The word "diversity" is thrown around a lot in criticism of Marvel Studios. What exactly does diversity entail, and what type of diversity do we want to see?
A quick check on Google tells us diversity is "the state of being diverse; variety" and "a range of different things."
Helpful, maybe, but not in regards to complex social science, history of media, and the desires of underrepresented audiences.
Diversity isn't as simple as it sounds. In the context of Marvel Studios and other media, it's best explained as a variety of identities. But identities aren't quantifiable. Hear ye, hear ye: Marvel should not make a checklist of races, sexualities, gender identities, religions, et cetera to construct characters. There's no compendium of communities in need of more heroic protagonists; the picture is bigger and more complex than that.
In other words, making Marvel more diverse should not be a result of flippant decisions. It should be thoughtful, and drawing identities out of a hat without consideration for their implications on background and story is not thoughtful.
NICK FURY: The problem with swapping identities
Don't get me wrong. It's pretty exciting that Nick Fury went from looking like this:
to this:
It's a step in the right direction, at least. Right? It seems like a clean solution, to inject an established character with the Diversity Serum and see what happens.
On one hand, it is. Nick Fury's casting in particular implies that anyone can fill the important leadership position of that character. It doesn't have to be a white man. There's equality in that, and representation. It's fair to say that it's better to have a black Nick Fury than no black representation at all.
On the other hand, it's somewhat problematic. It looks like filling quotas. It looks like taking an established, white character and applying "black face."
A point that Ollie Olukoya, a vlogger, makes in his video "Race Changing & Diversity In Superhero Movies," considers this in regards to the casting of Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm/The Human Torch.
The gist of it is this: they cast a black actor as Johnny Storm, but twisted the original story so that they could keep his sister, Susan Storm, white.
What went into that decision, I wonder? Simultaneously trying to cast for a similar appearance for the original depiction of one character, and deeming the other changeable? That is not authentic representation. That's pandering. As Olukoya put it, "What?
"If this was an attempt at true diversity, they would have made Sue Storm black as well."
These are the attempts that feel cheap and offensive. The people who made that decision were not considering how diverse identities could impact the narrative or the characters, but how to appease people who would complain about an all-white cast.
Again, there are two sides to this. Michael B. Jordan's Johnny Storm is as good as the comic character, or Chris Evan's Johnny Storm. People are, fundamentally, the same. Being black does not affect how this character can be a hero.
However, it doesn't feel quite right. It doesn't feel like this was a thoughtful decision, but a scrambling one. Switching the race of a character might be better than no representation at all, but the situation needs to improve from pandering to genuine explorations and discussions of diverse characters.
“Don’t make iconic heroes black; make black heroes iconic.”
-Ollie Olukoya
CHANGING FROM "DIVERSITY" TO "AUTHENTICITY"
Alex Brown discusses a definition of diversity that I want to focus on.
"Rather than getting hung up on diversity as a numbers game, we should be working toward inclusion and representation both on and off the page," Brown writes. Given that Marvel is, at the end of the day, a corporation, a lot of decision-makers would rather it be a numbers game. But diversity isn't about sales: it's about the creators.
Brown goes on: "True diversity is letting minority creators tell their own stories instead of having non-minorities creating a couple of minority characters to sprinkle in the background. It’s telling a story with characters that reflect the world."
The perfect example of this is Ryan Coogler's Black Panther. That film was wildly successful and loved by fans. A main reason for that is because a film centered around African and African-American culture was directed by Coogler, someone with knowledge of and respect for that premise. This is an instance of "own-voices" representation, when the creator shares the identity of the protagonist.
Finally, my favorite new vocabulary:
"G. Willow Wilson said it best: 'Let’s scrap the word diversity entirely and replace it with authenticity and realism… It’s not “diversity” that draws those elusive untapped audiences, it’s particularity.'"
We don't want colors flashed at us as a distraction from the lack of characters with more depth than tokens or stereotypes. Whether that's a range of skin tones or rainbow lights—although, for the record, Marvel hasn't even thrown us that bone yet.
We want authentic people. An authentic world. And our world, in this day and age, is diverse. That's the new reality. The variation available to creators to explore through the lens of the hero's journey is unimaginably vast.
So, we don't want changes made to canon—canon that was created nearly a century ago now. We want new canon, fitting of a new, explosively curious, fascinating world. And there's already plenty of it to infuse in a new era of Marvel films (see part four). The Marvel Universe is growing, and it's in a fantastic state compared to where it was decades ago. It can only keep growing more inclusive and beautiful when we add the Marvel Cinematic Universe to that equation.
CONCLUSION
So, does it matter that, for example, Riri Williams/Ironheart is not white, and not a man? No. It matters that she is a black teenage girl. Those identities are important to her character and her story. Those identities are important to us because they make her authentic. They make her particular.
Let's not define a character based on the negative, by what they are not, but appreciate who they are. Because in the end, we want complex stories that just so happen to include heroes that reflect the world around us. Heroes that look like us, come from the same background as us, and prove to us that we can be more than history or society has told us we are.
Make a world. Make characters. Marvel Comics's Director of Content and Character Development, Sana Amanat, believes "once we start telling these kinds of stories, we start normalizing...race and gender and religion and all those things. It's not such a big deal that the character is a minority that happens to carry Thor's hammer. It's no big deal."
Yes, people will be excited by the premise of non-typical crime fighters, of changes in the "politics" of identity and representation in media. But what will make them stay is the story. It isn't just about character, but about the life that character lives.
Authenticity, remember?
SEE PART FOUR: WHAT A DIVERSE MARVEL LOOKS LIKE
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