The most woke TV show ever?

[BuckSwope 654]

For me, a big part of it is if it is a natural thing, or something that the show writers experienced in their lives and are incorporating that into the shows, or if it's just there for the sole reason of inclusion and more cynically for clicks and watches.  As in a Producer decides that the stats show they will get x% more views and mentions if there is a lesbian couple in the show - things like that.    Problem, is it's really hard sometimes to know those motivations.   

The reason I thought of it was somebody yet again mentioned Cuties, which my understanding is that's something that the writer encountered and grew up with.   Also, for anybody who has kids in MS and HS, it's reality and pretty shocking how sexualized they and their dances can be.  

People on one side land more on the side that it's for clicks and pushing an agenda, people on the other side land more on it being art and expressing things that happened or are happening.  

[WhiteWonder 2,171]

19 hours ago, BuckSwope said:

I'd love examples of what you all would consider crossing over too much into wokeness in shows.   I watch very little TV- probably about 95% movies 5% TV shows. 

For me it’s anytime you can tell a character was cast as black/Asian/gay/etc just to make the show diverse even if it doesn’t really make sense and even if the actor or actress is terrible. 

[wiffleball 4,631]

Uh, Mr Rogers? 

[Hardcore troubadour 12,589]

Everyone knew Elton John and Freddy Mercury were fruitcakes. No one cared. Now Rob Halford, that was a surprise. I guess it shouldn’t have been in hindsight. 

[wiffleball 4,631]

5 minutes ago, Hardcore troubadour said:

Everyone knew Elton John and Freddy Mercury were fruitcakes. No one cared. Now Rob Halford, that was a surprise. I guess it shouldn’t have been in hindsight. 

Well that whole Jim Neighbors thing really threw me for a loop!

 

 

Well gooollllleeee!

[BuckSwope 654]

1 hour ago, WhiteWonder said:

For me it’s anytime you can tell a character was cast as black/Asian/gay/etc just to make the show diverse even if it doesn’t really make sense and even if the actor or actress is terrible. 

Interesting.  Do you have an example?

[WhiteWonder 2,171]

59 minutes ago, BuckSwope said:

Interesting.  Do you have an example?

very quickly off the top of my head are a few movies... when Fantastic Four had Michael B Jordan as Johnny Storm, with a white sister. Granted, I like him very much as an actor in other films.  The all female remake of Ghostbusters with extremely unfunny women. 

TV show off the top of my head because it was a recent watch would be House of Dragons. They cast House Velaryon needlessly black. I believe George Martin considered making the family black but to my knowledge did not.... and i've read a bunch of reasoning such as "it makes it easier for people to tell the characters apart". Really? I am shocked that people are not up in arms over that reasoning. 

 

edit to add I do agree with your previous comment 

Quote

or if it's just there for the sole reason of inclusion and more cynically for clicks and watches.

 

[WhiteWonder 2,171]

1 hour ago, BuckSwope said:

Interesting.  Do you have an example?

Oh another show on Netflix that comes to mind is Umbrella Academy. In the comics, all the children are white and straight. In the show, one is black, one is asian, one is mexican, one is pansexual etc. I happen to enjoy the show, but it is blatantly obvious that they cast the roles (and changed them around) simply for diversity and inclusion purposes. In the most recent season they flip a character from female to female identifying as male... and this was probably done because the actor paying the character came out as trans in 2020. 

[BuckSwope 654]

Thanks for the examples.  I haven't seen either of those shows.   One thing I struggle with are those cases of a POC replacing a white character from existing material.   One one hand, why?  On the other hand, isn't that what we are asking for - not seeing color and casting the best actors?   It is for sure more straightforward for me if it's historical figures or if their race was an integral part of the story.   

I get it, people largely want to see themselves on screen and have characters they can relate to.   I would guess groups speaking out that it's hard to get their stories told would much rather have original stories written and starring them than just saying "I know, how about black Karate Kid??".  That's where I fall more in the example of Ghostbusters or Ocean's Eight.  Instead of that, wasn't there another movie in the pipeline that could have been made instead with an all female cast?  

[avoiding injuries 1,220]

1 hour ago, WhiteWonder said:

Oh another show on Netflix that comes to mind is Umbrella Academy. In the comics, all the children are white and straight. In the show, one is black, one is asian, one is mexican, one is pansexual etc. I happen to enjoy the show, but it is blatantly obvious that they cast the roles (and changed them around) simply for diversity and inclusion purposes. In the most recent season they flip a character from female to female identifying as male... and this was probably done because the actor paying the character came out as trans in 2020. 

