Marvel comics has got some problems. Now what do I mean well it seems that they’ve forgotten their history and are in a pit fall of terrible writing. some of the gems of the recent marvel writing are 1) making a character write by a jewish team as an american war hero in ww2 join a nazi group 2) start the mass killing off of the team in their universe used as a place holder for any pressed group the x-men and 3) the most upsetting thing however they’ve done in my opinion the cruel treatment of a long time fan favorite villain magneto.  Some may know that in the comics he is a jewish man who survived nazi Germany. He has an infamous line in one of the films when asked why he won’t get a tattoo and shows his arm and the serial number and utters the words “Ive been marked once my dear and let me assure you no needle shall ever touch my skin again.” Now with all of this as a background and a well known one for the character they chose to have him become an agent of the fictional group hydra. Now what do hydra and being a holocaust survivor have to do with one another. Well that nazi group that I said the american war hero (Captain america) joined well it was hydra. In the comics hydra was a nazi science group that is a representation of the horrible experiments done onto those under the nazi regime. And they’ve taken a character who is not only jewish but a surviver of the holocaust and not only that but has Romani children and oh wait those Romani children he has well one of them has a mental illness oh and that Romani child he has that has a mental illness well she has a gay child. So they’ve taken someone who not only himself is a member of a group that was targeted but has a personal connection to other groups massacred by attention of his daughter and grandson. Even forgoing how insulting that is this in polar opposite to the whole reason he’s a villain. The reason he hates humans and tries to kill them is because as a surviver of the holocaust he sees the same actions and opinions he heard then being repeated and target towards the mutants in his world. So instead of trying to become peaceful he goes on the attack and has the mentality of killing what he view to be the people who will insight the death of his people. So making him bemuse a member of a group that is not only opposed to his character but ruins some of his other most iconic scenic in recent memory like oh i don’t know punching the LEADER OF HYDRA TO DEATH while uttering the words “I know my filthy abilities upset you, Schmidt don’t worry you’ll die pure  not magnetism just fists” is insulting to not only the people he represents but to the character himself. I cannot think of any long time reader that would’ve thought that this was good idea and cannot fathom why they would want to take their most loved and famous villain and drag him though the mud. And if you ask me the only thing they could do to rectify this is to have him go in yell ‘ha fooled ya didn’t I’ and kill every one in the building. But no they wanted an edgy event and instead ruined one of the most developed, well written, and respected villain in the medium.

 

Remender, Rick. “Uncanny Avengers 25.” N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.

 

