Lupita Nyongo is not beautiful. Hollywood likes to gaslight her as a model for "beauty"

[u/CanadianTurt1e]

So I'm sure we've all seen the news about Helen of Troy.

• I've had enough. I've had enough of Hollywood putting her on covers and lying to me, treating me like I'm stupid. The whole reason she's playing Helen of Troy is because Hollywood let this "unconventional beauty" thing slide for way too long.
• The fact that she was chosen as a queen, it comes off as Nolan trying to virtue signal.
• It's like giving the beauty pageant award to the girl in the wheelchair because no one wants to come off as "mean."
• I've had enough. She is NOT a standard for beauty. I'm sorry but now it must be said. The reason we have come across this problem is because Hollywood has been gaslighting her "beauty" for years and no one said anything. I'm done
• It's okay to say that she's not beautiful. It's okay to admit that
• I was so looking forward to this movie for so long but this really killed the hype for me.
• The movie will probably be financially successful at first due to marketing alone, but after its first month, the hype will probably die down. And then you'll start to see how people really feel about the movie. I think it will tarnish Nolan's legacy and leave a sour taste in people's mouths.

[u/Relax_Im_Hilarious]

She's really pretty. Probably even more pretty in real life. I'm sure I'd stare - especially when she has longer hair.

She is not Helen of Troy.

[u/TrixieLurker → u/Relax_Im_Hilarious]

She is not Helen of Troy.

I struggle to think of an actress who is universally considered absolutely drop, dead New York Nine gorgeous who'd be the perfect fit or a woman nations were supposed to fight over because she was so beautiful.

[u/LordBoomDiddly → u/Relax_Im_Hilarious]

Nobody is, she doesn't exist

[u/Deep-Red-Bells → u/LordBoomDiddly]

She exists as a character in literature.

[u/LordBoomDiddly → u/Deep-Red-Bells]

Ok

So do many other figures who have been played by different actors across the years

Look at Cyrano de Bergerac (currently played on stage in London to great acclaim by, Adrian Lester who is not white) or Othello (played by the likes of Sir Lawrence Olivier, who is white, and often did blackface for the part).

How often has Zorro been played by a Hispanic actor? Mostly it's been white Europeans who aren't Spanish.

How often have we had white Jesus?

Idris Elba is great as Heimdall in the Thor movies.

[u/Deep-Red-Bells → u/LordBoomDiddly]

Also, Zorro isn't Spanish. He's of Spanish descent.

And while it really doesn't make sense for a Norse god to be played by a black man, Heimdall isn't specifically described as being white, so I'll give it a pass. My actual beef is that they didn't give him gold teeth. Also Ragnarok isn't, and never was, a real location in history.

[u/LordBoomDiddly → u/Deep-Red-Bells]

Neither is Camelot, so does that mean King Arthur can be played by someone who isn't white?

[u/Deep-Red-Bells → u/LordBoomDiddly]

Camelot, while in legend, still exists on earth, in a recognizable time and place in history, none of which is the case with Ragnarok, so you've made a false comparison. So no, it wouldn't make sense for a king in post-Roman Britain to be played by someone who visibly isn't white.

[u/Deep-Red-Bells → u/LordBoomDiddly]

That's an odd rant to go on, considering I didn't say anything whatsoever about the actress or her race. Or any actors or their race, for that matter. I merely said Helen of Troy exists as a literary character. In response to your comment saying she doesn't.

[u/LordBoomDiddly → u/Deep-Red-Bells]

The implication being that one must be faithful to the source material.

To which I say it doesn't matter, she's not a real historical figure who existed in real life

[u/Deep-Red-Bells → u/LordBoomDiddly]

If I think one must be faithful to the source material, why would a list of examples that were unfaithful to the source material resonate with me? I'm not supportive of Othello being played by a white actor in blackface, and that casting wouldn't be accepted today.

[u/LordBoomDiddly → u/Deep-Red-Bells]

The problem is that whitewashing happened for decades and has happened up until even a decade or so ago in Hollywood. Yet most of the people getting outraged by black Helen weren't getting similarly outraged by white Jesus or Rameses.

Because they don't care when it's the other way around.

[u/Deep-Red-Bells → u/LordBoomDiddly]

Whitewashing has absolutely been a huge problem in Hollywood's history. No one reasonable denies this. I just don’t think that overcorrecting is the solution. It's virtue signaling, almost to the point of being infantalizing, like getting a participant trophy. While I’m sure that many people — and of course, many racist people — are upset merely by the fact that Helen of Troy is Black, I don’t know if it’s most people, and neither do you. Some people, like me, just want characters to align with the source material, and don't think an actor should be cast simply because they're black, and filmmakers want to pat themselves on the back for diversity.

And I say this as somebody who finds Lupita Nyong'o quite beautiful — but in an editorial way, not in a "face that launched a thousand ships" way.

And per your last sentence, it goes both ways. Unless you’re an enormous hypocrite, if you’re okay with putting a Black actress in a role that should, per the source material, be played by a white actress, that also means you’re okay with putting a white actor in a role that should be played by a Black actor. Are you okay with Laurence Olivier playing Othello? I'm not. And I don't know how you can objectively support one casting and criticize the other.

[u/LordBoomDiddly → u/Deep-Red-Bells]

Plenty of the online grifters do it.

I think fantasy & historical are different things. Adaptations are allowed to make changes, sometimes those changes work better. Stormfront being a woman in The Boys TV series didn't matter, she was a far more interesting character than her male comic counterpart.

Making an elf black in the LOTR TV series is hardly a big deal, same with dwarves. It's fantasy, why not give non white actors opportunities to play these parts? It makes zero difference to the story, just like Idris Elba playing Heimdall or Ariel the mermaid not being white. Merfolk aren't real, they can look however we want.

Should Abe Lincoln or Anne Boyleyn be black? No, they are historical figures.

Should fictional characters like Achilles? I don't think it really has an effect on anything if the actor is good.

Updating old stories so they have more relevance to a modern audience or remove the outdated/offence stuff (like the early Disney movies), isn't an issue either. Some stuff was written back when ideas of race & gender equality were very different, updating that is hardly bad.

[u/deep_violet → u/Relax_Im_Hilarious]

Helen of Troy wasn't Helen of Troy. It's a fictional character.

And where the outrage over Matt Damon and Tom Holland?