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 Lance845 wrote:
Liking the color red has never prevented you from getting married, caused bullying to a degree that there is a alarming spike in suicide attempts, or prevented you from voting. Or in other countries get you beheaded for existing or stoned to death for trying to go to school.

Saying being gay or a woman is a nothing feature that requires nothing or costs them nothing is incredibly short sighted and is oblivious to the lives they live.

So which is it you want, equality or special treatment? Equality means being ignored and treated the same way as 99% of everyone else, like crap.

Fun fact, I don't look like Bruce Willis or Pam Grier but I still can relate to them and the characters they play on-screen because I have empathy. What happened to the world where we were supposed to judge people by the content of their character?

 BaconCatBug wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
Liking the color red has never prevented you from getting married, caused bullying to a degree that there is a alarming spike in suicide attempts, or prevented you from voting. Or in other countries get you beheaded for existing or stoned to death for trying to go to school.

Saying being gay or a woman is a nothing feature that requires nothing or costs them nothing is incredibly short sighted and is oblivious to the lives they live.

So which is it you want, equality or special treatment? Equality means being ignored and treated the same way as 99% of everyone else, like crap.

Fun fact, I don't look like Bruce Willis or Pam Grier but I still can relate to them and the characters they play on-screen because I have empathy. What happened to the world where we were supposed to judge people by the content of their character?

Cant say i have EVER seen a half singaporian welshman in a film but here i am still loving these characters, shocking isnt it

 Formosa wrote:
Cant say i have EVER seen a half singaporian welshman in a film but here i am still loving these characters, shocking isnt it

Aren't you being a little bit obtuse for comedy sake at that point though? I don't think that being "half-singaporian" is a corner stone of your personnal identity or how people relate or classify you. I'm not sure, that it's very important to you to be known as a half-singaporian and that your condition of half-singaporian has defined a large portion of your life experience and how it made you who you are. You can love any character and in fact everybody loves a wide variety of character with various backgrounds, ability and appearence. I don't know a single person who likes only a single precise type of character at the exclusion of all others, but we do all have "favorites", types of character we enjoy more and with whome we relate more. These character almost always display characteristics that we display and are part of the corner stone or our identity. They share our values, they "live" our fantasies, they have comparable life experience and backstory, etc.

@Lance: Yeah but being a socially awkward nerd which is not any race or gender fits most of your categories as well.

You guys know i'm an autistic half jewish guy right and yeah at times each had a history where they were victims. Even from those perspectives i won't say any of 'my people' (whatever that means) are always infinitely good and never bad. My point is that shouldn't be your defining feature. Those things should have the importance to people as 'the color red' or a 'pizza topping' should have to someone. Anyway this is getting off topic again.

Going back on topic it was a decent movie with really good art style. The story was ok to decent but not great. However i'm guessing it's not meant to be like 'the manchurian candidate', 'seven' or in the sake of video games 'deus ex' and 'prey (2016)'

epronovost wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
Cant say i have EVER seen a half singaporian welshman in a film but here i am still loving these characters, shocking isnt it

Aren't you being a little bit obtuse for comedy sake at that point though? I don't think that being "half-singaporian" is a corner stone of your personnal identity or how people relate or classify you. I'm not sure, that it's very important to you to be known as a half-singaporian and that your condition of half-singaporian has defined a large portion of your life experience and how it made you who you are. You can love any character and in fact everybody loves a wide variety of character with various backgrounds, ability and appearence. I don't know a single person who likes only a single precise type of character at the exclusion of all others, but we do all have "favorites", types of character we enjoy more and with whome we relate more. These character almost always display characteristics that we display and are part of the corner stone or our identity. They share our values, they "live" our fantasies, they have comparable life experience and backstory, etc.

Yes and no, I am making fun of the clearly stupid idea that we can only like characters that look like us, its utterly utterly reductive to me, but hey, thats me

And your right, its not the corner stone of my identity, it barely matters to me at all but it matters to the identitarians who are obsessed it such things, I also see that your referencing intersectionality, nope dont have any truck with that either, it was a good idea on paper that was hijacked by lunatics.

