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[ManaByte]

Anthony Mackie Gets Candid About Marvel Studios' Lack of Diversity

Anthony Mackie shares his candid thoughts about seeing a lack of diversity on Marvel Studios productions.

thedirect.com

When "The Falcon and the Winter Soldier" comes out, I'm the lead. When "Snowpiercer" comes out, you're the lead. We have the power and the ability to ask those questions. It really bothered me that I've done seven Marvel movies where every producer, every director, every stunt person, every costume designer, every PA, every single person has been white.

But then when you do "Black Panther," you have a Black director, Black producer, you have a Black costume designer, you have a Black stunt chroeographer. And I'm like, that's more racist than anything else. Because if you only can hire the Black people for the Black movie, are you saying they're not good enough when you have a mostly white cast?

 

[-Arcadia-]

This is why you just hire the best people for the job, and let the racial percentages land where they may.

This is becoming an utter mess. Even the virtue signaling is racist now.

 

[Stiflers Mom]

I fondly remember the times, when movies were just movies.

Really, fuck all this bullshit.

 

[cryptoadam]

Oh my god white people have jobs how horrible. STFU.

The cash chucker needs to go back to acting. Stuid Richer.

 

[SirKicksalot]

I love his takes

 

[It's Jeff]

Thank goodness there's a dedicated team of white liberals on twitter that will inevitably correct him on his perspectives as a black man.

 

[ManaByte]

Thank goodness there's a dedicated team of white liberals on twitter that will inevitably correct him on his perspectives as a black man.

There's a fear that one prominent blogger who owns one of the biggest film sites is going to try to get him fired over this, all because that blogger is banned from interviewing him after Mackie roasted him for four minutes at the Infinity War press junket.

 

[Nymphae]

Well he's not wrong, making a point to hire an all black cast and crew certainly isn't being colour blind.

Shit like this is what gets me:

Dominated by largely white male voices, people of color have had a hard time breaking through and sharing their unique voices with the world through the medium of film....

Citation needed, this sounds nice and truthy on paper but are we just crying that the ratio of POC and WHITE cinema is skewed? I wonder why that might be.

...Marvel Studios made a step in the right direction with Black Panther, a production that featured a mostly Black cast and crew, which broke box-office records and garnered a coveted Best Picture Oscar nomination.

Ok, sounds good, very recent example of "people of colour breaking through and sharing their unique voices", highly praised and successful. BUT....

...However, while Marvel Studios has done a lot for increasing representation, there is still work to be done.

I guess? Why? What does that specifically mean to you?

 

[It's Jeff]

There's a fear that one prominent blogger who owns one of the biggest film sites is going to try to get him fired over this, all because that blogger is banned from interviewing him after Mackie roasted him for four minutes at the Infinity War press junket.

That blogger sounds like a serious pusshole. Who is it?

 

[iconmaster]

Black Panther is racist in its storyline and characters, too.

At heart, it is a movie about a divided, tribalized continent, discovered by a white man who wants nothing more than to take its mineral resources, a continent run by a wealthy, power-hungry, feuding and feudalist elite, where a nation with the most advanced tech and weapons in the world nonetheless has no thinkers to develop systems of transitioning rulership that do not involve lethal combat or coup d’etat.

European ideas of African similitude included Victorian notions of a continent of childishly simple and primitive people, unsoiled by and needing protection from the complexities of modernity and living in harmony with nature on an Edenic paradise...The Afrofuturism of black America, it seems, has little to offer the people of Africa. It cannot engage with them as human beings but, like the white and Chinese worlds, only as props for its own struggles and self-aggrandizement.

 

[ManaByte]

That blogger sounds like a serious pusshole. Who is it?

Frosty from Collider.

It's a long story.

In 2015 he deceptively edited a video where it made it look like Mackie was trashing Man of Steel and DC:


Mackie got PISSED over that and held a grudge over it for years, he even brought it up a year later when doing press for Civil War:


So in 2018 when they were doing the Infinity War press junket, Frosty was interviewing Mackie with Sebastian Stan and Winston Duke. Frosty couldn't get a word in because Mackie was ready for him and went off on him for more than four minutes just blasting him over that video. The whole thing was filmed, but Frosty managed to get Disney Publicity to delete the video and he'll never be allowed to interview Mackie again.

