While I don't think the sidelining of Boyega and Tran is because they are POC, I don't have the anger at him for his statements that some fanboys seem to have.
I dont know, the picture that has been painted about Hollywood at the very least in the last 10 years...has been pretty bad in that sense.
I havent heard about any POC that never experienced some form of open racism etc for being POC.
But of course that doesnt mean it was the reason in this case...just that there is a pattern.
I still like Boyega. I admire his balls to be speaking out against Disney, even if I don't 100% agree with the way he's going about this. I do agree that the way Disney marketed the films and publicly patted themselves on the back for having a diverse cast completely set them up for this and deserves criticism. That part was corporate BS.
At the same time, I think he has a blind spot here because he personally likes JJ, even though I don't think JJ really did his character too many favors. By letting JJ off the hook while leaving Rian out to dry, I feel it's fanning the flames of the tired and exhausting fan wars, and also distracts from the issue he's talking about.
Speaking out against Disney is a huge deal and could easily ruin his career.
Because a black man fighting a company like Disney...puh that could easily backfire considering how big the Gloves are that Disney has.
Its good to speak out for sure, maybe not the best the way he did it...but how the hell do you tackle this in the first place.
Its no secret that Finn in TFA was going to the direction of being one of the main characters, everything they did in TFA, the marketing etc pointed that direction.
Then came TLJ and things changed, Rian pushed him away from the main plot and all to the point where ROS couldnt fix that.
But as with everything in this trilogy, there is no one person to blame...many things fell apart for many reasons.
Hamill has spoken of not exactly being happy with all the choices Rian made.
I've like Rian's work since Brick and felt much of the vitriol he received after The Last Jedi was overly harsh but I also feel that there has been a almost Zack Snyder like cult that sprung up around him that seems to be very condescending and paints anyone with issues about his film in the same category as those abusive trolls.
Like most things on the internet the moderate voices are drowned out by those on the extreme end of the scale.
I dont think anybody but Harrison Ford was really happy with the direction...that man didnt give a **** either way.
I do not think it was ever possible to really live up to what Star Wars built, so im not surprised if even the cast wasnt completely happy.
I think most people wanted something easy from the sequels, which TFA delivered for the most part.
Johnson however did with TLJ something rather brave to evolve star wars...which was rough for many reasons etc.
The idea Johnson had was good, but maybe he wanted too much...either way its done and no way to go back.
Where he loses me is when he implies Daisy and Adam’s characters where handled better from the start. I’m sorry, but that’s complete bull ****. Every character in this trilogy suffered because there was no fixed idea about who or what this trilogy was about. There’s not a single character arc that works across this series. Hell, no-one can even describe what the actual story of this trilogy is about. He’s entitled to feel how he feels but that doesn’t make what he feels to be true. The reality is Lucasfilm created a bunch of new characters that didn’t win over the public. Finn just happened to get caught up in that.
Yeah, i mean at least Kylo and Rey havent been sidelined that noticeably...but they werent handled that much better.
So that point he makes isnt really strong.
It is interesting that Rian Johnson seemed to have made no connections with any cast member during the filming of the Last Jedi. No one speaks fondly of him.
Could be because his approach and all was just too "controversal" for a Star Wars.
But he seems like a nice enough guy from what i gather, so i dont know.