But I think it's fair to let people be disappointed when an adaptation of a character drops their only real visual trademark. I think that's a valid criticism to make.
I think that's fair too, and I think a lot of that
has happened in the thread.
The unfairness starts to settle in when people respond to those complaints with
their concerns, and those concerns get summarily dismissed as basically crying for attention or jumping at shadows (or virtue signalling or SJWing or whatever thoughtless buzzword of choice can get coughed up in place of critical thought).
Like I said upthread:
People hitting this solely from the single, superficial "mah comix" angle aren't wrong to do so. It's understandable. But when other people respond with something more nuanced than
that single aspect as a means to either counter those complaints, or support their own opinions separate from those complaints, conversation completely breaks down because the "mah comix" guys don't wanna hear any of that shit, and don't appreciate that you brought it up in the first place.
They get defensive. They don't
need to, but they do, because it seems like on some level they recognize the argument they're seeing has validity, but they don't wanna engage with it beyond "mah comix" and they feel forced into it, and that's when the indignance and annoyance sets in, usually in the form of "Oh, now I can't like it and not be a racist/sexist whatever. That's fair. Sure. Thanks."
I saw the Wonder Woman example get brought up earlier, and yeah, people complained that she didn't look like the Wonder Woman from 'mah comix' and in some ways, yes she does, and in other ways, no she doesn't. And in those conversations, a very similar divide broke out, where people were addressing those superficial complaints with "okay, but here are the things this addresses w/r/t body issues, image issues, these aspects of sexuality/femininity/etc" got summarily dismissed and cast as crybabies and outrage addicts for no other reason than it was easier to do so. To hear/listen/consider those other arguments (not even to agree with them, just to
take them into consideration) means its not as easy to simply point at a panel and go 'mah comix' and
pretend that importance trumps all.
And for a lot of people, the simplicity of elevating the superficial to prime importance is part of the reason they "escape" into genre fiction in the first place. So when those elements get brought into their longbox, they get upset and start projecting about outrage and such.
The adaptation of Domino to live action isn't all that out of bounds. It seems as if the director/producers have put a lot of thought into why she is who she is, and why she looks the way she does. Unfortunately, that look doesn't align one to one with any of the previous versions of the character that's existed (in varying different designs over the years) in mah comix. But fortunately, it's a look that seems to work very well for Zazie Beetz, who is a very good actor.
"I wish she looked more like the comic" is a valid take.
"I don't wanna hear anything about it that goes any deeper than that and you need to stop bringing it up" is not as valid.
