Star Wars' "Black Stormtrooper" to Critics: "Get Used to it"

[Jesterscup]

Seriously? 3 pages of this and not a single person remembered 'That' scene from chasing amy.....

 

[bdcjacko]

Spaceball's already had black storm troopers, that was part of the extended universe right?

 

[hermes]

This seems relevant...

 

[Scow2]

... there would be a point by the critics if this new Stormtrooper wasn't human. The Empire is Human Supremacist. If he had been a Rodian, Gungan, Twi'Lek, the idiots would have a point.

 

[templar1138a]

And my faith in humanity drops another point.

Morons, the Empire was Nazi against NON-HUMANS (and females). They didn't care what color skin the humans had. Those "critics" are just using this as an excuse to be racist and pretend to not be. It's pathetic.

 

[K12]

I hope the people using the master race argument realise that their argument is basically saying "Stormtroopers are meant to be a master race so obviously this excludes inferior non-white people". For fuck sake it's 2014!

There are lots of different ways to a be a supremacist and Lando Calrissian didn't seem to suffer any kind of racial prejudice in the original trilogy.

Why assume that the Empire cares about race when they have a whole galaxy of alien species to think they are better than. In a sci-fi world it's make perfect sense for black and white to gang up against green, it could even be an interesting satirical point (if it isn't done too clumsily) about how arbitrary the "one-of-us/one-of-them" distinction can be.

 

[Hagi]

How does it undermine the analogy?

It's only an analogy if it's like but different.

For example: The Star Wars Empire is to aliens like the Nazi Empire was to non-arian humans.

If the Star Wars empire was to non-arian humans like the Nazi Empire was to non-arian humans it wouldn't be an analogy. They'd literally be Space Nazis, not an analogy but rather a copy.

 

[William Ossiss]

Wait.. Were people angry about this? The only thing I thought about it was "Wow, what is he waking up from and what's wrong with him?"
This is the day and age where stuff like this shouldn't matter.... and yet here we go again.

I, for one, am excited about the entire thing. As a person who liked the prequels more than the original trilogy (just for the saber fighting), I can think of a billion different ways that a cross guard would be useful.

 

[nekoali]

Storm Troopers are not Clone Troopers. That is canon. Look at one of the episodes of Rebels, where Ezra infiltrates the Storm Trooper Academy on Lothal. Oh hey look, a diverse ethnic mixture of humans being trained to be Storm Troopers. Rebels is part of the new canon. Also during one of the Rebels Recon episodes, David Filoni was asked about the Clone Troopers and he flat out stated that there are very few of them left in active service. Since they were force grown to fight, they age faster as well. By the New Hope era, most of the clones are to old for active service, so they recruit from Imperial worlds. Which in part explains why they are so poorly trained. They just grab some recruits, give them just a few weeks of training and send them out. They operate as quantity, not quality.

Given the wide ethnic mixture of humans out in the galaxy, it is no surprise to see a black man. For all we know, 90% of the Storm Troopers that appeared in episodes 4-6 could have been people of color. They were completely covered by armor all the time they were on screen. All this complaint about John Boyega playing a Storm Trooper is just people projecting their own racial issues. There is absolutely no reason to think that all Storm Troopers are white, and actual on screen, canon evidence to show that they are a mixture of human ethnicity.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

The only thing that bothers me is that he has his helmet off and that is the first thing that we see. The first thing we see for a new Star Wars film should not be a Stormtrooper without his helmet. If it had started with him having the helmet on and then yanking it off in panic, I would be perfectly okay with that.

 

[Something Amyss]

I don't get it. The "Hitler" analogy has always carried through their human exclusivity.

was first surprised since originally they are all clones from a white gut but since he is all alone and freaked out, i also guess he must have been undercover and somehow ended up in the dessert.

The stormtroopers originated as a clone army, but there's nothing to say they have kept to that in the intermediate time. Hell, this is like 20 years after the end of Episode VI, right? They could be desperate.

Or he could be undercover. I'm just saying.

Disney doesn't really make great movies, and with Abrams; I have no hope.
On a positive note, it will be really good for a new generation of Star Wars fans.

Would you say....a lost hope?

But if someone asks him "Aren't you a little black to be a storm trooper?" I think I'll laugh out loud.

I think I would laugh my ass literally off.

I tried to find a reason that his race would bother some people but I ain't found shit!

Hard times for Starfleet?

 

[Something Amyss]

Spaceball's already had black storm troopers, that was part of the extended universe right?

They were Vulcans in disguise.

This seems relevant...

He's black?

Wait.. Were people angry about this?

A black person was featured prominently in a scif-fi/fantasy franchise. Of course people were angry.

As for the rest, I crack up every time I see him pop up in the trailer, but it has nothing to do with his skin. It just looks like something from a bad parody.

 

[shrekfan246]

In Star Wars Battlefront, it was already explained that the Empire continued to use clones(who aren't white) despite the rebellion at their cloning facility. To make sure that wouldn't cripple their steady supply of meat shields, they started recruiting more humans from everywhere in the Empire.

Since this takes place between episodes 3 and 4, it's technically still canon. Problem solved.

Actually it's not between 3 and 4. It's actually 30 years after the end of Return of the Jedi. So...is the Empire still around? I thought that they had fallen by this point. Or is the war really dragging?

