Kennedy On ‘Star Wars’ Woke Complaints: “Storytelling Does Need To Be Representative Of All People”

There's times when I really don't care if I'm seen as a sexist asshole and this is one of them. Movies DO NOT have to be all things to all people and they are better when then they are not. A woman has no business being in charge of a male centric movie franchise that has always appealed to us and if you don't believe that's okay its you who's the problem. Fuck her and her worthless minions. I'm sure Steven Spielberg loved your coffee as his secretary and that's all you'll ever be good for.

Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
The Thing (1982)
12 Angry Men (1957)

Just off the top of my head.

Movies need to be good, nothing else. If the story happens to require a wider variety of characters to fulfill that goal, great. Once you take your eye off the prize trying to "check off boxes," the quality starts to suffer. Story is always primary.

You are near-universally considered the biggest hack in Hollywood that has turned everything you've touched in to shit. Now please stop trying to spread your awful ideas and retire.

This is what happens when George Lucas starts Lucasfilm to make his own films HIS way, and then once it becomes a multibillion dollar industry, he just sells it off to the highest bidder. Yes Kennedy is useless but a male CEO would have been just as clueless spearheading Star Wars. Look at Marvel, and the airheaded men that have been running that place for decades. Any true comic fan knows the terrible leadership Marvel has had when it comes to stealing creator's intellecual property and not caring about the artform.

The problem is the industry, once anything becomes an industry = the creativity is gone. Star Wars, Marvel Studios and Blizzard are prime examples.

What did George Lucas call them when he first sold to Disney? The "White Slavers"?

This is just another of the many downside of rampant unchecked free market capitalism we're seeing ever since the neoliberal push in the 1980s and probably started before then.

Movies do not have to represent all people. If you need somebody in a movie who is the same race, sex, orientation, age, etc. as you before you can "relate" to it or enjoy it, then you are really limiting what you can be entertained by. Making movies "representative" is simply box checking to get woke points.

I think I mostly agree with the idea that storytelling should include everybody. After all, everybody has a story to tell, so no immutable characteristic should prevent somebody from coming to play. But, frankly, I don't think diversity itself is what anybody is complaining about.

In Star Wars, Leia tells the boys that they're doing a rubbish job of rescuing her before blasting her own way out of the detention area. It's a great play on "rescue the damsel." In Empire Strikes Back, Billy Dee Williams plays the cool, sexy Lando Calrissian because who else could?

The thing that people are objecting to is the perceived replacement of merit-based systems of hiring and firing with identity politics. Some people mistake objects to "woke" as objections to diversity, but that's not what has most people rolling their eyes. It's not "We hired such-and-such a person to be the showrunner/writer/director because they're awesome!" it's, "We hired this person *because* they're black/gay/a woman." If you tell people that the reason somebody was hired was because of their immutable characteristics, that creates the perception that they were not hired because of talent.

This is typically belied by the person in question. The three leads in the Sequel Trilogy are all good actors. They didn't let us down with bad performances, and it doesn't seem like they were hired because they were hispanic, black, and a woman. Most people don't complain about them, anyway, they complain about the writing, and the writing is bad. All the writing was done by white men, by the way - or at least the bulk of it. And even then, these are generally talented people. Executive meddling with no thought given to the actual story is the problem.

That's why we dislike Kennedy's handling of Star Wars. It's not because she's a woman, it's not because non-white actors are used. It's because diversity seems to be the only goal of the executives.

The fallout is that, because of this, fans are now suspicious whenever we see diversity because we can't help but think, "Why was that person hired?" It's the inevitable psychological trap that comes along with programs like DEI and Affirmative Action.

But when it's merited, nobody complains. Pedro Pascal is "diverse." Any objections to his performance as the Mandalorian? The vast majority of people agree that he rocked that part. The "OG" Mandalorian character, Boba Fett, and his father Jango are portrayed by Maoris. Anybody whine about that? Nope? I wonder why not... Rogue 1 is perceived as being one of the better entries in the Disney Star Wars era. Its cast is filled with women and minorities in lead roles. Did it catch flak for this? No, it didn't. (I didn't personally like the film, but again, it was bland writing leading to characters I didn't care about, not the performances or actors chosen).

So, when Kathleen Kennedy and Leslye Headland and other people say, "All of this hate is wrong and diversity is great," they're not wrong, but they're not actually talking about the problem that fans have a problem with. Some fans make racist, sexist, or other bigoted remarks, but the vast, vast majority of complaints aren't about race, sex, or other immutable characteristics; it's about Disney execs repeatedly telling us, "Our main priority is DEI," and us believing them.

Story comes first. Then you get people who fit the story. Not the other way around.

then why where there no whites on the cosby show, and when there was, they were portrayed as idiots.
same goes for the fresh prince, and numerus other shows.

black panther??

why can't i see the 32 comments?

anyone else see them?