I guess it also goes to show that people don't necessarily have a problem with "diverse" characters, they just don't like it when you try to "diversify" existing characters.
That's a good point. The Critical Drinker represents a school of thought that says there's nothing wrong with, say, a strong female protagonist as long as she's in a good, well-written story. Ripley from "Aliens" comes to mind. I love that movie, and Ripley is awesome. "Black Panther" also comes to mind: despite its narrative and CGI-related flaws, the movie showed us a human story that also included one of Marvel's best-written villains. Diversity absolutely works, but if it's diversity for diversity's sake, if it's all about the "woke" agenda and not about a good story, if it's about ignoring established canon and completely rewriting well-known, venerable characters to make them more PC, well, that's when you lose people like me. My long-ago review of "Zootopia" (see here) gets into some of these issues, at least obliquely.
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I guess it also goes to show that people don't necessarily have a problem with "diverse" characters, they just don't like it when you try to "diversify" existing characters.
ReplyDeleteThat's a good point. The Critical Drinker represents a school of thought that says there's nothing wrong with, say, a strong female protagonist as long as she's in a good, well-written story. Ripley from "Aliens" comes to mind. I love that movie, and Ripley is awesome. "Black Panther" also comes to mind: despite its narrative and CGI-related flaws, the movie showed us a human story that also included one of Marvel's best-written villains. Diversity absolutely works, but if it's diversity for diversity's sake, if it's all about the "woke" agenda and not about a good story, if it's about ignoring established canon and completely rewriting well-known, venerable characters to make them more PC, well, that's when you lose people like me. My long-ago review of "Zootopia" (see here) gets into some of these issues, at least obliquely.
ReplyDelete