Diversity and Representation in Media

Truly, TROS was a refreshing moment of unity in the fandom.

There wasn’t anywhere they could take the kids except to an active warzone, and they didn’t know if those kids had families and rescue would turn into kidnapping.

I actually like TROS.

Edited by Protagonist506 on May 23rd 2022 at 6:42:41 AM

"Any campaign world where an orc samurai can leap off a landcruiser to fight a herd of Bulbasaurs will always have my vote of confidence"

They also didn't know if the animals would die in days outside of captivity, but that was easily ignored for a cool metaphor.

I do appreciate the sequel trilogy for what it is (and I do legitimately like the first two movies), but the last one did not stick the landing. I will admit, Finn was not done justice in that final movie, and John Boyega has every right to be pissed.

I will say though that I have encountered people that legit cannot comprehend people like the sequel trilogy. It is astounding.

Edited by SatoshiBakura on May 23rd 2022 at 9:47:47 AM

@Inuria Considering TLJ ended with Rey telling Kylo to go fuck himself before he went off to get clowned on by an old man, yeah, it would probably sound incredibly absurd to suggest they would hook up in the end for any reason beyond “that’s what happens with a male and female lead, even if they’re mortal enemies”.

Which DID end up happening, for seemingly those reasons, but TROS (and the Sequel Trilogy, in general) was largely a product of HEAVY course-corrections and different captains making their own trips to wherever they went. Betting on the idea that somebody would look at the previous movie and think of a blooming romance going to happen next movie between those two characters would be a reasonable course of action would be like betting on a coin flip for the coin to be taken by aliens.

Also, “TLJ’s defenders didn’t care about race”?

@Lyn I’m sure people did like it, especially with how it did, but it does seem to have disappointed almost every demographic that was interested: the haters, the bigots, those who liked TFA, those who liked TLJ, the progressives...

...Oh, SHIT, we’re doing “Star Wars” Sequel talk again! This thread is going sink! Abandon topic, abandon topic!...for this new, more relevant to the thread one!

Has there been any conversation or discussion from disabled people about the history of prosthetics in “Star Wars” like Luke’s robot hand or Anakin’s robot arm?

Trans rights are human rights. TV Tropes is not a place for bigotry, cruelty, or dickishness, no matter who or their position.

Disability is a weird one when it comes to rep. I feel there are a ton of prosthetics in sci-fi, though how well its handled varies.

Changing the subject, do you think Daredevil is good blind representation?

There’s been some discussion, yeah. Disabled actor Angel Giuffria credits Star Wars with helping normalize the perception of prosthetics and how they’re treated as just a part of the setting.

On other hand, there’s also been criticism towards how the stories often treat prosthetics as evocative of “loss of humanity”. The Mods of The Book of Boba Fett were an interesting attempt to subvert that, as they take pride in their prosthetics and specifically view them as enhancing themselves. I only wish that they were actually played by disabled actors.

Edited by Tuckerscreator on May 23rd 2022 at 7:25:18 AM

You accuse anyone dealing with accusations from TLJ stans of really being racist and sexist no matter what. Then, I bring up my experiences, where I was right about what that movie meant for the future of the franchise, and you argue that no I wasn't, it was reality that was wrong?

At a certain point, you need to just look at facts: I don't think that people involved in any of the sequel movies set out to make a series where the POV of the white neo-nazi school shooter from a privileged background was given the most weight and where minorities as classic characters were used as apologizer props, but it happened because nobody with enough veto power was able to say "Wait, no, what the fuck."

Disability rep is hard, because so often it comes in the form of saying someone has a disability but then treating them like any abled character. One example I hate is the aunt from The Dragon Prince, where her being deaf and only able to read lips is established, but she's able to follow conversations outside of her line of sight regularly. Especially disappointing from the same writers as Toph, the beloved Disability Superpower gold standard.

Edited by IniuriaTalis on May 23rd 2022 at 10:31:18 AM

Well in Book of Boba Fett, cyber-augmentation, including limb replacement, is a youth trend among human teens kinda like piercing or tattoos.

But I do recall the series La Brea had Zyra Gorecki as 1 of the main characters and despite having 1 leg she's treated like a perfectly normal person. Then there's Echo being portrayed by an actual deaf actress w/ a prosthetic leg and she too isn't treated any differently as any fully-bodied person.

Edited by KRider on May 23rd 2022 at 7:27:52 AM

I only know of the Affleck version (so, presumably not the best one), but with his weird sonic vision superpower I remember that even as a teenager I was like "Wait… that means he’s not actually blind at all, doesn’t it?"

As for prosthetics in sci-fi, it kinda skirts the line between realistic surgery and outright transhumanism, which is a complex issue… But when the prosthetics become "augmentations", it’s the absence of prosthetics that becomes a handicap and that creates a different kind of inequality… That’s an interesting social issue to tackle. We’re not at that point yet, but what if we actually get there one day?

