On one hand, part of me rebels at the idea of “overhauling” the character that much. OTOH, as I see people online point out all the time, no one says “boo” when a white actor is cast as a character (often only described in its original literary form as) a clear person of color, while if you dare to make Johnny Storm any other race than Caucasian, people go apeshit. That makes me feel guilty about the above reaction. I mean, it’s hard enough for most people to get representation in Western (especially American) pop culture to begin with.
It seems to be an incredibly sticky and complex issue. What do y’all think?
I don’t think it’s as hidebound as he seems to think it is. Making Nick Fury African-American when he was white in the comics didn’t seem to do more than elicit a few comments. Casting Jessica Alba as the Invisible Girl didn’t bother me at all except that it provided a glaring problem when her brother was left being played by a white guy (Chris Evans, incidentally!) with no explanation.
My guess is that Captain America is played by a white actor in 2014 not because Captain America MUST be white, but because there aren’t really any African-American actors (with the possible exception of Will Smith) who are safe bets to cast in the lead role of an action film that’s expected to break all box office records.
Not very many people complained when James West, in “The Wild Wild West” was portrayed by a black actor.
They complained because the movie was a piece of garbage.
OneCentStamp’s example of Nick Fury is also a good one.
One might ask, could there be a black Tarzan, without destroying the whole point of his being, by nature, alien to the forests of Africa? But there is an easy rebuttal to that: Mowgli! Mowgli was native to the region of the Wainganga forest, but not to the forest itself. Mowgli is the “native Tarzan.”
But isn’t that at least partly because he’d already been re-worked as African-American in the comics, with his look based on Samuel L., and been a big hit with fans? That was my understanding, anyway.
Race or ethnicity should factor into a media portrayal if race or ethnicity was an important part of the backstory of the character.
Captain America is a GREAT example–him being the Aryan ideal as a gut punch to the Nazis is a pretty important part of the backstory. He’s supposed to look like this white bread guy and I get why a lot–A LOT of people think he’s boring, because he’s supposed to be on some level–the surface level. That’s why he’s a fantastic character to work with there’s a rich ground to work with.
Superman could be any race because him being an alien who looks human is the only important part.
I think it’s amazing when people say Americans need to “have a conversation on race,” because sometimes it feels like we converse about little else. :rolleyes:
Anyway, I don’t think there’s anything wrong if Captain America happens to be white, and I don’t think his whiteness is inherently racist or xenophobic or supportive of “moral monstrosities.”
When has this happened? I’m sure it has, but no examples are coming to mind?
The comics also had a black guy take on the role of Captain America (though not Steve Rogers) for a while. And the backstory explored some real and significant issues in the history of American racism.
Another recent controversial example, especially controversial in that it’s been reported that NO Native American actresses were sought at any point during the process (and in fact may have been specifically rejected; I don’t remember).
Yes (and as the first to receive the serum and survive, in fact). However, in my OP, I was thinking more along the lines of redefinition of an existing character (since that’s what the quoted writer seemed to have in mind, and we have the recent Johnny Storm kerfuffle still fresh) rather than as a legacy character.
A black Captain America is kind of a stretch, at least one with the traditional backstory. Its pretty hard seeing the 1940’s US army choosing a black guy as a propaganda tool.
Which I suspect is the guy quoted by the OPs real problem with the character. He’s kind of a white-washed symbol of American idealism in the 40’s, with all the racism and misogyny and other unpleasantness ignored.
In the comics, there was a black Iron Man for quite a while IIRC - when Tony Stark was sidelined by alcoholism, Rhodey took over the suit and became Iron Man. I could easily see this happening in the movies when RDJr. finally decides to step down or move to cameo status. I would hate it if they recast Tony Stark (because RDJr so clearly owns that role) but having a black man take over as Iron Man (especially one who’s Tony’s best friend) probably wouldn’t raise too many eyebrows. I think Rhodey is the logical choice to succeed Tony.
Besides, I think having a squeaky-clean white guy as Cap is part of the allure of the character: he’s the symbol of a bygone age, and they’re getting great mileage out of him having trouble coping with some aspects of today’s society (though I certainly see no sign of racism in him, given how he immediately accepted Nick Fury’s leadership and made nearly instant friends with Falcon). I think the fact that he is a walking Aryan stereotype has a lot of territory to cover, especially if they’re making more serious movies with Cap like Cap 2, instead of more four-color “puncheminnaface” style comic book movies.
Thanks! Most of those were white actors made up to look like members of a different race, which is still objectionable but different, I think, than what the OP meant. But there were some good examples of actually changing a minority’s character to white.
This is completely off topic, but I can’t help pointing out that actress Luise Rainer on the first slide of that link, who played an adult role in the 1937 adaptation of “The Good Earth,” is still alive at 104 years old!
