Time to Discuss Race: The White Washing of The Shredder

[LaughingMage]

It doesn't matter or factor into his personality since he's no more "Caucasian" than Clark Kent.

And yet, a black Superman would never fly with the general audience.

 

[Marvin]

@Spitcurl
I personally see as much outrage from fans of FF and TMNT with the latter having fans at least sometimes taking the side of self righteousness(ff fans really can't).
If there is some greater sense of outrage from one over the other perhaps we should try to look at the various other reasons for that:

Could it be that one is simply more culturally relevant and thus elicits a more culturally detectable response. What if instead of the outrage caused by massively relevant actor to a big marvel property(they sold their biggest properties first), with 2 live action films in the last decade(turtles: none), we instead compare the outrage of Shredder race change to that of Fury or better yet Hemidal "the white".

Or we weigh the value of changing a masked villain to that of a good looking super hero. I think you'll find villain changes are farrrrr more acceptable traditionally as with all supporting characters. There would be far more outrage at the thought of changing Jokers race than Batman.

Just two thoughts.

 

[Teelie]

I'm not outraged, just to be clear. I am disappointed however. To be outraged would mean I actually have to feel something stronger for this movie than I do.

At this point I'm happy the turtles don't have bird beaks and that they do look better than I was expecting (larger certainly). Their appearance is still growing on me and despite this disappointment I'm not going to not see the movie because "OMG white Shredder fails!" either. If I do skip it, there will be a more compelling reason than poor casting.

Making the Shredder white on top of completely writing off his origin (if rumors are to be true) is a disappointment that will really have to explain why they couldn't leave the character at least ethnically appropriate. Why make him white? What does this do to further the story? What harm is there in having someone fit the ethnicity? Should they have gone with Keanu?

I would be disappointed if he were black as well. The only reason it is more disappointing now is because, no offense to Fichtner, he's not the right man for the part. Yes, a black voice was used in the 80's cartoon, but the character was still Japanese when he took off his helmet.

This was also during the time Kung-Fu: The Legend Continues continued to use a white guy for an asian role (Kwai Chang-Caine, as played by a very white David Carradine reprising his descendent stealing the same role). So the fact Shredder's voice was black actually meant progress.

Why this disappoints today is that despite the progress made, they still keep white-washing roles. Particularly asian roles. I'm not asian, I'm not an asianophile but I'm not so insecure at seeing other ethnicities I have to demand they all be white people.

This also is not the case of adapting a series from another ethnically different country (like say Akira) but an already American comic that was deliberately written with a Japanese ethnicity for the villian.

Then again maybe it is better he is white, otherwise he might end up as a caricature of a bad asian stereotype.

 

[Hotwire]

why discuss it? We know nothing of the story....there could be a reasonable explanation for why this shredder is a white man

...
[/thread]

 

[Arach Knight]

Zaron and Teelie, excellent posts. Well said.

To those claiming this thread is irrelevant or premature because the film hasn't come out yet or we don't know enough about the portrayal, I think you're missing the point. AK used the example of FF & the visceral reaction casting a black male got vs. the relatively tame if head scratching decision to cast a white male as Shredder. In both cases, neither film has come out yet - FF hasn't even started; we know nothing about the nature of Johnny's relationship to Sue or how it will be handled - yet, that didn't stop the flood of negative reaction to it. So, asking the question of why that was such a big deal before the film's release versus the mostly puzzled but not righteously-indignant reaction to The Shredder (and the justification of it) is perfectly relevant.

As for other fictional characters and how equally upsetting it'd be if Black Panther were white or Batman were Asisn, that's also false equivalence: Black Panther being the Prince of Wakanda is intrinsic to his character; his ethnicity isn't a surface detail you can discard without irrevocably changing his character. You can make him an adopted white kid that becomes Prince of Wakanda, but there's already Tarzan if you want a male fantasy about a white guy inexplicably becoming leader of a predominantly ethnic society. Similarly, Bruce is of the same cloth as Zorro or Spring-Heeled Jack: bluebloods moonlighting as masked vigilantes. You'd have a hard time selling a POC coming from old-money here in the US given our history unless the entire story is an elseworld's tale with a different minority group having assumed power. If not, you'd be making changes to accomdate the character to the point that you may as well invent a new one.

