A place where i will post any interesting questions, ideas, etc. I will probably be under the influence of organic compounds most of the time so bear with me when i struggle to convey my internal ramblings.
Discussion is encouraged but its just discussion. Dont ruin it for other people by getting butt hurt.
Lets start off with my most recent pondering
We are starting too see gender-swapped reboots of movies, tv shows, etc more often. At what point does it happen to be a cultural norm? not really expected of a show to have a gender swapped version but not really being played off as a cash grab either. At what point does it become cultural expectation? Where a show not having a gender swapped version could be seen as trying to cheapen out on production costs.
At this point the cultural norm has become statements in the form of a full reversal; i.e., only a female version or only an “all black cast.”
Studios won’t waste money rebooting something unless it’s been long enough that they think people will pay to see it. Making two versions at the outset is pointless because the bottom line is based on appearing socially “progressive.”
I’m heavy on the quotes because it’s all for the $$$
In my area I have seen “all female crew” shoots, which, of course, is the polar opposite of inclusive. I don’t mind so much since I’m not really losing work on it but when people jerk themselves off over it, i have to say it bothers me a little.
I’m not really down for organic compounds, personally, but I’ll pass and raise a glass.
Cheers.
It’s never been a statement when ive been on all male shoots. It’s just who got hired. I don’t care who does what, as long as they do it correctly. Anyway what I said bothered me was the circle jerk, not the hiring itself.
Yet “all female crew” shoots are “the polar opposite of inclusive”. It’s just that when it was all men nobody made a point of that? So now, on some projects, only women get hired. Why do you care, as long as they do it correctly?
Guess what, there’s been an all male circle jerk for centuries.
The “patriarchy” mentality assumes all men are misogynists, rather than driven or obligated. We mustn’t assume the thoughts of others. Anyway, thoughts on the OP?
Battlestar did it right cause it had such strong characters and a strong story but they did get allot of grief at first. In that instance it worked cause Sackoff is a really good actress, and the Starbuck had allot of emotional baggage which the first Starbuck didn’t have.
Janeway was bad, the cringe stopped when Q and Seven of Nine in a Borg leotard saved the show.
The new Star Trek movies are basically a sci-fi reboot of the 90’s TV show 90210.
I think it will be a cultural norm when Star Trek reboots with Captain Sadiq Khan. If Marvel Comics doesn’t kill sci-fi completly @anon43920604
Emma Watson as Duchess Paulina Maud’dib with Rose O’Donnell as Baroness Valina Harkonnen
Reboots (in film at least) are in my opinion usually lazy, transparent cash-grab attempts by the industry to make money off of the generation that grew up with those franchises as kids. It looks like production companies are no longer willing to take the kind of risks that made the films of the 70s, 80s, 90s and early 00s so fantastic and varied. These days we just get forcefed the same Star Wars/Marvel/DC/Disney Princess continuity garbage, with the occasional gender-swapped Ghostbusters trainwreck. There’s very little innovation right now. I can enjoy a new Marvel/Disney release while watching it, but afterwards on the way home I think more about the film, and the more I think about it the more I dislike it. This has been true of almost every single movie I’ve been to theaters to see recently.
By far the best film I’ve seen that was released in the past few years was Silence. That is a great film, one that took a huge risk and lost, but an amazing film nonetheless. Anyone interested in Japan’s long history with Christianity should watch it. But for obvious reasons (religion) it was downplayed by the industry, rated R for no good reason whatsoever (it has one decapitation and not so much as a hint of sexual content), and was in theaters for all of two weeks. But that is, of course, my opinion.
As far as answering the question: I doubt gender-swapping will become the cultural norm in the near future, but at the very least it will become a facet of the laziness and lack of innovation of the film industry.
The biggest issue with this viewpoint that I have is that gender-swapping is irrelevant, since that’s just about the only option the studio has to make it different from the original. It’s just an attempt to cash in on IP that made money the first go-round and it’s low-hanging fruit without having to change much else for viability.
I can think of a half dozen Greg Bear novels that would make excellent films but they are too deep into hard scifi territory to make it in today’s commercial environment.
Dunno about gender swapping, but the Van Helsing series started off pretty good.
I would like to see more race swapping too- a version/ reboot of the drastic Reacher films with Idris Elba would be a lot more compelling (or Liam Neeson if not)
I’m totally on board with the suggestion Wendell had a really long time ago of remaking Lord of the Rings with every character played by Danny Devito.
At what point are all the original ideas exhausted? Our curious minds desensitized and eager for new unknown stimulus. What will we do when everything possible will have been said, performed and recorded?
