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| 6 | %% This list of examples has been alphabetized. Please add your example in the proper place. Thanks! |
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| 16 | [[quoteright:350:[[WesternAnimation/SouthPark https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rsz_sptoken.png]]]] |
| 17 | [[caption-width-right:350:[[PunnyName Token Black]][[note]] Later retconned into ''Tolkien'' Black[[/note]] and [[StealthPun Token Crip]].]] |
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| 22 | %% Quote selected by the General Page Quote Discussion thread: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1327331003042025100&page=394#comment-9833 |
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| 25 | ->''"Is that my official designation? "Asian cast member"?"'' |
| 26 | -->-- '''Creator/BowenYang''', ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'': "Maya Rudolph/Jack Harlow" |
| 27 | |
| 28 | The Token Minority is a character designed to get more minority groups into the plot. This serves several purposes: |
| 29 | * Allows the producers of the show to broaden its appeal by giving more viewers protagonists they can identify with. |
| 30 | * Is useful for bringing discussions of race, gender, and sexual orientation into the plot. |
| 31 | * Helps the producers feel a little better about using a ScaryMinoritySuspect in every other case. |
| 32 | * Allows the producers to make jokes related to a minority without any shame. |
| 33 | * Allows the producers to avoid criticism from minority groups. |
| 34 | * Fulfills the executives' desire for the show to be more ethnically respectful. |
| 35 | * Makes a character stand out visually from the rest. |
| 36 | * Depending on the setting, it can merely be an accurate representation of demographics in that region or industry. E.g. LATAM due to the heavily mixing of ethnicities. |
| 37 | |
| 38 | In some casts of animal, alien, or monster characters, WorldOfFunnyAnimals or not, there is a majority species and one or more minority species. Often [[WorldOfMammals the majority of the animal cast is made up of mammals]] and there is a token non-mammal. Usually, the token non-mammal is a bird, but reptiles, amphibians, and even invertebrates are certainly not unheard of. Sometimes, there are token animals, aliens, or monsters representing ethnic minorities in a group made of supposedly "white" ones. |
| 39 | |
| 40 | You might see this term used derisively in most contexts. This isn't out of contempt for minorities; this trope simply causes problems with representation, where, for example, the single black guy is forced to be exemplary of his entire race. This is very likely to lead being a FlawlessToken and make him TheScrappy. If there are instead four minorities (assuming a sizable cast), they can all have different strengths and flaws which [[RoundedCharacter round them out]] and make them generally equal to the rest of the cast. Taking this approach, UnfortunateImplications are unlikely to happen unless you somehow subject them all to the same stereotypes. You can even have one be explicitly antagonistic. |
| 41 | |
| 42 | However, this can be TruthInTelevision in cases where the prevalence of the minority, combined with the size of the cast and the demographics of the setting, make it genuinely unlikely that there will be more than one member of the minority present (not that this would justify stereotypes, but it would justify having only one minority). A show set in California featuring equal parts whites, Asians, and Mexicans would be credible, but not so a show in rural Maine with the same cast (simply because rural Maine is overwhelmingly white), and a show set in the American Bible Belt would have a hard time convincingly justifying multiple self-professed atheists in a cast of ten (unless a major theme of the show is nonconformity or religious/atheist tensions). |
| 43 | |
| 44 | The closest thing to a villainous counterpart would be EqualOpportunityEvil, for a diverse group of villains. After all, antagonists can make very memorable characters the audience will LoveToHate, so why excluding any group from this? And it's also a good way to avoid creating a FlawlessToken. Of course, when creating a villainous character from a minority background, it will be made clear that such character isn't meant to be representative of an entire demographic of people, and the work will often have a heroic member of said demographic to make that clear. |
| 45 | |
| 46 | Compare CaptainEthnic, TokenNonhuman, TokenHuman, TokenEnemyMinority, TokenMinorityCouple, TokenWhite, TwoferTokenMinority, FiveTokenBand, InformedJudaism, BlackVikings, TokenBlackFriend, and TheSmurfettePrinciple. |
| 47 | |
| 48 | [[noreallife]] |
| 49 | ---- |
| 50 | !!Examples: |
| 51 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 52 | [[folder:Advertising]] |
| 53 | * A controversy erupted after it was revealed that a photograph used to adorn the front of a University of Wisconsin-Madison undergraduate application booklet for the 2001-02 school year [[http://www.snopes.com/college/admin/uwmadison.asp was altered]] to add the image of a black student among a sea of white faces. It was promptly [[http://www.theonion.com/articles/black-guy-photoshopped-in,1433/ satirized]] by ''Website/TheOnion''. |
| 54 | * A Veet ad had this. When they stated that eight out of ten women were happy with the product, they showed a lineup of eight women, with one of them being black. Curiously, they were all dubbed over with the same voice. |
| 55 | [[/folder]] |
| 56 | |
| 57 | [[folder:Anime & Manga]] |
| 58 | * Onyankopon is the only notable black character in ''Manga/AttackOnTitan''. Black people have been observed here and there in the manga. Some seem to belong to the upper class, others are from nations subjugated by Marley. Onyankopon belongs to the latter group. He joined Armin's side under Yelena's leadership, in the hope of liberating his people. |
| 59 | * [[TheBigGuy Yasutora "Chad" Sado]] in ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'' is half-Japanese, half-Latino in an otherwise manga-typical all-Japanese cast. |
| 60 | * ''Anime/CodeGeass'': |
| 61 | ** Rakshata and Viletta are the ''only'' non-white/Chinese/Japanese characters of any plot importance, and of the two, Rakshata is the one who gets played in a more positive light. |
| 62 | ** There's also a supposedly elite pilot who dies mere seconds after she first appears on screen. |
| 63 | ** Nunnally fits into the paraplegic category. |
| 64 | %%** King. (Administrivia/ZeroContextExample) |
| 65 | * Central High's Vice President is the only black character in ''Manga/DailyLivesOfHighSchoolBoys''. Understandable since the series is set in a small Japanese town, and usually it tends to be large cities that take part in student exchange programs with other countries. |
| 66 | * Poor Hans from ''Manga/TheDaughterOfTwentyFaces'' is seemingly the only non-Japanese member of a group of burglars led by GentlemanThief "Twenty-Faces" that is ostensibly a globe-trotting organization. He often uses GratuitousGerman, to boot. |
| 67 | * Simon is the only black character in ''Literature/{{Durarara}}'', though a black gangster is also seen in the episode "Heaven's Vengeance". It's also implied that minor character Tom Tanaka might be part black, though it's never clarified either way. |
| 68 | * Jun Hono, the half-black, half-Japanese pilot from ''Anime/GreatMazinger'' and ''Anime/{{Mazinkaiser}}''. |
| 69 | * ''Franchise/{{Gundam}}'': |
| 70 | ** ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamZZ'' has the black Shinta and AmbiguouslyBrown Qum, but that's about it. Later in the show, Judau ends up befriending a young pilot from Africa, but his time on the show is very brief. |
| 71 | ** ''Anime/MobileSuitGundam0080WarInThePocket'' has Professor Lunland as the sole black character, and Gabriel as the sole Latino. |
| 72 | ** ''Anime/MobileSuitGundam00'': |
| 73 | *** In the first season of ''Gundam 00'', Daryl Dodge has the honor of being the only black person at all. He's also killed off in "[[Recap/MobileSuitGundam00S1E23StopTheWorld Stop the World]]". |
| 74 | *** Season 2 does introduce another black man as president of the Earth Sphere Federation, although that might be more to reflect [[UsefulNotes/BarackObama the real world]] than tokenism. However, he has little impact on the plot. |
| 75 | *** A minor example with Setsuna F Seiei -- whilst he does appear to fit this trope both within Celestial Being and in the wider Gundam metaverse in regards to protagonists, his Middle Eastern homeland forms a two-episode story arc in the first season and plays a large role in his interactions with the princess of a neighbouring country. However, the Middle Eastern aspects of the story only serve to represent the region and 21st-century problems to Japanese audiences, and beyond that, have no real importance to the story as the series progresses. |
| 76 | * Fairly common in ''Franchise/LoveLive''. All main groups have at least one non-Japanese character, although in all cases except Nijigasaki ButNotTooForeign is enforced and Liella! (''Superstar!!'') has two. |
| 77 | ** Eli Ayase from μ's is a quarter Russian from her grandmother and had spend parts of her childhood in Moscow. Her catchphrase is "Harasho!", meaning "good" in Russian, and her character symbol is the Cyrillic character "ya". |
| 78 | ** Mari Ohara from Aqours is Japanese-American-Italian, the Italian-American half coming from her father and her Japanese side coming from her mother (although the Movie shows that she's now mostly resides in Rome, Italy). She adores using GratuitousEnglish ([[KeepItForeign Italian]] in the English dub). |
| 79 | ** Emma Verde from Nijigasaki is a Italian speaking Swiss foreign exchange student. Later, the group also joined by two foreign students, Lanzhu Zhong, a Chinese-Japanese from Hong Kong, and Mia Taylor, a full-blooded American from New York. |
| 80 | ** Kanon Shibuya from Liella! is part Spanish from her grandmother. Keke Tang from the same group is a Chinese-Japanese from Shanghai. The Third Season adds Wein Margarete, an Austrian exchange student from Vienna. |
| 81 | * ''Anime/LucyMayOfTheSouthernRainbow'': The anime takes place in 1800s Australia and focuses on a British immigrant family (and their fellow European-Australian migrants). However, one episode has Lucy-May, Kate and Ben encounter an Australian Aboriginal man, who teaches them how to fly a kite. His real name is unknown (due to the language barrier), so Lucy-May nicknames him "Hercules". |
| 82 | * Choe Gu-Sung from ''Anime/PsychoPass'' is the only Korean character in a series that takes place in Japan. |
| 83 | * ''Anime/{{Robotech}}'': |
| 84 | ** "The Macross Saga", adapted from ''Anime/SuperDimensionFortressMacross'', has Claudia Grant/Claudia [=LaSalle=], apparently the only black woman on the entire ship. |
| 85 | ** "The Robotech Masters", adapted from ''Anime/SuperDimensionCavalrySouthernCross'', has Bowie Grant, seemingly the only black man on the entire planet Glorie. He was originally an unrelated character named Bowie Emerson who was re-written to be Claudia's nephew in ''Robotech''. |
| 86 | * ''Franchise/SailorMoon'': |
| 87 | ** Elsa Gray is the only black character in ''Anime/SailorMoon''. |
| 88 | ** There's also the AmbiguouslyBrown Sailor Pluto, depicted as noticeably dark-skinned in comparison to the other Senshi, and more so in [[Manga/SailorMoon the manga]]. |
| 89 | * In ''Manga/{{Saki}}'', an inversion happens for Rinkai, whose mahjong team is otherwise composed of transfer students. Satoha, the vanguard player, is the only Japanese member of the team, partly because of the rules requiring a Japanese player as vanguard, and partly because she is the ace. Played straight with Aislinn of Miyamori's team, who is from New Zealand and is on an otherwise entirely Japanese team. |
| 90 | * ''Manga/SupermanVsMeshi'': |
| 91 | ** The African-American Cyborg is the only non-white member of the Justice League. Though you can count Superman (Kryptonian) as one too. |
| 92 | ** Out of Clark's co-workers at the Daily Bugle, Lois, Jimmy and everyone else is white, but one of them is a black woman. |
| 93 | * Bob from ''Manga/TenjhoTenge'' would count as this. He's the sole black member of the otherwise Japanese cast. |
| 94 | * Indian student Akira is the only non-Japanese member of the main cast of ''Anime/{{Tsuritama}}''. Kate, the grandmother of one of the other protagonists, is French, while several black and Arabic members appear in the show's villainous CosmopolitanCouncil. |
| 95 | [[/folder]] |
| 96 | |
| 97 | [[folder:Audio Plays]] |
| 98 | * Lampshaded in Creator/TheFiresignTheatre's "High School Madness" sketch, from the album ''Don't Crush That Dwarf, Hand Me the Pliers'', where Mexican-American students come out of nowhere just to ask the white protagonist for advice (then promptly disappear). |
| 99 | [[/folder]] |
| 100 | |
| 101 | [[folder:Comic Books]] |
| 102 | * Debuting in ''ComicBook/FiftyTwo'', ComicBook/{{Batwoman}} managed to provoke a BrokenBase even before this due to press releases touting her as DC's first lesbian hero, who would be receiving DC's full support. Then DC promptly didn't do anything with her outside the series for over a year (and even in the series, she received little attention, as she was more supporting cast for her girlfriend, Renee Montoya). In all that time, she had very little storyline, so her characterization was mostly as a closeted lesbian and a Jew. When she came back in her own series, she was retconned into having a much more {{butch|Lesbian}} look and having come out several years before her first appearance. |
| 103 | * Adam Brashear, the Blue Marvel who featured in ''ComicBook/AdamLegendOfTheBlueMarvel'', represents a rather awkward representation of this trope. He is for all intents and purposes (in the context of the story) a Black Superman from a time when the adjective was quite emphatically capitalized. And applied as a noun. It doesn't help that even without his powers, Brashear is a super-man -- an athlete, military hero and scientific genius who gained ultra-super-powers when the experimental anti-matter reactor he was creating exploded. For about a year, he was the primary hero of the Marvel Universe (perhaps coincidentally around the same time the Sentry was supposedly very successful), but then it was discovered he was black, which immediately led to outrage and uproar among both black and white communities, until the President (JFK) gave the Blue Marvel the Congressional Medal of Honor and told him to quit being a superhero. Which he did until the present day. He is now a member of the ComicBook/MightyAvengers. |
| 104 | * ''ComicBook/ArchieComics'': |
| 105 | ** In order to keep up with changing American trends, the comic added some ethnic characters in the 70's: African-Americans Coach Clayton, his son Chuck (who, like many Africans of the day, sported a righteous 'fro), and Chuck's girlfriend Nancy, as well as the Hispanic Frankie Valdez and his girlfriend Maria. As of 2010, the former three continue to appear quite regularly (and Chuck has naturally lost the 'fro). The latter two, [[OutOfFocus not so much]]. Later ''Archie'' comics have also introduced some other minority characters, including Ginger Lopez (who works for a teen fashion magazine) and Raj Patel (an Indian student interested in film). Ginger shows up fairly regularly (moreso than Maria). |
| 106 | ** The company later introduced Kevin Keller, the first gay character in the series. Kevin was met with backlash by some conservative Christian groups but his debut issues sold very well and he was even given his own mini-series. |
| 107 | ** In ''ComicBook/ArchieComics2015'' Jughead is UsefulNotes/{{asexual}}. He's the only known ace character. |
| 108 | * ''ComicBook/TheAvengers'': |
| 109 | ** ComicBook/TheFalcon was this in-universe. He was added to The Avengers because [[ObstructiveBureaucrat Gyrich]] insisted that the team should have more black members; he didn't actually want to join. According to Creator/{{Christopher Priest|Comics}}, Falcon's nickname in the Marvel offices throughout the 70s and early 80s was "Fal-coon". No, Priest wasn't alright with it, though being a lowly intern at the time, he didn't raise a big stink. In his blog, he refuses to name the co-workers who used it for fear of burning his bridges. Years later, Triathlon served the exact same role (again, in-universe) during Creator/KurtBusiek's run. Later iterations of the team were thankfully more diverse. |
| 110 | ** [[AngryBlackManStereotype Rage]] also has bits of this in his debut story. He's given a spot on the Avengers line-up after picking a fight with Captain America over the lack of minority heroes on the team, but is reassigned to the ComicBook/NewWarriors after the team learns [[YoungerThanTheyLook he's underage]]. |
| 111 | ** It becomes a DiscussedTrope after Falcon leaves, as Gyrich's ReasonableAuthorityFigure replacement Freeman tries to help the team's public image and proposes they add more minorities [[FantasticRacism and less mutants]]. ComicBook/IronMan is adamantly against diversity quotas hampering the team's effectiveness, but relents after Freeman suggests that they could try bringing back past members they trust. All the minorities refuse for various reasons (including Falcon, who says he'd rather not be "Earth's Mightiest Token" again), and they end up with [[ComicBook/CaptainMarvelMarvelComics Captain Marvel]]. |
| 112 | ** In the 2005 Marvel comic ''Wha...Huh?'', one of the stories reimagines ComicBook/BlackPanther as a white man from South America, who is upset when he learns that The Avengers just want a token black superhero in their team and thought he was misrepresenting his race (also, ComicBook/BlackWidow is just there to fill the "[[TheSmurfettePrinciple woman quota]]"). |
| 113 | * ''ComicBook/JemAndTheHologramsIDW'': |
| 114 | ** Jetta, the token British character. She was the only non-American until The Stingers showed up. Jetta's also the only non-white member of her band, but this is downplayed as the series has a diverse cast. |
| 115 | ** Blaze is the only confirmed transgender character thus far. |
| 116 | * ''ComicBook/JusticeLeagueOfAmerica'': |
| 117 | ** The Justice League goes back in forth on this, with some eras (such as the Meltzer and [[Creator/DwayneMcDuffie McDuffie]] years) having very diverse casts, while others, like the James Robinson run, were criticized for having no minority members whatsoever. During the ''ComicBook/{{New 52}}'' relaunch, ComicBook/{{Cyborg}} was retconned into being the sole non-white founding member of the original team, presumably to make up for the extended periods of whiteness. He has been present in the League ever since, as he is arguably DC's most famous black superhero that isn't an AffirmativeActionLegacy character. Current comics and adaptations have also split the difference regarding his past with the ComicBook/TeenTitans, by presenting him as TheBabyOfTheBunch: a ''former'' Titan who has since graduated into the Justice League. |
| 118 | ** Lampshaded in Creator/GrantMorrison's ''JLA'' run. ComicBook/PlasticMan jokingly states that ComicBook/{{Steel}} can't quit the Justice League because then the team would lose its only minority member. |
| 119 | * Blindside in the comic series ''ComicBook/RelativeHeroes''. Notable in that the series was about a family of superheroes, and Blindside was explained as having been adopted in order to justify having a black kid as part of the main cast. |
