Minorities in Comics and Other Media, etc

[Lord Morph]

We may or may not be getting Idris Elba as Knuckles the Echidna in the Sonic movie sequel.

https://kotaku.com/idris-elba-teases...460243#replies

Also, I learned today that some fans code Knuckles as black. Which is odd to me considering Sonic is the one who was voiced by a black guy.

It's because the tough persona, and the "dreads".

[Lord Morph]

The point is that people had plenty of valid reasons for not wanting to watch Shang-Chi, and making it out to be a bunch of wacky foreigners who can't handle a movie star not looking like a plastic pop idol is just resorting to caricatures to gloss over the poor decisions of a movie studio failing to understand its intended audience. Both Crazy Rich Asians and Mulan flopped in the Asian market for much of the same reasons. As it turns out, trying to sell people a watered down version of their own culture and then blaming them when it doesn't do well isn't really a good way to go about it.

And yeah, it does suck for Simu Liu, especially since this is his first major role and his career is kind of hinging on this movie doing well, that he probably will just go down as the guy who was seen as too ugly to play a superhero, but someone who has chosen an acting career should be prepared for this sort of thing. Let's not pretend like it's only those wacky Asian people who care more about how movie stars look than how well they can act or how well they fit the role, it's just that our culture has this strange taboo against commenting on men's looks that isn't really found elsewhere. If they had cast an average looking dude off the street as Captain America, maybe people wouldn't be all over Twitter complaining about how the guy isn't handsome enough to play Cap, but they would for sure be thinking that and would find ways to express the same idea without saying it in so many words.

Obviously Asia doesn't have a problem with their own representation, so those films weren't gonna be anything special over there. If anything they're trying to replicate BP's success in the states with Asian Americans, and Crazy Rich Asians was a hit over here for the record.

And they might as well have pulled nobodies considering Chris Hemsworth was almost unheard of going into Thor, and Evans wasn't a major actor either. Holland was basically off the street as well, only known for plays and bit roles. Maybe an unpopular take, but I think it's a bit easier for White males to blow up into popular leading men then POC actors. Adam Driver looks as unconventional as my local pizza delivery guy, but yet he still has a sizeable fanbase of women lol

[Frontier]

It's because the tough persona, and the "dreads".

Also he had a lot of rap vocal themes in the Sonic Adventure games, from what I remember.

Really curious to hear what Elba does vocally.

[godisawesome]

Obviously Asia doesn't have a problem with their own representation, so those films weren't gonna be anything special over there. If anything they're trying to replicate BP's success in the states with Asian Americans, and Crazy Rich Asians was a hit over here for the record.

And they might as well have pulled nobodies considering Chris Hemsworth was almost unheard of going into Thor, and Evans wasn't a major actor either. Holland was basically off the street as well, only known for plays and bit roles. Maybe an unpopular take, but I think it's a bit easier for White males to blow up into popular leading men then POC actors. Adam Driver looks as unconventional as my local pizza delivery guy, but yet he still has a sizeable fanbase of women lol

Hollywood has far more practice at elevating White Dude #342 into a Star, and their audience likewise, since it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy and cyclical system. That’s what both systemic racism and an insistence on one demographic appeal over all else causes.

Adam Driver vs John Boyega is an excellent example; both are fantastically talented actors who are considered attractive, and compared to Daisy Ridley, were more established in that they both had at least one cult role that had raised their profiles to JJ Abrams and Kathleen Kennedy when making The Force Awakens (though yes, Driver’s profile was larger because he’d been in a premium series rather than a cult classic like Attack the Block). And of the two of them, Boyega naturally delivered a more substantial, complex, and “firm” performance - not because he necessarily did a better job than Driver, but because in TFA, the role of Finn is written to be more substantial, complex, and “firm” as a lead role.

…But then the larger LFL powers-that-be, a “pre-programmed” Hollywood, and a “pre-programmed” audience made a play in The Last Jedi to replace Boyega as the lead with Driver - and not by giving Driver more complex material to work with, but simply by shunting Boyega to the side in a lazy and sloppy way, and recontextualizing the story into worshipping Driver’s perceived “natural” archetype as a moody bad boy… even at the expense of the lead, Ridley.

[CliffHanger2]

Obviously Asia doesn't have a problem with their own representation, so those films weren't gonna be anything special over there. If anything they're trying to replicate BP's success in the states with Asian Americans, and Crazy Rich Asians was a hit over here for the record.

And they might as well have pulled nobodies considering Chris Hemsworth was almost unheard of going into Thor, and Evans wasn't a major actor either. Holland was basically off the street as well, only known for plays and bit roles. Maybe an unpopular take, but I think it's a bit easier for White males to blow up into popular leading men then POC actors. Adam Driver looks as unconventional as my local pizza delivery guy, but yet he still has a sizeable fanbase of women lol

Is Driver really considered a leading man tho? Nah...

