Marvel Gets Spider-Man Back...

[Russell Watson]

...from Sony, and one of the first things they (may) have done is cast a
black chick (Zendaya) as Mary Jane Watson, Peter Parker's previously
always white, red-haired future girlfriend.
I say "may have" because now they're saying maybe not: she's reported as
actually playing someone named "Michelle". The casting of Zendaya in a
"major role" was announced a while back, but late yesterday the story
that she was going to be MJ hit the web (heh-heh).
One can't help but wonder if they floated this as a trial balloon to see
what the reaction would be, with plans to adjust accordingly if they
catch too much "You cast WHO as Johnny Storm in the Fantastic Four
reboot?!" type flak.

Sorry, Rich, beat you to one, I guess. At least she's not Chinese...

[BTR1701]

Russell Watson <russell...@comcast.net> wrote:

> ...from Sony, and one of the first things they (may) have done is cast a
> black chick (Zendaya) as Mary Jane Watson, Peter Parker's previously
> always white, red-haired future girlfriend.

Yet if they took a previously established black character like the Falcon
and cast a white guy in the role, the howls of "raaaaccciiissssm" would be
deafening.

[trotsky]

Oh sure. It wouldn't be "Who the fuck is Falcon?" or anything.

[RichA]

You mean they're going to do a re-re-imaging of this poor, Skylock beat-to-death superhero?
Meanwhile, the latest Spider-Man is a LIMEY! A LIMEY!!! He was supposed to be the quintessential young, WHITE, American guy.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2250912/?ref_=nv_sr_1


http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2250912/?ref_=nv_sr_1

[Ronald O. Christian]

Well, I think he meant, deafening amongst the adults who knew who the
character was. So, probably not all that deafening. Especially
through the doors to their parents' basement.


Ron
-
2014 FLHTK "The Grey"

[Russell Watson]

Yeah, so is Superman. Ironically, bodybuilder David Prowse, known to
many as the physical presence of Darth Vader in the original Star Wars
trilogy, auditioned for "Superman: The Movie" in '78 and was turned
down, allegedly on the rationale that Americans would never buy anyone
not an American playing that role. Prowse was instead hired to
physically train the somewhat wormy-looking Christopher Reeve so that he
would look good in the tights.
Anyway, in neither case did they make the character a Brit. Superman is
still a Kryptonian by way of Kansas and Parker is still a dweeb from
Queens. How somehow ended up with a very hot Italian aunt instead of the
old school marm-looking woman she has been for 55 years.

[Russell Watson]

I'm an adult who doesn't live in anyone's basement who knows who the
Falcon is because I had the issue of "Captain America" that introduced
the character in 1969, when I was 10 years old.

[trotsky]

And you point is? That you're so fucking average that if you know who
the Falcon is everyone should?

[trotsky]

On 8/20/16 12:52 PM, Ronald O. Christian wrote:
> On Fri, 19 Aug 2016 17:09:43 -0500, trotsky <gms...@email.com> wrote:
>
>> On 8/19/16 4:59 PM, BTR1701 wrote:
>>> Russell Watson <russell...@comcast.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>> ...from Sony, and one of the first things they (may) have done is cast a
>>>> black chick (Zendaya) as Mary Jane Watson, Peter Parker's previously
>>>> always white, red-haired future girlfriend.
>>>
>>> Yet if they took a previously established black character like the Falcon
>>> and cast a white guy in the role, the howls of "raaaaccciiissssm" would be
>>> deafening.
>>
>>
>> Oh sure. It wouldn't be "Who the fuck is Falcon?" or anything.
>
> Well, I think he meant, deafening amongst the adults who knew who the
> character was.

No, you're making nail soup.

[Lewis]

In message <np7udf$6gv$1...@dont-email.me>

Russell Watson <russell...@comcast.net> wrote:
> At least she's not Chinese...

So you are a racist cunt too?

--
Lead me not into temptation, I can find the way.

[Ronald O. Christian]

Oh, I was a little older than that in 1969, and I still have my comics
from that era somewhere out in the garage. What I'm saying is that
trots kinda has a point -- he's not a well known character, outside of
comic geeks. So, a hue and cry by, for instance, you and I, would
hardly be deafening.

