Fish and Cherries Productions

I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that most of you have become aware of the new remake of Annie coming out this year, the spin being that the cast is almost entirely African-American. Naturally, as with every time a character’s race is changed in a remake or adaptation, this has caused a bit of an uproar with some uncomfortable words attached. To give my personal thoughts briefly, I’m not thrilled about the film, but it’s less about changing the race of the characters than wondering if we really need another adaptation of Annie. Also, as a person from a musical theater background, I have a problem when classic showtunes are “updated” by adding a hip-hop back beat or a pop remix. However, seeing as two of the movie’s producers are Jay-Z and Will Smith, it’s entirely possible that was part of the contract.

But that situation brings my attention to a controversy of the same nature that cropped up a month or two ago. This may have slipped under the radar, but 20th Century Fox is rebooting the Fantastic Four film franchise with a completely new cast and crew. The big twist? Johnny Storm, also known as the Human Torch, is now black. Sure enough, copious amounts of people got their undies in a bundle over this, since Johnny has always been white in the comics. The question then becomes if this whole thing is worth all the fuss. Personally, I would say it’s worth some concern, but not for the reasons you’d think.

There’s nothing wrong with changing a character’s race in an adaptation to give representation to the POC section of the population. After all, it worked for Heimdall in the Thor movies, seeing as he was one of the best parts of it. However, changing the Human Torch’s race comes with a little more baggage than that. You see, the Fantastic Four are known as the quintessential Marvel family in every meaning of the word, since Johnny and Sue Storm are siblings and Sue eventually marries Reed Richards (Ben Grimm is… um… the best friend that’s like family and crashes on their couch, I guess?). But here’s the thing: they made Johnny black, but kept Sue white and this just raises a lot of questions. Is Johnny a foster child? Are they step-siblings now? Have they been changed to cousins in this version? Now, if the movie addresses this, I’ll be completely fine with it. It could even be a great statement about what family truly means in the 21st Century and how blood relation isn’t the only definition.

UPDATE: I am told that Sue is the foster child in the Storm family in the upcoming reboot. However, given this next bit, I don’t think that helps matters.

But really, my issue isn’t that they’re making Johnny black. No, my issue is that they’re keeping Sue white.

If the filmmakers wanted to go all the way with this concept, they would have made both of the Storm siblings African-American. But for some reason, Sue, who I remind you is the one who gets married, kept her ethnicity. I’m not normally one to deconstruct things too excessively to look for discrimination, which should disappoint the faculty of UC Santa Cruz. But the more I think about it, the more this rubs me the wrong way.

Maybe it’s the possibility that a much grander statement was denied by not changing the marriage of Reed and Sue into an interracial marriage, or the idea that her race was kept the same because there was some weird societal standard that Caucasian women are somehow prettier or more desirable than African-American ones, or that the womanizer character got a race lift rather than the one in the stable relationship. (Wow, UC Santa Cruz really did get inside my head.) Really, though, what bugs me the most is that on the surface, it seemed like a character’s race was changed for a publicity stunt and no one at any point seems to have asked, “So why don’t we change his sister’s race too?”

At the end of the day, changing race should involve a lot of passion from the people doing it. We may not have asked for a racially different update to Annie, but the people behind it probably felt that this was a big step for the community. I detect no such passion behind the Fantastic Four change. To me, that strikes as a lazy attempt to try and seem like they’re progressive and with the times in order to trick more money out of the hands of moviegoers, as well as Fox’s attempt at being edgy and trying to keep up with the mainstream Marvel films. So when all is said and done, I do not believe the sun’ll come out tomorrow on this reboot.

