DC Africana Appreciation: Vol. 2

[Agent Z]

Miles' Spider-Man also doesn't have "Lightning Powers". It's bio-electricity that he is able to manifest as stings, shocks, blasts, currents, and even webbing.

In fairness, it does have the same visual effect.

Then there were the other CBR mentions, which I ended up scratching my head at. Like Jackson Hyde? Maybe I'm misremembering something there, but that feels like a giant reach.

Jackson can discharge electricity through physical contact. Note the article is specifically talking about electricity not lightning.

That said, I do agree the trope isn't bad. Just kind of lazy.

[Greg]

Hill has probably been the most disappointed writer for me and kinda goes to show that white mediocrity isn't literal to the point that it's limited to white men; it's any writer's mindset that compel's them to center "whiteness" and it's tropes to the point of producing mediocre works, particularly in relation to characters and elements of racial and ethnic diversity in said work [see:Star Wars].



with Jurnee it makes sense because Leti's character is written to be light-skinned in the book, and her light-skindedness (proximity to eurocentric beauty/femininity standards) is relevant to her story, and both informs her character and how others relate to her in story overall. the CW/Arrowverse is the far worse offender. how is it that you can cast 2 entirely different Vixen characters and both times come up with a light-skin mixed-race actress?

Even weirder is their choice with Wally West because it kinda enters this weird feedback loop of both comic AND televisions racial blindness. Wally on the show is the child of Joe (a darker brown skin black man) and his ex-wife (the darker skin Vanessa Williams from Soul Food), full black, and yet....



they cast a light-skinned clearly mixed actor as an adaptation of this character



who meanwhile, is regularly rendered like a dark-skin fully black character even though he's half white. this just feels like a one-drop rule situation mixed with their general slap-dash approach when building this character (even though i love Wallace). they needed a black character because they wanted a splash of color so they haphardedly made him Wally West and said "meeeh black is black, we'll just say he's mixed"

I will say, my siblings from my mom side aside from me are all light skinned with both parents being darker. Recessive genes is a thing.

[J. D. Guy]

In fairness, it does have the same visual effect.



Jackson can discharge electricity through physical contact. Note the article is specifically talking about electricity not lightning.

That said, I do agree the trope isn't bad. Just kind of lazy.

Unless I overlooked it, they repeatedly used the word Lightning, though.

I also don't think it's lazy, either, what with all the variation there is, some of which I referenced prior.

The Jackson one did slipped my mind.

[lemonpeace]

I will say, my siblings from my mom side aside from me are all light skinned with both parents being darker. Recessive genes is a thing.

My grandma has blonde hair and blue eyes, she's a Nigerian native with two (seemingly) fully black parents who didn't have those features; I get recessive genes, but there's a limit to the suspension of disbelief I'm willing to give Hollywood in these scenarios. there is a difference between light-skin and clearly not fully black; like at that boy's hair, that's not a typically black hair pattern. and he had that look for a minute while portraying the character. the issue isn't the existence of light-skin characters, the issue is consistantly casting black characters (particularly fully black characters) with light-skinned, usually mixed, actors because it's clearly a matter of their proximity to eurocentric aesthetic values and not a matter of casting the best character. what's more likely: these showrunners were thinking "oh yeah, recessive genes, that's why we're casting this guy" or something along the lines of "we need a black guy. he looks a 'good one', he'll do" and just didn't care that he's mixed/no fully black?

that's not a slight against these actors or the "blackness" of mixed and light-skinned actors, they're just making a living like everyone, but these casting directors need to do better.

[skyvolt2000]

Miles' Spider-Man also doesn't have "Lightning Powers". It's bio-electricity that he is able to manifest as stings, shocks, blasts, currents, and even webbing.

In Miles's case he has an excuse as there is a spider that does that.

For the most part in many cases it's the visual being used that has folks thinking that.

Static has more in relation with Magneto than Jefferson. The issue is he has not been in enough books to finally define his powers. In the New 52 abortion he was able to lose body parts and reattach them and a healing factor like Logan. The cartoon had his powers influence by the sun.

[lemonpeace]

In Miles's case he has an excuse as there is a spider that does that.

For the most part in many cases it's the visual being used that has folks thinking that.