(I'm a recovering geek. Stopped buying the books in the 1980's and
never looked back... well, except for the very occasional graphic
novel, if I can sneak into the store without being seen.)

[Russell Watson]

On 8/21/2016 11:56 AM, Lewis wrote:
> In message <np7udf$6gv$1...@dont-email.me>
> Russell Watson <russell...@comcast.net> wrote:
>> At least she's not Chinese...
>
> So you are a racist cunt too?
>

If you don't get it (which would be excusable if you were new here, but
you're not) you're not worth responding to further. Maybe someone else
will explain it to you.

[Obveeus]

The joke is on Rich...and Lewis.

[Bill Steele]

Only those of us who were around for the Silver Age. And anybody who's
seen the last movie.

Trouble is, as they adapt this stuff to the movies they have to apply
their own "creativity" and mess around with canon. As somebody once
said, "Everybody's a genius and knows how to make it better."

If Peter Parker is in high school in 2016, no surprise if he meets a
black chick -- who might not havw been around in the Silver Age.

[trotsky]

What years would the Silver Age be?

[Bill Steele]

It's not unreasonable to complain if a character doesn't look like the
popular image. Jack Nicholson gave a great performance, but the Joker
isn't that heavy. But when I saw the first picture pf Christopher Reeve
in costume it looked like he ha stepped out of the pages of the comic
book. Kirk Alyn wasn't a bad choice either.

Once we had a blonde Wonder Woman. You remember how that turned out.

In the Blondie movies of the 40s the opening credits showed the cartoons
of Blondie and Dagwood, and dissolved to Penny Singleton and Arthur
Lake. It looked right.

Orphan Annie is a redhead. And you don't cast a guy with hair as Daddy
Warbucks. They'll never get a dog that looks like that though.

[Ted Nolan <tednolan>]

There is no exact metric, but the time between the Sept 1961 "Flash of
Two Worlds" story and the death of Gwen Stacy in "Amazing Spiderman 121"
in 1973 is often used as a rough and ready demarcation.
--
------
columbiaclosings.com
What's not in Columbia anymore..

[trotsky]

That's before my time then. I started buying comics in '76.

[BTR1701]

Bill Steele <ws...@cornel.edu> wrote:

> On 8/20/16 4:58 PM, trotsky wrote:

>> On 8/20/16 2:23 PM, Russell Watson wrote:

>>> On 8/20/2016 1:52 PM, Ronald O. Christian wrote:

>>>> On Fri, 19 Aug 2016 17:09:43 -0500, trotsky <gms...@email.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On 8/19/16 4:59 PM, BTR1701 wrote:

>>>>>> Russell Watson <russell...@comcast.net> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> ...from Sony, and one of the first things they (may) have done is
>>>>>>> cast a
>>>>>>> black chick (Zendaya) as Mary Jane Watson, Peter Parker's previously
>>>>>>> always white, red-haired future girlfriend.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Yet if they took a previously established black character like the
>>>>>> Falcon
>>>>>> and cast a white guy in the role, the howls of "raaaaccciiissssm"
>>>>>> would be
>>>>>> deafening.
>>>>>
>>>>> Oh sure. It wouldn't be "Who the fuck is Falcon?" or anything.
>>>>
>>>> Well, I think he meant, deafening amongst the adults who knew who the
>>>> character was. So, probably not all that deafening. Especially
>>>> through the doors to their parents' basement.
>>>

>>> I'm an adult who doesn't live in anyone's basement who knows who the
>>> Falcon is because I had the issue of "Captain America" that introduced
>>> the character in 1969, when I was 10 years old.
>>
>> And you point is? That you're so fucking average that if you know who
>> the Falcon is everyone should?
>
> Only those of us who were around for the Silver Age. And anybody who's
> seen the last movie.
>
> Trouble is, as they adapt this stuff to the movies they have to apply
> their own "creativity" and mess around with canon.

But if they took a black character from the comics and "applied their own
creativity" to make him/her white, it would be deemed racist
"whitewashing".