Johnny Storm, on the other hand, isn't "Caucasian", he's "default". His personality isn't changed by his skin color; his skin color is nothing but a byproduct of being drawn at a time when *of course* every character was white; partly it was racism, but partly it was arists (predominantly if not all white) drawing what they knew of themselves and their culture or wanted to be (wish fulfillment). His "ethnicity" could be German, Dutch, Swiss, who knows. It doesn't matter or factor into his personality since he's no more "Caucasian" than Clark Kent.

Brilliant!

 

[Walt Bickle]

With all of the recent backlash that has come from the casting of Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm, I figure that now is as good a time as any to discuss the portrayal of another popular comic book character that is having their racial identity transformed; The Shredder.

To preface this discussion, I would like to note that I am addressing what I see as a hypocrisy when it comes to social reactions to race changes in film. I am not too concerned with an argument about whether or not fictional characters should have their racial identities changed, but rather am focused on the double-standard that comes with the reactions to the practice altogether.

While there is no dearth of fury over "making Johnny Storm Black" or people accusing studios of being politically correct for changing Nick Fury and Heimdal into non-Whites, there seems to be little ruckus made when a traditionally non-White character is made into a White character. I've seen the range of arguments.

1) It is okay to change the race of minor characters, but you shouldn't change the "look" of major characters.

2) <insert established minority character> isn't popular enough, so changing them into a White person doesn't make a difference.

3) Changing how they look changes the portrayal of the character.

There are many many variations of the above arguments, but it all boils down to society accepting White people taking on the roles of characters that are traditionally POC, but loathing an inverted scenario in which POC take on the roles of traditionally White characters. When an Irish man and a French woman were cast in the roles of Saudi Arabian father and daughter (the Al Ghul family in The Dark Knight trilogy), the actors were given kudos for a brilliant performance. Yet when it is brought up how the characters are a whitewashed portrayal, the common defense is that all that matters is that the portrayal is well done. Yet, before Jordan is even seen in a trailer, he has been demonized as being ill-cast, not because of lack of ability, but because he doesn't "look like" Johnny Storm.

Now how does this all relate to TMNT? Shredder is a full fledged Caucasian male in this film. The Shredder, a rather well known Japanese supervillain in comic books, whom was Japanese in the original TMNT film trilogy and cartoons, is now being cast as a White male. Now is the actor in question of dubious ability? Hardly. The veteran actor, William Fichtner, is known for playing villains on film, and in terms of ability, is likely to serve the role well.
What is disturbing however is that the same people whom complain about "accuracy" and "legacy" when it comes to White characters being recast, are no where to be seen or heard now that a popular minority character has had their race changed to White.

So why is it that society holds this double standard? Are non-Whites truly seen as being that unimportant to this society? It does not seem that people are so attached to the idea of iconic characters being portrayed exactly as they are in literature, because these bouts of anger over race changes only seem to occur when the character is originally White, but rarely, when the character is originally non-White.

This makes me think of The Hunger Games and how people took to Twitter with racist banter about Rue, whom is Black in the book as well as the film, yet movie-goers were still irate because of the sympathetic nature of the character and their seeming inability to be sympathetic for the death of a Black child.

I dunno what your on about man. There is backlash that shredder is no longer Japanese.. don't know where you are seeing people praise this new concept.. I for one specially hate it because I actually really like the shredder character... and I also hate that Aprils boss is changed from a white man to a black woman... I hate when any characters race is changed because it changes there character... hell I was even mad that batman was blonde in batman forever.. there is no double standard regarding changing a characters race or gender is just wrong in general!

 

[Walt Bickle]

I don't prefer it, but I don't mind it.