| 120 | * The ''Franchise/{{Superman}}'' comics' Ron Troupe started as the only black recurring staff member working at The Daily Planet. In all fairness, he was never as popular as other supporting characters working as journalists, such as Steve Lombard or Cat Grant (not least because these two had defects that added some depth), but since Troupe was the token minority he has lasted quite a bit. |
| 121 | * ''Franchise/WonderWoman'': |
| 122 | ** ''ComicBook/WonderWomanCharlesMoulton'': There were at least thirty named Holliday Girls in the Golden Age, and only one, Selina Ritio, was unquestionably a woman of color. |
| 123 | ** ''ComicBook/WonderWoman1942'': Nubia, who was even explicitly called the "Black Wonder Woman" in The '70s. In this version of the story, Hippolyta had originally been directed to make two figures, one dark, one light. The black baby was stolen by Ares and thereby hangs the tale. [[ComicBook/WonderWoman1987 Later]] [[ComicBook/WonderWomanRebirth years]] have shown the Amazons to be more racially diverse, so Phillippus, while the most prominent black Amazon, doesn't stick out quite so much. |
| 124 | ** ''ComicBook/WonderWomanAndTheStarRiders'': While it's not entirely clear if any of the Star Riders are human, only Starlily has dark skin and she and Wondy both have black hair while everyone else has hair colors that don't occur naturally in humans. |
| 125 | * {{Lampshade|Hanging}}d in Creator/PeterMilligan's ''ComicBook/XForce'' run with Anarchist, a black superhero who opposes the decision to add another black member to the team. His reasoning? [[MonochromeCasting Since most superhero teams rarely have more than one minority member,]] [[GenreSavvy another black guy on the team means that one of them will inevitably die.]] Averted in the ''ComicBook/XStatix'' series that followed, which has an additional black member (Venus), plus a Latino member (El Guapo) and two gay members (Vivisector and Phat). |
| 126 | * The second ComicBook/XMen team had ComicBook/{{Storm}}, who was, for quite a while, the only black X-Man. She joined the team along with Sunfire, a Japanese man who left almost immediately, and Thunderbird, a Native American man who died almost immediately, making her also the only active non-white X-Man for a good while. |
| 127 | * ''ComicBook/XWingRogueSquadron'': Reina Faleur and Sixtus Quin appear to be the only Humans of color. The cast will also always be majority Human, with a few people of other species as well. |
| 128 | * Empress was the sole minority member of the original ''ComicBook/YoungJustice'' team, and was added relatively late into the run after some complaints about the [[MonochromeCasting monochromatic makeup of the cast]]. |
| 129 | [[/folder]] |
| 130 | |
| 131 | [[folder:Comic Strips]] |
| 132 | * Spoofed by ''ComicStrip/MadamAndEve'' in [[http://www.madamandeve.co.za/cartoons/me002484.gif this comic.]] |
| 133 | * ''ComicBook/MonicasGang'' had a few. The main gang had a black kid and a mute kid (who had been described as deaf as well), then added one that due to his inspiration ([[WriteWhoYouKnow the creator's son]]) is ambiguously Asian, and both a blind girl and a wheelchair-using boy as well. The Chuck Billy 'n' Folks (Chico Bento) stories has, among its hillbillies, a Japanese boy (a nod to [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_Brazilian the huge Japanese-descended community]] in Brazil). |
| 134 | * ''ComicStrip/{{Peanuts}}'': |
| 135 | ** Franklin joined the cast in a nod to the court-ordered busing that was going on at the time. As Creator/ChrisRock points out, he was the only one in the cast without any distinct personality. In one interview, Schulz admitted that he really didn't know what to do with Franklin, since he had no experience with black children. Amusingly, cartoonists of Schulz's generation were not taught how to draw black characters without making them look like grotesque stereotypes, so for Franklin, Schulz just drew a "white" kid and then gave him curly black hair and lines across his face to symbolize dark skin. |
| 136 | ** Snoopy's Beagle Scouts are a group of birds consisting of Woodstock and [[YouALLLookFamiliar birds who are identical to Woodstock]]... except for the one called Raymond, who is noticeably darker than his peers. |
| 137 | [[/folder]] |
| 138 | |
| 139 | [[folder:Fan Works]] |
| 140 | * In the early days of the ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' fandom, Twilight was often portrayed the only POC in Ponyville when the cast was "humanized" in fan works, usually as black or Indian. Nowadays, more diverse interpretations are becoming more popular in the fandom, such as Middle Eastern Fluttershy and Rarity, Black or biracial Pinke Pie, Applejack and/or Rarity being trans mares, varying sexualities amongst the Mane Six, and Rainbow Dash being a black or latino lesbian showing up sometimes. |
| 141 | * ''Fanfic/HarryPotterAndTheIcePrincess'' makes Elsa the equivalent of this on two fronts, as she is the only one of Harry's close friends who both isn't from England and isn't in Gryffindor, having been born and raised in Arendelle and sorted into Ravenclaw after she started at Hogwarts. |
| 142 | * ''Fanfic/InfinityTrainSeekerOfCrocus'': Out of the passengers in White Gestalt -- and of the three heroic groups in general -- Specter is the only one who is part of the LGBT, for he harbers a crush on Ryoken and the authors revealed that he's demiromantic. |
| 143 | * In ''Fanfic/LifeOreDeath'' the main character [[OriginalCharacter Ferris]] is the only ''human'' female on the Team (Miss Martian being a Martian), and she remains the only black woman on the Team after Artemis and Zee join. |
| 144 | * A variation of this features in the ''Fanfic/InfinityCrisis'' spin-off ''New Charges'', when Miles Morales/Spider-Man becomes the only hero in Freeland whose powers don't focus on using and manipulating electrical energy in some manner. |
| 145 | * In ''Fanfic/TheNightUnfurls'', Hugh, a [[TheSpeechless mute]], is the only handicapped HunterOfMonsters. |
| 146 | * The "black guy in the corner" from ''Fanfic/SherlockSeason4''. The author even explicitly states that he added him so his story wouldn't be racist. |
| 147 | * The ''Anime/PokemonTheSeries'' fic ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/3866733/1/Sinnoh-League-Trials-of-the-Heart Trials of the Heart]]'' -- which depicts a timeline where Ash and Misty have been dating since Ash started at Sinnoh -- gives Misty an interesting example of this; while her speciality is Water-type Pokémon, she has acquired a Pikachu in her travels that she nicknamed "Elektra", although Misty only captured Elektra so that Elektra could be with Ash's Pikachu rather than just catching a Pikachu because she felt like it. |
| 148 | [[/folder]] |
| 149 | |
| 150 | [[folder:Films -- Animation]] |
| 151 | * ''WesternAnimation/{{Coco}}'': In a meta sense, John Ratzenberger is the only non-Hispanic voice actor in an all-Hispanic cast. His single line of dialogue is to thank in Spanish the dentist who vouched for him. |
| 152 | * ''Anime/FullmetalAlchemistTheConquerorOfShamballa'' takes place in early 20th century Germany. Of the main characters on Earth, Noah is the only non-white character, being Romani. |
| 153 | * Sara from ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfFrostyTheSnowman'' is AmbiguouslyBrown. |
| 154 | [[/folder]] |
| 155 | |
| 156 | [[folder:Films -- Live Action]] |
| 157 | * ''Film/AbandonedMine'': Of the group, the sole non-white character is "Ethan", who claims he's from India [[spoiler:but later admits that he's from Sri Lanka]]. |
| 158 | * ''Film/AcrossTheUniverse2007'': The cast is mostly white, but Jo-Jo's a black man. |
| 159 | * ''Film/BigBrother2018'' is set in Hong Kong, with the half-Pakistani Zufa being the sole non-Chinese or Hong-Konger character. |
| 160 | * ''Film/DeadlyDetention'': Of the five students in Saturday detention, Kevin is the only non-white. |
| 161 | * While the 2006 historical film ''Film/{{Flyboys}}'' was already heavily criticized for its historical inaccuracies relating to its World War I setting, one of the more amusing ones came from the film's fictional Token Minority, Eugene Skinner, a black boxer who joined the squadron to "pay back" his adopted homeland. Mainly because the end of the movie shows a picture of the real-life squadron, which is composed of exactly zero minorities. A rare moment where a film actually seems proud to reveal when it didn't do its research. Website/TheOtherWiki's [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flyboys_%28film%29 entry on the film]] points out that the film confuses the Lafayette Escadrille with the Lafayette Flying Corps with whom Eugene Bullard (the real person Skinner was based on) actually flew. |
| 162 | * ''Film/TheHairyBird'' is a teen comedy set in the early 1960s at an all-girls boarding school. The trope is [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] during a coed function with an all-boys school, where the girls are paired up individually with the boys. The only black student at the boys’ school is paired with a Japanese girl, the only student of color at the girls’ school. |
| 163 | * ''Film/HappiestSeason'': Sloane's husband Eric is black, the main character of color in the film. |
| 164 | * Parodied by ''Film/HaroldAndKumarGoToWhiteCastle'' with posters advertising the first movie as starring "That Asian guy from ''Film/AmericanPie''" and "That Indian guy from ''Film/VanWilder''". |
| 165 | * The Eskimo guide Oomiak played by Japanese actor Creator/{{Mako}} in ''Film/TheIslandAtTheTopOfTheWorld''. |
| 166 | * ''Film/TheLastQueen'': The cast is primarily composed of UsefulNotes/{{Algeria}}n actors and actors of Algerian descent, with the exception of the Scandinavian Astrid, played by French actress of Finnish and Polish descent Nadia Tereszkiewicz. |
| 167 | * The UrExample of this is ''Film/TheLittleRascals'' series from the 30s, where the gang always had at least one black member, the most famous being Stymie and Buckwheat. This is an example of Administrivia/TropesAreNotBad, seeing as at the time, there was basically no representation for minorities in film except for servant characters. |
| 168 | * ''Film/{{Lycan}}'': Irving, an outspoken black guy who is the only man of color in the group. |
| 169 | * ''Film/TheMajestic'': Emmett is a black man, the only person of color in the film and the small town of Lawson, California. Nobody appears to treat him badly, but he recalls visiting France as a soldier in World War I where the (white) French people greeted him gratefully and didn't care about his race at all, with it having been a moving experience he's always remembered. |
| 170 | * ''Film/AMatterOfFaith'': Portland is the only person of color in the movie with a significant role. |
| 171 | * ''Film/MysteryMen'': Invisible Boy and The Sphinx are the only people of color on the team. |
| 172 | * ''Film/{{Nobody}}'': |
| 173 | ** The couple who robbed Hutch's house turn out to be Latinos. |
| 174 | ** One of the guys whom Hutch beats up on the train is black, with the rest white. |
| 175 | ** One of Yulian's {{mook}}s is black, which gets commented as the other Russians don't realize that he's Russian. The guy explains that his parents were an Ethiopian athlete and a Russian woman who met during the 1980 Moscow Olympics, though his father was [[DisappearedDad not involved]] past his conception. Hutch later says he's never met a black Russian before and the guy replies he gets that reaction pretty often. |
| 176 | ** Harry, [[spoiler:Hutch's adopted brother]], also turns out to be black. |
| 177 | * In terms of film, equally well parodied/referenced by the "Token Black Guy" in ''Film/NotAnotherTeenMovie''. Named Malik Token, the GenreSavvy token helpfully [[LampshadeHanging explains]] the joke to the audience by introducing himself as the person that stays out of conversations and says "Damn!", "Shit!", and "That is whack!" At a party later in the film, he sees another black guy, played by Creator/SeanPatrickThomas, Token Minority from ''Film/CruelIntentions'', and tells him that he was at the party first. The other man apologizes and leaves the party. Malik's got to say, "Damn, that shit is whack!" There's also the musical number: |
| 178 | -->''I'm only in this song because I'm a black guy'' |
| 179 | * In the 1955 FilmNoir ''Film/ThePhenixCityStory'', the Ward family are the only non-white characters, which is highly conspicuous considering that the proportion of Phenix City's population categorized as "Negro" in the 1950 and 1960 censuses was 34.7% and 36.8%, respectively. |
| 180 | * In ''The Phynx'', the US government drafts four young men to start a rock band to act as a front for undercover operations. The band's drummer doubles as its only black member. |
| 181 | * ''Film/ThePostman'': Woody, Ford, and Clark are the only people of color with speaking parts in the film, and only a few others are even shown. All of them are black. |
| 182 | * In ''Film/PsychOut'', the band's drummer is also its only black member. |
| 183 | * ''Franchise/StarWars'': |
| 184 | ** After ''Film/ANewHope'' became a blockbuster, numerous people noticed that [[HumansAreWhite the entire galaxy of Humans were all white]] (which isn't ''entirely'' true; it's just that the main characters in the film are all white). ''Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack'' introduced Creator/BillyDeeWilliams as Lando Calrissian, the only person of color with a significant role in the original trilogy (one Rebel pilot in ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi'' is Asian, and utters a single line of dialogue -- you can barely tell by his helmet and the very brief appearance he has).[[note]]Of course, Vader is famously voiced by James Earl Jones, who is black, though the character is later revealed to be white.[[/note]] |
| 185 | ** Creator/SamuelLJackson in the prequels may also be a example of this, as his character serves as little more than a background character until ''Film/RevengeOfTheSith'' (excluding his excellent use in the ''[[WesternAnimation/StarWarsTheCloneWars Clone Wars]]'' shorts). |
| 186 | ** Casting Creator/TemueraMorrison, who is Māori, as Jango Fett and, by retroactive consequence, his clone Boba Fett and ''every single Clone Trooper'' reduces all other human characters in the series (black, white, or green) to token minorities by sheer weight of numbers. |
| 187 | ** Bail Organa of Alderaan, Leia's adopted father, was played by the Latino actor Creator/JimmySmits. |
| 188 | ** ''Film/TheForceAwakens'' has the black Creator/JohnBoyega as Finn, raising the grand total of black guys in the Galaxy Far, Far Away to three. Creator/LupitaNyongo is also in the movie's cast, but she voices an orange-skinned alien, so the actress's race is not visible. Creator/OscarIsaac, who's Latino, also plays Poe Dameron. |
| 189 | ** ''Film/TheLastJedi'' adds Rose, who's Southeast Asian. She is the first Southeast Asian actor to play a part with lines in the franchise. There's also her sister, but she dies early on and has no lines. |
| 190 | ** After the release of ''Film/TheRiseOfSkywalker'', John Boyega [[https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/culture/article/john-boyega-interview-2020 vocally accused Disney of pulling this trope]], claiming that both Finn and Rose amounted to little more than tokens while all the depth went to the white leads Rey and Kylo Ren. |
| 191 | ** ''Film/RogueOne'' has Cassian, who's played by the Mexican Creator/DiegoLuna. Creator/RizAhmed as Bodhi is the first South Asian who has appeared. Creator/DonnieYen (Chirrut) and Jiang Wen (Baze) are the first East Asians (except the single pilot from ''Return of the Jedi'' mentioned above). |
| 192 | * ''Film/ShadowInTheCloud'': Williams, the Maori pilot who stands out in the otherwise all-White crew. |
| 193 | * ''Film/StarshipTroopers'': Most troopers seen are White, though a couple at boot camp are Black ([[TwoferTokenMinority the woman]] is kicked out after accidentally killing a fellow trainee). There's another that [[AmbiguouslyBrown might be a mestiza]] as well (since they're all supposed to be Argentinians, and thus Latin American), since she has olive skin. |
| 194 | * ''Film/{{Sweetwater}}'': Sarah's husband Miguel, a mestizo Mexican man, was the only person of color in the film. He dies pretty early on. |
| 195 | * ''Film/TheyThem2022'': The staff and residents at the camp are mostly white, with a few exceptions. |
| 196 | ** Toby is black. |
| 197 | ** Gabriel's background isn't stated, but he speaks with an accent and was played by a Brazilian, Darwin del Fabro. |
| 198 | * ''Film/{{Toomorrow}}'', a science fiction comedy about a band led by Music/OliviaNewtonJohn, has the drummer as the band's only black member. |
| 199 | * Harvey Weinstein loved using this trope for his productions back in the late 1990's and early 2000's. Starting with ''Film/{{Scream 2}}'', nearly all of his teen-aimed productions had at least one token black character (often played by a rapper) solely to bump up the box office. He seemed to stop this after his remake of ''Film/ShallWeDance'', which has an AdvertisedExtra in the form of Ja Rule (who appears in one concert scene and has no impact on the plot). |
| 200 | * ''Film/{{Coneheads}}'': Creator/{{Sinbad}} and [[Series/SaturdayNightLive Tim Meadows]] are the film's only actors of color with speaking parts. Meadows also plays the only non-white Conehead who is shown. |
| 201 | * ''Film/WildInTheStreets'' has the drummer played by Creator/RichardPryor as the only black person in the band. |
| 202 | * Mercutio is a black DragQueen in the Creator/BazLuhrmann film ''Film/WilliamShakespearesRomeoAndJuliet''. |
| 203 | [[/folder]] |
| 204 | |
| 205 | [[folder:Literature]] |
| 206 | * ''Literature/AngelaNicely'': |
| 207 | ** Maisie is the only black main character. |
| 208 | ** Inverted for New Boyz, the band seen in “Starstruck!”, which has three black guys and one white guy. |
| 209 | * Jessi (black), Claudia (Asian), and Abby (Jewish) in ''Literature/TheBabySittersClub''. |
| 210 | * ''Literature/BazilBroketail'': |
| 211 | ** Manuel is the only dragonboy in the 109th Dragon Squadron who isn't an orphan. Because of that, he has a hard time getting accepted by others at first. |
| 212 | ** Purple-Green is the only wild dragon in existence who serves in Argonath's legions. |
| 213 | * ''Literature/TheBlackCompany'' has two black wizards, One-Eye and Tam-tam. This is justified because the Black Company is called this precisely because originally, all its members were black, from the equivalent of Africa in this fantasy world, but over the centuries their demography changed and these two magicians -- who are also very old -- are the only black men left in the company. |
| 214 | * Lheorvine is the only black man in ''Literature/BlackLegion'', and one of precious few in ''TabletopGame/{{Warhammer 40000}}''. Before Matt Ward retconned their dark skin into a "mutation", the Salamanders space marines, and the people of their homeworld, Nocturne, were an entire ''planet'' of Token Blacks. Post-Ward, it's assumed that the denizens of Nocturne are white, but "turn black" when they become Salamanders. |
| 215 | * ''Literature/TheCalielCycle'': Rahze is a dark-skinned elf. Wyre is a dark-skinned human (possibly she's meant to be black). Aside from them, the characters are described as fair skinned. Minor characters Karah (from a country that's somewhat like China) and Mohender Gosh (whose homeland is described as similar to India) appear later on. |
