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After the Emmy Nominations were announced earlier this morning, I posted this status on my Facebook page: “If Westworld doesn’t win every Emmy it was nominated for, I quit.” A friend of mine posted “Girl, it’s up against The Handmaid’s Tale in some cases. Nope.” And so, a conflict was born.
I adore both shows, and am so grateful that we’re living through a moment in television during which two high-minded, female-led genre shows about female bodily autonomy can not only exist, but be critically acclaimed and both be up for the Outstanding Drama Series Emmy.
However, I have to admit that Westworld is my personal favorite. When pressed to talk about why, though, I needed to give it some serious thought. After all, there’s a lot that these shows have in common and do well, and there are some things that The Handmaid’s Tale, both as a narrative and as a production, does better.
For sheer female participation behind the camera (and in front of it, given the nature of the show), The Handmaid’s Tale definitely has the edge. Of the five directors working on the series, only one is male, and he directs two of the ten Season 1 episodes. Reed Morano directs the most with three, Kate Dennis and Floria Sigismondi direct two each, and Kari Skogland directs one. They have a majority female writers’ room, too—seven out of ten writers are women, not counting Margaret Atwood herself, who is a consulting producer.
However, the show has a white, male creator and showrunner in Bruce Miller, whereas one of the showrunners and creators on Westworld, Lisa Joy, is a woman of color (she is half Chinese). Whereas with The Handmaid’s Tale, we’re getting a story that was created by a woman told through the prism of a male creator, in Westworld, we get a story that originated with a man (Michael Crichton) through a partly female prism (Joy is the co-creator of Westworld along with Jonathan Nolan).
From the conscious decision to make the figure in the Westworld logo a female one, to making the two main characters through which we get to see the hosts’ struggle and oppression female, Joy has helped deliver a unique and nuanced depiction of femininity to television. The role of creator and showrunner is important, as that voice is the one that guides the writers’ room.
While it makes sense that Miller saw fit to ensure that there were women in his writers’ room to, as he put it in an interview with Elle, balance his deficits, his is still the voice that guides the ship.
Emmy Nominations for Writing:
The Handmaid’s Tale – Bruce Miller for “Offred” (Pilot)
Westworld – Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan for “The Bicameral Mind” (Season Finale)
Still, the vision of The Handmaid’s Tale is in large part in the hands of its female directors, whereas Westworld only had one female director in its entire 20-episode first season: Michelle Maclaren, who directed “The Well-Tempered Clavier.” While the showrunner(s) of a television show are where the buck stops on any and all decisions related to narrative, the decision to see the world through female eyes is an important one, and necessary for a show like The Handmaid’s Tale.
Emmy Nominations for Directing:
The Handmaid’s Tale – Reed Morano for “Offred”; Kate Dennis for “The Bridge”
Westworld – Jonathan Nolan for “The Bicameral Mind”
Now, let’s get in front of the camera and talk story, performances, and visuals.
As I said above, both Westworld and The Handmaid’s Tale are stories about female bodily autonomy. In Westworld, that theme is explored through sci-fi tropes and metaphor, with Dolores and Maeve experiencing oppression as hosts that looks very similar to what women experience out in the world. In The Handmaid’s Tale, the constant refrain is that the show is scarily relevant. While technically a genre story in that it’s set in a dystopia, it’s much more literal and straightforward than Westworld.
One of the things that appeals to me most about Westworld is its artful storytelling. While individual episodes were often mysterious and/or confusing, there is not one moment or image wasted, and it’s all leading somewhere. Seen as a whole, seeing how all the pieces come together, Westworld Season 1 is a work of art that’s very much like looking at a beautiful watch, and the equally beautiful and intricate clockwork inside.
The Handmaid’s Tale is an artful adaptation, but the risks and successes of the storytelling come less from the show itself and more from its place in history. We love The Handmaid’s Tale in large part because of conditions outside the show; because it accurately captures the world in which we live, not necessarily because it is, on its own, particularly creative or innovative.
Both Westworld and The Handmaid’s Tale are based on other source material, but whereas The Handmaid’s Tale is very firmly an adaptation of the novel, Westworld merely uses the film on which it’s based as a jumping-off point, creating an entirely new world and cast of characters instead.