[Russell Watson]

Well you got me there. When I saw "The Winter Soldier" with someone who
is among the larger populace and the opening bit with the laps around
the Mall was happening my companion asked "Who's the black guy?" I said
"Falcon." and they said "Huh?" and said, "Be quiet and watch..." LMAO

>
> (I'm a recovering geek. Stopped buying the books in the 1980's and
> never looked back... well, except for the very occasional graphic
> novel, if I can sneak into the store without being seen.)
>
>
> Ron
> -
> 2014 FLHTK "The Grey"
>

Kind of funny, I gave them up a little earlier than that (late 70s') ,
but would sporadically buy one here and there for another few years. By
the time '05 rolled around I hadn't bought one in nearly two decades.
Wife was away on an extended stay with her elderly grandmother and I was
bored so I went to the comic book store and ended up bringing home the
first three issues of the latest Captain America reboot, which as it
would turn out was the beginning of what we now know as the "Winter
Soldier" story arc.

[Russell Watson]

On 8/22/2016 2:14 PM, Bill Steele wrote:
> On 8/21/16 7:10 PM, Obveeus wrote:
>>
>>
>> On 8/21/2016 5:13 PM, Russell Watson wrote:
>>> On 8/21/2016 11:56 AM, Lewis wrote:
>>>> In message <np7udf$6gv$1...@dont-email.me>
>>>> Russell Watson <russell...@comcast.net> wrote:
>>>>> At least she's not Chinese...
>>>>
>>>> So you are a racist cunt too?
>>>>
>>>
>>> If you don't get it (which would be excusable if you were new here, but
>>> you're not) you're not worth responding to further. Maybe someone else
>>> will explain it to you.
>>
>> The joke is on Rich...and Lewis.
>
>
> It's not unreasonable to complain if a character doesn't look like the
> popular image. Jack Nicholson gave a great performance, but the Joker
> isn't that heavy. But when I saw the first picture pf Christopher Reeve
> in costume it looked like he ha stepped out of the pages of the comic
> book. Kirk Alyn wasn't a bad choice either.

Back in the '80s I thought they should make a Batman series set in the
late '30s/early '40s and cast Martin Kove in it. He would have looked
just like Bob Kane's early drawings. He had the chin for it.

>
> Once we had a blonde Wonder Woman. You remember how that turned out.

Many probably don't. I mentioned this to a fan of the Lynda Carter
series a while back and they thought I was kidding them until I looked
it up and proved it to them.

>
> In the Blondie movies of the 40s the opening credits showed the cartoons
> of Blondie and Dagwood, and dissolved to Penny Singleton and Arthur
> Lake. It looked right.
>
> Orphan Annie is a redhead. And you don't cast a guy with hair as Daddy
> Warbucks. They'll never get a dog that looks like that though.

And then are those non-traditional things that end up retconned into
canon, like the costume Rex Smith wore as Daredevil in "Trial of the
Incredible Hulk" which has since been cemented by Frank Miller and more
recently the Netflix TV series as what his original outfit looked like
before he got the red suit. The TV series skips over the black & yellow
costume period entirely.

[Ronald O. Christian]

On Mon, 22 Aug 2016 16:44:50 -0400, Russell Watson

Wow I didn't know that. Have they been collected up into a graphic
novel yet?

I was drawn back recently by "No Man's Land" (which is a decent Batman
story, given to me for my birthday by wife) and Supergirl: Power, and
I admit to reading through Sandman (including the recently released
"Overture") in the early part of this century. But don't really have
any interest in what passes for the Marvel or DC universe in comic
book form. I got a little interested in Jeph Loeb's Supergirl, but
now I've heard they've rebooted the character yet again, so lost
interest. I thought parts of Marvel's Ultimate universe were decent,
but they destroyed it so again, lost interest. But there's always the
movies. Saw Suicide Squad last weekend, was not as bad as people are
saying.

[Ronald O. Christian]

On Mon, 22 Aug 2016 13:45:10 -0400, Bill Steele <ws...@cornel.edu>
wrote:

Sometimes that's for better, sometimes for worse. A good example of
"better" was "Redwing" being re-imagined as a drone. Having Falcon
walking around with a real hawk on his shoulder woulda been cheesy.