Plus, I don't think this is as clear cut as people believe it is.

There is definitely gonna be a twist to this.


Either with Eric Sachs' background, or with him not being the real Shredder.

to tell ya da truth I am on the same boat as you. if this is not a plot twist i'll be pissed...

but I reckon they will go for a reincarnation aspect like they did wit splinter and the turtles in the idw comics.. only this time they will have shredder one to. Eric Sachs being a reincarnation of oraku saki... I wouldn't mind this. they could have karai be his grand daughter and help him find out who he truly is. that could work

 

[Marvin]

to tell ya da truth I am on the same boat as you. if this is not a plot twist i'll be pissed...

but I reckon they will go for a reincarnation aspect like they did wit splinter and the turtles in the idw comics.. only this time they will have shredder one to. Eric Sachs being a reincarnation of oraku saki... I wouldn't mind this. they could have karai be his grand daughter and help him find out who he truly is. that could work

It seems pretty obvious at this point.
The old eerie latent ancient armor and learned guy with similar name trope.

 

[Walt Bickle]

It seems pretty obvious at this point.
The old eerie latent ancient armor and learned guy with similar name trope.

yeah true, it's just I haven't seen anyone actually say this yet so thought I was the only one to think this

 

[Arach Knight]

I dunno what your on about man. There is backlash that shredder is no longer Japanese.. don't know where you are seeing people praise this new concept.. I for one specially hate it because I actually really like the shredder character... and I also hate that Aprils boss is changed from a white man to a black woman... I hate when any characters race is changed because it changes there character... hell I was even mad that batman was blonde in batman forever.. there is no double standard regarding changing a characters race or gender is just wrong in general!

I never once stated that people are praising the concept. But there is a notable dearth of rancor from the Internet regarding the change of ethnicity for this character. But it is easy enough to find controversy about Michael B. Jordan playing Johnny Storm. In fact, simply googling "Michael B. Jordan" will lead you to controversy news on the first page of the search.

Conversely, a search for William Fichtner only reveals his press interviews while touring the media circuit. He isn't faced with harsh criticism for taking on the role. And the few interviewers brave enough (or concerned enough) to ask, are quickly rebuffed with Fichtner suggesting that everyone wait and see how the film handles the back story. I saw more ire over turtle beaks than I have over the race change of The Shredder.

 

[Marvin]

^Lots of white to black castings don't get the internet rancor of Bjordan/Human Torch.

 

[SpitCurl]

And yet, a black Superman would never fly with the general audience.

Which is a shame. He only needs to look human in order to be raised on Earth without raising (too many) eyebrows about his appearance, and I'd argue that it's actually plausible now to have the character be a POC adopted by a (white) Midwest family and still have the story work out the same.

It would really only add to those themes of Clark's loneliness and isolation growing up, giving us a simple (if too on-the-nose) visual representation of his "otherness". Even those tropes about no one looking at Clark and believing he could be Superman - a god-like hero - or recognizing him hiding out in plain sight in a busy cosmopolitan newsroom would take on a certain subtext and social commentary once Clark became a POC.

For the record, I don't need that to ever happen; I'm not offended when I look up at the screen and see a Superman who doesn't vaguely resemble me anymore than I'm bothered by the countless other superheroes, action stars and "regular Joe" audience-surrogates who are also default. You just get used to that sort of thing

@Marvin, I suppose the main difference I see between fans of FF and TMNT - and maybe what AK sees as well - is the willingness of those TMNT fans against the change to nevertheless entertain the notion that there *could* be a plausible reason for it, even offering up some, and in that way seeming less beholden to the roots of the character. Whereas FF fans appear to universally invoke "tradition", coming across as less willing to entertain a rationale for it. There's more of a line-in-the-sand attitude with them.

So yes, ppl are complaining about both, but the *nature* of the complaints feels different. It's more of an "I don't love it, but eh, let's wait and see" approach to Shredder while with Johnny it's "I'm sorry, the physical appearance is important to me and the character's always been drawn as white (ahem, "default"), so, my hands are tied."