I think the key point you made though and the most important point is this "They share our values"

While values change over time it always seems to be the characters that people like the most are the idealised versions of humanity, those that can overcome the odds and never give up, the heros journey i mentioned earlier.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
@Lance: Yeah but being a socially awkward nerd which is not any race or gender fits most of your categories as well.

You guys know i'm an autistic half jewish guy right and yeah at times each had a history where they were victims. Even from those perspectives i won't say any of 'my people' (whatever that means) are always infinitely good and never bad. My point is that shouldn't be your defining feature. Those things should have the importance to people as 'the color red' or a 'pizza topping' should have to someone. Anyway this is getting off topic again.

Going back on topic it was a decent movie with really good art style. The story was ok to decent but not great. However i'm guessing it's not meant to be like 'the manchurian candidate', 'seven' or in the sake of video games 'deus ex' and 'prey (2016)'

I have been a socially akward nerd. Its never stopped me from getting married, gotten me stoned, beheaded, or prevented my "people" from the right to vote. What you described doesn't fit most of anything i said.

My point was you were dismissive of the way some people see their representation while failing to acknowledge that they have vastly different life experiences than you.

@baconcatbug, i didn't say anyone should get treated differently. I said that he made a gak comparison that failed to recognize the differences. Not getting why some people look for representation is whatever. You don't have to understand anyone's point of view on anything. I was merely pointing out that liking a flavor of ice cream is not the same thing as people you grew up around having to fight to be able to vote and continue to have to look for equality in society.

 Formosa wrote:
Yes and no, I am making fun of the clearly stupid idea that we can only like characters that look like us, its utterly utterly reductive to me, but hey, thats me

I don't hink anybody in the history of mankind has ever said that you can only like character that look like us. The idea mention in this thread and everywhere else is that people are more suceptible to like character which share characteristics that are central to the way they define themselves and society judges them for example gender, race, religion, socio-economical situation, culture, sub-culture, values, life-experence, etc. Note that not all these characteristics NEED to be important to your identity both as an individual or a member of a group. These are just examples of the most commonly mentioned characteristics that are fundamental and important to a person's identity.

And your right, its not the corner stone of my identity, it barely matters to me at all but it matters to the identitarians who are obsessed it such things, I also see that your referencing intersectionality, nope dont have any truck with that either, it was a good idea on paper that was hijacked by lunatics.

Meh, the vast majority of people don't have the knowledge or background to talk competently or intelligently about social science concept. I don't fault people with missing the point unless they use it as a stepping board to spew contempt and hatred at other class of people.

I think the key point you made though and the most important point is this "They share our values"

Our personnal identity can be declined into our value, our expereriences, our tastes and our ambitions. Any character who shares any of those elements will necessarily be more easily relatable than one who doesn't and those who share them all are pretty much bound to please us (with a very few exceptions).

While values change over time it always seems to be the characters that people like the most are the idealised versions of humanity, those that can overcome the odds and never give up, the heros journey i mentioned earlier.

I disagree. The "hero's journey", is simply a narrative tool that follows a series of common narrative arc in a specific type of story. It's only useful in a limited type of stories and it does tend to create similar character because of the nature of the story in which there such a journey can take place. For example, many horror movies follow a different kind of narrative and have very different characters. Everybody loves power fantasies offered by the hero's journey up to certain point, but as it has been shown multiple times, not everybody loves it to the same level. Just think about Mary Sue character, all of them are pretty much the quintessential characters of a hero's journey, yet they aren't loved much (or even identifiable). Plus, some people don't enjoy action/adventure stories which are pretty much those in which "hero's journey" occur most often. But you are right in mentionning that some values are pretty much timeless and will attract a LOT of people; values like kindness, courage, valor, loyalty, wit, love, humility, wisdom, honesty.

I don't hink anybody in the history of mankind has ever said that you can only like character that look like us. The idea mention in this thread and everywhere else is that people are more suceptible to like character which share characteristics that are central to the way they define themselves and society judges them for example gender, race, religion, socio-economical situation, culture, sub-culture, values, life-experence, etc. Note that not all these characteristics NEED to be important to your identity both as an individual or a member of a group. These are just examples of the most commonly mentioned characteristics that are fundamental and important to a person's identity.

