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by Matt Goldberg Posted:June 19th, 2009 at 1:28 pm
So the LA Press caught “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” last night and reactions were decidedly mixed but there was an apparently unanimous opinion that it is bugfuck insane. Movieline [via ThePlaylist] compiled a list of nine shameless moments from just the first hour of the film and this one jumped out at me:
2. There are two robots in the film called Mudflap and Skids, and despite being red and green, respectively, they are voiced in a way that clearly designates them to be the “black” robots. Also, Skids has a gold front tooth (no, I’m serious) and both cannot read.
That is just magical. I can’t believe Michael Bay got away with that in not only a mainstream movie, but a massive summer blockbuster. But it’s not just magically incredible but inevitable because racism is not new to Bay’s movies. Almost all of his films have a sassy black person (preferably as an overweight black woman, but men will suffice). Even “The Island”, which is Bay’s futile attempt at a cerebral sci-fi flick, has a sassy black receptionist working at the cloning facility. It’s almost become a signature. Sam Raimi has his ‘73 Olds, Alfred Hitchcock had cameos, and Michael Bay has African-Americans that will respond to Earth-shattering events with sassy wisdom. I’m convinced if he could have gotten away with it, he would have had a large black woman shaking her fist and yelling at the Japanese bomber planes in “Pearl Harbor”.
Of course, in the first “Transformers” movie we had the Autobot “Jazz” who schucked, jived, and then was promptly ripped in half by Megatron. It was…awkward. And I’m sure folks will be quick to point out that Bay’s films contain positive black characters (or positive black men; his only leading black female character was Gabrielle Union in “Bad Boys II” and even she ends up as a damsel in distress when the “shit got real”) but they don’t magically negate the negative racial stereotypes of African-Americans in his movies. I’m not trying to be the political-correctness police (nor would I want to be because I find obscene racial stereotypes hilarious in their absurdity and shameful to those who would use them) and I don’t think Bay is personally racist (it’s hard to succeed in the modern world if you’re a hardcore racist), but I think, at least as far as this one aspect of “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” goes (and I personally haven’t seen the film but remain optimistic towards it), I think Bay may have gone right past “bravado” and tumbled right into “embarrassing”.
@fish, Hello there, Michael Bay.
Racism? Oh, please… This is really a pathetic way of bashing Michael Bay movies. Now in order to make the movie fail at the box office competitors are pushing so called professional critics to spread the lie of Transformers2 being racist?? And everytime the silly argument of "poor blacks"… They are aliens! So nowadays only black skinned people do rap? In which world do you live, really, are you still in the '60s? (and it wasn't really true back then anyway).
On Transformers movies it's full of black and hispanic people. Where is racism then? Alien metal lifeforms that don't even have a skin nor a fixed colour would be "poor blacks" ?
Black people should feel articles like this with these silly arguments to bash the movie to be really offensive instead.
You don't really understand anthropomorphization, do you. It's okay, it's a big word. It means that you put uniquely human characteristics on a non-human creatures.
And I actually love Michael Bay movies (except for "The Island" and "Pearl Harbor" which require subtlety and that's just not in his wheelhouse), but this isn't a stretch to see a racial stereotype here.
Oh, and no one's trying to drive down the box office of the film. Why would critics even care about that?
Actually you are assuming they are black, You assume that black people act like that since you are contextualising their background ;p Others could contextualise them as a different race of people ;p
Yes! I have not seen the movie yet, but I’m here to see if i heard any buzz outside of pissed African Americans on twitter. Last night my 1st Transormer tweet was from a latino who twitted in the movie theatre that they have racist based robots…one with a gold tooth and both speaking 1970’s jive talk, and cannpt read! I thought the guy was exaggerting. Then today every AA who saw it has been embarrased and pissed! Sad that some whites don’t understand how we feel. Having 2 stereotypical ghetto based Robots in 2009 is just GD uncalled for! I’ve been quiet on this crap for years! But it sucks! I cannot enjoy a damn ROBOT movie now! UUUUUUUUUGH!!!!!!!!!! And yes! I thought Jazz was a buffoon in last movie, but was quiet about it! I knew then, and now Michael Bay has confirmed his intentions! If we spoke up then, this would not be an issue now! Darn! When will we African American not need that idiot Al Sharpton! uh i know, when the average white Joe can see subtle racism and shut it down before it get public, because it offends him too! Now I’m scared to see movie! I wanted to enjoy myself! Ishhhh!
