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[Avatar: the Last Airbender]: you DO always come back!
So in this conspiracy, M. Night had originally cast the bad guys as white but so many people bitched about it that he created the cover-story that the original actor was unavailable. So he cast a non-white actor in that role (to appease all the people screaming about there not being enough diversity). And that means that he's racist for making the bad guys brown people?
The original cast was all white, not just the bad guy. Now we are fortunate to have all white protagonists fighting off an army of brown people, lucky us.
So in this conspiracy, M. Night had originally cast the bad guys as white but so many people bitched about it that he created the cover-story that the original actor was unavailable. So he cast a non-white actor in that role (to appease all the people screaming about there not being enough diversity). And that means that he's racist for making the bad guys brown people?
The point is, they made a few bad calls at the beginning, got called on it, and are now trying to run damage control. Some of their decisions were bigger than others. Some of these attempts were rather half assed, like asking Korean actors to audition in traditional kimonos.
I don't know whether or not fire nation was originally supposed to be brown, but what I do know is that Zuko's character originally wasn't. So either MNS was willing to change their race at the last minute, or he made it so that one of the few fire nation characters who finds redemption in the end just happens to be the lone white dude in a brown nation.
So in this conspiracy, M. Night had originally cast the bad guys as white but so many people bitched about it that he created the cover-story that the original actor was unavailable. So he cast a non-white actor in that role (to appease all the people screaming about there not being enough diversity). And that means that he's racist for making the bad guys brown people?
The original cast was all white, not just the bad guy. Now we are fortunate to have all white protagonists fighting off an army of brown people, lucky us.
I guess the populace of the largest nation in the world (and the main focus of the second movie), which includes the most beloved character in the series, doesn't count.
I guess the populace of the largest nation in the world (and the main focus of the second movie), which includes the most beloved character in the series, doesn't count.
Who knows how she will be portrayed in the movie. It certainly wouldn't count if all of those characters were subjected to being victims, background filler, or sidekicks.
I guess the populace of the largest nation in the world (and the main focus of the second movie), which includes the most beloved character in the series, doesn't count.
Would Toph have been played by a Chinese actress if the controversy never occurred?
We'll never know for sure.
However, if you say "Yes, they were planning to cast Toph as Chinese from the beginning," then that contradicts the notion that this was entirely color blind casting. Which makes the current casting decisions open to scrutiny.
And if you say "No," then that means that the producers caved into the backlash. Which justifies the existence of the backlash in the first place.
I guess the populace of the largest nation in the world (and the main focus of the second movie), which includes the most beloved character in the series, doesn't count.
Would Toph have been played by a Chinese actress if the controversy never occurred?
We'll never know for sure.
However, if you say "Yes, they were planning to cast Toph as Chinese from the beginning," then that contradicts the notion that this was entirely color blind casting. Which makes the current casting decisions open to scrutiny.
And if you say "No," then that means that the producers caved into the backlash. Which justifies the existence of the backlash in the first place.
Was Obama secretly pushing for actual death panels in the hopes of ridding society from the burden of caring for the elderly? We'll never know for sure.
Not really picking sides on the race front, but I think it's funny that they're like "no, no, we picked the best actors for the part!" when every review I've read has been like "this is some seriously shitty acting, here."
That must have been a very limited audition.
Wait, there's been reviews already? You gotta link to this shit man.
Not really picking sides on the race front, but I think it's funny that they're like "no, no, we picked the best actors for the part!" when every review I've read has been like "this is some seriously shitty acting, here."
That must have been a very limited audition.
Wait, there's been reviews already? You gotta link to this shit man.
I'm guessing there's plenty at aintitfilledwithexclamationpoints.com.
Wordherder on
Why the crap did I ever make my original name "cloudeagle?"
I was under the impression that thanks in part to the racially ambiguous design of Aang and others, folks generally projected race onto the main characters. ie: white viewers saw the gAang as white, while viewers from other ethnicities saw the gAang as being "ethnic".
