This topic came up when I was talking to my brother recently. He has three girls and they just finished watching the Obi-Wan show and my brother said that show was such a blatant example of pushing girl power where it made no sense and it clearly showed the writers didn't know or didn't care about Star Wars. Now my brother likes Andor and Mandalorian so he isn't at my level where I cancelled Disney plus and truly despise disney Star Wars, but around his girls I remain positive since I don't want to ruin their fun because the sequels were the first Star Wars they were exposed to and then they watched the rest. I am thinking for Christmas I may buy some EU books for his daughters to get them into that timeline.
But he was just frustrated at the endless push to get women into things that generally appeal to men and he said men and women generally like different things. It's just that simple.
I would love to be at one of the panels at a Con where someone like Anita Sarkessian or the Star Wars, RIngs of Power, Wheel of Time writers give their usual speech about not seeing many women, people of color, etc. and simply ask them why they don't understand that certain thing appeal to more guys than women or that there were always women/minorities that were into these hobbies but they think something is wrong if a large number of white guys enjoy something.
Anyway, do you see this trend waning? I'd like to think so but even with constant flops nothing changes. I really miss the days of being laughed at for reading comic books or a sci-fi novel because the worthless activists in charge of the shows or the ones winning the Hugos or Nebulas were most likely the very people who mocked nerds or thought gamers were losers until they saw those things being trendy and jumped on board.
My brother and is family are on the east coast so I only see them once or twice a year. The girls range between 9 and 15. Until I gave up all Disney Star Wars I liked Rogue One (although the Vader scene really adds to the cool factor) and mandalorian but while I know it sounds petty even watching mandalorian makes me remember it all leads to sequels. I am not sure what the girls think outside of being Mandalorian fans. I know my brother hated Kenobi because he said that was clearly a girl power show.
I know Disney owns the property and are free to do what they want but considering you had a good chunk of fans like me invested in the books and comics why not just have a separate continuity along with your own canon? They could write stories for both. And for KK to say we have no source material after not using what Lucas gave her and trashing the EU that still annoys me a bit. After leaving the theater after episode nine my first thought was This was all they had?! Had Favreau been involved with the sequels I don’t think you would have the bitterness of fans like me.
But sorry for the Star Wars rant, you are right. There was a time when a race or gender swap didn’t bother me since it wasn’t very often but now it’s a red flag because you know the motives. Or like Rings of Power or Wheel of Time. The cast can’t shut up about representation or race. What is most ironic is that for all the talk of diversity so many movies and shows are predictable because you know that the women will be much better than men, the white guy is a buffoon or learns to recognize his privilege, black people endlessly talking about race, etc.