>If Peter Parker is in high school in 2016, no surprise if he meets a
>black chick -- who might not havw been around in the Silver Age.

I guess. Still seems like stunt-casting to me.

[Ronald O. Christian]

I was thinking that too, as I was watching the first season of the
Netflix series.

>The TV series skips over the black & yellow
>costume period entirely.

As well it should.

[Russell Watson]

Oh yeah, that actually predates the movie by a good bit.

>
> I was drawn back recently by "No Man's Land" (which is a decent Batman
> story, given to me for my birthday by wife) and Supergirl: Power, and
> I admit to reading through Sandman (including the recently released
> "Overture") in the early part of this century. But don't really have
> any interest in what passes for the Marvel or DC universe in comic
> book form. I got a little interested in Jeph Loeb's Supergirl, but
> now I've heard they've rebooted the character yet again, so lost
> interest. I thought parts of Marvel's Ultimate universe were decent,
> but they destroyed it so again, lost interest. But there's always the
> movies. Saw Suicide Squad last weekend, was not as bad as people are
> saying.
>
>
> Ron
> -
> 2014 FLHTK "The Grey"
>

I didn't hate "Suicide Squad" either. Having seen it, the 20-some% RT
ranking baffled me. Not the R-rated gore and F-Bomb fest some seemed to
expect, a la "Deadpool", but not terrible for what it is.

[Russell Watson]

Yeah, and it gets worse. Outlets are now saying that Zendaya is indeed
playing Mary Jane, though for some as yet unexplained reason is not
going to be called that at first, going by the name "Michelle".
Presumably she will be revealed to either be someone in hiding or
someone who ends up that way, hence the name games. Meanwhile,
apparently the new Peter Parker is down with the brown, since MJ is a
later flame in his life and his current love interest is a girl named
Liz, who is also played by a Sistah (and somewhat darker one than
Zendaya: who has quite a bit of cream in her coffee). I came into
Spider-Man land when Gwen was the gf and MJ was with his friend. I
believe I read somewhere that before either of those Betty Brandt was
his girlfriend for a time, but that predates me. Don't know if this Liz
character is from the comics or someone they made up, but they seem hell
bent on the race mixing angle. Someone mentioned upthread that it would
be more likely today, which is true: as a white kid in a city public
high school our teenage hero would be a minority without a doubt.
However, there is a big difference between being a minority and having
ZERO white girls to pick from, especially when one of the characters in
question has traditionally never been anything but.

[Obveeus]

Do you have any reason to believe that the Peter Parker character
actually has 'zero white girls to pick from'? ...I mean, any reason
besides knowing beforehand that they ones he does pick are not white in
this version?

[Russell Watson]

That's kind of the point: there obviously would be some but the writers
of this abortion decided he ain' roll dat way. After having painted him
as the ultimately geeky dweeb in "Civil War" they're gonna give him some
street cred by having the sistahs diggin' on him and vice averse. I
really don't have a problem with it...in some movie where they actually
make up all their own characters and their back stories, etc. As with
"Fantastic Four", they're screwing with 50+ years of character history
to "reimagine" it. That's where my beef lies.

[Obveeus]

...except that you think that in the total absence of any evidence. in
reality, they may very well show white women in the film too...that in
no way means that a white man has to then walk in their direction.

> After having painted him
> as the ultimately geeky dweeb in "Civil War" they're gonna give him some
> street cred by having the sistahs diggin' on him and vice averse.

I very much doubt that. The dweeb in CIVIL WAR is what any next
SPIDERMAN film is going to portray (didn't he do it all in secret as per
orders from the others?) and he is much more likely to be 'shunned' as a
geek in school, just like always, and end up hanging out with the school
newspaper and/or AV crowd.

> I
> really don't have a problem with it...in some movie where they actually
> make up all their own characters and their back stories, etc. As with
> "Fantastic Four", they're screwing with 50+ years of character history
> to "reimagine" it. That's where my beef lies.

...and I'll never understand how/why a 're-imagined' skin color is a
problem for anyone when reading/watching a remake.