Guardians of the Galaxy was, as expected, a lot of fun and a great direction for the Marvel Cinematic Universe to go. It’s interesting because apart from being a new, untested property, Guardians also has the least continuity connection with the rest of the movies (apart from one significant plotline), which was refreshing, but at the same time I sorely missed some reference to the Asgardians or having the only human scene have a Stark Industries billboard in the background. It’s also a new direction because this is the first straight up comedy in the franchise; while Iron Man and Thor definitely straddled the line between action and comedy, Guardians of the Galaxy dives in head first and decides it doesn’t want to come up for air. Sadly, though, the comedy water didn’t penetrate all of its internal organs, as the villains are both lacking in humor and personality. They’re cool, but that’s about it. While we’re on the subject of weak characters, I felt that Gamora was underutilized and didn’t really live up to her reputation as the deadliest woman in the universe. The rest of the main cast is great fun, though I have to give the award to Bradley Cooper as Rocket Raccoon. That man truly nailed the part. With all that said, I’m worried that there’s a bit of a quirkiness to the directing, writing, and editing that may put people off a bit, though I personally enjoyed it. All in all, though, if you can get past that, you’ve got a great experience that I will personally recommend (could’ve used more “I am Groot,” though). Now, Marvel, if you could now do a Captain/Ms. Marvel and Black Panther movie, that would be great. Don’t keep me waiting now.

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is a mixed bag of varying qualities. On the one hand, it continued the previous movie’s tradition of giving Spider-Man the humor that the previous film series was sorely lacking, some of the music (particularly Electro’s theme) is quite cool, and the stuff between Peter and Gwen really feels genuine at times. On the other hand, the script has a lot of shortcomings, there was a little too much going on to feel complete, the villains’ motivations (save for Harry Osborn) are really weak, and the reveal of Richard Parker’s secret that the trailers have hyped up so much was a real letdown. On top of that, the more I think about it, the more I realize that the movie doesn’t do a good job of portraying foreigners, as the Russian Rhino and the German Dr. Kafka turn in laughably cartoonish performances that would probably tick me off were I a native of any of those countries. If you were wondering if there was a stinger after the credits, there is… for the upcoming X-Men movie, which makes its placement here absolutely baffling. Despite some really good stuff here and there, I wouldn’t go see it again. The best adaptation of Spider-Man to date was Greg Weisman’s Spectacular Spider-Man and this movie doesn’t even come close to capturing its brilliance. It is worth noting, however, that the series was canceled before its time to allow this movie franchise to exist, so take some time to mull on that for a bit.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier is a thrilling action movie and a great addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The thing I’m discovering is that each of the mini franchises in the MCU corners a certain niche that they excel at and the Captain America series’ niche is drama and heartbreak. Apart from some very strong 9/11 parallels that this movie touches upon, the characters of the Winter Soldier and Falcon are welcome additions to the world and there is a very strong theme of control vs. rogue elements running through multiple layers of the story. If I had to pick something to complain about, it’s that I found the shaky cam a bit distracting during some of the fight scenes and some of the male gaze scenes on Natasha were a little blatant. However, for the last one, you could argue that they were from Steve’s perspective and that there was an equal amount of female gaze shots present. Besides, both are minor nitpicks in what is arguably the second best film in the franchise and an absolute must-see.

Thor: The Dark World is an immensely funny, action-packed, and very strong entry to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The fight scenes were amazing, the dialogue was sharp and punchy, and Loki once again, stole the show right from under Thor’s feet. Admittedly, there are some awkward elements, like the Darcie and Ian scenes which feel like they belong in a different movie altogether and a few of the jokes did leave me less than amused. However, this barely detracts from a very intense story that culminates in an incredibly creative and epic final battle. This is my second favorite Marvel movie, right under The Avengers, possibly under the first Iron Man as well.

EDIT: Admittedly, after a little while has passed, some of the flaws because more apparent, but that still doesn’t make this a bad movie by any means.

The first time I saw The Wolverine, I was so exhausted that I kept dozing off. After seeing it again, I can definitively say that it is a conflicting movie. On the downside, it drags very heavily in the second act and some of the action scenes feel incredibly long. On the upside, the action scene on the bullet train is absolutely amazing and it cleanses the pallet of the previous, rather awful Wolverine movie. It also avoids one of the major problems of the first movie where they made an action movie around an indestructible protagonist and instead made it a drama with action scenes. After all, there are few characters who have as much easily mineable angst as Wolverine. The movie is far from perfect, as there are a few characters that feel underutilized or underdeveloped, but on the whole, it’s worth a watch. There’s also a post-credits scene that will make fans of the franchise wet their pants, so there’s that too.

I return with a vengeance, just in time for China to declare war on me.

NOTE: There may be an edit to this video eventually.