| 216 | * In the book ''[[Literature/TheTillermanFamilySeries Come a Stranger]]'' by Cynthia Voigt, the main character gets to be the only black girl at an exclusive summer camp. After the camp gives her a lame reason for kicking her out, she gets asked "How does it feel to be an ex-token minority?" |
| 217 | * ''Literature/ACourtOfThornsAndRoses'': Mor, Helion, Thesan, Nephelle and her wife, and the two unnamed Mortal Queens are the only non-straight characters in the series. |
| 218 | * ''Literature/EarthsChildren'': |
| 219 | ** Ranec, along with the children he's sired (only one is ever shown) are the only dark-skinned humans in the books. This is justified as it's set in Ice Age Europe, where populations were separated by vast distances, as traveling on foot was long and difficult. In spite of this, he owes his existence to a European man doing just that (from what's modern Ukraine all the way to ''North Africa''). There his father Wymez (not that they know yet about paternity) married a black African woman and fathered Ranec, then returned with him many years later. She and her tribe are only mentioned. |
| 220 | ** Ayla also counts as one in regards to the Clan (Neanderthals), along with the mixed Cro-Magnon/Neanderthal children (including Ayla's own son Durc). This is again pretty justified as the Clan and Others dislike each other to varying degrees, so such couplings are rare (unfortunately, they're often rape). |
| 221 | ** A couple of East Asian people also appear in the last books, who have also made a very long journey, along with the woman's daughter by a European man. |
| 222 | * ''Literature/TheHanSoloTrilogy'': Lando, Salla, and one Alderaanian cop are the only black Humans in the books. Xaverri might be darker than white as well, though it's unclear. |
| 223 | * ''Literature/HarryPotter'''s school Hogwarts has a few, including the very Irish Seamus Finnegan (although there may be others who are less obvious), the Indian Patil twins, the Jewish Anthony Goldstein, the Chinese Cho Chang, and the black Dean Thomas, Lee Jordan, Angelina Johnson, and Blaise Zabini. To Creator/JKRowling's credit, no ado is made of any of these characters' ethnicities, nor are they ever described as such. In fact, WordOfGod has been needed to identify some of the black characters in the series. |
| 224 | * ''Literature/TheHouseOfNight'': |
| 225 | ** Kramisha is the only black Red Fledgling. She is portrayed as a [[SoulBrotha Soul Sister]] who speaks mostly in {{jive|Turkey}}. |
| 226 | ** Shaunee, the only black member of the "nerd heard" (and the only black lead for the first several books) and who we're constantly reminded is black. |
| 227 | * Both Jem Carstairs and Magnus Bane from ''Literature/TheInfernalDevices'' are part Asian. |
| 228 | * ''Literature/{{Inkmistress}}'': Hal and Nismae, his older sister, are described as black people (the only two in the book). |
| 229 | * Creator/StephenKing's ''Literature/{{It}}'' has the character of Mike, the only African-American kid of the Losers' Club, who is also in both [[Film/It1990 film]] [[Film/It2017 adaptations]] of the novel. |
| 230 | * In ''Literature/KeeperOfTheLostCities'', elves are explicitly stated to have no concept of racism and be very -- racially -- inclusive. However, within the heroine's group of friends -- and thus within a big part of the main cast -- there are only two non-white people. They're described as Asian, but it is unclear if they are Japanese, Vietnamese, or Korean. They are related and what's more, they end up being relegated to the rank of secondary characters and PutOnABus as soon as their powers are not relevant anymore. Similarly, one of the few black characters introduced in the first book and utterly forgotten for every following book is conveniently reintroduced to the somewhat main cast once she manifests a power that is needed for their mission. |
| 231 | * Jose Rodriguez, the [[BlackAndNerdy nerdy]] Afro-Latino doctor from ''Literature/KyoKaraMaoh''. |
| 232 | * ''Literature/LookingBackward'': Julian's black butler (who puts him in the hypnotic state) is the only person of color (at least who's ever identified as such). Not surprising for a book from the 19th century, perhaps. |
| 233 | * ''Literature/TheMortalInstruments'': Simon is [[NiceJewishBoy Jewish]], Maia is biracial, and Magnus is part Asian. |
| 234 | * Invoked in the short story "Papanin's Mauser" by Michael Veller. It depicts a drift-ice research unit of four people. Three of them are Russians and Communists and the last one is a nonpartisan German. According to the Soviet laws, three Communists is enough to constitute a Party cell, so every day they have to conduct a Party meeting, for members only. During these meetings the German has to leave the "meeting room", namely the tent where they all live, and spend time tramping around it in the bone-chilling cold. Eventually he applies for membership in the Party to end this nightmare, but is rejected on the following ground: as he is he symbolizes the international nature of the Soviet people and the unbreakable ties between partisans and nonpartisans. |
| 235 | * Radar from ''Literature/PaperTowns''; he even lampshades this by referring to himself as the "token black friend" of the group. |
| 236 | * ''Literature/ThePower'': Tunde is a Nigerian reporter who's the only man of color in the main cast. |
| 237 | * ''Literature/ReignOfTheSevenSpellblades'': |
| 238 | ** Out of the main cast, the Sword Roses, five out of the six human members are [[FantasyCounterpartCulture Fantasy-European]], and four of those are Yelglish (English) since the story is set at a WizardingSchool in Yelgland. The exception is TheLancer of the group, Nanao Hibiya, who is from Yamatsu, a country far to the east that stands in for UsefulNotes/SengokuPeriod Japan. |
| 239 | ** Upperclasswoman Lesedi Ingwe is the only black character in the series, identified as being descended "from another continent". Her name comes from the Bantu language group: her given name means "light" in Tswana. |
| 240 | * The Japanese novel ''Literature/RunWithTheWind'' (also adapted into a manga, film, and anime) stars a male university track team. In the otherwise all-Japanese team is the Tanzanian exchange student Musa, a second year Science and Engineering student. Prejudice or stereotypes are occasionally addressed (for example the team thinking Musa should be fast because he's black and some people's disgust that the team isn't fully Japanese), but Musa otherwise fits in with the team and is portrayed decently. Downplayed a little as outside the main cast there are also several other African exchange students that take part in the track meets and are considered serious competition. Unlike Musa, these African students came to Japan specifically to join the track teams and in particular run at the prestigious Hakone Ekiden. |
| 241 | * Lord Wulfston in ''The Savage Empire'' books by Creator/JeanLorrah is the only black person we see in the first five books or so. On the other hand, nobody makes a big deal about it; he just has a hard time being anonymous. |
| 242 | * ''Literature/SisterhoodSeries'' by Creator/FernMichaels: Yoko Akia is the Token Asian, and Alexis Thorne is the Token Black of the Sisterhood or the Vigilantes. The other women are white. The two characters' nationalities definitely play a role in the series. Oddly, Alexis reveals in her thoughts that she knows that she was framed for crimes she did not commit because she was a poor black woman, but in the book starring her called ''Lethal Justice'', that is not brought up at all. |
| 243 | * ''Literature/TalesOfThePack'': Duane appears to be the only black man at Milton College. |
| 244 | * ''Literature/TalionRevenant'': Countess Jamila, who's half Stelosian (a black African counterpart) and Marana (who was born to a people which seem to be equivalent to Berbers or Arabs). All of the rest come from the European counterparts. A few more Stelosians also appear: the ambassador to Hamis and bodyguards of his (Jamila's father had been the previous Stelosian ambassador). Jamila also has a young son with her Hamisian noble husband. They are the only characters of mixed heritage. |
| 245 | * ''Literature/TeaShopMysteries'': Josette is an African-American woman who sells/donates the handwoven sweetgrass baskets to the Indigo Tea Shop. She's the only minority character who pops up throughout the series. There are a couple other African-American characters who appear, but they only appear within the book they're introduced. |
| 246 | * ''Literature/ThirdTimeLuckyAndOtherStoriesOfTheMostPowerfulWizardInTheWorld'': Most of the characters are white (though they're not all explicitly described in many cases), though with some exceptions (certain people appear to be olive-skinned, though it's not very clear if they're equivalent to some other ethnicities). |
| 247 | ** Joah and Zayd in "And Who Is Joah?" are described as black people, coming from a country much further south from the main setting. |
| 248 | ** One of the wizards in "Nothing Up Her Sleeve" it seems has an East Asian appearance. |
| 249 | * Espelho from ''Literature/VampirosDoRioDouro'' is the only black member of the Seven, a vampire group of all white Portuguese men (Espelho is an former African slave). Lobo in the other hand, is the only Spaniard. |
| 250 | * ''Literature/TheWarlordChronicles'' reimagines Sagramor, who is usually a French knight, as a Nubian (Black) cavalry commander. Technically the viewpoint character, Derfel, could also count as he is ethnically an Angle while the rest of the cast are Britons; both peoples are white by modern-day standards but are seen as distinct in the time the books are set. |
| 251 | [[/folder]] |
| 252 | |
| 253 | [[folder:Live-Action TV]] |
| 254 | * Transparently present every single time a British channel is presenting UsefulNotes/AssociationFootball. The usual line up is "old white manager[[note]]Coach, for American audiences.[[/note]]", "middle-aged white recently retired ex midfielder/defender/goalie", "just-retired black forward/midfielder". Sometimes they even try to claim "Scottish" as equivalent to "black". Infrequently but annoyingly, the channel ends up with someone from Francophone Africa whose grasp of the English language simply isn't up to the job, making the tokenism at play especially obvious (and presumably depriving Francophone viewers of the much better standard of commentary he could offer in his native tongue). |
| 255 | * ''Series/ThirtyRock'': |
| 256 | ** Lampshaded when, to call attention during a GE exclusive lunch, Jack calls out, "Gentlemen... token ladies." |
| 257 | ** The character Toofer is named for the TwoferTokenMinority trope. |
| 258 | * ''Series/TheFortyFourHundred'': Richard, who's Black, is the only man of color in the main cast. |
| 259 | * ''Series/AmericanHorrorStoryCoven'': |
| 260 | ** Queenie is the only African American witch in the Institute, which becomes an important plot point when she begins contacts with other Black witches. |
| 261 | ** Nan is a witch with Down Syndrome. |
| 262 | * ''Series/{{Angel}}'' has Charles Gunn as the only black guy, though Doyle and Lorne might count as token demons. |
| 263 | * Chyna Parks from ''Series/ANTFarm'' becomes the token black girl after her brother Cameron left the show following Season 2. |
| 264 | * Trish De La Rosa from ''Series/AustinAndAlly'' is the token Latina. |
| 265 | * ''Series/AvocadoToast'': Two supporting characters are black men. |
| 266 | ** Elle's adopted dad, Roger. |
| 267 | ** A client of hers, Dave. |
| 268 | * On ''Series/TheBachelor'' and ''The Bachelorette'', every season will typically have one or two minority contestants who never win and rarely even get close to winning. These contestants also frequently fall into ButNotTooForeign. |
| 269 | * Averted in the original ''Series/{{Battlestar Galactica|1978}}'', especially in the episode "[[Recap/BattlestarGalactica1978FireInSpace Fire In Space]]", which was nominated for an NAACP Image Award for the black Boomer and Tigh's extensive roles. |
| 270 | * The ''Series/{{Bellisarioverse}}'': |
| 271 | ** ''Series/{{JAG}}'' has a few minorities represented in lead and recurring characters: Major/Lieutenant Colonel Sarah "Mac" [=MacKenzie=] is multiracial (White–Iranian–Cherokee), Commander Sturgis Turner and Congresswoman Bobbi Latham are African Americans, Gunnery Sergeant Victor Galindez is Latino, and Harmon Rabb has a Russian half-brother. Mac's background is close to that of her actress, Creator/CatherineBell. She was born in London to a Scottish father and Iranian mother. |
| 272 | ** Leon from ''Series/{{NCIS}}'' is one of the first recurring black characters -- introduced in Season five -- though his race is rarely ever mentioned, and Agent Dorneget (a minor character introduced in Season 9) is the only recurring gay character. |
| 273 | * Naldo Montoya from ''Series/BestFriendsWhenever'' is the token Latino. |
| 274 | * In an overwhelming Caucasian cast on ''Series/BeverlyHills90210'', Silver is AmbiguouslyJewish. |
| 275 | * Rajesh "Raj" Koothrappali of ''Series/TheBigBangTheory'' was born and raised in New Delhi, a reference to his British-Indian actor, Kunal Nayyar, having spent most of his life growing up in the city. |
| 276 | * ''Series/BoyMeetsWorld'' has two separate token blacks at different points: Eli Williams in Season 3 and Angela in Seasons 5-7. Angela lampshades this a few times: "Gosh I got to get some black friends." |
| 277 | * ''Series/TheBoys2019'': In "[[Recap/TheBoysS0205WeGottaGoNow We Gotta Go Now]]", Maeve is [[InvokedTrope being set up for LGBTQ representation by Vought]] right after Homelander [[ForcedOutOfTheCloset forcibly outed her on television]], and much of the marketing by Ashley and the rest of Vought's teams are following this at his behest. They also want to get Elena further involved, wanting her in [[ButchLesbian manly clothes]] because a same-sex couple without [[MasculineFeminineGayCouple clear-cut roles]] isn't as marketable. |
| 278 | * ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'': |
| 279 | ** Both subverted and played straight. Instead of bringing a token gay character onto the show, the writers had one of the three central characters turn out to be a lesbian. On the other hand, it wasn't until the seventh season that there was an important character who was black, and when he did show up he was the token black guy. |
| 280 | ** Season 3 has the GenreSavvy (and sadly under-used) villain Mr. Trick, a modern black vampire who [[LampshadeHanging comments]] on the fact that there are very few people of color in Sunnydale. There are also a few other black characters, like [[DragonInChief Absalom]] and [[NewOldFlame Olivia]], as well as [[DeadpanSnarker Rona]] in Season 7. |
| 281 | ** Before coming out as a lesbian, Willow was already the Token Jewish Girl. Of course, after her outing, she became a TwoferTokenMinority. |
| 282 | * ''Series/{{Camelot}}'': Ulfius on Arthur's side and Vivian on Morgan's. Both are the sole Black people among the cast, who are otherwise White. |
| 283 | * ''{{Series/Charmed 1998}}'': Darryl Morris throughout the first seven seasons (he's PutOnABus in the eighth due to budget cuts) is the only non-white regular cast member. He does have some significance as the FriendOnTheForce, and in Season 2 becomes a SecretKeeper for the Halliwells. But he's also the one most likely to miss episodes and rarely have an arc of his own, except in Season 6. |
| 284 | * ''Series/{{Carrusel}}'' has a few: Cirilo is Black, David is Ashkenazi Jewish, Kokimoto is Japanese, and Bibi is North American of English ancestry. |
| 285 | * The modern ''Series/CharliesAngels'' revamp adds a black Angel in order to appeal to modern audiences. |
| 286 | * In ''Series/{{Chuck}}'', it's lampshaded that Morgan only manages to keep his job at the Buy-More because of his Hispanic descent, fulfilling the ethnic diversity quota set forth by company policy. Big Mike makes it clear that the moment he finds another Hispanic nerd to do his job, Morgan is ''gone''. |
| 287 | * In ''Series/TheClass2006'', Kyle's boyfriend Aaron is introduced as a secondary character to counteract the MonochromeCasting. |
| 288 | * ''Series/ClassOf07'': The characters are mostly white, with the exceptions of a few. Teresa, Tegan, Phoebe and Megan are those with focus in the show. Megan is of East Asian descent, Phoebe, Tegan and Teresa's ethnicities aren't clear. Sandy was also the one American exchange student there with the rest being Australians. Tegan and Phoebe are both also lesbians, while the rest are straight women (so far as is shown). |
| 289 | * Lampshaded on ''Series/{{Community}}'' (which actually does have a very diverse cast). Elroy Patashnik is introduced in Season 6 after Troy and Shirley, the series' other two major black characters, both depart from the show. One episode has a scene where he addresses his status as the sole black member of the group and states that he won't allow himself to be treated like a token, saying "I'm nobody's fourth [[Franchise/{{Ghostbusters}} Ghostbuster]]." |
| 290 | %%* Fred from ''Series/CoopAndCamiAskTheWorld''. (Administrivia/ZeroContextExample) |
| 291 | * The only non-white main character on ''Series/CornerGas'' is Davis Quinton, the Sergeant of Dog River's two-member police force. He (and the actor who plays him, Creator/LorneCardinal) is a member of the Cree Nations, hardly a rarity in Rural Saskatchewan. However, this is incidental to his character; it's only brought up once, at the end of the first season, when Karen suggests going to a ticket scalper and he acts offended. Also, both bartenders (Phil and Paul) appear Cree. One of them speaks some Cree, enough to know the original name of Dog River. |
| 292 | * ''Series/Counterpart2018'': Ian Shaw, who's a black Englishman, is the only man of color in the main cast. |
| 293 | * Three ''Series/CSIVerse'' series have one black character each: |
| 294 | ** ''Series/{{CSI}}'' has Warrick first and then Ray Langston, though with his departure, there aren't any. |
| 295 | ** ''Series/{{CSI Miami}}'' has Alexx (season 1-6), Tara (season 7), and Walter (season 8-10). |
| 296 | ** ''Series/{{CSINY}}'' has Sheldon Hawkes. |
| 297 | * ''Series/Cursed2020'': Arthur and Morgana become black in the series, along with some minor/background characters. |
| 298 | * A sketch on ''Series/DeadRingers'' lampshaded this with the Schwarzenegger film ''Shooting Lots and Lots of Bad Guys with my [[{{BFG}} Very Big Gun]]'' -- Arnie shouts "Noooooo! Token Black Buddy!" after his sidekick is killed by [[EvilBrit Token British Bad Guy]]. |
| 299 | * ''{{Series/Defiance}}'': Despite the show being set in the (former) St. Louis (majority Black city), only a few characters are actually Black or otherwise people of color, though the Native American [=McCauley=] family are prominent (they also avert common stereotypes by being the rich owners of a mine). On the Votan side, the Sensoth race only have one character in the show, with a minor role. |
| 300 | * Showtime's ''Series/{{Dexter}}'' manages to avert this. In adapting from [[Literature/{{Dexter}} the book]], the producers were given the liberty to change the ethnicity of any character based on the actors they wanted to hire. Instead, they hired a genuinely racially diverse cast and nobody got a RaceLift. However, [[DiscussedTrope the issue of tokenism is addressed]]; [=LaGuerta=] got her position based on her ability to spin things to her advantage and her TwoferTokenMinority status (black Hispanic woman), and when she pisses off her boss, he very carefully replaces her with a second twofer-token (a black, Haitian woman) who got her rank as an officer the ''hard'' way. |
| 301 | -->'''Captain Matthews:''' ''[referring to [=LaGuerta=]'s replacement]'' Turns out she's an ''actual'' hero. |