Personally I would not go so far as to make this out into some sort of insidious perpetrated intentionally by the production company, but it certainly is disconcerting to see an overarching practice of cultural appropriation and whitewashing that seems so common in media folks don't even notice it for the most part. Because of this we get crap such as the Earthsea movie adaptation, 21, Forbidden Kingdom, and the Dragonball Z debacle.
The Last Airbender was a fantastic opportunity to showcase some talent that would otherwise most likely not have a chance to display themselves otherwise. To see what happened was not surprising, but definitely disappointing.
This, I agree with completely.
However, I think Earthsea is a little different from Avatar, because race is explicit in the Earthsea novels and LeGuin has commented that she "switched" the races of the civilized/barbarian people to make a moral point about how race is an incident of culture. (i.e. the civilized advanced wizard culture were all black and brown; the illiterate savages at the outskirts of the world were pale-skinned).
Whereas, in Avatar's universe, race matters not one iota. Aang and co. can sneak through the Fire Nation and not be recognized by their skin color; likewise with Zuko and the Earth Nation.
Also, if you take LeGuin's moral point to its logical conclusion, then an argument could be made that we shouldn't get mad at all about Avatar, since if race is incidental to culture, it doesn't matter who plays Aang or Zuko or what skin color anyone is.
I once held that position but now I've come around to thinking that Shamaylan and Hollywood have acted irresponsibly; despite what Shaymalan claims about the show's racial universality, it is obviously a prominent example of non-Western, Asian culture and art style. And it does matter to minorities to see heroes in the likeness of themselves onscreen; we aren't living in a post-racial utopia where everyone accepts the premise of LeGuin's argument. Like you said, the movie is a huge missed opportunity to showcase Asian/Inuit talent.
So in this conspiracy, M. Night had originally cast the bad guys as white but so many people bitched about it that he created the cover-story that the original actor was unavailable. So he cast a non-white actor in that role (to appease all the people screaming about there not being enough diversity). And that means that he's racist for making the bad guys brown people?
The original cast was all white, not just the bad guy. Now we are fortunate to have all white protagonists fighting off an army of brown people, lucky us.
I guess the populace of the largest nation in the world (and the main focus of the second movie), which includes the most beloved character in the series, doesn't count.
So, in a series based almost entirely around Asian, in particular Chinese and Japanese, culture, we might get one major character played by someone of Chinese or Japanese descent? In three years? Assuming they don't change their minds or this was just a stunt in the hope that the casting controversy blows over? In the less than 50% chance that they even get to make a sequel? Score.
SethTheHuman on
You know what? Nanowrimo's cancelled on account of the world is stupid.
So, in a series based almost entirely around Asian, in particular Chinese and Japanese, culture, we might get one major character played by someone of Chinese or Japanese descent? In three years? Assuming they don't change their minds or this was just a stunt in the hope that the casting controversy blows over? In the less than 50% chance that they even get to make a sequel? Score.
Hey, just because they sit on the ground cross-legged to eat, with chopsticks, and have topknots and meditate and are obsessed with drinking leafy teas and wear Asian-looking robes and ride on Asian-looking boats and live in Asian-looking temples and palaces doesn't mean they're Asian.
I once held that position but now I've come around to thinking that Shamaylan and Hollywood have acted irresponsibly; despite what Shaymalan claims about the show's racial universality, it is obviously a prominent example of non-Western, Asian culture and art style. And it does matter to minorities to see heroes in the likeness of themselves onscreen; we aren't living in a post-racial utopia where everyone accepts the premise of LeGuin's argument. Like you said, the movie is a huge missed opportunity to showcase Asian/Inuit talent.
Thank you, Qingu.
Honestly, I would be a lot more forgiving if MNS would at least acknowledge the criticism. If he had simply said, "Well, Hollywood doesn't think that Asian actors sell tickets, and I'm not strong enough to fight the Hollywood."
So, in a series based almost entirely around Asian, in particular Chinese and Japanese, culture, we might get one major character played by someone of Chinese or Japanese descent? In three years? Assuming they don't change their minds or this was just a stunt in the hope that the casting controversy blows over? In the less than 50% chance that they even get to make a sequel? Score.