[Bill Steele]

That might be a bit late. I would date it from the day I walked into my
usual newsstand and found the Fantasstic Four. X-Men and Spider-Man
origins, and a few months later the DC revivals. That'when I was in
Calofornia, so I'll say 60s - 70s. What we have now is a continuation of
all that, so there's probably no real end.

Perhaps we should name the current era of movies and TV shows -- unless
somebody already has; I haven't been following the scholarship about
this. Since silver was a step down from gold, is this Bronze? Or Celluloid?

[Bill Steele]

He did say it's a work in progress.

I guess the show is building it's own universe. I'm up to about episode
10 or so and they still haven't elucidated the "sense of perception."
(Anybody remember that?) If you didn't know, you'd think he was doing it
all by sound.

Hollywood "development" rules:

1. Keep title. (It's what sells it.)
2. Keep names of principal characters. (So old fans will think it's
going to be OK.)
3. From there on, make up whatever you want. It's your show, ans you're
a genius.

See also: Teen Wolf, Beauty and the Beast.

[Russell Watson]

On 8/22/2016 10:44 PM, Obveeus wrote:

>
>> I
>> really don't have a problem with it...in some movie where they actually
>> make up all their own characters and their back stories, etc. As with
>> "Fantastic Four", they're screwing with 50+ years of character history
>> to "reimagine" it. That's where my beef lies.
>
> ...and I'll never understand how/why a 're-imagined' skin color is a
> problem for anyone when reading/watching a remake.

Dubiousness over the motivations of those decide to make the changes,
mostly. They're usually driving some agenda. And as others have pointed
out, it only ever goes one way. Reciprocal stunt casting is always met
with a backlash. Make a previously male character female, no problem.
Make a formerly white character red, yellow, black or brown, no problem.
Make a previously heterosexual character homosexual, no problem. In fact
not only are none of these a problem, they're lauded as "brave" or
whatever. Reverse any of those and it's hell to pay. And the reason they
do this to established characters is because they can continue to pass
them off as "popular" because they have decades of history in another
form that is assumed to be shared by the "reimagined" version whereas if
they create something new they risk having it fall flat and they're
exposed as pushing something that really isn't so popular after all.

[Lewis]

In message <npg62s$npe$1...@dont-email.me>

You must be apoplectic about the casting of Hamilton then.

--
Some humans would do anything to see if it was possible to do it. If you
put a large switch in some cave somewhere, with a sign on it saying
"End-of-the-World Switch. PLEASE DO NOT TOUCH," the paint wouldn't even
have time to dry.

[Russell Watson]

No, casting a black guy to play a white guy on Broadway is OK. He's
playing Hamilton as Hamilton (or the playwright's vision of Hamilton,
anyway), not trying to retcon Hamilton as a historical figure into a
black guy, so his actual race is irrelevant.Nobody wrote that and said
"Hey, let's cast a black guy as Hamilton!" They held auditions and he
got the part because he could do the job.

[Obveeus]

Um...you might want to read up on what Hamilton on Broadway is. I'm
pretty sure that they did say 'let's cast a black guy as
Hamilton'...since that was pretty much the whole point of the project.

[Ronald O. Christian]

On Tue, 23 Aug 2016 22:40:58 -0400, Russell Watson
<russell...@comcast.net> wrote:
>No, casting a black guy to play a white guy on Broadway is OK. He's
>playing Hamilton as Hamilton (or the playwright's vision of Hamilton,
>anyway), not trying to retcon Hamilton as a historical figure into a
>black guy, so his actual race is irrelevant.Nobody wrote that and said
>"Hey, let's cast a black guy as Hamilton!" They held auditions and he
>got the part because he could do the job.

^^^^^^ This. It's a distinction that people with an axe to grind (on
both sides) will never understand.

[BTR1701]

In article <npgdag$89r$1...@dont-email.me>, Obveeus <Obv...@aol.com>
wrote:

> ...and I'll never understand how/why a 're-imagined' skin color is a
> problem for anyone when reading/watching a remake.

