Thursday, December 23, 2010

They're just movies!

One of the traditions I have every year is watching A Christmas Carol on TV. The one with George C. Scott, preferably...and of course there is always Mickey's!

I am a little disturbed by the fact that it hasn't aired this year, especially since they showed the Patrick Stewart version (nowhere near as good) earlier this week, and last year they were showing it ad nauseum. Did I mention that AMC is showing Scrooged! Seriously, who wants to see that on a regular rotation like it is some sort of classic (which it most certainly is not).

However, that is not the point of this post. In my search for airings of A Christmas Carol, I came across a post on one of the message boards that stated that republicans must hate the ending and how it must be like a horror movie to them because of how Scrooge becomes generous with his money...blah, blah, blah.

Another person said that this was nothing more than socialist propaganda that Dickens was trying to brainwash the people of the time into believing. I'm not too familiar with socio-economic climate of England during this period, but both of these topics are a bit disturbing.

Seriously, who takes a simple book/movie and tries to twist it into something political? It is just a work of entertainment, nothing more....nothing less!

Of course, now that I think about it, I seem to remember Glen Beck claiming that The Dark Knight was a victory/metaphor for conservatives --rolls eyes--

If all that wasn't bad enough, apparently there is a flap over the casting of an African-American...well, he's British, but I don't know what the correct term is over there...actor in the upcoming superhero flick Thor.

Idris Elba is going to playing Heimdall, a Norse warrior/God (not too familiar with the lore of Thor, so don't quote me on that). Obviously, when you think of Norsemen, the first thing that comes to mind would be a pale skinned, blonde figure.

If I'm not mistaken, in the comics, Heimdall is as white as the paper and has brown hair. However, as much as I am a proponent for movies to be faithful to the source material, I have no issues with this. Skin color is not that big of a deal. Well, guess what, someone has taken offense to this.

When I first heard of this, I thought it was just some fanboys, but apparently, a hate group from St. Louis has taken issue with Elba's casting. Their website states

"It's not enough that Marvel attacks conservatives values, now mythological Gods must be re-invented with black skin. ... It seems that Marvel Studios believes that white people should have nothing that is unique to themselves."


This has gone so far that there is actually a website called Boycott Thor that is filled with stuff related to making sure this movie is a flop just because this guy was cast! WTF?!?

In his defense, Elba had this to say

"Thor's mythical, right? Thor has a hammer that flies to him when he clicks his fingers. That's OK, but the color of my skin is wrong? I was cast in Thor and I'm cast as a Nordic god. If you know anything about the Nords, they don't look like me but there you go. I think that's a sign of the times for the future."


I applaud his for taking such a strong stance toward this unnecessary hatred. I mean if this was something like Will Smith being cast as JFK, there would be a reason for the outrage, but as he said this is nothing more than mythological fantasy. No reason at all to be taken so seriously. Some people just want to create something out of nothing apparently.

In conclusion, I would like to say that these examples are proof that there are those in our society that take stuff way too seriously and read way too much into everything. For goodness sakes, THEY'RE JUST MOVIES!!!!!

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