And here we get to the amazing nuanced female characters both shows gave us to enjoy.
Elizabeth Moss’ Offred in The Handmaid’s Tale is breathtaking and raw. Moss has always been an amazing actress who always chooses wonderful projects to get involved in, and Offred is definitely a case of the perfect actress aligning with the perfect role. Her Offred is both fierce and vulnerable, jaded and hopeful, beaten-down and determined to survive. Watching her ups and downs as she experiences Gilead is an amazing experience.
However, the slow-burn awakening of Evan Rachel Wood’s Dolores on Westworld is a revelation, precisely because she spends so long naive and “asleep.” Whereas Offred starts and continues to be a fighter. The role, and Moss’ performance are a destination we want to visit. Wood’s Dolores is a journey we want to embark on. We get to watch Wood’s finely-calibrated performance as Dolores realizes there’s something off, follows it, goes crazy for a while, and ultimately makes her way to full-on host revolution.
Where Westworld has an edge character-wise is in the role of Maeve, played by the incomparable Thandie Newton. The Handmaid’s Tale also has a prominent female character of color in Samira Wiley’s Moira, and Moira (not to mention Wiley’s performance) is awesome. However, she’s very much a supporting role to Moss’ Offred. All of the other female characters and actors, while brilliant, are all in service of Offred’s story. This isn’t a bad thing, simply the nature of the story being told.
Maeve on Westworld is a co-lead. She doesn’t exist to support Dolores, she exists parallel to Dolores, with her own arc and interests. When we’re watching Westworld, we’re watching both their stories.
As Dolores makes her way to the idea of host revolution slowly, Maeve has gotten there much more quickly, and spends much of the season taking matters into her own hands. By the end of the season, as Dolores seems to embrace the idea of the world belonging to the hosts (and the hosts lining up behind her as she charges), Maeve seems to have a different approach, giving each host she comes across the choice to join her. I feel like Maeve and Dolores are going to go head-to-head in Season 2, as each woman has very different interests when it comes to rebellion. The fact that Westworld has two female protagonists, one of which is of color, is a huge plus for me.
Emmy Nominations for Best Actress:
The Handmaid’s Tale – Elizabeth Moss
Westworld – Evan Rachel Wood
Emmy Nominations for Best Supporting Actress:
The Handmaid’s Tale – Samira Wiley; Ann Dowd
Westworld – Thandie Newton
And on a side-note re: the performances, Alexis Bledel gives The Handmaid’s Tale a boost with her Guest Actress nomination, and both Anthony Hopkins and Jeffrey Wright (one of two men of color in his category, out of seven) were nominated for their brilliant performances in Westworld as Lead Actor and Supporting Actor, respectively.
What struck me as interesting when looking at the technical awards that each show was nominated for is that there were many for which The Handmaid’s Tale just didn’t qualify, simply because of the nature of the show. After all, you can’t expect a show about a society that doesn’t value hair and make-up to earn hair and makeup awards. It’s also not the kind of show that requires prosthetic make-up or very many VFX. So, as far as that stuff goes, Westworld has the edge just for being a big sci-fi show.
Westworld snagged nominations in: Outstanding Special VFX, Outstanding Sound Mixing, Outstanding Sound Editing, Outstanding Prosthetic Make-up, Outstanding Main Titles, Outstanding Interactive Media (for the awesome Discover Westworld site), Outstanding Hairstyling, and Outstanding Editing.
Meanwhile, The Handmaid’s Tale got a nod for Outstanding VFX in a Supporting Role (I have no idea what that means). Both shows got nominations for Outstanding Period/Fantasy Costumes for a Series, because of course they did. Have you seen those costumes?
So, why am I #TeamWestworld? Female showrunner, female-led series with two strong, nuanced female characters, an original story that is an artful metaphor for female oppression, and brilliant performances, storytelling, and production value all around.
There’s also the matter of it being more sci-fi. I will always have a soft spot in my heart for fictional stories about science, robots, evolution, and the implications of human being creating technology that eventually causes more problems than it solves.
I’ve always loved dystopias, and am a huge fan of not only The Handmaid’s Tale as a novel, but of YA fiction like The Hunger Games and Divergent. But that’s the thing. People have come to expect female-led dystopias, so much so that there are parody Twitter accounts to that effect. Feminine and female-led sci-fi is still much more rare, and so I would love to see Westworld take home the big Outstanding Drama Series prize if for no other reason that I wanna see female-created sci-fi win.
