Iron Fist Iron Fist General Discussion Thread - Part 2

[pr0xyt0xin]

Finn Jones shouldn't play Danny Rand because of the color of his skin.

 

[Slick]

I don't think it'd be all that surprising. Rachael Taylor had a vocal cameo in Luke Cage. Hogarth showed up for one scene in season 2 of Daredevil.

Also, didn't Cottonmouth and Kingpin have the same attorney?

Yes they did.

 

[TheVileOne]

I'm not going to get into a long winded argument but I understand why people are frustrated about the situation. I just think that they should have directed their frustrations at Marvel. I'm not going to agree with probably anyone here about this and that's okay. I don't care whether my opinion is popular. You know it's taken Marvel 10 years to make a movie starring a black dude and 11 for one starring a woman. Maybe we'll see a Marvel thing starring an Asian person in 15 years. If that exists in the comics, I don't know.

Not sure why that's Marvel's fault really.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

I'm not going to get into a long winded argument but I understand why people are frustrated about the situation. I just think that they should have directed their frustrations at Marvel. I'm not going to agree with probably anyone here about this and that's okay. I don't care whether my opinion is popular. You know it's taken Marvel 10 years to make a movie starring a black dude and 11 for one starring a woman. Maybe we'll see a Marvel thing starring an Asian person in 15 years. If that exists in the comics, I don't know.

They made a show starring a women, where the majority of the main cast were women, in 2015.

And Danny Rand is white. Has been since his inception. The frustration with this specific situation zero sense, unless you are big into stereotyping. Why haven't they asked for Thor, Iron Man, or anyone else to be Asian randomly? Matt's a ninja, no freaking out about that either. How about Batman or Superman?

It is apparent that those talking about this aren't even fans of the character.

 

[TheVileOne]

I want I SEE SPIDEY to know I love her and all but here's my problem with "it took 10 years/11 years blah blah blah."

I mean nine years ago, did anyone even know if the Iron Man movie could be a success? Did anyone even know if Marvel doing its own film franchises could work and really take off? Could we actually get a cinematic universe with multiple ongoing films and franchises. Even in Iron Man 2 I wasn't sure if it could still work or not. And I was skeptical if Thor could even become a big movie franchise.

If I'm making a point here is that if you want to attack Marvel for tone or this or that, OK. But let's also not forget, Marvel was taking a lot of risks when it got into the film business on its own with Iron Man and Incredible Hulk in 2008. A lot was done to build and service Avengers in 2012, and it ultimately paid off.

So yeah, it took time and some things had to change...but it still happened right? 15 years ago, the best we could hope for were the X-Men or Spider-Man films, and then we had to deal with a lot of uncertainty in between this time period. It took time to get to this point with the MCU, but it paid off.

So why should we punish or degrade Marvel because it took them 10 years to make a movie about a black superhero? Did they not bring in black superheroes to Iron Man 2, Civil War, and The Winter Soldier? As for the women, Marvel released both Jessica Jones and Agent Carter, which both debuted in the same year. When has DC Entertainment launched two TV shows starring female heroes [titular role] in the same calendar year? '

If we are going to do that, it's like we should punish them for how long it took to get their act together and finally start making films themselves when you know they were primarily a comic company and not a media entertainment company. It's foolish.

In 2008, the big names to make movies off of were Iron Man, Hulk, Captain America, and Thor. Those were the biggest names and iconic characters in the Marvel arsenal since all the other big names were set up at other companies. That means X-Men, Fantastic Four, Spider-Man. And Marvel still did it and they made lesser known heroes and character into mainstream franchises. And with the success of that and Avengers they were able to start branching out.

 

[UltimatePyro9]

They made a show starring a women, where the majority of the main cast were women, in 2015.

And Danny Rand is white. Has been since his inception. The frustration with this specific situation zero sense, unless you are big into stereotyping. Why haven't they asked for Thor, Iron Man, or anyone else to be Asian randomly? Matt's a ninja, no freaking out about that either. How about Batman or Superman?

It is apparent that those talking about this aren't even fans of the character.

Well, if it means anything (and it probably doesn't) the MCU had Hogun be portrayed by an Asian actor. That's something? Oh, and Wong is a pretty decent character in Doctor Strange, all things considered.

But to be fair, I do agree that the main issue is that Asians and Asian-Americans (especially men) are woefully underrepresented positively in media, specifically superhero media. In Daredevil's 2nd season, the main villains were the Hand, an ancient Asian cult that are assassins or something sinister. Better representation for Asian in the media is all I'm asking for.