I believe he meant Battlefront was between III and IV.

OT: Seems kinda pointless for people to get upset or confused about it to me, since it's probably just a disguise. I'll give them kudos if it ends up not being one and we actually do focus on a stormtrooper for once, but that's going to have to wait until I actually see the film (or we get more information).

 

[V4Viewtiful]

You can't use Fett as a reason, aspects of the prequels suck when narratively anyway.
and the Nazism still holds up becausbecause they are just disposable slaves... So if anything it might reinforce the Nazi analogue😝

 

[theApoc]

"Furthermore, as much as it pains me to recall scenes from the Prequels, since Stormtroopers are originally clones of Jango Fett, who is a Maori, the "white people master race" analogy from the Original Trilogy has already been undermined."

I don't think anyone gives a crap about having a black storm trooper except in regards to the above mentioned analogy. So you headline is disingenuous and nothing more than race baiting for clicks.

The analogy is not a about a "white people master race" but rather about the power elite of the galaxy. At the time(the 1970s), a good way to illustrate that would have been to make everyone who was imperial look a certain way(which they did). In the pre-quels, at the time of the clone war, it is very much in line with that type of thinking as the clones were completely disposable, so them being of a "lesser" race makes perfect sense. If in this movie, the empire has continued to try an exert it dominance, with the same mentality of the initial movies, their critique COULD make some kind of sense in terms of story, but seeing as there are no details, anyone implying race has anything to do with his character is just silly.

 

[babinro]

Who has actually criticised the trailer for having a black stormtrooper? Citation desperately needed.

^

This thread appears to be bringing up something that's not actually an 'issue'. Trying to create drama from a loud internet minority that you might see pop up in a youtube comments section or equivalent troll oriented community.

That said.

I'm criticizing this trailer for it's depiction of 2 males and 1 female. This is STAR WARS. That ratio is completely wrong. I demand at least 300 males before 1 female is allowed to grace the screen. I can't even assume that the storm troopers are male given that first scene.

The sith is male because they have a male gait.
Though I suppose it could be transgendered.
In which case that's a whole lotta Star Wars NOPE right there!

Feel free to write featured thread based on this comment and how it somehow reflects the genuine thoughts of 'some' people.

 

[P-89 Scorpion]

The EU defined things where The Empire went out conquering and subverting planets and then conscripting large portions of the inhabitants into the military and then sending them out to attack other planets (getting the dangerous guys away from home, and keeping them under control as they mix up the conscripts)..

Never read any of the SW:EU myself but this strategy is what the British Empire used to do and it worked well.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

... there would be a point by the critics if this new Stormtrooper wasn't human. The Empire is Human Supremacist. If he had been a Rodian, Gungan, Twi'Lek, the idiots would have a point.

This was my reaction to. The analogy is that race in "the real world" was equated to species in the Star Wars universe. Besides, hasn't George Lucas said that he based the Empire on the third Reich but that they aren't meant to be an exact analogy, but rather a big part of the inspiration?

 

[cleric of the order]

Man I hoped when you said black storm trooper it was more of this stock

Given that we regularly saw Stormtroopers of different heights and with different voices in the original trilogy it seems pretty obvious they were either not all clones or no longer all clones of the same guy.

Yeah the 501st said something to that effect but cloning is (not sure with the starwars trilogy specifically) more akin to creating your own sibling which might be why different clones excelled while others didn't.

All in All I think it has to be a dream come true for the actor, man he fucking gets to be in starwars.
I'm more worried they might fuck up his character, turn him into a walking stereotype or something otherwise I'll just hope the series isn't shit and wish the man the best of luck

 

[cleric of the order]

I thought that they established that the Emperor stopped bringing in the Jango Fett clones as fresh troops after Order 66 because he didn't want an Order 66 to happen to him. I thought the Original Trilogy storm troopers were the clones of a bunch of different people and volunteer soldiers. A mix so that a huge part of the army wouldn't be too loyal to one person besides the Emperor.

And how do we know that all the storm troopers are supposed to be white when, you know, they never took off their helmets. Once. In the entire original trilogy.

Or is this a "Lando is the only black person in the galaxy" thing?

They sacked kamino, straight from wookiepeida
"Although the stormtroopers of the 501st Legion proved their loyalty to the Galactic Empire once again, the circumstances surrounding the battle convinced Emperor Palpatine that a clone army, composed entirely of clones based on one genetic source, was too susceptible to corruption. From that point on, it was decided that new clone stormtroopers would be created from various templates;[9] the Empire even resorted to enlisting regular Humans into the Stormtrooper Corps.[7] Though the 501st Legion remained composed purely of Jango Fett's progeny for the time being, the rest of the Imperial Army became increasingly diverse through an ever-growing pool of enlisted troopers and alternative source clones.[9]

Thus, the "Clone Revolt" on Kamino was indirectly responsible for turning the clones of Jango Fett into a minority within the army that they once filled as a whole, an irony that the Fett clones neither appreciated nor ever grew accustomed to. Roughly a decade after the incident on Kamino, Commander Cody was bitterly resentful of the Imperial Army's pitiful decline in operational effectiveness. In addition to that, Cody absolutely hated enlisted stormtroopers, dismissing them as incompetent idiots that were utterly expendable.[7]"
Damn.... that last paragraph seems kinda racist in light of the subject, why cody, why?