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My facebook has been ablaze with the War of the Rings of Power, and by that I mean Amazon putting out tons of propaganda to indicate that everyone is racist for not liking the the Rings of Power, followed by half of the people saying no that doesn't make us racist, and the other half saying they just don't like it because it's a bad show. A similar thing is going on for the Little Mermaid, too. Alas, that these evil days should be mine.
The thing that strikes me is that no one is saying the obvious. To me, and I'll guess to many others, I really don't mind diversification of media. Or, that is to say, I wouldn't mind it, if it weren't for the fact that it's now the norm, it's practically mandatory for any show that doesn't want to be cancelled by internet SJWs, it's crammed down my throat everywhere, and it's turned into a major moral issue where half the audience browbeats the other. I feel like I'm being subjected to someone else's religion.
But that woke audience always comes back to "Why are you against black people playing roles? What are you, racist?" Well, no, I honestly don't think I'm racist. But in the position I'm put in, I get that I am taking actions that a racist would. The only difference is that a true racist would be against black people being cast no matter what, and I am only against it being mandatory and moralized. But since we live in this world, where it is mandatory and moralized, does that mean that there's nothing that would really satisfy me short of black people not being cast?
I don't quite think so. Another point that the woke audience comes to is "They clearly just thought that Halle Berry was the best person to play Ariel". And really, I think the answer to that is, no, they clearly prioritize diversity casting. She is black and they want to cast lots of black people because it scores them points with the woke crowd (and possibly also because it drums up controversy, which may be good for business). And then on top of that, they thought she'd be fine for the part. I don't know how I can prove that, but it just seems evident to me that diversity casting for its own sake is something that is being given high priority. In some limited cases, it's possible to prove it, such as with Ryan Condal, the showrunner for House of the Dragon who indicated that they cast black people to play Valerians explicitly for the purpose of diversity-washing. However, I'm guessing that Condal regrets saying that outright, because it's not a good look. It gives the other side ammo and also casts doubt as to whether the people hired really would have earned the spot on merit alone.
At this point. I don't really know what it would take to convince me that most castings of black people are not just to fill a quota. But this puts me in a tough spot, because I don't really want to be racist in action, even if I know I'm not in thought.
I feel like I don't care too much about the actor's races, as long as the actors are good. I've watched live plays where men play women and women play men. Or where one actor plays multiple characters. Idk, its all make believe and I have an easy time suspending my disbelief and filling in the gaps. I think the casting in hollywood is pretty competitive these days and its not hard to get good actors of any race.
Having said all that ... I still don't want to watch any of these shows. As others have said there is a whole marketing strategy with stoking these racial animosity stories, and I really don't want to support that sort of marketing strategy, and nor do I think its a good signal of quality. If the show is still considered huge and important in five years I'll start watching it then. Otherwise I'll just read a plot summary/spark notes at some point to understand any cultural references.
Back when they cast Idris Elba to play Heimdall, I had about two seconds of "But Heimdall is Norse..." before I went "Feck it, Elba's a good actor, this will be fantastic!"
I did not feel that way about Arondir and Dísa. I don't know who these actors are, or if they're any good. I admit my memory is shaky but I don't recall back when casting Elba that there was all this guff about "Well ackshully Asgard is populated by many different races" and representation etc. Hogun was played by a Japanese actor, but the canon comics had Hogun being vaguely Asian, and the in-universe explanation is that he is Vanir, not Aesir. There you go, no problems with contradicting the source material (which is comic books and not pure Norse mythology). However, they still cast Chris Hemsworth and not Dwayne Johnson as Thor.
Black Dísa? Tell us that she is from one of the Eastern houses of the Dwarves, it's intermarriage between two royal lines. Don't beat us over the head with "That's racist!" when asking how come she is the only black Dwarf in the place. Give us a reason in-universe for this, instead of a parade of news media interviews about "I'm the first black/female/Dwarf ever!" (which people have pointed out is not true; there have been female dwarves and black dwarves in other shows and movies before).
I don't know what they have officially said or not said about the actors being black. I just got a bunch of articles about how so and so actor was flooded with hate for their role in the rings of power. I don't want to waste any time researching what was said back and forth by the creators (unless this turns out to be a popular show 5 years from now). Condemning them without knowing what they said seems premature, so I'll mostly withhold judgement. All I've seen so far is the advertising campaign, and that is what I'm judging.
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Also, the Thor comic books only have a passing familiarity with the actual fables/myths. If someone was actually trying to dramatize the Poetic Edda, transracial casting would be a bigger deal.
There's no pretense that they're adapting the actual Norse myths, everyone knows it's the comics. So that at least is honest.
And if they were trying to do the myths, they'd have to have Loki transforming into a mare and giving birth to the eight-legged horse that Odin then rides, as well as Thor cross-dressing to be a giant's bride in order to get his stolen hammer back. Real mythology is way wilder than a few feeble attempts at "we are thoroughly modern Millie".
Even this show chickened out of showing the First Kinslaying, so we get the comic scene of the Elf-fleet sailing after Morgoth to Middle-earth For Great Justice (if you believe the voice-over in the prologue) with nary a word about all the Elf-on-Elf murder and theft. I know in large part it's because they don't have the rights to the material, but they shouldn't have touched any First Age stuff at all then. They have the simple plot-line of Elves Good, Sauron Bad and they're sticking to it desperately.
This is the real bone of contention. There is material there to do a Second Age story, but first they don't have rights to the source material so they're stuck with what is in the Appendices and second, they don't really want to do the story as it is in canon. They want their Generic Epic Fantasy Game Of Thrones Rip-off, just with names like Galadriel and Elrond pasted on the characters.
I could accept the compressed timeline and having Galadriel and Tar-Míriel and all the other characters interacting, because I realise that's necessary for the adaptation to television. I can't accept Bitchy Galadriel and Warrior Queen Regent.
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