Static has more in relation with Magneto than Jefferson. The issue is he has not been in enough books to finally define his powers. In the New 52 abortion he was able to lose body parts and reattach them and a healing factor like Logan. The cartoon had his powers influence by the sun.

I have no proof of this other than Bendis being aware of Milestone, but I have had the sneaky suspension that Miles came about as a sorta pastiche on Static; with the latino aspect of the character added on to change it up from the inspiration. iirc Miles' identity as afro-latino wasn't even as integral to his character under Bendis.

[iron chimp]

My grandma has blonde hair and blue eyes, she's a Nigerian native with two (seemingly) fully black parents who didn't have those features; I get recessive genes, but there's a limit to the suspension of disbelief I'm willing to give Hollywood in these scenarios. there is a difference between light-skin and clearly not fully black; like at that boy's hair, that's not a typically black hair pattern. and he had that look for a minute while portraying the character. the issue isn't the existence of light-skin characters, the issue is consistantly casting black characters (particularly fully black characters) with light-skinned, usually mixed, actors because it's clearly a matter of their proximity to eurocentric aesthetic values and not a matter of casting the best character. what's more likely: these showrunners were thinking "oh yeah, recessive genes, that's why we're casting this guy" or something along the lines of "we need a black guy. he looks a 'good one', he'll do" and just didn't care that he's mixed/no fully black?

that's not a slight against these actors or the "blackness" of mixed and light-skinned actors, they're just making a living like everyone, but these casting directors need to do better.

I know what yr saying but its a somewhat dangerous game judging someones 'blackness' by the colour of their skin - as seen with bob marley, yellowman, salif keita, sorry bamba etc who all took a load of flak in their home countries for the shade of their skin before establishing themselves as icons of their countrys culture.

[Robotman]

I know what yr saying but its a somewhat dangerous game judging someones 'blackness' by the colour of their skin - as seen with bob marley, yellowman, salif keita, sorry bamba etc who all took a load of flak in their home countries for the shade of their skin before establishing themselves as icons of their countrys culture.

I don’t think the main argument was how a society judge skin color but how Hollywood/pop culture has a bad habit of favoring light skin. To the point of actually lightening the skin of a traditionally darker skinned character. I think it started because of what happened with Bumble Bee.

[lemonpeace]

I know what yr saying but its a somewhat dangerous game judging someones 'blackness' by the colour of their skin - as seen with bob marley, yellowman, salif keita, sorry bamba etc who all took a load of flak in their home countries for the shade of their skin before establishing themselves as icons of their countrys culture.

no one is judging the actors blackness, it's a criticism of the people casting them. this isn't like bob Marley or anything like that because you and me both know that when these people are casting these characters they are not thinking about recessive genes or how closely they look to the actual character they're portraying; that has nothing to do with the actors "blackness". these people doing that casting, when they're casting, are just looking for "attractive" black people which in there mind equals out to ones who are closer to european aesthetics. three different full black brown to dark skin characters who've been casted as three mixed race lightskin actors who don't look even like their comic book counterparts.

that's why I don't buy into post racial "I don't see color" nonsense, because it's a gaslight. when dealing with black characters their skintone, the actual color of them, is important to their character because in real-life their skintone will affect their treatment; as these characters demonstrate. imagine being a dark skin person being told you're ugly just because of your skin, or that your pretty "for a dark skin person". then you see Storm or Vixen for the first time, two beautiful dark skin characters, but when you see them on screen and they're played by light skin actresses because the "standard" is light-skin = beautiful; it's problematic. again, it isn't the fault of the actresses and actors, they're just still being used to perpetuate a problematic standard.

[iron chimp]

no one is judging the actors blackness, it's a criticism of the people casting them. this isn't like bob Marley or anything like that because you and me both know that when these people are casting these characters they are not thinking about recessive genes or how closely they look to the actual character they're portraying; that has nothing to do with the actors "blackness". these people doing that casting, when they're casting, are just looking for "attractive" black people which in there mind equals out to ones who are closer to european aesthetics. three different full black brown to dark skin characters who've been casted as three mixed race lightskin actors who don't look even like their comic book counterparts.

that's why I don't buy into post racial "I don't see color" nonsense, because it's a gaslight. when dealing with black characters their skintone, the actual color of them, is important to their character because in real-life their skintone will affect their treatment; as these characters demonstrate. imagine being a dark skin person being told you're ugly just because of your skin, or that your pretty "for a dark skin person". then you see Storm or Vixen for the first time, two beautiful dark skin characters, but when you see them on screen and they're played by light skin actresses because the "standard" is light-skin = beautiful; it's problematic. again, it isn't the fault of the actresses and actors, they're just still being used to perpetuate a problematic standard.