 

[Marvin]

@Spitcurl
I see what you are getting at, but it's a generous generalization that I personally won't accept until I see some form on consensus.

I paid a visit to that Technodrome forum, particularly after that Faraci article. Safe to say I saw alot of what you are suggesting there is alot of. If there is any "wait and see's" it's from people like me and such. And as you can see on these very forums, it's not like I don't have anyone to debate with.

 

[FrostBite]

^Lots of white to black castings don't get the internet rancor of Bjordan/Human Torch.

This. No one gave a **** about Nick Fury. As a resident of Flint, MI I'd say we're probably about 50/50 on the white-black residency. At least, in my neck of the woods and even many African Americans were upset about the Johnny Storm thing.

You could run rampant circles about morality or this or that, but... we're a reactionary culture and reactions don't always follow a logical pattern. For example? I hate the Jordan casting. I was one who didn't want a race switch. Ironically though? I find him the best cast in the bunch and when the others were announced I suppose I was inherently "ageist" and Jamie Bell as thing just...

...Just... **** me.

But with Nick Fury? ****, the minute he was changed to black in the comics to the moment I saw it on screen, the character just works better that way. From the moment I saw him conjured up for the Ultimate line he went from boring Grandpa McCraps himself to a confident, strong leader with a **** ton of presence.

For those saying race doesn't intrinsically hold value for white characters as it is "default" your are systematically doing what white people have done for years, erasing culture and differentials. While the "default" might be white, "white" is a really vague term which seals away identity and history. Take for example that, as my family came to the U.S. Italians were forced into ghettos, starved of job opportunities and literally treated as an inferior race. We turned to crime to feed ourselves and it was the only way we could survive for a good while. Fast forward and we're white. White people didn't see us as white. Now we're white. We graduated to white. Astounding. Yet I still hear racial slurs thrown about. "Guido" is now a common American term for tan *****e-nozzles, when I still know it as a slight on my people. Can I speak up? No. I'm white now. I lose *****ing privileges because the same country that hated me, hated my family, got up one day and decided "Dawgs, your not as dark as them! (Even though we are, actually.) Join us on the white side!"

There are lots of race switches that weren't only not noticed, but readily accepted. Which kind of breaks the fallacy of much of these arguments I've read in here. That race bothers people when there is a switch from white to black. (Which is funny we only talk about switching to black, and that so far, all switches from Caucasians have been to black rather than the wealth of other races and ethnicities... we talk about an Asian Batman, but ha... right.)

So can someone break down the race switched roles for me? I can only pluck off a few in recent memory:

Harvey Dent was made black, no one cared. Kingpin was black, no one cared. Nick Fury is black, people prefer it in my experience with the GA. And people overwhelmingly despise it happening with the Torch.

Perhaps you need to look at that as a protagonist thing, and even then, is that a race thing so much as public consciousness being ingrained to see one thing? For example: Sure Johnny Storm was default. He couldn't be not-default. But you know what? That's like... what? 60 years of default? That's a lot of default being public knowledge and a highly recognized character. Make Johnny anything other than that... boom. You're going to **** people off.

Now this is a TMNT thread so... let's get to Shredder being white washed and the reaction being so stifled (despite actually being harsher than Kingpin/Fury/yaddayadda). The reason Shredhead's in a middle ground is yes... he has an identity that is public knowledge and ingrained in their experience, childhood and minds... but ahhhhh there's a difference. Despite being a main character this man has always been masked. Growing up I knew he was Asian, but in main incarnations of the character he wears his outfit so often that despite consciously knowing this he has such white and actually prominent black tendencies (voice, in particular) that the character is an enigma. He's shrouded and as such allows a bit of "bend" to their care. Notice the out-cry over the Turtles height? That's ingrained. Notice that I hate Donny's glasses even though they make perfect sense? Ingrained.