Yeah, Umbrella Academy definitely flipped the woke switch for the last season. Forced and unnecessary. 
Woke probably isn’t the best descriptor, but Black’ish is a pile of sh!t. 

[WhiteWonder 2,171]

1 hour ago, BuckSwope said:

Thanks for the examples.  I haven't seen either of those shows.   One thing I struggle with are those cases of a POC replacing a white character from existing material.   One one hand, why?  On the other hand, isn't that what we are asking for - not seeing color and casting the best actors?   It is for sure more straightforward for me if it's historical figures or if their race was an integral part of the story.   

I get it, people largely want to see themselves on screen and have characters they can relate to.   I would guess groups speaking out that it's hard to get their stories told would much rather have original stories written and starring them than just saying "I know, how about black Karate Kid??".  That's where I fall more in the example of Ghostbusters or Ocean's Eight.  Instead of that, wasn't there another movie in the pipeline that could have been made instead with an all female cast?  

I definitely want the best actors playing roles... it just seems that a lot of the time, a minority actor gets cast for a role just because of pandering more so than being the best actor. 

marvel/DC and other comic or graphic novel stuff can be more open for interpretation than historical figures, of course, but the source material generally has the characters portrayed in a certain way. Thor for example is not going to be a black man unless somewhere along the line, producers decide we need a woke Thor. Then if they cast a black actor to play Thor, the defense will be "fans are okay with magical flying hammers, but the color of Thors skin is too unrealistic?" 

on the other hand when Will Smith played deadshot in suicide squad, it was good because 1. Will Smith and 2. even though i'm no comic book nerd, I don't think deadshot ever really had a defined race. 

[BuckSwope 654]

1 hour ago, WhiteWonder said:

I definitely want the best actors playing roles... it just seems that a lot of the time, a minority actor gets cast for a role just because of pandering more so than being the best actor. 

marvel/DC and other comic or graphic novel stuff can be more open for interpretation than historical figures, of course, but the source material generally has the characters portrayed in a certain way. Thor for example is not going to be a black man unless somewhere along the line, producers decide we need a woke Thor. Then if they cast a black actor to play Thor, the defense will be "fans are okay with magical flying hammers, but the color of Thors skin is too unrealistic?" 

on the other hand when Will Smith played deadshot in suicide squad, it was good because 1. Will Smith and 2. even though i'm no comic book nerd, I don't think deadshot ever really had a defined race. 

Yep.  Like I said, my first reaction to a situation like that is more on the lines of why instead of doing black Thor wouldn't they look for one of the hundreds of characters and stories in comics and graphic novels and do those instead?   Unfortunately, the answer is usually either money (safer to go with a more well known story) or what you are describing above.  

Anyway, thanks for the feedback.  Just curious where people's different lines are and why.  

[TBayXXXVII 2,107]

The DC shows on CW are pretty woke.  You won't find a straight white male dating a straight white woman on Super Girl.  They gave Super Girl a boyfriend for like a season or two, but that's it.  Every other white guy is either the bad guy, gay, trans (who's a girl), or dating an alien.  They even went as far as having a bad guy for about 3 or 4 episodes who was referred to as "The Conservative".  I mean, you can't get much more woke than that.

The Flash had 3 straight white guys in their cast early on... one was dating the black girl that the Flash ended up marrying, until he died at the end of the first season, and the other one was the bad guy.  He eventually became a good guy, but that's all there really was, as far as main stays.  Everyone else on the show is either a woman or a minority.  The only white guys who have stretch runs are generally the bad guy.

I never really watched the DC Legends series.

Arrow was the only one where I watched all the way through.  It used to be pretty much in line with society the first couple seasons where like 60% were white (2 of them were gay [in real life]), and the rest minorities.  Only 1 character was only gay.  Then, around season 4, they lost 3 people (2 white), and replaced them with 1 gay black dude, and 2 Hispanics.  I mean, that's usually normal for shows too.  NCIS was like that.

Whenever someone left, their replacement was a minority or a woman.  Kate leaves, enter Ziva.  Ziva leaves, enter the blonde chick (don't know her name).  DiNozzo leaves, enter Fez.  Abby leaves, enter black girl.  Morrow was the director, when he left, enter Jenny Sheppard... when she left, enter Leon Vance.  I'm pretty sure that until Gibbs left and he was replaced by Parker, he's the only white character to be a replacement in the shows 20 years.  I could be wrong on that though... I stopped watching after season 5 or 6.

 

[DonS 3,063]

I just read that a reboot of "Escape From NY" is in the works:

https://www.cinemablend.com/movies/scream-6-directors-are-now-developing-a-reboot-of-a-john-carpenter-classic

They better not recast Kurt Russell's role as a black tranny Snake Plithkin.

