keep/boot the new cast
- Thread starter Temis the Vorta
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Isn't that dislike all the more reason for a Star Trek production to make a statement that it's all right for a Korean to play Sulu? Surely you can't mean that ST should submit to prejudices rather than condemning them? For that matter, George Takei is on record as saying that Sulu doesn't have to be played by a Japanese actor.
And you're wrong that Sulu's background was intended to be Japanese. "Sulu" isn't even a Japanese name, not by a long shot (in the original Japanese dub of the series, he was known as Kato). He was named for the Sulu Sea, which abuts the Philippines and Malaysia (as well as for Desilu exec Herb Solow, pronounced "solo"). The idea was for him not to be identified uniquely with any Asian country.
Most likely, Hikaru Sulu (a native of San Francisco, remember) is part-Japanese and part-Filipino, and perhaps has some other nationalities in his ancestry as well. Logically, in a culturally unified Earth of the future where national boundaries no longer exist, there'd be a lot more interbreeding among groups we currently think of as distinct.
But that would just be an expression of their own prejudices. Genetically speaking, Japanese and Koreans are quite closely related and most likely have a common origin. (The indigenous people of Japan are the nearly-extinct Ainu; the majority population in Japan now is descended from immigrants from the mainland -- most likely Korea -- who displaced the indigenes thousands of years ago.) Their denial of that fact is just the result of their historical rivalries and prejudices. It's more like the traditional rivalry between England and France than a real racial distinction.
Yelchin is a native of Russia, though he only lived there for the first six months of his life. In fact, he was born in Chekov's favorite city, Leningrad (now St. Petersburg).
Again, why this rigid fixation on national origin? Nichelle Nichols was born in Robbins, Illinois, for Pete's sake. Actors don't have to be from the same countries as their characters. Heck, weren't you the one saying you like Urban as McCoy? He's virtually from the opposite side of the planet from his character, Wellington, New Zealand as opposed to Atlanta, Georgia. And I strongly doubt he has DeForest Kelley's part-Cherokee ancestry.
I voted for Quinto, Saldana & Pine to keep.
Saldana was my first pick since news came they were recasting entire TOS cast.
Quinto has really impressed me with his performance in Heroes and it doesn't hurt he looks like young Nimoy.
Pine is good choice as Kirk. I have seen couple of his movies and he has great potential.
I'm okey with Urban as McCoy.
I find the word boot a bit harsh still people i voted to ,,boot,, were Simon Pegg, John Cho and Anton Yelchin.
I think Cary L. Brown has good point that maybe the reason Pegg was cast as Scotty instead of Paul McGillion(fan favorite as Scotty.) was Pegg had worked with Abrams before.
John Cho as Sulu could work but i would have liked to hear beside Cho who else was in the running as Zulu..
If i had been Abrams i would have used the Internet more and give us info on 2 front runners for for Zulu, Scotty and Bones e.c.c. and let fans express their opinions and takes fans reaction to consideration when casting those roles.
Most fans seems to like Pine as Kirk instead of f.e. Vogel who was front runner before Pine so fans are more acceptance to Pine as Kirk maybe because of that(i think).
of course this kind a backfired when Abrams casted Pegg as Scotty instead of McGillion.
I voted to boot Anton Yelchin mainly because i feel Chekov character shouldn't be in this movie. I would rather have introduce a new female bridge member instead.
Saldana was my first pick since news came they were recasting entire TOS cast.
Quinto has really impressed me with his performance in Heroes and it doesn't hurt he looks like young Nimoy.
Pine is good choice as Kirk. I have seen couple of his movies and he has great potential.
I'm okey with Urban as McCoy.
I find the word boot a bit harsh still people i voted to ,,boot,, were Simon Pegg, John Cho and Anton Yelchin.
I think Cary L. Brown has good point that maybe the reason Pegg was cast as Scotty instead of Paul McGillion(fan favorite as Scotty.) was Pegg had worked with Abrams before.
John Cho as Sulu could work but i would have liked to hear beside Cho who else was in the running as Zulu..
