Rightwing ‘review-bombers’ couldn’t be more wrong: the casting of David Oyelowo in a kind of prequel to the Peter Pan and Alice stories is inspired
There’s a long history of rightwing antipathy towards progressive racebending – if we can even call it that – in the movies. From Idris Elba as Heimdall in Marvel’s Thor films to John Boyega starring as stormtrooper Finn in the
Star Wars sequel trilogy and even Halle Bailey as the Little Mermaid, there’s something about seeing black people in roles that might once have been played by white actors that really gets under the skin of organisations such as the Council of Conservative Citizens. The fact that nobody has any idea what levels of melanin Norse gods and mermaids had, or what the imperial troops looked like with their helmets off in the original Star Wars trilogy seems to have been conveniently forgotten.
Lately, the culture war seems to have moved into more insidious territory. Rather than just spitting bile on horrible forums that the rest of us can happily ignore, fascist types have taken to “review-bombing” movies that don’t fit with their worldview, a process whereby trolls target a film’s user-generated IMDb or Rotten Tomatoes rating in an effort to stop people seeing it.