[BuckSwope 654]

2 hours ago, TBayXXXVII said:

The DC shows on CW are pretty woke.  You won't find a straight white male dating a straight white woman on Super Girl.  They gave Super Girl a boyfriend for like a season or two, but that's it.  Every other white guy is either the bad guy, gay, trans (who's a girl), or dating an alien.  They even went as far as having a bad guy for about 3 or 4 episodes who was referred to as "The Conservative".  I mean, you can't get much more woke than that.

The Flash had 3 straight white guys in their cast early on... one was dating the black girl that the Flash ended up marrying, until he died at the end of the first season, and the other one was the bad guy.  He eventually became a good guy, but that's all there really was, as far as main stays.  Everyone else on the show is either a woman or a minority.  The only white guys who have stretch runs are generally the bad guy.

I never really watched the DC Legends series.

Arrow was the only one where I watched all the way through.  It used to be pretty much in line with society the first couple seasons where like 60% were white (2 of them were gay [in real life]), and the rest minorities.  Only 1 character was only gay.  Then, around season 4, they lost 3 people (2 white), and replaced them with 1 gay black dude, and 2 Hispanics.  I mean, that's usually normal for shows too.  NCIS was like that.

Whenever someone left, their replacement was a minority or a woman.  Kate leaves, enter Ziva.  Ziva leaves, enter the blonde chick (don't know her name).  DiNozzo leaves, enter Fez.  Abby leaves, enter black girl.  Morrow was the director, when he left, enter Jenny Sheppard... when she left, enter Leon Vance.  I'm pretty sure that until Gibbs left and he was replaced by Parker, he's the only white character to be a replacement in the shows 20 years.  I could be wrong on that though... I stopped watching after season 5 or 6.

 

Ok - that is pretty funny.   

I would have guessed that shows and movies targeted for younger audiences are doing this more.  I think it makes sense that you'd see a bit of that on the CW and shows like that.   Thanks for the reply - I haven't seen any of those shows either.   

Only one I've bothered to watch lately is Yellowjackets.  I love the show, but when we got to Ep9 last night I thought there were a couple things that could rub people the wrong way, but to me that was a couple minutes out of 10 episodes, so it didn't bother me much.  I also read that one of the leads said she got a lot of body shaming feedback, which I thought was interesting too.  

With your examples of The Flash, Arrow, and NCIS - do they also do things like the bolded where there is also an anti-right story or dialogue, or is it more just a noticeable attempt to diversify the cast?    

I also have tiers of "wrongness" with these things.  e.g. - I have less problem with them just choosing to do that because those actors tested the best or they just wanted to do it naturally.  Way worse when it's out of fear of being called out or in reaction to online whining.  

[OldMaid 1,838]

The chick from Yellowjackets should get a bunch of body shaming. She’s a moose. 

[Bill E. 666]

20 hours ago, BuckSwope said:

As in there was a 10min back and forth about how you shouldn't address a group of people by "guys"?  

Yea though for like 20 years it was fine.  Now all of the sudden it is offensive.  If it was just that it would not have been noticeable but they started the season with a thing about making each other feel good about themselves.  This on a show where they starve people and force them to  conspire against each other to vote them out of the show.

[avoiding injuries 1,220]

1 hour ago, Bill E. said:

Yea though for like 20 years it was fine.  Now all of the sudden it is offensive.  If it was just that it would not have been noticeable but they started the season with a thing about making each other feel good about themselves.  This on a show where they starve people and force them to  conspire against each other to vote them out of the show.

It’s still fine, and don’t let anyone try to tell you otherwise. 

[Bill E. 666]

2 hours ago, avoiding injuries said:

It’s still fine, and don’t let anyone try to tell you otherwise. 

Thanks guys!!

[TBayXXXVII 2,107]

12 hours ago, BuckSwope said:

Ok - that is pretty funny.   

I would have guessed that shows and movies targeted for younger audiences are doing this more.  I think it makes sense that you'd see a bit of that on the CW and shows like that.   Thanks for the reply - I haven't seen any of those shows either.   

Only one I've bothered to watch lately is Yellowjackets.  I love the show, but when we got to Ep9 last night I thought there were a couple things that could rub people the wrong way, but to me that was a couple minutes out of 10 episodes, so it didn't bother me much.  I also read that one of the leads said she got a lot of body shaming feedback, which I thought was interesting too.  