Hey, just because they sit on the ground cross-legged to eat, with chopsticks, and have topknots and meditate and are obsessed with drinking leafy teas and wear Asian-looking robes and ride on Asian-looking boats and live in Asian-looking temples and palaces doesn't mean they're Asian.
I mean, they could be anything.
I sometimes make the joke, "Food Network really loves Asian food, but apparently not enough to hire an Asian TV host."
The joke being that American audiences have no problem accepting Asian culture, they only have a problem with Asian people.
I sometimes make the joke, "Food Network really loves Asian food, but apparently not enough to hire an Asian TV host."
The joke being that American audiences have no problem accepting Asian culture, they only have a problem with Asian people.
I think the same thing was said about Firefly/Serenity. For a show that uses a lot of Asian-inspired designs and Chinese phrases, I sure didn't see a lot of Asian people :?.
Oh, and I have probably posted this before, but it seems appropriate, and fun!
The excuse is usually that in Firefly, Asian people live in the rich areas, which they haven't explored.
Of course, considering the number of completely far out and unique people they met throughout their journey, it's real far fetched to think that they couldn't find even come across one Asian character.
The excuse is usually that in Firefly, Asian people live in the rich areas, which they haven't explored.
Of course, considering the number of completely far out and unique people they met throughout their journey, it's real far fetched to think that they couldn't find even come across one Asian character.
Oh, I won't pretend to defend Firefly on this subject. The central cast is somewhat diverse, at least, but there's no reason they couldn't have Asian secondary characters and extras at the minimum. At least Dollhouse seemed to indicate that Joss was aware of this problem and worked to correct it (or his co-creators insisted.)
At least they were original characters, though, not Asian (and Inuit, etc.) characters whitewashed to appease the hypothetical xenophobic American audience.
SethTheHuman on
You know what? Nanowrimo's cancelled on account of the world is stupid.
The excuse is usually that in Firefly, Asian people live in the rich areas, which they haven't explored.
Of course, considering the number of completely far out and unique people they met throughout their journey, it's real far fetched to think that they couldn't find even come across one Asian character.
Oh, I won't pretend to defend Firefly on this subject. The central cast is somewhat diverse, at least, but there's no reason they couldn't have Asian secondary characters and extras at the minimum. At least Dollhouse seemed to indicate that Joss was aware of this problem and worked to correct it (or his co-creators insisted.)
At least they were original characters, though, not Asian (and Inuit, etc.) characters whitewashed to appease the hypothetical xenophobic American audience.
I thought it was that the rim was basically Deliverance.
Quite. They would have Northern, Southern, Eastern, and Western temples, and are called Nomads, for a reason.
I'm more curious about what Aang and the Air-Potentials are going to do about the Sky Bison deficit. Isn't it implied that Appa is also the last of those?
SethTheHuman on
You know what? Nanowrimo's cancelled on account of the world is stupid.
0
ShadowenSnores in the morningLoserdomRegistered Userregular
Quite. They would have Northern, Southern, Eastern, and Western temples, and are called Nomads, for a reason.
I'm more curious about what Aang and the Air-Potentials are going to do about the Sky Bison deficit. Isn't it implied that Appa is also the last of those?
Quite. They would have Northern, Southern, Eastern, and Western temples, and are called Nomads, for a reason.
I'm more curious about what Aang and the Air-Potentials are going to do about the Sky Bison deficit. Isn't it implied that Appa is also the last of those?
Yeah. And Momo's probably the last lemur, too.
There's no real reason to assume Momo's the last lemur. It's not like he was on ice, too.
Blackjack on
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
0
ShadowenSnores in the morningLoserdomRegistered Userregular
Quite. They would have Northern, Southern, Eastern, and Western temples, and are called Nomads, for a reason.
I'm more curious about what Aang and the Air-Potentials are going to do about the Sky Bison deficit. Isn't it implied that Appa is also the last of those?
Yeah. And Momo's probably the last lemur, too.
There's no real reason to assume Momo's the last lemur. It's not like he was on ice, too.