Oh yeah im not having colour blind.. thats nonsense to me too. If i can discriminate between shades of colours in a clothing store i dont suddenly lose that ability when looking at humans.

What i mean is its a tough call to tell someone sorry yr not black enough for a part. Im not sure one can make that call. Well you can but i think there would be hell on. In the examples i gave all those people were told they werent black enough by other jamaicans / malians ... people who said that ended up looking pretty foolish.

Dont look like their comic book counterparts is a tough one too. Samuel l Jackson looks nothing like comic book nick fury but also looks exactly like him too.

[chief12d]

The decisions that are made for that DC Super Hero Girls show (in both versions) have been problematic for me since Day 1. First in the web series, they only had the one token black female character (Bumblebee), and they doubled down on that when they moved the show to television. And now apparently they've lightened the skin tone of the one token black female character they've got.

This, combined with what someone tried to pull by lightening Storm's skin and altering her features so that she looked more Caucasian than African American in some video game, (which was also discussed on Twitter) and you can tell these are some deliberate moves to make black female characters "less black."

Most of the creative teams for these projects don't have black people on them and if they do there's not that many. The individuals that design the characters have skewed perceptions of beauty that associate their their own traits like paler skin, with attractiveness.

So in the course of designing a character like Bumblebee they probably don't think anything of making her look lightskinned because they more than likely think she looks better that way. It's an unconscious bias that manifests itself in the erasure of black features which we see all the time with Bumblebee and Storm. Hell sometimes it's not even that unconscious, some people (of all races) are pretty flagrant about their disdain for dark skin. Add in the marketing element and trying to appeal to mass audiences with the same mentality and this stuff becomes normalized.

[lemonpeace]

Oh yeah im not having colour blind.. thats nonsense to me too. If i can discriminate between shades of colours in a clothing store i dont suddenly lose that ability when looking at humans.

What i mean is its a tough call to tell someone sorry yr not black enough for a part. Im not sure one can make that call. Well you can but i think there would be hell on. In the examples i gave all those people were told they werent black enough by other jamaicans / malians ... people who said that ended up looking pretty foolish.

Dont look like their comic book counterparts is a tough one too. Samuel l Jackson looks nothing like comic book nick fury but also looks exactly like him too.

I agree that you shouldn't just tell someone "oh your not black enough for this role" and I don't think they should ever do that, but like they typically do to dark skin actors they can just say "you just aren't right for the role"; which i think is fair. I mean it's not like only light-skin and mixed actors applying for these roles. so why is it more ok to reject a dark skin actor because they want to go with someone lighter than it is to reject a light-skin actor who doesn't look like the character they're portraying, ya know? both ways someone is gonna be bummed but the difference is one is significantly more problematic culturally.

Samual Jackson as Nick Fury was in the comics first, but even in that case, it's less problematic to replace white characters with characters of color because there is an over-representation of characters. there is more room to work with there but with characters of color there aren't as many roles and even when there are there is always a 50/50 chance they'll botch some aspect of the character or their role in the narrative. [see:Game of Thrones, Star Wars, etc.]

[mace11]

This was posted in one of the x board threads.
It's close down now but it's a interesting topic.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe is 61% White, But Does That Matter

So is the Marvel Cinematic Universe diverse enough to represent its viewers? The answer is nuanced. Again, the overall representation of significant actors who are white was at 61%. While this is very much the majority, the U.S. Census estimates the representation of whites in the United States to be 60.7%.
In this regard, the MCU’s depiction of white representation is more or less spot on. Continuing on with this Census report, the Black/African American category is put at 13.4% which, compared to the MCU’s 20%, would mean that Marvel is actually over representing this subgroup.
The MCU also over-represents those of a multiracial background at 11% while the true number is only 2.7%. The Census does not separate between East and South Asian, however, if we combine both categories in this study we get a total Asian representation of 6%, very close to the Census’ 5.8%. Then, while the MCU gives us nothing for both the Native American/Alaskan Native and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander categories, the Census estimates them to be at 1.3% and 0.2%, respectively.