Would I be down for an Iron Fist portrayed by an Asian actor? Absolutely. Will I whine about 'white savior' this, 'racism' that because Marvel hired Finn Jones as the lead? Not really. It seems like a petty waste of time to 'fight the power' or something. And by that, it just means harassing an actor on social media so much that he quit Twitter for a while. Will I still watch Iron Fist on Netflix? Sure. For all its faults, the Netflix are still 4 for 4 with their Marvel stuff.

Still, Marvel has improved a bit on hiring POC in some of their media. They did hire 2 Asian actors and one Black actor in their Inhumans series. Who knows? Maybe they'll use an Asian actor for Namor whenever that begins production. It may not be 'comics-accurate' as it were, but the DCEU has Jason Momoa as Aquaman and he is nowhere near comic-accurate for that character.

Sorry. I ramble a bit.

 

[GeckoMoria]

N one should be attacking Marvel. They have done more for diversity especially in tv than any other company DC or Fox. Are they perfect? No. But they are not racist. Especially when from all their tv shows 3 have female leads and one is as black as it gets.

Also Pyro how exactly would you portray the Hand differently? They are an ancient cult of evil ninjas and that's how they have been for decades. What's wrong about it?

 

[TheVileOne]

At the end of the day, these shows and characters, they are great, we care about them and all. But let's not get mixed up here. These are still make believe. They are works of fiction. These works are not curing cancer. They are not rebuilding homes torn apart by war and strife or natural disasters. They are not offering aid in third world countries. They are giving us some fun entertainment for a little while.

Yeah we want to see characters we can identify with on a gender or racial level. Or some similarity. On some level all of us want to see that for stories we like. It's human nature. But creators don't have to make their work that way. They don't really have to do anything.

 

[GeckoMoria]

Oh, Vile i have been meaning to ask you, you have gotten the screeners right?

 

[Spider-Fan]

So much of this debate is just ignorance of the source material. I don't see the issue here, honestly. Marvel has done a great job introducing diverse characters, and now are putting many diverse charactera in lead roles. Like Vile said, Marvel had to build a brand before it could play with the toy box.

 

[chamber-music]

There were rumors of Ike Perlmutter not being interested in making women and minority lead movies.

If a movie is good is what people remember more than what came first.

Personally I would rather wait for something good than see Marvel, DC or Fox rush out subpar movies simply to satisfy peoples demands for diversity.

We probably would not of had Ryan Coogler directing Black Panther and Chadwick starring as T'Challa if the movie was made a few years ago. Sometimes things work out at the right time.

Also, didn't Cottonmouth and Kingpin have the same attorney?

Yep , Big Ben Donovan is Cottonmouth and Kingpin's attorney.

 

[Mike Murdock]

Well, if it means anything (and it probably doesn't) the MCU had Hogun be portrayed by an Asian actor. That's something? Oh, and Wong is a pretty decent character in Doctor Strange, all things considered.

But to be fair, I do agree that the main issue is that Asians and Asian-Americans (especially men) are woefully underrepresented positively in media, specifically superhero media. In Daredevil's 2nd season, the main villains were the Hand, an ancient Asian cult that are assassins or something sinister. Better representation for Asian in the media is all I'm asking for.

But Marvel television has been much better. Ming-Na Wen and Chloe Bennet are on Agents of SHIELD. Inhumans cast Ken Leung as Karnak and Mike Moh as Triton. Neither one are starring in the show, but Karnak is an important (and decidedly cool) role. I almost think it's unfair to project the movies' shortcomings onto Marvel Television even if Iron Fist doesn't star an Asian lead.

 

[Brian Braddock]

Maybe it's just me but I'm that jaded by this whole issue that I get the feeling that Marvel could cast a Chinese lead as Shang-Chi right now and it would still somehow get criticism from certain quarters.

 

[GeckoMoria]

This whole backlash is really hypocritical. Fox and WB have been making comic book long before Marvel and they have way more attempts than the MCU.

Why are not they getting any heat?

 

[Iron_Stark]

This whole thing is incredibly stupid. Danny Rand has been white since his inception. Why change him? To pander to a vocal minority?

There's no controversy, there's no white washing and Finn Jones and Marvel shouldn't be attacked for it.

 

[Web-Head]

Finn Jones shouldn't play Danny Rand because of the color of his skin.

No joke, I saw a Twitter user say that. They said he should've turned it down because he's white, therefore he'll get other roles.

 

[Dark Raven]

They could've just used Mike Colter and made him both Power Man AND Iron Fist.

Power Fist? Iron Man?