With your examples of The Flash, Arrow, and NCIS - do they also do things like the bolded where there is also an anti-right story or dialogue, or is it more just a noticeable attempt to diversify the cast?    

I also have tiers of "wrongness" with these things.  e.g. - I have less problem with them just choosing to do that because those actors tested the best or they just wanted to do it naturally.  Way worse when it's out of fear of being called out or in reaction to online whining.  

No, the Flash, Arrow, and NCIS were never as bad as Supergirl.  I only made it through 3 seasons of that show.  I gave up on Flash after 6 when they constantly needed to keep adding either gay/gender neutral characters.  I made it all the way through Arrow, but I struggled through the last season.  I wanted to finished it because I knew it was wrapping up.  Personally, I thought the only reason to watch that show was because of Amell & Ramsey.  They're really great actors and carried that show.  I stopped watching NCIS only because I was working 2 jobs at the time and got really far behind.  Took too long to catch up.  I did watch shows on TBS from time to time, but when they added Fez (to replace DiNozzo), and the black girl (to replace Abby), I was done.  Simply, they're just really terrible actors.

I don't really have a problem with NCIS, because they're just replacing people that are leaving, Arrow was like that too, until the end and that's why I limped to the finish line.  I gave up on Flash earlier because they were just replacing people, they were finding new ways to introduce new characters (which isn't a problem), but everyone of them was either a strong minority woman, a gay guy, or weak white guy who had a short run.

[BuckSwope 654]

20 hours ago, OldMaid said:

The chick from Yellowjackets should get a bunch of body shaming. She’s a moose. 

Interesting.   I'd say she's the most attractive of the main 4 adults, and that J.Lewis looks gross and unhealthy.  

Not sure why anybody should need to be shamed into anything anyway, so there's also that.  

[Hardcore troubadour 12,589]

42 minutes ago, BuckSwope said:

Interesting.   I'd say she's the most attractive of the main 4 adults, and that J.Lewis looks gross and unhealthy.  

Not sure why anybody should need to be shamed into anything anyway, so there's also that.  

Beta

[BuckSwope 654]

12 minutes ago, Hardcore troubadour said:

Beta

Probably 

[OldMaid 1,838]

52 minutes ago, BuckSwope said:

Interesting.   I'd say she's the most attractive of the main 4 adults, and that J.Lewis looks gross and unhealthy.  

Not sure why anybody should need to be shamed into anything anyway, so there's also that.  

Well, yes… J Lewis looks like a crack wh0re.  And I agree, nobody should be shamed into anything-I’m just sick of the whole body positivity movement. It started off as something good, and now we’re using it as a justification for people to be lazy and eat like crap, then we tell them it’s ok. 
 

Sorry, but being 15-20 pounds or more overweight is not what the body is supposed to look like, which is what that Melanie chick said. 

[BuckSwope 654]

9 minutes ago, OldMaid said:

Well, yes… J Lewis looks like a crack wh0re.  And I agree, nobody should be shamed into anything-I’m just sick of the whole body positivity movement. It started off as something good, and now we’re using it as a justification for people to be lazy and eat like crap, then we tell them it’s ok. 
 

Sorry, but being 15-20 pounds or more overweight is not what the body is supposed to look like, which is what that Melanie chick said. 

There's a difference between celebrating and not bullying.  I think sometimes we go too far into celebrating as we get away from bullying/shaming. 

Just fascinates me we have numerous examples on shows and movies where a typically hot woman is married to some chubby dope.   Of course nobody seems to care much about that.  

[OldMaid 1,838]

2 minutes ago, BuckSwope said:

There's a difference between celebrating and not bullying.  I think sometimes we go too far into celebrating as we get away from bullying/shaming. 

Just fascinates me we have numerous examples on shows and movies where a typically hot woman is married to some chubby dope.   Of course nobody seems to care much about that.  

I care. Everyone should put a little effort into their appearance, IMO, not just women.

[taco breath 419]

•  

 

[taco breath 419]

 

[Hardcore troubadour 12,589]

I’ll save it but it won’t take long. 

[OldMaid 1,838]

11 minutes ago, Hardcore troubadour said:

I’ll save it but it won’t take long. 

Douches are allowed to be bullied.   Lighten up, Francis.

[titans&bucs&bearsohmy! 2,745]

One that jumped out at me in recent years was designated survivor... the president had a trans sister or something and they made a huge deal of it. That was just one of many liberal preachings though.

[Hardcore troubadour 12,589]

34 minutes ago, OldMaid said:

Douches are allowed to be bullied.   Lighten up, Francis.

I’m taking about murdering someone. What are you taking about? Oh I posted that innthe wrong thread.