That said, I would not at all be upset if one of The Handmaid’s Tale‘s brilliant female directors took home the Best Director prize. Specifically Reed Morano, who’s work is awesome.
As for all the rest, I would happily see Westworld take everything. The Handmaid’s Tale is great, but Westworld is a triumph.
What do you think? Am I nuts? Are you #TeamWestworld, too? Or do you think another one of the Drama nominees deserves the top prize more? Let’s talk Emmys in the comments below!
(image: HBO/Hulu/Teresa Jusino)
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—The Mary Sue has a strict comment policy that forbids, but is not limited to, personal insults toward anyone, hate speech, and trolling.—
After the Emmy Nominations were announced earlier this morning, I posted this status on my Facebook page: “If Westworld doesn’t win every Emmy it was nominated for, I quit.” A friend of mine posted “Girl, it’s up against The Handmaid’s Tale in some cases. Nope.” And so, a conflict was born.
I adore both shows, and am so grateful that we’re living through a moment in television during which two high-minded, female-led genre shows about female bodily autonomy can not only exist, but be critically acclaimed and both be up for the Outstanding Drama Series Emmy.
However, I have to admit that Westworld is my personal favorite. When pressed to talk about why, though, I needed to give it some serious thought. After all, there’s a lot that these shows have in common and do well, and there are some things that The Handmaid’s Tale, both as a narrative and as a production, does better.
For sheer female participation behind the camera (and in front of it, given the nature of the show), The Handmaid’s Tale definitely has the edge. Of the five directors working on the series, only one is male, and he directs two of the ten Season 1 episodes. Reed Morano directs the most with three, Kate Dennis and Floria Sigismondi direct two each, and Kari Skogland directs one. They have a majority female writers’ room, too—seven out of ten writers are women, not counting Margaret Atwood herself, who is a consulting producer.
However, the show has a white, male creator and showrunner in Bruce Miller, whereas one of the showrunners and creators on Westworld, Lisa Joy, is a woman of color (she is half Chinese). Whereas with The Handmaid’s Tale, we’re getting a story that was created by a woman told through the prism of a male creator, in Westworld, we get a story that originated with a man (Michael Crichton) through a partly female prism (Joy is the co-creator of Westworld along with Jonathan Nolan).
From the conscious decision to make the figure in the Westworld logo a female one, to making the two main characters through which we get to see the hosts’ struggle and oppression female, Joy has helped deliver a unique and nuanced depiction of femininity to television. The role of creator and showrunner is important, as that voice is the one that guides the writers’ room.
While it makes sense that Miller saw fit to ensure that there were women in his writers’ room to, as he put it in an interview with Elle, balance his deficits, his is still the voice that guides the ship.
Emmy Nominations for Writing:
The Handmaid’s Tale – Bruce Miller for “Offred” (Pilot)
Westworld – Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan for “The Bicameral Mind” (Season Finale)
Still, the vision of The Handmaid’s Tale is in large part in the hands of its female directors, whereas Westworld only had one female director in its entire 20-episode first season: Michelle Maclaren, who directed “The Well-Tempered Clavier.” While the showrunner(s) of a television show are where the buck stops on any and all decisions related to narrative, the decision to see the world through female eyes is an important one, and necessary for a show like The Handmaid’s Tale.
Emmy Nominations for Directing:
The Handmaid’s Tale – Reed Morano for “Offred”; Kate Dennis for “The Bridge”
Westworld – Jonathan Nolan for “The Bicameral Mind”
Now, let’s get in front of the camera and talk story, performances, and visuals.
As I said above, both Westworld and The Handmaid’s Tale are stories about female bodily autonomy. In Westworld, that theme is explored through sci-fi tropes and metaphor, with Dolores and Maeve experiencing oppression as hosts that looks very similar to what women experience out in the world. In The Handmaid’s Tale, the constant refrain is that the show is scarily relevant. While technically a genre story in that it’s set in a dystopia, it’s much more literal and straightforward than Westworld.
