Don't Ask Questions, Just Consume Product and Then Get Excited for Next Products
the tweet isn't even talking about a POC show, it's referring to Ms. Marvel
i don't know if you're joking or if this is a real thing but the fact that this sounds like the Morbing it up meme and the subsequent morbius sequel films joke makes me think its real.
so youre gonna watch the next coming of age comedy about a teenage muslim pakistani girl in new jersey right? im gonna hold you to that
Disney is racist for not having produced Everything Everywhere All At Once .
No, I will not be taking questions.
Yes, I do realise I should have ended the sentence after 3 words.
look, hollywood is doing its part by making morally good television, now the consumers just have to solve racism by consuming it
Its simple. We uhhh... Don't watch the Disney slop :joker-che:
I was looking for some content pablum and decided to watch the Hawkeye series. Hawkeye wears a hearing aid (which is canon, so fair enough), and the villain is a deaf, one-legged character (played by a deaf, one-legged actress, tbf), but then they stuck a literal one-eyed golden retriever in the show. I shit you not, every episode there's a dog essentially winking at the camera like "psst This is the one with disability representation!"
I have nothing against representation in media (I don't think it matters much either way), but when the whole thing is nodding towards a specific type of representation, it starts to feel offensively pandering. Having disabled characters and actors is great. What's not great is making a show that's like "Here, we made a thing for you disableds. Isn't that what we're calling you now? It's not cripple anymore, that much I know. Anyway, this has some of you people in it."
The show itself is dogshit except for the trick arrows. I'm a sucker for the trick arrows.
This is probably a terminally online thing (no offense), because when I watched the show it never occurred to me to feel anything particularly special about Hawkeye and the villain both being disabled, I saw it as being entirely normal because both were still able to function entirely well. As for the dog being disabled.....I hate pets so I didn't like the dog at all, but it also never occurred to me to consider I'd been looking at three disabled characters while watching the show. I think unfortunately this view of pandering to disabled people might be because a lot of the content we view on youtube these days talks about the importance of representation heavily.
Or maybe I have the attention span of a goldfish; I mean I watched black panther and didn't feel I was watching Disney engaging in representation (although comparing with Hawkeye, a far better form), just that I was watching a superhero movie.
Actually I might have the attention span of a goldfish.
Hawkeye having a hearing aid makes sense. He's around explosions all the time, his character in the comics becomes partly deaf, and Jeremy Renner is actually hard of hearing. No issue there. I thought it was a perfectly fine character development choice. Further, it's also common that if the hero has some sort of handicap, disability, quirk, etc., the villain might also have a similar quirk. It's a bit cliche, but cliches exist for a reason. There are narrative elements that can be explored with the dynamic. Plus, there's nothing wrong with writing deaf characters, nor with wanting deaf actors to play them.
The problem is the dog. The whole point of representation in media, as you imply, is that you aren't supposed to notice, or rather that your attention isn't supposed to be drawn to the representation overtly. It's not supposed to be a big deal that there are characters with non-normative qualities. They're just supposed to be characters who happen to have those qualities, and I would love to have watched the show and not really noticed.
But here's the thing: They wouldn't cast a one-eyed dog just because he showed up really well in the audition. You may not have noticed/cared that the main characters and the dog were disabled, but there is a zero percent chance that the multitude of people involved in the decision didn't notice that they cast a disabled dog to be in the show about the disabled hero and the disabled villain. That was an intentional choice, and it was a bad one. It telegraphs to the audience that the creators knew exactly what they were doing, which largely invalidates the purpose of media representation.
And again, I can't stress this enough, the dog has one eye. The dog is a superhero mascot character who is not only figuratively a wink and nod to the audience about what they were doing, but also literally looks like he was winking at the camera. It was too much for me.
You know goddamned well that there's a committee at Disney who had to calculate the exact number of frames that it would be OK to show the lesbian kiss in the background in The Rise of Skywalker.
From what I know about how Disney operates, that’s totally plausible.
I'm trying to remember but I think I completely missed that the dog only had one eye.😅
the dogs is in the hawkeye comic the show is based off of my guy, he wasn't there because of representation, but because he was in the comic
I think one thing with flawed media depictions in that there's a promise of real representation and diversity but they never quite do it.
Disney and other IP holders (JK Rowling for one) promise a gay kiss or characters of color, but it's only ever done in safe ways that don't hurt their profits.
