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Jar Jar Binks has long been the symbol of everything goofy and lighthearted about the Star Wars franchise. The Gungan outcast was the focus of ire for many years from a certain sect of Star Wars fandom who only wanted things to be ultra serious. In fact, some fans have actually tried to retcon Jar Jar into secretly having been an agent of the dark side the whole time. He did help to start the Empire after all.  So maybe it’s not that far-fetched?

Kevin Cassidy

Okay, so this theory is probably not true. But what if it were? What if the mysterious “Phantom Menace” wasn’t a reference to Palpatine, a.k.a. Darth Sidious….but actually Jar-Jar?  Via Geeks Are Sexy, we’ve discovered what a dark side, Sith Lord version of Jar Jar Binks would actually look like. Creature and character designer Kevin Cassidy put his skills to the test and crafted these terrifying images that he shared on Instagram. You can take a look at various versions of “Darth Jar Jar” below:

Kevin Cassidy

We’re not going to lie. This is a version of Jar Jar that we would not like to encounter in a dark alley at night. Or in the middle of the day for that matter. Kevin Cassidy has some other extremely cool and creepy “horror-fied” designs of various dark side Star Wars characters on Instagram. He’s designed even scarier versions of Darth Vader, Darth Maul, Kylo Ren, stormtroopers, and the Emperor’s royal guards from Return of the Jedi.

The original Jar Jar actor, Ahmed Best, has gone on record saying that he thought his character’s semi-tragic fate in canonical Star Wars novels was appropriate. But we can’t help but wonder if he wouldn’t have loved playing a dark-side version of Jar Jar that looked as badass as Kevin Cassidy’s. Hey, who knows? Maybe it’ll be a Disney+ streaming series in ten years. Stranger things have happened.

For more of Cassidy’s amazing work, be sure to head on over to his ArtStation page or his Instagram account.

Featured Image: Kevin Cassidy

The post Creature Designer Reimagines Jar Jar Binks as Evil Sith Lord appeared first on Nerdist.

It's that time again, people....Black History Month!  So let's just make this simple and dive in! Listen to a new episode of Afronerd Radio's Mid Week in Review (MWIR) broadcast airing on the BTalk 100 platform this Wednesday at 8pm eastern.  The topics slated to be discussed are:  Dburt revisits the history of BHM, how it could be revitalized in the wake of George Floyd's death (and the departing Trump administration/Capitol Riots) and how current trends and competing agendas hopefully will not stagnate it as an annual observance; and then there's some interesting BHM comic book/graphic novel recommendations for our listeners and beyond;  Deadline reports that Black Panther filmmaker, Ryan Coogler has inked a 5-year Exclusive Disney TV deal with a Wakanda centric series in development; thoughts about some interesting trailers that hit the cyberverse like HBO's forthcoming Joss Whedon project, The Nevers:

And new DC Animated product entitled, Justice Society: World War II:

Oh and what kind of analogy was Sen. Ted Cruz attempting to make regarding The Watchmen and Avengers: Endgame?  His recent podcast diatribe caused agita for some on social media:

Sen Ted Cruz: "Have you noticed in how many movies how often rabid environmentalists are the bad guys? Whether it's Thanos or go to 'Watchmen.' The view of the Left is people are a disease" pic.twitter.com/fthdBWVSWv

— Jason Campbell (@JasonSCampbell) February 1, 2021

Dburt discovers the extremely popular anime franchise, One Piece twenty years later.....Lastly, does director, Nate Parker's American Skin movie fall under the umbrella of black tragedy porn?  And can American Slavery cinema also skirt under that same aforementioned umbrella?

*One thing that Dburt is doing (finally) is investing in cryptocurrency, courtesy of Roundlyx. We would implore our followers to investigate, discern and then explore by using our referral code: afro-87A4BF

Call us LIVE at 508-645-0100. AFTER CLICKING ON THE HIGHLIGHTED LINK, GO DIRECTLY TO AFRONERD RADIO!!! 

or This link below.....
function openPlayer(s){window.open("https://radio.securenetsystems.net/v5/"+escape(s),"Player","height=630,width=940,modal=yes,alwaysRaised=yes")}

Holy tone shift, Batman! The final five episodes of The Millionaire Detective: Balance Unlimited bring to a close this ridiculous season of rich people and cops suffering from a hero-complex going way above their pay grade to fight bad guys. As I discussed in my last review, there is a pretty not-so-subtle tone shift midway through this season. It is pretty dark throughout the final episodes. I almost did not want to finish the season, if I am to be quite honest. I did, simply because, the murder-mystery of Daisuke’s mother did intrigue me. 

I am a dub-slut myself. Allow me to explain: I prefer watching dubs because it allows me to do other things while listening to what is happening. When the anime is subs only, I am essentially forced to maintain my focus solely on the show, which can make me antsy. Especially during this quarantine, I have noticed that my attention span has not been at its top form. The episodes were not too long, and it came to a rather unoriginal end. However, it was a decently enjoyable ride, even though I still stubbornly maintain my stance that this would have been way better as a queer romance, slice-of-life comedy. The silliness plays out wayyyyyy better than the drama does, and it’s more interesting to watch.

Now, I feel obligated to speak on a very awful scene that’s in one of the final episodes. There is a really weird scene where Suzue has to relay critical information to Daisuke without their A.I. (which is everywhere) from reading their lips. She pulls him into a bedroom, under the covers on a bed, and places herself on top of an unwilling and uncomfortable Daisuke. See, this is the type of shit that if you’re a seasoned anime watcher you may be used to seeing, but it’s still BULLSHIT. I hate this kind of sexual assault/sexual harassment that gets a pass for whatever reason. Not only does this take you out of the narrative, but it can be super triggering for your audience. Can animation studios and writers please keep this nonsense out of their work? It is super gross.