One of the things that appeals to me most about Westworld is its artful storytelling. While individual episodes were often mysterious and/or confusing, there is not one moment or image wasted, and it’s all leading somewhere. Seen as a whole, seeing how all the pieces come together, Westworld Season 1 is a work of art that’s very much like looking at a beautiful watch, and the equally beautiful and intricate clockwork inside.
The Handmaid’s Tale is an artful adaptation, but the risks and successes of the storytelling come less from the show itself and more from its place in history. We love The Handmaid’s Tale in large part because of conditions outside the show; because it accurately captures the world in which we live, not necessarily because it is, on its own, particularly creative or innovative.
Both Westworld and The Handmaid’s Tale are based on other source material, but whereas The Handmaid’s Tale is very firmly an adaptation of the novel, Westworld merely uses the film on which it’s based as a jumping-off point, creating an entirely new world and cast of characters instead.
And here we get to the amazing nuanced female characters both shows gave us to enjoy.
Elizabeth Moss’ Offred in The Handmaid’s Tale is breathtaking and raw. Moss has always been an amazing actress who always chooses wonderful projects to get involved in, and Offred is definitely a case of the perfect actress aligning with the perfect role. Her Offred is both fierce and vulnerable, jaded and hopeful, beaten-down and determined to survive. Watching her ups and downs as she experiences Gilead is an amazing experience.
However, the slow-burn awakening of Evan Rachel Wood’s Dolores on Westworld is a revelation, precisely because she spends so long naive and “asleep.” Whereas Offred starts and continues to be a fighter. The role, and Moss’ performance are a destination we want to visit. Wood’s Dolores is a journey we want to embark on. We get to watch Wood’s finely-calibrated performance as Dolores realizes there’s something off, follows it, goes crazy for a while, and ultimately makes her way to full-on host revolution.
Where Westworld has an edge character-wise is in the role of Maeve, played by the incomparable Thandie Newton. The Handmaid’s Tale also has a prominent female character of color in Samira Wiley’s Moira, and Moira (not to mention Wiley’s performance) is awesome. However, she’s very much a supporting role to Moss’ Offred. All of the other female characters and actors, while brilliant, are all in service of Offred’s story. This isn’t a bad thing, simply the nature of the story being told.
Maeve on Westworld is a co-lead. She doesn’t exist to support Dolores, she exists parallel to Dolores, with her own arc and interests. When we’re watching Westworld, we’re watching both their stories.
As Dolores makes her way to the idea of host revolution slowly, Maeve has gotten there much more quickly, and spends much of the season taking matters into her own hands. By the end of the season, as Dolores seems to embrace the idea of the world belonging to the hosts (and the hosts lining up behind her as she charges), Maeve seems to have a different approach, giving each host she comes across the choice to join her. I feel like Maeve and Dolores are going to go head-to-head in Season 2, as each woman has very different interests when it comes to rebellion. The fact that Westworld has two female protagonists, one of which is of color, is a huge plus for me.
Emmy Nominations for Best Actress:
The Handmaid’s Tale – Elizabeth Moss
Westworld – Evan Rachel Wood
Emmy Nominations for Best Supporting Actress:
The Handmaid’s Tale – Samira Wiley; Ann Dowd
Westworld – Thandie Newton
And on a side-note re: the performances, Alexis Bledel gives The Handmaid’s Tale a boost with her Guest Actress nomination, and both Anthony Hopkins and Jeffrey Wright (one of two men of color in his category, out of seven) were nominated for their brilliant performances in Westworld as Lead Actor and Supporting Actor, respectively.
What struck me as interesting when looking at the technical awards that each show was nominated for is that there were many for which The Handmaid’s Tale just didn’t qualify, simply because of the nature of the show. After all, you can’t expect a show about a society that doesn’t value hair and make-up to earn hair and makeup awards. It’s also not the kind of show that requires prosthetic make-up or very many VFX. So, as far as that stuff goes, Westworld has the edge just for being a big sci-fi show.
Westworld snagged nominations in: Outstanding Special VFX, Outstanding Sound Mixing, Outstanding Sound Editing, Outstanding Prosthetic Make-up, Outstanding Main Titles, Outstanding Interactive Media (for the awesome Discover Westworld site), Outstanding Hairstyling, and Outstanding Editing.
