Many people seem to be very upset that they couldn't have chosen Japanese/Asian actors in this movie - rightfully so. How many of you all think this could effect the BOX Office #?
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Reply by Salt-and-Limes
on March 3, 2017 at 5:28 PM
Most of the original fans, and the majority within the Asian American community, do not accept this decision.
Reply by Letthewookiewin
on March 13, 2017 at 11:12 PM
Is the major actually Japanese? I think it actually would have a positive effect on the domestic box office because ScarJo is such a big name. Internationally I don't expect it to have an impact because it effectively cancels out (big name vs "whitewashing")
Reply by ocelot11snake
on March 19, 2017 at 8:22 AM
Personally I find most anime race neutral so it doesn't upset me. Not to mention I've only seen her character referred to as "Major"
Reply by poweranimals
on March 28, 2017 at 7:01 PM
Well, Scarjo is the only reason I'm interested in it, so...
Reply by tmdb65271336
on March 28, 2017 at 7:42 PM
I think the public's apathy towards a weird-looking sci-fi movie will be far more impactful than the casting choices they made. I find that news outlets put far, far, far too much emphasis on social media controversies without placing the amount of furor in context. I've seen too many stories with about ten Twitter quotes that seem to be cherry-picked to stir up controversy while in the real world few if any people actually care.
I don't think GiTS will do well--I expect $20-$25M, tops--but apart from those of us that have seen and care about the Anime, it's a non-issue for 95% of the moviegoing public. It's still not going to make a dent against Beauty's third week at #1.
Reply by Phi_Phenomenon
on March 28, 2017 at 9:09 PM
Here's a good argument that she is not:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Mukokuseki
Reply by OddRob
on March 30, 2017 at 3:29 AM
This will have zero impact on the box office. Its just some SJW looking for anything to try to clasp onto to show how 'white privilege' rules the world blah blah blah. If this movie is going to fail its going to fail at the script/story level, not the casting. This is an American version of Ghost, they bought the writes to the story so they can tell it how and with whomever they want as the lead. The only issue I personally have with it so far is that it seems like a watered down version of the original, obviously made by a big studio to try and get as many people in the movie seats as possible for a max profit. The soul of the story is unfortunately lost in translation. But Id rather get this than nothing at all. On a side note, I believe this production has more minority roles represented than any other film out in the past year. But the lead is white so fuck them right.
Reply by Movie Queen41
on April 1, 2017 at 8:02 PM
Weird how the Major and Kuze were both originally Asian as humans and then became white as AIs.
Reply by countzero99
on April 30, 2017 at 6:18 PM
While the main reason for the casting was that they had a big star in the lead instead of an unknown asian actress, it makes sense in the story as well.
One reason could be that they wanted to make their new bodies as different from the old ones as possible.
Another might be that Hanka Robotics seems to be run mostly by white people. For their newest and most important "product" it makes sense that they created them in their own image.
Reply by OddRob
on May 2, 2017 at 3:33 AM
This.
Reply by Opus Chao
on May 4, 2017 at 1:42 PM
(Spoiler warning) Well, lets examine this "controversy". In this movie she is Asian, they just didn't put her in an Asian body. In the original they do make a blonde, which we can assume from that is not Asian, so even in the original they used non Asian bodies in Japan. There is no actual way to determine which ethnicity Major is in the movie, it's just assumed she looks Asian because of black hair and the story being set in Japan. Now considering that this movie is vastly different from the original, so much so that it misses the whole point of the original movie, it wouldn't be the same character people grew up with anyway. The original actually had a lot to do with race issues being raised here, pointing out that ultimately diversity is part of how life survives and that through these differences merging we grow stronger and are resilient. The very point in the original is that not only does she chose to stop being Asian, she stops being completely human, she abandons the entire human race in order to evolve into something new and arguably better. This new movie takes the cowards way and try to avoid any racial or political implications, which changes the whole story, yet they managed to create a "controversy"? The original was far more controversial than this, and in a good way.
Reply by simian_ninja
on July 21, 2017 at 12:46 PM
From what I remember the majority of people who were upset about the controversy were largely Asian American and seeing as how vastly under represented they are in American media, I can't really blame them either. Also, from what else I remember, not many people in Japan cared about it whatsoever - probably because they are well represented within their own media.
I finally got around to watching this and during the entire thing all I could think was "Blade Runner 2" is going to demolish this. I haven't watched the original anime and I don't really have any plans to either, but the entire film felt very familiar and literally all I could think was "Blade Runner" and how much I'm looking forward to the sequel.
Also, I live in Hong Kong. I thought they only shot a couple of scenes here but it looks like the entire film is set here...or...whatever fictional "state" the film is supposed to take place in.
Reply by Phi_Phenomenon
on July 21, 2017 at 11:47 PM
Brutal man, the original and its (2004?) Sequel are timeless masterpieces. Just go watch some YouTube analyses on it, even Nerdwriter1's. See if anything gets your interest is piqued at all. Those two films are essential viewing.
This adaptation completely sh** on the main, groundbreaking theme of the animé. I'm trying to figure out whether it was through stupidity or greed. My jaw actually dropped when I watched the ending of this, especially since there was so much other stuff ripped shot-for-shot from the original.
Reply by OddRob
on July 22, 2017 at 6:02 AM
Actually it was mostly SJWs with nothing better to do but bitch about a non issue like this. As for Blade Runner, I think Masamune Shirow the creator of Ghost said he was inspired by the original Blade Runner so of course we would see that in the stories he told. The sad part is that Ghost 2017 had sooooo much material to pull from and they wasted that. Instead we get a generic bad corporation plot with little to no character development, I enjoyed what they did visually but the story...oh man it was bad.
Im looking forward to Blade Runner 2049. I want to see if America has gotten aboard the cyber punk train, or if its going to get left behind like the original movie. Time will tell.
Reply by Renovatio
on January 27, 2018 at 9:07 AM
@simian_ninja
I got a far more Hong Kong vibe than Japan as well... This is despite having a Japanse speaking character in the movie!
But yeah... Still very Cyberpunk...