All Clark Kent needed was a pair of glasses.
Why is batman always black in the films?
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All Clark Kent needed was a pair of glasses.
Doesn't the whole thing take place at a time where that was the actual case?
Chinese Lone Ranger would constantly run into racial issues. If that's what you would want to tell, that's fine. But if you changed the ethnicity and then pretended that it wasn't a deal at all in the story for the characters at that time and place, THEN it would be pretty offensive.
Just for the hell of it, I was looking at all of the alternate universe versions of Superman that have popped up in the comics over the years, and they did bring in a black version once. So even the people making the comic books don't have a problem with the idea of a black Superman.
As for myself, as long as he's still Superman in spirit, I couldn't care less what he looks like.
As for myself, as long as he's still Superman in spirit, I couldn't care less what he looks like.
Insofar as mainstream American society was dominated by whites, sure. My objection is to a story that depicts that racial hierarchy as a good and virtuous thing by depicting the Lone Ranger as, in essence, Mighty Whitey Whom Red Man Loves to Serve.
So far as I can tell, the setting is not nailed down except "the Old West." Well, that was an era where there was a lot of resistance to white domination from the Native American nations that had been forced out west. The Battle of Little Bighorn, the Ghost Dances, the Wounded Knee Masscre all come to mind as examples of Native Americans trying to preserve their cultures in the face of white domination. So to me, there's something deeply troubling about seeing a member of an oppressed community, Tonto, willingly subordinating himself to a white man-- especially one like the Ranger, whose goal is to aid in "civilizing the frontier," which in reality meant solidifying whites' hold over the West and the Native American nations who lived there.
To me, that's the equivalent of seeing a black man become the willing sidekick of a Confederate soldier depicted as a hero during the Civil War, or a Jew the willing sidekick of a Nazi. It's just a disgusting piece of whitewashing, and it perpetuates the idea that it's natural and just for whites to have power and for minorities to follow them, even when they're being oppressed.
So if you subvert that -- if you make the Lone Ranger a man who also comes from an oppressed community, and if you make his goal less "helping the U.S. win the frontier" and more "fighting for justice on the frontier," then I think you have a far more interesting, and far more moral, version of the story.
Well, one mustn't generalize about white people any more than any other race. There must've been some white people on the frontier who had no such imperialist agenda and just wanted to keep the peace. The Lone Ranger could easily be one of those. Whatever the political underpinnings of the original, a remake doesn't have to be enslaved to them.
I've recently been revisiting Filmation's The New Adventures of the Lone Ranger animated series from 1980. Filmation was usually pretty progressive in its depiction of racial diversity, and in its casting. In this version, Tonto (played by Native American actor Ivan Naranjo) was an equal, not a subordinate, to the Lone Ranger, and was an official deputy of his tribe, even taking the lead in an episode dealing with the enforcement of tribal law (where the bad guy was a cavalry commander who had just the kind of imperialist attitudes you're decrying, and our heroes had to teach him the error of his ways).
Although you're right about the setting not being nailed down. Since this was in the days when animated shows were obligated to be at least nominally educational, there were a lot of episodes in the Filmation series built around real personages and events from the Old West -- yet they ranged at least from 1861 to 1889, not in chronological order, and the Ranger, Tonto, and their horses stayed the same ages throughout.
She's had different looks, they pretty much all look more like Lynda Carter than Gina Torres. As you cut out, I said it was a personal preference due to my like of the character that wants her to look like the comic as much as possible. For marketing to movie goers, few characters are known at all that one would expect changing the race of the character would matter to audience awareness. Make Superman or Wonder Woman black and audiences may know the difference, though I doubt it would affect sales in any great degree. However, having a known visual image, I can see a company being less willing to have a black Superman or Wonder Woman than a black Flash, who doesn't have the same visibility and isn't selling posters, lunch boxes, T-shirts and such. Why fool with the brand recognition?
