So what's wrong if Idris Elba is the new Bond? - Race, Role and Actor

If you are a regular person who loves movies and is on the internet for a normal amount of time, you would probably have already come across the Idris Elba - James Bond controversy. Most of the discussion online has regressed to racists keyboard wars and troll baits. I came across a post in one of the popular Malayalam Facebook groups, where the post-author expresses his disagreement with Idris Elba as an option for Bond.

Here, he accuses this "decision" of being an example of white guilt. It is quite obvious that the person is not going on a racist tirade, but expressing his dissatisfaction in the deviation from the work of fiction. I think it's worth our time to examine the nuances of racial representation of characters and the artists who portray them.

1) I agree with him on his point that pandering to a particular community for the sake of image/political correctness is a problem and it does not help the community in question.

When Blizzard Entertainment decided to make a character in their game Overwatch called Soldier-76 gay, it felt so random that even the LGBTQ community spoke against it.

It is a step towards progress when a marginalized community finds representation in mainstream media, but it is a slippery slope leading to pandering if it is not done with the best interests in mind. I don't think this is the case with Idris Elba. Why? That's the next point -

2) If a character is explicitly of a particular race, it is generally accepted to stick to the canon in further adaptations. From what I understand, even the creator of the character James Bond has at some point of time expressed the race-fluidity of the character. So if Bond is portrayed by a black man, it doesn't really make any fundamental difference. The best example of this is Nick Fury. He is portrayed as both black and white in the comics. It doesn't make any difference in the "bad-ass-ness" of the character. Hamilton portrays all the founding fathers of the US using black actors. If Idris Elba is ever to be cast as James Bond, it would never be as someone's pet project to uplift the African community. Even JKR has never explicitly said that Hermione is a white girl. A common rebuttal to this is the acceptance of portrayal of non-white characters by white actors. So what are the scenarios where a character is portrayed by an actor of a different race is bad? That's the next point -

3) Blackface and White Washing: So if a black Bond is OK, then what's wrong with a white man portraying a character of colour? That is the logical question that follows. When it comes to portraying a character of colour, there is more than just logic that applies. One has to consider the socio-political history of the said community. It is the same as saying "All lives matter" as a counter to "Black Lives Matter". Of course all lives matter, but the movement of Black Lives Matter exists because of a flawed and biased system that discriminates against coloured communities. Historically, actors of the coloured communities have had fewer opportunities in Hollywood when compared to white actors. So when a coloured role is taken by a white actor, it is one less opportunity for a coloured actor. This White Washing is still prevalent in Hollywood - as recent as films like Aloha, Last Airbender and Exodus: Gods and Kings.

People are still getting into trouble for Blackface controversies. Recently, the governor of Virginia got into trouble when pictures surfaced of him in blackface during his college days. As a stereotypical representation of a race harking back to the days of slavery and minstrels shows, blackface is not a logical corollary to race fluidity in characters.

As long as an actor can do justice to the character and add value to the art form, I think it is better to overlook the race of the actor. It is hard to imagine the Human Torch as a black person at first due to the existing body of work, but we have to consider the fact that most of the comic characters where created in the "pre-woke" era as white and whatever black characters where created, were for the purpose of having black superheroes. We don't live in that time anymore. Progress goes forward. As long as Johnny Storm turns in to the flaming Human Torch when he yells "Flame On!" and kicks ass, the race of the actor playing him shouldn't matter.