Aug 082015
  August 8, 2015

JohnnyLet’s just start with the premise: “Heritage” is never the answer to anything. It is never a reason to do anything, or like anything. Heritage is a description of history. It is now your job to determine if the events of that history are good, or bad, or simply irrelevant, and act accordingly.

Recently, heritage has come up as a defense for the Confederate flag still flying over government buildings, or flying over a home. That the flag is a symbol of racism, that it was originally used as an icon for an army formed, and then fighting, to retain slaves, and that it was pulled out of mothballs by racist groups, and by racist legislators long after the Civil War as a way to protest civil rights is a matter of history. Or, if you will, that is its heritage. When someone says the flag is a symbol of heritage, that is the heritage of which they speak. I’m not going to argue that any more because chances are if you are reading my blog, you already know that and believe it.

Which brings us to heritage in geekdom. Just like for racist Southerners (and some Northerners), heritage is used in the geek community as an excuse for all kinds of sins. It is also used mindlessly. As I need a distinction, I divide those in the community into “fans” and “fan-boys.” (And yes, you can have a female fan-boy). Fans are people who like a work. Fan-boys are those who no longer care if something is good, or great, or even if it is horrible, as long as it is pure, and supports their egos. Fan-boys are ego connected to the things they clutch close to their breasts. They take their identity from those things. To Star Wars fan-boys, an insult to Star Wars is an insult to themselves. Someone laughing a Batman is laughing at them (the Batman fan-boy). It’s why they can’t stand camp.

Fan-boys are by nature conservative. A change in what they connect to threatens their self-identity. And like most conservative ideologies, it is inherently racist. Sexist too. Just an aside, because people forget what words mean, a racist doesn’t have to dislike people of other races. He doesn’t have to be a bigot about race. He has to act in ways that harm other races to a greater extent. Racism is oppression. It may or may not involve hatred. And while fan-boys are bigoted, it is not necessarily race that they are bigoted about. Racism is a by product.

All of which brings me to Fantastic Four, the newest unnecessary reboot of a franchise, and Fox’s move to keep the rights which would revert to Marvel if they didn’t make some kind of film. By every account, Fantastic Four is a mess, and I’ve heard no one supporting it. I’ve heard it is boring. I’ve heard the characters are underdeveloped. I’ve heard they make foolish decisions (making Ben’s battle cry the phrase that his brother used when beating him as a child) that boggles the mind. I’ve heard it is too hurried to tell the story is seems to want to, and far too slow getting to that story. I’ve heard a lot of very reasonable complaints.

And then I’ve heard the unreasonable one: Johnny is black.

I’d heard this months ago, but that uproar seemed to have silenced, so I was ready to ignore it, but now it is back. In every thread, in ever discussion about the now-accepted train wreck quality of the film, someone says, “yeah, and they made Johnny black.” I’ve seen, “Them making Johnny black is a symptom that they don’t understand the characters.” Hmm. So they don’t understand the fundamental whiteness of the characters?  Or, “When I write a character, race is one of the characteristics I give, and I wouldn’t want anyone changing that.” Really, so all of your characters are written so their race is of prime importance in their actions and thinking? Really? Show me how? I’m curious how race always is important. How about hair color? Handedness? Length of various toes? Are those of great importance too?

Mind you, I agree, race can be of great importance to a character. Othello pretty much needs to be dark skinned. It is relevant to showing what he has overcome, that the fact he’s needed to overcome things is still with him, and that people trust him, in spite of what he is. Race is also important to Rhett Butler, but then Gone With the Wind is a horribly racist and just generally horrible work, so take that how you will.

But being a superhero…being a part of a family and gaining the ability to fly and burst into flame, those are not things that only make sense when viewed from a black or white or Asian experience. Johnny is Caucasian in the comics. Hell, he’s Aryan going on albino. But being white, and having a white sister, are not vital elements. Having a sister is. Having a white one is not. And he and his sister being the same race is not, unless you believe that adoption is an evil construct and only genetics define family.  In which case you are scary.

And if race was a part of who Johnny was, then maybe it would be time to change who he was to something more interesting, something better. But the thing is, it wasn’t.

Yet the fan-boys are out in force, waving their version of the confederate flag and chanting heritage. “Our heritage, our comics, have him white, so he must be white. And if everyone in comics in the ’60s were white, then we should only have white representations of them now. That’s not racist, it’s heritage.”  Well, it’s heritage that is racist.

As I said at the beginning. Heritage is never a reason for anything. Sticking to the source material because it is the source material is mindless stupidity. And would have lost us Blade Runner. You try to make something good. In that, you take from the source what works in this new medium, and you change things where it would be better to change them. The only way to evaluate it is if it is good, not if it is pure, not if it matched what was.

Which is a point I make a lot. Change is not frightening. It is not evil. Look at what’s on the screen (or in the book, or on the canvas) to see if it is good or bad, not if it is a change. It’s a sound point, but it doesn’t even come into play here (it does with making the Fantastic Four dimension travelers instead of space travelers). But Johnny’s race isn’t a change. It isn’t something to consider because his race was never an issue. Changing Iron Fist to being Asian would be a change (and one I’d love to see them do) because race is relevant with that comic. It isn’t here.

So if you object to Johnny being black, you’re being a fan-boy, waving your confederate flag, and mumbling heritage, mumbling about the deep importance of nothing at all.