Amandla Stenberg And The “Titans Effect”

I wasn’t going to do any more Star Wars than we were already getting from Nutsa’s reviews in the Daily Video, but something interesting crossed my path.

The Acolyte was not well received by classic Star Wars fans. They pointed to lore breaks, bad writing, a poor attempt to make the Sith the real heroes and the Jedi the baddies, which backfired because between “The Stranger” and the not-Nightsisters they actually looked rather bad. (Yes, I know the not-Nightsisters didn’t call themselves Sith, but like the actual Nightsisters, these knock-offs seemed to use the Dark Side, so I’m counting it.) And of course it was blamed on “toxic fans”, bigotry, and everything else they could use to hide the real complaints: the writing and direction, plus the acting, but I haven’t seen any of them in better roles to know if they’re any good. All I hear about is the dude who used to be in Squid Games was good as Master Sol, but even if I had Netflix, that’s not my kind of show.

Of course, Amandla Stenberg, the actress also known for an anti-fan “diss track”, took to social media to blame the “alt-right” for the show’s cancelation, the supposed minority perspective that somehow had the power to get the show canceled simply by not watching it. It’s funny because when the “other side” claims majority status (probably in Hollywood but not necessarily in the real world) they reject the idea that a minority could influence such things simply by taking charge of the outlet of shows, movies, and other media.

I’m going to bounce off a video by YouTube channel Midnight’s Edge, going over what Stenberg said. However, it seems host Andre doesn’t have my perspective on what’s wrong here…and why I can point to the failed attempt at DC’s Titans as an example of why she has that perspective.

I’m going to start by simply copy/pasting what I put in the comments, because it’s appropriate and what convinced me to make this article more than the video itself:

I can actually describe the problem without going into “wokeness”, though we’ll come back to that. Stenberg isn’t a Star Wars fan. She doesn’t care about the characters, themes, tones, or anything else about Star Wars that the fans do. She saw a role she wanted to play or someone she wanted to work with, and went for it. I first realised this mindset in Hollywood with the Titans show, where the actors couldn’t understand why fans hated it, because they saw characters or character types they wanted to play and enjoyed playing with no understanding of why fans of the characters found the show to be an insult, so they took it personally. They don’t connect with media the way we do, and they’re too insulated from the world to understand it.

Now, add being an activist for this or that cause into the mix. They get to represent (insert allegedly repressed social group here), believe it’s absolutely necessary, still don’t understand the themes of the original, and get to represent their group or some group they decided needed more representation regardless of whether it makes sense in the source material they’re adapting. Now they take it not only personally but as an attack on that group, and lash out even harder. That’s the problem right there, an already bad perspective made worse by activism.

Building on that, here’s comments I made on another video by Eric “YoungRippa59” July and Az “The Silverback” from Heel Vs. Babyface (will start playing when the page opens in a new tab) when they discussed the show’s failings and how the fans were being blamed for not supporting the show.

What’s funny to me is how often they claim to be the majority, demonstrating the power they have to control things, refusing to believe a minority could have that kind of influence. Then when the actual majority nopes out they insist we’re still the minority opinion that somehow has the power to influence a company they basically command to drop a show they support…while not actually supporting it by taking time to watch it or even have it on in the background while they dust or something. It’s just they still haven’t left high school and hate the nerdy geek kids, so the everything for meeeeeeeeeeee crowd must turn that popular thing into what they like.

This could be directed at the Titans actors, or the Acolyte actors.

If an actor is only interested in working with that director, playing that character type, pushing that cause, or anything else that isn’t trying to create a good experience for fans and casual viewers alike, you get something destined to fail. As I went over yesterday in talking about the Sonic movies and the new trailer for the third film, you can make something for the fans while appealing to a broader audience. However, said audience has to be interested in that type of movie to begin with. No matter how good a horror movie is, it’s never going to cater to what I want to see in a movie, nor should it. It would stop being a horror movie, or at least one horror movie lovers would want to see. Instead, make a horror movie for horror movie fans, without losing some casual viewer who might want to try it out because a favorite actor/actress is in the cast, or they’re just in the mood for something scary at the moment, or got dragged in by friends/significant other and might still enjoy it in spite of not being their usual genre.

The actors aren’t at fault for the depiction on screen, which granted is what complaining fans should keep in mind. That goes to the directors and screenwriters, and even the casting people who put the wrong person in the wrong role. Think George Clooney as Batman, directed by the wrong director simply for being the opposite of the director that lost the kid audience. It’s putting their ego and “my story” instead of the characters’ story in front of the fans’ experience, and not surprisingly the fans respond by going back to the depictions that made them fans instead, since they have that option.

What the actors can be blamed for is listening to the Hollywood echo chamber when it comes to why fans are upset. They won’t look at actual fan responses, or are already biased to assume all the negative responses come from actual bigots (which funnily enough is a minority opinion), so they miss the actual issues. They care more about their experience than what the fans of the franchise want or expect, which on the surface I’m not against, but the willing ignorance instead of reaching out to critics to find out what their actual complaint is to think about in the future, when they had so much enjoyment making the show or playing the character or supporting a cause they believe in that week. If that’s all you care about, you shouldn’t be working on an adaptation. If you want your audience to empathise with you or your character, you have to return the favor.

I’m going to start calling this mindset the “Titans Effect”, as you probably guessed from the article title. It didn’t start there, but it is the place when I first noticed this problem. I’m not against an actor wanting to play a certain character or character type, or wanting to work with a particular performer or director, or in a certain genre because they think it will boost their career. Ultimately, the failing of the adaptation is on the director, producer, showrunner, and writer. I will, however, take the actor or actress to task for not taking the time to understand the source material (even when told not to), and at the very least understanding why the fans are unhappy with their performance and the adaptation as a whole regardless of the works’ quality as an original production…because it isn’t an original production. They told us “this is totally a Star Wars product” or “this is our version of the Titans” and the fans felt lied to for the sake of using a brand to get butts in seats watching their show that they considered more important than getting the adaptation right. Even if The Acolyte has been good it wouldn’t be Star Wars to the fans who want to cheer on Jedi against evil and see the expanded Star Wars Galaxy beyond the usual characters. Dark Horse Comics did a great job with that. This was not up to their standards. If you don’t want to learn why, don’t blame them for not showing up when even the people who supposedly support the show didn’t do so with their viewership.