Edited by Lyendith on May 23rd 2022 at 4:41:44 PM

Prosthetics are one of those things that could really benefit from 'casual' representation, rather than having to be A Thing about a character. I remember that was a plus in Luca for the amputee father, since it was just there and didn't have a tragic explanation or anything. (Also something I appreciated about Furiosa, so I kind of fear her upcoming centric prequel will make it A Thing).

---

I think the concept of Disability Superpower characters as 'rep' zigzags, because there's usually a mentality of "making up for" or "going beyond" the missing sense/body part/etc, and at worst they're like basically not even disabled.

Edited by Synchronicity on May 23rd 2022 at 9:38:39 AM

It's weird with that, because to use the one aid that is so ubiquitous nobody really thinks of it as an aid- glasses- it is easy to soup them up (transitions, glare coating, blue coating) to the point they can be preferable to something like contacts or laser eye surgery.

Hiccup's leg was well handled.

I do feel most disability is usually prosthetics, but maybe that's because my media diet is heavily leaned towards action and sci-fi/fantasy.

The key point being that glasses are a. easily removable if they get in the way and b. affordable for more or less everyone. I guess that’s why we don’t really think much of them.

@Inuira I made no such accusations of the sort, Inuria. I did not accuse you of ulterior motives. I did not accuse everybody else that disliked the film of ulterior motives. I certainly didn’t call anybody or all of a group of any people “secret racists and sexists”. And I sure as heck did not say anything like “no, that didn’t happen, your account is false and you’re a liar”. This is edging close to strawmanning.

I was trying to move on before because I didn’t want to encourage this thread to be drowned in another fight about the Sequel Trilogy and it was a sudden shift on account on the sudden realization I had but I’m making this post now because I don’t want to part here on bad terms with you. I don’t dislike you and I’m trying to keep myself from pushing people away and acting bitter to everybody.

So, punt away your “truth”, let the echoes of our outbursts die out (especially about “TLJ defenders” and “stans”), and let’s just...

I’ll take the first step: I’m sorry about that my wording wasn't more clear earlier. Let's try again, from the top.

I was trying to point out that the idea of Rey and Kylo ending up together, despite the events of the previous two films, is a sexist idea and trying to state that Hollywood brain-child runs a risk, since communication isn’t always perfect, of landing on either side of the coin: pointing out sexism or expressing sexism. Reylo wasn’t a reasonable idea nor can it be said to be the objectively most obvious next step to most people, hence an adverse reaction to trying to argue for it. Can we agree that there is room to argue on that?

That’s it.

Edit: I...uh. I spent some time trying to make this right, might have missed some posts. <_<

Edited by fredhot16 on May 24th 2022 at 2:01:22 AM

Trans rights are human rights. TV Tropes is not a place for bigotry, cruelty, or dickishness, no matter who or their position.

One of the oddest bits to me in Star Wars being weird about disability is Luke’s Force Ghost appearance in The Rise of Skywalker. Throughout the scene he only uses his left hand, with his right being covered by his cloak. It appears this implies that he doesn’t have his right arm, but for some reason he can conjure “ghost clothes” but not a ghost prosthetic. Especially odd considering when he faded in the previous film his metal arm went with him.

This also leads to the bizarre implication that Anakin’s ghost in Episode VI didn’t have his limbs either and was just a floating armless legless body.

@Inuria Wait, what’s the problem with Toph? I’ve never heard complaints about her on the representation front before.

Trans rights are human rights. TV Tropes is not a place for bigotry, cruelty, or dickishness, no matter who or their position.

Inuria is saying there isn't a problem with Toph, which makes the problems with the aunt from Dragon Prince more glaring from the same writers.

You fell victim to one of the classic blunders!

(Checks again) I didn’t know that those shows had the same writers. Probably a few different ones, too, which may affect things. Was the aunt a major character, that’d probably affect how much attention is given to make sure she plays the part right?

Does the aunt still make deaf jokes?

Edited by fredhot16 on May 23rd 2022 at 11:39:31 AM

Trans rights are human rights. TV Tropes is not a place for bigotry, cruelty, or dickishness, no matter who or their position.

She was a secondary character.

Every accusation by the GOP is ALWAYS a confession.

Not sure if this kind of topic could fit in this thread, but I'm wondering, is there any piece of media that gives characterization to one or more refugees from actual nationalities other than just mere props for political discussion of the tragedy of war and disasters?

You can't kill art.

Honestly, the closest that comes to mind is Tam from Young Sheldon, and I seriously doubt that he is a good example. While he talks about his past in his first episode, the rest of his appearances focus on him as a friend of Sheldon. However, he is practically a non entity in later seasons, due to Sheldon moving out of his school.

Edited by magnumtropus on May 24th 2022 at 2:37:19 PM

What a shame.

At the very least, some authors out there might make the effort to do while also making sure said refugee identity is not the sole characteristic of said character.

You can't kill art.

Actually one of the seasons of Slasher had a main character that was a refugee. If I remember correctly the fact she has a different cultural background is important, but the fact she is specifically a refugee and not an immigrant or someone from an "old fashioned" family is only brought up two or three times.

You and I remember Budapest very differently