Whitewashing!: Netflix's "Death Note" movie blasted for lack of Asian cast

Death note may have been a fantasy series, but it did not seem to go outside the normal color scheme for races. There was not a lot of odd colored hair or strange styles. I thought light was an Anglo transplant. Even his father had somewhat of an Anglo look. He could have dyed his hair blonde or light brown, but given his and his father's position and attitude I didn't see him going that radical. Also many anime will use Japanese last names for characters who are clearly not from Japan. I also thought that light being raised in Japan as a foreigner gave a certain characteristic to him. He would have had to buy better and more ambitious to overcome the prejudice of society and to get to do what he did with the authorities. Having done so we would have contributed to his arrogance in thinking he could be God of the new world, and to his hatred and camaraderie with L who was his only real equal in the series.

Then again it has been noted that despite looks that might be more Anglo the Japanese see the animated characters as Japanese just like we would see characters as American even though they may not be intended to be.

Of course I am still waiting for this crossover:

I think you gave it way more thought than the writers did. I just saw a crazy bored genius kid who wanted to kill time, only to switch up and seem himself God the decision to

shows someone was asleep at the wheel.

As for addressing prejudice, we'll be dead and buried before that ever happens. Japan's culture makes the Deep South look like the Castro district of San Francisco in comparison. Our concept of discrimination is something that doesn't exist there.

True. Again, I see how some folks might feel this is just some kind of political correctness and whatnot, but I don't think it's unfair to petition for characters that you identify with when it comes to TV and other media. Like I mentioned above, back in the 1950s, we had white people put on brown makeup and talk with a really shitty Spanish accent, because they were "Mexicans."

For example, Winchester '73, a good western with better than average writing, but there's still a scene where Rock Hudson plays a native American brave, speaking in pidgin English and everything. You'd have thought we got past that, right? Fuck no, in 2013, Johnny Depp plays Tonto, the Lone Ranger's native American sidekick. I can understand the frustration in cases like that, because it is absurd. When an asian guy is playing a role, it's usually for comic relief, or he's a nerd. When it's the black woman, she's a soul sister who ain't got time for dat. White people are often the central characters, the run of the mill, average joes. There are exceptions, of course, but that doesn't excuse the rule. If I were a person of color, I'd be annoyed, too.

Actually it's funny when you think about it, because in the anime he's the palest person you ever saw, but in the American version he's going to be black.

Interestingly, none of the "white-wash" crowd seems to have a problem with that change.

It's not that difficult to understand. There are white people everywhere. We are everywhere. Straight, white males used to play black people, Mexicans, Asians, Native Americans, gay people, women (always for a joke), more recently it has been transgender people, and so on, and so on. We are everywhere, we have saturated our culture. Demographically speaking, white males once made up the vast majority of this country, but that is changing. One should expect the representation in media and politics to change as well, and it is, but not nearly as fast as the actual populace is changing. White men still manage to find the best roles, the most plum positions in this society, the majority of the time. It is a victory to see someone else actually land a role that is not stereotyped out for them. Black guys who get roles not associated with "the hood," or being a criminal of some sort. Asian actors who land roles where they don't have to play the nerd, or the socially awkward technocrat. Women who aren't just there to be hung on the arm of the lead male role, or to fight the supporting female's character.

In short, there are more than enough white guys still getting roles laid out for people of other ethnicities. That the inverse happens is something of a minor miracle, and a welcome one.

First off, the autistic screeching was about the fact it wasn't a Japanese actor playing a Japanese character. I pointed out another example of where that wasn't the case. The double standard people like yourself have is well known, so I don't really need to see the fresh example of doublethink you provided me to "explain" it to me. Frankly the attitude is racist. And don't bother screeching at me about how it's impossible to be racist against white people - everyone with a brain and an ounce of intellectual honesty knows that racism is racism, no matter who it's directed at or who it comes from.

Christ, use some of that casino money to buy a fucking dictionary.

Yeah, I do not know what the writers were thinking about in the end of the series.

My main problem with a real life remake is I don't see too many people who can be L. I guess just remaking the character might be what they are going for, but he was just animated quirky and I cannot picture an actor getting it down. Perhaps, if he could act, you might get Marilyn Manson? He is probably too old now to do it, but that is about all I could think of.

It's a good thing, gingers are soulless monsters that need to be purged from the entertainment industry.

Producers adapted the material, and the cast, to their audience. I don't see what the big deal is. Those of Japanese descent account for about 0.4% 0f the US population, so if there's one major character who's still Japanese, than they're over-represented.

1. Netflix serves more than just the US.
2. Death Note arguably has an inherently Japanese attitude to it. Light only survives as long as he does because his human opponents insist on behaving honourably. Even the idea that an anonymous, supernatural murderer of criminals is a villain is a foreign concept in a country where the police put Punisher logos on their vehicles.
3. If the big deal seems odd to you, you must have missed the furor from people here over black Heimdall, black Johnny Storm, and mixed-race Mary Jane.

