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Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios announced this afternoon that actor Tom Holland would be the next actor to play Spider-Man on the big screen. Wired’s Angel Watercutter was ready within hours to bash the decision because…he’s white.
Ms. Watercutter said Tuesday for her piece ‘Your New Spider-Man Is a…Fresh-Faced White Dude. Great’:
When Marvel and Sony announced Spider-Man’s inclusion in the Marvel Cinematic Universe earlier this year, fans got excited that we could see a fresh take on the character, rather than just another fresh-faced white dude. (No offense to fresh-faced white dudes.) In particular, the studio had a chance to shift gears and make the new cinematic Spider-Man not Peter Parker, but Miles Morales—the half-black, half-Latino teenager who wears the Spidey suit in the Ultimate Comics: Spider-Man. The prospect of that was virtually nil (though Morales is taking over as the web-slinger in the comics), but there was still a shot that Peter Parker could be re-imagined.
As for Watts, he’s the latest in a series of young and relatively unknown directors to take on a Marvel property. Sure, Joss Whedon and Kenneth Branagh are big deals, but folks like Thor: The Dark World’s Alan Taylor or Joe and Anthony Russo, who will likely direct Holland in his Parker introduction in Captain America: Civil War, were mostly TV directors before joining Marvel. Those directors have all done good work in the MCU, and there’s no reason to believe Watts won’t as well, but if you were expecting this new Spider-Man flick to be directed by a big-name director (or a woman, or a non-white person), that’s not going to happen this time around.
Just as Brian Michael Bendis believes that white superheroes cannot be for “everybody,” Ms. Watercutter seems to define “fresh take” as “anything but a white guy playing a character who has been white since his inception.” And by “fans” who were excited, she really means “fans who subscribe to Angela Watercutter’s race-obsessed worldview.”
Ms. Watercolor is so obsessed with race that she even laments that the next Spider-Man movie is being directed by a white man. How sad is it when a woman can’t look at anything unless she’s wearing a racial View-Master while simultaneously taking on the role of racial bean counter. “Are there too many white people in this story? Why are there so many white people? Is this justified? If I think it’s justified, then is it truly justified — or is that just my white privilege talking? Raceraceraceraceracerace!”
If you think this is an isolated mindset, then think again. It was only a few months ago that Dan Slott weirdly started referencing Jim Crow laws when fans said that Peter Parker should remain white for his cinematic appearances. It was just days ago that Gawker’s Sam Biddle said “Spider-Man is a fucking dork” because he is a straight white male who does not do drugs or have sex as a high school teenager.
The ideal Peter Parker for Wired and Gawker writers is apparently a popular gay black woman who does copious amounts of drugs while engaging in teen orgies. Classic.
Maybe instead of being bitten by a radioactive spider, Peter (or was it Pam?) could snort an arachnid up her nose like a line of cocaine. Maybe that would take away the “fucking dork” status. (If you write for Gawker, then you have to swear because that somehow makes your arguments more valid.)
The one bright spot in all of this is that Stan Lee is speaking up.
Newsarama reported June 22:
“I wouldn’t mind, if Peter Parker had originally been black, a Latino, an Indian or anything else, that he stay that way. But we originally made him white. I don’t see any reason to change that. …
I think the world has a place for gay superheroes, certainly. But again, I don’t see any reason to change the sexual proclivities of a character once they’ve already been established. I have no problem with creating new, homosexual superheroes. It has nothing to do with being anti-gay, or anti-black, or anti-Latino, or anything like that. Latino characters should stay Latino. The Black Panther should certainly not be Swiss. I just see no reason to change that which has already been established when it’s so easy to add new characters. I say create new characters the way you want to. Hell, I’ll do it myself.”
But hey, what does Stan Lee know? Until he’s a gay black heroin addict his authority on all things Peter Parker is pretty much zero.
Douglas Ernst Blog 
Ah, well thanks for clarifying what is going on. I’ve seen that kid’s photo in a couple places with some snide comments attached to it and I had no idea why. What a bunch of bullies! Shouldn’t somebody now be looking for a half black, half latino, to replace Angela Watercutter? Isn’t it hypocritical for her role as diversity cop to be played by a fresh faced white girl?
I think that’s why people like Angela make strange comments about white people. They’re advertising to the world (i.e., their ideological cliques), “Look! Look! I’m not like them. I’m not like those other white people.”
They seem to think that if they intellectually flog other white people and sort of take any opportunity to diminish “whiteness” (whatever the heck that even means in their warped minds), then it’s somehow racial penance paid in full. Maybe all these western feminists should go move to Saudi Arabia if “whiteness” is so evil. They can live under Islamic rule for a bit and get a taste of how the rest of the world lives.