If i had been Abrams i would have used the Internet more and give us info on 2 front runners for for Zulu, Scotty and Bones e.c.c. and let fans express their opinions and takes fans reaction to consideration when casting those roles.
Most fans seems to like Pine as Kirk instead of f.e. Vogel who was front runner before Pine so fans are more acceptance to Pine as Kirk maybe because of that(i think).
of course this kind a backfired when Abrams casted Pegg as Scotty instead of McGillion.
I voted to boot Anton Yelchin mainly because i feel Chekov character shouldn't be in this movie. I would rather have introduce a new female bridge member instead.
That would be an awful way to go about it. For one thing, the goal is to find the best people for the job, the people who play best on camera and interact best with one another as well as giving the best performances. The general fanbase doesn't see these people's screen tests and auditions, doesn't talk to them in person, and so doesn't have enough information to judge which one would really be best in practice. All they'd have would be superficial impressions and opinions, and that's a terrible standard to base any decision on.
For another thing, the Internet audience is a tiny fraction of fandom, and the percentage of people who'd actually bother to respond to an Internet poll would be a tiny fraction of that tiny fraction. No voluntary poll is ever going to be a remotely representative sampling, statistically speaking, because it's going to be a very small and highly biased cross-section.
Anyway, it's not as if these filmmakers are unaware of fan opinions. The screenwriters regularly survey the Trek fansites, and have actually participated in discussion on the TrekMovie.com newsblog. They are certainly getting a sense of the preferences of online fans, and are giving that as much or as little weight as it deserves in their considerations.
Well, they're casting for a film series, not just one movie. And the TOS audience out there would expect to see the familiar seven. Besides, Yelchin is a very good match for Walter Koenig both in face and voice, and he's actually Russian. And unlike Koenig, he isn't 9 years older than the character he's playing.
Maybe I'll save the results and redo this poll after the movie premiere. That can be fun. But mostly when I think of something like this, I forget the followup! Somebody remember to remind me.
There are plenty of examples of actors playing the "wrong" ethnicity - Adrian Pasdar on Heroes is Persian-Russian and plays a chracter of Italian ancestry. Or: Naveen Andrews on lost, who is Indian but plays an Arab. Why doesn't anyone bitch about those kinds of things? Oh right, cuz it's stupid and who cares! If the actor can pass for the correct race or ethnicity, that is all that matters. Let the actors do their jobs. I'm amazed people aren't complaining that they didn't get a real Vulcan to play Spock.
And as for stupid nationalistic hatreds, phooey on em! That's NOT the kind of thing Trek should cater to. That is the opposite of Trek! Trek should make a point of spitting in the faces of people with such troglyditic mentalities.
..anyway I thought I already laid this issue to rest by pointing out that Sulu is a San Franciscan in the 23rd C. I live there in the 21st C. Of the married Japanese-Americans I know under the age of, oh 50, NONE have married within their ethnicity, because they aren't bizarre weird-ass racists I guess. (Ditto for the shacked up ones, who around here count as married enough.) So by the 23rd C, there will be no purebreds left and Sulu is highly unlikely to be 100% Japanese. He might be only a tiny percentage Japanese. How the hell could we know, it hasn't been established canonically!
There isn't just a big Filipino population, but also Chinese and various Southeast Asians, and let's not forget the Samoan/Polynesian population (who already tend to be heavily mongelized) and who says he doesn't have some non-Asian ancestry as well? Takei may be Japanese but he's far from stereotypically Japanese looking, and could be any number of interesting things, and therefore so could Sulu.
Huh, I never knew that about him, well screw it, I want an Irish-Cherokee McCoy and I'm stomping my foot till I get one!!!
The people of the Korean Peninsula and the peoples of the Japanse archipelago are actually very closely related to each other genetically (moreso than they are to other Southeast Asian peoples). Most anthropologists think that Japan was settles by people from the Korean Peninsula -- they are only separted by about 200 miles across the Sea of Japan.