| 302 | * ''Series/DexterNewBlood'': Logan appears to be one of the only Black people in Iron Ridge. Not surprising in a small town. In any case he's the only one in the main cast. |
| 303 | * ''Series/{{Earth 2}}'' has a token black character who is [[UnfortunateImplications a violent criminal]] whose "reform" consists of a chip in his brain -- when the chip malfunctions, he tries to kill everybody. |
| 304 | * ''East West 101'' has a Token Polynesian cop. It also has a Muslim Arab-Australian cop, but in that case said cop is the main character, so "token" would be stretching it. |
| 305 | * ''Series/{{Emergency}}'' was pretty good for its time on this subject. |
| 306 | ** There are many African-American and Hispanic extras, including police officer Vince and an African-American detective who appears in a couple of episodes. Firefighter Marco Lopez is Hispanic and Johnny Gage is part Native American. |
| 307 | ** Averted with Dr. Morton; he's conspicuously the only black person in the main cast, but he's never treated as a token. From the first episode he's an accepted member of the Rampart ER medical team. His education as a doctor is a running subplot in several episodes; in fact, he's the only main character who gets anything resembling a CharacterArc, as he progresses from an arrogant, wet-behind-the-ears intern to a confident, competent ER doctor. |
| 308 | * One season of ''Exatlon Estados Unidos'' features a non-Latino American on the team. He knows minimal Spanish, but each episode he says a new Spanish sentence. |
| 309 | * ''Series/FeelGood'': Nick, a black guy who owns the club where Mae performs and once let her stay on his couch, is the only man of color in the main cast for season one. |
| 310 | * Elena Tyler from ''Series/{{Felicity}}'' is the token black female main character and best friend of main character Felicity. While a relatively positive representation, she's isolated as a woman of color in a way contraindicated by the incredibly diverse composition of both New York City and NYU's populations. |
| 311 | * In ''Series/{{Flashpoint}}'', we have the black Lewis Young, Winnie the dispatcher, and [[spoiler:after Lewis's death]] Leah Kerns as the Token Minorities. |
| 312 | * ''Series/Flowers2016'': Shun is a young Japanese man now working for Mr Flowers. He's the man of color in the main cast. |
| 313 | * ''Series/FreshOffTheBoat'': Invoked; at one point Eddie Huang (the new kid) gets into a scuffle with an African-American kid who says that Eddie's the new token minority. |
| 314 | %%* Franklin Delgado from ''Series/GamersGuideToPrettyMuchEverything''. (Administrivia/ZeroContextExample) |
| 315 | * ''Series/GameOfThrones'': |
| 316 | ** Khal Drogo was the only prominent cast member of the Dothraki race in the first season, and is killed off in the finale. Irri was likewise recurring but had to be killed off sooner because of her actress's visa problems. |
| 317 | ** Season 2 introduced a CanonForeigner, Talisa Maegyr. She fills the role of Robb's eventual wife Jeyne Westerling from the books, but is a completely different character. According to Creator/OonaChaplin, the role was auditioned race-neutral and she in fact assumed she wouldn't be considered. She was originally just going to be Jeyne as she was in the books, but the hectic production and many changes led to George RR Martin suggesting they just rename her. So she became an exiled noblewoman from Volantis. [[spoiler: Unlike Jeyne, she is killed off at the Red Wedding]]. |
| 318 | ** Season 4 sees Pedro Pascal joining for one season as Oberyn Martell. As he's explicitly bisexual, it makes him a TwoferTokenMinority. His paramour Ellaria Sand sticks around for a couple more seasons, but isn't a regular. Oberyn's bastard daughters, the Sand Snakes, appear in Seasons 5-7, but not as regulars. In fact, Dorne being introduced in Season 5 was an attempt to capitalise on the popularity of Oberyn and Ellaria the previous season. |
| 319 | ** Missandei and Grey Worm are notable for being the longest running non-white characters in the cast. Missandei has plenty of prominence as Daenerys's most trusted handmaiden and translator, but rarely affects the plot on her own. Grey Worm likewise is the leader of the Unsullied, but is otherwise a SatelliteCharacter to Daenerys. |
| 320 | * ''Series/GangRelated'': |
| 321 | ** Cassius is the only African-American main character. |
| 322 | ** Tae is the only Asian-American main character. |
| 323 | * ''Series/TheGoodWife'' has Kalinda Sharma (her ethnicity is never specified but it's presumably Indian, going by her name and the actress's background) from Season 1-6. Later, African-American Lucca Quinn becomes the Token Minority and also a SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitute. |
| 324 | * Rico Suave from ''Series/HannahMontana'' is the only Latino in an otherwise monochrome cast, but he subverts the TV stereotype of Latinos by being intelligent, wealthy, and motivated. |
| 325 | * Charlotte from ''Series/HenryDanger'' is the token Black girl. |
| 326 | * ''Series/HigherGround'': Latino boy Auggie is the only male student of color. |
| 327 | * Both radio experts on ''Series/HogansHeroes'' are token black characters. Given that they're all prisoners and obviously not all from the same unit, WWII segregation isn't really an issue. |
| 328 | ** It's downplayed with Sgt. Kinchloe (played by Ivan Dixon), as he's more than the radio expert -- he's second-in-command. He also has at least three episodes showcasing him, and his role was prominent enough that the practice of cutting out the black characters for the "Southern Version" (practiced up to the late 1960's) wasn't usually possible. |
| 329 | ** Sgt. Baker (played by Kenneth Washington) was a better fit when he took Kinchloe's place, having previously been the one black guy in the mob of line-less background prisoners. However, it is still notable that most of Kinchloe's spotlight episodes are the only ones to feature a black GirlOfTheWeek (an African princess and an old high school girlfriend respectively). |
| 330 | * ''Series/HomeAndAway'' had the Samoan Australian actor Jai Laga'aia's character, although the moment another non-white actor got a part Lagai'a was fired. |
| 331 | * On ''Series/{{House}}'', Creator/OmarEpps is the only series regular of color for three seasons, until House hires three new underlings, at which point Creator/KalPenn becomes the token South Asian guy. Having said that, Wilson, Cuddy, and Taub are all Jewish [[InformedJudaism to varying degrees of obviousness]], Thirteen is bisexual, and House is an atheist. And his atheism is portrayed... well, not ''entirely'' negatively, at any rate. They did okay. |
| 332 | * Jasmine Kang from ''Series/IDidntDoIt'' is the only Asian in the group. |
| 333 | * ''Series/{{Impulse|2018}}'': Zach is the only boy of color in the main cast. At school Zach appears to be the only black student, or among a very few. |
| 334 | * ''Series/IrmaVep'': |
| 335 | ** Herman Ray, an African-American director who's promoting his latest firm in Paris, is a supporting character. |
| 336 | ** Grégory Desormeaux, an older man who's a producer for ''Les Vampires''' production is also black. |
| 337 | * Lampshaded in ''Series/JasonKing''. King is adapting one of his adventures for a TV series. The television executive insists that the hero should have a sidekick, who is first portrayed as a white guy, only to change to a black guy to go with the latest trend, then ending up with an Asian guy to get a wider potential audience. |
| 338 | * Parodied and {{enforced|Trope}} in the ''Series/KeyAndPeele'' sketch "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EtalOOS-eM A Cappella]]", where the token black member of the otherwise all-white a cappella group treats a second black member joining [[SeriousBusiness as if his country was being invaded]]. |
| 339 | * Jerry Martinez from ''Series/KickinIt'' becomes the token Latino following Eddie's departure from the show after Season 2. |
| 340 | * ''Series/KrodMandoonAndTheFlamingSwordOfFire'': Aneka, Bruce, and Zelezry. They're the only people of color on the show, though at least they're in the main cast. |
| 341 | * Leo Dooley from ''Series/LabRats'' is the token black guy. In the sequel show ''Series/LabRatsEliteForce'' this role went to Skylar Storm of ''Series/MightyMed'' as the token Asian alien (who didn't qualify in her former series because of the Latino Alan -- and Horace if you count him as a lead) |
| 342 | * ''Series/LALaw'': |
| 343 | ** Victor Sifuentes was the token Latino lawyer at [=McKenzie=] Brakman. He comments on it a couple of times. When he left he was replaced by Daniel Morales. |
| 344 | ** Jonathan Rollins is the token African-American lawyer. |
| 345 | ** Arguably Benny Stulwitz is the token disabled character. |
| 346 | ** Even less arguably C.J. Lamb is the token queer character. She describes herself as "flexible". |
| 347 | * The ''Franchise/LawAndOrder'' franchise: |
| 348 | ** In a transparent attempt to say "we had a gay regular on the show", ''Series/LawAndOrder'' had Serena Southerlyn come out as lesbian to the audience in the last minute of her final episode. |
| 349 | ** ''Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' lampshades it when Detective Fin replaces Detective Jeffries (both are black). The show also averted it in later seasons with the addition of M.E. Warner and Dr. Huang to the regular cast. By the time of Season 15, this trope was entirely averted, as of the five members of the main cast, two were Latino and one is black. |
| 350 | * ''Series/LegendOfTheSeeker'': Chase is portrayed by a Samoan actor, with many other minor male characters on the show played by Maori actors. |
| 351 | * Miranda Sanchez from ''Series/LizzieMcGuire'' is the show's token Mexican. |
| 352 | * ''Series/TheLordOfTheRingsTheRingsOfPower'': Arondir is the only non-Caucasian Elf introduced. He could be a literal interpretation of the ''moriquendi'' (dark elves), who like Arondir were more attached to Middle-earth than the other elves, though traditionally they didn't live as far east as Tirharad. The distinctively different style of the armour worn by Arondir and the other elves initially standing guard with him also strongly suggests they belong to a different group than Galadriel or Elrond. |
| 353 | * ''Series/{{Lost}}'', despite having a huge cast from a diverse range of backgrounds, only ever had one gay character, Tom Friendly. And his sexuality wasn't even confirmed until after he'd been killed off. |
| 354 | * ''Series/LostInSpace2018'' changed the all-white cast of the [[Series/LostInSpace original]] by having Judy be mixed race (black father, white mother) as she's the daughter of Maureen's previous marriage, and also by making Don West a Latino character. |
| 355 | * ''Series/TheLWord'': For most of the series, Alice is the sole bisexual, which gets her some flack from lesbians. |
| 356 | * ''Series/MadTV1995'' was guilty of this with Creator/BobbyLee, the only Asian on the show. He even played a stereotypically Asian recurring character. |
| 357 | * ''Series/MakoMermaidsAnH2OAdventure'': |
| 358 | ** Mimmi is white, though she gets treated like this in Season 2 due to her hailing from the Northern Pod (Canada), which has an infamous reputation, unlike the other members of the cast, who all hail from the Mako/South Pacific Pod (Australia). [[spoiler:We later find out that Mimmi is Zac's long-lost biological sister. Although his race in the context of the show is never confirmed, Chai Hansen is half-Thai, so we can assume that Zac, and by extension Mimmi, is too in the context of the show. This makes Mimmi a true {{Token Minority}}, though Allie Bertram herself is not half-Thai.]] |
| 359 | ** In Season 3, Weilan joins the show and is clearly a token Asian. |
| 360 | * Although only a recurrent character, Griff in ''Series/MarriedWithChildren'' plays the part of TokenBlackFriend to Al. He even lampshades this in some episodes, like when he objects to go first into dangerous situations because BlackDudeDiesFirst. Another recurrent Black character is CorruptCop Officer Dan, who's a member of the mostly white NO'MAAM club. |
| 361 | * Matt Fielding is the token gay on ''Series/MelrosePlace''. He rarely has a story line that isn't directly related to his gayness. He gets gay-bashed (twice!), fired for being gay (twice!), and challenged as guardian for his niece because of being gay. He's the only resident of the apartment complex not to have an on-screen sex life, and the one time he's shown in an amorous situation, the camera cuts away as he's leaning in to kiss another man to a shocked reaction shot of a neighbor. |
| 362 | * Mixed-race actress Creator/AngelCoulby was the result of AbilityOverAppearance when it came to casting her as Guinevere on ''Series/{{Merlin|2008}}'', and to their credit, the producers have never once defended or explained this decision beyond saying that she was the best for the role. However, one can't help but feel that the later inclusion of Gwen's brother Elyan is the result of this trope: he's the only black knight of the Round Table and doesn't really get to do much. [[spoiler:His death, which seems to only serve as an excuse for people to brush off Gwen's post-brainwashing strangeness, is far from encouraging. After Gwen returns to normal, he's forgotten.]] Their dad also serves as this [[spoiler:before he too is killed off]]. |
| 363 | * ''Series/{{Misfits}}'': Curtis is Black, the only man of color in the original group. |
| 364 | * ''Series/ModernFamily'' has Gloria and her son Manny, who fit Hispanic stereotypes perfectly. They are also used as an excuse to use Hispanic jokes shamelessly. There are also two gay men who are raising an adopted Vietnamese child. |
| 365 | * ''Series/MrYoung'' has Dang, the Vietnamese janitor, in a cast of otherwise all white characters. |
| 366 | * ''Series/TheMurders'': One of the supporting characters, Detective Bill Chen, is of East Asian ancestry. He's the only person on the police force shown with his background. |
| 367 | * Sarah Fox from ''Series/MyBabysittersAVampire''. She's AmbiguouslyBrown, though her actress is biracial. |
| 368 | * Cookie from ''Series/NedsDeclassifiedSchoolSurvivalGuide'' is the token Black of the group. |
| 369 | * Queer people are severely under-represented in ''Series/NewGirl''. A recurring gay character from 2014-2015 was Mike who worked at the same bar as Schmidt. He has no major involvement in the plots, but in scenes co-starring him he will often chime in to remind characters (and the audience) that he is gay. |
| 370 | * ''Series/{{Neighbours}}'' has an Indian Australian family, the Kapoors, in the main cast. |
| 371 | * Paxton's sister in ''Series/NeverHaveIEver'' has Down Syndrome, but she has little involvement in the main plots. |
| 372 | * ''Series/TheNevers'': Dr. Cousens the only Black male main character. |
| 373 | * Ricky and later Junito (Latino) of ''Series/NoahsArc'', which has a predominantly African-American cast. In fact, they are the only non-African-Americans of the cast. |
| 374 | * ''Series/TheOutpost'': Janzo and Naya are played by South-Asian actors, Tobin's actor is black. Zed's is mixed race. A couple of minor characters are also people of color: Essa, Milus, Sill, and Jabaan, along with a few extras. Later the Blackblood leader Yavalla, along with her daughter Wren, are played by black or mixed-race actresses. The rest of the series' cast is white, though it's more than usual for a fantasy. |
| 375 | * ''Series/ThePact'': The lesbian Cat to the main group of women is one sexuality-wise, and the mixed-race Tish is one to the broader all-white cast along with being bisexual too. |
| 376 | * ''Series/PipoDeClown'': Klukkluk is the only Native American amongst an European cast, and this is highlighted by his poor grasp of the Dutch language and FunnyForeigner antics. He is portrayed by a white actor in {{brownface}}. |
| 377 | * Almost every team of ''Franchise/PowerRangers'' consists of three white people (one of whom is also possibly Latino) and one black person and one person of Asian descent to form the token minorities. HumanAliens occasionally appear on teams as well. This multiracial team lineup also seems to apply to the non-human Alien Rangers of Aquitar, which includes the black Aquitian Blue Alien Ranger Cestro. |
| 378 | * ''Series/ThePractice'': Eugene is black, the only man of color in the main cast. |
| 379 | * ''{{Series/Primeval}}'' received criticism in its first two seasons for its lack of diversity, with the only recurring non-white character being the antagonistic Caroline in Season 2 (although she gets a HeelFaceTurn in the finale). Season 3 introduced Sarah Page, who was happily well-received as a regular. Unfortunately, the show was cancelled and not picked back up for a while, in which production moved to Ireland. The actress was unwilling to move, having just given birth, and Sarah was killed off in between seasons. Season 4 then introduced Alexander Siddig as Philip Burton. |
| 380 | * ''Series/{{Ramy}}'': Parodied in the second episode. Right after firing Ramy (the protagonist), his white techbro boss thanks him for providing the office with "Mediterranean flair". |
| 381 | * Parodied in an episode of ''Series/TheRealHusbandsOfHollywood'' where Creator/GeorgeLopez guest-stars as himself, with his introduction caption stating "Helping attract Latino audience." |
| 382 | * Subverted on ''Series/TheRedGreenShow'' with the character of Edgar K.B. Montrose, played by First Nations Canadian actor Creator/GrahamGreeneActor. Greene himself approached producer Steve Smith, asking to be on the show after enjoying it on TV. The role they gave him was essentially color-blind -- that of an explosives "enthusiast" who can't really call himself an expert, since experts have the proper license and permits, and more training in handling dynamite than just watching a lot of [[WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes Road Runner]] cartoons. Edgar is TooDumbToLive, but that also describes everybody else on the show. The only reference to Greene's ancestry in his time on the show is a humorous ShoutOut in his first appearance, when Edgar comments about the film ''Film/DancesWithWolves'', and states that the "Native guy" (Greene himself) should have gotten the Oscar. |
| 383 | * ''Series/TheRepublicOfSarah'': |
| 384 | ** Grover is a Black man. |
| 385 | ** Tyler is Native American. |
| 386 | * In ''The Riddlers'', Eesup is the only African-American Riddler. |
| 387 | * ''Series/RobinHood'' has David Harewood as a black Friar Tuck in 12th century England. Djaq is a dark-skinned Muslim woman (called "Saracen", although that was a very general term for Muslims at the time -- she's played by an Indian actress). |
| 388 | * ''Series/Rush2008'' has a single Polynesian cop. |
| 389 | * ''Series/TeenWolf'' seems to maintain a slot for a recurring gay extra (Danny in Seasons 1-3, Mason in Season 4). These characters are usually only in about half the episodes in any given season, onscreen for less than two minutes if they do appear, and may not have any actual dialogue. They occupy the roles of best friends of secondary characters. If they have dialogue, it almost invariably [[HaveIMentionedIAmGay contains some reminder that they are gay]]. The streak appeared to be broken in Season 3 with the introduction of gay werewolf Ethan, but he also occupied a minor role, did not always have lines, and was only present for the one season. |
| 390 | * Dreama and Quizmaster Albert (they're both black) in ''Series/SabrinaTheTeenageWitch''. |
| 391 | * ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' has been guilty of this at multiple points in its run. |