 

[Kadayi]

Black Panther is racist in its storyline and characters, too.

That's some colonial thinking right there REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[SkylineRKR]

This is why you just hire the best people for the job, and let the racial percentages land where they may.

This is becoming an utter mess. Even the virtue signaling is racist now.

Preach.

Its getting out of hand. I said the same thing somewhere else I won't mention (it was about voice actors) and guess what.

They're digging and digging. What if, you know, there are simply more white actors and directors around? Guys like Will Smith were once the best paid actors in Hollywood. Was that about race as well? It was because he had star appeal. Hire the best people for the job.

 

[Tesseract]

There's a fear that one prominent blogger who owns one of the biggest film sites is going to try to get him fired over this, all because that blogger is banned from interviewing him after Mackie roasted him for four minutes at the Infinity War press junket.

what a pussy, i hope mackie crushes that dude's spine

 

[LoV]

I hated Altered Carbon season two, but I loved the first season a lot.

 

[SkylineRKR]

Altered Carbon S2 was neutered garbage to appeal to whining kids. I like Mackie, but you had a black lead, a lesbian, asians, basically any kind of background appeared in that show just to appease everyone. A lot of the changes and obvious messages dragged the show down, the first one wasn't a masterpiece either but it was more fun.

 

[JimiNutz]

They should ban all races.
Nobody of the same sex should be able to have sex or marry. Any babies born of same race parents should be killed or sent to work camps.
Mixed races only.

 

[Sakura Doritos]

They should ban all races.
Nobody of the same sex should be able to have sex or marry. Any babies born of same race parents should be killed or sent to work camps.
Mixed races only.

Why would we want what is happening with Dungeons and Dragons to happen to movies. It is soul crushing.

 

[Fbh]

I can see his point but what would his suggestion be?
It's not ok if you ignore race and just hire the best people for the job, but it's also not ok if you hire people specifically for their skin color. Then what do you do?

There's a fear that one prominent blogger who owns one of the biggest film sites is going to try to get him fired over this, all because that blogger is banned from interviewing him after Mackie roasted him for four minutes at the Infinity War press junket.

LOL as if Disney is going to fire a black actor in the current climate for saying something is racist

Altered Carbon S2 was neutered garbage to appeal to whining kids. I like Mackie, but you had a black lead, a lesbian, asians, basically any kind of background appeared in that show just to appease everyone. A lot of the changes and obvious messages dragged the show down, the first one wasn't a masterpiece either but it was more fun.

To be fair though, the biggest issue with S2 was that the story was shit and production values took a hit too.
Also from what I know instead of adapting a the next book they went with an original story

The only character that had a compelling storyline in S2 was the white digital butler, lol

 

[SkylineRKR]

I can see his point but what would his suggestion be?
It's not ok if you ignore race and just hire the best people for the job, but it's also not ok if you hire people specifically for their skin color. Then what do you do?




LOL as if Disney is going to fire a black actor in the current climate for saying something is racist




To be fair though, the biggest issue with S2 was that the story was shit and production values took a hit too.
Also from what I know instead of adapting a the next book they went with an original story

This is correct. I think there was only one location. The first had more travel, a kind of whodunit story and I guess more nudity.

 

[SurprisedPikachu]

This is why you just hire the best people for the job, and let the racial percentages land where they may.

This is becoming an utter mess. Even the virtue signaling is racist now.

How dare you spout of something logical, the liberals are going to lose their shit over that. :')

 

[Stilton Disco]

This makes me more favourable to him being Captain America (even if it makes zero sense in universe) and I'm glad he's talking some sense, especially at the moment.

Hiring people because of their skin colour is and always will be racist. Worse, it's starting to bring back segregation as an 'acceptable' solution, and that's just sodding abhorrent, spitting in the face of everyone that actually fought, sometimes died for equality and freedom in the actual civil rights movement.

 

[cryptoadam]

Black Panther would be declared as a racist movie if the Director wouldn't be black

Instead of being oscar nominated multiple times and declared as "the best Marvel movie ever" it would have been probably outed as hugely racist, don't you agree? Edit: To mods, if this goes more in a political direction feel free to move it in there. I'm sorry.

www.neogaf.com

 

[-Arcadia-]

How dare you spout of something logical, the liberals are going to lose their shit over that. :')

Isn't it crazy how much controversy the proposal of just hiring the best for the job would generate? It's why people need to say this stuff in the real world -- the innocuous statement + rabid reaction will show quite a bit to the sane bystander.