Marvel got away with a lot of shit largely because they offered enough representation to keep people hopeful that they'll do it better next time. But that's the thing. They'll do things better, but they won't do things right.
They'll keep bigoted audiences satisfied half to keep their money and half because they have just as much antipathy.
I think people are waking up and seeing that they don't and have never cared about good representation and are only doing the barest minimum to keep their money. That the crumbs they scatter are a calculated risk.
But of course you've got the holdouts we're seeing. They compare Wonder Woman to RBG and fantasize about Robert Mueller coming out of retirement to drag Trump kicking and screaming out of Mar-a-lago. They want a redemption arc for never-Trump Republicans because they want to like them. Because they do like them
But they're being seen for who they are too. In utter denial of the world burning around them. People who have already sided with fascism. People who want polite conversation while we're dying.
I'm glad that people are finally starting to see how cynical and callous these institutions really are.
I just hope that enough change happens in my lifetime.
I completely agree with your analysis, however I don't think the people upset with Ms Marvel's alleged lack of commercial success have reached the conclusions you have made. I hope they do, but I am not certain
Oh I know those folks aren't getting it. They're just mad that other people aren't eating the slop anymore.
Yeah it's better than before, but it's not good enough for as much as the rest of the world has still been progressing. I think more people will get it but yeah, I hope they get it too.
Did Disney even really advertise for this show though? I didn't see anything about it until a day or two before the show premiered.
and judging the show purely on number of watchers doesn't make sense. The streaming business model is all about hooking people in with a really wide variety of shows, so the only relevant question is "did Ms Marvel attract new viewers/retain past ones?"
Yeah, they ran a bunch of ads that kinda felt like it was a show for teen girls. I'm not that so I was on the fence but finally checked out the first ep. It was alright, as a show it was on par with Hawkeye, but i'm clearly not the demographic for it. I'm not gonna click the link, but clearly not all the marvel shows are for everyone just like all the comics are not for everyone.
Honest question: Why do people like the supehero genre?
I have no interest in such things
When the first Iron Man movie came out, it was novel. They finally had the CGI budget to pull off some neat stuff, and it was fresh and interesting, compared to everything else.
The trouble was that it proved to be popular, and nothing kills novelty and freshness like having to crank out enough slop to keep the money coming in. Marvel now needs to make money for the Mouse, forever.
For me, it's almost entirely nostalgia. Comics and superheroes were a big part of my childhood and teenage years, and I still dabble in reading comics. But as I get older and my worldview gets more coherent, the stories are becoming less meaningful and more, "What will the good guys do to get out of THIS jam?" There are still some gems, but I admittedly mostly consoom capeshit for the sole purpose of seeing my favorite characters working together to overcome the conflict.
I mean, if they keep cranking out Goofy Himbo Chris Hemsworth flicks, I'm gonna keep watching them. It's one of the laws of physics.
It's power fantasy. Honestly...I sometimes fantasize about what I would do if I had force powers or if I had a healing factor.
It's juvenile I concede...but it is a real thing I think and experience and like to believe I'd do something with.
When you spend most of your waking hours alienated and powerless, it's nice to let the imagination wander, and that's exactly to what these stories cater. Unfortunately, too many people start believing in the bullshit.
Even as someone who likes it...It is pretty wild to sometimes contemplate how effective superheroes have been as a counterrevolutionary force. They have essentially not only served as a framework for the concept of "great man theory" of history, but also taught multiple generations of people that the truest morality is having absolute power and doing as little with it as possible.
Exactly; there's a reference to Nietzsche's master/slave morality in there somewhere, but I'm too much of an uneducated pleb to articulate it.
As long as I'm at the lathe, though, I'm guessing that there's a non-zero chance that Breitbart-loving CHUDs eventually deem Captain America: The First Avenger to be "too political" and/or "glorifying Marxist totalitarianism" because Cap punches Hitler, culminating in a Twitter panic wherein a bunch of boomers tweet videos of themselves smashing their Rokus and Fire sticks to protest a Marvel movie made in 2011. Many liberals are scratched during the incident.