| 392 | ** Creator/GarrettMorris in the '70s. |
| 393 | ** Creator/EddieMurphy in the early '80s. While certainly nobody would question Murphy's right to be there, the fact remains that the show felt no obligation to have another black person in the cast as long as Murphy was there (in fact, Robert Townsend, who was originally hired to be the token black guy, was let go once Murphy showed up). |
| 394 | ** In the early '90s, the show for a change had multiple black people in the cast. However, when ''SNL'' turned over most of its cast in 1995, they kept Creator/TimMeadows on primarily to avoid giving the impression that the show was trying to rid itself of all its black performers. |
| 395 | ** For a couple of years it was just Creator/KenanThompson. |
| 396 | ** Season 35 introduced Creator/JayPharoah alongside Kenan. While it seemed he might take the favorite spot over Kenan, especially to play the slimmer, more handsome African-American celebrities such as Creator/DenzelWashington, he was let go and Kenan has remained. Pharoh was let go despite the fact that his impressions are spot-on for nearly anyone. However, there are also the non-black but non-white characters, like Creator/NasimPedrad, who is Iranian (notwithstanding the controversy over whether Iranians should be lumped in with Arabs and other Semitic peoples, or whether they are "dark whites"), or Creator/FredArmisen (half German-Venezuelan, half Korean). He is both the second Asian and second Hispanic cast member of ''SNL''. |
| 397 | ** The first Hispanic cast member was Creator/HoratioSanz, a ''white'' Hispanic from the looks of him. He was often cast as Italian characters. |
| 398 | ** In late 2013, SNL received a lot of criticism for their relative lack of black female cast members throughout their almost 40-year history. They held a casting call and ended up casting Creator/SasheerZamata, who was only the fifth black female cast member in the history of the show and the only one on the show since Creator/MayaRudolph's departure in 2007. They elevated writer Creator/LeslieJones from the writers room to the main performing cast in 2014, raising the number of black women to two. Therefore, to maintain the token minority numbers and their tacit promise to uphold the Token Code, Zamata was let go from SNL in 2017. |
| 399 | * ''Series/SavedByTheBell'' has Lisa (played by Creator/LarkVoorhies), the Black Princess of the group, and Slater (played by Creator/MarioLopez), the Hispanic. How stereotypical they are depends on the episode, but according to the producers their characters were of no specific race and they were cast just because they were the best. They ethnicity does comes into play in some {{Very Special Episode}}s. |
| 400 | * ''Series/{{Scrubs}}'' had the great feature of JD and Turk's College Brochure. Turk is photoshopped in twice to make it appear more diverse. Lampshaded in the episode "My Long Goodbye" when Turk struggles to think of other black members of staff. He gets himself and Nurse Roberts (whom he is speaking to), Snoop Dog Attending, and Leonard the Security Guard... |
| 401 | -->'''Turk:''' This ''is'' a white-ass hospital. |
| 402 | ::: He then adds that if this were a horror movie, [[BlackDudeDiesFirst he'd be getting nervous]]. |
| 403 | * ''Series/SexLife'': A couple men of color join the mostly White cast in Season 2: |
| 404 | ** Majid, a man who's half Persian like Billie is. |
| 405 | ** Kam, who's Black and Sasha's ex-boyfriend. |
| 406 | * ''Series/{{Shadowhunters}}'': |
| 407 | ** Simon's Jewish, while the rest of the cast are gentiles. This is especially hard for him once he becomes a vampire, since Judaism prohibits consuming blood (which Simon now needs to survive). |
| 408 | ** Luke is Black. He's one among just two men of color in the main cast. |
| 409 | * In-universe example from ''Series/ShamelessUS''. Liam, the black child of the Gallagher clan, manages to get into a private school where he's pretty much the only black kid in the class. It soon turns out that much of Liam's day is being pulled out of the classroom to be in the playground when prospective parents pass by so he can be an example of the school's "openness and diversity." |
| 410 | * Pete Ross from ''Series/{{Smallville}}'' is an especially funny example, as in the comic book version he's [[RaceLift white]]. |
| 411 | * ''Series/{{Soap}}'': |
| 412 | ** Benson was the only black character in the show for the first three seasons and he was the butler. He was never used to put across any racial message, and if anything he was the OnlySaneMan in the entire show. When Benson got replaced in Season 3, there was Saunders the {{Expy}}, also black. |
| 413 | ** In Season 3 only, there was Polly Dawson, a black woman who dates Danny who was there to try and push a racial message around. They do get some racial attacks and eventually Danny gets paranoid about everybody staring at the two of them in public. |
| 414 | * ''Series/TheSociety'': Will's the only explicit boy of color we see in the town. |
| 415 | * ''Series/SomeAssemblyRequired'''s protagonist Jarvis is black, but everyone else in the cast is white. |
| 416 | * Nico Harris from ''Series/SonnyWithAChance'' is the token black guy. |
| 417 | * ''Series/SonsOfAnarchy'' deals with fictionalized versions of outlaw Motorcycle Clubs. Most of the clubs are racially-exclusive in RealLife, and the most they tend to mix is that those that are not White-supremacists or Black admit White and Hispanics (the case of the Hell's Angels, which is the club the Sons are based on). On that note, Juan Carlos "Juice" Ortiz is the only Latino character among the main cast and in the chapter of the city of Charming (that also happens to be the international headquarters). As sexual minorities go, Alex "Tig" Trager is bisexual (he starts a relationship with a transgender person). Near the end of the series they open the club to Black members. |
| 418 | * Teal'c in ''Series/StargateSG1'', who, as well as being the token black guy, is also the token alien of the titular flagship off-world reconnaissance team SG-1. In "[[Recap/StargateSG1S1E5TheFirstCommandment The First Commandment]]", one of the first signs that the team have brought a highly contagious infection back from another world is an unprovoked assault on Teal'c, which, perhaps for the sake of not appearing racially aggravated, is instigated by another black man. |
| 419 | * ''Franchise/StarTrek'': |
| 420 | ** Back in [[Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries the original series]], the creators had to fight ExecutiveMeddling to get two Token Minorities, Sulu and Uhura, on the bridge, and ''some'' non-whites among the extras. The original pilot pushed further with a female second in command, and Spock was considered to be radical at the time as an Alien, especially with the original plans being for Spock to have either green or red skin. Also notable that both lead characters of Spock and Kirk were played by Jewish actors. Then there's the gutsy move of creating a Russian main character at the height of the Cold War. |
| 421 | ** ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'': |
| 422 | *** Worf is an in-universe example as the only Klingon in all of Starfleet, having been adopted by humans in his youth. Quite a bit of CharacterDevelopment results from his dealings with born-and-raised Klingons who variously fail to live up to his idealized image of Klingon honor or disapprove of his choice to stay with the humans instead of returning to his people (where his family was disgraced anyways). |
| 423 | *** Another in-universe example would be Data as the only Android of the Starfleet (and one of the very few Androids of the whole universe). |
| 424 | ** ''[[Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine Deep Space Nine]]'', with a somewhat varied cast itself, has an odd ''class'' example. Miles O'Brien is heavily played up as a CloserToEarth blue-collar [=NCO=] in a staff of implicitly elite OfficerAndAGentleman types, complete with a labor movement martyr in his ancestry (granted, one can call Captain Sisko upwardly-mobile, as the son of a restaurateur, but this is revealed much later and never emphasized). Though the Federation is supposed to be truly egalitarian, classless meritocracy, so the whole issue is a little murky. |
| 425 | ** Referenced in ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' (itself a very racially diverse show) when Janeway and Chakotay discuss the issues involved in a ship crewed by both Federation members and Maquis separatists. Janeway notes that by making the Maquis Chakotay her second in command she hopes that she has already shown that she can be tolerant of them, but Chakotay responds, "I have no intention of being your token Maquis" when discussing whether B'Elanna Torres should be chief engineer. |
| 426 | ** ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'', unlike the previous shows (which were such aversions of HumansAreWhite they were often accused of being {{five token band}}s by some), has a black guy, an Asian woman, and ''everyone else'' is white (aside from a couple of minor, seldom-seen characters). And also note that, in order to make it obvious to the audience that he was only on the show so they could say they had a Token Minority, the black guy was a glorified extra... |
| 427 | * ''Stockinger'', the spinoff of the Austrian show ''Series/InspectorRex'', has Antonella Simoni, a cheerful Italian-Austrian cop and the first female cop to appear in the ''Inspector Rex'' franchise. |
| 428 | * Lucas Sinclair in ''Series/StrangerThings'' was initially the only Black character in the entire main cast, before his sister Erica joined the main cast starting Season 3. The show is GenreSavvy enough to lampshade this hilariously sometimes, like in Season 2, when Lucas, Mike, Will, and Dustin dress as the Film/{{Ghostbusters|1984}} for Halloween, and Lucas goes as Venkman, arguing that he doesn't want to be Winston. |
| 429 | * Invoked in-universe in ''Series/{{Suits}}'' when Jessica Pearson's backstory reveals that she was originally hired by the law firm because she was a black woman and the firm decided it needed "diversity". She was initially told that she was hired strictly on merit, but later saw a working memo which specifically had "diversity" written next to her name. What really pissed her off was the fact that the memo did not mention her being a top-of-her-class Harvard graduate or her work at the Harvard Law Review, which should have made her one of the top candidates for the job no matter what her race or gender is. She got even by rising through the firms ranks and then ousting the managing partner who wrote the memo. |
| 430 | * ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'': This is a show about two white guys, with the addition of up to two other white guys, where a supermajority of women with speaking roles are blondes. Everyone but white males appears only as token, although a couple of white women have gotten to the level of supporting cast before dying. Or, in one case, being given LaserGuidedAmnesia so they wouldn't be traumatized by their kidnapping, or miss Dean after he left them [[ItsNotYouItsMyEnemies for their own good]]. |
| 431 | ** There are quite a few black characters on the show, but somehow none of them come even as close to being core cast as the women: |
| 432 | *** The only one who manages to be seriously recurring is the psychotic VampireHunter who eventually becomes a vampire. His ScaryBlackMan traits are played with initially in that Dean thinks he and his badass attitude toward decapitation is ''awesome'', and then the guy turns out to be a hateful extremist who offed his own little sister after she was vamped, which pushes Dean's BerserkButton, and who doesn't make any distinction between FriendlyNeighborhoodVampires and the dangerous kind. |
| 433 | *** The archangel Raphael, the one who never really does anything or gets much characterization, is the one linked to a bloodline of black people. He never even wears the same black person for more than a couple of appearances, because after he burns them out and dumps them they're in no condition to consent again. That poor family. Also, those poor actors. The guy he wears in "[[Recap/SupernaturalS05E03FreeToBeYouAndMe Free to Be You and Me]]" is pretty impressively creepy. |
| 434 | *** There's a married black couple of {{hunter|OfMonsters}}s, one of whom is British, who are rude and overconfident. [[BlackGuyDiesFirst The husband dies]] in their first appearance, and the wife is not very useful and never comes back. |
| 435 | *** First-season psychic character [[MagicalNegro Missouri Moseley]] could have been useful on a number of occasions when the Winchester brothers are desperate for allies, including on a couple of occasions specifically a psychic, but is never even referenced, even when they go back to her town, although it's too late for help by that point. |
| 436 | *** In Seasons 2 and 3 there are a few appearances by hard-assed CowboyCop Victor Hendriksen, the black FBI agent assigned to the Dean Winchester case. He has an EnemyMine when the station in which he's holding the boys fall under demonic siege, and after they leave he's killed. He reappears as an angry ghost at the beginning of Season 4. |
| 437 | *** There's also Bobby's old partner Rufus Turner, gruff old bastard with a taste for fine scotch. |
| 438 | ** Minorities other than black generally don't even get token appearances, though there were some hot Asian {{fanservice}} girls, at least one with a small speaking part. |
| 439 | ** The longest running non-white character is probably Kevin Tran, who shows up at the very end of Season 7 and makes sporadic appearances throughout Seasons 8 and 9. His mother, Linda, also premieres around the same time, but is in even fewer episodes than him. [[spoiler:And in the mid-Season 9 finale, Kevin is killed off. He shows up as a ghost a few episodes after that, and leaves with Linda to never be seen again.]] |
| 440 | ** The only recurring queer character is Charlie Bradbury, a lesbian who shows up intermittently throughout Seasons 7-10. [[spoiler:Like Kevin, she gets killed off.]] |
| 441 | * ''Franchise/SuperSentai'': Generally, Super Sentai rarely features non-Japanese characters and even more rarely characters who are not Asian. However, there have been a few times in which a non-Asian character appeared as a permanent supporting cast member within a specific series. |
| 442 | ** ''Series/ZyudenSentaiKyoryuger'': The two Spirit Kyorugers are deceased warriors from the past that have come back to help the modern Kyoryugers in the present as part of the auxiliary team. One of them is Ramires, a White guy from Europe and the only character in this series who isn't Asian as the other Spirit Kyoruger is Chinese and everyone else is Japanese. |
| 443 | ** ''Series/KaitouSentaiLupinrangerVsKeisatsuSentaiPatranger'': Commissioner Samuel Hilltop who is the Commanding Officer of the Police themed Patrangers and the only Black guy in a show where 99% of the characters are ethnic Japanese. |
| 444 | * ''Series/SWAT2017'': |
| 445 | ** Hondo is the only black member of the main SWAT team. When the white leader shoots a black youth during a raid, commander Hicks makes Hondo the team leader at a press conference despite the fact that Deacon is next in line. Hondo himself complains over this being an obvious policial move to soothe tensions. Indeed, when things calm down, Hicks presses for Deacon to become leader, but Deacon makes it clear he doesn't want to be part of some political game undermining Hondo. Several episodes have Hondo relating how he had to fight to prove he wasn't just a "token" member of the team. |
| 446 | ** Tan is the only Asian member. |
| 447 | ** Sanchez is a second man of color commanding 20-Squad after Hondo's demotion, as a Latino (no coincidence surely), as otherwise it would look bad to get rid of Hondo. |
| 448 | %%* ''Series/ThatsSoRaven'' has a Token Latino. (Administrivia/ZeroContextExample) |
| 449 | * Habib (Asian and Muslim) and Gladstone (black Caribbean) on ''Series/TheThinBlueLine''. Of course, this is modern-day London, so an ethnically diverse workplace makes sense. |
| 450 | * ''Series/TidelandsNetflix'': |
| 451 | ** Jared, one of Augie's men, is part Aboriginal. |
| 452 | ** A couple of the L'Attente guys are also men of color, but they don't get lines or characterizations. |
| 453 | * Bonnie Bennett in ''Series/TheVampireDiaries'' TV show. She has her own storyline for a bit, but it turns out to exist only to facilitate the (white, male) lead vampire's storyline. She's white in [[Literature/TheVampireDiaries the books]] -- but they completely erased the existence another extremely prominent female character who is Latina and definitely minimized Bonnie's personality and agency. |
| 454 | * ''Series/VanPires'' has the black Snap, who is really blatantly this. [[TotallyRadical Just look at that nickname!]] |
| 455 | * ''Series/VeronicaMars'' has two examples: Veronica's best friend Wallace, who is African-American, and biker-allied Eli "Weevil" Navarro, who is Latino. |
| 456 | * ''Series/{{Vida}}'': While still Latina, Nico's the only Honduran/Argentine-American living in a Mexican-American neighborhood. |
| 457 | * Initially played straight in ''Series/TheWalkingDead2010'' with T-Dog, who is the only major character in the series not to have any sub-plots and little dialog. Extremely apparent in the Season 2 episode "[[Recap/TheWalkingDeadS02E11JudgeJuryExecutioner Judge, Jury, Executioner]]", in which the group deliberates whether or not to [[spoiler:kill Randall]]. The episode focuses on the opinions of every member of the group except T-Dog, whose one line of dialog is cut off by Dale. In Season 3, [[spoiler:T-Dog is killed off, then shortly after they gain a new black cast member. The new black guy is then killed off later, just as Tyreese, another black guy, shows up.]] Later, Tyreese and his sister Sasha join the main cast, though [[spoiler:Tyreese dies in the episode after Beth]]. After that it starts getting subverted with the addition of Michonne at the start of Season 3, who is easily one of the most prominent female characters on the show, being an undeniable badass with a sword. Both Michonne and Sasha remain alive and important to the show. |
| 458 | * Khaleel "Kenny" Al-Bahir is the Token Middle Eastern person in ''Series/TheWarAtHome''. Also token gay. |
| 459 | * ''Series/WarOfTheWorlds2019'': Mustafa Mokrani, a Frenchman of Arab descent, and Kariem, a Sudanese immigrant to the UK, are the only characters of color on the show. |
| 460 | * ''Series/WaterRats'' has a single token Polynesian cop. |
| 461 | * The character of Charlie Young was added to ''Series/TheWestWing'' just because the NAACP was criticizing the show for ''not'' having a Token Minority. Charlie's "token minority" status is particularly interesting in this case, as only two of the show's main characters are white and Protestant (and that is if one guesses on Sam, whose religion is not mentioned but can be presumed not to be Catholic or Jewish). Two of the main characters are Jewish and four are Catholic, making the show's main cast far more diverse than the actual US population, even without Charlie in the mix. |
| 462 | * ''Series/WildCards2024'': |
| 463 | ** Cole's boss Li is Asian Canadian, played by Terry Chen. |
| 464 | ** Detective Simmons is a black man, one of Cole's colleagues. |
| 465 | * Venus Flytrap on ''Series/WKRPInCincinnati'', although the show made a strong effort to depict him as a well-rounded individual. |
