[Discussion] On Television, Cinema and the Under Represented

Thread for race issues in media.

Birth Of a Nation
This movie isn't do so good. I think this is because black people are tired of slave type movies, white people don't want the white guilt, and everybody else is turned off by the rape case. I mean this in general. This is just a perfect storm for the downfall of the movie.

Surviving Compton
Straight out of compton left out the ladies. This lifetime show means to correct that. I believe all of the production was done by women.

Mulan live.
All Chinese cast. Maybe the dumb choices of Gods of Egypt are over.

Stengah wrote:
Tscott wrote:

Um, Star Trek featured the first interracial kiss on US television. And don't they depict a post-money idealized society where basically everyone is equal and everyone has a home and access to food?

I feel like it dines out on that way more than it ought to. Uhura and Kirk didn't share a romantic kiss, they were forced to kiss against their will by an alien. There are much better examples of Star Trek's "wokeness".

True, but I think the fact that they went there, however problematic, was big for the time that it aired. Not to mention the fact that they had an African American woman on the show at all (the first in a staring role?) was huge to many including, reportedly, Martian Luther King Jr.:

“‘I am the biggest Trekkie on the planet, and I am lieutenant Uhura’s most ardent fan,’” Nichols recalls King saying to her. “I didn’t even know how to say thank you,”
...
“Do you not understand what God has given you? … You have the first important non-traditional role, non-stereotypical role. … You cannot abdicate your position. You are changing the minds of people across the world, because for the first time, through you, we see ourselves and what can be.” Nichols remembers King saying to her.
Tscott wrote:
Stengah wrote:
Tscott wrote:

Um, Star Trek featured the first interracial kiss on US television. And don't they depict a post-money idealized society where basically everyone is equal and everyone has a home and access to food?

I feel like it dines out on that way more than it ought to. Uhura and Kirk didn't share a romantic kiss, they were forced to kiss against their will by an alien. There are much better examples of Star Trek's "wokeness".

True, but I think the fact that they went there, however problematic, was big for the time that it aired. Not to mention the fact that they had an African American woman on the show at all (the first in a staring role?) was huge to many including, reportedly, Martian Luther King Jr.:

“‘I am the biggest Trekkie on the planet, and I am lieutenant Uhura’s most ardent fan,’” Nichols recalls King saying to her. “I didn’t even know how to say thank you,”
...
“Do you not understand what God has given you? … You have the first important non-traditional role, non-stereotypical role. … You cannot abdicate your position. You are changing the minds of people across the world, because for the first time, through you, we see ourselves and what can be.” Nichols remembers King saying to her.

Some (IMO) important context missing is that she had already quit at the time of that discussion. After that talk with King, Nichols asked Gene Roddenberry for her job back (who instantly welcomed her back.

Mary Kay for Men isn't stable!

Gasp!

Rat Boy wrote:

IMAGE(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FSwv1_WWYAg5Oan?format=png&name=900x900)

This sort of thing makes my hate-gland squirt indiscriminately. I wish I could wipe every one 'a them half-white Yangs off the face of the planet.

Guy Who Doesn’t Even Like New ‘Star Wars’ Thing Now Forced to Defend It

It me!

Hell, I have zero desire to watch it at all, and now I feel like I should just leave it streaming in another room in solidarity.

Prederick wrote:

Guy Who Doesn’t Even Like New ‘Star Wars’ Thing Now Forced to Defend It

It me!

Hell, I have zero desire to watch it at all, and now I feel like I should just leave it streaming in another room in solidarity.

My confession - from a lore perspective I love that it’s not just White actors portraying Imperial villains. The Empire is a pan human supremacy movement, with certain respect accorded to ally races like the Zabrak and Rattataki. I like that the Empire is evolving storywise from just being a thin Nazi allegory.

But at the very least you would think the Proud Boy fans would be rooting that a Black woman is the bad guy.

She may be a villain but she still has power and authority. Even a truly negative depiction isn’t always enough though, what they really want is everyone but cis white guys and trad wives scrubbed from media.

ruhk wrote:

what they really want is everyone but cis white guys and masturbation fantasy waifus scrubbed from media.

Fixed on a minor technicality. Bidoof's Law, etc.

I don’t think there’s a difference there lol

Prederick wrote:
ruhk wrote:

what they really want is everyone but cis white guys and masturbation fantasy waifus scrubbed from media.

Fixed on a minor technicality. Bidoof's Law, etc.

I had to look up Bidoof’s law and just want to say that I am playing a Veena bunny girl in the GWJ FF 14 clan simply because the light armor styles look better on her.