Meanwhile, The Handmaid’s Tale got a nod for Outstanding VFX in a Supporting Role (I have no idea what that means). Both shows got nominations for Outstanding Period/Fantasy Costumes for a Series, because of course they did. Have you seen those costumes?
So, why am I #TeamWestworld? Female showrunner, female-led series with two strong, nuanced female characters, an original story that is an artful metaphor for female oppression, and brilliant performances, storytelling, and production value all around.
There’s also the matter of it being more sci-fi. I will always have a soft spot in my heart for fictional stories about science, robots, evolution, and the implications of human being creating technology that eventually causes more problems than it solves.
I’ve always loved dystopias, and am a huge fan of not only The Handmaid’s Tale as a novel, but of YA fiction like The Hunger Games and Divergent. But that’s the thing. People have come to expect female-led dystopias, so much so that there are parody Twitter accounts to that effect. Feminine and female-led sci-fi is still much more rare, and so I would love to see Westworld take home the big Outstanding Drama Series prize if for no other reason that I wanna see female-created sci-fi win.
That said, I would not at all be upset if one of The Handmaid’s Tale‘s brilliant female directors took home the Best Director prize. Specifically Reed Morano, who’s work is awesome.
As for all the rest, I would happily see Westworld take everything. The Handmaid’s Tale is great, but Westworld is a triumph.
What do you think? Am I nuts? Are you #TeamWestworld, too? Or do you think another one of the Drama nominees deserves the top prize more? Let’s talk Emmys in the comments below!
(image: HBO/Hulu/Teresa Jusino)
Want more stories like this? Become a subscriber and support the site!
—The Mary Sue has a strict comment policy that forbids, but is not limited to, personal insults toward anyone, hate speech, and trolling.—
Next year is going to be an incredible one as far as cinema is concerned. Yesterday, we reported on the impeccable images from Entertainment Weekly's Black Panther shoot. But we would be remiss if we didn't mention Ava DuVernay's collaboration with Disney A Wrinkle In Time. Not only is she directing, she casted a Black girl as the lead in the part. Recently images of the cast in their makeup and costumes were released, check them out on the following pages, plus a few quotes from Ava about the casting and decision making process. First, for the three Mrs., DuVernay shared her thoughts with Entertainment Weekly: “My whole process with this film was, what if? With these women, I wondered, could we make them women of different ages, body types, races? Could we bring in culture, bring in history in their costumes? And in the women themselves, could we just reflect a fuller breadth of femininity?"We’ve tessered to create a wrinkle in time and bring you the movie even earlier! In theaters, March 9, 2018! #WrinkleInTime pic.twitter.com/CgAw2d5AKw
— Wrinkle In Time (@WrinkleInTime) April 29, 2017
See exclusive first look photos of @Oprah, @mindykaling, @RWitherspoon and more in 'A Wrinkle in Time': https://t.co/WxuzFqYqpF pic.twitter.com/YKPwFrGInN
— Entertainment Weekly (@EW) July 12, 2017
Oprah
“I mean, when you’re trying to cast the wisest woman in the world, what’s the question? You go and you call her and you’re glad that you have her number on speed dial...[The character] is so much of what she teaches and shared through her shows over the years, through her magazine and OWN, about owning your light and conquering darkness and how we have to power ourselves through this life in a certain way and look out for each other. She dropped into the character so well, but it’s also Oprah. When we see her in Henrietta Lacks, she’s not Oprah to me. When I saw her in The Butler, she became Gloria to me. But in this, because of the things that Mrs. Which says, her Oprah-ness is really helpful.”Mrs. Who coming atchu pic.twitter.com/Se2BhmSUfx
— Mindy Kaling (@mindykaling) July 12, 2017
Mindy Kaling
“I wanted a black Mrs., a white Mrs., and a Mrs. that was not either, and Mindy was the first one that came to mind. I feel like we don’t talk about a lot of the other colors and cultures enough, and Mindy is so beautiful to me. Her character is one that, in her costumes and in working with Mindy, we wanted to bring in a remix of styles and cultures and customs from around the world. She was a real partner in that. She was working with two legends, but I think she’s a legend in the making in terms of what she does and being a fresh voice as a comedic actress.”— Veronica Wells (@VDubShrug) July 13, 2017