 

[Turnt]

People act like Black Panther is super woke when one of the heroes in it is a CIA agent who kills people with a drone.

 

[Cravis]

Isn't it crazy how much controversy the proposal of just hiring the best for the job would generate? It's why people need to say this stuff in the real world -- the innocuous statement + rabid reaction will show quite a bit to the sane bystander.

“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

- Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Dr. King is rolling in his grave. The Dream is dying.

 

[JoduanER2]

HAHAHAHA!! This people like Mackie are completely insane... well 99% of hollywood.

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

Mackie's a cool-ass dude, and it's great to see he's one of the few visible Hollywood types who isn't compromised by the current SJW think-tank wave. He also made some statements on police interactions with black Americans a few years ago while doing the press circuit for a then-recent movie that was also very good and something you won't hear from a single presenter at these BLM protests (because it speaks to logic and reason rather than blind emotional rage).

Ridiculous how Bob Iger tried using Black Panther as a trophy to show how diverse Disney was, I think it was in response to Martin Scorcese criticizing them. Meanwhile Martin's done more for foreign African films than Disney will ever do in its entire existence, and those are genuine films to boot, not corporate fast-food film schlock riding on current pop trends.

HAHAHAHA!! This people like Mackie are completely insane... well 99% of hollywood.

You literally just read the headline and not the actual comments in the OP. Embarrassing.

 

[-Arcadia-]

“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

- Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Dr. King is rolling in his grave. The Dream is dying.

One of my childhood heroes, btw. This makes me sad.

 

[GreyHorace]

I love his takes

Man... he's much smarter than I gave him credit for. I'm surprised his Disney overlords didn't reprimand him for those takes. They're refreshing takes don't get me wrong, but I'd be surprised if he didn't get a talking to for that.

Don't agree with his whining about the lack of black people in film crews, but it's nice to hear him throw shade at Black Panther. That movie (though I did like it) gets way too much credit and praise. I wonder how fans of the movie would react to Christopher Priest's comments on first working on the title. Priest, as comicbook fans know, wrote the definitive take on the character for Marvel Knights in 1998.

The Man Who Made Black Panther Cool

Christopher Priest broke the color barrier at Marvel and reinvented a classic character. Why was he nearly written out of comics history?

www.vulture.com

But the big action came when Priest made his unlikely, prodigal return to an old disaster site: Marvel Comics. By 1998, Marvel was in a financial tailspin and furiously tossing out new ideas. One such project was the Marvel Knights imprint, a stab at telling edgier stories about classic characters. Among them was Black Panther — a character that Knights editors Joe Quesada and Jimmy Palmiotti thought had potential. When they approached Priest about writing it, he was less than enthused.

“I was a little horrified when the words ‘Black’ and ‘Panther’ came out of Joe’s mouth,” he would later write. “I mean, Black Panther? Who reads Black Panther? Black Panther?!” But they were adamant, and Priest acquiesced — with “one basic stipulation: Black Panther could not be ‘a black book.’ ” Even though he had become the best interpreter of race in the game, Priest saw something troubling happening to his career. “I stopped being a writer, or being thought of as a writer,” he tells me, “and started being thought of as a black writer.”

So, in order to make this new endeavor interesting for himself, he managed to persuade Quesada and Palmiotti to let him give a book called Black Panther a white protagonist. While watching the Friends episode “The One With the Blackout,” Priest was taken by a scene in which Matthew Perry’s Chandler Bing finds himself trapped in an ATM vestibule with a supermodel. “Respected and successful, Bing nevertheless was the horrified fish out of water,” Priest later wrote. He felt he needed a Chandler, so he created Everett K. Ross, a hopelessly overwhelmed white man who works for the U.S. government and serves as a diplomatic escort for the Panther when the monarch embarks on a trip to Brooklyn. It was a genius move that allowed a book about a stoic superhero to be hilarious.

Can you believe that? A black comicbook writer hated being pigeonholed as only being able to write black superheroes. So he created a white protagonist in a comic featuring Marvel's most prominent black superhero to make it interesting.

 

[LaughingStock]

So which is it?

Hire the best people for the job or hire only black people in every movie?