Sadly they do, quite often in fact, us normal people dont that true but even a quick google search will show that a minority of people think exactly this.

Meh, the vast majority of people don't have the knowledge or background to talk competently or intelligently about social science concept. I don't fault people with missing the point unless they use it as a stepping board to spew contempt and hatred at other class of people.

yeah your likely right about that, like I said the concept is a good one its just got a bad name from all the lunatics trying to use it without understanding it.

Our personnal identity can be declined into our value, our expereriences, our tastes and our ambitions. Any character who shares any of those elements will necessarily be more easily relatable than one who doesn't and those who share them all are pretty much bound to please us (with a very few exceptions).

a fair point.

I disagree. The "hero's journey", is simply a narrative tool that follows a series of common narrative arc in a specific type of story. It's only useful in a limited type of stories and it does tend to create similar character because of the nature of the story in which there such a journey can take place. For example, many horror movies follow a different kind of narrative and have very different characters. Everybody loves power fantasies offered by the hero's journey up to certain point, but as it has been shown multiple times, not everybody loves it to the same level. Just think about Mary Sue character, all of them are pretty much the quintessential characters of a hero's journey, yet they aren't loved much (or even identifiable). Plus, some people don't enjoy action/adventure stories which are pretty much those in which "hero's journey" occur most often. But you are right in mentionning that some values are pretty much timeless and will attract a LOT of people; values like kindness, courage, valor, loyalty, wit, love, humility, wisdom, honesty.

Everything the mention there is basically just tacked onto the heroes journey, its generally the baseline of almost all of our most popular stories and then built upon.

epronovost wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
Yes and no, I am making fun of the clearly stupid idea that we can only like characters that look like us, its utterly utterly reductive to me, but hey, thats me

I don't hink anybody in the history of mankind has ever said that you can only like character that look like us. The idea mention in this thread and everywhere else is that people are more suceptible to like character which share characteristics that are central to the way they define themselves and society judges them for example gender, race, religion, socio-economical situation, culture, sub-culture, values, life-experence, etc. Note that not all these characteristics NEED to be important to your identity both as an individual or a member of a group. These are just examples of the most commonly mentioned characteristics that are fundamental and important to a person's identity.

But that's the point I'm making - why is what's important to your real identity a factor in whether or not you can enjoy and connect with a fictional character in a story that bears little resemblance to reality? I'm not black, African, African-American, royalty, in any kind of leadership position, and I have no siblings, but that was no barrier to me understanding and empathising with T'Challa because he expresses character traits that are common to pretty much all people and all fiction, nor did a lack of personal experience of the issues being discussed prevent me from grasping the totality of Killmonger's character and ideology, or from feeling a chill run down my spine when he spoke his last words.

That's why I find the push by some towards the idea you can only truly invest in a fictional character if they resemble you to some degree so bizarre, it's completely counter-productive if your goal is to make the world a better place for all people; certain groups have spent decades trying to construct an Us vs Them/separate but equal narrative in developed nations, I just never thought "my side" would end up embracing that idea.

EDIT: To clarify what I mean - certain people make the argument that films like Black Panther ought to be made so that one group within our real society can "see themselves reflected on screen", and that's who it's "for". I believe people should be arguing that films like Black Panther ought to be made because they're great stories that enrich all of us by drawing from cultures and aesthetics outside of the norm, and that they're "for" everybody because how much "identity" you share with the protagonists is an irrelevance.

 Yodhrin wrote:

epronovost wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
Yes and no, I am making fun of the clearly stupid idea that we can only like characters that look like us, its utterly utterly reductive to me, but hey, thats me

I don't hink anybody in the history of mankind has ever said that you can only like character that look like us. The idea mention in this thread and everywhere else is that people are more suceptible to like character which share characteristics that are central to the way they define themselves and society judges them for example gender, race, religion, socio-economical situation, culture, sub-culture, values, life-experence, etc. Note that not all these characteristics NEED to be important to your identity both as an individual or a member of a group. These are just examples of the most commonly mentioned characteristics that are fundamental and important to a person's identity.

