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NEWS: Akira Toriyama Comments on Live-Action Dragonball Film

testor: testor:

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There is no "dangling participle" in the Japanese language.

Sentaku...

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Now this is really getting off topic, but Dean Cain, the tall, fit, good looking actor they casted as Superman in Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, was born Dean George Tanaka.

But he actually looks and talks like Superman. That white boy does not look like or sound like Goku.

But hey, SNL tried to use the same argument for why they couldn't get a black actor to play Obama. They said he was Japanese, so they weren't technically racist.

Nevertheless, I'll give you a freebie. Lana Lang is a Midwestern red-head; so why is she played by an Inuit-Chinese girl in Smallville? I'm guessing in that case, they wanted someone who actually looked like she had a small-town background, since there are so few of them nowadays in the States.

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You know, they casted an Asian man to play Spike Spiegel in the anime.

And American cartoons sometimes have white people voicing black people. What's your point? The difference is they're playing a voice, not the actual person. Plus, how many white people who are fluent in Japanese can also voice-act in it? That's a whole different skill in itself.

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But it was silly for Gatsu to claim "Hollywood can't allow Asians to direct or even star in Asian roles" in a thread about a Hollywood film directed by an Asian American with Asian and Asian-American actors.

It was silly, even though Cliff validated my argument. And you still haven't tried to counter my Avatar counter-argument, either. Anyway, the guy's not directing; he's subbing. A real director would take control of the project his way, not the studio's way. And the "actors"[I use the term loosely for most of them.] are being cast to read lines and fill parts, not to actually emulate their characters. If
they couldn't find anyone who didn't work on an American production, they'd cast white people in their place in a second, which is what happened in the case of Avatar.

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Goku is not a real baby boy name in Japan.

It's not a real baby boy name in America, either, but emo-boy has it anyway.

The different "sentaku" words in Japanese are nouns or participles, but they're not "dangling participles."

Anyways, back to your claim, "Goku" isn't a participle, dangling or not.

Now we're talking about acting and direction--but that's different from ascribing human ethnicities to alien characters.

Saturday Night Live performer Fred Armisen was born to parents of Caucasian, Japanese, and Venezuelan descent.

Smallville actress Kristin Kreuk is a Canadian of Dutch and Chinese ancestry. She is neither Inuit nor from the States.

As far as we know, Goku is not an "actual person."

We have an Asian actor playing a character named Spiegel, and we have a non-Asian actor playing a non-Human character who was originally named Kakarot. There is a discrepancy, but not the one you claim.

Anyways, Avatar has an Asian-American director, so even Avatar doesn't support this blanket statement.

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The different "sentaku" words in Japanese are nouns or participles, but they're not "dangling participles."

The ku is, though.

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Anyways, back to your claim, "Goku" isn't a participle, dangling or not.

Sengoku Wars?

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Now we're talking about acting and direction--but that's different from ascribing human ethnicities to alien characters.

Well, Goku still doesn't look like a white teenager, even if he's an alien. There's about one still shot at the wedding where you could argue he looks like that, and even then his hair is bushier than the guy they cast.

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Saturday Night Live performer Fred Armisen was born to parents of Caucasian, Japanese, and Venezuelan descent.

Yes, but the guy still isn't black.

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We have an Asian actor playing a character named Spiegel, and we have a non-Asian actor playing a non-Human character who was originally named Kakarot. There is a discrepancy, but not the one you claim.

The discrepancy is that one casting decision is based on a limited medium, while another is based on racial politics.

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Anyways, Avatar has an Asian-American director, so even Avatar doesn't support this blanket statement.

If he were a nobody, it'd be a different story. I'm guessing the only reason he even got his Sixth Sense gig was he could shoot it on the cheap.

We all have such low expectations about this movie that there is a good chance we'll be pleasantly surprised. Many great works of literature have been retelling (DB itself was a retelling of journey to the west) and ended up better known than the original, so who knows?

"The main reason why comics can’t work as films is largely because everybody who is ultimately in control of the film industry is an accountant. These people may be able to add up and balance the books, but in every other area they are stupid and incompetent and don’t have any talent"

Ladara7 wrote:

We all have such low expectations about this movie that there is a good chance we'll be pleasantly surprised. Many great works of literature have been retelling (DB itself was a retelling of journey to the west) and ended up better known than the original, so who knows?

Name several examples. Heck, name one from both TV and Movies that far surpassed the original.

CCSYueh wrote:

By that logic, any tall, fit, good looking actor of any race could be Supes. (I wonder how people feel or react if they cast a tall Asian guy as Superman in the next movie?

Now this is really getting off topic, but Dean Cain, the tall, fit, good looking actor they casted as Superman in Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, was born Dean George Tanaka. His father was Roger Tanaka, half-Japanese. "Cain" comes from his adoptive father.

Name several examples. Heck, name one from both TV and Movies that far surpassed the original.

How about when Goku stuffs himself with rice bowls?

Japanese guys do occasionally have 'fros, so that does not preclude Mr. Satan. Dunno who the hell Sharpner is, though-probably a supporting character.

But Vegeta's named after a Japanese garnish, and the names of his attacks can likely be attributed to the fact that he was not raised in an Asian culture.

But she barely does anything, anyway, so she's not important to the story.

testorschoice wrote:

CCSYueh wrote: By that logic... Now this is really getting off topic...

That was Cliff, not me.

when DB was a daily grind Toriyama put out to pay the bills. Legend was he was an unemployed graphic artist who didn't really read manga, but was sitting in a restaurant paging thru a manga zine & decided to enter a contest & happened to win. It's not like he grew up wanting to be a manga-ka, but it's something he fell into & was winging it. It's lucky for all of us he did enter that contest (although the DB haters probably wish he hadn't).

You can curse his editor forever for making DB a fighting title. It allegedly was not doing all that well in its first year (where they were searching for the Dragon Balls) & it was his editor who suggested he turn it into a fighting title like Fist of the North Star if he could.

And the point is people are taking this as if DB is something sacred like the Bible one can't make a movie version of (although all the movies I've seen made off the Bible change a certain amount of stuff) when DB was a daily grind Toriyama put out to pay the bills.