Sure, it happens on the Left, Netflix is especially accused of white washing (recent example: Three Body Problem). But, conservatives don’t give a shit when it happens the other way around.
Regardless, I truly couldn’t give a shit who gets cast for what regardless of source material. If the actor/actress is able to play the part well, I come for entertainment and couldn’t care less.
People made a big deal over Sean Connery in The Highlander, although no one was really offended. It was just another joke
The best example I can think of where the race choices really got stupid to the point of offensive was the first “The Last Airbender” movie where the director race swapped the entire fire nation to Indian, made the water nation white when they probably should have been Innuit or something similar, then chose to mispronounce the main characters name to make it sound more ethnic when the source material was in English, so they knew exactly how it should be pronounced.
Then for whatever reason, people got mad that the main character was white when it was the only character animated in such a way they could be white, and the tribe was a nomadic collection of people making it somewhat possible albeit not relevant to the nation theming of the other nations.
Anyways, this triggered my annual Last Airbender rant, so sorry about that.
That poor movie was a travesty on multiple levels. Why Shyamalan was chosen to write/direct that movie, I care not to look up. My off the cuff theory was that he had kids obsessed with the animated show and he wanted to destroy something they loved after they accidentally broke his one and only Golden Globe award.
There aren’t many conservatives on Lemmy. Why bother talking about what they think?
I dunno. It always felt weird to me that someone named Raz Al-Gul was an Irishman, or that a traditional Buddhist monk looked like a soccer mom that went all in on yoga.
Correct. Nobody was bothered by Nick Fury’s change for example, even though he went from white to black. That was a wholly unknown character for most Marvel moviegoers. And Samuel L. Jackson is awesome in that role.
Actually, Fury’s always been black in the Ultimate Marvel Universe; the character and the design was actually based on Jackson so casting him for the MCU probably was an obvious direction choice.
I also had my boss, when I worked in fast food, list this as one of the issues he had with the movie, when it came out (to quote him, “he’s a white character; no offense but that’s what he is,” which was particularly galling, given the aforementioned fact).
I also had my boss, when I worked in fast food, list this as one of the issues he had with the movie, when it came out (to quote him, “he’s a white character; no offense but that’s what he is,” which was particularly galling, given the aforementioned fact).
Megyn Kelly said that stupid shit on TV 10 years ago and she is even more popular today.
TIL; thank you! I was aware enough of the comics to know of white Fury, but didn’t know there is, in fact, a black Fury.
Your boss is an idiot. I’m white as printer paper and would gladly let SLJ play me in a biopic. Because he’s awesome in every role he’s played. Good actors are good actors.
Turns out Jackson is also a master at reading bedtime stories…
Fury was white!? I think it’s one of the perfect castings, along with J.K. Simmons as J. Jonah Jameson and Hugh Jackman as Wolverine. So good that I wouldn’t be able to read the source material without picturing the actor!
He was (but not always, as I’ve learned). He first appeared in 1963 and had his own comic, Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Fury,_Agent_of_S.H.I.E.L.D.
And yes, agreed on Simmons and Jackman. Also, we obviously can’t forget RDJ as Tony Stark. An actor so perfectly cast, he basically launched the entire MCU. If it had been anyone else in that role, I feel confident in saying that it would’ve fizzled out long before we’d ever get to an Endgame.
Huh. Interesting. And yeah, totally agree about RDJ! Damn, I knew I was forgetting one of the best examples of casting so good they sort of “retro-canonically” re-cast the character in other media…
I hate it because it’s disney and we all know that it’s just a braindead money grab virtue signaling and has nothing to do with actual representation or inclusion. Make another Miles Morales, not this.
Only if it turns our he is a distant cause of Black Panther or has ties to so.e super rich people. Disney does not care about the poors.
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What really confuses me about the outrage over casting a black actor to play the little mermaid is that a mermaid is a fictional creature. Why are people so upset that a fictional creature doesn’t fit what their particular preference is?
i mean there are people who believe jesus was white
Something something Danish folklore means white mermaids.
If African folklore had a mythical character played by a white actor wouldn’t they also be criticised?
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The Little Mermaid has changed so much since Hans Christian Anderson it cannot really be considered Danish anymore.
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Yes they would and rightfully so. I dislike the casting of the movie, it just so happens the movie was bad enough on its own.
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It should be as realistic as possible. My Ariel is fish colored for the same reason fish are. Maybe greenish blue for water camouflage, or grayish for sea floor camouflage, or brightly patterned if she lives near coral reefs or is poisonous. I’d love a cuttlefish mermaid for the flashing colors but I guess that’s not technically a fish, not sure if it matters.
I’d love a cuttlefish mermaid for the flashing
Takes off seashell bra
It would be a different kind of Disney movie.
Eh, plenty of people voiced issues with the racial (and gender) recast of the Ancient One when Doctor Strange came out.
Tilda Swinton is great btw.
She’s great in The Boys too.
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.
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
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.
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.
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 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.
This is a good point. Casting a genuine Tibetan actor would cause the house of mouse to lose all that sweet china money.
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
Considering most Americans lose their shit at the slightest hint of an accent, it’s not really surprising.
To me, the weirdest one was Johnny Depp as a Native American. Like I couldn’t wrap my head around it in the movie. I kept thinking the plot was that he was a delusional person who believed he was Native American.
I only watched the German version, but I never knew that the character was based on a real person.
I though he was some kind of “ally”, like a white guy that jumped the fence and joined the Native cause or raised by natives.
I also thought it was basically Jack Sparrow 2.0
Would’ve been funny
So what is white if Romani isn’t? I really do not understand the American concept of race, for me they are all humans.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Hating Romani is more a European thing.
“Not white enough” would be my guess.
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.
Family Guy, if it was Simpsons they’d be yellow instead of white/pink
Hah, don’t know how I switched that one up.
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.
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.