But that's the point I'm making - why is what's important to your real identity a factor in whether or not you can enjoy and connect with a fictional character in a story that bears little resemblance to reality? I'm not black, African, African-American, royalty, in any kind of leadership position, and I have no siblings, but that was no barrier to me understanding and empathising with T'Challa because he expresses character traits that are common to pretty much all people and all fiction, nor did a lack of personal experience of the issues being discussed prevent me from grasping the totality of Killmonger's character and ideology, or from feeling a chill run down my spine when he spoke his last words.

That's why I find the push by some towards the idea you can only truly invest in a fictional character if they resemble you to some degree so bizarre, it's completely counter-productive if your goal is to make the world a better place for all people; certain groups have spent decades trying to construct an Us vs Them/separate but equal narrative in developed nations, I just never thought "my side" would end up embracing that idea.

EDIT: To clarify what I mean - certain people make the argument that films like Black Panther ought to be made so that one group within our real society can "see themselves reflected on screen", and that's who it's "for". I believe people should be arguing that films like Black Panther ought to be made because they're great stories that enrich all of us by drawing from cultures and aesthetics outside of the norm, and that they're "for" everybody because how much "identity" you share with the protagonists is an irrelevance.

Not sure what side you meant by you saying 'your side'.

As far as games go i saw a let's play of 'Prey (2016)' and it was really, really good. The story is amazing and i feel like i'd at least argue with anybody that says different. The gameplay looked solid and the ending was quite a twist. It also features a couple gay minor characters and the main character (male or female as you can choose) is asian. The story asks far more important questions in the sense of trying to understand and possibly co-exist with some alien life which we can't entirely communicate with that seems openly hostile. I'll admit when i first saw it i thought it was a diversity thing to have both male and female characters with asian descent and a gay minor character but really that's only a bad thing when used as a 'get out of jail' card for a game or movie being terrible (like the last ghostbusters film supposedly). However all this goes away when the story is great and the game feels good and has good aesthetics. It became a very memorable game and one i should've bought. I've heard comparisons to it being like 'system shock' and that sounds like a good thing.

As far as 'black panther' goes i'm not gonna lie i never saw it. If i had to watch a movie with a black superhero i'd prefer 'Blade'. I might even prefer the 'prototype 2' game but i heard that wasn't as good as the first and never played it.

Whoever thinks you need a character that looks like you to relate has probably never seen any of those cartoons or 3d animated movies or shows with animals or objects that talk and act like people.

 Yodhrin wrote:
But that's the point I'm making - why is what's important to your real identity a factor in whether or not you can enjoy and connect with a fictional character in a story that bears little resemblance to reality?

Because that's just how human works. We relate more easily to things we understand and with whome we share some point in common. The point in common you share, the easier it is to create a link with a fictionnal character. That doesn't mean you can't relate to a character with drastically different characteristics then you. Your ability to do so might be affected for example by your age and your personnal sociability. Your consumption of fictionnal media might also affect it. The more movies and books you consume, the easier it gets to relate with characters. That's why some character you thought were so cool at some point in your life you might find boring and predictable later on (or vice versa, this character is gak, now I think it's great). There are many factor at play here.

I'm not black, African, African-American, royalty, in any kind of leadership position, and I have no siblings, but that was no barrier to me understanding and empathising with T'Challa because he expresses character traits that are common to pretty much all people and all fiction, nor did a lack of personal experience of the issues being discussed prevent me from grasping the totality of Killmonger's character and ideology, or from feeling a chill run down my spine when he spoke his last words.

That comes with experience and personnal talents. You didn't appreciated the character in the same way then others though. What makes you connect to the character seems to have been his values. You also had prior existence with other characters, culturaly closer to you that displayed similar values and conflict, helping you to grasp a more "exotic" version of the same trope. For others, the character not only resonate with them thanks to his values, but also his cultural background. For others, he resonate culturally, but has values that aren't shared or important to the viewer (that creates a place for learning or changing minds). For some neither and in those cases, it's rare they will enjoy the character. Finally, like almost all characters and movies in the melodrama genre, some will connect with the underlining socio-political message of the movie and of the character. The subtext of the character thus becomes very important and can open a new dimension of appreciation of the movie/story/character.