Done well it can do what any sci fi does; hold a mirror up to society and explore ideas and concepts in a new and interesting way. I loved Xmen growing up because of the politics and how it explored how a demonised minority can be persecuted, not to mention how powerful people manipulate fear of the other and basically institute a massive surveilance state and bring in something like fascism. It seemed quite relavent around about the first few years of the millenium. Stuff like Alan Moore's watchmen is also good for exploring similar ideas but in a significantly more complex way - for instance the comedian kind of got me reading up on Latin America and Contras. Worldbuilding is also usually pretty interesting too... how the world works when you have actual superheroes etc. I quite liked the worldbuilding in Worm for instance.
There is also the power fantasy aspect. With superhero stuff, you can kinda think about what it'd be like to have that kind of power. Also, at the end of the film or comic, you know that however bad things look they will be resolved. Even if someone gets killed you can be fairly sure they will be back so in that way it is safe I guess?
The thing is, comics in the US can't really deviate from the superhero medium like other countries (France, Japan, Brazil, the UK, etc.) so practically every story that's actually interesting has to fit into the superhero mold. Alan Moore's Swamp Thing run is one of the greatest works of gothic fiction of all time, but to sell the comic it still has to be about a "superhero." So you end up having to sort out the cliche from the actually profound.
Babe it's 4pm, time to watch the origin story of Stilt Man on Disney+
"Performative representation with patronizing roles and themes is all the wokeness you're going to get, and that wokeness will be challenged by chuds and you will be forced to take a side in the resultant culture war. All the while, our message of 'any change is bad, actually' and status quo supporting propaganda will be uncontested." :capitalist-woke:
For the record: based on episodes thus farMs. Marvel is the best of the marvel shows after Wanda vision. It's like a direct response to the boys.
....it's counter revolutionary yes...but it's a good show.
That's fine, but the person tweeting about how Ms Marvel isn't doing well enough is because of racial bias is just stupid.
Oh for sure. Honestly I think how hit or miss these shows have been is the biggest reason for its struggles. Most of the shows have been entirely forgettable. I was already checked out by this point in winter. Soldier/ falcon, And I still haven't even been able to finish Hawkeye. People are getting fatigued. Edit...although thinking about it...I think i'm being too kind. Racism is probably a factor also.
When you say it's a direct response to The Boys what do you mean?
The Boys is a cynical and hella on point deconstruction of not just the super hero genre and its tropes, but also of the role superheroes play in popular culture and the overlap and intersection that's put them at the center of the military, celebrity, social media, and manufactured culture (IE: Capitalism). When Alan Moore wrote watchmen (this shows predecessor in so many ways) one thing he did, given the era he was in, was establish that in his universe because superheroes were real children obviously wouldn't be reading comics about them. Hence: the black freighter sub plot. The Boys recognizes, correctly, that superheroes are so engrained and essential to the post 9/11 western cultural makeup that its basically impossible to do a universe where superhero fandom doesn't exist. The Boys posits a world where superheroes are all just asshole sociopath celebrities and corporate personality brands and products...but recognizes that they'd still sell toys, movies, and party supplies about them to six year olds.
Now to be clear: I'm not saying Ms. Marvel is or ever will be as good as the Boys and its too early to say what its impact will be at this stage, but just in the first two episodes it feels like an attempt at hopeful reconstruction of these tropes and ideas. Kamala is a Marvel fangirl living inside of the Marvel Universe who goes to Marvel conventions...but the cynical critique of how this is all bullshit manufactured culture is replaced with a pretty cute coming of age story about how all this stuff has had a pretty formative impact on a lot of people whether we like it or not.
Ah I see, thanks for the explanation! I don't really like cape stuff so pretty much the only superhero related show I watch is the boys, so this wasn't on my list anyway
And what a lovely experience it was 😝
Jokes aside I do think the show could have ended on a stronger note that wasn't such paint by the numbers super hero action but everything up to that point was great and I would argue it was (accidental or no), the definitive covid 19 show given how it's a show all about isolation and retreating into nostalgic fantasy. I'll also never forget the moment in episode 03 where they make the perfect meta joke about mystery box shows where you see them all huddled around the monitor binging the 'wanda show' looking for clues and eating Chinese food and it's impossible not to realize you're looking at a mirror.
:downbear. With a second colon nstead of a period is your friend
I still enjoy comics, and I always liked Kamala Khan. I haven't read anything featuring her since I've become a communist, so idk how I'll feel when I re-read her books with a new worldview.
The show just...doesn't look good, though.
