No, because the rationale in making Kingpin black is that Kingpin’s race isn’t important to the character. There’s nothing in his background, in the movie or the comic, that would have to happen differently if he were black. Making Storm white would mean that most of her comic-derived origin no longer applies. Since the whole point of the X-Men movies is to bring the comicbook to the big screen, why include a pointless change that alters the entire nature of one of the major characters from the comics?
[/QUOTE]
That doesn’t hold up. Storm’s comic background matters and Kingpin’s doesn’t?
Storm’s entire background never played into the movie. Any actress of any race could have played that part. In the comics, originally Storm was African, this was later changed to her being an American who was in Africa when her parents were killed. Her goddess worship was based on her powers NOT her being black. How at ALL does her being black effect her essential origin story? It doesn’t.
Storm is black with white hair in the comics. That’s a signifgant part of the look of the character. To me a signifigant part of the Kingpin is that he’s an immense white guy with a bald head.
I think ‘white privliege’ is also a part of the character. A black guy and a white guy are going to have different paths on the ladder in crime. The Kingpin’s a mobster. He’s also supposed to be largely untouchable. I don’t buy the mob kowtowing to a black guy. If I’m supposed to accept Daredevil as happening NOW in a real world setting which was the aesthetic the movie went for, it doesn’t work on paper, if he’s black.
[QUOTE=Miller]
Not nearly a big enough dude. Kingpin is almost inhumanly gigantic. Hell, Michael Clark Duncan was still too small for the role. I can’t really think of an actor who’s physically bigger than him who can still act, though, so I think he makes the best choice.
[/QUOTE]
Oh Andre the Giant, where are you when we need you the most?
[QUOTE=Otto]
Wait, what? When did that happen? AFAIK Xavier recruited Storm because he needed immensely powerful mutants to rescue the original team. Nothing multi-culti about it originally, unless someone retconned it in.
[/QUOTE]
I think the multi-cultural aspect was more of a writer’s/editor’s idea than and actual in-universe “idea” from Xavier. But it was definetly a multi-cultural team; I think it’s around then that they introduced Nightcrawler and Colossus as well as Storm.
[QUOTE=Revenant Threshold]
I think the multi-cultural aspect was more of a writer’s/editor’s idea than and actual in-universe “idea” from Xavier. But it was definetly a multi-cultural team; I think it’s around then that they introduced Nightcrawler and Colossus as well as Storm.
[/QUOTE]
Yep, Nightcrawler (German/Romany), Storm (African/African American), Colossus (Russian), Banshee (Irish), Wolverine (Canadian at the time) and Thunderbird (Native American) all introduced at the same time. I’m glad, what with the retroactive insertion of another X-team between the original five and this lot, that at least the We Are The World business hasn’t been shoehorned in as original intention.
[QUOTE=Push You Down]
That doesn’t hold up. Storm’s comic background matters and Kingpin’s doesn’t?
[/quote]
No, both their backgrounds count. However, nothing in Kingpin’s background hinges around him being white, so changing his race doesn’t mean that his background changes at all.
If her origin story is, “Born in Africa,” then yeah, making her not black would be a pretty big change to her origin story, wouldn’t it? I wasn’t aware that they had retconned her into being an American, though. When did this happen?
To me, the significant part of Kingpin’s look is that he’s immense and bald. White isn’t so much an issue to me with this character. There are other characters who I’d feel different about. Making Captain America black wouldn’t work, because it would play hob with his origin story, or require a total white wash (sorry) of American race relations during WWII. On the other side of the fence, I don’t think it particularly matters if Spawn were made into a white guy. His race (so far as I’m aware; I was never a big Spawn fan) never played a particularly large role in that character’s development or backstory.
One thing that makes this discussion so lop-sided is that a lot of black heroes, especially in the '70s, were created so that they could make comics about race issues, so the character’s race became intrinsic to that character’s personality and motivations. You can’t really do Black Panther as anything other than a black guy without completly breaking the character, for example.
It’s a movie about a blind guy in tights who dodges bullets, and a black mob boss is what’s breaking your suspension of disbelief?
I should say, rather, that “big” is a much more important part of the character than “white.” You need someone really fucking huge for the role. A really, really big black dude works better for the part than a slightly smaller white dude. There are not a lot of actors with that body type, and even fewer who can actually act, as opposed to stand around and look menacing until the good guy kills them. Given those limitations, it was a smart move (possibly the only smart move in the whole film) to go with biggest actor they could find for the role, instead of limiting themselves to the biggest white actor they could find.