EDIT: To clarify what I mean - certain people make the argument that films like Black Panther ought to be made so that one group within our real society can "see themselves reflected on screen", and that's who it's "for". I believe people should be arguing that films like Black Panther ought to be made because they're great stories that enrich all of us by drawing from cultures and aesthetics outside of the norm, and that they're "for" everybody because how much "identity" you share with the protagonists is an irrelevance.

While not a "bad" argument to make, it completely ignores or brush aside the subtext of stories and entertainment in general. The idea isn't simply to "see themselves reflected on screen" in sort of tokenish form. That would be a reductive way to represent or perceive the calls for more diversity in the entertainment industry. We talk about subtext that defend, exalt and celebrate marginalised sub-culture or groups; that shows their imaginary and idealised constructions; their own "spin" on timeless and universal values That's what those calls about diversity are about they are about defending, exalting and celebrating marginalised sub-culture or groups in an unapoloetic fashion, without a "safe" filter for those who don't belong to those groups and for whome, while they may love the character for its values and message, might not be able to relate to it culturally as much and who neither can relate to the subtext as strongly.

Because that's just how human works. We relate more easily to things we understand and with whome we share some point in common. The point in common you share, the easier it is to create a link with a fictionnal character. That doesn't mean you can't relate to a character with drastically different characteristics then you. Your ability to do so might be affected for example by your age and your personnal sociability. Your consumption of fictionnal media might also affect it. The more movies and books you consume, the easier it gets to relate with characters. That's why some character you thought were so cool at some point in your life you might find boring and predictable later on (or vice versa, this character is gak, now I think it's great). There are many factor at play here.

That is a fair way of looking at it, the more you expose yourself to other concepts and ideas the more likely you are to be able to relate to these ideas or concepts, over familiarity with the same concept /idea can lead to stagnation of that concept/idea, basically you are talking about "tropes"

That comes with experience and personnal talents. You didn't appreciated the character in the same way then others though. What makes you connect to the character seems to have been his values. You also had prior existence with other characters, culturaly closer to you that displayed similar values and conflict, helping you to grasp a more "exotic" version of the same trope. For others, the character not only resonate with them thanks to his values, but also his cultural background. For others, he resonate culturally, but has values that aren't shared or important to the viewer (that creates a place for learning or changing minds). For some neither and in those cases, it's rare they will enjoy the character. Finally, like almost all characters and movies in the melodrama genre, some will connect with the underlining socio-political message of the movie and of the character. The subtext of the character thus becomes very important and can open a new dimension of appreciation of the movie/story/character.

again a fair assessment but to add to it, a lot of people try to find a sub text that simply is not there or create a sub text the original creator did not intend and even get it completely wrong, a good example of this is heinlein starship troopers, the movie is about Facism, the books are about libertarianism, the movie writers and directors simply did not understand what they were doing and now most people who know of starship troopers think its about a fascistic society, they get the sub text wrong because the movie creators got the interpretation wrong.

While not a "bad" argument to make, it completely ignores or brush aside the subtext of stories and entertainment in general. The idea isn't simply to "see themselves reflected on screen" in sort of tokenish form. That would be a reductive way to represent or perceive the calls for more diversity in the entertainment industry. We talk about subtext that defend, exalt and celebrate marginalised sub-culture or groups; that shows their imaginary and idealised constructions; their own "spin" on timeless and universal values That's what those calls about diversity are about they are about defending, exalting and celebrating marginalised sub-culture or groups in an unapoloetic fashion, without a "safe" filter for those who don't belong to those groups and for whome, while they may love the character for its values and message, might not be able to relate to it culturally as much and who neither can relate to the subtext as strongly.

