This is actually so historic, why are more people not talking about this?? An Asian lead getting paid $15 mil is crazy to me, this makes me really hopeful for the future of Hollywood ❤️ https://t.co/AoIaxA5V6m
— raga | Aquaman Mode (@aqua_womannn) October 11, 2018
This tweet inspired today’s post, and I thank this user for getting me back to the blog. For those who don’t get it, this tweet is poking fun at Scarlett Johannson for her role as Motoko Kusanagi or The Major in Ghost in the Shell. Of course, the film’s credits also list the character as Mira Killian, an anglocized version to explain Scarjo’s lack of Asianness.
I saw this tweet and saw a good joke, but I knew that the colour-blind racists would be swooping in to defend ScarJo.
Here are some of the weakest defences so far
- The creator is cool with the whitewashing.
Lol what a dumb reply. Dude can’t read. And Idk why everyone is bitching when the creator of ghost in a shell said he doesn’t care who gets cast cause it’s a robot 😂😂
— Jesus Medina (@ElBorregoal) October 12, 2018
He is likely cool with it because he still got a paycheque.
Also, I am sure some of the same people defending ScarJo would complain about political correctness if a black actress was cast. When racial ambiguity comes up, white tends to be the accepted default. A similar example is how Ridley Scott’s “confluence of cultures” argument about Ancient Egypt, led people to defend a depiction of Egypt that was almost entirely white (except for some servants) and reject the idea that black actors could have been cast.
Yes, The Major is a robot. However, she was a robot designed in Japan and given a Japanese name. Is it possible the (Japanese) people who designed her might have modelled her after a Japanese person?
2.
But let’s be honest tho is there any Asian action actresses that would of done better in that role
— Danny 🤖 (@akaStarh) October 12, 2018
Alright, let’s break down some assumptions here.
First, there is the implication that no Asian actress is as good an actress as ScarJo. What this user is really saying is that “White actresses are just better.” Maybe people want to believe that is why we don’t have more Asian A-listers?
Or is it because there aren’t many films made about Asian characters (because they are not viewed as marketable) and because some roles for Asian actresses (like Ghost in the Shell) get whitewashed (to make them more marketable).
I’m open ears for a name
— Danny 🤖 (@akaStarh) October 12, 2018
So, he wants names. Yet he doesn’t realize that his reasoning makes no sense. If you have a system that whitewashes Asian roles, and also doesn’t star many Asian roles, how do you create Asian A-listers? The only name that came to the top of my head was Lucy Liu or Jessica Henwick (from Iron Fist). Let’s say Tom Cruise was cast as Black Panther in Captain America: Civil War. The usual suspects for black A-listers, e.g. Will Smith, Denzel Washington, The Rock, were all considered too old or were unavailable. The studio knows Black Panther needs to carry his own film, with a setting where a lot of the people look like him. They don’t think black will sell well, so why not make the character white, so he’s more marketable? Bring in Tom Cruise. Those darn “Sjws and race baiters” get all twisted out of shape but the movie turns out good.
“Tom Cruise killed it as Black Panther, name me a black actor who could have done better?”
Then this becomes “Scarlett Johannson killed it as Shuri, name me a black actress who could have done better?”
See where I’m going with this?
This hypothetical idiocy is not an argument. It is evidence of the close-minded mindset that prevents new talent from breaking through. 2018 marked Letitia Wright’s breakthrough into mainstream Hollywood. She had a role in The Commuter as well but I think we can agree her role as Shuri in Black Panther overshadowed that. If someone asked me, “Name a black actress who could have done better than ScarJo as Shuri,” I wouldn’t have had Wright’s name on the tip of my tongue.
That is how new talent works. Black Panther brought in some older heavyweights, like Forrest Whitaker and Angela Bassett but it was the newer blood that carried the film and was featured heavily in the marketing. The newer blood like Chadwick Boseman, Michael B. Jordan and Letitia Wright.