True, and there was a reason for the Fire Nation to go after the bison, aside from them being three-ton fanatically-loyal flying bodyguards for the people they were trying to exterminate. And it seemed like the main reason the lemurs hung around was to eat food the monks gave them. Still, it seems odd that not a single other one of Momo's species showed up in the series in modern times.
You laugh now, but in 3-4 years when the second movie comes out, you'll see that the king has a pet POLAR bear, when the bear was CLEARLY brown in the cartoon!
SethTheHuman on
You know what? Nanowrimo's cancelled on account of the world is stupid.
It boiled down to "I can't capture the ideas and themes in Avatar, so I'm going to copy+paste as much as possible from each season and shoehorn it into movie sized chunks."
Like, I get that he's a fan, and he really wants to make a good movie, but jesus. He uses the word "edgy" a lot and I don't know what the heck he means by it. Does he mean it as "morally ambiguous?" Because the way he uses it makes me think he means "dark for the sake of being dark."
The Blue Spirit episode is all foreshadowing to Zuko's role in the second book - that he can leave behind his family and its politics and return to his sense of justice that he expressed as a child. Of course, he discovers this capacity during his attempt to prevent someone else for getting credit for capturing the Avatar - that's what is most interesting about the episode. Calling it "Edgy" and "Dark" seems to miss the mark.
So my friends and I are heading off to a few cons this year, and we're debating on what type of Bender we should "cosplay" as. I'm all for Earth Bender, but my friend are in favor of Fire Bending. So let me take an unoffical poll: what kind of non-main-charcater Bender would you like to see cavorting about a convention? (It's a general nerd con, I don't do anime/cosplay cons anymore.)
Posts
The original cast was all white, not just the bad guy. Now we are fortunate to have all white protagonists fighting off an army of brown people, lucky us.
The point is, they made a few bad calls at the beginning, got called on it, and are now trying to run damage control. Some of their decisions were bigger than others. Some of these attempts were rather half assed, like asking Korean actors to audition in traditional kimonos.
I don't know whether or not fire nation was originally supposed to be brown, but what I do know is that Zuko's character originally wasn't. So either MNS was willing to change their race at the last minute, or he made it so that one of the few fire nation characters who finds redemption in the end just happens to be the lone white dude in a brown nation.
I guess the populace of the largest nation in the world (and the main focus of the second movie), which includes the most beloved character in the series, doesn't count.
Who knows how she will be portrayed in the movie. It certainly wouldn't count if all of those characters were subjected to being victims, background filler, or sidekicks.
People can't seem to separate the idea of "Hollywood is biased in favor of white people" from "Hollywood is a Neo Nazi front."
Since Hollywood is not a neo-nazi front, obviously, they can't have any biases.
Would Toph have been played by a Chinese actress if the controversy never occurred?
We'll never know for sure.
However, if you say "Yes, they were planning to cast Toph as Chinese from the beginning," then that contradicts the notion that this was entirely color blind casting. Which makes the current casting decisions open to scrutiny.
And if you say "No," then that means that the producers caved into the backlash. Which justifies the existence of the backlash in the first place.
Was Obama secretly pushing for actual death panels in the hopes of ridding society from the burden of caring for the elderly? We'll never know for sure.
Wait, there's been reviews already? You gotta link to this shit man.
I'm guessing there's plenty at aintitfilledwithexclamationpoints.com.
However, I think Earthsea is a little different from Avatar, because race is explicit in the Earthsea novels and LeGuin has commented that she "switched" the races of the civilized/barbarian people to make a moral point about how race is an incident of culture. (i.e. the civilized advanced wizard culture were all black and brown; the illiterate savages at the outskirts of the world were pale-skinned).
Whereas, in Avatar's universe, race matters not one iota. Aang and co. can sneak through the Fire Nation and not be recognized by their skin color; likewise with Zuko and the Earth Nation.
Also, if you take LeGuin's moral point to its logical conclusion, then an argument could be made that we shouldn't get mad at all about Avatar, since if race is incidental to culture, it doesn't matter who plays Aang or Zuko or what skin color anyone is.
