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Do you think they should just make Scotty English?

M

MadBaggins

Captain
Captain
We all know Simon Pegg is a great comedy actor, up there with Ali G and Borat as one of the all time greats, and it is absolutely physcially impossible to imagine him talking in a scottish accent without laughing. Just try. I just tried!

:rommie:

That's what happened. I started laughing and looked just like that smiley. (I'm not green and I don't have pointy ears, I should point out, but the laughing was so me.)

Since this movie is NOT a comedy, why not just make Scotty English? Britain is a tiny island anyway so there isn't much of a difference. Scotty is only his nickname because his name is Charles Montgomory SCOTT. I mean, if they changed Kirk's home state from Iowa to somewhere else nobody would care. Shatner spoke with a Canadian lilt in TOS and I'm sure Chris Pine won't speak like that (I HOPE NOT ANYWAY.) I think we should be flexible and prepared for accent changes.
 
Sure, then they can give him bad teeth and have him say things like "yeah...groovey, baby" etc. And then they can give him a midget sidekick. Oh, wait...
 
MadBaggins said:
We all know Simon Pegg is a great comedy actor, up there with Ali G and Borat as one of the all time greats, and it is absolutely physcially impossible to imagine him talking in a scottish accent without laughing. Just try. I just tried!

:rommie:
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And your point is?

James Doohan's Scottish accent was pretty phony to begin with, as he was a Canadian. Let's wait until we hear Pegg's accent, then bash him. I'm no fan of Simon Pegg by any stretch of the imagination, but I can't criticise him for something I haven't heard him do yet. ;)

And aren't Ali G and Borat both personas of Sacha Baron Cohen?
 
I personally would not like it. The Scottish aspect for the character of Scotty is a very important one. It's like making an Asian actor be James Bond or Superman. It shouldn't be done. :)
 
The original intent of making him Scottish was that the Scots were once well-famed for their quality shipyards and GR was trying to encompass that to a degree.

Welshie failed when he didn't pay up on a bet.

Oh wait...that was WELCHIE. My bad. :D
 
StarTrek1701 said:
I personally would not like it. The Scottish aspect for the character of Scotty is a very important one. It's like making an Asian actor be James Bond or Superman. It shouldn't be done. :)
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Actually, neither one of those would bother me a bit. Particularly Superman -- he's not white Euro-American, he's a friggin alien for crying out loud. Any casting of that character could easily fit into the "he's adopted" part of the story.
 
Cranston said:
Actually, neither one of those would bother me a bit. Particularly Superman -- he's not white Euro-American, he's a friggin alien for crying out loud. Any casting -- any casting of that character could easily fit into the "he's adopted" part of the story.
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But that is not how he is originally intended to be, plus he is an American icon. Unlike Starbuck in new BSG, everyone practically knows of Superman by birth. It would be extremely disgusting if they changed such a notion.
 
StarTrek1701 said:
But that is not how he is originally intended to be, plus he is an American icon. Unlike Starbuck in new BSG, everyone practically knows of Superman by birth. It would be extremely disgusting if they changed such a notion.
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The "intention" to make him look Euro-American was hardly part of the core of the character -- it was just the standard default for any heroic character in the 1930s. His "whiteness" was exceedingly rarely - if ever - an issue, so it's an utterly superficial aspect of the character. His otherness (his alienness) is an essential part of the character, and one that wouldn't be impacted at all by having a non-white actor play him.

So it might be slightly jarring to see an Asian actor play Superman, I suppose, for someone who was really wrapped up in the details of how Superman was drawn. But I can't fathom why anyone would consider it "disgusting," much less "extremely disgusting." Care to elaborate on that part?

[edited to keep things on-topic:]

As for Scotty, his character was so thinly defined to begin with that his Scottishness is, pretty much, a big part of his character definition. (That definition was pretty much: Scottish, highly competent, drinks a lot.) But if he'd been named something else (Montgomery Williams, for example) and never wore a kilt, I'd be just fine with them shifting his home to a different part of the British isles.
 
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StarTrek1701 said:
Cranston said:
Actually, neither one of those would bother me a bit. Particularly Superman -- he's not white Euro-American, he's a friggin alien for crying out loud. Any casting -- any casting of that character could easily fit into the "he's adopted" part of the story.
Click to expand...

But that is not how he is originally intended to be, plus he is an American icon. Unlike Starbuck in new BSG, everyone practically knows of Superman by birth. It would be extremely disgusting if they changed such a notion.
Click to expand...

Cranston said:
StarTrek1701 said:
But that is not how he is originally intended to be, plus he is an American icon. Unlike Starbuck in new BSG, everyone practically knows of Superman by birth. It would be extremely disgusting if they changed such a notion.
Click to expand...

The "intention" to make him look Euro-American was hardly part of the core of the character -- it was just the standard default for any heroic character in the 1930s. His "whiteness" was exceedingly rarely - if ever - an issue, so it's an utterly superficial aspect of the character. His otherness (his alienness) is an essential part of the character, and one that wouldn't be impacted at all by having a non-white actor play him.

So it might be slightly jarring to see an Asian actor play Superman, I suppose, for someone who was really wrapped up in the details of how Superman was drawn. But I can't fathom why anyone would consider it "disgusting," much less "extremely disgusting." Care to elaborate on that part?
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You know this would be a fascinating topic, in another forum. ;)
Feel free to start a new topic in the General Sci-Fi forum on Superman.
 
MadBaggins said:
We all know Simon Pegg is a great comedy actor, up there with Ali G and Borat as one of the all time greats, and it is absolutely physcially impossible to imagine him talking in a scottish accent without laughing. Just try. I just tried!

:rommie:

That's what happened. I started laughing and looked just like that smiley. (I'm not green and I don't have pointy ears, I should point out, but the laughing was so me.)

Since this movie is NOT a comedy, why not just make Scotty English? Britain is a tiny island anyway so there isn't much of a difference. Scotty is only his nickname because his name is Charles Montgomory SCOTT. I mean, if they changed Kirk's home state from Iowa to somewhere else nobody would care. Shatner spoke with a Canadian lilt in TOS and I'm sure Chris Pine won't speak like that (I HOPE NOT ANYWAY.) I think we should be flexible and prepared for accent changes.
Click to expand...
Thank God they corrected their original error and cast an American as Kirk.
 
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