The racist backlash to The Little Mermaid and Lord of The Rings is exhausting and extremely predicta

I’m not butthurt.
I think some see how superficial it is to change movies that have already been done before for the sake of diversity.
It’s lame.

 

Upset is not the word I would use. I think when we consume art, we want the story to feel authentic, imaginative, and creative. Changing the skin pigmentation of the main character in a sequel is none of those things. Movie watchers want to be lost in another world with its own unique conflicts, storylines, tensions, etc. We are going to the movies to watch another story. Identity politics changing the skin color of the main character is obviously a phony intrusion from the real world into the fantasy world. People watch fantasy movies to be lost in a fantasy, not to see little nuggets of commentary on identity politics that remind them the story they are watching is not real.

Here is a good analogy. If you remember the movie Inception, people were inhabiting their own dream world. A good dream architect would make the fake dream such that it was indistinguishable from a real dream. It would be convincing. The people in the dream had to be convincing that the fake dream was actually a real dream. When the dream was obviously fake, the people in the dream started attacking the intruders.

Inserting identity politics into a sequel is similarly inserting something unnatural to the story arch that clearly comes from American identity politics. Everyone in the theater knows its phony. They know it does absolutely nothing to develop the story. They see it as an intrusion upon an authentic story. People can see the insertion of identity politics into story lines. It doesn't make me mad but let's not pretend that we have to celebrate phony intrusions of identity politics as brilliant, imaginative, creative storytelling and entertainment production.

 

First off, it's not a sequel, so no one changed the skin color of a character midway through the story. It's the same story as the original, just live action. So you are saying it's the skin color that doesn't make it "feel real", not that it's a mermaid? Pretty sure the "mermaid thing" would have clued me in that it's not real.

 

That and it was originally a cartoon

 

It is phony identity politics that detracts from the story. I am open to stories that have black female protagonists. I think it can be done in an imaginative, creative, brilliant way, but Little Mermaid is not that.

 

Yeah, it's just funny the way that a film who's target demographic is pre-teen girls is upsetting middle aged moms and dads (and probably a lot of incels, too.) I'd like to see the interviews with the 8 year old girls saying "It was a okay, but would have been so much better if she was white", then maybe they'll have a point.

 

Okay, I can see you are on a mission to say "identity politics" as many times as you can today. But maybe Disney is just a corporation that wants to make money by building brand, and see diversity and inclusion as a way to expand their audience and make more money. If you really think "get me a black girl because identity politics it my #1 priority" was being shouted by execs at the casting, then I don't know what to tell you...

 

Something like Little Mermaid undergoing a racial transformation did not happen without high level conversations high up at Disney. That is exactly what happened. It is a free country. Disney can do what they want, and consumers of good storytelling and film making are also free to have an opinion that forcing DEI into stories where it is not natural makes for bad storytelling.

 

So DEI means letting Black people be in the movie?

 

So consumers should be upset that little mermaid went from white to black, because we all know that mermaids are in fact white?

 

I’m guessing you weren’t a fan of the Hulk.

 

It depends on who you ask, but yes. I don't have a problem with Disney making non-white princess movies. Moana was done tastefully.

 

I think you are being obtuse here. Ariel is white. China and South Korea did not receive the film well for the same reason. So, it is not just a southern/conservative/Republican/MAGA talking point. People in other countries know what distasteful political tampering with a movie franchise looks like. They can see how phony Disney is.

 

Ariel is a fictional character.

If Snow White or even Cinderella were made black, it would be a bit more of a stretch, but little mermaid? Meh.

 

Ariel is a fictional character, but that doesn't mean she is totally amorphous. Superman is a fictional character too. Would you shrug your shoulders if a new Superman came out and Superman was trans?

 

You may be right that it’s merely a rehash. I don’t know. Have you seen the movies?

Do you think the actor playing James Bond should remain White for every film in that franchise, for example?

 

Or short and bare bones skinny. Some characters fit this iconic profile. And race happens to be part of that iconic profile along with things like hair color, size, and frame.

There's nothing wrong with wanting live action characters to have a close resemblance to their iconic profile.

I think most conservatives would say the same about Black Panther or War Machine for example just to stick with comic books. I've always seen both depicted as Black.

 

You’re not gonna like this….


https://collider.com/the-little-mer...cs theorize The,had not been fully recognized.

 

I have not seen the new Little Mermaid. I have seen clips, but I did not go to the theaters to watch the movie.

I think James Bond should stay white. If you want to feature a black character in that role, then it would go over a lot better with consumers if a brand-new character was introduced in the story. You could then retire James Bond, and star the new character without the awkward Michael Jackson-esque skin surgery part of the story that got skipped over without any sort of storyline explaining why his skin color changed.

 

Well, at least you're being honest.

Sure. Would be an interesting twist.

Considering James Bond has been portrayed by numerous different actors, the easy explanation is that James Bond/007 isn't a single person. It's an identity used for the agent in that role.