#like this is not a question that someone like Roger Craig Smith or whatever would ever get

[snapscube]

possibly an odd/stupid question but how do you feel about people imagining you as a voice claim for their ocs? (like, imagining that their character's voice would be your voice) is it something that would make you uncomfortable or no?

i’m a voice actor, i literally actively want people to imagine me voicing their characters haha. that’s like the whole point.

[maizethecorn]

YouTube Clips of favorite character Baron Draxum in Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:

Baron Draxum is my favorite character in this series. Baron is voiced by John Cena in the first season and Roger Craig Smith in the second season. Draxum was a really interesting villain in the first season. Draxum just wanted to turn all humans into mutants so youkai could live above ground. He was frustrated none of the other youkai supported his scientific experiments. He’s a villain with well extreme intentions of sorts. What I liked about Draxum’s character is that he just wanted to make a difference to help youkai and also wanted to be taken seriously by people. I think that was part of what drove him to be evil at first. He wanted to be in charge, be respected and recognized for what he was doing to attempt helping youkais. In real life, alot of people want to be recognized for whatever hard work they do and to have some respect from someone. Draxum is really relatable in that way. Draxum also has flaws in that he sometimes doesn't pay attention to detail despite how smart he is. An example of this lack of paying attention to detail is how he just accepted what the foot clan said about him being a partner when he joined their ranks. Draxum was doing lowly tasks like fetching the foot clan coffee with Cassandra despite being a so called equal partner. Also, Draxum put on the dark armor without questioning the side effects of what would happen once wearing the metal. As smart as Draxum was, he sometimes didn't think his actions through. Lots of people can be really smart but not think things through. Draxum’s huge problem is that he is obsessed with a prophecy that youkai will be destroyed one day. He naturally assumed humans would be the ones to destroy youkai, given what humans have done to the planet. I didn’t think his guess was unreasonable based on what he has observed of human nature. The prophecy is why Draxum wants to turn humans into mutants. He thinks the world will become a better place for youkai again. However by the end of season one, Draxum realized by helping Shredder get his amour that he had set up the villain that would destroy youkai, humans and the world. Also, his powers got drained by Shredder and he became homeless. 

Season two had Mikey one of the turtles set Draxum up with an apartment and a job. Draxum had a really attractive face when his mask come off. I was glad he didn’t get a new mask. My favorite episode in season two was the mystery meat episode. I loved that episode because Draxum had to figure out how to solve a problem without his powers. As he told April, using his powers in his job as the head cafeteria worker made things really convenient for him at keeping the kids in line and cafeteria operating. Who wouldn’t want to use their powers to solve an issue given the chance? However, April and Mikey reminded Draxum that using his powers would get him exposed and thrown in jail. So, Draxum had to think outside the box to defeat the food monster that was causing chaos in the school. He defeated the monster using his mind and human made tools at his disposal. The nice thing about this episode while his award was taken away by the school supervisor, the other cafeteria workers accepted him and told him he was one of them. Draxum seemed really happy since he finally had co-workers who respected him and recognized the hard work he did at the school. He also was shown to like his job since he was the one in charge of the highschool cafeteria. An added bonus was how cute Draxums expression was when he saw the fish stick statue built of him by the school. His eyes watered from how happy he was looking at the replica of himself. The second best episode of season two was part of the bad hair day episode where Draxum and Splinter went with Mikey to the water fountain. I swear Draxum and Splinter fought like they were a divorced couple over their turtle kid Mikey who kept looking at them anxiously. The sweetest moment of that episode was when Draxum apologized to Splinter and Mikey hugged the two of them, saying his wish came true. Later, Draxum became a second father figure to the turtles once he and Splinter worked out their baggage. I would love to see Draxum come back for another series or movie if possible. Here are some YouTube links to Draxum’s best character moments:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3pGM-ePLgw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWU_Ob3oMmU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txsAptsQ8Hg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFcXjGOZrvs

[chevd-blog]

My Two Cents: Whitewashing and Politically Correct Casting in Film

I’m poking the hornets’ nest again. 