Well thats not quite true, I can easily show you that people these days are exactly pushing for tokenism over quality, and I agree its very reductive and frankly quite insulting to just change a character for the sake of pushing tokenism, I have always advocated for creating something new rather than changing something established for the sake of a single minorities ideology, advocates for said ideology claiming to speak for the very people that actually mostly disagree with them and even going so far as to attack the self same people they are claiming to represent if they step out of line.

epronovost wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
Cant say i have EVER seen a half singaporian welshman in a film but here i am still loving these characters, shocking isnt it

Aren't you being a little bit obtuse for comedy sake at that point though? I don't think that being "half-singaporian" is a corner stone of your personnal identity or how people relate or classify you. I'm not sure, that it's very important to you to be known as a half-singaporian and that your condition of half-singaporian has defined a large portion of your life experience and how it made you who you are. You can love any character and in fact everybody loves a wide variety of character with various backgrounds, ability and appearence. I don't know a single person who likes only a single precise type of character at the exclusion of all others, but we do all have "favorites", types of character we enjoy more and with whome we relate more. These character almost always display characteristics that we display and are part of the corner stone or our identity. They share our values, they "live" our fantasies, they have comparable life experience and backstory, etc.

So what you're saying is that being gay or bi or trans is the very cornerstone of their personality and that's ALL they should ever be considered? As gay, bi, trans, or whatever?

Not as, you know... people?

Once again, that's not equality. That's special treatment.

EDIT: I love how people tell me I can't understand racial discrimination because I'm white. I attended a predominately black high school barely a mile outside Ferguson. Oh yes, I know all about it and have literal scars to prove it. I was 'whitey' and I was fair game, so far as they were concerned.

It didn't stop me from liking Blade, and Storm, and T'Challa, and any of Will Smith's characters. Why? Because those characters are not racist. They didn't judge those around them based on skin color, as so many of my high school classmates did.

For me, how much I relate to a character comes from their response to the situation they are in. If I can see myself at least trying to do the same thing in the same situation, I can relate to them. That's why I don't care much for horror movies, or a lot of the newer comedies. The characters are handed the idiot ball and have to make dumb decisions to move the plot forward. I cannot relate to that. It's also a big part of why I don't like TLJ; Too many characters making dumb decisions all the way around.

Of course, then there's the dumb (i.e. likely to get you killed) but morally correct (i.e. defending someone in trouble) decision... since I'm still here you know I've never run into that situation. I'd like to think I'd stand up and fight in that situation, so I identify with people who do so in movies. All the better when they survive (Ellen Ripley comes to mind), of course, but sometimes they don't (there are elements of this in Boromir, and in Denzel Washington's character in Man on Fire). But as the Kingons say, "Just as mere life is not victory, mere death is NOT defeat'.

Note that neither race nor gender play any part in that. Men and women have faced the same choice. People of all countries have been there at various times. It's the situation and their reaction I relate to. Not the trivialities of plumbing, pigmentation, or even sexual identity and/or preference. Because it truly is trivial in my mind.

It's not tokenism they are pushing for. Tokenism is in fact the thing they are fighting against. In the past the only exposure they ever had was tokenism. What they want is fair treatment when they are on screen and a more even and fair mix of exposure.

That is not tokenism.

Wanting some mix of women characters in a sea of male characters isn't tokenism.

Having Black Panther be a stand out because it had a majority black cast isn't tokenism. Ive said it before, but the thing that is amazing about BP is that it's JUST another Marvel Movie while having a majority black cast. That has NEVER happened before.

And before others chime in with Blade again, Blade had a single black actor in the lead role. Not a majority black cast. THAT is closer to tokenism then this could ever be.

The advocates today are not arguing for tokenism. They want fair treatment of characters and fair treatment of portrayals and fair treatment of actors.

Alita does this well. Wonder Woman, Captain Marvel, Black Panther. All good examples. Luke Cage did great. So did Jessica Jones.

 Lance845 wrote:
It's not tokenism they are pushing for. Tokenism is in fact the thing they are fighting against. In the past the only exposure they ever had was tokenism. What they want is fair treatment when they are on screen and a more even and fair mix of exposure.

That is not tokenism.

Wanting some mix of women characters in a sea of male characters isn't tokenism.

Having Black Panther be a stand out because it had a majority black cast isn't tokenism. Ive said it before, but the thing that is amazing about BP is that it's JUST another Marvel Movie while having a majority black cast. That has NEVER happened before.

And before others chime in with Blade again, Blade had a single black actor in the lead role. Not a majority black cast. THAT is closer to tokenism then this could ever be.

The advocates today are not arguing for tokenism. They want fair treatment of characters and fair treatment of portrayals and fair treatment of actors.