Reese Witherspoon
From Entertainment Weekly, " “I was looking for that innocence, that thing Reese plays so well, but also that great power and precision, and funny. The character has so much funny going on, you really need someone who’s proven and who’s done a bit of it all, and that’s Reese. It was so lucky that she was a fan of the book and wanted to come play with me.”@ava as a kid picturing myself as Meg was inconceivable. Now all these little brown girls who can or will brings me joy. #awrinkleintime pic.twitter.com/LA2RqwllNh
— Dora Milaje Trainee (@Bainst06) July 12, 2017
Ava and Storm
In her interview with Entertainment Weekly, “The first image [I had in my head] was to place a brown girl in that role of Meg, a girl traveling to different planets and encountering beings and situations that I’d never seen a girl of color in,” she explains. “All of those scenes struck my fancy, and then it was also something that [Disney VP of production] Tendo Nagenda said to me, which I’ll never forget. One of the things that really made me want to read it was when he said, ‘Ava, imagine what you would do with the worlds.’ Worlds! ‘Planets no one’s ever seen or heard of,’ he said. There aren’t any other black women who have been invited to imagine what other planets in the universe might look and feel like. I was interested in that and in a heroine that looked like the girls I grew up with.”You: I don't know, I think a Wrinkle in Time didn't need a movie because- Me: pic.twitter.com/foPVNqhNXM
— rachel leishman (@RachelLeishman) July 12, 2017
Chris Pine
“Chris is the first full-on heart-throb type of actor that I’ve ever worked with. That’s how the world sees him. But I always just saw a damn good actor. I saw Z for Zachariah and Hell or High Water, and I just knew I wanted him because I saw, that dude’s got chops.”.@EW Has First Look At Director @Ava Duvernay’s A Wrinkle In Time w/ @stormreid @Oprah & Chris Pine - https://t.co/1OYKmWCtfl pic.twitter.com/FMJ42vRQdJ
— Wilson Morales (@blackfilm) July 12, 2017
Full cast
A Wrinkle in Time | Sci-fi Fantasy | Storm Reid plays Meg. This is Ava DuVernay's adaptation of the iconic novel. March 9th 2018!! pic.twitter.com/TFLPkvzxqL
— POC Cinema & TV (@POCCinema) June 29, 2017
Storm Reid
Ava on why she chose Storm. "She’s got the sweetest, warmest heart, and all that I saw every day was just a further blossoming of the good that is Storm Reid. She’s appropriately named. She’s a force.”A Wrinkle In Time hits theaters March 9, 2018.
#nationalsuperheroday #blessingsonblessings
(@stormreid) on Apr 28, 2017 at 11:35am PDT
The post The Beautiful Images From Ava DuVernay’s Upcoming Wrinkle In Time appeared first on MadameNoire.
Sam Wilson being promoted to Captain America will likely be one of my favorite things to ever happen in comics. With that, I’d like to think I’ve been fair as I reviewed each of the two titles, Sam Wilson: Captain America and All-New Captain America, that highlight Wilson’s experiences through this unexpected journey. I’ve handed out plenty of praise and the occasional raised eyebrow of a cautious onlooker. Finding out that Sam’s time as Captain America will officially come to an end sent me into a rage: First I was shocked, then embarrassed as I heard the “I told you so’s” ring in my mind. In hindsight, I’m glad I waited and didn’t write up the first 1,000 words of pure, unhindered bars I had planned to come at Marvel with for this move. I spent my July 4th weekend re-reading some of my favorite moments of the run and accepted that it was never meant to last for long.
Should/could it have? Hell yeah. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. But I’ve read enough comics and had enough conversations about comics to know there’s an unspoken trend of short-lived greatness in comics that are too far outside of the status quo. I’m still pissed off. I’ve just contained that emotion and turned it into monitored thoughts. By now, all I can do is throw on a stale face for the ages and move on. But not until after I speak my piece on the premature demotion of Sam Wilson.
When it was first announced that Sam Wilson would be next in line to take up the shield once Steve Rogers was out of commission, I was one of many caught by surprise. A black man is really America’s hero, is what I constantly found myself muttering. That quickly changed to My Captain America can fly. [Considering making a t-shirt out of that, by the way. Leave your size in the comments.] However, I’ve been around long enough to know that nothing in comics sticks for long besides the deaths of Bucky, Batman’s parents and Uncle Ben Parker.