| 466 | * ''Series/TheWorstWitch'': Ruby, a Token Black, and Jadu, a Token Asian, in the '98 TV series. Azmat Madari in ''Weirdsister College'' would also count. The 2017 series averts the tokenism with more people of color (some not actually main characters either, but just in the background). |
| 467 | * ''Series/YouMeHer'': |
| 468 | ** Dave, who's half-Turkish, is the sole man of color who's there across the whole series. |
| 469 | ** Andy is black, and he appears from Seasons 1-2. |
| 470 | ** Nathan is olive-skinned, though his ethnicity isn't stated. He was played by Lee Majdoub, who's Lebanese-Canadian. |
| 471 | %%* Kojo from ''Series/ZekeAndLuther''. (Administrivia/ZeroContextExample) |
| 472 | [[/folder]] |
| 473 | |
| 474 | [[folder:Music]] |
| 475 | * Music/FiveSecondsOfSummer has the Māori-Australian member Calum Hood alongside three white guys. |
| 476 | * Jaimoe the black drummer is the only black member of Music/TheAllmanBrothersBand. |
| 477 | * Poor Niall Horan of Music/OneDirection. Simply known as "The Irish One" by non-directorners. He's also the only blond. Zayn Malik, meanwhile, is the only non-white member of the group. |
| 478 | * Mel B (Scary Spice) from Music/SpiceGirls is the only black Spice Girl (although technically she is mixed-race). |
| 479 | * Floyd Sneed of Three Dog Night is the band's only black member. |
| 480 | * As is Music/DariusRucker in Music/HootieAndTheBlowfish. |
| 481 | * Both Howie Dorough and AJ [=McLean=] of the Music/BackstreetBoys are Hispanics on their mothers' side and Irish on their fathers' side. |
| 482 | * Terrance Hobbs Guitarist from Music/{{Suffocation}} is the only African American in this band after Drummer Mike Smith left the band. |
| 483 | * Diamond Rowe from Tetrarch is the only African American and also the first female African American Metal Guitarist and Drummer Ruben Limas are Hispanic from Venezuela. |
| 484 | * Tom Morello from Music/RageAgainstTheMachine & ex-Music/{{Audioslave}} is only African American on his father side and Irish & Italian on his mother side and Zack de la Rocha are Mexican American. |
| 485 | * Music/SlashMusician from Music/GunsNRoses and ex-Velvet Revolver are British on his father side and African American on his mother side. |
| 486 | * Derrick Green from Music/{{Sepultura}} replacing Max Cavalera the white Brazilian is the only African American along side three white Brazilian. |
| 487 | * Howard Jones ex-Music/KillswitchEngage and Light The Torch is only African American along side another white guys. |
| 488 | * Music/SuicidalTendencies in the 80s and 90s Guitarist Rocky George is only African American and Bassist [[Music/{{Metallica}} Robert Trujillo]] is Hispanic. After George left the band he been replaced by another African American Dean Pleasants. Suicidal Tendencies current Bassist Ra Diaz also a Hispanic and Pleasants still in the band. |
| 489 | * Music/{{Metallica}} in the 80's and 90's, Kirk Hammett is only English, Scottish, German and Irish on his father side and Phillipino on his mother side. In 2003 Robert Trujillo joined Metallica and he is Hispanic. |
| 490 | * Music/{{Sleeping With Sirens}} as of 2020. Following the departure of their previous drummer, Matty Best of Sydney pop-punk band Tonight Alive joined the lineup, making him the sole Australian in a band with four Americans. |
| 491 | |
| 492 | [[/folder]] |
| 493 | |
| 494 | [[folder:Myths & Religion]] |
| 495 | * Literature/TheBible: |
| 496 | ** In ''Literature/BooksOfSamuel'', Uriah is a Hittite residing in Israel, which was considered as an ethnic minority in Israel back then. However, he's not among the Gentiles as he follows Israelite beliefs, which was a requirement for him to marry Bathsheba, an Israelite herself, in the first place. He also [[TheMenFirst genuinely cares about his subordinates]] and refuses to have sex with his wife while a war is going on, despite royal orders, because he doesn't want to accept privileges that his men aren't being allowed. And after his death, the prophet Nathan promptly [[WhatTheHellHero calls David out]] for inventing the UriahGambit. |
| 497 | ** Balthasar, one of the three[[note]]who, by the way, are neither named ''nor numbered'' in the Bible: it is only a medieval tradition that there were three or that their names were as here plus Caspar.[[/note]] Wise Men, has been depicted as black since [[OlderThanPrint Medieval times]]. Melchior is sometimes depicted as Asian as well, so the Wise Men represent the three continents of the Medieval world: Europe, Asia, and Africa. One researcher has found [[http://www.usatoday.com/yourlife/mind-soul/spirituality/2010-12-03-three-wise-men_N.htm references]] in an ancient manuscript saying that the Magi came from a country called Shir, which was in the far east, bordered an ocean, and produced silk. The Magi might have actually been Chinese, or perhaps Persian. Since "magi" were the name of the Zoroastrian clergy from Persia, the latter was probably intended. |
| 498 | [[/folder]] |
| 499 | |
| 500 | [[folder:Pinball]] |
| 501 | * ''Pinball/{{Heist}}'': Franklin Cooper is the only black character in the game. |
| 502 | [[/folder]] |
| 503 | |
| 504 | [[folder:Print Media]] |
| 505 | * ''Magazine/{{MAD}}'' magazine referenced the trope back in 1966 (issue 101). In a parody of the movie ''The Sandpiper'', a character refers to himself as the film's "token Negro". It was a long time ago indeed. |
| 506 | [[/folder]] |
| 507 | |
| 508 | [[folder:Pro Wrestling]] |
| 509 | * While it was averted in later years, around 2010, the WWE Divas were falling into this. Each brand had one (and in many cases, ''only'' one) member of each minority group amidst the sea of blond hair on the rest of the roster. |
| 510 | ** On ''Wrestling/WWERaw'', as seen by the [[http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_74DOUg2qS3k/TB38mp8S4AI/AAAAAAAADHM/A0auqaG47rA/s1600/Divas+Championship+Fatal+4-Way+Match.jpg Fatal 4-Way Divas match]], there was the white Wrestling/{{Maryse}}, black Wrestling/AliciaFox, Asian Wrestling/GailKim, and Latina Wrestling/EveTorres (although the then-recently-returning Wrestling/{{Melina}} shook that up, and with the Wrestling/BellaTwins, Latinas became something of the majority on ''Raw''.) |
| 511 | ** On ''Wrestling/WWESmackDown'', it doesn't even go that far. There's the British/Moroccan Wrestling/{{Layla}} who seems to be filling in for black [[http://wrestlecrap.com/sbt%20files/sbt-laylafigure/extreme-expose.jpg despite being paler than some of the more tan-addicted Divas]] and the Latino Wrestling/RosaMendes, that's it. |
| 512 | * Black Warrior, the lone Mexican of the Japanese anti-Mexican La Ola Amarilla PowerStable that periodically invaded Wrestling/{{CMLL}} between 2005 and 2013. He served as the group's TranslatorBuddy. |
| 513 | * Jonathan Gresham in Search And Destroy, although this wasn't by design so much as [[RealLifeWritesThePlot circumstance]]. One other did briefly make it to TV, but Wrestling/LioRush was PutOnABus due to an attack from Shane Taylor of The Rebellion. |
| 514 | %%* Ezekiel Jackson served as this for The Corre. (Administrivia/ZeroContextExample) |
| 515 | * Kenny King in the Full Impact Pro PowerStable Young Rich And Ready For Action. Kenny ''could'' be considered one of the "main" members, mostly by virtue of representing the group in Wrestling/RingOfHonor, but nonetheless the rest (Jason Blade, Portia Perez, Wrestling/ClaudioCastagnoli, The Lovely Lacey, Sal Rinauro, Radiant Rain, Wrestling/{{Daffney|Unger}}, Steve Madison, Becky Bayless, Chasyn Rance, [=SoCal=] Val, etc) were all white. |
| 516 | * After Michael Tarver and Wrestling/DarrenYoung were kicked out of Wrestling/TheNexus, Wrestling/DavidOtunga became the only black member of the group. |
| 517 | * Concerning SHINE PowerStable Las Sicarias, it is easy to forget Amanda Rodriguez is "The Peruvian Princess" when every other member (Wrestling/IvelisseVelez, Wrestling/LaRosaNegra, Wrestling/TheaTrinidad, Wrestling/MercedesMartinez) is Puerto Rican and 3/4ths of them [[PatrioticFervor are loud about it]]. |
| 518 | * Of the foreigners who came into Wrestling/{{FMW}} for ''Texas Street Fight'', [[Wrestling/{{Jacqueline}} Sweet Georgia Brown]] became this among the FMW women's division. She spent an even longer time as the black one of the WWF's women's division until [[Wrestling/CarleneMoore Jazz]] debuted. |
| 519 | * Legado Del Fantasma, Joaquin Wilde is only Philipino American with other Hispanic. In main roster Elektra Lopez was not in the stable and replace by another Hispanic [[Wrestling/TheaTrinidad Zelina Vega]]. |
| 520 | [[/folder]] |
| 521 | |
| 522 | [[folder:Puppet Shows]] |
| 523 | * Lieutenant Green -- token black of ''Series/CaptainScarletAndTheMysterons''. The show also counts a Japanese and a black amongst its minor characters. |
| 524 | [[/folder]] |
| 525 | |
| 526 | [[folder:Sports]] |
| 527 | * Manchester United have a large Asian fanbase, and for a time seemed to ensure that they always had at least one Asian player in the squad, presumably to appeal to said fans: |
| 528 | ** Park Ji-Sung (Korean, 2005–2012) |
| 529 | ** Shinji Kagawa (Japanese, 2012–2014) |
| 530 | ** Since averted, however. United hasn't had an Asian player on the main roster since Kagawa left. |
| 531 | * Tottenham Hotspur have Korean Son Heung-min and also become a famous footballer in his country. |
| 532 | * Liverpool, Arsenal, Newcastle United, Southampton and Brighton & Home Albion have Japanese player Takumi Minamino played for Liverpool (2020-2022), Takehiro Tomiyasu played for Arsenal (2021-) Yoshinori Muto played for Newcastle United (2018-2021), Maya Yoshida played for Southampton (2012-2020) and Kaoru Mitoma played for Brighton & Home Albion (2021-) |
| 533 | [[/folder]] |
| 534 | |
| 535 | [[folder:Tabletop Games]] |
| 536 | %%* ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'' has Kaya going from planeswalking ghost assassin to head of the Orzhov Syndicate. However, when you take some time to think about the Orzhov Syndicate practices... (Administrivia/ZeroContextExample; what minority, and what do the practices have to do with it?) |
| 537 | * In Creator/PrivateerPress's tabletop war game ''[[TabletopGame/IronKingdoms WARMACHINE]]'', Major Markus "Siege" Brisbane is the game's only black warcaster. Before the release of the expansion book ''Pirates of the Broken Coast'', he was the only black model in the game. Siege came out in ''Apotheosis'', the third expansion of the game. |
| 538 | [[/folder]] |
| 539 | |
| 540 | [[folder:Theatre]] |
| 541 | * Theatre/AltarBoyz does this in multiple ways. Mark is the token gay, while Juan being the token Hispanic. The most notable and parodied example is Abraham, who is the token Jew in a Catholic boy band. |
| 542 | [[/folder]] |
| 543 | |
| 544 | [[folder:Toys]] |
| 545 | * ''Franchise/MyLittlePony'': |
| 546 | ** Kimono from ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyG3'' is Japanese, as shown by her name and her occasional kimono wearing in the books. |
| 547 | ** There's also Fiesta Flair, whose toy was [[ToylessToylineCharacter actually cancelled]] for what fans speculate was due to being too stereotypically Mexican. |
| 548 | [[/folder]] |
| 549 | |
| 550 | [[folder:Video Games]] |
| 551 | * The ''VideoGame/AceCombat'' series' ConstructedWorld of Strangereal seems to have no [[FantasyCounterpartCulture equivalent]] of Africa or East Asia, yet some token characters obviously representing those regions' ethnic groups come included: |
| 552 | ** The most egregious case is the SeriesMascot Kei Nagase, who has appeared in some form (i.e. as one of mostly unrelated women who just happen to have the exact same name, looks, and similar personalities) in ''VideoGame/AceCombat2'' (and [[VideoGame/AceCombatAssaultHorizonLegacy its remake]]), ''VideoGame/AceCombat3Electrosphere'', ''VideoGame/AceCombat04ShatteredSkies'', and ''VideoGame/AceCombat5TheUnsungWar'' -- despite being the only apparently Japanese person in world where no Japan exists. (She also pops up in ''VideoGame/AceCombatAssaultHorizon'' and ''VideoGame/AceCombatInfinity'' but those are set on alternate Earths, making her appearance more plausible, if still token.) |
| 553 | ** As noted, no equivalent of Africa exists in Strangereal, so Keith Bryan from ''VideoGame/AceCombat3Electrosphere'' and Marcus Snow from ''VideoGame/AceCombat5TheUnsungWar'' seem to be the only black guys in the world. |
| 554 | ** ''VideoGame/AceCombat7SkiesUnknown'' mixes up things a little bit more compared to previous entries, featuring several Black characters (Wiseman, Skald, Col. Johnson, plus David North from the DLC missions) as well as a few more who are AmbiguouslyBrown (Avril, Brownie, arguably Champ). There's also Húxiān, whose name and appearance suggest she's of Chinese ancestry (or, rather, whatever comes closest to China in Strangereal). |
| 555 | * ''VideoGame/AnimalRestaurant'': Hedwig, a snowy owl, is the only staff member of the restaurant who isn't a cat. |
| 556 | * ''VideoGame/BaldursGate'' has Dynaheir, a powerful witch of Rashemen, which in the Forgotten Realms lore is a north-eastern country whose people are explicitly said to be dusk-skinned and whose culture is similar to that of Ukraine/Ruthenia, Medieval Russia and Tatar kingdoms. Her bodyguard, Minsc, has indeed a Eastern Slavic-resembling accent. But Dynaheir is black, the only one in a game set in a land resembling Northern Europe, with a thick Afro-American accent filled with some attempts of YeOldeButcheredeEnglishe words. It is never stated nor discussed in-game if she was an immigrant, adopted, or descendant of immigrants, nor if Rashemen is more ethnically diverse than previously depicted. She is also supposed to always wear a mask as per custom of the Rashemi wychlaran, but there is no mention as well of that and her face is always visible. |
| 557 | * ''VideoGame/BaldursGateSiegeOfDragonspear'' was criticized for introducing several token minority characters. The one that got most attention was Mizhena, a woman who, upon first meeting her in the game, when you choose certain dialogue options about how she got her name, reveals that she's transgender. She does this before providing little else in the context of the game. After the first patch, Mizhena only discloses her identity after the protagonist gets her trust by doing a quest and choosing the right dialogue options. |
| 558 | * ''VideoGame/BodyBlows'': The British boxer Junior is the only black guy among the human characters. Though Junior does make up for this somewhat by being a prominent character in that he is one of the only two characters to be in all of the games of the series. |
| 559 | * In ''VideoGame/{{Bully}}'', each clique will have a black boy and a bisexual boy. The nerds clique have [[TwoferTokenMinority a black bisexual]] boy. |
| 560 | * ''Franchise/TheElderScrolls'': |
| 561 | ** In ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion'', there are exactly three non-Imperials among the nobles of Cyrodiil: Count Andel Indarys of Cheydinhal, a dark elf who is accused of having gotten his position via {{nepotism}} (he's supposedly friends with King Helseth of Morrowind); Andel's son Farwil, who is [[LeeroyJenkins an idiot]]; and Imperial Battlemage Ocato, a high elf who only even appears twice. Note that it is made quite clear in books and dialogue (before, during, and after ''Oblivion'') and in a later game with an appearance that there ''are'' more non-Imperial nobles in Cyrodiil. It's just that the Elder Council is conspicuously missing from their meeting hall every time we go there in ''Oblivion''. |
| 562 | ** The "Hearthfire" DLC for ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'' adds a Redguard housecarl, Rayya. The rest of the housecarls available to the player are Nords. |
| 563 | * Averted in the PC FPS ''VideoGame/EthnicCleansing'', where almost all characters are of non-white races, save for the protagonist and few [=NPCs=]. However, the reason for this, as the name implies, is quite nefarious. |
| 564 | * ''VideoGame/FearAndHungerTermina'': O'saa is the only dark-skinned character in the game (implied to have North African origins), and Tanaka is the only Asian character. |
| 565 | * ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'': |
| 566 | ** General Leo Christophe from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVI''. He's actually a slight inversion, as his sprite has the same skin tone as the rest of the characters, while his art has a notably darker skin tone. |
| 567 | ** Barret Wallace from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'', who is played perfectly straight amongst the heroes. Paradoxically, it wasn't done for the feelings of the fans, or for racial diversity. |
| 568 | ** Sazh Katzroy from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIII'' is the token black guy. |
| 569 | * ''VideoGame/FireEmblemPathOfRadiance'' has Devdan, the only black guy in the game. Sequel ''VideoGame/FireEmblemRadiantDawn'' adds AmbiguouslyBrown Fiona. |
| 570 | * ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIV'' has an ad for Weazel News, an {{Expy}} of the Fox News Channel, that parodies the use of token minorities on TV news programs. The voiceover for the ad explicitly mentions the "diverse" news team as proof that they aren't racist, and when the Asian reporter is listed, an ''[[RefugeInAudacity oriental gong sound]]'' is clearly audible. |
| 571 | * [[BadassNormal Sig]] in ''VideoGame/JakAndDaxter'' is apparently the only black guy on ''the entire freakin' planet'', including the [=NPCs=] that just wander around. |
| 572 | * In ''VideoGame/KillerBear'', the titular killer refers to Tracy as "the token black girl." |
| 573 | * Jerome and his father the principal, both black, are the only characters of colour in ''VideoGame/{{Kindergarten|2017}}''. ''VideoGame/Kindergarten2'' excludes the principal due to [[spoiler:him dying at the end of the first game]], but instead adds Carla, a Latina student. It also "adds" a disabled student with Monty, who's beaten half to death by the AxCrazy janitor in the first game and ends up in a wheelchair in the second due to his injuries. |
| 574 | * Louis in ''VideoGame/Left4Dead'' is considered the game's token black guy. Veteran Bill is the token old guy, and Zoey is the token girl. Young white male biker Francis is the least mentally stable of the four, and some {{Fanon}} says he's gay. |
| 575 | * ''VideoGame/{{Majesty}}'' has the Solarii (singular Solarus), mace-wielding warrior women dedicated the sun goddess Helia. They are the only dark-skinned humans in the game, and their mode of dress vaguely implies that they are from the desert-filled lands on the southern edge of the world map. |
| 576 | * ''Franchise/MassEffect'': |
| 577 | ** ''VideoGame/MassEffect1'' has an interesting take on this. While the crew of the Normandy consists mainly of humans with only one member of various other species present (one asari, one turian, etc.), those species are so common throughout the galaxy that most of your NPC interactions involve them. Tali'Zorah Nar Rayya, on the other hand, is the only quarian in the entire game, making her your token minority team member. She's also a [[SpaceJews Space Romani]], making her and anyone of her race a barely tolerated outcast everywhere outside their fleet. |
| 578 | ** ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'' gives a double subversion, since Shepard's field mission squad consists of only three humans and seven aliens of different races, but when it comes to the human crew on Normandy SR-2, [[OnlySaneMan Jacob Taylor]] is the only black man on the whole ship, until you download the DLC and thus you have Token Minorities within token minorities. In the humans, you have an Australian (Miranda), a Canadian (Shepard, both sexes), an American (Jacob), a Brit (Zaeed), and a Japanese GenkiGirl (Kasumi). |
