by Jamison Ashley
|
EVERYONE at Bleeding Fool is excited to see the upcoming Black Panther film from Marvel Studios. I MEAN EVERYONE.
Jim Treacher at PJ Media recently weighed in on the controversy along with a quote from Ryan Coogler, the film’s director, in response to the supposed boycott. Classy all the way.
Every so often we see a certain kind of entertainment news pseudo-controversy: “There’s a new [big-budget franchise] movie coming out, and the new [big-budget franchise character] is a black person, and those racist right-wingers are freaking out again. Quick, everybody, let’s pat ourselves on the back about how awful those racists are, and how progressive and open-minded we are in comparison!” We saw it when Idris Elba was cast as Heimdall in the Thor movies. We saw it when Michael B. Jordan was cast as the Human Torch in that regrettable Fantastic Four movie. We saw it when John Boyega was cast as a renegade Stormtrooper in The Force Awakens.
And each time it was just a handful of trolls, authentically racist or ironically racist or both, triggering a bunch of good-hearted people who just couldn’t believe anybody could be such an awful bigot in [current year]. You would see the “controversy” trending on social media, not because anybody was actually agreeing with the trolls, but because lots of people felt compelled to voice their opposition.
Yet somehow, that opposition to racism became proof of some vast racist conspiracy. If “Stop the Klan” is trending, there must be a Klansman on every street corner, right?
Yes, racism exists. No, there was no organized racist plot against Finn from Star Wars.
Now it’s happening again with the upcoming Marvel movie Black Panther. But this time, if the director of the film is any indication, the reaction might be different. Bill Bradley, HuffPo:
A Facebook group called Down With Disney’s Treatment of Franchises and Its Fanboys, whose moderator describes himself as “alt-right,” recently announced its plans to intentionally tank “Black Panther’s” Rotten Tomatoes score once the movie starts showings on Feb. 15…
On Thursday, we asked [ Black Panther director Ryan] Coogler for his thoughts on the group’s threat against “Black Panther.” The director hadn’t heard about Down With Disney, but he didn’t seem fazed when we explained it.
“For me, I’m looking forward to everybody seeing the film,” Coogler said. “I’m really looking forward to sharing the film with audiences regardless of what their political views are … that’s kind of where I [stand on that].”
This is the correct response. This is the only correct response. If somebody tries to troll you, the answer isn’t to freak out and declare yourself a victim. The answer is to dismiss it. Laugh at it. Treat it like what it is: nothing.
The Down with Disney page is no longer on Facebook, which makes it every bit as threatening as when it was on Facebook. Because, as cooler heads have pointed out:
Fun fact, did you know that literally anyone can start a Facebook page and claim to be a member of any group https://t.co/H7sg1NaDQq
— Alex Griswold (@HashtagGriswold) February 2, 2018
Read the whole thing at PJ Media here
The same kind of rumor was started to try to explain that Star Wars the Last Jedi was being down-voted by “alt-right” fans to boycott the pro-feminism message of the latest Star Wars movie. Rotten Tomatoes flatly denied that was true, and explained that the poor audience score was legitimate. So if the movie is good, the score will be good. You can’t hack the RT score, folks. Stop getting worried about dumb things like this. Go see Black Panther in theatres on February 16, 2018.
=====================
Follow Jim on Twitter @jtLOL