As some of you may know the soon coming (or already released) Beauty & the Beast live action adaptation has made a few changes to the original cast. One that got its own press release is that the character Le Fou, or as I remember him the hobbit that followed around the misogynist has been ‘reimagined’ as a gay character. Now to be fair the original characters obsession with Gaston didn’t always come off as one of admiration and he does have a musical number in dedication to his ‘icons’ body. Now there are most definitely those who are ecstatic over an canonically openly gay disney character coming to the big screen, however there are those myself included who are less than jubilant over this announcement. In this camp who’s membership isn’t steeped in a simple hatred of gay people the reason for their lets call it caution towards this portrayal is multifaceted. Now the first thing is that the actor playing Le Fou is a straight cisgendered man. Now it’s not like the film won’t hire gay actors as the man playing Gaston, Luke Evans is openly gay so it seems odd that they wouldn’t hire a gay actor to play their first gay role? This is the same problem I have whenever a straight or even cisgendered actor plays an LGBT role because like it or not they stole that role from an actor who’s true life experience makes them a better cast. I could go on into a rant on this alone but their are other problems that deserve recognition. The next issue is the choice of character that they used. Not only did they subjugate their ‘historic’ idea to a minor character in the film but also chose to make the first gay character in a major family move from a company with almost a hundred years of work one who’s name is literally the fool. Of all the people in the disney rolodex (and I don’t even want to think of how many better choices that are in that listing) they chose the fool to be gay. Now imagine if you would that the first person that a major company chose to be REcast into a minority group was the one named the fool, the idiot, the joke, the not-worthy. Even with the simple matter of this insult aside the ‘arc’ (if it can even be called that since his lack of importance to the story leads to him having more a flat line) of this character consists of simply being obsessed with a man. Not only is it insulting that a gay man called the fool is boy crazy, the man he’s crazy for ISNT GAY AND WILL NEVER RETURN HIS ATTENTION. The man he’s ‘in love with’ is not only in love with another person, who’s another gender, and hates him, on top of theres  THAT IS HIS ‘LOVE INTERESTS’ INTIRE PUROSE IN THE MOVIE!. To be in love with Belle and pursue her thats it thats all he does he never even redeems or gets over her he just dies. (spoiler? the film is almost thirty years old) Now even if they get rid of the second problem in the live action film and have him get over her go to college and shave half his head and become a feminist this doesn’t change that he’s a straight man who’s the antagonist/villain who’s in love with the female protagonist. Now from the little we’ve gotten of actual footage from the film even this pisses me off. One of the songs and the majority of Le Fou’s lines is centered around complementing him and my god if that isn’t both the most stereotypically gay caricature that he could’ve found. At one point in the song he literally and I wish I was making this up jumps onto a bar crosses his legs puts his arms behind him and winks seductively  at Gaston. If this doesn’t get on your nerves I can imagine anything can. I cannot fathom why disney didn’t think this through or upon seeing this scene cut the actor and recast. Having the first gay man in their move cross his legs on a bar and wink at a man is as bad as if they’d had Tatiana eat fried chicken or made Pocahontas own a casino. They might as well have him in heels and do drag hell id rather that. The only thing that will make my blood boil more is if his wrists are consistently making a perfect 90 degree angle with his arms and the word ‘hey’ is ten syllables. And before any of you go that this is a “true person in the LGBT community” please remember that this is a STRAIGHT man doing this action. So now not only is Pocahontas the owner of a casino but the person playing her is a white woman named Katelyn. Now even with ALL THAT aside I’m still annoyed because they had other more imperative characters who would’ve been a far better recasting. why not make Lumiere and Cogsworth gay? Why not one of them why not make the dresser a lesbian? If you really wanted to push the story why not make belle a man? The beast is intended to be a personification of AIDS according to one of the most celebrated lyricists in all of animation Howard Ashman. Heck you are most defiantly not constricted to the first two letters you could’ve also made either a female character for the Beast to compete with for the Belle or a Male one for Belle to need to beat out for the prince. Why not even make Belle or the Beast or any of the cursed servants trans? Someone used to being in a body not their own trapped and cursed? Now I don’t want to hear that disney needed to save face, this company owns half the dam earth. They could make the new star wars (which they own) just two people in a park getting high and swinging blunts at one another with the light saber sound and still make more money in a month then most people see in a lifetime. And lets also be clear no matter what they did to this movie this act included they were going to make millions off of it. Its a remake of Beauty and the Beast for crying out loud anything they did wouldn’t matter cause everyone and their mom, dads, and children are going to see this. They could’ve made the cursed servants paper cut outs with stick figure smiling faces and it still would be up for an academy award. So now this isn’t a risk its a back handed response to the decades long outcry for representation from a giant who owes a large portion of its success and fame to the blood, sweat, tears, and cash of the LGBT community. And the sad thing is that despite these complaints its probably the best representation of a member of the LGBT in a family move that most people can think of. But Id rather no representation then something that will undo all the hard work and make the brave people still fighting for their rights into nothing more than a joke for cis hets to laugh at. But mark my words this abomination will make more money in a week than When We Rise will make for the next ten years.

Something that I’m excited to watch is a multipart documentary airing on ABC called when we rise. The story of the documentary is thought the eyes of reenactments of real historical figures and do through the entirety of the gay rights movement. The first part aired last night and was set in post stonewall San Fransisco. From what I can ascertain from the trailers the arc of the documentary will begin there and fallow up until the supreme court decision. Its almost ironic that its coming out post the absurdity surrounding the unneeded fight over bathroom rights for transgendered individuals. Now something of a similar caliber also came out before this that was meant to only show the stonewall riots, however that movie was while set in a historical setting both not a documentary and not realistic. It removed key players from the truth of the events in favor of forwarding the imaginary protagonist and fused actual key figures together and renamed them to allow someone to fulfill some of their actions while delegating other key moments to the fictional persona. Now while only the first part has aired my hope is that this will be far more respectful to the true figures who fought and died in the course of their fight and allow them the respect they deserve by having whoever portrays them to perform the action associated with them. I also hope that they will acknowledge the blunders made through the movement that the problematic political movements used to normalize the community in an effort to gain favor with cis hets. And on that point I ask a question. For a documentary showing the struggle of a group of people is it their responsibility to edit and focus the film in a way that makes it more digestible to the majority of the audience as to give people previously unaware with the source material some familiarity with it even if the edges are smoothed out to make it digestible? Or is it better to give the people who inherited their struggle and fight a true and accurate background of the history of their movement all of the dirty laundry included?

 

Antonio Garofalo