That's the whole fucking point! The only characters allowed to have any obvious character flaws are the white guys.

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.

Also "cool, collected" has nothing to with testing human limits and passing out in the process. That's not a character flaw.

It's not a character strength either, it's portrayed as a neutral training accident.

That's the whole fucking point! The only characters allowed to have any obvious character flaws are the white guys.

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.

That's the whole fucking point! The only characters allowed to have any obvious character flaws are the white guys.

The thing is, the non-white/non-male characters don't have any particular strengths either and are firmly 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.