You make a good point. It is ironic for a white woman enjoying all the freedom of the western world to be complaining about how oppressive things are for women. It reminds me of the guy in Oregon standing on the street corner with his sign, “America is fascist.” If America were truly fascist you would not have the freedom to look like a moron holding a sign on a street corner!
The only thing more ironic than that is having the leader of the free world flying over the little people in his private jet and lecturing us all about how racism is firmly embedded in our DNA.
I guess the thing that bothers me is that there’s some sort of strange insinuation that white people have a monopoly on sin. I don’t think so, Wired. I don’t think so, Gawker. I don’t think so, Tumblr kiddies. Try traveling around the world for a little bit or reading a few history books if you’re short on cash. There is plenty of sinful nature to go around. Take a walk through the Middle East or northern Africa if you want to see just how eager very non-white populations are to kill each other.
I believe the latest Islamic State video shows them drowning their victims instead of burning them alive… But hey, why talk about the Islamic State flag when we can talk about the Confederate flag, right? Sigh.
Amen! These are scary times because so many people have grown up in enough comfort and safety that they now take our country and our freedoms for granted. People do not understand what it is like out in the “real world,” all through history. America as the greatest evil, compared to what?? They have nothing else to compare it too, so we simply become the biggest sinners ever to walk the planet, while those who genuinely wish us harm are now protected and defended, perceived as victims.
Reblogged this on pundit from another planet.
“I just see no reason to change that which has already been established when it’s so easy to add new characters. I say create new characters the way you want to.”
I’d like to see Stan speak up more and really give the interfering moronic SJW’s a serve.
Stan needs to see the writing on the wall. These people want to totally warp his creation. The skin obsession is just weird, but when they start wanting him to use drugs, turn gay, criticize him for being a “dork” (Ummm, the unpopular element is sort of essential to his origin, Gawker), then we have problems.
I would as well. My friend Captain Frugal just had a discussion with a SJW about this and other topics and the person could not understand facts. The SJW then asked him if he is white as if that mattered. I don’t think he received the answer he wanted since CF is technically not white since he is 40% Native American. SJW mind blown.
The fact is they are using minorities for a marketing stunt and making them tokens, shame on them.
Y’know, at this point, it might just be easier to copy-and-paste some old comments and just splice in the appropriate names. It’s like a broken record at this point.
Race doesn’t and shouldn’t matter. Has Angela (and the other people whining about this) considered the possibility that Tom Holland is right for the part? Obviously not. I don’t know Holland off the top of my head, but he certainly looks like Peter. And Marvel has been pretty good at casting actors: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Mark Ruffalo–okay, not that last one, but he’s the exception that proves the rule. And, of course, there’s Samuel L. Jackson, though that comes with a qualifier. Marvel had to use him; it was part of a deal for letting them use his likeness for Ultimate Nick Fury, but Jackson’s a great actor, so big deal.
The funniest thing about this is that the news broke mere days after Bendis and Marvel were taking victory laps over Miles Morales. Oh, I’d love to be a fly on the wall of the Marvel offices when this was announced. It’s like the perfect demonstration of how much more important the movies are than the comics.
“Y’know, at this point, it might just be easier to copy-and-paste some old comments and just splice in the appropriate names. It’s like a broken record at this point.”
There’s the rub, though. These people never stop. They are constantly chipping away at the culture…trying to deconstruct everything and then build it back up into a fun house mirror version of its former glory. Peter Parker can’t just be Peter Parker. He has to be gay Peter Parker. He has to be druggie Peter Parker. He has to be popular and black and having sex when he’s 15 years old or else he’s a “fucking dork.”
Do guys like us just throw our hands up and let them do it, or do we push back against the tide? Good question. I really just want to move to the mountains on most days. When I’m in Montana and every U.S. city looks like Detroit, I’ll just shake my head, sigh, and then go back to whatever trail I was hiking.
Reblogged this on Aussiedlerbetreuung und Behinderten – Fragen.
I wonder sometimes — is there a number that’s “enough” minority characters? Does it have to be exactly 13% (the percentage of black people in the US population)? Of characters? Sales?
Is it always better to replace a white character with a minority character? If so, why? Is that true up to some point, or is it true absolutely? Is that because more minority characters is automatically good, fewer white characters is automatically good, or both? To what extent are creators obligated to make changes to their casting that might negatively impact their own project’s success?
I can’t figure any sort of principle to it, is my point. And the whole thing is stupid; when 60+% of your audience is white, they’re going to generally prefer white characters, because that’s what they are. That’s not prejudice. If you go to China, you better believe all nearly all the characters are Chinese. I don’t understand why it’s so hard for people to process that businesses will want to reflect what the majority of consumers like, and that that has nothing to do with how anyone feels about any particular group.