Because it can impact the entire plot when it's done just for sake of
political correctness and so they can say "Isn't it awesome how diverse
and progressive we are!"

For example, the upcoming film version of Stephen King's DARK TOWER.
Idris Elba has been cast as Roland Deschain, which not only directly
contradicts the books (yes, he is actually described as white in the
books), but completely destroys a major character dynamic between Roland
and another key character, schizophrenic Odetta Holmes/Detta Walker, a
black woman, whose violent, predatory alternate personality hates Roland
for the color of his skin, and whose hatred figures prominently in
several key plot points. But story be damned, we have an Agenda here!

(And of course, casting Roland as black will also necessitate changing
the characters of his parents-- Steven & Gabrielle Deschain-- from white
to black also.)

[Russell Watson]

These character race changes serve only to assuage the feel-good vibes
of white liberals, both those who do the casting and the movie-goers who
think "But of course!" Like one purple haired, oversized glasses doughy
white girl whose reaction to the initial story was "I don't even like
Spider-Man, but if this true I would buy and advance ticket right
fucking now!"
Meanwhile, the people whose acceptance they crave respond thus:

http://www.theroot.com/articles/culture/2016/08/no-zendaya-in-spider-man-homecoming-is-not-the-progress-were-looking-for/

[Lewis]

In message <npj1fp$b5f$1...@dont-email.me>

I doubt Lin auditioned for his own musical.

But the entire cast is non-white. Jefferson, Washington, Burr, etc. ANd
that was intentional.

--
I WILL NOT ENCOURAGE OTHERS TO FLY Bart chalkboard Ep. 7F03

[Russell Watson]

Must admit I was not aware of that, don't know the history of the play
so I didn't realize it was an ALL black cast. I guess the salient point
would be whether they play they characters accurate to history or if
this is some fictionalized deal designed to show the Founding Fathers of
the USA as a bunch of privileged white prick slave owners.

Meanwhile, Pope Stan Lee the First has given his benediction to the
casting of Zendaya as MJ, so all is well in the world. Ironically, the
article I read about that this morning (don't remember the source and it
was another computer so I can't find it in history right now) then went
into a great diatribe about the history of "race-bending" in motion
pictures, which it dated back to Valentino being cast as an Arab in"The
Sheik" in 1921 (pretty sure there were westerns made in the teens
wherein white actors played Indians). Ironically, it refers to any
situation wherein whites have played other races: not made characters of
other races out to be white folks, mind you, just white actors playing
the parts, as "whitewashing", while the altering of traditionally white
characters to other races was referred to as "colorblind casting". Nope,
no liberal bias or agenda to see here folks. Move along, and be sure to
buy your ticket to "Spider-Man: Homecoming". No thanks. I'll take Tobey
McGuire's weepy, organic web-shooting Peter Parker and Kirsten Dunst's
MJ (the scene in the alley in the rain in that sweater makes up for
whatever else may have been wrong with the movie) and Andrew Garfield's
somewhat more accurate Parker to Emma Stone's Gwen and this new PC shit
can kiss my ass, as Jerry Lee Lewis once said of "Angland".

[Obveeus]

On 8/25/2016 8:59 PM, Russell Watson wrote:

> Meanwhile, Pope Stan Lee the First has given his benediction to the
> casting of Zendaya as MJ, so all is well in the world. Ironically, the
> article I read about that this morning (don't remember the source and it
> was another computer so I can't find it in history right now) then went
> into a great diatribe about the history of "race-bending" in motion
> pictures, which it dated back to Valentino being cast as an Arab in"The
> Sheik" in 1921 (pretty sure there were westerns made in the teens
> wherein white actors played Indians). Ironically, it refers to any
> situation wherein whites have played other races: not made characters of
> other races out to be white folks, mind you, just white actors playing
> the parts, as "whitewashing", while the altering of traditionally white
> characters to other races was referred to as "colorblind casting". Nope,
> no liberal bias or agenda to see here folks.

Just to be clear, here...you are fine with real life historical figures
like Genghis Khan and Sacajawea being played by white folks like John
Wayne and Donna Reed, but you are outraged by a brown skinned girl like
Zendaya playing imaginary characters from the pages of a comicbook...
and the people who might think otherwise are the ones with the agenda
and bias?