Prederick wrote:

Guy Who Doesn’t Even Like New ‘Star Wars’ Thing Now Forced to Defend It

It me!

Hell, I have zero desire to watch it at all, and now I feel like I should just leave it streaming in another room in solidarity.

This again, but for the new Ms. Marvel show, despite the fact that after Endgame I was like "that's enough Marvel for me, thank you."

I swear these troglodytes don't even watch the shows they hate. Ms. Marvel is frickin' fantastic.

Have people been hating on Ms. Marvel? In the MCU-related circles I travel it's more been quietly ignored than anything else.

hbi2k wrote:

Have people been hating on Ms. Marvel? In the MCU-related circles I travel it's more been quietly ignored than anything else.

That's what's been drawing it criticism from the usual suspects. Low ratings, "Go woke/go broke," etc.

As I understand it, Hawkeye had the lowest ratings of any Marvel Disney Plus series at the time it came out. I'm sure the usual suspects are doing what the usual suspects do, but if a culprit needs to be found for low ratings, I don't think you need to look farther than franchise fatigue.

My interest was already flagging halfway through Doctor Who Series 13 and 1/3 Loki. Only made it a couple episodes into Hawkeye. It was... fine? I dunno. I keep thinking I should give Ms. Marvel a shot, I haven't heard anything but good things about it, but I keep not doing it.

hbi2k wrote:

My interest was already flagging halfway through Doctor Who Series 13 and 1/3 Loki.

IMAGE(https://c.tenor.com/mygNNI7LP9oAAAAC/thierry-henry-laugh.gif)

When viewing your entertainment starts feeling obligatory, then it's not entertainment.

So it's ok if I don't watch all 6 currently airing Star Trek series? Whew.

A tangent, but good lord, I haven't seen a second of any of those new shows that don't seem like they've decided to take all the wrong lessons from the movies and none of the good ones from DS9/Voyager/etc.

I feel like Discovery and Picard in particular took the wrong lesson from DS9 in going almost completely serialized when DS9 only went full serialized for only a few stretches.

I kind of think that Lower Decks is the best Star Trek show out there.

Nevin73 wrote:

I kind of think that Lower Decks is the best Star Trek show out there.

IMO The Orville is the best Star Trek show, but Lower Decks is the best Star Trek-branded show. (in general, not just currently active shows.)

What was your favorite part of Lowered X? The memberberries, or when it kicked the main character in the proverbial (and sometimes literal) balls?

Because that's kind of its two moves.

Lower Decks got better and more interesting as it went along, it had to develop the characters a bit before it had a chance to introduce any nuance at all. The Orville is absolutely the best Trek show right now. Disclaimer: haven't had a chance to watch Strange New Worlds yet.

But I suspect Orville+SNW is going to perfectly reprise my growing up watching TNG on the local unaffiliated station, followed by rerun TOS episodes, while I lay in bed avoiding going to sleep.

IMO (and this will be my last word on this tangent), the Lower Decks was mediocre at best for the entirety of season one. Season 2 didn't start off great, but at the very back end, hit a run of 3-4 very strong episodes to end the season.

Now, whether they'll keep that energy in S3, I dunno.

All of these series just feel like Streaming Service Filler Content to me.

Rat Boy wrote:

I feel like Discovery and Picard in particular took the wrong lesson from DS9 in going almost completely serialized when DS9 only went full serialized for only a few stretches.

I am in early season 3 and have been finding Discovery to be a solid step better than I had expected. I definitely agree that going full-serialized like this was a misstep, that DS9 had the best balance of serialized story fleshed out with robust episodic content throughout. From what little I have read, it sounds like Strange New Worlds may be going in that direction?

But more relevant to this discussion, I love the way in which Discovery has embraced diversity in today's sensibilities but -- at least to my admittedly privileged perspective -- without doing so gratuitously or in a way that sensationalizes it.

Interesting Newsweek article about how casting Black actors in the wrong roles can actually hurt diversity and typecast the actors for the wrong sort of roles. I found it a good read, even though I disagree with the idea that Black actors shouldn't play bad guy dictators. Steve Toussaint as Lord Corlys Velaryon in the new GOT series is an interesting choice, and I thought the bad guy family of the series are focused less on race and more on maintaining their magical abilities.

I've always thought the issue was a bit more complicated than the yelling people on Twitter would like to present it as.

For instance, in animated shows, I'm not insomuch about only hiring PoC voice actors to play PoC roles as I am just giving more opportunities to PoC VAs and other people in positions of power in production.