As far as I’m concerned, if corporations want to have 100% white characters, that’s their decision. That just creates market space for other people to create content starring other kinds of people, if they want (apparently not that important, since the whole world watches the US’s movies full of people that don’t look like them). If they want to hire the actor that fits best regardless of race (as long as it makes sense), that’s fine too. But having quotas of minorities is just silly. There are black people in China, but you’re not going to see them on TV, because that’s not what Chinese prefer to see.
Bravo Stan, he just said what I have been saying!
If this is the kind of reverence these people have for the character while Stan Lee is alive, then imagine what they will come up with after he is gone. I’m glad that he is on record saying that these activists should just come up with their own creations if they want more diversity.
The aggravating thing is that we have all of these race demagogues complaining about how this or that white character shouldn’t be white anymore while none of them have lifted a finger to bring greater awareness to non-white heroes. It would make a hell of a lot more sense to try to bring those characters to the forefront and make them top-tier than to rewrite old canons. Hell, Marvel should make a Cloak and Dagger movie.
“It would make a hell of a lot more sense to try to bring those characters to the forefront and make them top-tier than to rewrite old canons. Hell, Marvel should make a Cloak and Dagger movie.”
Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. That’s crazy talk. And by “crazy,” I mean “logical.” 😉 How could Marvel creators get fawning press coverage if they just quietly did the right thing? How could Brian Michael Bendis, Dan Slott, Wired and Gawker writers, and a whole slew of other media activists put themselves up on moral pedestals if they just made and promoted, say, a really cool Deathlok movie?
I hope you don’t want to work for Marvel because you’ll never get hired if you keep using common sense and reason.
I’m not surprised that the SJWs in the media are throwing tantrums because a white guy was cast Peter Parker. They always flip out when things don’t go their way, and are constantly scouring the internet to look for things to get outraged about. They don’t understand that Peter Parker has always been white, and that when the general public thinks of Spider-Man, they think Peter Parker, not Miles Morales.
What kills me is that the SJWs have a platform to voice their insane views, and that people in the media listen to them. In the pre-internet days, they would’ve rightly dismissed as total cranks and told to seek help.
I’ve said this before: if people want non-white superheroes, they should create them or promoting existing non-white heroes. Don’t change an existing white character because a bunch of angry Tumblr idiots have demanded you do so.
This whole SJW/Liberal invasion in comics, movies, video games, etc. is happening because of the internet. SJW’s/Liberals are the way that they are because they are losers in life. Who are the ones always complaining about how female characters are too “sexy”? Unattractive women who are jealous of fictional characters because they think that “sexy” fictional characters are/or will keep them from getting a man, and unattractive men who can’t get a woman so they try and kiss up to these women. All the attractive and confident women all like the way females are portrayed in comics, if you look at con pictures, all the attractive women all cosplay these so called “degrading” images!
I said all of this is happening because of the internet, why? Because in the real world, if you saw what these people really were and what their lives were like and you listen to the things they said, you wouldn’t even take them seriously because you would know right away that they are LOSERS. That’s why they hate what Peter Parker represents, he has STRENGTH and liberals don’t.
Also the internet is their soapbox because the internet needs content, so they can just keep spewing this stuff over and over and it justifies the internet existing. As I said in the real world pre-internet these people didn’t even have a platform and people that had these views even then (like Mark Waid) didn’t come out with all of this stuff.
By the way, Mark Waid gave an interview about “All New All Different Avengers” and he kept bringing up the fact that it is really good that there is only one White guy on the team.
Marvel’s hand in this, in my opinion? They are just going along with the popular trend of the time, in which you just spout off liberal ideas to get a pat on the head…
Cosplay girls will even take outfits that are plain and make them into “sexy” versions (e.g., “sexy” female Deadpool). I’ve gone to a few conventions and seen random women walking around the floor as Catwoman with their butts in the air, etc. There are plenty of female comic book fans who subscribe to the “if you’ve got it, then flaunt it” mentality. That’s why Social Justice Weenies need to just go away and let everyone do their own thing.
We can have books that cater to liberal feminists and we can have books that cater to women who like to show skin at conventions. We can have books that portray every female character as flawless in every regard for liberal feminists, and we can have books where women are like normal human beings. I’m very libertarian in that regard, but the SJW crowd seems to draw its inspiration from North Korea.
If articles like the one from Wired were limited to, “there’s no reason Peter Parker in the films has to played by a white actor,” then that would be a valid argument. After all, other than the comics, there’s nothing which really states Peter has to be white, and films adapted from comics don’t look 100% identical to their source material anyway. I can also understand the frustration in wanting something different for another Spider-Man film, especially since this would be the second reboot in less than a decade, and effect which is bound to carry with it a sense of fatigue to potential movie-goers. But what they’re these articles really seem to be calling is for Spider-Man in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to be Miles Morales, not Peter Parker. Which means, in a desire for having more diversity in superhero films, these critics also haven’t considered any the following:
1. It’s not just comic book readers who see comic book movies. Matter-of-fact, the general audience who sees comic book movies far outnumbers those who read comic books. And as far as the general audience is concerned, Peter Parker is Spider-Man. There was no way Marvel, as part of their deal with Sony, was going to reintroduce Spider-Man into the Marvel Cinematic Universe and not have it be the character most people are familiar with—something even Forbes in their article acknowledged.
