WIRED says George Lucas ‘failed’ to bring women and POC into Star Wars as ‘fully-developed characters’
From ‘The WIRED Guide to Star Wars‘:
“The Disney-era plans for the overall brand come at a fraught time, culturally. [Kathleen] Kennedy explicitly set out to bring women and people of color into the franchise as fully-developed characters, something people rightly criticized [George] Lucas for failing at.”
Can WIRED introduce us to the people who think Leia Organa, Lando Calrissian, Padmé Amidala, Schmi Skywalker or Mace Windu are minor characters?
0 Comments
Tony
Lol are they serious??? George Lucas’ characters, whether they were male, female, of colour, or an alien, they all fitted into the story seamlessly, and had important roles to play. And they felt REAL (ie they were flawed beings and not made to look perfect at everything like Rey), so people could ACTUALLY relate to them.
Jar Jar Binks for me is someone I would add to your list countering Wired’s absurd statement. I think anyone who has ever felt like an outsider due to having a different cultural background can relate to him. I have an Asian background, and I’ve always felt I could relate to JJB. The message surrounding his story and that of the gungans, the idea of not just dismissing someone or a group of people because their different, is far stronger and empowering than simply having a non-white actor on screen. I’m all for a diverse cast, and of course SW has always been a diverse universe as reflected in the sheer number of alien species created, which was shown particularly in the prequels. But Lucas also actually tackled issues of being an outsider directly, and in a clever way such that it fitted in with the story, and which made JJB a great character.
The new movies make the characters seem like they’re there for the sake of pushing an agenda. It’s hard not to think that when the makers of the film (KK especially) can’t stop talking about “oh look at our diverse cast and “strong” women that SW never had!”
Equality will only be achieved when there’s nothing extraordinary about the fact a woman, person of colour, transgender person etc is casted into a role.
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https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YUvkxjVuT9g
Enough said.
Marshall
When are we going to stop listening to WIRED? Those people are so stupid, they have to study to take a urine test.
joe
f**k them
Jonathan
The Lord of the Rings trilogy of 2001-2003 and the Hobbit trilogy of 2012-2014 were pretty much majority/exclusively white as far as I can recall; the latter case is particularly interesting because it was filmed and released around the same time that Hollywood diversity started to become a major issue. IIRC there was even a controversy over a casting agent who dismissed non-white auditions for Hobbit roles.
George Lucas’ prequel trilogy depicted a black Jedi Master whose stature is second only to Yoda, an Indian boy as Anakin’s best childhood friend, an Indian girl as the elected successor to Queen Amidala, a Maori bounty hunter and his Maori son, an entire clone army based on the Maori bounty hunter (who were later given a much greater focus in the CGI animated series), a Puerto Rican as a crucial mythology character who winds up being instrumental in preserving a thread of hope for the galaxy, multi-ethnic younglings….
….I’m sorry? Who failed again?
jppiper
WIRED CAN GO F**K THEMSELVES!!!!