#peterlopez

A request for  @peterlopez !

It’s his character Zander from the story he’s been writing!

Request for @peterlopez of their in-game inkling! :3

are they in separate rooms at least??

by Peter Lopez

Films from the Walt Disney Company are typically seen as the epitome of happiness and innocence. The control that has been asserted by the company on the culture of the United States, and furthermore the world, is unparalleled by any other animation studio. Through their movies, television programs, merchandise, theme parks, books, and most likely anything else you can think of, they’ve turned generation after generation of children into vigilant consumers from as early as they could talk. One of their biggest franchises include the Disney Princess line, with famous names such as Snow White, Cinderella, and Belle. These princess movies are known to teach values to young girls, but the movies might also be teaching them negative ideologies of what it means to love and what it means to be beautiful. Beauty and the Beast was released in 1991 and is being remade into live action for 2017. The main character, Belle, displays many positive attributes and is widely credited for that. However, it must be considered the negative lessons that this film teaches young girls and boys, and why this story resonates so much that it is still being recreated today.

One of the primary problems with Beauty and the Beast is the stripped down plot of the movie. Belle is locked up, taken prisoner by the Beast, and over time the servants in the castle persuade her to fall in love with him. He gets nicer as time goes on, and Belle has inner “beauty” and accepts him for who he is and that breaks the curse. She gets her prince, of course. All throughout the film Belle is recognized by the townspeople as an intellectual who can’t put her books down, but in the end the only asset she could contribute was her physical appearance. Regardless of what her goals might have been, I’m assuming she had a dream to get away from “this poor provincial town”, it likely didn’t involve being a princess. The only reason the Beast fell in love with her was because of her beauty, considering that he ignored everything about her personality until he just had to try to impress her with a library. Somehow, Belle fell in love with her captive and while many have questioned this as probable stockholm syndrome, Disney has given us a tale as old as time of someone who could love without boundaries. Negative implications of this lesson include staying with someone who is abusing you because if you’re good enough, they’ll change.

One must, however, understand the positive step taken by Disney with Belle. Beauty and the Beast is especially interesting because it’s the first Disney princess to show a different interest than in love. Unlike the other princesses, Belle is interesting to deconstruct because she was never looking for love. She repeatedly refuses Gaston, and although she’s talked about as the town’s most beautiful girl, she remained involved with books and supporting her father. The only reason she got in the whole mess was because she sacrificed herself for him. For these reasons, Beauty and the Beast is sometimes seen as progressive by having an intelligent female protagonist who falls in love over time and not overnight, but one must consider all the negative implications in this film regardless of the few steps that Disney might have taken forward. By propelling Belle up a few notches in any sort of female empowerment, it just brings to attention how many of the other Disney princesses only have beauty to offer. These ideologies affect children, and even though they are young they won’t only see these films as pure entertainment. There is learning going on, there are dozens of subliminal messages, and even though these films are marketed towards children they are of course not made by children.

In conclusion, critically thinking about the themes in Beauty and the Beast are interesting because while many negative implications can be found, there are many positive things to say as well. Taking into consideration the time period, it’s going to be telling to see how this film will be remade in 2016. It’s very probable not much will change, but Disney has been taking some steps following all the online criticism their culture has gotten as can be seen in their Star Wars movies. A cultural presence as strong as Disney should be held accountable for the messages they convey to young minds. Consumers can only be hopeful that change will in fact come, since they did after all wait around and love Disney the entire time while they were abused just like Belle.

by Peter Lopez

Fantasy films are known for being built upon very intricate and immersive worlds. Popular fantasy films have laid out different foundations, but somehow find themselves only using a population of Europeans with British accents to inhabit the worlds. Game of Thrones, a television show on HBO based on the A Song of Ice and Fire book series by George R.R. Martin is barely an exception. While the show makes use of plenty of people of color, the Dothraki that buy Daenerys Targaryen, a white main character, nor the slaves that she goes on to liberate, are positive representations. Game of Thrones is credited for being rooted in realism, regardless of the dragons and magic, but still, one has to wonder whether only caricatures and pitied characters can be people of color while only white characters fight for an iron throne. George R.R. Martin has said himself that the story is based on snippets of history all pasted together in a fantasy setting, but if he can have giants roaming around Westoros why not a diverse group of people as well? That surely didn’t exist in medieval Europe.

Game of Thrones is about struggle for power, and is meant to mirror our actual history and world. In the show, however, there is no impending struggle of power between anyone of color. The universal lesson being shown to us can only be done through the eyes and presentation of white bodies. Think of Jon Snow, Daenerys Targaryen, Cersei Lannister, Tyrion Lannister, Sansa Stark, and many more who play this political russian roulette: they are all portrayed as universal because they are white. People of color like the Dothraki and the slaves of Yunkai, Astapor, and Meereen only served to further the army and following of Daenerys Targaryen. Other than that, they seem to have no hidden motives or interesting plots like many others do in this show. Even the Wildlings/Free Folk who are seen as outsiders do not act as uncivilized or brutally unintelligent because we must still see them as people.

George R.R. Martin self-describes himself as being political and his books are about that. He is a feminist, he is anti-war, but one wonders what his stance on race is. Robin Kawakami wrote for The Wall Street Journal that Martin has said in an interview, in response to criticism, “Westeros around 300 AC is nowhere near as diverse as 21st century America, of course… but with that being said, I do have some ‘characters of color’ who will have somewhat larger roles in WINDS OF WINTER. Admittedly, these are secondary and tertiary characters, though not without importance.” While it’s important for him to respond to the criticism, one has to wonder what kind of response this really was. The series is basically a worldwide story and Martin has not found it necessary to make any characters of color who hold primary roles. In doing this, knowingly or not, Martin is perpetuating that white bodies are universal and applicable to everyone, while “ethnic” ones can only exist in certain roles. Viewers may not see the power behind these visuals, In a series about realism and history and power struggle, it’s odd that Martin just left this one out.

In the header image, we can see Daenerys Targaryen liberating thousands upon thousands of brown slaves from a city called Yunkai. These slaves were able to fight back their masters and gain their freedom, but only because Daenerys Targaryen was there to make it all happen. The scene where she’s being praised by these slaves, one white woman with blonde hair in a sea of color, is very iconic in the show but also very controversial. 

In conclusion, the representations of race and power in the Game of Thrones world is problematic. While many fantasy stories completely neglect any kind of characters of color, Game of Thrones does make the effort of including other kinds of people on screen. The ways that they are included, however, makes as negative of a statement. In order to break the cycle that media has given the public with whiteness and colored-ness, people of color need to occupy more spaces than just the savage or just the slave. Game of Thrones still has time to potentially break away from this hegemonic way of film and television, or continue to fall victim to it.