[Russell Watson]

I have a bigger problem with the hypocrisy behind the use of the terms
"whitewashing" vs. "colorblind casting" than with the actual practice
thereof.
You should change your handle from "Obveeus" to Obtuse, since you seem
to miss the salient point a lot.

[Obveeus]

I think the point remains: imaginary characters don't really have an
ethnicity whereas real world historic figures do.

[Russell Watson]

When Tom Clancy wrote THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER he pictured Jack Ryan as
Tom Selleck. He said so. So if they made a new Jack Ryan movie (actually
not, but there is going to be a series on Netflix or something) and cast
Denzel Washington, yeah, that would bother me. Ian Fleming said James
Bond looked like Hoagy Carmichael, so casting Idris Elba in the role is
an issue.
The thing that makes this even more problematic with comics characters
is that you have actually SEEN them. I didn't imagine Mary Jane Watson
to be a white girl with red hair who always wore a yellow sweater: I SAW
her depicted as such every month for most of a couple of decades of my
life.
Now, is there an argument that can be made, and Stan Lee and others
would be the ones to make it, that if the times had been different in
the early '60s that they might have conceived the characters
differently, and would have represented a wider variety of ethnicities,
sexual orientations, etc? Perhaps so, and seeing it in that light I try
really hard to excuse it. It is not a secret that a lot of the topics
tackled in the early Silver Age magazines were thinly veiled metaphors
for real life social issues. But at the end of it all, I keep coming
back to the idea that the existing ones should be left alone and if
anyone wants to go down that road, do so with new characters. I still
think the main reason they don't is because of fear of what it will
reveal about where peoples' tastes really lie.

With historical figures, as long as someone plays a reasonably accurate
version of the character I'm not sure who plays the part matters much,
especially in a play. Movies matter a little more in that regard because
so many of the movie-going public are so low-brow that if you cast a
black guy as George Washington in a bio-pic many would walk away
thinking he really was black and that the racists just made him look
white on money.

[william ahearn]

On Friday, August 26, 2016 at 5:19:58 PM UTC-4, Russell Watson wrote:

> When Tom Clancy wrote THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER he pictured Jack Ryan as
> Tom Selleck. He said so. So if they made a new Jack Ryan movie (actually
> not, but there is going to be a series on Netflix or something) and cast
> Denzel Washington, yeah, that would bother me. Ian Fleming said James
> Bond looked like Hoagy Carmichael, so casting Idris Elba in the role is
> an issue.

Really? The producers can change the plot to modernize it, shoot more enemies and toss off one-liners, chuck in more bimbos, and that's OK? There wasn't any music in the book, but, hey, what's that sound? What's so special about race?

[Ted Nolan <tednolan>]

In article <npqbps$a0p$1...@dont-email.me>,

Nick Fury is an interesting case..
--
------
columbiaclosings.com
What's not in Columbia anymore..

[Obveeus]

A lot of people were overwhelmed simply because a short guy got the role
the first time. Me? I'd much prefer a short guy than a goofy comic.

> Ian Fleming said James
> Bond looked like Hoagy Carmichael, so casting Idris Elba in the role is
> an issue.

Maybe its only an issue for people who read the books and have very
little imagination. As it is, that Bond guy seems to look quite
different every few years so I think people are just being extra anal
when they do things like complain about a Scottish accent when he is
supposed to be English (or whatever). There was another recent example
in HARRY POTTER(?) where people flipped out about a black
character...only to find out later that the character was always black
and people just hadn't noticed.

I can sort of see the issue because we all make up the character in our
minds...which is why when you first hear Garfield talk it is shockingly
wrong compared with the voice in your head. But that initial shock
should not cause people to fail to watch the character at all. If Bond
shows up on screen as a black guy instead of a white guy it really
doesn't make a lick of difference to the film...the Bond guy never
really wore any disguise or tried to fit in anyway. Instead, he just
walked around announcing to all his enemies that he was James Bond, 007 spy.

> The thing that makes this even more problematic with comics characters
> is that you have actually SEEN them.