Alita does this well. Wonder Woman, Captain Marvel, Black Panther. All good examples. Luke Cage did great. So did Jessica Jones.

Not to mention poor Finn in TFA/TLJ. A role with such potential reduced to 'token comic relief black guy'. His role reminds me too much of the poor token comic relief black guy in Evolution.

 Lance845 wrote:
It's not tokenism they are pushing for. Tokenism is in fact the thing they are fighting against. In the past the only exposure they ever had was tokenism. What they want is fair treatment when they are on screen and a more even and fair mix of exposure.

That is not tokenism.

Wanting some mix of women characters in a sea of male characters isn't tokenism.

Having Black Panther be a stand out because it had a majority black cast isn't tokenism. Ive said it before, but the thing that is amazing about BP is that it's JUST another Marvel Movie while having a majority black cast. That has NEVER happened before.

And before others chime in with Blade again, Blade had a single black actor in the lead role. Not a majority black cast. THAT is closer to tokenism then this could ever be.

The advocates today are not arguing for tokenism. They want fair treatment of characters and fair treatment of portrayals and fair treatment of actors.

Alita does this well. Wonder Woman, Captain Marvel, Black Panther. All good examples. Luke Cage did great. So did Jessica Jones.

Remember when the Buzzfeeds of the world were praising the "diversity" of Black Panther because 98% of the cast was black, yet if a movie is 98% white it's suddenly racist?

 BaconCatBug wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
It's not tokenism they are pushing for. Tokenism is in fact the thing they are fighting against. In the past the only exposure they ever had was tokenism. What they want is fair treatment when they are on screen and a more even and fair mix of exposure.

That is not tokenism.

Wanting some mix of women characters in a sea of male characters isn't tokenism.

Having Black Panther be a stand out because it had a majority black cast isn't tokenism. Ive said it before, but the thing that is amazing about BP is that it's JUST another Marvel Movie while having a majority black cast. That has NEVER happened before.

And before others chime in with Blade again, Blade had a single black actor in the lead role. Not a majority black cast. THAT is closer to tokenism then this could ever be.

The advocates today are not arguing for tokenism. They want fair treatment of characters and fair treatment of portrayals and fair treatment of actors.

Alita does this well. Wonder Woman, Captain Marvel, Black Panther. All good examples. Luke Cage did great. So did Jessica Jones.

Remember when the Buzzfeeds of the world were praising the "diversity" of Black Panther because 98% of the cast was black, yet if a movie is 98% white it's suddenly racist?

Remember when Buzzfeeds were relevant in any capacity? Me neither.

I don't give a gak what verbiage a bunch of click bait web sites used to stir up traffic. The "diversity" Black panther bought wasn't to it's own film, it was to the film industry. Again, the first movie of it's kind with a majority black cast where being black wasn't a gimmick.

The film was not a gimmick, the media surrounding used it as a gimmick, as you said lance, click bait media, all those "race baiting" articles still exist and thankfully the end of last year and the start of this year we have seen a lot of these "journalists" start to lose their jobs and influence, Twitter and FB are next, although i do not see FB falling soon.

Holy Balls is this convo getting a little too political. I get i didn't help it any but the ball was rolling when i got here.

Maybe we should focus on robo girl with super powers instead.

Once again i'd just like to say that while the character was a bit mary sue i enjoyed the aesthetic a lot of this universe. It at least seems to have plenty of effort put into it but i imagine that's more the manga writer than the film.

Fair one flaming, I thought we were talking about archeotypes within societys and the cultural norms that affect movies but I can start another thread for that

Well to get back to Alita.

The movie is at 385 M worldwide and should hit 400+ M after this weekend.

The haters cannot say it bombed anymore.

I expected it to make a billion dollars. Therefore I will declare it a failure. So says modern corporate greed!

On the flip side, we're already seeing opinion stories about how Alita is not really a strong female character. Apparently the logic is that she doesn't waltz through the story effortlessly, and winds up needing help from other, male, characters....

Roll eyes indeed.