Take Green Lantern, in the wake of the Justice League cartoons, I would have expected them to go with John Stewart rather than Hal. The cartoon visibility was far greater than the comics, why not ditch Hal for the better known John Stewart? The general audience knows nothing about Hal or the Corp, where the saga starts in comics just doesn't matter to them. So, why not go with the higher visibility form of the character?
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John Stewart is Green Lantern in Young Justice. I guess they wanted to keep him for the show that's more in line with the DCAU continuity of the past few years, while having the Green Lantern cartoon keep Hal so they might use it to promote any future Green Lantern live action films they might make.
To you, maybe. Definitely not to me. Different people see things differently. Clearly there are a lot of people for whom skin color looms a lot larger in how they see a person than it does for me. And clearly there are people for whom it isn't nearly as big a factor as it is for you. It's important to understand the difference between a personal perception and a universal truth.
Heck, it bewilders me when people say that Brandon Routh looks like Christopher Reeve. I don't think they look anything alike. I think Routh has a good facial structure for playing, say, Sherlock Holmes or Spock, but I've never been able to buy him as Superman. And yet there are a lot of people out there who think he looks perfect for Superman. So you just can't generalize. You can't assume that your personal perceptions of an actor will be universally shared by all audiences -- or all casting directors.
But again, we aren't talking about casting models. We're talking about actors, people who have to capture the personality and spirit of a character, not just the look. The modern Wonder Woman isn't the sweet, gentle, warm, feminine figure that Lynda Carter played; she can be those things, but she's also a powerful, commanding authority figure, a warrior and ambassador alike. Torres has proven in her past roles that she has the acting chops to pull off that kind of character, and that's more important in a casting decision than how closely she resembles the character in appearance. Sure, looks matter in casting, but they don't matter more than the ability to capture the character in performance.
No, the DCAU continuity is long over, and modern DC productions have never made any effort to continue it. Each DC show these days establishes its own distinct identity and continuity. I assume that YJ chose John Stewart for the same reason JL/U did, but independently: because the traditional Justice League team lineup needed more ethnic diversity, because the all-white lineup it had when it was introduced in the '60s is no longer acceptable in a modern show. (Note also that the YJ Martian Manhunter adopts an African-American human disguise.) Or perhaps it was just that its producers liked John Stewart and were aware of his popularity these days.
Thinking about it, what's bonkers about the Kitt Catwoman is that she's not playing an all new reboot, nor is she a new character assuming the role of Catwoman. She's supposed to be playing the same person as Julie Newmar and Lee Meriwether.
How many other TV shows (or indeed film franchises not involving a reboot) have changed the ethnicity of one of their regulars with a recasting? And the glorious thing is, no one ever seems to have even noticed.
How many other TV shows (or indeed film franchises not involving a reboot) have changed the ethnicity of one of their regulars with a recasting? And the glorious thing is, no one ever seems to have even noticed.
Honestly, I was never entirely clear on whether the three Catwomen were meant to be the same person. I mean, in the movie, Batman/Bruce didn't recognize Miss Kitka, even though I'm pretty sure he'd seen Catwoman without her mask before (after her arrests or at her trials, surely). So that was supposed to be the first time he'd encountered the Meriwether version of Catwoman. True, the original intent was for the movie to be made before the series began (this was changed because the network moved up the series premiere), which is probably why it was written that way. But in context, it seems to imply that it's a different Catwoman -- except that doesn't really work because Newmar was back in the role in season 2.
(I think it's safe to say, at least, that John Astin's Riddler was meant to be the same person as Frank Gorshin's Riddler, since Astin was trying his best to do a Gorshin impression throughout, which really didn't fit him well or vice versa.)
That depends on whether you count the Joel Schumacher Batman movies to be a reboot of the Burton continuity or not, since we went from Billy Dee Williams as Harvey Dent to Tommy Lee Jones as Two-Face.