[ed2962]

Dawg, there's a perk I hadn't considered before these viewing options happened due to the pandemic. Roasting the shit out of a brand new movie from the couch with the kids. I was on one when WW84 dropped, GvK too. Pandemic seems to picking back-up steam so I don't see to much of near end to the same day stream options. They even closed our Indiana State Fair a couple days a week during the run for 'cleaning'.



Them D+ shows stopped for me after the second/third time through Falc/Cap. I never found Loki as charming as most so I haven't started that (do wanna see dude as Kang onscreen though). I'm ready for Armor Wars tough, I thought these joints would be quasi back to back, look like that won't drop til '22.

I'm hip, without spoiling one of the biggest movies ever her ahh, exit in Infinity War was pretty perfect, prequel scmequel. Question is, will you drop the $30 for Eternals, personally I think that'll be a wait for me too.

Shang is different, I got the 5 year old chiming in, "ten rings" when the promos come on. I know I'm not getting a 1976 era Run Run Shaw production with this but I'm hoping it's not just blatantly forgettable. Mandarin deserved better than that corny-ass IM3 misdirect.

Unpopular opinion: I actually liked the twist. I thought it said something interesting about the media and propaganda.

[Besouro]

Meh, Shang-Chi deserves to bomb. The movie was only made as a cynical cash grab for the Chinese market, but now it probably won't ever get released there because Marvel couldn't help but make it into an orientalist caricature. And this is especially bad because Chinese audiences generally love MCU films, even Black Panther made over $100 million there despite all the hand wringing in Western press about how racist Asians won't be interested in a movie about black people. So this movie either has to depend on the Asian-American audience, which is tiny and mostly can't identify with Shang-Chi anyway, or hope that it appeals to non-Asian viewers too, which is pretty unlikely because after all, there's a reason that Hollywood doesn't make movies with Asian leads and it's probably not that audiences are clamoring for it and the studios are just refusing to do so and costing themselves money in the process.

Please explain the "Orientalist Caricature" part?

And how is it any different from saying "
movie was only made as a cynical cash grab for the ..." ...black market in the case of Black panther?

[CosmiComic]

Is Driver really considered a leading man tho? Nah...

Does "leading man" still exist in the same way?

[PwrdOn]

Please explain the "Orientalist Caricature" part?

And how is it any different from saying "
movie was only made as a cynical cash grab for the ..." ...black market in the case of Black panther?

He's an Asian dude that does kung fu and has weird mystical powers, and that's not even getting into all the stuff with the Mandarin, his name doesn't even mean anything in Chinese. Representation in media only matters if people feel they are being represented well, and there's nothing about Shang-Chi that suggests it'll be anything more than the kind of generic kung fu movie we've all seen dozens of times before. If this is the best that Hollywood can do when depicting Asians on screen, I would rather they just not even try, and evidently there are a lot more people that agree with me than the tiny handful of people who get giddy over Asian people showing up in movies at all, regardless of how they are being depicted.

Obviously Asia doesn't have a problem with their own representation, so those films weren't gonna be anything special over there. If anything they're trying to replicate BP's success in the states with Asian Americans, and Crazy Rich Asians was a hit over here for the record.

And they might as well have pulled nobodies considering Chris Hemsworth was almost unheard of going into Thor, and Evans wasn't a major actor either. Holland was basically off the street as well, only known for plays and bit roles. Maybe an unpopular take, but I think it's a bit easier for White males to blow up into popular leading men then POC actors. Adam Driver looks as unconventional as my local pizza delivery guy, but yet he still has a sizeable fanbase of women lol

Eh, the type of person who would get excited about Shang-Chi would probably watch anything that had Asian people in it, no matter how ridiculous, but there are not nearly enough of them to sustain a blockbuster film. Crazy Rich Asians had a comparatively tiny budget and its box office take wasn't anywhere near what would be a acceptable for a MCU film.

[MindofShadow]

eh, they are selling Shang in the US as an MCU movie. They aren't selling it as an Asian movie. It is MCU meets Kung Fu. They are counting on the brand just like they did with all the other "new" heroes.

I agree with PwrdOn overall point that you can't sell an "asian" movie to Asia and not have it be authentic. Disney doesn't seem to understand that after Mulan it seems. You also can't go into a place known for Martial Arts/Kung Fu movies and make an inferior product and expect it to sell well (Mulan). If hte choreography isn't up to China's standards, they wont like it.

... which is probably why they have a dragon in the movie, ten rings, abomination and such lol. They are trying to not make it a pure "kung fu" movie because they can't win over there with that.