This relates back to my post on characters that appeal to me. A character that has everything come easily to them does not appeal to me because I HAVE had to struggle a lot through my life. And sometimes the only way I made it through was with the help of my friends. Thus, I can easily understand Alita, who does struggle and does need the help of her friends to ultimately succeed.

Captain Marvel, while an entertaining movie, falls short of Alita for this reason. She's just too self-contained for me to really identify with. Having said that, I can understand the search for identity she goes through - most people go through that at some point, usually adolescence.

Between the two, I'd re-watch Alia over Marvel for that reason.

 Vulcan wrote:
On the flip side, we're already seeing opinion stories about how Alita is not really a strong female character. Apparently the logic is that she doesn't waltz through the story effortlessly, and winds up needing help

Reminds me of the female lead from The Predator, who was so hyper competent every step of the film it was utterly inhuman. Not really what I'd consider the gold standard for progress.

“Strong female character” means a female character who is strong, as in can do anything and don’t need no man, right?

I prefer fictional females with strong character; which is to say, someone defined more by what she has gone through, what she wants out of life, and her realtionships with other characters than, say, being better at everyone else at whatever for no particular reason.

And if the character in question is the main protagonist of the story, she should obviously be likeable — to the audience, if not necessarily also to other characters in the story.

Alita is strong in the superficial sense. She’s an amazing warrior, to the point of being a living weapon. And yet that by itself doesn’t make for an interesting character (think about the T-1000, for example). She also has a strong character because she has flaws as well as strengths. She dvelops in the course of her story arc.

 Vulcan wrote:
On the flip side, we're already seeing opinion stories about how Alita is not really a strong female character. Apparently the logic is that she doesn't waltz through the story effortlessly, and winds up needing help from other, male, characters....

Roll eyes indeed.

This relates back to my post on characters that appeal to me. A character that has everything come easily to them does not appeal to me because I HAVE had to struggle a lot through my life. And sometimes the only way I made it through was with the help of my friends. Thus, I can easily understand Alita, who does struggle and does need the help of her friends to ultimately succeed.

Captain Marvel, while an entertaining movie, falls short of Alita for this reason. She's just too self-contained for me to really identify with. Having said that, I can understand the search for identity she goes through - most people go through that at some point, usually adolescence.

Between the two, I'd re-watch Alia over Marvel for that reason.

Having a strong lead (female or not) is good, but I think there's two ways you can do it badly. One is to forget to give them traits other than "strong" or to have any parts in the story when they're not being "strong", so they end up being bland or forgettable. And the other is to have their strength come at the expense of other interesting characters, who get reduced to obstacles to be kicked over with little effort, or cheerleaders who can't do anything for themselves and talk about how awesome the hero is. For what it's worth, I think both movies avoided those pitfalls.

(Mind you, I think we are often more tolerant of a male character being a shallow, underdeveloped power fantasy.)

I disagree. Captain Marvel most definitely did not avoid the first pitfall, and I wouldn't argue with someone who claimed it fell for both. Alita did manage to avoid both.

 Elemental wrote:
(Mind you, I think we are often more tolerant of a male character being a shallow, underdeveloped power fantasy.)

I can't argue that one bit.

It's a trap that even I fall for sometimes, especially when watching action/adventure movies. Let's face it, in a lot of such movies the lead waltzes through the plot with even less effort than Captain Marvel does... and yet, we still enjoy them as brainless entertainment.

Bran Dawri wrote:
I disagree. Captain Marvel most definitely did not avoid the first pitfall, and I wouldn't argue with someone who claimed it fell for both. Alita did manage to avoid both.

Of what pitfall are we talking about? Are we talkingg about the pitfall of lost memories or the pitfall of "Mary Sue". I personnaly think Alita fell face first in both, while Captain Marvel made a narrow dodge on one and fell in the other.

epronovost wrote:

Bran Dawri wrote:
I disagree. Captain Marvel most definitely did not avoid the first pitfall, and I wouldn't argue with someone who claimed it fell for both. Alita did manage to avoid both.

Of what pitfall are we talking about? Are we talkingg about the pitfall of lost memories or the pitfall of "Mary Sue". I personnaly think Alita fell face first in both, while Captain Marvel made a narrow dodge on one and fell in the other.

I disagree, but that's just my opinion. To each their own.