Question regarding the race/gender-swapping of roles
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Nygma_Enigma_44 — 9 years ago(November 05, 2016 07:33 PM)
I think it's best if people just stick to a characters original race/gender for any next reboot or incarnation. I don't gender/race changes are necessary for most comic book characters (sometimes it a slippery slope, black Perry White and Deadshot) but just for the sake of not being criticized and pissing people off I think people should just stick with the characters original race in gender generally.
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dnno1 — 9 years ago(November 05, 2016 10:02 PM)
Sometimes you have to race/gender swap an iconic figure in order to sell a film or product. Although it wasn't a race swap, scenes were added to Iron Man 3 that included Chinese actors in order to boost sales in the Chinese market. Honestly, even though The Gods of Egypt was a box office flop do you really think the film would have done any better in the western markets with Egyptian actors? It would be different if the Egyptian box office could produce $90 million in revenue. Finally, a perfect example of a race swap was the main man himself, Jesus Christ. He was Semetic, but has been portrayed as a white European for eons just so that westerners would buy into Christianity (a practice that originated in North Africa). I think people need to get off their high and mighty and start looking at the business end of the motion picture industry to find their answers. It's not just as cut and dry as saying what you feel is right.
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Destructo_Dude_Reborn — 9 years ago(November 05, 2016 10:55 PM)
It's contentious with a few, but usually the Whiteness wins out on recognition.
No one's going to choose Ryan Choi over Ray Palmer, but it's very likely people will pick Michael Holt over Terry Sloane.
Blue Beetle is the one that's questionable, because there are people that appreciate Jaime Reyes as sort of a Peter Parker archetype compared to another genius inventor billionaire in Ted Kord, who admittedly still has a big following and more groundswell with other DC characters. Dan Garret the original Blue Beetle probably will never be seen again. -
Hassan_Scarborough — 9 years ago(November 06, 2016 01:04 PM)
I'd prefer they stick to the actual gender and race but nationality as well.
Not Asian for Asian sake or Black for Black sake.
If the character is Japanese get a Japanese actor to play them.
If, for example, Black Lightning is supposed to be a Nigerian descendent, get the right actor to play him.
If Diana is supposed to be Greek with blue eyes, comb the earth to find that actress.
Oscar winning actors haven't saved either franchise. So claiming "just pick the best actor, ignore heritage" is a silly thought process at this point, because it hasn't helped DC or Marvel. -
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Awas7021 — 9 years ago(November 14, 2016 07:04 AM)
i think they should stick with the origins and not change it for the sake of the race or gender or to be more modern for the current generations but if they want more gender or race diversity i think there are a lot of heroes that have different race or gender so why dont adapt those instead change the characters origin or gender or race or any change that could effect it.
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littleyellowfish — 9 years ago(November 14, 2016 10:17 PM)
I think it should be decided on acting ability. Casting a character of different gender/race shouldn't matter unless it's relevant to the character. For example, Deadshot's skin color is never brought up as important
(there's only one joke in Suicide Squad that actually mentions it)
, so anyone could play that part, regardless of race.
But for Michael B Jordan in Fantastic Four, while MBJ is a great actor, it's clear they were only casting him to make him the "token black" member, since Fox just wanted to say "hey, we had a black superhero on our main team before the Avengers did!" which is even stupider since
AOU
came out before that movie did.
But even then, Jordan's casting does give some, let's just say
unfortunate
implications. If they changed Johnny's skin color to accommodate Jordan's casting, why not go all the way and make Sue black as well? Especially since allegedly Fox and Trank were only auditioning white actresses for the part. Not only does this seem unfair to talented black actresses, this kind of ruined the team dynamic, since the important part of Johnny and Sue's relationship is that they're supposed to be the only members of the FF who are blood-related.
"How come nobody's ever tried to be a superhero?" - Dave Lizewski, 2010.