My Captain America can fly.
Was Sam-Cap a publicity stunt? Short answer, probably. Long answer, it was one of many moving parts of Marvel’s attempt to diversify its lineup with more people of color and fewer straight white dudes named Steve and Tony. Sadly, because of years of a lack of representation and a sudden aha! moment, Marvel’s attempt at true representation boiled down to a knee-jerk reaction that a lot of fans didn’t respond well to. While I personally loved the efforts of introducing Sam Wilson as Captain America, Riri Williams as Tony Stark’s protege, Jane Foster as Thor and expanding Wakanda’s significance, I also acknowledge that a lot of comic book fans hate change the same way that your great-grandparents refused to let women wear pants. [I’m sure they’d deny it now, but they did.] Neither of these hills are worth dying on, yet they’re both covered in bodies draped in #AllLivesMatter t-shirts.
Despite the writing on the wall, I chose to enjoy as much of Sam Wilson carrying the shield as possible. Steve Rogers is long known for being the Boy Scout who’s the living embodiment of picking oneself up by their bootstraps. Sam more closely represented people like me. Not just because he was a Black man, either, although it definitely helps. His experiences reflected the struggle many people often feel living in the United States. I may love my country and what it offers me, in theory, but I’m much too familiar with what it forces me to actually live through to blindly follow a set of hopeful ideals first introduced more than two centuries ago.
Sam Wilson could fly down 79th street of my native Chicago to save a family from a burning building…
Outside of a few cringeworthy moments that screamed “Get off my lawn you rambunctious, millennial punks!,” I think Sam Wilson’s run as Captain America should be far more respected than it is. He became the symbol of everyday people in America, not just middle America — what some choose to inaccurately refer to as fringe America. Sam Wilson could fly down 79th street of my native Chicago to save a family from a burning building but also stop a kidnapping in Evanston. On the other hand, I imagine Steve Rogers never coming south of 35th street or east of the Dan Ryan Expressway. And that means a lot to readers like me.
One of the most disappointing parts of Sam Wilson returning to the fold as Falcon is this: We already have a new Falcon. And he’s great! What the hell are we supposed to do with Joaquin Torres now?!?! My mans has actual falcon wings coming out of his body. He has falcon eyes. Might as well have a beak. There isn’t much else left for him to do in the superhero world. What’s next for him? Is he gonna be Lil’ Falcon? Falcon B? Birdboy? What’s going on here, man?
It’s a story as old as this thing we call society. Once someone gets pushed down, everyone under them gets shuffled around too, often for the worse.
Despite this, the most disappointing thing about Sam Wilson’s demotion – because, no matter how they try to spin it, that’s exactly what it is – is how it’s wrapping up. One of the most consistent struggles Sam faced as Captain America was hate, both from citizens and readers. He regularly mentioned how he took on much more than his fair share and the toll it took on him. But that doesn’t mean he gets to quit and not give it another shot. Last we saw of him with the shield, Sam left it back in his New York apartment because the system literally tried to kill Rage and Steve Rogers made him think he let a senator get killed. If he doesn’t get a chance to redeem himself as Captain America, I’ll risk sounding hyperbolic and say everything up until now has been a waste.
Look, I don’t expect Sam to defeat white supremacy within a couple volumes of a comic book series. I don’t even know what the hell that would look like if I’m being totally honest. But couldn’t he at least put a stop to the Americops? They played such a major role in Sam’s storyline that no one else has any right to end the living extensions of police violence. And there’s no way I’ll ever accept them just being a consistent part of the Marvel Universe going forward. Black people being targeted by police in the streets is enough to give me an ulcer, but in my comics too? Nah, bruh.
If Sam would’ve become Captain America, stepped away while on top, and at least made a lateral move, this would be understandable. But no. As far as we know now, he’s heading back to the old guard. Even though it was brief, Sam Wilson will be my personal favorite Captain America for a long, long time.
Read more about Captain America: Sam Wilson, our comics reviews and our commentary.
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On the right thing to decide.
Will I take the wrong direction,
All my life, where will I go,
What lies ahead of me?”