[QUOTE=Otto]
Yep, Nightcrawler (German/Romany), Storm (African/African American), Colossus (Russian), Banshee (Irish), Wolverine (Canadian at the time) and Thunderbird (Native American) all introduced at the same time.
[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=Miller]
If her origin story is, “Born in Africa,” then yeah, making her not black would be a pretty big change to her origin story, wouldn’t it?
[/QUOTE]
Not if they cast Charlize Theron.
[QUOTE=Miller]
If her origin story is, “Born in Africa,” then yeah, making her not black would be a pretty big change to her origin story, wouldn’t it? I wasn’t aware that they had retconned her into being an American, though. When did this happen?
[/QUOTE]
IIRC her father was an American photojournalist and her mother was Kenyan, and Storm spent some time in Harlem as a very young girl. I have this memory of an issue in the 130s or so where Storm visits the apartment building where she used to live in Harlem and it’s infested with hookers or pushers or something.
Meaning that when he was introduced his origin had him from Canada, working for the Canadian Secret Service, Department H, etc. but since he’s supposedly a hundred or more years old they could’ve retconned him into an Atlantean for all I knew.
I think part of what makes it work is that Michael Clark Duncan acted the part of Kingpin very well. I could believe just looking at him that this guy pounded his way to the top of the mob and brained his way to the top of the business world. It wasn’t just his size - he was believable. I looked at him and “saw” the Kingpin. I honestly can’t see any other actor doing better, and very few, in any, as good. He did have asense of humor you don’t see in the Kingpin, but otherwise I could imagine him as such without changing much.
When the Kingpin was first made, I might understand that it wouldn’t make much sense to change his race. But these days, it only adds to his aura of power.
[QUOTE=Miller]
No, both their backgrounds count. However, nothing in Kingpin’s background hinges around him being white, so changing his race doesn’t mean that his background changes at all.
[/QUOTE]
And I think it does. I think a Kingpin’s assload of his background depends on him being white. Clearly we disagree.
[QUOTE=Miller]
It’s a movie about a blind guy in tights who dodges bullets, and a black mob boss is what’s breaking your suspension of disbelief?
[/QUOTE]
W…T…F. I never said it broke my suspension of disbelief. I’m saying I didn’t like a casting choice pal.
[QUOTE=Hey you!]
Who I totally wanted cast as Sue Storm. (Jessica Alba’s reading was a bit too sorority-girlish to me.)
[/QUOTE]
Gretchen Mol, the blonde actress from The 13th Floor (underrated sci-fi noir) and Rounders (underrated poker drama), was my top choice for Sue Storm. I think of Sue as hot, but in a MILFy, soccer-mom kind of way, not an exotic knockout like Jessica Alba.
[QUOTE=MadTheSwine]
To further hijack the thread,I thought Eric Stoltz would have been perfect as Matt Murdock.
[/QUOTE]
At 45, Eric Stoltz is a touch old for the role. I’ve always though of Murdock as early- to mid-30s.
[QUOTE=Big Bad Voodoo Lou]
Gretchen Mol, the blonde actress from The 13th Floor (underrated sci-fi noir) and Rounders (underrated poker drama), was my top choice for Sue Storm. I think of Sue as hot, but in a MILFy, soccer-mom kind of way, not an exotic knockout like Jessica Alba.
[/QUOTE]
I would have loved Reese Witherspoon as Invisible Woman. I always thought of Sue Richards as WASPY and dainty and Reese is both to a tee.
[QUOTE=MadTheSwine]
Good lord, can you imagine the outcry if Cameron Diaz or Gwyneth Paltrow would have been cast as Storm? Tho I like Duncan in almost all his roles he was certainly the wrong choice and color for The Kingpin.
To further hijack the thread,I thought Eric Stoltz would have been perfect as Matt Murdock.
[/QUOTE]
To continue the hijack, I think Damian Lewis would have been perfect as Matt Murdock. For those of you who have seen HBO’s Band of Brothers, he played Maj. Winters.
[QUOTE=Big Bad Voodoo Lou]
Gretchen Mol, the blonde actress from The 13th Floor (underrated sci-fi noir) and Rounders (underrated poker drama), was my top choice for Sue Storm. I think of Sue as hot, but in a MILFy, soccer-mom kind of way, not an exotic knockout like Jessica Alba.
[/QUOTE]
I think we’re of the same mind. I was only aware of Mol from Bettie Page, but after checking out a Google image search, — whu-hoa! — I could see her in the role too, so long as they didn’t sex her up too much.