 

[SirKicksalot]

Can you believe that? A black comicbook writer hated being pigeonholed as only being able to write black superheroes. So he created a white protagonist in a comic featuring Marvel's most prominent black superhero to make it interesting.

Bilbo as Everett Ross was one of the good things about Black Panther. He was the only actual hero lol

 

[Echelon]

How are little black boys and girls going to know they can become grips, choreographers or costume designers if they don't hire blacks for movies with...white casts?

What the fuck do they even want anymore?

 

[thicc_girls_are_teh_best]

So which is it?

Hire the best people for the job or hire only black people in every movie?

I think he's saying both? Let's not pretend Hollywood hasn't had a history of squeezing out black people or other minorities from positions in film crews. Though some of that can probably be attributed to biases I would say a lot of it is down to networking/connections; you hire who you know and who your friends know.

On the other hand, Hollywood now thinks the best way to "fix" that is to just shunt all minorities to their own isolated projects, but it's pretty clear they mostly do this to placate requests to just treat minority film crew members/actors/writers/directors whatever as just people, and might be doing it instead because they're looking at their minority status first instead of simply their talent. So basically, they get typecasted and strung to only doing projects that are targeted at minority demographics, even when knowing people don't want to be pigeonholed that way.

So in the end they really aren't addressing anything.

 

[squallheart]

Frosty from Collider.

It's a long story.

In 2015 he deceptively edited a video where it made it look like Mackie was trashing Man of Steel and DC:


Mackie got PISSED over that and held a grudge over it for years, he even brought it up a year later when doing press for Civil War:


So in 2018 when they were doing the Infinity War press junket, Frosty was interviewing Mackie with Sebastian Stan and Winston Duke. Frosty couldn't get a word in because Mackie was ready for him and went off on him for more than four minutes just blasting him over that video. The whole thing was filmed, but Frosty managed to get Disney Publicity to delete the video and he'll never be allowed to interview Mackie again.

Lol i tried finding the clip but no luck.

 

[ManaByte]

Lol i tried finding the clip but no luck.

The video of their interview never went online and was destroyed.

 

[SkylineRKR]

Black Panther is one of the weakest MCU films imho. Its success is next to being MCU its because BP promoted black people in such a way that it was a huge blockbuster movie. All communities got out and praised it, the movie was subject to the most watched talkshows in my country and world wide unlike any other MCU film. This was purely because of the racial discussion going on. If I didn't know it was MCU, I would think they would discuss an Academy Award darling back then.

Its not a bottom barrel movie in general, but as far as MCU goes I would place it above the first 2 Thors, Iron Man 3, Avengers 2 and on par with Captain Marvel and Ant Man 2 perhaps. Its not a patch on the likes of Winter Soldier, IM 1, IW, Civil War et al but thats my take. I thought it was fairly ho hum.

 

[GreyHorace]

Bilbo as Everett Ross was one of the good things about Black Panther. He was the only actual hero lol

Everett Ross is such a great comedic foil to T'Challa in the comics, but the movie? He's barely a character and it's a huge waste of a good actor like Martin Freeman, who could've milked that role for all it's comedic worth.

And it's not just Ross who has this problem in Black Panther. The main character himself barely has an arc or any sort of development. T'Challa was much more interesting in Civil War where his desire to avenge his father really pushed the plot forward and gave the story some dramatic conflict. But in his own movie he becomes so bland and uninteresting that the women in his life (his mother, his sister Shuri and Nakia) end up stealing the movie from him.

 

[SurprisedPikachu]

Isn't it crazy how much controversy the proposal of just hiring the best for the job would generate? It's why people need to say this stuff in the real world -- the innocuous statement + rabid reaction will show quite a bit to the sane bystander.

Most woke places will fire you for suggesting they hire based on merit not the race, it's why I get super fucking triggered when I hear the words "DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION" because that is quite literally a leftist dog whistle for getting rid of straight white men. After the riots of George Floyd my company did a townhall with the African American employees and they demanded Juneteenth off as an annual paid holiday, which they now have, and they're now demanding even more stuff - removal of white C-level execs and replacement with a black person being the main thing. They don't care if they meet the requirements, they just want power at this point and they'll do anything to get it.

