I hear some youtubers say that the tide is turning and they cite things like the Chappelle special or the Gervais special. I can kind of see where they are coming from, but people still flock to see Marvel movies and Marvel along with other studios still can't shut up about representation.
I would have to see the following to believe a major tide is turning:
Black character in a movie where they don't need to discuss race
Male character doesn't need to be surrounded by "much better" women
Gay character has a devout Christian friend/relative who still loves and respects them despite their beliefs
A book adaptation where the main character is white..... is actually white in the show/movie
Period pieces actually look like the people from that period.
Any show/movie that addresses immigration doesn't make anyone who isn't for open borders an evil person.
Yes, I know that is unrealistic but seeing as how Wheel of Time was a book that had plenty of females and non-white characters once they leave their area and they still had to butcher the source material I have little hope and will continue with my rule of "be very wary of anything made after 2014".
What do y'all think? Is the tide actually turning and I'm just too cynical to see it?
No.
I just watched Top Gun: Maverick. Was a pretty good movie, which is exceptionally rare for me to say. Didn't have a Mary Sue chick show up Tom Cruise to show us how great she was and how he always actually kind of sucked. Has realistic conflicts and relationships.
Some of the characters were kind of set already; they can't replace Cruise, by bringing back Goose's kid they're stuck with a white guy there, Iceman was already Val Kilmer.
However, we've got a brand new class of Top Gun students. Well, when they introduce these new students, you get the "cool, collected" group and you get the "pathetic mal-adjusted autistic loser" and the "cocky, overconfident asshole."
Well, the "cool, collected group" is all female or non-white. (I think there might have been one white guy who didn't really get any lines and didn't have a character defect). The asshole and loser were just coincidentally white guys. You can immediately guess who will end up being selected to run the mission when the new class is introduced. The main female pilot has to stick up for the loser and take the asshole down a peg.
Furthermore, every authority figure that hates Maverick is a white guy. The higher ranking officers that support him are all black. The command deck during missions are stuffed full of women giving status updates.
And as a nice cherry on top, Maverick finds himself in a rural town at one point and walks into a diner. Obviously it's full of a bunch of backwards looking rednecks that think he's a space man because he's wearing a flight suit.
It's not overt girl power crap and nobody mentions race explicitly. But it's just the same predictable shit Hollywood has been doing for decades now. And once you see it, you can't un-see it.
With respect, having also seen the movie and loved it, I think you are just looking for reasons to nitpick.
The "cool, collected" ones still have their own issues. Phoenix has an arrogant streak to her as well, she just keeps it in check better. And while Hangman is indeed a cocky asshole, it is repeatedly shown throughout the movie that, like Mav in the first movie, he is cocky because he has the skill to back it up. He is the only one who can even keep up with Mav in training, with everyone else consistently losing. I also think calling Bob a "pathetic mal-adjusted autistic loser" is not accurate. He is shown to be a mild stick in the mud when first meeting everyone, but in other scenes you see him cut loose and actually get along and join in the party. Also worth mentioning that Bob is more in line with most fighter pilots I have ever met, if that means anything to you.
For authority figures, the black one standing up for him is one. The only other prominent black guy is Mavs personal mechanic. And the black guy is outranked by the white guy who dislikes Mav. And part of the point is that Mav has done tons of shit that he would have gotten him either thrown out of the Navy or even arrested. Its explicitly stated that the only reason he even still has his wings is because Iceman is using his Admiral rank to protect him.
And of course, the dinner scene is nothing like you describe. He is getting gwacked at because he is out of place and covered in scorching. The only one who calls him a "space man" is a little kid who wouldnt know better. I also wouldnt describe the crowd as "backward rednecks." They looked like totally average working class people, nothing more, nothing less.
Dont get me wrong. I think Hollywood will burn before it changes its ways. I just dont think Top Gun is an example of being woke unless you want to make the bar for "woke" be so low as to be useless.
Look, I get it. It's nitpicky, I know. If it were just this movie, it would be no big deal. Just a coincidence. And like I said, I enjoyed it.
I understood the plot just fine. I understood why Mav was liked by some authority figures. I understood why Mav was disliked by other authority figures. But we, the audience, know that Mav is the good guy and we're supposed to root for him. His antagonists were the white guys, and the sympathetic characters that we, the audience, are supposed to agree with are the black guys.
The pilot personalities were honestly a minor part of the movie. It was just typical and predictable. They were mostly forgettable.
As for the diner scene, let me tell you what would have happened in an actual rural diner if he had walked in like that: everyone would have immediately said, "holy crap! You look awful! Are you ok? What happened?" because that's what happens in rural communities. There would have been no awkward silence as everybody stared at him. Yes, I know it was played for laughs. But I've heard that particular joke a million times already and predictable jokes are boring.
And like I said, it's not just this movie. It's every fucking casting decision in every goddamn Hollywood movie. People have been complaining about how racist and sexist Hollywood is for decades, and honestly, at this point I agree with them. But not for the reasons they state.
Misreading of the movie. The diner scene is funny because of the novelty of a burnt astronaut-looking dude interrupting a regular day. Everyone including Maverick acts like it's weird, because it is.
I didn't see this "cool, collected group" you're talking about. I don't think that actually exists. One of the Hispanic pilots G'd so hard that he passed out, not exactly his fault but not cool either. The other prominent non-whites were Payback and Fanboy and neither of them had much to do in general compared to everyone else. Bottom line they are all elite pilots, and the most skilled pilot is Hangman (the jerk).