But should the goal of the MCU really be just to reflect the diversity of American audiences? These films are global cash machines with devout fans in every corner of the globe. Additionally, the Marvel heroes themselves have, over twenty movies, caused trouble in Germany, Russia, India, Afghanistan, China, Mexico, and many more places. Now, there is really no reliable source of global racial/ethnic distribution data, however, it’s a safe bet that the world’s share of Caucasian/White individuals is far lower than 61% and that its share of African/Black and Asian individuals is much higher. In this regard, then, perhaps the MCU does have some work to do.

These statistics cannot change the fact that these stories are loved by fans the world over. And they shouldn't. The call for diversity doesn't stem from a hatred of the genre. It stems from a love of these stories, and a desire to connect closer with them. Superhero movies, done right, inspire a zeal to be heroes ourselves, to stand up against odds we know should defeat us, and to fight against them anyway. We are supposed to see our better selves in these vigilantes, people we could become. And seeing that dream, and being inspired to act on it, is so much easier when the character on screen looks back at us like a reflection in the mirror.

Marvel Studios knows this, and they’ve made positive steps forward by greenlighting Black Panther, Captain Marvel, Black Widow’s upcoming solo film, and even hinting that Kamala Khan may get in on the fun too. The executives in charge have acknowledged the need for more diversity, and all signs show that they are tackling it. But when millions of people are watching these movies and learning from them what heroes are supposed to look like, I’d give them a push to move just a little bit faster.

To read more go here.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/anharka.../#15f831744482




This was posted here as well and check out my other posts inside the link below.

THREAD: WHY DO PEOPLE THINK KEVIN FEIGE WILL DO THE X-MEN JUSTICE?
https://community.cbr.com/showthread...justice/page12


Sony will have silk a series on amazon by way and there is still no traci 13 series from dc like they said they would have a few years ago.


I wonder if there is race breakdown of the current dc and dceu films.

[skyvolt2000]

I have no proof of this other than Bendis being aware of Milestone, but I have had the sneaky suspension that Miles came about as a sorta pastiche on Static; with the latino aspect of the character added on to change it up from the inspiration. iirc Miles' identity as afro-latino wasn't even as integral to his character under Bendis.

Depending on who you go by Miles came about when someone joked about Donald Glover being Spider-Man.

It floated around for awhile and when the second season of Community (the show Donald was on) premiered we had a scene with Donald with a Spider-Man shirt on. Going by the DVD commentary that was what set the ball on Miles Morales.

Miles being biracial was or at least seemed to be there day one or at least in the sketches by Sara. Race was never a major factor in Miles's first or even second volumes.

And where would he bring it up? He's in a costume that no one can see his skin.

Jason Reynolds went that route in Miles's novel.

Miles didn't really use those powers as much until his current writer took over. Bendis admits that he forgot about it at times.

Remember Static was not around when Bendis started outside of his 4 issue mini and that Teen Titans mess.

[skyvolt2000]

This was posted in one of the x boards threads.
It's close down now but it's a interesting topic.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe is 61% White, But Does That Matter

This was posted here as well.
THREAD: WHY DO PEOPLE THINK KEVIN FEIGE WILL DO THE X-MEN JUSTICE?
https://community.cbr.com/showthread...justice/page12

Sony just came recently and will have silk a series on amazon.

I wonder if there is race breakdown of the current dc and dceu films.

Okay here is part of the issue many will avoid in topic like this.

Part of the reason you have so few POC in certain fields is because many of them were never shown or told about those said fields when they were growing up. In some case some were discourage from entering them.

Take Static-most folks have ZERO idea he was created and OWNED by black people. Because aside from maybe TWICE the black media acknowledge Milestone. Static never got any NAACP awards let along nominations.

For Black History Month (well pretty much every month TBH) at my school I did displays of various black folks in different job fields. The feedback I got was shock from kids to learn about someone like Jean-Michel Basquia or the Hidden Figures ladies.

We need to have conversations about these jobs and get our kids of color interested.