There's also the unresolved question of whether the two recent live-action Scooby-Doo prequel TV movies, which cast an Asian actress as Velma, are meant to be in-continuity prequels to the live-action theatrical films, which didn't.
I was going to mention Felix Leiter in the Bond films, but then I remembered that the two times he's been black were in the out-of-continuity Never Say Never Again and the current rebooted continuity.
(I think it's safe to say, at least, that John Astin's Riddler was meant to be the same person as Frank Gorshin's Riddler, since Astin was trying his best to do a Gorshin impression throughout, which really didn't fit him well or vice versa.)
That depends on whether you count the Joel Schumacher Batman movies to be a reboot of the Burton continuity or not, since we went from Billy Dee Williams as Harvey Dent to Tommy Lee Jones as Two-Face.
There's also the unresolved question of whether the two recent live-action Scooby-Doo prequel TV movies, which cast an Asian actress as Velma, are meant to be in-continuity prequels to the live-action theatrical films, which didn't.
I was going to mention Felix Leiter in the Bond films, but then I remembered that the two times he's been black were in the out-of-continuity Never Say Never Again and the current rebooted continuity.
That's because Felix Leiter and James Bond are cover identities, not real names. 
Again, there are characters where changing the ethnicity is no big deal, but there are also characters where it is. Historical figures, mythical figures, characters with a background that is shaped by their ethnicity and the time they live in, and so forth. It would be pointless to make Martin Luther King white and make black or asian people the oppressors just for the heck of it, it would be silly to make Robin Hood black, and it would upset the established order to change the skin color of Jesus Christ.
Felix Leiter could be any ethnicity. Well yeah, hm, he shouldn't be Asian because then his character name would be a bit of a stretch then.
Making Heimdall, a Norse God, black was a bit of a stretch as well. But it's a comic, so what the hell.
Another silly question I just thought of... would a black Bruce Wayne have a white butler? Or would he be all aware of any form of slavery and condemn it as part of his character?
Again, there are characters where changing the ethnicity is no big deal, but there are also characters where it is. Historical figures, mythical figures, characters with a background that is shaped by their ethnicity and the time they live in, and so forth. It would be pointless to make Martin Luther King white and make black or asian people the oppressors just for the heck of it, it would be silly to make Robin Hood black, and it would upset the established order to change the skin color of Jesus Christ.
Felix Leiter could be any ethnicity. Well yeah, hm, he shouldn't be Asian because then his character name would be a bit of a stretch then.
Making Heimdall, a Norse God, black was a bit of a stretch as well. But it's a comic, so what the hell.
Another silly question I just thought of... would a black Bruce Wayne have a white butler? Or would he be all aware of any form of slavery and condemn it as part of his character?
Nothing wrong with being Asian on the mother's side and having an Anglo last name. I dated an Asian girl in high school with a Anglo name (she was adopted).
Lots of ways that could happen.
Not all Asian-Americans have Asian names. Someone biracial whose mother is Asian would typically use the father's family name, for instance, like actresses Julia Nickson and Maggie Q (Margaret Quigley), or former Power Ranger Johnny Yong Bosch, whose birth name is actually John Jay Bosch.
But Heimdall isn't a Norse god. He's an alien being that was worshipped as a god by the Norse people. It's likely that their legends and artworks would've portrayed him as Norse regardless of his real appearance, in the same way that European renderings of Jesus Christ make him look European rather than Middle Eastern.
No he's A Green lantern in Young Justice. Hal Jordan and Guy Gardner are both Green lanterns on this show and the last I heard both Hal and John are members of the Justice League, they just have more than one Green Lantern on the team.
That's because Felix Leiter and James Bond are cover identities, not real names.
I know your making a joke but can this insane theory just die already Lazenby was making an in-joke, why do people keep reading too much into that.
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Heck, two of my nieces are Asian and their surname is, er, Cox. I also have a black cousin.
Family names aren't all that indicative of such things anymore.
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