Okay.. so no thats a lie. but you'll understand why i said that. ;p
Sorry to get anyone's hopes up... hehe
So I remember hearing rumors about a year ago that they were in the process of making a live action DRAGON BALL Z movie!!!
Well as soon as I heard that memories started rushing back to me. My childhood obsession with this show/series some would say was unhealthy. I would constantly rewatch episodes i recorded on VHS and then go online to ultimatedbz.com to read up on trivia, news, etc. There was not a tidbit of information about the series i did not know.
What could have caused this ridiculous obsession?? Crazy battles? Lovable characters? the secret desire to be a super saiyan??? (or saiya-jin if youre nasty.)
I think that it might have been a combination of all of the above.
But also the fact that for the first time in my life, I finally had a cartoon hero, that looked like me! I remember as a child this one time when i was playing in 4th grade when we were all picking which x-men we were going to be playing as. I of course wanted to be the big bad wolverine. However, when i picked him right away one of my friends who wanted to be wolverine also said to that he should be wolverine because he looked more like him.
I pointed out that, i looked like wolverine just as much as he did. He then pointed out that wolverine wasn't asian. I lost that argument because the rest of the group agreed with my friend, and they all wanted to start playing. I got stuck with Nightcrawler. didn't think too much about it.
Not that Nightcrawler isn't super bad ass! I love Nightcrawler, and as I grew older, he is definitely one of my favorites. However at the time, he is nowhere as bad ass as the rough n' tough wolverine.
Well, as x-men's popularity waned and anime was on the horizon, the tables started to change. I remember how my friends and I started a mini "guild" about dragon ball z. And for halloween I had the pick of the bunch of who i wanted to be. And of course, I chose to be Goku, the protagonist. My sisters helped me make the costume and everything. I looked cool.
Well after all those memories came rushing back, i googled the dragon ball z movie and started to check out what it was about.
And then I saw it. The Man that was able to stop Vegeta's conquering of the earth. The man who put down the Freeza. The man who kicked the shit out of Majin Buu. The man that was my Hero from 4th-8th grade. (yes 8th grade)
Goku, was being played by a white actor..
Oh you better believed that pissed me off. The coolest thing asian kids had going for us in the mainstream media. Our hero, was now being played by a white guy. Whyyyyy!!!!!!
Does anyone else find this discouraging? Of course this goes along with the whole "asian guys can't be protagonists" but still... Come on!!! Its like, give a brotha a shot!!! Not only is the guy obviously asian in the series, but dude, he is the master at martial arts!!!!! WTF!!! It should have been a give me!!!!! Like, dude, i know this is terrible to say but when it comes to playing master martial artists, i'm pretty sure us asian guys got that down.
Now there is the argument that Goku is not necessarily "asian". He's a Saiyan. Who knows if he looks asian or not! Well, read this next 5 sentences and then ask that again.
Which brings me to the title of this whole thing. What if they announced that the next superman was to be played by say, John Cho. Or Rick Yune. Oh you better believe there would be people up in arms saying ohhh, you can't do that! he's white!!!
WRONG MOTHER FUCKER!
i'm sure all of you comic book experts know that Clark Kent, isn't actually "white". He's actually a Kryptonian. THATS RIGHT!!!!! HE IS AN ALIEN ALSO FROM THE PLANET KRYPTON!!!! So boo yah.
don't even try to make that argument.
This is just another example of unequal media representation at its best. This whole thing made me think of the whole "Charlie Chan" TV show from the 30s and 40s. (White guy portrays an immigrant chinese detective)
Also makes me think, wow so one of the one things asians can play in movies (martial artist) we can't even play anymore?! Come on folks. I think we need a new plan of action. Lets make our own movie on our favorite anime. Anyone wanna make a live action pokemon movie with me???? And the best part is, we can have him get with Misty in the end breaking the whole Taboo of an asian protagonist guy with a non asian girl!!!!! Lets do it!
Now i'm not saying that I need my heros to look like me or anything.. But i'm just saying, it would be nice to have that connection every once in a while ya know?
