r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Character_Growth_397 • 13h ago

Hated Tropes Things meant to be progressive just end up being incredibly offensive

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What If - In one of the comics Miles becomes Thor, and it's full of stereotypes about black people such as the Mjolnir having graffiti on it and the infamous "by Odin's fade"

Emilia Perez - Everything about the movie

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u/Slow_Bowler8285 13h ago

They also did a similar thing in Justice League Unlimited with the Ultimen

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u/YamatoIouko 12h ago

Turns out they’re a neat concept when you’re not explicitly focusing on their ethnicity.

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u/Mister_Dink 10h ago

Explicitly focusing on their ethnicity would have helped the originals not suck ass. The lack of study or care for their ethnicities is what made them bad.

If the creators did two minutes of research into Latin American mythology, they could have come together with a distinct set of powers and appropriate backstory that would actually help.

If Samurai has anything to do with Japan, he's be better than "floating skull guy."

The motive isn't the problem, is the zero-effort execution.

Nobody gets mad about The Thing's deep Jewish roots as a character or inspiration from the Golem. You can get iconic characters and good stories from respectfully integrating ethnic or religious history.

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u/somebeautyinit 9h ago

Under appreciated comment.

This is the flip side of thought that anything can be a joke, it just really depends on who's telling it. These character beats CAN be super cool and meaningful, but you have to tell the story right.

The Black Lightning CW show made it clear that it was impossible to separate his ethnicity from his life, and it worked! It was compelling! Same with Luke Cage; a bulletproof Black man in a hoodie was not an accidental image.

The Boys did a great job with this in the A-Train storyline too, and even lampshaded it in the bio pic they were forcing him to make.

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u/OneWholeSoul 7h ago

Oh, shit! I don't think I'd ever put together Ben's Judaism and the Golem/Homunculus myth origins!

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u/Mister_Dink 5h ago

It's one of those things that moved in and out of focus, especially since the fantastic four comics got so weird so fast with Galactus, time travel, all the 80s cosmic stuff. He's based on the golem, but doesn't have that many "golem-shaped" stories or parables he features.

Every once in a while you get more grounded moments in the F4 franchise and remember "oh, shit, yeah."

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u/CrankyAtticGhost 6h ago

Pretty on point! I will say that it may be a coincidence, but Samurai turning into a floating skull might actually be a reference to Taira no Masakado, a famous samurai who is said to have become a powerful vengeful spirit after he was decapitated; notably, most purported sightings are of his head floating around.

Of course, if that was the case, then that makes the lack of research for the other characters even more egregious. Why research for the Japanese guy, but not the others???

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u/David_the_Wanderer 4h ago

I mean, considering how underbaked everything else about this line-up is, I seriously doubt Samurai was an intentional reference to Taira no Masakado.

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u/CrankyAtticGhost 4h ago

Yeah, I'm leaning towards it being unintentional too. Also, like... "Samurai" as a Japanese superhero name is like using "Knight" or "Soldier" for the name of a European superhero. That's not a superhero name, that's literally just a profession.

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u/Toys_to_Astonish 58m ago

You’re not gonna believe this

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u/Stewart_Games 2h ago

A yes, the ancient and intriguing latin american mythology...

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u/Gettles 37m ago

Superfiends came out in the 70s. There was no such thing as "two minutes of research" research meant you had to travel somewhere and actually search for information.

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u/Mister_Dink 10m ago

All it meant was going to a local library, or speaking with the local university professor. Further, DC Comics was headquartered in Manhattan at the time. The could have put out an ad in the paper and have instant access to the most diverse writers pool in the English speaking-speaking world.

Hell, even opening a copy of the encyclopedia britanica and doing literally 2 minutes of reading in a very literal sense would have gotten them further.

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u/vonBoomslang 9h ago

now I wanna see something have a character who's explicitly an elf/atlantean/ixian/etc diversity hire

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u/SledgeThundercock 12h ago

Hell yea, that's better

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u/hambonedock 12h ago

Their use here was so good , it give them both very nice redesign but also a reason of adding them ass this young new youth group

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u/SledgeThundercock 12h ago

I love that Wonder Twins take, I never thought they could look cool. Glad they dropped the fuckass monkey.

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u/Wild_Marker 11h ago

The "turns into water" guy trying to take on Aquaman and him being "uh... King of the Sea, remember?" will never stop being funny.

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u/SledgeThundercock 11h ago

That was the most uneven fight in that show since Batman beat Kalibak by summoning Superman who then one punched him through like ten cars

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u/carso150 8h ago

you know he wanted to say "oh shit"

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u/MrWaluigi 12h ago

How could you say that about Gleek? He was very important to the team. He was in the League longer than Batman. 

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u/SledgeThundercock 12h ago

Bro, fuck Gleek.

Hated him as a kid and now that I was reminded of his existence, I still hate his ass

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u/ThatOneHebdoCartoon 10h ago

I forgot about the wonder dip shits. I'm also mad.

New ones do look much cooler

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u/PeteRawk 12h ago

Both of these iterations were so fire to me. Loved Static making it into YJ, and I still remember Longshadow all these years later. The Ultimen were an EXCELLENT story

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u/SigmaBunny 11h ago

My favourite thing is that Longshadow's fakebackstory is now Giganta's comic backstory

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u/bobbi21 9h ago

The twins are the wonder twins reference i think but otherwise yeah

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u/MisterNefarious 9h ago

This is one of my favorite episodes

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u/Crafty-Heron-5115 4h ago

They had better names, too. I still use Longshadow and Wind Dragon to identify the originals. (Except Juice, that was a tad too tone-deaf.)