Narnia Needs More Diversity!!!

Well, in the first one, the only humans were the children, which are white according to the book. (Oh, and the white witch, for the same reason as well.)

And in the second, there was just them and the Talmeranians. I suppose they could've made them black, but..well, they didn't. Obviously it's not because they didn't want to, but more because that's just how it happened. (By the way, they might've been supposed to be Spanish in the book as well. I don't think the die hard fans would've liked it if they completely changed the race of the people.)

Sure, it's been two movies with not much diversity, but it's not like they have tons of chances to include all different kinds of people. Narnia is mostly populated by animals, afterall.

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"I know, you had it sorted."
- Edmund Pevensie

it was written during the 50s genius
adding diversity wouldn't exactly be going by the book which so many of you whine about


Maybe i wanna do what bunnies do with you if you know what i mean

If there was to be diversity as you suggest it should have been people of Polynisain descent or similar as the Telmarines were descendants of Pirates and South Sea Island women. Not to be offensive but why should there be "African American" people why not Anglo/African or French/African or African/African? Naria though, as someone else pointed out, does not have a genuine human population it was never meant to have one, in the beggining Aslan created it for the Talking Animals not humans, the only humans are those who get there by accident.

Cry God for Harry, England and St George

Have no fear. If they ever decide to do The Horse and his Boy, that book is loaded with Calormenes, or are "dark" skinned. You will just have to wait a few films.

likekiki17 defines the term "white guilt".

It's just the part of the Narnian world they come from. Telmarines are basically Spanish. Calormans are Arabic. I'm sure the world has some other part, probably near the equator, where the people are darker-skinned than the ones we've seen.

Wait a minute. I've just remembered Voyage of the Dawn Treader. The world is flat. They don't have an equator. In which case, if they do have black people, they have probably gotten there through the various rifts between the worlds, rather than being native.

Of course, humankind itself isn't native to that world; it was created for the animals. The first humans got there by following Aslan, and later some slipped through the rifts. None of the people who followed Aslan in Magician's Nephew were black, so any black people would be descendants of those who came through the rifts. If no black people have traveled through the rifts, then obviously there wouldn't be any in Narnia. I think it's probable that there are some; we just haven't bumped into them yet.

Anyway, whatever the in-story excuse, the fact remains that this is based on European mythology. When someone makes a movie about Africa, no one complains about a lack of diversity because the whole cast is black - it's realistic. Therefore, it makes sense for a movie based on European mythology to have a predominately white cast.

I know I'm rambling. It took me a while to get my thoughts sorted out. I'll stop now.

Cross my heart, smack me dead, stick a lobster on my head.

This diversity issue with Narnia, especially the movies, has boggled my mind for quite a bit. These two movies have been more diverse than most other current fantasy films. Look at Lord of the Rings, the only black people you saw there were the bad guys on the mumakil. I am not a Harry Potter fan, but from what little I have seen, there doesn't seem to be much diversity.
The Narnia movies, on the other hand, have shown much more diversity. As others have pointed out, the centaurs were black. The Telmarines were spanish (or is black the only race that counts as "diverse"?). Later we will have the Calormens, which to me always sounded more middle eastern, but could conceivably be cast as black. Although I think that black Calormens would make the contrast between their appearance and the appearance of Shasta too sharp. In the book he doesn't really notice that his appearance is that different from his "father". They also have heroes that are other-than-white. Caspian, of course, is one. Dr. Cornelius is half Telmarine. Later we'll have Aravis and then Emeth.
The Chronicles of Narnia was written by a middle aged white guy in the 40s-50s. Of course his main characters will be white. People write what they know. I would fully expect books written by someone of another race to write in terms of their race. It just makes sense.

I mean, really, what is the big deal?

likekiki17; Nobody seems to care, but you.