But Shredder. His moniker. His identity. His physicality never rested in his ethnicity for me. Sure his background was important but it was the looming fear of this demon personified as a man covered in his weapons and shrouded in darkness. To me, Shredder began when Oroku failed. One died and the other was born.

I was extremely hesitant about the race switch for Oroku, in fact, I was quite ****ed when I heard the name "Eric Sachs" at first.


...then I watched an entire Prison Break marathon caught Will being the perfect homicidal maniac and realized that outside of a few instances what I viewed the Shredder as was hardly ever a reality and that this particular actor may be able to bring that to the screen.

And EVEN THEN after these flicks I'd be ****ed again if we got another white Shredder until proven otherwise.

I've not followed the arguments here too in-depth. In my area racial differences are so prevalent that the race issues are mute and obnoxious to many of us. It's such a poor area even that the discrepancy between white, black, Asian, Arabic, etc. just kind of puts us all in the ****ter. But knowing how these things generally go down... I am going to say my peace. This... big.... long.... frickin.... peace and jet out. I know these debates don't honestly solve anything and hardly progress the matters that plague our country in terms of racial inequality. Both sides are hardly lenient enough to learn why people might feel a certain way and spout why they are right instead.

So. Have fun with that. These are my two cents.

 

[SpitCurl]

@Spitcurl
I see what you are getting at, but it's a generous generalization that I personally won't accept until I see some form on consensus.

I paid a visit to that Technodrome forum, particularly after that Faraci article. Safe to say I saw alot of what you are suggesting there is alot of. If there is any "wait and see's" it's from people like me and such. And as you can see on these very forums, it's not like I don't have anyone to debate with.

Certainly, that's fair enough. My opinions are mostly drawn from this forum and a few others, so I can only speak to those reactions that I've seen but so far, it seems to be breaking the way I stated above.

I've never been to the Technodrome forum but to hear you all speak of it I'd imagine that only the IMDB boards have it beat in terms of general vitriol. If true, I'll pass =) The Hype has enough in the way of mood swings for my tastes.

 

[Walt Bickle]

I never once stated that people are praising the concept. But there is a notable dearth of rancor from the Internet regarding the change of ethnicity for this character. But it is easy enough to find controversy about Michael B. Jordan playing Johnny Storm. In fact, simply googling "Michael B. Jordan" will lead you to controversy news on the first page of the search.

Conversely, a search for William Fichtner only reveals his press interviews while touring the media circuit. He isn't faced with harsh criticism for taking on the role. And the few interviewers brave enough (or concerned enough) to ask, are quickly rebuffed with Fichtner suggesting that everyone wait and see how the film handles the back story. I saw more ire over turtle beaks than I have over the race change of The Shredder.

Which is a shame. He only needs to look human in order to be raised on Earth without raising (too many) eyebrows about his appearance, and I'd argue that it's actually plausible now to have the character be a POC adopted by a (white) Midwest family and still have the story work out the same.

It would really only add to those themes of Clark's loneliness and isolation growing up, giving us a simple (if too on-the-nose) visual representation of his "otherness". Even those tropes about no one looking at Clark and believing he could be Superman - a god-like hero - or recognizing him hiding out in plain sight in a busy cosmopolitan newsroom would take on a certain subtext and social commentary once Clark became a POC.

For the record, I don't need that to ever happen; I'm not offended when I look up at the screen and see a Superman who doesn't vaguely resemble me anymore than I'm bothered by the countless other superheroes, action stars and "regular Joe" audience-surrogates who are also default. You just get used to that sort of thing

@Marvin, I suppose the main difference I see between fans of FF and TMNT - and maybe what AK sees as well - is the willingness of those TMNT fans against the change to nevertheless entertain the notion that there *could* be a plausible reason for it, even offering up some, and in that way seeming less beholden to the roots of the character. Whereas FF fans appear to universally invoke "tradition", coming across as less willing to entertain a rationale for it. There's more of a line-in-the-sand attitude with them.

