Captain Marvel star Brie Larson originally made headlines when she was announced as Marvel’s first female superhero to feature in her own solo film. Captain Marvel grossed over $1-billion in earnings, making it the seventh Marvel feature to reach over a billion dollars at the box office.
With the spotlight fixed on Larson, the 29-year-old actress took the opportunity to draw attention to the apparent oppression of women in the film industry, suggesting females aren’t granted the same opportunities as men.
According to Larson, not only were the overwhelming majority of critics reviewing movies male, but they were also mostly white. “About a year ago, I started paying attention to what my press days looked like and the critics reviewing movies, and noticed it appeared to be overwhelmingly white males.”
“I spoke to Dr Stacy Smith at the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, who put together a study to confirm that,” Larson added.
According to the study, 63.9% of reviews were written by white males, 18.1% white women, 13.8% underrepresented men and 4.1% underrepresented women.
“Am I saying I hate white dudes? No, I’m not,” Larson said. “But if you make the movies that is a love letter to women of color, there is an insanely low chance a woman of color will have a chance to see your movie and review your movie.”
Larson continued: “I’m happy to be on the forefront of the normalisation of this type of content and to prove once again that representation matters. Diverse storytelling matters, the female experience matters, and these are markers. It’s something I’ve always known and I think a lot of people always knew.”
Well, it would now appear that some folks are taking her words more seriously than she intended. Following the huge success of Marvel’s latest instalment, Avengers: End Game, where Larson makes another appearance as Captain Marvel, a petition was created demanding Larson be replaced with a “gay woman of color.”
“We need Brie Larson to step down from her role to prove she is an ally of social justice and ensure a gay woman of color plays the role. Let Monica, the original female and BLACK Captain Marvel instead of white-washing characters for the benefit of straight, white men running Disney.”
Something tells me this isn’t exactly the reaction Larson was looking for, but as many often discover, the real threat to Social Justice Warriors (SJWs) isn’t white men – it’s other SJWs. So, I guess we should grab the popcorn, sit back, and watch the latest SJWs battle it out.