I once held that position but now I've come around to thinking that Shamaylan and Hollywood have acted irresponsibly; despite what Shaymalan claims about the show's racial universality, it is obviously a prominent example of non-Western, Asian culture and art style. And it does matter to minorities to see heroes in the likeness of themselves onscreen; we aren't living in a post-racial utopia where everyone accepts the premise of LeGuin's argument. Like you said, the movie is a huge missed opportunity to showcase Asian/Inuit talent.
So, in a series based almost entirely around Asian, in particular Chinese and Japanese, culture, we might get one major character played by someone of Chinese or Japanese descent? In three years? Assuming they don't change their minds or this was just a stunt in the hope that the casting controversy blows over? In the less than 50% chance that they even get to make a sequel? Score.
Hey, just because they sit on the ground cross-legged to eat, with chopsticks, and have topknots and meditate and are obsessed with drinking leafy teas and wear Asian-looking robes and ride on Asian-looking boats and live in Asian-looking temples and palaces doesn't mean they're Asian.
I mean, they could be anything.
Honestly, I would be a lot more forgiving if MNS would at least acknowledge the criticism. If he had simply said, "Well, Hollywood doesn't think that Asian actors sell tickets, and I'm not strong enough to fight the Hollywood."
I sometimes make the joke, "Food Network really loves Asian food, but apparently not enough to hire an Asian TV host."
The joke being that American audiences have no problem accepting Asian culture, they only have a problem with Asian people.
I think the same thing was said about Firefly/Serenity. For a show that uses a lot of Asian-inspired designs and Chinese phrases, I sure didn't see a lot of Asian people :?.
Oh, and I have probably posted this before, but it seems appropriate, and fun!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNmzegQUtFA
The excuse is usually that in Firefly, Asian people live in the rich areas, which they haven't explored.
Of course, considering the number of completely far out and unique people they met throughout their journey, it's real far fetched to think that they couldn't find even come across one Asian character.
Oh, I won't pretend to defend Firefly on this subject. The central cast is somewhat diverse, at least, but there's no reason they couldn't have Asian secondary characters and extras at the minimum. At least Dollhouse seemed to indicate that Joss was aware of this problem and worked to correct it (or his co-creators insisted.)
At least they were original characters, though, not Asian (and Inuit, etc.) characters whitewashed to appease the hypothetical xenophobic American audience.
I thought it was that the rim was basically Deliverance.
I'm more curious about what Aang and the Air-Potentials are going to do about the Sky Bison deficit. Isn't it implied that Appa is also the last of those?
Yeah. And Momo's probably the last lemur, too.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
True, and there was a reason for the Fire Nation to go after the bison, aside from them being three-ton fanatically-loyal flying bodyguards for the people they were trying to exterminate. And it seemed like the main reason the lemurs hung around was to eat food the monks gave them. Still, it seems odd that not a single other one of Momo's species showed up in the series in modern times.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
Flashback. They went after the cakes Gyatso and Aang put on the meditating monks' heads.
Surely you mean a platypus-bear.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
Skunk-bear?
Steam | Twitter
Gopher-bear?
Just...Bear
A bear-bear? Like, a polar-panda?
You laugh now, but in 3-4 years when the second movie comes out, you'll see that the king has a pet POLAR bear, when the bear was CLEARLY brown in the cartoon!
It boiled down to "I can't capture the ideas and themes in Avatar, so I'm going to copy+paste as much as possible from each season and shoehorn it into movie sized chunks."
Like, I get that he's a fan, and he really wants to make a good movie, but jesus. He uses the word "edgy" a lot and I don't know what the heck he means by it. Does he mean it as "morally ambiguous?" Because the way he uses it makes me think he means "dark for the sake of being dark."
The Blue Spirit episode is all foreshadowing to Zuko's role in the second book - that he can leave behind his family and its politics and return to his sense of justice that he expressed as a child. Of course, he discovers this capacity during his attempt to prevent someone else for getting credit for capturing the Avatar - that's what is most interesting about the episode. Calling it "Edgy" and "Dark" seems to miss the mark.