honestly the more i hear of the latest endeavors, especially the Fantastic Beasts movies, the more i'm really glad i fell out of hardcore love with the Harry Potter series in high school and stopped holding JK Rowling as a serious amazing role model years and years ago
i'm not sure i'll ever watch the Fantastic Beasts movies to be honest, i keep sort of meaning to, but the first one just makes my brain pull up a BSOD when i remember one of the critiques of it:
a story set in Harlem in the 1920s with like.... no black people....
what the fuck lol
i mean, the obvious racism aside - and i am aware that i can only say that sitting on my fucking THRONE of wypipo privilege - ISN'T THAT THE EXCITING PART OF THE SETTING?
a story set in harlem in the 1920s, but a harlem that has no black people in it, is just... it's bizarre. it's creepy. i don't understand why you would choose that setting and then leave out the interesting bit.
so part of me is very angry at the racism on display, but another part of me is continually going apeshit about how it seems like everyone went out of their way to write in a far more fucking boring time. like it's not just morally wrong, but it's storytelling that expends a lot more effort in order to be incredibly bland. the flavor, the meat of it, the exciting stuff was RIGHT THERE, and there was a heavy detour to AVOID THE INTERESTING STUFF????
ETERNAL SCREAMING. I DON'T FUCKEN GET IT YALL
it's like going and ordering a beautiful birthday cake, fussing about the flavor combinations, doing extended taste testing, and so on, paying for the wonderful expensive cake, bringing it out at a party, having everyone cheer and line up for the cake to be cut after lighting all the candles and singing,
and then removing one birthday candle, licking the frosting off the bottom, and tossing the entire cake into the trash.
?????????????????? WHY