2. In order to establish Miles Morales, you need to establish Peter Parker first. Because Miles’ origin as Spider-Man is entirely dependent upon Peter having already been Spider-Man and, what’s more, no longer being Spider-Man, either because he was killed like in the Ultimate Comics, or is forced to retire in some capacity. This means that, in order to have Miles as Spidey in the films, you need to make yet another origin story—the very thing Marvel and Sony are trying to avoid with the new film.
3. There are more than 50 plus years of Spider-Man stories featuring Peter Parker to draw inspiration from, versus the four years worth of Spider-Man stories featuring Miles Morales (and very decompressed ones at that thanks to Brian Michael Bendis’ writing style). There’s a lot of iconic moments in that 50 plus year history and to arbitrarily insert Miles into them would just seem unnecessary. Not to mention that since Miles is supposed to be a different character with his own personality and history, those iconic moments would no longer have the same context.
4. Shaking the Spider-Man franchise up by having Miles Morales instead of Peter Parker isn’t going to matter jack-you-know-what if the film isn’t any good. You can have the most diverse group of talented actors and top notch special effects and production values, but none of that is going to matter if the story and script sucks. This is what happened with Amazing Spider-Man 2 and why Sony is rebooting the franchise with the Marvel Studios deal in the first place. Andrew Garfield was, quite possibly, one the best actors to play Peter Parker/Spider-Man, the chemistry between him and Emma Stone’s Gwen Stacy was undeniable, and the effects (especially the Spidey stuff) were the best of any Spidey film to date. But almost everyone agrees that the script for that film was terrible, and the performances from otherwise excellent actors such as Jamie Foxx and Dane Dehann were utterly wasted in thankless roles. It’s content, content, content which matters.
“If articles like the one from Wired were limited to, “there’s no reason Peter Parker in the films has to played by a white actor,” then that would be a valid argument.”
Agreed. But not only do they essentially call for Peter Parker to be killed off or rendered obsolete in favor of Miles, they do it in a really nasty way. The creators and these mean-spirited writers have a strange symbiotic relationship going on that allows them to see us as somehow the “bad” guys. Why? Because we’re actually faithful to the character’s roots.
Which definitely says more about those writers, I agree. Of course, the irony to all of this is Spider-Man, whether it was by accident or design, was a superhero who already had a wide appeal all across racial and ethnic lines regardless of the color of his skin. That’s because Spidey is the everyman and every-nerd superhero, and anyone who’s ever had to struggle making ends meet or maintaining relationships (which is pretty much everyone) can relate. And since Spidey wears a full-body costume covering him from head-to-toe, most of the time you don’t see what color his skin really is, which means every kid from any background can easily imagine themselves as Spidey already. And this is something even the comics have explicitly shown more than once.
Sort of related, Doug: here’s a Tweet from Mark “Go F*** Yourself” Waid, where he quotes fellow writer Kieron Gillen: “‘Regarding fans, I would encourage them to be a little more relaxed about books that aren’t for them.’ Year’s best quote,from @kierongillen.”
It reminds me of Nick Lowe’s “Permission to Leave” comments and our old “friend” X-menxpert’s comments that comics shouldn’t be for everyone.
These guys don’t know whether they’re coming or going. Bendis says we have to write books for “everybody” — by turning white characters into minorities or females instead of creating new heroes — but yet fans who think that’s weird are told books for “everybody” aren’t for everybody. Interesting.
“Maybe instead of being bitten by a radioactive spider, Peter (or was it Pam?) could snort an arachnid up her nose like a line of cocaine.”
I don’t know about you but that sounds like it would hurt. lol
Now I’ve had this argument with many a people, and it makes me absolutely relieved that Stan “The Man” Lee would come out and tell these yuks what’s what. I’ve known Peter Parker/Spider-Man since I was 7 years old, and I’d like to think I know his character better than this Angela person. But if you’re gonna go full retard with the race goggles and cry out “Why can’t you just use Miles Morales for the next Spider-Man film instead of Peter Parker again?”, why stop there? Why not Miguel O’Hara? He’s half Irish and Hispanic. Why focus on the character when you can over sensationalize their skin color? Who cares about character anymore, the race is all that matters!
Also this isn’t anything new from Gawker really. This hipster rag has been nothing short of a propaganda mill for hacks like Anita Sarkeesian and her ilk.
She’s an anti-white racist, and they think everything is class war.