Arguably inherent Japanese attitude? Point in fact, not anymore.

Yeah, I'm vaguely familiar with all of these complaints. My position remains thus: If you don't like other people's artistic work, feel free to make your own. It's dubious to claim that a piece of art hurts the fans or the Japanese in any way.

So it's been redone for American audiences. What is the big deal?

The Japanese have done this Death Note multiple times. According to Wikipedia they've done four films and 2 series on TV within the last 10 years.

When dealing with anime you get a lot of redos. Do you know how many times they have redone Evangelion? One of the movies was even titles you cannot redo. If the product is still selling add some post production crap or make the quality better and release it again and profit.

Here's a video I stumbled upon about Death Note and Ghost In The Shell. One could say it anecdotal but I'm thinking we Americans make a bigger issue of "whitewashing" than the people of other countries supposedly being whitewashed do.

I have to say scarjo looks and can act like the character. She also has a huge draw right now. You are not going to find an Asian actress with an American draw like she has. In the case of GITS you use her because it is a mainstream release meant to pull in the most profit possible. For all the complaining by the anime perfectionists you are simply going to lose money casting an Asian actress. I cannot say the same for the death note release on Netflix. The actors are not big, and it is like being straight to DVD. They should have auditioned for Asian actors and seen if one of them did well.

So apparently the director of the film the live action GitS is taking all of its imagery from has no problem with the casting in it: Link.

So fuck off, ya moral busybodies!

no u

Would have rather seen grace park as major then scarlet.

Ok, just saw the Netflix death note and I have seen the anime also. I have not seen the live action Japanese film for comparison.

The Netflix death note is overall pretty decent. William defoe is awesome as ryuk. This is a movie and cannot have the development of a manga or anime series. It's adaptation is pretty good. It loosely keeps the characters in their same roles, but the plot is very altered. The biggest difference is misa is another student in high school with light and is not a bimbo. It was made to occur in America so most of the casting is fine and makes sense. Actually the think that makes the least sense is the inclusion of Japan at all which means Santorum is out of place being Japanese. There is really no foreign presence that was made important so you could have just left L as a black orphan from the US and rewrote everyone. It was out of place since L was cast as African American and everything else was Americanized and big liberties were taken to adapt the plot. They could have easily made L fit just by Americanized him with everything else and the m black L with an Asian sponsor would have fit better, but coming from Japan it was just out of place.

Aside from that most of the rest of the movie is decent. Even L was also acted. The only bad thing I noted was at the climax the editing choices made me laugh at the music choice for being really campy. It was not a place where you were supposed to be laughing. It was much better than many made for tv movies. It was not as slick as a full Hollywood feature film, but it was decent. It was well worth watching if you have Netflix. I would not get Netflix for this, but it is worth the watch. It keeps the spirit of the original while making it a movie and American I think you could have made L Asian and kept the same backstory and it would have made more sense. It is just a black guy speaking Japanese in an English movie stands out.

Well I don't remember this thread being in the Red Room. Why is it here?

Anyways it brings up............

Ed Skrein Leaves ‘Hellboy’ Reboot After Whitewashing Backlash; Lionsgate & Millennium Respond

http://deadline.com/2017/08/ed-skrein-hellboy-whitewashing-backlash-lionsgate-millennium-1202157461/

Remember how different the response was from the usual suspects when it was white characters getting turned black?

Hmmmm, in case you missed it L was Asian in the original, or at least white (technically an orphan who's lineage was never revealed IIRC), and he was cast as black in the American version. So it was white characters being turned black, or I guess yellow but that is not pc.

Yes, the prejudice is pretty clear there.

Yeah, I'm going to go ahead and call bullshit on that one. We already saw with GitS that it didn't actually matter to actual Asian people, and the the only ones who were bent out of shape about it were white people being offended for them.

There's nothing more annoying than a self-righteous cracker.

I haven't seen this Netflix show Death Note, nor am I familiar with it's original Asian source material. I don't think most of you will understand or relate to this, but if a story is based in a particular culture, and you'd like to adapt that story for larger or different audience, I don't see the harm in maintaining as much of the source material as possible when making your adaptation. Especially when Asian actors are so vastly under represented in Hollywood. In taking a story from one culture and adding it to another, does it change the context in anyway? Or do the producers think they can market this story to white audiences better if the actors are mostly white? If so, then I am against this. I might appreciate a look into Asian culture. Whoever adapted the material did, why wouldn't I?

Specifically Asian actors.

Except that there already is a live-action Death Note movie with a Japanese cast. This is no different than any other movie that's been adapted for US audiences, like The Ring or The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. People need to realize that making an adaptation exactly the same as the source material kind of makes doing the adaptation pointless.

Is Sanford and Son blackwashing? It is, after all, an adaptation of an English sitcom.

Actually, I'd say yes. It's also 40 years old.