MaDD Blogger

Why did they do that? Race, gender and the modern comic book movie.

Will Smith as James West? Sharon Stone as the new female James Bond? Chris Rock as Jimmy Olsen? Halle Berry as Catwoman? If you're familiar with any of the characters I speak of or read the entertainment press as I do every day you may have heard some of these rumors or had the unfortunate pleasure of seeing some of the bad movies they produced.

Over the last decade a series of movies based on some of my favorite comic books and TV series have been greenlit by Hollywood. The problem is that most of these movies have just plain sucked ass having been handled by people with only a marginal understanding of the characters that they are making the movie about and just see it as their next blockbuster project, something to tide them over until Brad Pitt and Tome Cruise become available. This particular essay is meant to expose one of the major mistakes that I and others have talked about over and over again.

Let me state my opinion on this subject quite clearly. Commander Starbuck is not a girl you morons! Oh wait a minute yes she is at least on the new BattleStar Galactica that airs on the Sci-Fi channel. Lorne Greene is probably spinning is his grave and Dirk Benedict is too busy hoping that he gets asked to make a guest appearance to talk about how they took the character he made famous and snipped the balls off of him.

I grew up watching re-runs of The Wild Wild West when I was a kid and when I heard that there was a movie in the works by Men In Black director Barry Sonnenfeld I was hyped, that is until I heard that Barry had cast his MIB star Will Smith to play James West which would have been fine except for the fact that James West is white and not an escaped slave who managed to snag a snazzy job as as Americas top spy. Any historian would tell you that an escaped slave at the time would have had a better chance of serving the President his dinner than working for the secret service. There were a lot of fuck ups with this particular movie but I plan on writing an essay about this movie so I'll save my critiques for that.

Before Joel Schumacher fucked up the Batman franchise by gaying up the suit with "Bat Nipples and a cock piece". The movie Superman Lives was greenlit with Batman producer-director Tim Burton attached who then brought in Kevin Smith to help polish the script and direct. After Batman and Robin bombed the movie was scraped but you may remember hearing about this film as Oscar winner Nicholas Cage was attached to play Superman even though he looked nothing like the part. To be even more edgy the producers decided that maybe they should cast Chris Rock to play good ole red headed wholesome as apple pie Jimmy Olsen. Anyone happen to notice that for the last oh I don't know...70 fucking years that Jimmy Olsen was white and Superman too for that matter?

This move was nearly as bone headed as casting Dean Cain as Superman on Lois and Clark. Cain is half Hawaiian and as much as I wish it were different he can't pass for white anymore than I can. I remember at the time that some of the entertainment reporters had the nerve to ask about this questionable casting decision and they would get answers like "We wanted to get the best actor possible for the role" or "Superman is not white he is an alien from the planet Krypton so Mr.Cains racial background is irrelevant." which on paper sounds goods and may not matter to people who are only vaguely familiar with Superman but it drove comic book purists like myself crazy and the majority of them avoided the show like the plague.

I remember going to some of the more established comic book and fan forums and reading stuff like "If they really wanted to be edgy they should have just cast a soul brother!" Or one of my personal favorites "Why did they cast a Mexican to play Superman?". While I thought the bulk of these posts were mean spirited and racists quite a few of them addressed the decades of history and tradition of a true American icon as their basis for Cains' casting being a mistake and I found myself agreeing with them. Superman is indeed an alien but his father Jor-El picked the planet Earth specifically because the Kryptonians looked like humans and he knew that his son could at least blend in with it's inhabitants. So for the producers to suggest that Superman's race is irrelevant is ridiculous when the characters own father used that as a determining factor when deciding where he should send his son in order to save his life.

Something else that bothered me about Lois and Clark is that they cast a Lex Luthor who wasn't bald. You may recall that the original Superman movie had this problem as well. Gene Hackman refused to shave his head bald to play Luthor but Richard Donner was smart and placed a lot of site gags throughout the movie via Toupees and having Hackman wear different hairstyles in some scenes which led to the big reveal at the end with Hackman pulling off his "wig" and revealing Luthors infamous bald head. Out of respect for the material I feel that the person playing Lex should shave their head. Kevin Spacey has been cast as Lex Luthor for next years Superman Returns and there are already talks about whether or not Spacey will decide to shave his head. I hope he does.

When Ben Affleck was cast as Dare Devil a few years ago Access Hollywood did an interview with Cuba Gooding Jr. You see Cuba was upset that the people at Fox passed him over for the part and gave it to Affleck instead and cited his race as a key reason that he was turned down for the role. Well guess what? Considering the fact that for the last 40 years Dare Devil has been white it might not have been the best decision to cast a black guy in the role but Cubas' interview raised a stink and the next thing you know Michael Clark Duncan had been cast to play Dare Devils arch nemesis the Kingpin who of course is white and anyone who has seen the Green Mile will tell you that Duncan is not. The producers of course denied that this was done out of political correctness and that Duncan was "The best actor for the job".

I think Duncan is a true talent but the Kingpin that I grew up reading about is white and still is when I pick up a comic book so I tend to cringe when I see Latin temptress Jessica Alba cast as blond haired blue eyed Sue Storm in the Fantastic 4 or see Halle Berry cast as Catwoman when Ashley Judd pulled out of the movie. To appease comic book purists the producers made changes to the script and announced that Berry's Catwoman was not "Batmans Catwoman" and merely "Another Catwoman" they even changed the characters name. And then there was all the stuff about how Eartha Kitt had once played Catwoman on the old Batman TV series. Forgive me but I'll take Julie Newmars Catwoman anyday of the week.

The original movie was supposed to have a Batman cameo but once Judd pulled out that was scraped. I went to the movie and it was GOD AWFUL. Halle should have let someone else stink up that movie as I feel that it may have hurt her box office appeal.

Racial diversity is extremely important in movies and TV but when you're dealing with established characters with decades of history you have to have respect for the original creators intent. Instead of taking an established character with years of established history and making major changes that alienate the core fan base the producers should make sure that when Clark Kent goes to work at the Daily Planet he goes to a diverse work place. Jimmy Olsen should remain white but news rooms are very crowded and there's no reason that people of color shouldn't be cast in other roles in the news room or that some of Clarks' friends can't be of another race. You can't claim that you're making a movie for the fans, spit in the fans faces, and wonder why the movie bombed.