Recently, it was announced that the Twelfth Doctor, Peter Capaldi, would be leaving Doctor Who at the end of the 2017 season. Now, I’m a pretty big fan of Doctor Who, so of course, this was a big deal for me. I’m going to be sad to see him go. At first, I’ll admit, I was skeptical-- I absolutely adored David Tennant and Matt Smith in the role, and Capaldi’s version of the Doctor was very different. But in time, despite being older and initially quite a bit more abrasive, the last season truly made me a believer (particularly his performances in “The Zygon Inversion” and “Heaven Sent”).

But I digress.

Of course, with the news of Capaldi’s departure, there’s been the inevitable wave of conjecture-- who will play the Thirteenth Doctor? And of course, part of this conjecture has been the now-commonplace suggestion that the role in question need not go to another white male actor. This is something that has been seen with increasing frequency in recent years, and which has been directed at everything from Star Wars to Marvel to James Bond. As a fan of these franchises, I’m invested in this discussion. So, against my better judgment, I find myself compelled to broach the subject of how to approach race and gender in casting.

Before I begin-- I realize that identity politics can be a very thorny and divisive subject, even in the context of the film industry. I’d like to note, as a white male film fan, the opinions I express here are only my own, and should be taken with a grain of salt. I mean absolutely no disrespect to anybody else, and I appreciate other perspectives on the issue, including ones that diverge from my own, so long as they are respectful as well.

So what is whitewashing? Basically, it’s the practice of productions casting white actors for non-white roles. It’s a very old practice that Hollywood has undertaken ever since its inception. This 2016 segment from Last Week Tonight with John Oliver sums it up quite nicely (warning: NSFW language):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XebG4TO_xss

(Just as an aside-- while the John Oliver segment succinctly sums up the issue pretty well, I don’t agree with the entirety of it. For example, Tom Cruise’s role in The Last Samurai was a fictional character, but one which was based largely on a real historical figure named Jules Brunet. Admittedly, the film did take some liberties with the character, portraying him as American, where Brunet was actually French. Also, while it is largely open to audience interpretation, my impression of the film was that the “Last Samurai” referenced by the title was actually Ken Watanabe’s character, and not Tom Cruise’s.)

As shown here, there’s been quite a lot of backlash against whitewashing in recent years, with demands of more political correctness in casting becoming much more frequent. On the whole, honestly, I have to say I find fault with both sides of this dichotomy. Yes, whitewashing a movie like Gods of Egypt is absolutely ridiculous. I acknowledge that. And I also acknowledge that Hollywood has a long history of white actors being given preferential treatment. On the other hand, blind political correctness of any kind irks me as well, because it feels like an incomplete, disingenuous, kneejerk reaction to a complex problem. It doesn’t actually fix anything, it just breeds resentment. I suppose, for me, the governing principle is actually as simple as plausibility and faithfulness to the source material. Let’s take this on a case-by-case basis, using some of the properties that are most important to me, and I’ll explain my stance on each.

Let’s start in the realm of sci-fi. As a general rule, I would say that diversity is a boon in sci-fi, because one of the inherent appeals of the genre in the first place is the removal of real-world racial barriers. There have been so many fantastic non-white characters in my favorite sci-fi canons: Sulu, Uhura, Worf, La Forge, Tuvok, Chakotay and Torres in the Star Trek universe, Lando Calrissian and Mace Windu in Star Wars, Morpheus in The Matrix. Likewise, for women, there’s Princess Leia, Ellen Ripley, Sarah Connor, and Trinity. All of these characters have had a profound impact on me, and serve as a way for sci-fi to do what it does better than any other genre: reflect on the human experience, which in no small part includes our diversity. So long as there’s no conflict with the continuity, I’m satisfied. So from my position, the uproar over Finn from The Force Awakens made no sense. In the context of the continuity, there was nothing that really seemed problematic to me about the character being non-white, and I’d love to see more good roles created for females and non-white actors in sci-fi. This is an instance where I oppose whitewashing and unequal treatment of women.

Fine, I hear you say. The characters you’ve mentioned here were all clean slates when they first appeared in their respective franchises. What about non-white or female characters who are already established, as with live-action adaptations of books or animated series? Here, again, I reassert my stance against whitewashing. The best example I can cite here is the upcoming Ghost in the Shell movie. I’ve been a big fan of GitS since the first season of Stand Alone Complex aired on [adult swim] over a decade ago, during my early college days. I desperately want this to be a good movie. And in fairness, until the movie comes out, I’m trying to withhold too much judgment, but... I have to admit, I’m not thrilled by the casting of Scarlett Johanssen as Motoko Kusanagi. I don’t like the concept of discarding an established character’s core identity for the sake of being more sympathetic to a certain demographic of viewers.