Let me make this point clear - I do not care what your skin color is or what your biological sex is - if you're not batshit insane and fit for the role I am trying to fill, you're hired, if not, it's nothing personal you just didn't meet the requirements of the position. Not sorry. I will also make this clear - I will put American citizens before illegal immigrants and H1B Visa folks above all.

 

[Ememee]

Black Panther is one of the weakest MCU films imho. Its success is next to being MCU its because BP promoted black people in such a way that it was a huge blockbuster movie. All communities got out and praised it, the movie was subject to the most watched talkshows in my country and world wide unlike any other MCU film. This was purely because of the racial discussion going on. If I didn't know it was MCU, I would think they would discuss an Academy Award darling back then.

Its not a bottom barrel movie in general, but as far as MCU goes I would place it above the first 2 Thors, Iron Man 3, Avengers 2 and on par with Captain Marvel and Ant Man 2 perhaps. Its not a patch on the likes of Winter Soldier, IM 1, IW, Civil War et al but thats my take. I thought it was fairly ho hum.

It’s painfully average. I did feel B. Jordan elevated it for a minute before his character became regulated to every other villain’s shtick.

Anyway. I like Mackie. And I’ve always had a soft spot for loyal-sidekick roles. So I was happy he got the shield and not Buckster.

He seems to be speaking candidly and honestly here. I welcome our new observational captain America overlord.

 

[Halo is Back]

When you become so woke you hit flat Earth level of stupidity. It's not enough for him that the movie made ONE BILLION world wide. The movie was literally a celebration of African culture and setting up a super hero for black people to look up to. Of course so many black people were involved in the production because that was the whole point. Blacks make up only 13% of the total population in America so of course you will see more white people in the vast majority of movie productions.

 

[JoduanER2]

Mackie's a cool-ass dude, and it's great to see he's one of the few visible Hollywood types who isn't compromised by the current SJW think-tank wave. He also made some statements on police interactions with black Americans a few years ago while doing the press circuit for a then-recent movie that was also very good and something you won't hear from a single presenter at these BLM protests (because it speaks to logic and reason rather than blind emotional rage).

Ridiculous how Bob Iger tried using Black Panther as a trophy to show how diverse Disney was, I think it was in response to Martin Scorcese criticizing them. Meanwhile Martin's done more for foreign African films than Disney will ever do in its entire existence, and those are genuine films to boot, not corporate fast-food film schlock riding on current pop trends.



You literally just read the headline and not the actual comments in the OP. Embarrassing.

?? What are you talking about idiot? I read the whole thing.

 

[GAMETA]

Altered Carbon S2 was neutered garbage to appeal to whining kids. I like Mackie, but you had a black lead, a lesbian, asians, basically any kind of background appeared in that show just to appease everyone. A lot of the changes and obvious messages dragged the show down, the first one wasn't a masterpiece either but it was more fun.

Sounds a lot like The Last of Us 2

 

[HoodWinked]

Anthony Mackie has been incredibly consistent with his nuanced and thoughtful views. not surprising seeing this from him.

 

[EverydayBeast]

Black Panther wasn't meant for racism outrage, it's a super hero movies with super hero elements but I'm glad someone can make that connection.

 

[God Enel]

I fondly remember the times, when movies were just movies.

Really, fuck all this bullshit.

Same with games brotha

 

[SidViscous]

He's not wrong, why isn't the black panther crew good enough for the regular MCU films? Seems weird to segregate entire production teams and not use the same folk again.

 

[MacReady13]

Anthony Mackie Gets Candid About Marvel Studios' Lack of Diversity

Anthony Mackie shares his candid thoughts about seeing a lack of diversity on Marvel Studios productions.

thedirect.com

God this is great! So it's racist to ONLY hire black people for Black Panther?! Great! Just hire the best fucking people, no matter their color or sex! That should be simple to understand...!

 

[MacReady13]

He's not wrong, why isn't the black panther crew good enough for the regular MCU films? Seems weird to segregate entire production teams and not use the same folk again.

So it's racist is it?

 

[Dick Jones]

I agree with him. It's all well and good being diverse in your casting, but when you do it once and beat the drum about it while not using them for later movies in the MCU, it's only tokenism. The same with the multinational companies that put the pride flag up this month on Twitter and claim to care but "forget" do it on their Russian Twitter account, and once the 1st July happens they forget about LGBT for 11 months.