The future of comic book movies

If this summer proved one thing, it's that superhero movies are still bankable. A few critics I read seemed surprised that nobody was tired of them yet. In any case, I'm glad we're not, because it means I get to see a movie that could perhaps make me feel more patriotic than Top Gun and Rocky IV put together: Captain America. I don't know much about comic books, but I do know that a guy with an invincible shield, a hatred for Nazis, and a costume made out of the American flag might make me feel good about my country.

I've been thinking long and hard about who should play him. Here are my endorsements:

Dwayne Johnson:
So I know Captain America is supposed to be a little more Aryan, but think about it. This guy is huge! And Captain America is a serum-enhanced, perfect human specimen. Plus we know he can do action. Comic book movies have a history of changing the ethnicity of their characters. And besides, make-up and hair dye could make him look as white as those guys who always play Jesus.

Look up a picture of Captain America. No one could look as muscly and tall as he does (and be as adept at kicking ass) except a former pro wrestler.




Aaron Eckhart:
Look at that square jaw. This guy was born to fight Nazis. He's a little on the older side, but he still beat up a few dudes pretty bad in The Dark Knight, and for a guy in his 40s he's pretty fresh looking.

People might be confused because he's already wrapped up in a superhero franchise, but it's a different universe so there's no chance that his two characters will ever have to meet each other.








Matthew McConaughey:
Witty, and has a winning smile. He'll drive the women into the theater along with the men. Plus it's doubtful he'd turn it down to do some lame romantic comedy.

Hello!

Welcome to my blog! Here I will opine on politics, current events, pop culture, and probably find excuses to use words that I really like (like opine). I hope you enjoy, and while you do, keep a few things in mind:

• This blog will be opinion based. Disagreement and debate is welcome and encouraged.
  
• Tell me things you want to hear about! The idea here is to get my opinions and yours out in the open so we can search for truth together.
• Please don’t feel the need to point out grammatical errors in my posts. I know white people love grammar, but please try and restrain yourself.
  

So, here’s my first post/rant back in the blogging world. My thoughts on race:

Try as I might, I cannot get away from the topic of race right now. Besides the nonstop election coverage forcing us to consider a racial minority in the White House, I find myself working in close proximity all day with a more racially diverse group of people than I have ever spent consistent time with before. This work takes place in the receiving area of the U of A bookstore, where the shipments of books I unpack all day seem to overwhelmingly deal with race.

This last bit has gotten me really upset. Every – no exaggeration here, I really mean the word every – book on race that I have looked at has a title like “The White Man’s Problem” and talks about how white people really suck and are the sole source of the problem when it comes to race. A rant seems in order. So here are a few of my thoughts about race:

• I’m sick and tired of hearing white people tell me how deep down I’m probably a racist. From my experience, I don’t hear minorities complain about racism nearly as much as white people do. Besides Jesse Jackson.
• College-aged Americans like to idealize Europe, but forget that they have a long and distinguished history of racism. Europeans are only recently dealing with the melting pot effect that Americans have always had. And I hate to break it to all those American college students who think Europeans are the cat’s pajamas, but they are often horribly racist. Case in point: this picture the Spanish Olympic basketball team took before going to Beijing:
• John McCain’s Paris Hilton ad was not dealing with race. It just wasn’t. And I lost a lot of respect for the Obama campaign when he said that whole thing about the dollar bill.
• The reason I thought Crash deserved the Oscar a couple years ago was not because it was better produced, written, acted, etc. than the movies it was up against (it really wasn’t), but because it was the only – again, no exaggeration – honest, open-ended take on American race relations I’ve ever seen. It supposed that there was more to the race problem than white people still being scared of people with dark skin. That’s a very rare thing in pop culture.
• My recommendation for easing race relations: lighten up. I’ve made racial jokes to the people I work with and they laugh and make them back because they know it’s in good fun. I often think that people really aren’t as sensitive about race as we’re told they are.

By the way, how come no one has cried foul about Robert Downey Jr. in Tropic Thunder yet?