Batman + Racism
Dec. 18th, 2010 12:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seriousficI love how on the Dark Knight Blu-Ray, the aspect ratio switches to IMAX every time there's an action sequence. It's like your TV is telling you "Shit just got real."
Anyway, have you heard about this? Some whackos are protesting that in the upcoming Thor movie, Heimdall is played by a black man. Now, I fully admit to being a hypocrite about this, because my thoughts on Donald Glover!Spider-Man are not "OMGYAY!"--I mean I have a total Supreme Court/pornography/I'll-know-it-when-I-see-it reaction to... IDK, alternate-race casting? Like, Gina Torres as Wonder Woman, I'd be cool with that, but Beyonce as Wonder Woman? Shut up! It's a lot to do with whether an actor is able to embody a character in enough ways to outweigh the fact that they're not the same race as a character? Like how... and I know it's not really the same thing, but how James Bond is brunet, but Daniel Craig is blond, only who cares, did you fucking see Casino Royale?
Anyway, dude. It's Heimdall. He's a spear-carrier (...okay, we're going to have to stop calling him that, but you know what I mean). It's not like he's some much-beloved character who fans have waited decades to see on-screen, only to cruelly see him sacrificed on the altar of political correctness. It's the guy who stands on the Rainbow Road. Really, being played by Idris Elba is an upgrade no matter how you slice it.
And for all the people saying "hey, what about The Last Airbender and everyone who complained when those characters got changed into whites," c'mon, it's the 21st century. We know how this works. Minorities get to complain about being underrepresented in the media, white people get secret magical powers.
Yes, that's right, I'm kidding. *wink wink, white people, wink wink*
But seriously, it's not like white people are going to be underrepresented in media anytime soon, or are even conspicuously absent in this movie. Thor? White. Odin? White. Loki? White. Warriors Three? Mostly white. Plus, the way I understand it, the Norse "gods" in the movie are being treated as advanced aliens who are mistaken for gods (in contrast to Ridley Scott's Robin Hood, this is supposed to be the Zach Snyder bullshit version of history*). So, before you get upset about Thor, you really should take some issue with Stargate SG-1. That Thor is way off!
*Which is a shame, because I liked the whole "yeah, fucking magic!" part of the Marvel universe, but I get that it's easier to get across in a two-hour movie/two-minute trailer than "okay, they're gods, but they're not God-gods."
Jane Foster: So, Thor, what we took to be magic and monsters was really advanced technology and aliens?
Thor: Significantly advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
Jane: So, what's with Loki turning into a horse in getting pregnant?
Thor: Well, you see, nanotechnology... and, uh, genetic engineering...
See how boring that is compared to "yeah, my fucking brother got knocked up as a fucking horse"?
ETA: How much do I love Bruce and Alfred's banter in the Batman movies? Thiiiiiiiis much!
Anyway, have you heard about this? Some whackos are protesting that in the upcoming Thor movie, Heimdall is played by a black man. Now, I fully admit to being a hypocrite about this, because my thoughts on Donald Glover!Spider-Man are not "OMGYAY!"--I mean I have a total Supreme Court/pornography/I'll-know-it-when-I-see-it reaction to... IDK, alternate-race casting? Like, Gina Torres as Wonder Woman, I'd be cool with that, but Beyonce as Wonder Woman? Shut up! It's a lot to do with whether an actor is able to embody a character in enough ways to outweigh the fact that they're not the same race as a character? Like how... and I know it's not really the same thing, but how James Bond is brunet, but Daniel Craig is blond, only who cares, did you fucking see Casino Royale?
Anyway, dude. It's Heimdall. He's a spear-carrier (...okay, we're going to have to stop calling him that, but you know what I mean). It's not like he's some much-beloved character who fans have waited decades to see on-screen, only to cruelly see him sacrificed on the altar of political correctness. It's the guy who stands on the Rainbow Road. Really, being played by Idris Elba is an upgrade no matter how you slice it.
And for all the people saying "hey, what about The Last Airbender and everyone who complained when those characters got changed into whites," c'mon, it's the 21st century. We know how this works. Minorities get to complain about being underrepresented in the media, white people get secret magical powers.
Yes, that's right, I'm kidding. *wink wink, white people, wink wink*
But seriously, it's not like white people are going to be underrepresented in media anytime soon, or are even conspicuously absent in this movie. Thor? White. Odin? White. Loki? White. Warriors Three? Mostly white. Plus, the way I understand it, the Norse "gods" in the movie are being treated as advanced aliens who are mistaken for gods (in contrast to Ridley Scott's Robin Hood, this is supposed to be the Zach Snyder bullshit version of history*). So, before you get upset about Thor, you really should take some issue with Stargate SG-1. That Thor is way off!
*Which is a shame, because I liked the whole "yeah, fucking magic!" part of the Marvel universe, but I get that it's easier to get across in a two-hour movie/two-minute trailer than "okay, they're gods, but they're not God-gods."
Jane Foster: So, Thor, what we took to be magic and monsters was really advanced technology and aliens?
Thor: Significantly advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
Jane: So, what's with Loki turning into a horse in getting pregnant?
Thor: Well, you see, nanotechnology... and, uh, genetic engineering...
See how boring that is compared to "yeah, my fucking brother got knocked up as a fucking horse"?
ETA: How much do I love Bruce and Alfred's banter in the Batman movies? Thiiiiiiiis much!
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no subject
Date: 2010-12-18 03:53 pm (UTC)If Aang, Katara, and Sokka had been cast with Asian actors, and then some supporting character like....I dunno, Master Pakku or even someone as prominent as Suki had been a white actor or a black actor, Racebending.com would not have happened. If the producers hadn't talked about getting the best actors available and then Ringer Peltz and Rathbone turning out to be mediocre-to-super crappy, it wouldn't have been an issue.
Meanwhile, if Thor, Odin, Loki and Sif were all black or Asian or Maori, and bad actors to boot, they might have an equivalent point.
But as it stands, Heimdall is a supporting character, heck, he's a tertiary character in a movie that has The Warriors Three in it. And Idris Elba is fucking badass. If you're going to argue that Elba is weak (actor skill) casting for just about anything you need to go sit in the Shut Up corner.
It's just not the same situation at all.
Not to mention, these people blathering about this really need to be grateful about the stuff in Norse Mythology that's getting glossed over or elided, because culturally speaking some of the stuff those Norse gods got up to would not play in contemporary American society at all.
no subject
Date: 2010-12-18 11:22 pm (UTC)