"Link up, family. Let's protect our sister." This is just one of the many tweets that have been posted since the announcement. Get ready for a rough ride.
6 July 2019 by Fachana Techamaneewat
Halle Bailey has just been cast for the role of the little mermaid in Disney’s The Little Mermaid live-action, and the public is freaking out. Why? Well, because she's black.
Already, an army of supporters is rushing to Twitter to voice their support and to prepare for the oncoming hurricane of hate that they believe will inevitably come.
After all, the little mermaid is an iconic character that everyone has grown up with. And with such a specific image in mind, fans of the tale will most likely react badly if the image was suddenly changed.
Heck, when Jennifer Lawrence was cast as Katniss Everdeen in the Hunger Games film series, fans were angry that she didn’t have the same hair colour as the character.
And now, according to fans, here is Disney changing the race of their beloved character.
Check out the tweets preparing for battle:
A lot of the tweets attempted to defend the casting by stating that the Little Mermaid is a mermaid, i.e., make-believe, so it doesn't actually matter what race the actress is, right?
A similar case to this is the recent casting of Starfire for the Teen Titans live-action. Both characters are clearly make-believe. The first character is a mermaid and the second is an alien, therefore, in theory, they can be of any colour or race.
That's not what some fans think.
Fans of the original tales are adamant for their iconic characters to remain the same.
...Similar to how different reboots and remakes of Superman all have similar looking actors.
So at the time, fans called for any chosen actress to resemble closely to the Starfire in the comics.
And then when Anna Diop, a black actress, was cast for Starfire, the backlash was so huge that she had to disable the comments on her Instagram posts and laid low in her social media platforms. And all this happened just last year.
And sadly, it appears that one year later, the same thing is happening again.
Racist hashtags have even been created with #arieliswhite, #notmyariel #arielisnotblack.
Not to mention some are even retaliating by trying to promote a white Pocahontas or white Tiana and are calling this 'colour washing'.
On the other hand, there are others who are protesting by calling for original stories that star coloured people. And not remakes of classic stories that were previously played by white people.
But.
Despite all the sea of negativity, there are a lot of people who are supportive of the casting and sending congratulatory tweets by the second.
And get this: even celebrities are joining in on the celebrations! Check it out:
The Little Mermaid is scheduled to begin production next year in April 2020.
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Fachana Techamaneewat is a news writer at Exclusive Hollywood and is responsible for researching and writing news articles while providing story updates wherever necessary.
Fun fact: On the weekends, she's an avid writer for practically anything. Her current obsession is the Umbrella Academy, and as of now, is writing a book.