| 579 | * ''VideoGame/MetroExodus'': Damir is Central Asian, and his motivation for joining the "Aurora" is to find out if he has any relatives who survived the apocalypse back in Kazakhstan. |
| 580 | * Anthony Higgs of ''VideoGame/MetroidOtherM'', who is the first ''major'' black character; there are a few black people on the [[VideoGame/MetroidPrime3Corruption Valhalla]] (key word being "few"). [[spoiler:He's also the only supporting character who survives to the end of the game.]] |
| 581 | * ''VideoGame/NeverwinterNights'' has the NPC Aarin Gend as the token black guy. |
| 582 | * In ''VideoGame/NightTrap'', SCAT has a token black guy. |
| 583 | * Chains from ''VideoGame/PaydayTheHeist'' is the team black guy. |
| 584 | * ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'': |
| 585 | ** There's a young dark-skinned girl standing in the player's hometown in ''[[VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue FireRed and LeafGreen]]''. But the sprite for this girl doesn't appear anywhere else in the ''entire game''. |
| 586 | ** Pheobe, who shows up in ''VideoGame/PokemonRubyAndSapphire'', is implied to be the Pokémon world's equivalent of Pacific Islander. ''VideoGame/PokemonSunAndMoon'' later introduced a Hawaii-based region called "Alola", leading many to assume Phoebe either hails from or at least has connections to the region, though no official word has been given on the matter. |
| 587 | ** In ''VideoGame/PokemonDiamondAndPearl'' features a Frontier Brain named Dahlia who is ambiguously Latina. One of the Gym Leaders, Fantina, is also implied to not be native to Sinnoh due to peppering her speech with foreign language phrases (GratutiousFrench in English, GratutiousEnglish the original Japanese version as well as French). |
| 588 | ** Mostly averted in ''VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite'' (whose region, Unova, [[FantasyCounterpartCulture is based on]] New York as opposed to Japan), since minor [=NPCs=] of varying skin tone are common, and two [[note]]Iris's skin tone is AmbiguouslyBrown in the games and anime, but Sugimori's original art is darker skinned than her sprite and anime counterpart[[/note]] Gym Leaders are Black. |
| 589 | ** Averted in ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'', which are set in Kalos, the 'verse's equivalent of France. Not only do you have the option to customize the character's skin tone, but the player encounters a fair number of AmbiguouslyBrown and even Black Trainers (more than previous games). Nobody treats them any differently. That said, of the main characters Shauna is the only non-white one (unless your protagonist is brown). |
| 590 | ** As far as spin-offs go, there's the boss of the main character in ''VideoGame/PokemonRanger: Shadows of Almia'', a BoisterousBruiser as well as DaChief. |
| 591 | * Mizuki Akiyama from ''VideoGame/ProjectSekai'' is effectively non-binary. AmbiguousGender (and AmbiguousGenderIdentity) is explicitly enforced in the game's story, and among English-speaking fans the commonly accepted pronoun of choice is "they/them". This unfortunately means that Mizuki has to deal with a harsh amount of discrimination from their peers. |
| 592 | * In ''VideoGame/{{Prototype}}'', Dr. Ragland is the only black character of plot significance. Particularly JustForFun/{{egregious}} considering the game takes place in ''UsefulNotes/NewYorkCity''. |
| 593 | * In ''VideoGame/RomancingSaGa3'', Harid "El Nool" Tornado is the lone black character you can choose. He's a mercenary. |
| 594 | * In ''VideoGame/ScoobyDooWhosWatchingWho'', Monty Caswell is the only black member of the Ghost Scene Investigation team. |
| 595 | * In ''VideoGame/SilentHill4: The Room'', Cynthia Velasquez, a Latina, is the only minority character, and also the first to die. |
| 596 | * ''VideoGame/SnakesRevenge'' has Nick Meyer, the only African-American in Snake's crew. |
| 597 | * In ''VideoGame/StarCraftI'', the only black fellow in the entire Colonial/UED Marine Corps drives the [[WorkerUnit SCV]]. [[UnfortunateImplications I get that Terrans are space hillbillies, but wow...]] |
| 598 | * ''VideoGame/StoryOfSeasons'' occasionally has a few. For example, ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon64'' has a black fisherman and AmbiguouslyBrown Kai in a town full of mainly white (and a few Asian) people, while ''VideoGame/StoryOfSeasons2014'' introduced the first explicitly gay character in the series. |
| 599 | * Of the four player characters in the Konami arcade shoot-'em-up ''VideoGame/SunsetRiders'', Cormano is the only Mexican. The other three are blond white cowboys. |
| 600 | * In ''VideoGame/TeamFortress2'', several of the classes are represented as clearly being of a certain nationality. The Demoman represents Scotland, however he is also the only black man in the game. He is also a drunk and a "cyclops", making him a "Threefer". The ''Team Fortress 2'' team stated in their blog (providing some early concept art) that the Demoman was going to be a redheaded white guy, making him look more like the stereotypical Scot. Instead, they decided that he looked too much like [[WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons Groundskeeper Willie]], so they made him black. So this probably isn't a case of tokenism, but an attempt to break a stereotype. Amusingly, the "aggressive black Scotsman" with an absurdly broad accent is a stereotype of its own in the UK. It's lampshaded in the Demoman's intro video on the official site: |
| 601 | -->'''Demoman:''' I'm a black Scottish cyclops! They've got more f-''[extended censorship bleep]'' than they do the likes of me! |
| 602 | :: : Ironically, it appears that in the world of ''Team Fortress 2'', there is in fact a clan of black Scottish demolitions experts... but the Demoman is unusual in that he still has one of his eyes. |
| 603 | * The story of ''VideoGame/TempleRun'' seems to be taking place in Asia (judging from the architecture and rainforest), but all characters save one are western. The one non-western character is Asian. Her name? "Karma Lee". |
| 604 | * The main casts of every arc in the ''VideoGame/TrailsSeries'' each tend to have one or two members that are of a different ethnicity than the others: |
| 605 | ** In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfHeroesTrailsFromZeroAndTrailsToAzure'', [[spoiler:Rixia is the only playable character to be of Eastern descent.]] |
| 606 | ** Gaius from ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfHeroesTrailsOfColdSteel'' is the only member of Class VII from the Nord Highlands, hence his skin tone being noticeably darker than the others'. |
| 607 | ** In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfHeroesTrailsThroughDaybreak'', Feri is the only Middle-Eastern member of the Arkride Solutions Office, while Aaron is the sole member of Eastern descent. |
| 608 | * The four kids you can play as in ''VideoGame/AWalkInTheWoods'' has a black boy and an Asian girl amongst the cast. |
| 609 | * The Rehda in ''VideoGame/YsVITheArkOfNapishtim'' are culturally reminiscent of Native Americans, although their chief, Ord, talks like an Afro-American in the English dub. |
| 610 | [[/folder]] |
| 611 | |
| 612 | [[folder:Visual Novels]] |
| 613 | * ''VisualNovel/DaughterForDessert'' contains only one Asian character: Lily. |
| 614 | * Xianne is the only East Asian character (and unambiguous racial minority) shown and named in ''VisualNovel/{{Melody}}''. |
| 615 | [[/folder]] |
| 616 | |
| 617 | [[folder:Web Animation]] |
| 618 | * ''WebAnimation/DCSuperheroGirls'' has Bumblebee (who is black) and Katana (who is Japanese) as the two non-white main characters. |
| 619 | * Parodied in ''WebAnimation/EverySimsMachinimaEverParody'', where it's mentioned that the GirlPosse consists of "Madylynne the bully and her token black friend, Jessica". This is LeaningOnTheFourthWall about how a lot of ''Sims'' machinimas sparingly feature non-white Sims. |
| 620 | * In ''WebAnimation/FoxyGetsHooked,'' Freddy is the only character with an American accent, and thus the only one whose accent isn't from somewhere in the UK. |
| 621 | [[/folder]] |
| 622 | |
| 623 | [[folder:Webcomics]] |
| 624 | * ''Webcomic/AxeCop'' does it with as crazy a twist as everything else: When asked whether there will be "members of other races" in Axe Cop's team, they introduce a merman team member. |
| 625 | * ''Webcomic/ElGoonishShive'': |
| 626 | ** Grace is AmbiguouslyBrown and described as "very, very mixed." |
| 627 | ** Nanase is Japanese, though she doesn't really look the part. |
| 628 | ** Sensei Greg was the token black guy, but he eventually became a victim of ChuckCunninghamSyndrome. |
| 629 | * Hilariously subverted in ''Webcomic/ErrantStory'' by Bani, who's well aware of her status and doesn't want to become the [[BlackDudeDiesFirst black dude who dies first]]. |
| 630 | * ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}'': |
| 631 | ** The {{Webcomic}} [[ShowWithinAShow within the]] [[Webcomic/MSPaintAdventures MS Paint Adventure]] ''Homestuck'', ''Webcomic/SweetBroAndHellaJeff'', has the most pointless of Token Minority characters with Geromy. Introduced as "The new friend", he has never moved, spoken, or been aknowledged by another character. He's even called the token black friend in the theme song! Amusingly enough, he is actually the third black character introduced after Barack Obana and The Big Man, with both actually having at least a minimum of a role in the comics. |
| 632 | ** Interestingly, in ''Homestuck'' itself, WordOfGod has given a similar, though less cynical, rationale for having Jade, [[CatGirl Nepeta]], and [[ItsNotPornItsArt Equius]] be [[UsefulNotes/FurryFandom furries]]. |
| 633 | * Alice in the ''Webcomic/{{Loserz}}'' strip. As she says in one strip, one of the few black kids in school. |
| 634 | * ''Webcomic/{{Misfile}}'': |
| 635 | ** The character of [[StraightGay Kay Wheeler]] exists solely to try and crack open Emily's TransparentCloset. |
| 636 | ** [[GenkiGirl Missi Fuller's]] [[ChineseGirl ethnicity]], while lampshaded in her intro comic, serves no plot purpose other than to bring a bit of variety to the cast. |
| 637 | ** The sole black character who's particularly recurring, Eponine, only in later times started getting attention. |
| 638 | %%* Clark is probably this in ''Shape Quest''. (Administrivia/ZeroContextExample) |
| 639 | * Parodied in a ''Webcomic/{{Shortpacked}}'' strip dealing with the controversy around Creator/MichaelBJordan [[RaceLift being approached to play]] [[ComicBook/FantasticFour the Human Torch]]. An irate comic fan complains to Jacob about this development and states that this would likely make the Invisible Woman (Torch's sister) black as well, and when Jacob doesn't see a problem with this, the fanboy responds by claiming that having two black people in the cast would be "unrealistic". The fanboy then runs off screaming when Lucy, the strip's other major black character, shows up. |
| 640 | * In ''Webcomic/{{Subnormality}}'', one of the awards given at the [[http://www.viruscomix.com/page482.html Awards]] is the Token Ethnic Award. |
| 641 | [[/folder]] |
| 642 | |
| 643 | [[folder:Web Videos]] |
| 644 | * Creator/AchievementHunter had Creator/RayNarvaezJr as the only Hispanic member, being of Puerto Rican descent. There's also the very British Creator/GavinFree. |
| 645 | * The Website/ChannelAwesome sites: |
| 646 | ** Krissy Diggs, a.k.a. That Chick with the Goggles, was the only black person on any of the sites (doesn't help that her video postings were extremely sporadic). That is until WebVideo/TheRapCritic was added. Krissy left the site in January 2011, leaving Rap Critic as this for Blacks. |
| 647 | ** [[WebVideo/TheAngryJoeShow Angry Joe]] was the only Hispanic member before WebVideo/TheBlockbusterBuster joined in. |
| 648 | ** WebVideo/{{Benzaie}} was the only open bisexual. |
| 649 | ** Ma-Ti, the only non-white hero in ''WebVideo/SuburbanKnights''. |
| 650 | * Invoked/parodied in the third episode of ''WebVideo/CorruptingTheClassicsWithContemporaryCrap''. "Project Playwright" has five contestants: Creator/DavidMamet, Creator/HaroldPinter, Creator/AntonChekhov, Creator/NoelCoward, and ''Theatre/ForColoredGirls'' author Ntozake Shange. Celebrity judge Creator/OscarWilde implies that Shange is only there because she is a black female, which Shange doesn't take kindly to. HilarityEnsues. |
| 651 | * [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] in LetsPlay/FundayNightGaming's cast, as all but one of the main cast is gay. |
| 652 | * WebVideo/TheGamingPixie and Mike Maverick are the only two black people on Reviewers Unknown. |
| 653 | * The WebVideo/{{Sidemen}} have Vikram Barn ([=Vikkstar123=]) as their only member who is neither white nor black; he is of Indian descent. Vik is also the only member in the group who does not play ''VideoGame/{{FIFA|Soccer}}'' on a regular basis; it's ''VideoGame/{{Minecraft}}'' and ''VideoGame/CallOfDuty'' for him. |
| 654 | [[/folder]] |
| 655 | |
| 656 | [[folder:Western Animation]] |
| 657 | * ''WesternAnimation/{{Animaniacs}}'' has The Goodfeathers (Pesto, Bobby, and Squit), who are Italian, and Flavio and Marita, who are Spanish. |
| 658 | * ''Franchise/TheAvengers'': |
| 659 | ** ''WesternAnimation/TheAvengersUnitedTheyStand'' has Falcon as the only minority member of the team. |
| 660 | ** ''WesternAnimation/TheAvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes'' has ComicBook/BlackPanther, an African king who's proven himself a very competent fighter and quite knowledgeable about science and magic. However, he sometimes goes whole episodes without saying anything. Some unused production art shows that at some point before the series finally aired, Black Goliath was apparently supposed to take [[ComicBook/AntMan Giant-Man]]'s spot on the team. |
| 661 | ** Perhaps in response to some of the complaints about the [[MonochromeCasting racial]] and [[TheSmurfettePrinciple gender]] disparity in [[Film/TheAvengers2012 the live-action movie]], ''WesternAnimation/AvengersAssemble'' has ComicBook/TheFalcon added to the film's Avengers roster, making him the only person of color. However, he has a very large role in the show, and is the AudienceSurrogate of the team. |
| 662 | * Everyone in ''WesternAnimation/{{Bertha}}'' is white, except for the Indian Panjid. |
| 663 | * ''WesternAnimation/BewareTheBatman'' looked to be doing this by using the Asian ComicBook/{{Katana}} as Batman's sidekick instead of ComicBook/{{Robin}} or ComicBook/{{Batgirl}}. Noticeable in that she was explicitly touted as "the new Robin" in press releases. Seeing how the show was canned after a mere 26 episodes, forbidden from being aired after September 28, 2014, and written off by the company, we will never know. |
| 664 | * In order to have some racial diversity in the cast of ''WesternAnimation/BionicSix'' (despite the main characters all being related), the Bennetts were given two adoptive sons who were African-American and Japanese, respectively. |
| 665 | * John Thunder, the Native American member of the ''WesternAnimation/{{Centurions}}''. Maybe one of the best out there. |
| 666 | * ''WesternAnimation/ClerksTheAnimatedSeries'' added a token minority, Lando (named for the only person of color in the original ''Star Wars'' trilogy), who rarely did anything other than show up to showcase his non-whiteness. This was expressly parodying this trope, however. |
| 667 | * ''WesternAnimation/CodeLyoko'' has Yumi Ishiyama as the only hot and mysterious senior Japanese girl, likely in order to make the show more culturally Japanese, considering all characters wear out-of-place kimono when they enter Lyoko at first (they later switch to more tech-like virtual reality-appropriate outfits). She and Ulrich (who's younger) have a thing for each other, though William, her classmate, also has another thing for her. |
| 668 | * African-American character Jonathan Reed in the Christian claymation ''WesternAnimation/DaveyAndGoliath'' was added by the Lutheran Church to make the series more diverse in the post-1970s Civil Rights America, followed by the Hispanic character Cisco; Mr. Lee, an Asian barber; and George Soaring Eagle, a boy of Native American heritage, to name a few. |
| 669 | * In ''WesternAnimation/{{Daria}}'', Jodie Landon and Mack [=McKenzie=] seem to be the only black students at Lawndale High, and they are apparently the only people (other than possibly Andrea) whom Daria and Jane respect in that school. Jodie and Mack are painfully aware of their status and are uncomfortable being effectively examples of their race; for instance, Jodie complains how she has to be "Queen of the Negroes" at school. This includes when they were dubbed school parade King and Queen consecutively over multiple years, which they suspect is possibly in part because it disguises how little real diversity there is at the school. However, Jodie notices a little black girl looking awestruck at her being so honored, and decides she can put up with it for the greater good of inspiring other minority kids to dream. On the other hand, Jodie's parents are a pair of jerks, Tiffany of the Fashion Club is an AsianAirhead, and the school's principal, Angela Li (also Asian ethnicity) is a strutting self-important dictator. |
| 670 | * ''Franchise/DCAnimatedUniverse'': |
| 671 | ** ''WesternAnimation/SupermanTheAnimatedSeries'' has the Asian Angela Chen, who's essentially a [[RaceLift race-swapped]] version of Cat Grant from the comics, right down to being a catty gossip columnist and ComicBook/LoisLane's rival at the Daily Planet. |
| 672 | ** ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'': |
| 673 | *** John Stewart, the black Green Lantern. Less "token" because not only does he have the [[LegacyCharacter same]] ''nom de guerre'' as a major member of the original team, but he has worked with the League in a number of stories in the comics when he was Hal Jordan's backup, thus giving the character's inclusion some credibility. Furthermore, in the ''Unlimited'' phase of the series, the producers strove to dilute the issue by bringing in many of DC's other minority superheroes like Mr. Terrific, Vixen, Steel and Doctor Light. Note that, save for Batman and Superman, both of whom had a previous series unto themselves in the DCAU, John Stewart is the most featured character in the DCAU, having the most Limelight episodes on ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'' and getting a good amount of plot in ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeagueUnlimited''. He got so much screen time that many younger fans expressed confusion over why the 2011 movie version of Film/GreenLantern2011 ''wasn't'' black. |
| 674 | *** In addition, the first and second season of ''Unlimited'' features the Ultimen, straight (and far better done) versions of many of the ''Superfriends'' token minority characters. |
| 675 | *** Shayera Hol (Hawkgirl), from the planet Thanagar, was deliberately given a Latino voice actor as well. |
| 676 | *** Out of the Original Seven, [[BadassNormal Batman]] is the only one without superpowers. But who needs that when he's Batman? |
| 677 | *** Superman is Kryptonian, Martian Manhunter is Martian, Hawkgirl is Thanagarian, Wonder Woman is Themysciran. The only people who aren't minorities on the team are Batman and Flash. |
| 678 | * Mee Mee and Lee Lee (Dee Dee's friends) in ''WesternAnimation/DextersLaboratory'' are black and Asian respectively. They might even be a light parody of this trope. |
