Prometheus‘ David comes face to face with Walter, an almost identical fellow android, and as the two attempt to learn from each other, the scene takes a surprising turn - one probably not meant to be homoerotic, but who knows? As David tries to teach Walter to play the flute, he says, “I’ll do the fingering.” It was weird. Ridley Scott’s decision to focus the continuation of the Alien franchise on his artificial intelligence designs has proved contentious at best, but at worst it resulted in an Alien: Covenant scene that was so bad it elicited immature laughter from audiences. It flies way beyond jokey reference and into some really gross shilling. She’s running around demanding these pitiful humans tell her where the Krispy Kreme is, and then there’s even an extended shot of her nonchalantly eating a doughnut mid-battle. Krispy Kreme’s role in Power Rangers isn’t a one-off joke or the occasional shot of a store in the background of a scene, it’s vital to the culmination of Rita’s evil plan. We can’t remember the last time product placement was this unironically brazen in a movie. Rita Repulsa eats a doughnut in Power Rangers It might have sounded like an interesting intellectual exercise on paper, but in practice it was an appalling instance of whitewashing that left fans, particularly Asian fans, upset. Its next solution was to address the disconnect within the film, by revealing that the Major – a character wrestling with her identity, specifically wondering if she is more machine than human – was actually a Japanese woman whose mind had been transplanted into a white woman’s body.
Io9 best anime of 2017 movie#
So the movie renamed her character the Major, which of course fixed nothing.
Io9 best anime of 2017 series#
The live-action Ghost in the Shell movie was in trouble from the very beginning after casting noted non-Japanese person Scarlett Johansson in the lead role of Major Motoko Kusanagi, the Japanese character from the Japanese anime series (and manga) that the US film was based upon. “She was Asian all along!” in Ghost in the Shell Seeing Yondu’s former partners from across the galaxy salute the fallen Ravager was visually gorgeous, and heart-achingly emotional, too. This was emotional enough, but then came his funeral. Yes, Yondu did some very bad things, but he also did some very good things, including sacrificing himself for Peter. It helped that the movie focused so heavily on father figures Peter “Star-Lord” Quill finally met his dad, Ego the Living Planet, before realising that his foster father, Yondu, was a more loving parent, as well as being much, much less of an arsehole. While Yondu wasn’t particularly sympathetic in the first film, the sequel did an incredible job of fleshing out his character. Image: Disney Yondu’s funeral in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.