It is all moot anyway, because of covid, it isn't making any money at all overseas anyway. It is 100% gonna bomb

[CSTowle]

I do wish they'd choose a non-martial arts/mystic type of character for an Asian lead, or at least feature more in team settings. Jubilee of the X-Men, Grunge (though change that name, it's almost 30 years past its expiration date) of Gen 13, just somebody whose power isn't kung fu. But I suppose I shall have to watch and then judge. Maybe it'll be quippy and have bad '70s music like Guardians.

[Overhazard]

I do wish they'd choose a non-martial arts/mystic type of character for an Asian lead, or at least feature more in team settings. Jubilee of the X-Men, Grunge (though change that name, it's almost 30 years past its expiration date) of Gen 13, just somebody whose power isn't kung fu. But I suppose I shall have to watch and then judge. Maybe it'll be quippy and have bad '70s music like Guardians.

Well, there was Omac, who was essentially DC's hulk. I always found it a little funny that Marvel can't make Superman and DC can't make a Hulk. Though it seems to be a tradition that Omac be their version of a marvel thing. The original was Captain America in the future, the Omac androids were essentially sentinels, and Kevin Kho was an electric blue cyborg hulk.

There was New Super-Man, I liked him a lot too, but now that Connor is back and Jon's a teenager I'm never going to see him or the Justice League of China, again who had a Sammo Hung Batman.

Edit: Shang-Chi's going to be a marvel movie, quipping is all they know how to do, maybe it won't be as egregious as Thor: Ragnarok where nearly every dramatic or sincere moment was undercut by a joke. Thor lost his home, his hammer, and his father, and he was barely phased by it.

[CosmiComic]

I do wish they'd choose a non-martial arts/mystic type of character for an Asian lead, or at least feature more in team settings. Jubilee of the X-Men, Grunge (though change that name, it's almost 30 years past its expiration date) of Gen 13, just somebody whose power isn't kung fu. But I suppose I shall have to watch and then judge. Maybe it'll be quippy and have bad '70s music like Guardians.

I hope they don't do too much dad rock. The MCU is already over the top with it.

Anyway, I share your sentiment. I'd like more Asian-descended heroes in general, and not just be martial artists. But I think, as others have pointed out, this isn't purely a martial arts movie, and the crew seem to be somewhat aware of the problematic history of the main characters of this movie from the comics, so I think they'll at least do an ok job. And I presume he will join the Avengers at some point. At least, I hope so.

Marvel needs more Asian-descended heroes overall, but some of the recent ones, like Amadeus Cho and Silk, aren't martial artists and could get adapted at some point. Silk is already getting a tv show. I can't see someone like Jubilee being a main lead, though. What's she going to do? Sparkle and wear a stupid costume?

Well, there was Omac, who was essentially DC's hulk. I always found it a little funny that Marvel can't make Superman and DC can't make a Hulk. Though it seems to be a tradition that Omac be their version of a marvel thing. The original was Captain America in the future, the Omac androids were essentially sentinels, and Kevin Kho was an electric blue cyborg hulk.

There was New Super-Man, I liked him a lot too, but now that Connor is back and Jon's a teenager I'm never going to see him or the Justice League of China, again who had a Sammo Hung Batman.

Edit: Shang-Chi's going to be a marvel movie, quipping is all they know how to do, maybe it won't be as egregious as Thor: Ragnarok where nearly every dramatic or sincere moment was undercut by a joke. Thor lost his home, his hammer, and his father, and he was barely phased by it.

Tbh, why would DC need a Hulk. I like Bruce, but his power is fairly limited. I'm not sure what DC would gain from that.

[MindofShadow]

MCU doesn't own Silk. And is "genius asian kid" really that different of a stereotype (cho)

The East Asian options at Marvel are SLIM.

Shang is cool. Y'all are trippin. I don't care about avoiding stereotypes, Shang deserves a solo movie. There hasn't been an MCU kung fu movie either. Give me some kung fu + comic book crap and inject it in my veins.

[ed2962]

I hope they don't do too much dad rock. The MCU is already over the top with it.

Anyway, I share your sentiment. I'd like more Asian-descended heroes in general, and not just be martial artists. But I think, as others have pointed out, this isn't purely a martial arts movie, and the crew seem to be somewhat aware of the problematic history of the main characters of this movie from the comics, so I think they'll at least do an ok job. And I presume he will join the Avengers at some point. At least, I hope so.

Marvel needs more Asian-descended heroes overall, but some of the recent ones, like Amadeus Cho and Silk, aren't martial artists and could get adapted at some point. Silk is already getting a tv show. I can't see someone like Jubilee being a main lead, though. What's she going to do? Sparkle and wear a stupid costume?


Tbh, why would DC need a Hulk. I like Bruce, but his power is fairly limited. I'm not sure what DC would gain from that.

Jem and the Holograms say hi ( 80's version, not that movies from a few years ago).