6 ms·

China doesn't have anyone in the board of Hollywood production houses either and yet I learnt right here from HN that there are no Chinese villains or bad portr

China doesn't have anyone in the board of Hollywood production houses either and yet I learnt right here from HN that there are no Chinese villains or bad portrayal of China anymore. Irrespective of the money they received if they plan to bring Reddit to China, Reddit will be washed clean to Chinese specifications.

kingbirdy 8y ago
Reddit can (relatively) easily filter content to get past the great firewall, without affecting what's shown outside of China. It's much harder to have one version of a movie in China and one with a different ethnicity of villain elsewhere, hence making the movies as broadly suitable as possible.
TheOperator 8y ago
>I learnt right here from HN that there are no Chinese villains or bad portrayal of China anymore. That has more to do with the Chinese box office being a 9 billion a year market than it does Chinese investors.
- jandrese 8y ago
  This is what they call soft power.
- moorhosj 8y ago
  Does it? The US market is greater than $10 billion and there are plenty of movies that portray Americans as bad guys. Seems more like the government of China might not allow that movie to be released in the first place.
  - dx87 8y ago
    The difference is that it's an American movie with an American bad guy. Take a look at the Chinese movie poster for "The Force Awakens", they minimized the presence of the black character because they knew he wouldn't be popular with Chinese audiences. https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2015/12/star-wars-china-poster-controversy.jpg https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2015/12/star-wars-chi...
    - azeotropic 8y ago
      Just curious -- Is Finn actually popular with any audiences? Aren't minor villains from the original trilogy more popular than Finn?
      - basil-rash 8y ago
        Nobody knew that they didn't like Finn before the movie even came out though. This is TFA, not TLJ.
        azeotropic 8y ago
        The TFA release date for China was almost one month after the rest of the world. Plenty of time to realize nobody really likes Finn,and adjust marketing accordingly.
        intertextuality 8y ago
        > Plenty of time to realize nobody really likes Finn [Citation needed] [Substantiation needed to show that marketing materials for films can be changed that quickly]
        azeotropic 8y ago
        Finn is consistently less popular than Grand Moff Tarkin and Boba Fett. I've even seen him ranked below Darth Maul, who doesn't even really have a personality at all. It's a poster. You take it to a printing press and ask for a few thousand new ones, it's NBD. If they didn't already have several alternate designs from before they selected this one, it's like an hour of mucking around in adobe CS to make Finn smaller and droids bigger, less if you have the original images on hand.
      - FiddlyPack 8y ago
        Wow, people don’t like Finn? This is not sarcasm, I am truly surprised. I thought he was a fantastic rebirth of the Han Solo ethos. I love him.
  - b_tterc_p 8y ago
    To white Americans, white Americans are normal people. It is unremarkable when they play any role. I’m sure China features plenty of movies featuring evil Chinese people.
shaki-dora 8y ago
Is it really that bad if Hollywood is somewhat discouraged from following the latest villain-du-jour trend? As a German, it became somewhat tiresome in the 80s, although we obviously still deserved it (and much more). Then 9/11 got others into the hot seat for a decade. This being fiction, any decision to give your villains some distinct national or ethnic identity seems suspect. I guess it’s fine, or at least necessary, I’d the fabric of the plot (Godfather, or that series where Hitler had won WW2). But if it just serves to tell apart good and bad guys by their accent (Die Hard), it seems like entirely unnecessary vilification.
diminoten 8y ago
I strongly urge you not to learn things here. At best, have your curiousity piqued here, and go learn elsewhere.

kingbirdy 8y ago

Reddit can (relatively) easily filter content to get past the great firewall, without affecting what's shown outside of China. It's much harder to have one version of a movie in China and one with a different ethnicity of villain elsewhere, hence making the movies as broadly suitable as possible.

TheOperator 8y ago

>I learnt right here from HN that there are no Chinese villains or bad portrayal of China anymore. That has more to do with the Chinese box office being a 9 billion a year market than it does Chinese investors.

jandrese 8y ago
This is what they call soft power.
moorhosj 8y ago
Does it? The US market is greater than $10 billion and there are plenty of movies that portray Americans as bad guys. Seems more like the government of China might not allow that movie to be released in the first place.
- dx87 8y ago
  The difference is that it's an American movie with an American bad guy. Take a look at the Chinese movie poster for "The Force Awakens", they minimized the presence of the black character because they knew he wouldn't be popular with Chinese audiences. https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2015/12/star-wars-china-poster-controversy.jpg https://pmcvariety.files.wordpress.com/2015/12/star-wars-chi...
  - azeotropic 8y ago
    Just curious -- Is Finn actually popular with any audiences? Aren't minor villains from the original trilogy more popular than Finn?
    - basil-rash 8y ago
      Nobody knew that they didn't like Finn before the movie even came out though. This is TFA, not TLJ.
      - azeotropic 8y ago
        The TFA release date for China was almost one month after the rest of the world. Plenty of time to realize nobody really likes Finn,and adjust marketing accordingly.
        intertextuality 8y ago
        > Plenty of time to realize nobody really likes Finn [Citation needed] [Substantiation needed to show that marketing materials for films can be changed that quickly]
        azeotropic 8y ago
        Finn is consistently less popular than Grand Moff Tarkin and Boba Fett. I've even seen him ranked below Darth Maul, who doesn't even really have a personality at all. It's a poster. You take it to a printing press and ask for a few thousand new ones, it's NBD. If they didn't already have several alternate designs from before they selected this one, it's like an hour of mucking around in adobe CS to make Finn smaller and droids bigger, less if you have the original images on hand.
    - FiddlyPack 8y ago
      Wow, people don’t like Finn? This is not sarcasm, I am truly surprised. I thought he was a fantastic rebirth of the Han Solo ethos. I love him.
- b_tterc_p 8y ago
  To white Americans, white Americans are normal people. It is unremarkable when they play any role. I’m sure China features plenty of movies featuring evil Chinese people.

shaki-dora 8y ago

Is it really that bad if Hollywood is somewhat discouraged from following the latest villain-du-jour trend? As a German, it became somewhat tiresome in the 80s, although we obviously still deserved it (and much more). Then 9/11 got others into the hot seat for a decade. This being fiction, any decision to give your villains some distinct national or ethnic identity seems suspect. I guess it’s fine, or at least necessary, I’d the fabric of the plot (Godfather, or that series where Hitler had won WW2). But if it just serves to tell apart good and bad guys by their accent (Die Hard), it seems like entirely unnecessary vilification.

diminoten 8y ago

I strongly urge you not to learn things here. At best, have your curiousity piqued here, and go learn elsewhere.