X-Men: First Class, Matthew Vaughan cast Options

Here’s the first small image of the assembled cast for Matthew Vaughn‘s X-Men: First Class. Left to right, we see: Michael Fassbender as Magneto, Rose Byrne as Moira MacTaggert, January Jones as Emma Frost, Jason Flemyng as Azazel, Nicholas Hoult as Beast, Lucas Till as Havoc, Zoe Kravitz as Angel Salvadore, Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique, and James McAvoy as Charles Xavier.

http://www.slashfilm.com/cast-xmen-class/

Opinions?

Okay, the poster kind of sucks, but don't almost all movie posters? I kind of understand the Hollywood logic behind showcasing the faces of actors on posters when that usually doesn't say anything about the movie, and that logic is "Make people want to be as cool/attractive as these actors".

Anyway... I think this movie is going to be good! It has politics, social commentary and complex relationships! And I think it looks way more interesting than kickass white man gets magic space ring, or kickass white man gets magic hammer, or kickass white man gets magic muscles injection.

I think all the raised concerns are due to poor marketing choices from the studio. They are trying to make it look like kickass white guys kicking ass, when this movie is probably more like 'broken people trying to fix themselves but only to discover that they are no more broken than the rest of the world'.

Okay, bring on the hate mail.

Actually, Eric, thank you for bringing that up, that is a topic which deserves some debate. There is quite a deficit of multicultural heroes in cinemas this summer. I suppose that is why more and more people are turning to TV.

I mean, if one looks at the movies coming out from Marvel, they are all white folks. Even the Avengers is made up of a superhero team of white people. Yes, Nick Fury is black, but not really. I mean, it's the same situation as when they made Kingpin black in Daredevil. Yes, the actor was black, but the character is white. They just changed his skin colour, but the character was caucasian at heart. Nick Fury in the comics is white, outside of the Ultimate books, and in the film he is black. Yet he is not ethnically black, similar to Kingpin in the movies. On the other hand, Blade is ethnically black, coming from a tough neighbourhood and living on the streets. Luke Cage is ethnically black,he grew up in harlem, so much so that casting a white actor in the role would be about as convincing as having Vanilla Ice in the role. Black Panther is ethnically black, as he hails from an African Nation.

On the other hand, Heimdall is being played by a black actor in Thor, and it does not matter if he were played by a black or white actor. Why? Because gods come in all shapes, sizes and colours. Just ask Ganesh and Vishnu. All some may look at the situation, seeing a blonde haired, blue eyed actor commanding a black man, and see racist connotations. Others are calling him a glorified bouncer.

But if we look at a situation last year, we had a black superhero in the form of war machine. Yes, one can say he is a sidekick, but the current output has very little for multi cultural audiences to identify with. One could literally look at the films and say "They're all about whitey saving the world". It has been quite some times since we got a comic book hero who was anything other than white. The last Blade movie came out in 2004, and sucked. Hancock was a hero created for film who had not existed up until then, but the movie was terribly flawed.
Book of Eli-same story, a flawed movie. Yet why are Marvel and DC not trying to get more of their minority characters onto the big screen, or small screen, and putting in just as much effort as they do for their caucasian characters? Black Panther was pretty much a webcomic or motion comic or web animation from 10 years ago, and the animation would not have been accepted then, yet they used this animation in a full fledged series. Huh?
Why are so many shows aimed at minorities often badly animated or written? The only exceptions I can think of to this rule are the Boondocks and Static Shock.

And now there is talk of a live action remake of Akira. And guess what? The entire film is being whitewashed. Even George Takei has spoken out about this. All of the articles relating to the topic of casting the main actors are citing white actors only. Its becoming a joke. I mean, many of us laughed when we saw Robert Downey Jr playing an actor who blacked up to play a character on film, but when when Angelina Jolie was blacked up for 'A Mighty Heart' a year or two beforehand, it was not so funny. And the movie bombed because of it. And it is becoming a far bigger problem, as less and less roles are availabe for actors who are not white, and those that are available are sub par (check out The Last Airbender movie last year, to see a plethora of multicultural actors wasted in a movie nobody wanted to see). I mean, we all had heroes to look up to when we were kids, and many of us looked to the actor with our shade of skin colour. But what characters and heroes are there for minorities to look to for role models?
The first Star Wars films had Lando Calrissian, and Darth Vader (the prequels had no heroes. Just bland characters and lousy villains). Star Trek had Uhura and Ensign Sulu. Next Generation had Worf and Geordi LaForge. Deep Space Nine even had an African American captain of the ship, as well as Dr Bashir and Keiko O'Brien.
Yet how, in these supposed liberated times, are there such a deficit of minority heroes? Nearly all of them are sidekicks, not the lead characters.

Oh god, Rant over. Sorry bout that.