All in all, I recommend The Millionaire Detective: Balance Unlimited if you’re looking for a quick binge on a crime dramedy. The last few episodes hold some cool fight scenes and bloody ends. I want to avoid too many spoilers, but just know that this crime-fighting duo gets a happy ending and most of their teammates enjoy some yummy food in bliss. For a one-season (I think?) anime, it’s a satisfying end.  

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The post ‘The Millionaire Detective: Balance Unlimited’ Season 1 Comes to a Satisfying End: A Review appeared first on Black Nerd Problems.

When Variety critic Dennis Harvey used his review of Promising Young Woman to question the casting of Carey Mulligan, he was rightly called out far and wide for his blatantly sexist writing.

“Mulligan, a fine actress, seems a bit of an odd choice as this admittedly many-layered apparent femme fatale,” Harvey wrote of the character, who spends her weekends pretending to be fall-down drunk to see if men will prey on her. “Margot Robbie is a producer here, and one can (perhaps too easily) imagine the role might once have been intended for her. Whereas with this star, Cassie wears her pickup-bait gear like bad drag; even her long blond hair feels like a put-on.”

The implication seemed clear, and Mulligan herself mentioned it in an interview with the New York Times. “It felt like it was basically saying that I wasn’t hot enough to pull off this kind of ruse,” she told the outlet. Mulligan said that her issue with the review “wasn’t some sort of ego-wounding thing,” but that a film review in this day and age would still even include criticisms of a woman’s appearance in that way.

Harvey has finally responded to the criticism after initially avoiding “the social media discourse,” as he told The Guardian. His response is, essentially, that his words were misconstrued by people who didn’t actually read his review. Moreover, he implies that Mulligan and the film’s creative team might not actually have found the review offensive at all, but used it to generate attention.

“He also queried the timing of the controversy, noting that his review had apparently been found unobjectionable enough to escape complaint for 11 months, ‘until the film was finally being released, promoted and Oscar-campaigned,’ writes The Guardian. “Only then was his review ‘belatedly labeled ‘insensitive’ and flagged with an official ‘apology.’’

What Harvey doesn’t mention is that it’s totally normal for reviews written about festival movies to not gain traction until the film is actually released to the public. Mulligan also wouldn’t have been asked about the review in her initial round of press for the Sundance premiere, but she has been now that she’s doing another round of interviews. Harvey is now managing to add film snobbery to his initial sexist review, as if anyone who didn’t immediately read the initial piece about a movie they wouldn’t be able to see for close to a year doesn’t later get to have an opinion on his writing.

As for the accusation that the people who took issue with the review didn’t actually read it, that’s a really juvenile, defensive deflection—and I say that as someone who did read it, as I think many did.

“I assumed that film-makers who created such a complex, layered movie wouldn’t interpret what I wrote as some kind of simpleminded sexism,” Harvey says. “And while Carey Mulligan is certainly entitled to interpret the review however she likes, her projection of it suggesting she’s ‘not hot enough’ is, to me, just bizarre. I’m sorry she feels that way. But I’m also sorry that’s a conclusion she would jump to, because it’s quite a leap.”

Let’s be totally clear: That is not an apology! It is an insult and an accusation that happens to include the word “sorry.”

Here are some more of Harvey’s own terrible words defending his other terrible words:

“What I was attempting to write about was the emphasis in the film and [Mulligan’s] performance on disguise, role-playing and deliberate narrative misdirection. Nor was bringing up Margot Robbie meant to be any comparison in ‘personal appearance’.

“Robbie is a producer on the film, and I mentioned her just to underline how casting contributes to the film’s subversive content – a star associated with a character like Harley Quinn [Robbie’s Suicide Squad character] might raise very specific expectations, but Mulligan is a chameleon and her very stylised performance keeps the viewer uncertain where the story is heading.”

Does that mean he thought it would better if we knew Mulligan’s character Cassie had villain (or more anti-hero) potential? And does he think she actually is a villain? In his review, he called the character “admittedly many-layered.” Does he want fewer layers? I genuinely don’t understand but it doesn’t matter because I don’t want to veer off into differences of opinion on the movie or its (admittedly perfect) casting. I want to focus on what Harvey said in his review and how it was garbage and how now he’s trying to spin it as a different form of lesser garbage.

If Harvey did, in fact, think he was criticizing Mulligan’s casting, calling her outfits “bad drag” and her hair “a put-on” is not appropriate, nor is it good criticism.

If he did not mean to compare the appearance of Mulligan and Margot Robbie (“I’m a 60-year-old gay man. I don’t actually go around dwelling on the comparative hotnesses of young actresses, let alone writing about that,” he says now), then he shouldn’t have made comparisons about them in the same paragraph that he made those derisive comments about Mulligan’s appearance. That’s just bad, clumsy writing.

Harvey said that he was “appalled to be tarred as misogynist, which is something very alien to my personal beliefs or politics. This whole thing could not be more horrifying to me than if someone had claimed I was a gung-ho Trump supporter.”

But the thing is, even people who don’t think they are misogynistic (or racist, or homophobic, or transphobic, or anything else) can engage in misogynistic and otherwise bigoted behaviors. He wasn’t “tarred as misogynist,” he wrote misogyny into his own review.

We all have invisible biases, which is one of the reasons why people like Mulligan and so many others in this industry have been pushing to diversify all aspects of it, including reviewing press. That Harvey would be so incredibly defensive, going so far as to insult his readers (by suggesting they didn’t read his review) and the star of the movie (by implying she was faking an opinion to stir up some Oscar buzz) is only further evidence of how necessary that diversity is.

(via The Guardian, image: Focus Features)

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