Politics in arts and PC culture

[ToTheNines]

Originally Posted by Andrew NDB

They should've just had the F4 jump forward in time from the 60s in the first movie and, at the same time, reveal the X-Men have been hiding in plain site for decades and we see what's really going on at the Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters.

That's it. Nice, neat. No alternate worlds, Doomsdays and world merging or THIS team is on THIS world and THAT team is on that world mumbo jumbo.

Seriously. They were so intent on that 60’s setting/aesthetic, but forced all these mental gymnastics to make it work.

And it still doesn’t really make much sense that everybody looked the same when they went to Earth 818, but Reed was John Krasinsky. I know they just hand wave and say “multiverse”, but it doesn’t sit right with me.

[Andrew NDB]

So... possibly great strides in dismantling a decent portion of the weaponization of the arts of late. Let's look at the state of the union now:

* Skydance bought up Paramount last year. We have yet to really see the ramifications of that yet but it would reason to say that Skydance probably has no interest in "The Message™."

* Paramount just won its pursuit of WB, so soon WB will be brought under the same umbrella. We can really only speculate what this will mean beyond the above.

* Disney/Marvel has had the crap kicked out of it with just about every movie and Disney+ release for the last two or three years, largely because of its last gasps of the woke/untalented activist type of material that got squeezed out at the buzzer before Iger said they're not doing that crap anymore. So they've pretty much been beaten into submission in the corner and are showing big signs of coming around on no more of "The Message™" and letting there be projects for boys again and not just girls or the "Modern Audience" that does not exist in any financially beneficial way.

So pretty seismic shifts that we'll probably see the fruit of in... eh, the next 2-4 years or so?

[Prowler]

I think it depends on how much political messages are conveyed and delivered in art and culture. They need to be done cleverly and not super in your face and in a preachy way. So many things are done with the subtly of a sledgehammer.

Changing characters nationalities or "race" has been a thing for a long time, like Baxter Stockman in the FW series. But it didn't have the political soapbox intentions behind it like all those Netflix shows and that horrible Scooby-Doo spin-off Velma had.

Just like there's been strong women in fiction since forever. No one had a problem with Samus Aran, Lara Croft or that woman from Kill Bill. But female Ghostbusters movie... that was not innocent. And yet, the vultures attacked James Rolfe for refusing to watch and review the movie.

A lot of people will accuse us of being racist or sexist when we point those things out, sadly. If creators want to make black characters, lesbian characters, etc., then they should simply create their own brand new characters. Don't change established characters like Bruce Wayne, April O'Neil, Arsene Lupin, etc.

I'm glad Japan doesn't seem to be taking part in this nonsense so far.

[Andrew NDB]

Originally Posted by Prowler

I'm glad Japan doesn't seem to be taking part in this nonsense so far.

Yeah, and where's all the uproar about Japanese cinema not being diverse enough? How come it's mostly only Japanese actors and actresses?!

[ToTheNines]

I hate how you can get lumped in with one side or the other for not liking something, regardless of your reasoning.

I was pretty angry when they announced 2016 Ghostbusters, just not for any “political” reason. I didn’t like how the decided to move forward with it when Harold Ramis’ body was practically still warm. Felt gross. But if I pointed that out… I was a misogynist or a Trump supporter of whatever. Shut up.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by Andrew NDB

Yeah, and where's all the uproar about Japanese cinema not being diverse enough? How come it's mostly only Japanese actors and actresses?!

Occasionally you'll see people complaining about that when it comes to Japanese media and media from European countries. There was a minor outrage over The Witcher III not having any people of colour. The Witcher is a game series made by a Polish company that's an adaptation of a Polish fantasy novel series. Like OK, the games have elves, dwarves and other mythical creatures, but nonetheless, it's a little absurd to DEMAND them to add Black and Indian people to the game, no? And I bet that if they added black people or Indians to the game and a couple of them turned out to be bad guys, there'd be outrage over it too. You can't win with those people.

Quite frankly, most of that outrage when it comes to diversity in the media comes from young Americans. Americans in general, whether they're left-wing or right-wing, tend to have exceptionalistic attitudes and assume the whole world should work like the US. That's one thing that really pisses me off.

Originally Posted by ToTheNines

I hate how you can get lumped in with one side or the other for not liking something, regardless of your reasoning.

I was pretty angry when they announced 2016 Ghostbusters, just not for any “political” reason. I didn’t like how the decided to move forward with it when Harold Ramis’ body was practically still warm. Felt gross. But if I pointed that out… I was a misogynist or a Trump supporter of whatever. Shut up.

Also, this.

[CyberCubed]

We will probably be seeing a lot more straight white males in leading roles going forward. I remember how it was in the 90's, most shows and movies had an all-white cast, you had maybe one token black guy, and the only time Asians would be shown if they needed kung-fu karate experts. Gays and lesbians were almost never seen (unless it was just two girls making out for some reason), and you'd never hear a whisper of a transgender character.

Also is it just me or were they never any Indians in shows/movies back then either? Like almost never, you would barely see any minorities unless they were black, some hispanics, and Asians were just relegated to kung-fu karate flicks.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by CyberCubed

We will probably be seeing a lot more straight white males in leading roles going forward. I remember how it was in the 90's, most shows and movies had an all-white cast, you had maybe one token black guy, and the only time Asians would be shown if they needed kung-fu karate experts. Gays and lesbians were almost never seen (unless it was just two girls making out for some reason), and you'd never hear a whisper of a transgender character.

Also is it just me or were they never any Indians in shows/movies back then either? Like almost never, you would barely see any minorities unless they were black, some hispanics, and Asians were just relegated to kung-fu karate flicks.

Black people in American shows and movies were already common place before the 90s.

Perhaps the South Asian population of USA is not very large and there's not a lot of South Asian actors in Hollywood?

[Mayhem]

I think a lot of people don’t realise Ben Kingsley is half Indian. But you’re right, there weren’t a lot in Western shows and films last century.

[ToTheNines]

Anybody like The Boondocks? I thought of this thread when I saw this Aaron McGruder quote the other day:

“No matter what message you have, you better be captivating your audience first. Or, understand, nobody’s going to listen.”