I would like to know if any actual African-Americans have complained about this? Because it seems to me that you have to be a little racist yourself to see racism there in the first place. My friend at work (who is of Indian descent) was complaining a couple of weeks ago about how dangerous political correctness is for people like him. He mentioned how even though it's ultra-pc white people that insist on saying things like 'Happy Holidays' instead of 'Happy Christmas', racists still take it out on people like him. The funny thing about Jar Jar Binks was; the person that played him (who was African-American) didn't think he was a stereotype and neither did his co-star, Samuel L. Jackson, but miraculously a lot of white people managed to look at an Orange skinned, floppy eared amphibian that sounded like Woody Allen on dope and somehow see a Jamaican stereotype. Says more about them than George Lucas (whose GF is… African-American, BTW).
I am african-american and very annoyed by the obvious racism in the movie. There is racism in alot of movies and it’s sometimes pretty fun but this is tasteless and inappropriate. Usually I let it go but while taking my seven year old daughter to see this movie, I was shocked. Movies for adults is one this but let’s save the racism for an audience that can understand it and not affected by it in the long run. By the way, people will do anything for money even if it includes hurting someone else, including their own race. The fact that black people continue to show up in tv and movies and help continue bashing their own race for money is another issue.
I have to say that I am not surprised. I am not African American and I am not the PC police. In fact, political correctness in general annoys me. However, I was aghast to see how horribly ignorant Transformers was about ethnicities especially to African Americans. Anthony Anderson’s character was a cliche-ridden stereotype and weren’t we all laughing when an Indian phone operator picked up the phone with his accentuated accent? There were so many examples of this and the point that this article made about Jazz was right on cue. I couldn’t believe that the only black Autobot was ripped to shreds. It was awkward and disturbing. Obviously Transformers won’t go out to say anything directly negative about blacks. But I think the general audience can pick up on these “subtle” and “subcontextual” messages. It’s just disgusting.
@CILZ I guess we are assuming they are black because there are so many stereotypes of black people out there to choose from. I am an african american and I do not go overboard and object to every ridiculous thing I see and believe me there are many, this however is outright ridiculous and so blatant. I guess I am playing into the stereotype by wanting to punch Michael Bay in his hack face.
I love how this is somehow the author’s fault. That Bay didn’t put these characters into the movie, he’s the one projecting his racism on these characters! So what if they seem stereotypical, because if you think they’re racist, YOU’RE the one at fault for seeing it!
Seriously? Not everything in this bright world of ours is a fucking Rorschach’s test.
And yeah, I nailed the Jazz thing right from the get-go. It’s still a sticking point with how the characters are portrayed in the first movie, as broad stereotypes, and it’s going to be a sticking point with this one as well. Granted, Jazz in the cartoon, as voiced by Scatman Crothers, wasn’t exactly Nelson Mandela or anything, but it was not as broad as Jazz was in the movie, or as broad as these apparently are going to be.
I am so sick of whites saying that Black people are being over sensitive when we point out the obvious! The frigging robots have exaggerated features, gold teeth and sound Black! And while we are on Jazz, it’s funny how the Autobots can repair one another but not bring back Jazz.
Just because some sell out Blacks look the other way for money like Sam Jackson, Tiger Woods etc doesn’t mean it’s not racist
Things like that you can’t take to seriously …
I feel like those characters are not black not even a race ..
They represent something that I’am not..so I am not offended.
I actually know people who act like that.. (black white Mexican).. it’s not a race…. It’s a personality…
If you don’t present yourself in this manner.. why would you be upset
itzzz,amazing
No in this instance I was definately not looking for racism. I was expecting giant robots smashing shit up. I got that and then I was given two stereotypical ghetto youths with gold teeth, bad dialogue, no education ( they openly admit to not being able to read anything, not just ancient Cybertonian) and to top it all off, faces that I felt looked abit like chimps.