| 679 | * ''WesternAnimation/DoozyBots'', the attempt to adapt anime from ''Franchise/{{Gundam}}'' to American audiences in the early '90s (that thankfully never got past a short 5-minute preview video) featured the black kid of the gang who also happened to be in a wheelchair. To make matters worse (or funnier, depending on how you see it), when the main characters all transform into the eponymous super-deformed chibi Gundams/Mobile Suits, he gets stuck being the Guntank -- which is the top half of a Mobile Suit attached to a set of tank treads. |
| 680 | * The children's television series ''WesternAnimation/DragonTales'' has Lorca, a dragon in a wheelchair who can't fly either. Most of the plot of the episode where Lorca is introduced, "A New Friend", depends on this. |
| 681 | * Jonny from ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy'' is stated to be black. Rolf may count, as he's AmbiguouslyBrown. |
| 682 | * ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'': |
| 683 | ** Parodied with the TV newscast's (a ShowWithinAShow) on-site reporter, who is consistently referred to by the anchors as "Asian Reporter Trisha Takanawa". |
| 684 | ** One episode also introduces us to "Hispanic Reporter Renee Jimenez". Interestingly, though, she's depicted as an otherwise baseline white woman who speaks with a ''slight'' Spanish accent. Talk about having your cake and eating it too... |
| 685 | ** And then there's Cleveland Brown, the token black guy who in the later seasons becomes a portmanteau for black stereotypes that had nothing to do with his established personality. And you can't bring up minorities on the newscast team without talking about "Blackuweather forecaster Ollie Williams." Another episode, perhaps unintentionally, provides an explanation: most black residents of Quahog are disguised as whites to avoid police harassment. One example is when Cleveland is in the golf course the second time with a Richard Nixon mask. |
| 686 | * Creator/EnidBlyton's ''Literature/TheFamousFive'' were reimagined for a Creator/{{Disney}} cartoon series, starring the children of the original Five. George's daughter Jo (Jyoti) is Anglo-Indian. Compare the extremely white originals with the [[http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_mlURBYuHJQ8/R-I0NQdtQAI/AAAAAAAAAkI/jQ1x5fvj0fk/s1600-h/famous+five.jpg next generation]]. |
| 687 | * ''Franchise/{{Ghostbusters}}'': |
| 688 | ** ''WesternAnimation/TheRealGhostbusters'' has the movie version of the team, including the token black guy Winston Zeddmore. |
| 689 | ** The ''WesternAnimation/ExtremeGhostbusters'' team is compiled of all minorities. Roland is a black man, Eduardo is a Hispanic male, Garrett a white guy in a wheelchair, and Kylie is a goth chick. Egon is the only non-minority, but he doesn't always go out with the team, instead holding a figurehead position. Their receptionist, Janine Melnitz, is AmbiguouslyJewish (considering her last name). |
| 690 | * Valerie from ''WesternAnimation/JosieAndThePussycats'' is the only black member of the band. Of course, she was also this in the [[ComicBook/JosieAndThePussycats comic book]] beforehand. |
| 691 | * Sara Simple from ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfFrostyTheSnowman'' is AmbiguouslyBrown. |
| 692 | * Sunil Nevla from ''WesternAnimation/LittlestPetShop2012'' is a rare animal example that isn't of the Token Non-Mammal kind. He's an Indian mongoose while all the other pets in the main cast are American. |
| 693 | * ''WesternAnimation/TheLoudHouse'' has Lincoln and his family being white except for Lucy, who has pale skin resembling a lighter shade of gray; Clyde is black with gay parents; and of course, the Casagrandes as a Hispanic family with CJ having Down syndrome. |
| 694 | * ''WesternAnimation/MollyOfDenali'': Most of the characters are Alaska Natives (with some {{Token White}}s here and there), but Trini and her father Daniel are the only black people in Qyah. They moved to Alaska from Texas. |
| 695 | * Subverted in ''WesternAnimation/MuchaLucha'', where the whole main trio is non-white. Rikochet is somewhat dark-skinned, and Buena Girl and Flea's lighter skin looks sort of Afro-Caribbean. However, many secondary characters are white. The show is set in Mexico (or at least a Mexican-American community), where everyone is perceived to be "foreign" and "exotic" in ''some'' way. |
| 696 | * ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb'': |
| 697 | ** Baljeet is Indian, Holly (Fireside Girls) and Coltrane are African-American, Stacy and her sister Ginger (Fireside Girls) are Asian. The show in general obviously tries to be very cosmopolitic. |
| 698 | ** Isabella Garcia-Shapiro is Mexican (ethnicity) and Jewish (religion), making her a TwoferTokenMinority. Though one episode has the cast visiting the "Mexican Jewish Cultural Festival", so Danville might just have a particularly large population of Mexican Jews... |
| 699 | * ComicBook/PlasticMan's sidekick Hula Hula in ''The Plastic Man Comedy/Adventure Show'' is Polynesian, whilst Plastic Man and his girlfriend Penny are white. |
| 700 | %%* ''WesternAnimation/TheProudFamily'' has a Token Latino. (Administrivia/ZeroContextExample) |
| 701 | * The only non-white Color Kid from ''WesternAnimation/RainbowBrite'' is Indigo. She is Indian. |
| 702 | * ''WesternAnimation/ReadyJetGo'' has Sydney and her mom, who are African-American, Mindy, who is Latina, and Lillian, who appears to be Asian. Everyone else is white, but the Propulsion family are exceptions because even though they appear to be Caucasian, [[HumanAliens they are actually aliens]]. |
| 703 | * ''WesternAnimation/RobotChicken'': |
| 704 | ** Spoofed in the sketch "[[Film/TwelveAngryMen 12 Angry Little People]]", when the only black juror points out that not every black person needs to be a positive role model. |
| 705 | ** Parodied in a skit which featured [[ComicBook/ArchieComics Riverdale's]] first Pride Parade, which was just one guy on a float. Archie then notes that this went a lot better than their Black History Month parade since the only black guy was out of town that day. |
| 706 | * ''WesternAnimation/ScoobyDooMysteryIncorporated'': [[spoiler: Angel Dynamite/]]Cassidy Williams was the only black member of the original Mystery Incorporated. |
| 707 | * ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' episode "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS4E2AStreetcarNamedMarge A Streetcar Named Marge]]" mentions "Token black panelist, Drederick Tatum!" |
| 708 | * ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'': |
| 709 | ** Parodied with [[HisNameReallyIsBarkeep Token Black]] ([[SuddenNameChange formerly named the less on-the-nose Token Williams]]), the only black kid. Part of the joke is that all the other characters think he's the token ''rich'' character -- the only one to regularly call attention to Token's blackness is Cartman, who has been shown in other contexts to be [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain quite racist]]. And his parents own the Hooters {{expy}} restaurant Raisins. Which is done as a deliberate subversion of this trope. |
| 710 | ** Ruthlessly parodied in "The Big Fix", where Randy, in attempt to appeal to black customers, attempts to recuit Token's father - Steve - into his weed farming business. After succeeding, Randy proceeds to ignore all of Steve's actual input and makes it incredibly obvious that he's only using him for his race, going to far as to plaster billboards across town with Steve's face on it. Steve proceeds to angrily quit [[LaserGuidedKarma and opens up a rival company right across the street.]] Meanwhile, Randy's attempt to get Stan and Token to connect leads to the "revelation" that Token was actually named ''[[Creator/JRRTolkien Tolkien]]'' all along, and that apparently everybody in South Park except for Stan and Randy knew that. Complete with the episode BreakingTheFourthWall to [[BlamedForBeingRailroaded accuse the audience of being racist]] for thinking otherwise. |
| 711 | ** For some reason, the [[Literature/TheTwilightSaga Vampire kids]] have a black adult among their group in "Goth Kids 3: Dawn of the Posers", which leaves the goth kids slightly confused. |
| 712 | * ''WesternAnimation/StationX'': Of the cast, Davis is the one black person. |
| 713 | * ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'' has the Indian Maheswarans and African-American Pizza Twins. There's also Lars (who is at least half-Filipino) and the AmbiguouslyBrown HumanAlien Garnet. |
| 714 | * ''WesternAnimation/StrawberryShortcake'': |
| 715 | ** Orange Blossom is the TokenBlackFriend to Strawberry in every generation. The most egregious case is ''Berry Bitty Adventures'', where she was the only character of color in the entire series. |
| 716 | ** The International Friends from the 1980s series were introduced to diversify Strawberry’s circle of friends. They include the British Lem and Ada, the French Crepes Suzette, the Chinese Almond Tea, the Dutch Mint Tulip, and the Mexican Cafe Ole. |
| 717 | ** Orange Blossom and the AmbiguouslyBrown Ginger Snap of the 2003 series, though later seasons introduce more characters with different ethnicities, like Tangerina Torta, Tea Blossom (a renamed Almond Tea), and Crepes Suzette. |
| 718 | * ''WesternAnimation/{{Superfriends}}'' was notorious for that kind of character, with a bunch of obviously non-white superheroes; Apache Chief (Native American), Black Vulcan (African-American), Samurai (Asian), and El Dorado (Latino). The final season tried to address the black issue by replacing Black Vulcan with ComicBook/{{Cyborg}} of the ComicBook/TeenTitans, a character that Creator/MarvWolfman and Creator/GeorgePerez worked hard to create as a legitimate original character. |
| 719 | * ''WesternAnimation/TotallySpies'' has Alex as a mixed-race main character ([[AmbiguouslyBrown dark in complexion]], racially half-white, though [[SeriesContinuityError/WesternAnimation later changed to be non-white]]), and Britney as an Asian-looking recurring character. The only black villain is an Afro-bearing, '80s-obsessed dude named Boogie Gus. There are also a couple more notable minority characters here and there at times. It's not uncommon for white girls to be paired with guys of all kinds of skin colors in the show, though. |
| 720 | * ''Franchise/{{Transformers}}'': |
| 721 | ** ''Anime/TransformersArmada'': |
| 722 | *** Token Hispanic Carlos. The fact that his catchphrase was "holy frijoles" should tell you how badly that turned out. |
| 723 | *** Alexis was also supposedly Vietnamese, according to WordOfGod. [[http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/transformers/images/1/1c/Alexis.jpg Not that you can tell from looking at her, considering she looks like a white brunette.]] |
| 724 | ** Averted amongst the humans in ''WesternAnimation/TransformersAnimated'', where there are a number of prominent non-white characters. However, it's notable that when the Autobots turn human in "[[Recap/TransformersAnimatedS3E06HumanErrorPartI Human]] [[Recap/TransformersAnimatedS3E07HumanErrorPartII Error]]", there's one black kid -- and it's Bumblebee. This is because of the voice actors -- Bumblebee is the only main Autobot with a black voice actor (Creator/BumperRobinson). |
| 725 | * The main characters in ''WesternAnimation/TheWeekenders''. Though Tino's race isn't mentioned, WordOfGod states that he's an Italian American who is probably Pagan. Lor is Scottish American, Carver is African American, and Tish is an Eastern-European Jew. |
| 726 | * Freight Train from ''WesternAnimation/WheresHuddles'' is token black guy on the American football team the show centers around. |
| 727 | * Spyke in ''WesternAnimation/XMenEvolution'' is not only the token black member of the team, he's related to the only other black person in the cast. Spyke was [[TheScrappy so unpopular]] that he was written out of the series and made to [[PutOnABus live in the sewer]] (no, really). His eventual guest-star role as a vigilante was more well received by the show's fans than his entire run as a cast member. By that time they had balanced things out a bit by adding a few other minority kids to the cast, notably Sunspot (Afro-Brazilian), Magma ({{Race Lift}}ed into a dark-skinned Brazilian), and Jubilee (Chinese-American). Though of course, Jubilee herself was also PutOnABus until the [[BackForTheFinale finale]]. |
| 728 | [[/folder]] |
| 729 | |
| 730 | ---- |
| 731 | !!Token Non-Mammal Examples: |
| 732 | |
| 733 | [[folder:Films -- Animation]] |
| 734 | * Abigail, Amelia, and their uncle Waldo (three geese) from ''WesternAnimation/TheAristocats''. |
| 735 | * Kaa the snake from Disney's ''WesternAnimation/TheJungleBook1967''. |
| 736 | * Verne the turtle on ''WesternAnimation/OverTheHedge''. |
| 737 | * Inverted in ''WesternAnimation/{{Rango}}'', where most of the inhabitants of Dirt seem to be anything ''but'' mammals. |
| 738 | * ''{{WesternAnimation/Zootopia}}'' takes place in a WorldofMammals, but the flies buzzing around [[NakedPeopleareFunny Yax's]] head are the ''only'' non-mammalian animals to make an appearance in the movie. |
| 739 | [[/folder]] |
| 740 | |
| 741 | [[folder:Literature]] |
| 742 | * Lowly Worm from Creator/RichardScarry's books. |
| 743 | * Mr. Toad in ''Literature/TheWindInTheWillows''. |
| 744 | [[/folder]] |
| 745 | |
| 746 | [[folder:Toys]] |
| 747 | * The ''Toys/{{Fabuland}}'' toy line by Franchise/{{LEGO}} only had one crocodile and three birds among an otherwise all-mammal cast. |
| 748 | * ''Franchise/MyLittlePony'': |
| 749 | ** G1 had every princess with their own pet baby dragon: Spike, Prickles, Smokey, Fiery, Flash, Spiny, and Sparks. Majesty's dragon, Spike, is the most famous due to his use in adaptations such as the ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyTVSpecials'', ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyAndFriends'', and the British ''ComicBook/MyLittlePony'' comics. Most of the dragons were scrapped in future generations, though Spike returned in G3 and G4, where he is a main character in ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic''. |
| 750 | ** Of the "Pony Friends", Cutesaurus the Dinosaur is the only non-mammal. |
| 751 | ** Princess Silverswirl from G2 has an unnamed pet dragon. |
| 752 | [[/folder]] |
| 753 | |
| 754 | [[folder:Video Games]] |
| 755 | * Judd the cat in ''Franchise/{{Splatoon}}'' is the only land mammal openly living amongst anthropomorphic and humanoid sea creatures. A second cat shows up from ''VideoGame/Splatoon2'' onward, but that's just his literal clone. |
| 756 | [[/folder]] |
| 757 | |
| 758 | [[folder:Western Animation]] |
| 759 | * ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'': [[http://arthur.wikia.com/wiki/Unknown_Male_Alligator This]] unnamed crocodile/alligator. There are also anthropomorphic ducks in "[[Recap/ArthurS1E20ArthursAlmostBoringDayTheHalfBakedSale Arthur's Almost Boring Day]]", and they're the only anthropomorphic characters to make animal sounds and speak with an AnimalSpeciesAccent. |
| 760 | * ''WesternAnimation/BabyFollies'': Of the major cast of babies, only one of them is Black. Seemingly every other baby in town is Caucasian. |
| 761 | * Inverted with Sleepy Bat in ''WesternAnimation/{{Birdz}}'', the only reoccurring non-avian. |
| 762 | * ''Franchise/CareBears'': Cozy Heart Penguin is the only avian member of the Care Bear Cousins. |
| 763 | * WesternAnimation/DonaldDuck and WesternAnimation/DaisyDuck started out like this in the ''WesternAnimation/ClassicDisneyShorts'', though many family members were introduced later on in the comics. |
| 764 | * Several episodes of ''WesternAnimation/TheGetAlongGang'' include a turtle named Braker as an ancillary member of the Gang, with the Cartoon Over-Analyzations blog describing him as "the Furry equivalent of a Token Minority", as he's the one reptile in a group of mammals. |
| 765 | * An inversion -- in the 1936 ''[[WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes Merrie Melodies]]'' short ''WesternAnimation/ILoveToSinga'', Jack Bunny is the only mammal, the rest of the characters are birds. |
| 766 | * While non-mammals do show up regularily in ''WesternAnimation/LittlestPetShop2012'', Vinnie Terrio is the only one in the main cast, being a lizard while all the other main pets are mammals. |
| 767 | * ''WesternAnimation/PBAndJOtter'' has Flick Duck, the only bird among his group of friends. |
| 768 | * Inverted in ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants''. Sandy Cheeks (a squirrel) and Pearl Krabs (a sperm whale) are the token mammals among the main, major, and supporting characters. |
| 769 | * ''Franchise/WinnieThePooh'': Owl is the only bird in the main cast, just like in [[Literature/WinnieThePooh the original book]]. Other non-mammals sometimes appear, but usually just in minor roles. However, ''Series/TheBookOfPooh'' did promote Kessie, a bluebird, to main character. |
| 770 | [[/folder]] |
| 771 | |
| 772 | ---- |
| 773 | !!Token Minority Species Examples: |
| 774 | |
| 775 | [[folder:Films -- Animation]] |
| 776 | * WesternAnimation/MickeyMouse and WesternAnimation/DonaldDuck are this in ''WesternAnimation/AGoofyMovie'', being a mouse and a bird amongst dogs and cats. |
| 777 | * Ratigan, Fidget the bat, Felicia the cat, Toby the dog, and a lizard from ''WesternAnimation/TheGreatMouseDetective'' among a cast made mostly of mouse characters. |
| 778 | * ''WesternAnimation/{{Zootopia}}'' has this as a significant part of the plot, with Judy Hopps being the first rabbit police officer of Zootopia and having to struggle against the label of being the Token Minority. |
| 779 | [[/folder]] |
| 780 | |
| 781 | [[folder:Comic Books]] |
| 782 | * In ''ComicBook/PaperinikNewAdventures'', Angus is clearly meant to be a FunnyAnimal kiwi bird, the only one in Duckburg. He is not only explicitly said to be from New Zealand, but also a Maori. |
| 783 | [[/folder]] |
| 784 | |
| 785 | [[folder:Web Videos]] |
| 786 | * In the cat video series ''WebVideo/TheSixCatsParade'', Rico is the only black cat (and the only without white color) of the group, in contrast to his three black-and-white and one Siamese siblings and his mother, who is a gray and white cat. |
| 787 | [[/folder]] |
| 788 | |
| 789 | [[folder:Western Animation]] |
| 790 | * Violet from ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales2017'' is the only one of the kids who is a hummingbird instead of a duck.[[note]]Unless you count Lena, who is a LivingShadow in the form of a duck.[[/note]] |
| 791 | * {{WesternAnimation/Pete}} and P.J. are this in ''WesternAnimation/GoofTroop'', ''WesternAnimation/AGoofyMovie'', and ''WesternAnimation/AnExtremelyGoofyMovie'' as token cats, despite being treated like {{Dogfaces}} in those worlds. Also, Waffles and Chainsaw from ''WesternAnimation/GoofTroop'' are a token non-anthropomorphic cat and dog in a world of {{Dogfaces}}. |
| 792 | * Felix the frog in ''WesternAnimation/MissSpidersSunnyPatchFriends''. |
| 793 | * In ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'', the majority of the population as well as the main six characters seem to be evenly distributed among unicorns, pegasi, and earth ponies. However, there are several other intelligent species in the world. Cattle, sheep, donkeys, mules, buffalo, zebra, and possibly goats are all people just as much as ponies, and the same goes for some mythological beings like minotaurs and griffons. However, these beings only have short gag cameos or one-shot appearances. The only exception is Zecora the Zebra. |
| 794 | [[/folder]] |
| 795 |
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