So yes, ppl are complaining about both, but the *nature* of the complaints feels different. It's more of an "I don't love it, but eh, let's wait and see" approach to Shredder while with Johnny it's "I'm sorry, the physical appearance is important to me and the character's always been drawn as white (ahem, "default"), so, my hands are tied."

of course like, common sense will tell you that. At the moment Michael b Jordan is an upcoming actor and this will be the highlight of his career to date which is basically the thing that makes him interesting right now and have the majority of information about him. Where as William ficthner has done many things and has a repertoire of all sorts of information exposed of him throughout the years.. that's how the internet works. your just a racistesnist looking for excuses to look for racism where it don't exist, racism is nearly a thing of the past now... but the people who try to make racial speculations like this are the ones who are racist..
stop looking into white/black situations and just look into fact.... your giving out bout a film that made a japenese character American and saying it's racist, but I also noted that the same film has also made a white man into a black woman... you didn't bring that in to your criteria

and ps

the whole thing with superman not being recognised with glasses is dumb... but has to tried to be made believable.. do you think you could do the same thing with a black man?? and no it is not racist to say that before you even try to imply it.

 

[Marvin]

Michael B Jordan as Shredder.

 

[FrostBite]

your just a racistesnist (that's not a word) looking for excuses to look for racism where it don't exist,

Probably true.

racism is nearly a thing of the past now...

Not true.

the whole thing with superman not being recognised with glasses is dumb... but has to tried to be made believable.. do you think you could do the same thing with a black man?? and no it is not racist to say that before you even try to imply it.

Proves quote #2 is wrong.

 

[Walt Bickle]

Probably true.



Not true.



Proves quote #2 is wrong.

I'm just sayin, for example, it wouldn't be pretty hard to recognise will smith with glasses... at least a white actor could changer his hairstyle atleast.. am I wrong?

 

[FrostBite]

I'm just sayin, for example, it wouldn't be pretty hard to recognise will smith with glasses... at least a white actor could changer his hairstyle atleast.. am I wrong?

Extremely.

 

[Walt Bickle]

that's a dumb answer. an actor like ashton kucther for e.g. he can wear the glasses and have a different hairstyle to.. this sells the idea. Will smith could not do that. is that racist to note this fact?

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

There's already a black Superman.His name is Icon and he's from Milestone comics.

I wouldn't mind seeing that movie done properly.

 

[Walt Bickle]

There's already a black Superman.His name is Icon and he's from Milestone comics.

I wouldn't mind seeing that movie done properly.

never heard of it but I will look It up....a kind of elseworlds story I presume though.. but I also want to add that will smith was offered the role of superman before in the 90's and he said no because he said that a black man being superman is just dumb so all the race pushers on characters need to pipe down... unless will smith is a raist? lol

 

[Arach Knight]

that's a dumb answer. an actor like ashton kucther for e.g. he can wear the glasses and have a different hairstyle to.. this sells the idea. Will smith could not do that. is that racist to note this fact?

You accuse me of being a racist because I am supposedly "looking for racism", yet you turn around and make a post which is filled with ignorance and prejudice. Black people are quite capable of changing their hair style.

 

[Arach Knight]

never heard of it but I will look It up....a kind of elseworlds story I presume though.. but I also want to add that will smith was offered the role of superman before in the 90's and he said no because he said that a black man being superman is just dumb so all the race pushers on characters need to pipe down... unless will smith is a raist? lol

Race pushers? Leave the Fox News rhetoric for some other thread. Will Smith turned down playing Superman because he knew that White people would lash out if he did, not because he thought the idea of changing Superman's race was "dumb."

"The last Superman I got offered, the script came, and I was like, 'There is no way I'm playing Superman!' Because I had already done Jim West (Wild Wild West) and you can't be messing up white peoples' heroes in Hollywood," he recalled.

"You mess up white peoples' heroes in Hollywood, you'll never work in this town again!"

comic book movie.com/superman_movies/news/?a=4791