 

[2kt09]

This whole backlash is really hypocritical. Fox and WB have been making comic book long before Marvel and they have way more attempts than the MCU.

Why are not they getting any heat?

Lol what?

I said before Iron Fist is a damned if you damned if you don't as far as between an asian or a caucasian actor simply because he's a martial artist who grew up, trained with and fights asian stereotypes.

Majority of viewers couldn't care less.
Comic purists and SJW's do and twitter has been a cesspool for a while now.

 

[Dasher10]

But Marvel television has been much better. Ming-Na Wen and Chloe Bennet are on Agents of SHIELD. Inhumans cast Ken Leung as Karnak and Mike Moh as Triton. Neither one are starring in the show, but Karnak is an important (and decidedly cool) role. I almost think it's unfair to project the movies' shortcomings onto Marvel Television even if Iron Fist doesn't star an Asian lead.

You forgot Elodie Yung as Elektra (who honestly deserves her own series).

 

[UltimatePyro9]

Also Pyro how exactly would you portray the Hand differently? They are an ancient cult of evil ninjas and that's how they have been for decades. What's wrong about it?

The main issue is that it plays on the "Yellow Peril" trope (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/YellowPeril). There's some problematic implications in that its a White guy fighting an evil Asian cult from taking over New York. Admittedly, Elektra kinda side-steps this, but its still there.

Maybe it's just me but I'm that jaded by this whole issue that I get the feeling that Marvel could cast a Chinese lead as Shang-Chi right now and it would still somehow get criticism from certain quarters.

Yep. Some may claim that Shang-Chi plays on the 'Asian knows martial arts' thing.

They could've just used Mike Colter and made him both Power Man AND Iron Fist.

Power Fist? Iron Man?

Funny enough, the character Power Fist actually exists: http://marvel.wikia.com/wiki/Luke_Cage_(Earth-8545)

 

[Darepool]

More and more, day by day, I see these people becoming caricatures to a lot of people. Self-important, self-entitled gas bags who complain if they don't see their 'idealized' image of the world to a tee. From social justice warriors to irritating hot air. Context is everything kiddies, you are turning into a universal punch line. Finn was clearly out of touch for trying to engage with twitter idiots. He'll get the last laugh.

 

[Darepool]

Not sure why that's Marvel's fault really.

Great point about the comics. Stay true to your characters and don't cater, eventually these people will get a life or finally engage in intelligent dialogue in the 'real world'.

 

[Faith_Cassidy]

I'm not going to get into a long winded argument but I understand why people are frustrated about the situation. I just think that they should have directed their frustrations at Marvel. I'm not going to agree with probably anyone here about this and that's okay. I don't care whether my opinion is popular. You know it's taken Marvel 10 years to make a movie starring a black dude and 11 for one starring a woman. Maybe we'll see a Marvel thing starring an Asian person in 15 years. If that exists in the comics, I don't know.

I agree with you. I think the people who wanted an Asian American Danny have valid points. I was rooting for a racebend myself. It didn't happen. I accepted it and moved on. However, as a woman of color, I know how important representation is, I know how crucial it is to keep the conversation going so that tptb will make more inclusive casting choices in the future. And Marvel has been getting better in that regard. But that's who the fans should take their issues to, those making the casting decisions, not an actor, who's near the bottom of the power hierarchy. That's where I start to lose sympathy. There's no good that comes from attacking an actor, especially one who acknowledges that a problem exists. We're at this point though because actors are easy targets.

Anyhow, I'm glad Finn is back on twitter and I hope he realizes that the best thing he can do is to ignore the naysayers. That will make it a much better experience for him.

 

[TheVileOne]

The main issue is that it plays on the "Yellow Peril" trope (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/YellowPeril). There's some problematic implications in that its a White guy fighting an evil Asian cult from taking over New York. Admittedly, Elektra kinda side-steps this, but its still there.

It's all in execution. These are still artistic works of fiction. The Hand is like an ancient order of bad guys, so why can't they be Asian? Yakuza and Triads still exist in the world as well. The show also has Colleen Wing, who is an Asian American character and not a villain.

 

[Darepool]

The only acceptable villain is the white man. No white heroes, just villians. Hyperbole yes, but many of these so-called SJW's would be more then fine with this scenario I'm sure. It's a vocal minority who just love to troll. That's what it is really. Trolling for the sake of. There are real world problems of hatred and discrimination, if changing the established race of a 40 year old character will make you all warm and fuzzy then you are ignoring the real problems. It's fiction, fantasy. Get over yourself.