Phoenix (the girl) was neither terrible, nor super special wonderful. Bob looked like a weak nerd in the beginning but the point of his character is that he's actually an amazing EWO. Dimensionality creates memorable characters. Hangman got his redemption just like Iceman.
I don't get this white authority figure thing, the black no.2 of Jon Hamm obviously doesn't approve of Maverick either. Was there even another non-white commanding figure in the movie?
Rorschach test I guess.
That's the whole fucking point! The only characters allowed to have any obvious character flaws are the white guys. Sometimes they get to redeem them, sometimes they don't. But nobody else has any goddamn flaws. Sticking up for your friend and taking the piss out of a hothead aren't flaws. Also "cool, collected" has nothing to with testing human limits and passing out in the process. That's not a character flaw.
And yeah, Phoenix wasn't super special or terrible. I never said she was. In fact, I said:
But as soon as I saw her, I knew she was flying the mission. Because Hollywood is predictable. The only reason it didn't hurt the movie was because it didn't really end up mattering who flew the mission; they were all just interchangeable bland characters except Rooster, who obviously had to be special because the story required it.
The thing is, the non-white/non-male characters don't have any particular strengths either and are backgrounded. Phoenix standing up for the nerd happens in the first quarter of runtime and is irrelevant to the plot. The notion of a "cool" group simply does not exist.
Dimensionality and screentime determine the importance of a character, so basically most of the important characters are white males. That even includes Jon Hamm's admiral, because he actually shows he's got a tiny bit of guts and principle near the end.
It's not a character strength either, it's portrayed as a neutral training accident.
When the student pilots were introduced, I saw what looked like a pretty easy-going, cool group that was getting along well, and a couple of obvious (white male) misfits. I guess you didn't see that. Even though you agree that all of the flawed pilots were white men and the other pilots had no flaws. Whatever. Fortunately, the pilots' individual personalities had very little to do with the rest of the story, which is why I said it didn't really detract from the overall movie experience.
It's also not a trope or a climax or a dinosaur or an encyclopedia or a Volkswagen, but I never claimed it was any of those things, so I'm not sure what your point is. Unless you're just disagreeing to disagree. In that case, feel free to list all of the other things that you think it isn't until the end of time. I promise I'll read it when you're through.
Either way, I'm out. You've just repeated my arguments back to me and then split some irrelevant hairs about what you think is or isn't "cool," and I don't feel like clarifying for you further.
My point is very simple, that characters without obvious flaws or strengths are insignificant to theme.
Flaming out because you were pressed on this, not even with a hint of personal attack, shows you're not very "collected" yourself.
Short answer is no.
As much as I wish you were wrong you aren’t. As I said Wheel of Time got a second season and you wouldn’t believe the people on YouTube twisting themselves in knots to justify the changes
Mainstream media and every other major institution is still solely under leftist control.
How will things change if the same people who fucked it up in the first place are still in charge?
Sad but true. But they have to see that pushing lgbt in everything makes no sense due to them being a tiny fraction of the population or constant racial stuff or “strong female character” are not popular
They don't just get money from QE. The economy is extremely financialized. You fund woke garbage when you buy toilet paper.
The tide is high and the SJWs are holding on. No turn yet.
I don't think the mainstream can ever be reformed. I can see alternate studios popping up and tapping into the demand for non-cucked content. Look at the news media to see how this might look. You have giant rotting legacy outlets that are propped up by vested interests and their own inertia, but you also have alternate outlets popping up through the rotting edifice and they're often quite good. So I don't think entertainment is completely doomed but there's no putting the woke genie back in its bottle.
No. If the "turning tide" is anything but trannies being depicted as psychos and rapists, maligned the same way white men and Christianity are today, then the answer is No. A rich black man lightly poking at crossdressers is basically nothing.
Yea one comedy special means nothing. Like I said I’d have to see a lot more. For starters a faithful adaptation of a book
Abandon all hope for Western media. Just watch older stuff or stuff not made in the west.
I highly doubt stuff is ever gonna change in that regard..not without a big change in culture as a whole.
Let's see how The Kangz of da Rangz performs in September.
But honestly I think November will be a better indication.
Given that we have had some variation of this thread every few months for 6 years now, I'm going to say No
Did the gays stop pushing their dicks in man poo? If the answer is no, you have your answer.
Woke or not modern entertainment is not very entertaining and no i am not watching any prequels/sequels from 80's & 90's movies.
I generally watch older stuff. Same with my reading
Nope, finding the occasional gold nugget does not change the fact that you are looking through sewage for it.
Woke media was never about reflecting public cultural norms, but influencing them. Just because a couple of comedy programs bucked the trend doesn't mean the money propping up all the cultural destruction propaganda has dried up, and it won't stop until that money goes.
They might realize how badly being blatant has backfired and go back to being more subtle, but bear in mind that nothing has happened to change their motivations since they were openly trying to brainwash you and your children.
Some people appear to be so overwhelmed by the wokeness that they cling on to this straw despite all the evidence to the contrary. The resistance is bigger, yes, but it's still a long way to go. Don't give up yet.
Yea, I see few signs but like you said we have a very long way to go.
Not even in the slightest. As long as woke entertainment gets funding from you (via the government) and ESG funding they don't have to worry about not turning a profit.
Yea. Comic books being a huge example with libraries