I can get people being on board with the movie and wanting to defend it. At the same time, the reason there's been criticisms against this film is because a white actress was cast in the role of a predominantly Japanese character. That's why people give a **** at this point.
Additionally, it's sort of shed light on poor Hollywood practices and racist practices when it comes to casting. This movie would probably be getting less attention over the issue if it wasn't such a thing in the past. Case in point, casting directors wouldn't even consider Asian American or Japanese American actors for the Light Yagami role in Death Note. In The Last Airbender movie, M. Night Shymalan and Frank Marshall cast white actors in the lead roles for characters who were of a visibly ethnic type in the show. And no, I'm not referring to making the Fire Kingdom Indian and Middle Eastern instead of oriental/Asian. I'm referring to Katarra, Sokka and Ang, the show's main trio.
Knowing that she's been changed to a white character doesn't really erase the problem at hand. I'm not saying you shouldn't see the movie or that it will be awful. But for the people who are upset over this, it's not a matter of "The Major is white time to move on!" The very fact she is white and still is white is arguably offensive. And whether it was experimented for the Major or not, there were also reports of digital FX test to make white characters appear Asian. That doesn't really help the situation either. The studio's admission did lend credence to the rumor.
At this point it means nothing to me, I just don't care. i've heard every side of this story over and over again, I've read the articles, read people's opinions on social media, forums so on and so forth, I'm well past it, I just want to see the movie now.
I get it, this whole thing blowing up is an opportunity to push an agenda, there's nothing wrong about having a discussion about it......... but we've talked about it, what now? eh? we talking about it over and over and over again? What does that accomplish? My problem is alot of people forgotten beyond this agenda there's an actually ****ing movie coming out, it exists and some are not offended by it's existence and you know might be interested in watching it and even talking about it.
If you want to talk about whitewashing so bad I'll gladly bite. I've heard the term "predominately Japanese" repeatedly regurgitated about Major kusanagi, yet beyond her name which probably not her real name, what is so japanese about her? hell it can't even be proved she's even japanese, she's used a prosthetic body most her life and very little is known about her beforehand. She's only predominately japanese because she's an asian creation being played by a white actress and that's supposed to be "offensive" just like changing a white character into a minority or making a male character female is "progressive" despite both being guilty of the same damn thing. Please don't feed me that media horse**** .
Why even bring up death note? why is light yagami being japanese relevent in a non japanese setting? Light is Japanese because the manga is set in japan which is a homogeneous nation, once you change the location, him being japanese becomes irrelevant. Yes asians are american too I know but is it a most? No. Death note can be done in most countries not to mention there's already a Japanese death note adaptation, a Japanese live action tv series and another Japanese movie that came out this year.
What I don't like is the disregard of people who are not triggered about this, like actually japanese who are not offended but of course they shouldn't have a voice and should be ignored because they're not offended, they don't get it, they're represented, they're not asian american etc every excuse to silence and invalidate their opinon, in fact some were even mad they were even asked, like they don't even matter........... ironic!!
There's a holier than thou vendetta to be had here, **** me, **** this movie and **** everyone who doesn't think this is more important.