Conversely, though, this is the same problem I have with the other side of the coin: political correctness in casting for its own sake. To demonstrate, let’s talk now about a character who was originally created as a white male: James Bond. I’ve been a fan of the James Bond movies since I was a kid, so this is a franchise which is uncommonly close to my heart. I have every single Bond movie in my collection, and I’ve seen them all multiple times. Growing up, I respected Sean Connery’s classics, and the grace brought to the role by Roger Moore, but of course, my favorite was the current one at the time, Pierce Brosnan. For me, there was nobody else who could make the role his own like Brosnan did. And then Daniel Craig was cast. As I was with Capaldi’s Doctor, I was a bit skeptical of Craig’s Bond at first. It wasn’t because he was the so-called “Blond Bond”, as he was called by so many others. It was because he was so serious, so dry, so gritty. Whatever wry sense of humor Brosnan brought to the role, Craig seemed to remove. In retrospect, it was probably for the better, considering that Ian Fleming’s original books depict Bond as a lot less “fun” than the movies made him out to be through the years, and I recognize that Daniel Craig is a talented actor. In Skyfall, I was heartened to see him even starting to lighten up with the role ever so slightly. With recent rumors of Craig’s retirement from the 007 mantle, though, much has been made of creating a female “Jane Bond” role for an actress, or, as mentioned in the clip above, casting Idris Elba. Now, as I just mentioned, I realize the movies have not always been faithful to the plot elements in Fleming’s books, and for the most part... yeah, it’s not that consequential to me. However, I do feel that changing the role of James Bond himself purely for the sake of political correctness is a bridge too far. I don’t say this to cast aspersions on Idris Elba, who is a truly phenomenal actor. But it is a complete, wholesale abandonment of Fleming’s original intent with the character. As an artist and an occasional writer myself, that doesn’t sit right with me. Yes, the Cold War is over, and popular attitudes about Bond’s womanizing ways have changed-- but to alter the core identity of James Bond would, I feel, fundamentally shatter the franchise. For those of us who have invested decades in the franchise’s evolution, and in the character’s development, it’s essentially saying, “All that time and emotion you put into following this is now completely nullified, and you don’t matter.” And truthfully, what logical sense does it make, to alter a pre-existing character’s identity, when someone could just as soon come up with a completely original non-white or female spy character? You want a franchise? Go for it. Own it. Create a new character to rival James Bond and Jason Bourne at the box office. I’ll be standing in line at the theater for a ticket just like you. I’d welcome diversity in this genre too. I just don’t see the sense in throwing 50+ years of continuity out the window and antagonizing longtime fans of 007 to accomplish it.

So what about the Doctor, who, like James Bond, also has 50+ years of precedent to consider? Well... the Doctor is a Time Lord, from Gallifrey. Things are a bit different for Time Lords, as there actually is established precedent for drastic canonical identity changes during regeneration, including race and gender. During Capaldi’s tenure as Doctor, his longtime Time Lord arch-rival, the Master, resurfaced with a new female identity, Missy-- and it was a great plot twist. In the past week, once again, I’ve seen Idris Elba suggested for the new role. In this case, I say-- yeah, great, if he wanted the role, I’d totally support that, because it doesn’t contradict the character’s canon. There are only really two things I’d prefer to see in a new Doctor: 1) that it remains a British role, and 2) that it goes to someone who will be able to believably embody the Doctor. That’s it, no skin color or gender requirements.

In conclusion-- my biggest problem with the usual arguments about this issue (and to some extent, about identity politics in general) is that the discussion really isn’t so simple as to merit a black-or-white response. No single answer is correct for every instance. Whitewashing is a perpetuation of an exclusionary status quo, but baseless political correctness can damage a franchise’s credibility as well. When it comes to casting, my suggestion is to practice moderation, make decisions based on what is best for the craft of storytelling on an individual basis, and look to the source for a guide.