However, the Japanese people are very nationalistic -- a holdover from the first half of the 20th century -- and many Japanese will find it offensive to be told they were settled by people from what is now Korea, even though it is probably true. Some learned Japanese people actually say they "were always there" and that the Korean Peninsula was settled from Japan (which is silly, considering they are an Island nation).
So if the Japanese dislike the use of a Korean actor, then the problem is with the old-fashioned Japanese Nationalism, and not with the Korean Actor.
...and by the way, I'm a Greek-American. Some of the actors who played Greeks in 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding' were not Greeks at all...should I be upset about this?
(I'm not upset, by the way)
Well, I for one am upset that Zachary Quinto isn't really from Vulcan.
Nahh... but I also don't have a particular problem with a black person playing a white character or a white actor playing a black character, using makeup to make it work. But imagine the response if they had, say, Jim Carrey play Malcolm X...Jackson_Roykirk said:
The people of the Korean Peninsula and the peoples of the Japanse archipelago are actually very closely related to each other genetically (moreso than they are to other Southeast Asian peoples). Most anthropologists think that Japan was settles by people from the Korean Peninsula -- they are only separted by about 200 miles across the Sea of Japan.
However, the Japanese people are very nationalistic -- a holdover from the first half of the 20th century -- and many Japanese will find it offensive to be told they were settled by people from what is now Korea, even though it is probably true. Some learned Japanese people actually say they "were always there" and that the Korean Peninsula was settled from Japan (which is silly, considering they are an Island nation).
So if the Japanese dislike the use of a Korean actor, then the problem is with the old-fashioned Japanese Nationalism, and not with the Korean Actor.
...and by the way, I'm a Greek-American. Some of the actors who played Greeks in 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding' were not Greeks at all...should I be upset about this?
I'm not saying it's good, or bad... I'm saying that it's INSENSITIVE TO THE REAL FEELING OF REAL PEOPLE.
In other words, its creating a potential problem where none need exist.
And as for the original intended nationality of Sulu, I'm basing that upon Roddenberry's original intent (as chronicled, among other places, in Whitfield's book and Solow's book).
But that's a totally spurious comparison, because, as has been pointed out, Japanese and Koreans are essentially the same ethnic group. A better analogy would be, say, getting a Caucasian actor from New York to play General Robert E. Lee. The divide is cultural and political, not ethnic or racial.
Yes, but that "real feeling" is a feeling of irrational nationalist prejudice, the very kind of divisive, intolerant sentiment that Star Trek has always renounced. You might as well say that TOS was insensitive to the "real feelings" of racists who didn't think there should be black people in space. Some feelings don't deserve respect.
That's how intolerance and injustice endure: because people aren't willing to cause trouble by taking stands against them. What made Star Trek so powerful and enduring is that it was willing to take that kind of a stand rather than coddling the prejudices of its audience.
Uhh, when was the last time you read Whitfield's book? I just opened it to p. 247, the beginning of the chapter "Other Star Trek Regulars" in the section "An Official Biography of a Ship and Its Crew," and right there on the very first line of the Sulu section, it describes him as having "mixed Asian ancestry." The next paragraph says "Although of mixed Oriental and Filipino background, Sulu's cultural heritage is mainly Japanese." Cultural heritage, not genetic heritage. His ethnic origin is explicitly not limited to any single group or nationality. (The Filipino background must have been specified to explain why he was named after a sea in the Philippines.)
So it would be ridiculous to protest the casting of a Korean actor as Sulu even if Koreans and Japanese weren't the same ethnic group. Which they essentially are.
Besides, I think most Asian-Americans would be happy to see Asian actors getting work, period, regardless of the intended ethnicity of the role.
and perhaps a little of "... and I trust his talent, personality and professionalism so highly that I know he is the best person to pull this character off..."?
I doubt that is true. A lot of Asian-Americans that I know don't seem to particularly care. Of course if they don't care about that they certainly don't care much about the ethnicity of the actor either.
Keep them all, add Hayden Panettiere as Janice Rand.
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