Yep...and they change size depending on their surroundings and they have
tiny waists and tiny necks and HUGE breasts and are in no way
proportional to human beings so why aren't you complaining about every
real human that tries to play them?

> I didn't imagine Mary Jane Watson
> to be a white girl with red hair who always wore a yellow sweater: I SAW
> her depicted as such every month for most of a couple of decades of my
> life.

And? You cannot imagine any new vision?

Can you at least imagine that the 95% of the population that is in no
way burdened by having played with comic books won't be suffering from
the same issue and as such will be perfectly capable of seeing a brown
skinned girl on screen without cramping up.

> Now, is there an argument that can be made, and Stan Lee and others
> would be the ones to make it, that if the times had been different in
> the early '60s that they might have conceived the characters
> differently, and would have represented a wider variety of ethnicities,
> sexual orientations, etc? Perhaps so, and seeing it in that light I try
> really hard to excuse it. It is not a secret that a lot of the topics
> tackled in the early Silver Age magazines were thinly veiled metaphors
> for real life social issues. But at the end of it all, I keep coming
> back to the idea that the existing ones should be left alone and if
> anyone wants to go down that road, do so with new characters. I still
> think the main reason they don't is because of fear of what it will
> reveal about where peoples' tastes really lie.

Introducing any new characters to the public is a major uphill
battle...which is the entire reason that there are so many remakes and
sequels and such in the first place. How many manga character films
have you rushed out to see? Even currently, the movie studios are
trying like mad to move on to 'new thimngs' by bringing all the new teen
book series characters to the big screen instead of the ones from half a
century ago, but it is an uphill battle because the old folks won't even
go to watch HARRY POTTER, much less MAZE RUNNER or DIVERGENT. Heck, with
SPIDERMAN and SUPERMAN they cannot even seem to get much past the origin
story before everyone loses interest and they have to start again.

> With historical figures, as long as someone plays a reasonably accurate
> version of the character I'm not sure who plays the part matters much,
> especially in a play. Movies matter a little more in that regard because
> so many of the movie-going public are so low-brow that if you cast a

If you think comic book readers are somehow less low brow than movie
watchers, I think you are kidding yourself...and especially if you are
talking about people who were reading comics decades ago. There is
really nothing high brow about the SPIDERMAN story. Geeky kid gets
super-powers is every geeky kid's wet dream and has been going all the
way back to when the geeky kids still lived in caves.

> black guy as George Washington in a bio-pic many would walk away
> thinking he really was black and that the racists just made him look
> white on money.

Like Jesus has been recreated as a white man and now many people believe
that? I think it only works if people cannot look up the real character
and know that Washington/Jefferson/etc... were old white men.

[Lewis]

In message <npqbps$a0p$1...@dont-email.me>

It is an issue for racist cunts, yes.

--
Mickey and Mallory know the difference between right and wrong; the just
don't give a damn.

[Russell Watson]

Yeah, I'm a racist. I'm white so it's automatic. If you're white you are
too. You can't help it: it's in your DNA. Just ask around You can't suck
enough black dick to get over it if you lived to be 100, so give it up.
Unless you just enjoy then, then by all means carry on.

[Ronald O. Christian]

On 26 Aug 2016 22:09:54 GMT, t...@loft.tnolan.com (Ted Nolan

...in that Marvel made him black in the Ultimate universe comics, and
deliberately made him look like Samuel Jackson. I seem to recall that
they asked his permission to use his likeness.

[Russell Watson]

That is probably why I didn't have an issue with in on film. I had
already gotten over the change to the character of my youth in print.
Even though I have not read comics consistently in many years I do keep
up with changes in them via other media or through discussions with
others who do still read them, so I was familiar with SLJ as Fury in
print before seeing the movie, had even seen a few panels from the
comics, so it didn't set me off.
At the end of the day does it matter? No, probably not. Lots of things
in the world that bother me more.
As I've said several times upthread, for me it's more the principle of
the thing and the fact that people would shit a brick if anyone ever
reversed this when white actors can't even play people of other races
without the libtards nearly having a cow about it.