1. So the only way for a story to be quintessentially Asian/Japanese etc, is if it's deeply rooted in the stereotypical conventions of Asian culture? Come on Bio, you're better than that
Name me the ways in which Death Note is "too Japanese" to jump cultures appropriately.
You're pretty much saying any Asian/Japanese etc story is fair game to be race-lifted and changed if they don't involve monks, samurais or Ninjas.
I shouldn't even dignify this BS with a response. If you actually paid attention to what I said, then you wouldn't make this statement. It isn't about superficial cultural iconography, it's about the difference between global vs. local understanding of behaviors within a story. Death Note is a fantasy, one that is not deeply rooted in a quintessentially Japanese context. Because the story itself does not actually change without that context. I shouldn't need to explain this. (Although Airbender is part of an entirely different argument altogether.)
But for sake of humoring you, this is also a story that heavily involves Shinigamis that are a part of Japanese religion
If you did even a rudimentary amount of research, you would find that the Shinigami from religious texts have very little (if anything) in common with those in Death Note. Which have far more in common with the western personification of death. Which has also undergone its own cultural transformation - in some ways separate - from its original religious association. Look at a show like Dead Like Me, where there are "reapers." Plural. Most of whom look entirely human, and have to deal with the established "rules" of the trade, which, not dissimilar to Death Note, must be explained to the audience, local or otherwise.
as well the Alias for Light being Kira aka the Japanese word for Killer.
Explain to me how Light's alias is anything other than an entirely superficial detail.
I don't think the whole "Movie for American audiences = White American actor" holds as much water knowing that the James Bond movies still have English actors,
James Bond is an English staple. They are not localizing a foreign story. James Bond is a western character. He speaks the language, and the Author who created him wrote popular English books, built around an English spy. Therefore pre-film exposure to the character would be in novels Americans were likely to have already read. I have tried to get people to watch Death Note. MANY are hesitant because it's a Japanese cartoon. See the difference? Americans read a book about a British spy - in English, they make an English movie with a Scottish (wait..?) actor. Many Americans
don't watch an amazing story about Japanese characters, so an American company makes it an American story, because it's possible to convert it, so that Americans will watch it. (By the way, the very first live action attempt at James Bond made him an American spy.
Sort of f--ks with your argument a bit, doesn't it?)
Girl with the Dragon Tatoo wasn't relocated and still had an English lead in Daniel Craig,
That story could not have worked in America. Daniel Craig is also a popular, well known actor, in America. Like Benedict Cumberbatch. (Personally I thought the adaptation was useless.)
and Harry Potter wasn't localized or Americanized in any way.
That's not even true, but this is not dissimilar to James Bond. Besides, you don't just take a movie that is already in English and reshoot it with American accents.
Hell Slumdog Millionaire still had Middle Easterns in the the major roles despite being made for American audiences.
I'm struggling to figure out what this has to do with anything. (By the way Slumdog Millionaire was a British made independent film.) There is a difference you know, between choosing to set your film in another country (English speakers too!), that no major studio wants to make (for that reason) and repeating the steps of another culture's already made movie, "just because."
Not to mention, in the upcoming Jungle Book adaptations for Disney and WB, Mowgli is still Indian.
Again. What is the point of highlighting this? Jungle Book is written by an English author, its adaptations are American. He's Indian because they made him Indian, Light is Japanese
because the setting is Japan.I don't get up in arms as I used to about this stuff but I still am baffled by the fact that considering that America isn't as Lily white as some think it is, With these anime adaptations they have a chance to do something different by casting a race appropriate lead for these characters and they go the BS whitewashing route almost every time it seems. There is no real excuse for it.
Money. Is typically the excuse for it, but as I have already said, multiple times, so is localization. Whites are still the majority in America. I mean this paragraph basically ignores every point I made about this, specifically. You all wouldn't accept black Light, or Mexican Light, or Honduran Light. It's "he's Japanese because he's Japanese" with no further thought than that put into it. I really don't care what race Light is, sh!t I'm not sure there's any reason to care what
gender Light is! I'd like to know how making the one character, and his family Japanese is supposedly to fix all of the "oh so very Japanese" elements that are supposedly to be lost in translation. Like "Kira"... Why in the world would a group of Americans call a faceless killer "Kira?" And how would giving that killer a (secretly) Japanese face, change that? It changes nothing, and that's the point.
Unlike America, Japan isn't a huge melting pot
Okay, for the last time the "melting pot" argument does not work, because you (or the majority of people you are arguing for) don't want the movie to be an accurate reflection of America. You want it to conform to the irrational (in an American context) template of the original Japanese version, because you can't imagine it another way.
This isn't a race related issue, it's an issue of superficiality, and that's my problem with it. It is the same reason people get mad when a black actor is cast as Johnny Storm, or (and this is real) when fans get up in arms about a studio picking a James Bond without dark hair, and mock the decision by calling him "James Blond" Not to mention the people who go apesh!t at the thought of Idris Elba taking the role. I don't appreciate people couching their argument in some sort of call to diversity, like their reasons are noble and progressive. Their reasons are rigid and conservative.
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everythingangels
9 years ago
Honestly, most people aren't uber-political and just like what they like. I think it's about that simple. Most of the people that get angry that Johnny Storm isn't the Johnny Storm they think they know or James Blond isn't the James Bond they think they know (with blond hair) don't have a political agenda... they just like what they like and want what they want. Nothing more!
And let's not forget that YOU, yourself, seem to prefer the idea of Japanese characters:
Honestly. It would actually be cool if they made Light and his dad Japanese, at least
So... what the heck, man?
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