Seriously, we’ve all been there. We’ve had a show that started out near and dear to our hearts. The show whose purpose surpassed mere entertainment value and led us to enlightenment or an awakening. A show with meat and heart, characters that you fall in love with. Then that show goes left of center and then south and then left again, but never truly back to where it started. You try your best to stay with it, but at some point you realize that it isn’t the show you thought it was. Maybe you’ve changed, maybe the show changed. Either way, it’s not a healthy relationship and the loyal completest inside you has finally decided that this needs to come to an end. So, you break up.
That’s me. I finally did it. After most of my friends had done the same. I finally broke up with Orange Is The New Black. I’m going to spare you the fifth season spoilers, because honestly, I don’t feel like reliving those hours. Even if I break them up into minutes and seconds. I don’t want to go back. The trailer made me do it. I was worried about Taystee and wanted to know who was taking care of Suzanne. I was sad for Soso and I wanted any glimpse of Poussey smiling and laughing that I could get. The only thing I was left with was frustration, anger and hours of time that I can never get back.
I started to question why I began watching OITNB to begin with. When I thought about it, I realized that I started the show for equal parts entertainment and awareness. I wanted to know more about the penal system. I also fell instantly in love with Taystee, Crazy Eyes (Suzanne) and Poussey. What I realized after some time, was that the show was incredibly horrible at keeping a sense of actually realizing the prison system, the brutality that comes along with it and what happens when you privatize such a system and strip it down to the bare bones of any kind of organization.
So, I went looking for what I couldn’t get with OITNB; a sense of realness sans Black and Brown body exploitation for means of entertainment. I found a few movies that shed light on the corporatized prison system and the psychology that comes with it. These movies aren’t necessarily easy to watch, but not in the “lemme exploit the pain and suffering of people of color and call it woke t.v.” kind of pain. Nah, this is some real shit. If you’re looking for pure entertainment, these aren’t your movies. However, if you need to see and understand what can possibly be happening to folks that we know or know of who are enduring the penal system, then I encourage you to watch these movies.
The Stanford Experiment
(2015)
Based on a true story, The Stanford Experiment follow 12 men who were selected to be a part of a simulation study on the psychology of imprisonment in 1971. The results of this experiment are eerily painful and I had a very hard time watching this without pauses. It’s unbelievable that the results are so relevant today, in the sense that – nothing has changed. People are degraded and stripped of any evidence of their individuality and instead of this study extinguishing these practices (practices endured by white male Stanford students), we can see the prevalence of those actions in detained individuals today. The actors include the beloved and late Nelsan Ellis, who portrayed Jesse Fletcher, a consultant to the experiment who had spent 17 years in the San Quentin State Prison and was brought in to help enforce and legitimize the experiment.
Civil Brand (2002)
Civil Brand stars almost every Black actor known to the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. You have N’Bushe Wright, LisaRaye, Da Brat, Yasiin Bey (Mos Def), Monica Calhoun, Clifton Powell, Lark Vorhees, Tichina Arnold and MC Lyte. Listen, Civil Brand isn’t filled with Oscar worthy performances, if you’re using the Oscars as any kind of measurement. It’s a low-lower budget flick, Da Brat is the narrator and I will still watch this movie a hundred more times before viewing another season of OITNB. The movie is set in Whitehead Correctional Institute, a women’s penitentiary and it follows the experience of several of the inmates. The movie aims to shed light on the prison industrial complex’s use of prisoners for profit versus rehabilitation & release, and the mental and physical abuse of female inmates by guards. Say what you want about the acting/overacting or even the way the movie veers off the main topic (exploitation of prisoners), it doesn’t go about making it’s point by exploiting the bodies of women for ratings.
It’s worth saying that neither one of these movies are Shawshank Redemption, but there can only ever be one Shawshank and that’s that. At the same time, I think it’s good to note that these movies are also not Orange Is The New Black and that’s what I needed. I needed to back away from the hype of an overly privileged white woman retelling the stories of imprisoned Black and Brown women when she only spent thirteen months in a Connecticut minimum security prison and is now making money off of it. /endrant.
Issa break up, so my movies may not be perfect (sorry/not sorry)… let me know in the comments what to add to my list to help me get over my ex-favorite show.
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