Yeah, it’s weird.
CW network working on Batwoman series
- Thread starter Samurai8472
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Yes and?
I would not mind if Black Lightning remains in its own universe; its such a tight, rich production that--in one season--promised and delivered much in a way that's rare for debut TV superhero series. Its of a quality leaving the other DC TV series in the dust.
WB/DC should let Black Lightning be that one jewel of its superhero shows, and in the future, introduce other DC characters (new to adaptation) into BL. Continue creating a different kind of superhero universe with an equally different voice.
Because representation matters when you’ve never really had it before. I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that most of the posters on this board are white, straight cis men. It’s not a judgement, it’s just demographics and based on interactions. You’ve never known a world where you didn’t see countless people like you in all forms of media. From Robin Hood to Luke Skywalker to King Arthur to Harry Potter. There’s nothing wrong with it, but if you aren’t a white, straight, cis man you want to see someone like yourself for once.
It’s why Black Panther was as big as it was. Black people, especially black men rarely get to see a black man be the hero. Not a sidekick or comic relief or most cases the villain. But an asskicking badass who is the beloved king of his country with a sister who is the smartest person on the planet and an army of badass women at his side. He’s constantly shown to be the equal to Captain America and the two have a deep respect and trust of each other. When you say that why can’t they just have a straight person play a gay person because it’s just acting, it’s the same as saying why couldn’t they hire a white guy to play Black Panther. You’re robbing the role of its power to empower and inspire. A lot of black kids who saw that movie will go to become actors themselves because of the movie, some will become scientists or become politicians because they saw someone like themselves. They know that they can be the hero now.
You’ve been empowered like that for so long that you can’t remember what it was like before. The rest of us want that too and some of you are arguing to deny that because you don’t think it’s fair. The situation has never been fair and equal, now that attempts are made to actually make it that way the ones who take it for granted are complaining because they feel they’re losing something because others are gaining something. This isn’t a zero sum game, everyone can be represented and we get a lot of entertaining stories in the process.
There is no scenario in which any of this statement is a coherently argued point.
I just want to start by saying that I have no problem with gay actors playing characters. I don't meany any of the following as an argument against it, I'm just trying to understand your position better.
I usually agree with you about 90% of the time, but I think this time you are taking things a bit farther than necessary.
EDIT: Just to clarify my position, my feelings on this are pretty much the same as when an Aussie or Brit is cast as an American, or vice versa, it's nice when they go for someone who who is a actually from that country, but as long as they can pull it off convincingly I'm fine with someone from the other country being cast.
As long as the character is a positive portrayal of a gay character, why does it matter if the actor is gay or straight? As long as the person can convincingly play a realistic gay person without falling into stereotypes or cliches shouldn't that be enough?
I don't know if this would be entirely the same situation since being white and not black is an obvious visual thing, a white person can't convincingly play a black person without going into black face. It's not that hard to a straight person to pretend to be gay.
I'm not complaining, I think it's great when they do it, I just don't see they have to do it.
I usually agree with you about 90% of the time, but I think this time you are taking things a bit farther than necessary.
EDIT: Just to clarify my position, my feelings on this are pretty much the same as when an Aussie or Brit is cast as an American, or vice versa, it's nice when they go for someone who who is a actually from that country, but as long as they can pull it off convincingly I'm fine with someone from the other country being cast.
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It matters to LGBTQ people, you’d think that would be enough but I clearly keep having to explain myself. Having a straight person play a gay person or more insultingly having a cis person play a trans (especially cis men playing trans women) is saying we want your stories, but you don’t get to tell it because we know better than you. It reduces us to a performance and one we have no say in. An LGBTQ actor brings a truth to a character and can fight against anything that’s clearly wrong because they have first hand experience of that life. I don’t know a single example of a cishet actor playing a LGBTQ character that isn’t somewhat problematic, some of which are actually damaging and all of them are meant to be positive.
It is the same. The mere act of a cishet person playing a LGBTQ person is reducing them to stereotypes in one way or another whether or not they intended to. If being gay can be a performance, how would you do it? How do you pretend to be gay?
It’s different. This is something that’s affected my life and the lives of others, is it that hard to take our word for it?
@Awesome Possum: Trying to exclude non-LGBT actors from playing LGBT characters might create more opportunities for LGBT actors, but what I think is a more likely outcome is that there would be a decrease in the amount of LGBT characters featured in film and television simply because of the logistics involved.
Representation matters, but there also needs to be flexibility.
Representation matters, but there also needs to be flexibility.
So it’s do what we say or we’ll take it away from you.
You've missed the point I was trying to make. The LGBT acting community just isn't large enough to practically and logistically support the exclusivity policy you're calling for.
So there just aren’t enough LGBTQ actors to support all the LGBTQ roles? That’s honestly absurd and unsupportable by the facts. There are more actors than roles. Trans actresses are routinely turned down for trans roles because they didn’t “look trans enough”, so those roles went to men instead. Maybe the problem isn’t the lack of actors or the lack of roles, it’s the people in charge of various productions refusing to give it to them.
Homosexuality is one of the major stereotypes about actors, though.
So, basically, there's the "perfect world" argument that the actors' sexuality shouldn't really matter, but we all also know that we're pretty far from living in a perfect world.
An increase in LGBT roles would decrease the number of available actors, especially if your exclusivity policy were enacted.
And when that happens, when Hollywood actually runs out of LGBT actors to fill the LGBT roles, we can certainly talk about flexibility in casting. But, until then ...
Giving opportunity to new LGBTQ actors, especially since they’ll be inspired to do so. The problem solves itself.
But wouldn't that be true every time a person from one group plays a member of another?
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But everything an actor does is a performance, there are plenty of examples of actors from outside of a group being able to put in a convincing performance as member of that group. I don't see why of all of the groups out there that aren't related to race, gays have to be off limits to anybody who isn't gay.
Would it make a difference if there were gay people behind the camera who could ensure that the performance was believable?
You're telling me that out of all of the gay characters ever to have appeared on TV there is not a single one that was a good, convincing, non-stereotyped performance?
The same way you would a straight person, only when you're character is romantically interested in someone, it is a person of the same sex.
It’s different. This is something that’s affected my life and the lives of others, is it that hard to take our word for it?[/QUOTE]
I can see wanting to see gay actors to play gay characters, it just seems very extreme to be to saying that no straight person should ever play a gay character.
I've dealt with medical problems my entire life, so that's made a big supporter of people with disabilities. I love it when shows cast real people with disabilities, like Marlee Matlin, and the numerous deaf and hard of hearing actors in Switched at Birth, and Viktoria Modesta on Killjoys, but I'm not about to say that only people with disabilities should be able to play disabled characters.
Put it this way: remember all those old movies where White people played Black, Native American or Asian people? Can you imagine how said peoples feel about such portrayals then and now? Would you ever attempt to argue that "there's no reason a White person can't portray an African"? Now take all that and just switch out those ethnic groups with LBGTQ people and you'll start to get a sense of where we're at here.
Exactly. I don’t know how anyone can keep making the argument that it doesn’t matter when someone who is actually affected by it is telling you that it does matter.