Snap was a retcon, he was introduced as a social worker trying to help people by his creators and then retconned into an immoral, stereotypical gangster.
Snap was a retcon, he was introduced as a social worker trying to help people by his creators and then retconned into an immoral, stereotypical gangster.
I don't blind date I make the direct market vibrate
Last edited by Iron Maiden; 07-20-2020 at 04:46 PM.
Yes, the Snap Wilson retcon was horrible. Period, point blank. But...
Devil's advocate: The retcon was concocted at a time when the glorification of pimps, gangsters, thugs and other social miscreants in predominantly minority communities was becoming vogue. Whether we're talking fictional characters like Superfly, or real life individuals like Iceberg Slim, Nicky Barnes and Bumpy Johnson, we can't deny their impact on both the community and pop culture. Hell, even Malcolm "Detroit Red" Little started off as a two-bit hustler and pimp before he found Allah and his divine calling as Malcolm X.
This trend would arc well into the modern era with the emergence of gangsters and drug dealers who later became well-known rappers, or strippers who pushed through the muck to become some of the biggest celebrities in the world. We have exalted them to these heights. You can't get too upset with Marvel writers for mistaking these characters as the type that most Americans, black and otherwise, see as paradigmatic. To this day there are people out there still basing their come-up off of questionable means that garner them "street cred." As perverse as it may be, through that transmogrification of values they achieve respect, love and acceptance within the community, but more importantly, outside of it.
It's possible that's all the Snap Wilson persona was intended to be: an attempt to make Sam complex and controversial, so as to appeal to readers during the height of the Blaxploitation era. They didn't want Sam to be perceived as a "cornball brother," so they gambled on making Sam less like "They Call Me Mr. Tibbs" and more like "Black Caesar" or "The Mack" ... and failed mightily in the attempt.
Yes, they were wrong for even trying. It's too bad Marvel didn't have someone like James Baldwin as a resource back then. I'm sure Mr. Baldwin would have set them straight and advised against it. Hell, any black man in a leadership position on their staff would have steered them clear of the Snap Wilson nonsense.
“True peace is not merely the absence of tension; it is the presence of justice.”
~Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
“If I love you, I have to make you conscious of what you don’t see.”
~James Baldwin
Now that you mention it, I always envisioned Tony's family originating from Italy, Spain, or Corsica -- perhaps even further east to Greece. Never Germany, England, Scotland, or even Romania. I don't know why.
Maybe, but Bendis' run started with this retcon and ran all the way til the end with it.
Bendis completely ignored what Gillen had established about the adoption, the flashbacks about it, on the two runs do not match at all. In fact, he only remembered that Arno ever existed, at the very end of his run. If he wanted to, he could have completely ignored it all.
I don't believe it was a last minute decision. It was absolutely intentional.
I wouldn't call it the "most racist". The Snap Wilson thing will forever have that title.
That said, I was dismayed when Stark was retconned into being not only pure white, but pure english stock. He has generally been drawn vaguely ethnic, and his mother was indeed a Carbonell. I was dismayed and surprised. When they announced that Stark would have new parents, I thought they might take this chance to make him even more clearly ethnic than he has been, maybe make him Jewish or partially Asian. Nope. They retconned him into being pure English. I wanted to puke.
I have never thought of Tony as looking vaguely ethnic.
If anything, I would have pegged his ancestry as being Italian.
Agree with both of you. It added nothing substantive to the character. They should have just left things they way they were. I think Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Larry Lieber and Don Heck knew what they were doing when they created Tony Stark/Iron Man. Once you start messing with a characters origin, it’s like messing with the foundation of a house.
Last edited by Tony Stark; 07-21-2020 at 02:26 AM.
"We live in a world of cowards. We live in a world full of small minds who are afraid. We are ruled by those who refuse to risk anything of their own. Who guard their over bloated paucities of power with money. With false reasoning. With measured hesitance. With prideful, recalcitrant inaction. With hateful invective. With weapons. F@#K these selfish fools and their prevailing world order." Tony Stark
Being latin@ or of spanish descent doesn't automatically make someone non-white. There are plenty of white latin@/spanish people out there. I get if people don't like the retcon, but saying that it somehow whitewashed Tony seems like a reach to make the character be more diverse than he actually is. If Tony was supposed to be a POC latino, I'm sure that's something that would've come up by now, like it has for characters such as Miles Morales, America Chavez, Robbie Reyes, etc.