Maybe I'm being too generous, but I've always seen Holden as at least partly Asian / East-Asian. In-universe he has the DNA of 12 different adults, but I concede that he looks pretty white.
Personally, where I had seen whiteness as a subject (if at all) was in Amos and (in season 4) Murty, as acknowledging whiteness as a colonialism and brutality hidden by marks of authority.
In general, Season 4 is a bit more relevant. Although both the "official," corporate interests and the refugee-coded settlers are ethnically diverse, the Belters are much *more* diverse and the corporatists are strongly coded white. In general I feel that season did a good job of threading a needle between current issues and the theoretical potential issues of the show's premise.
The actor Steven Strait is white; he has some Italian heritage which may be why he reads possibly POC? obviously if they wanted a non white actor they could have cast one though.
Amos is I think insistently positioned as a servant/retainer/bodyguard, not as an authority figure. There's maybe something about working class whiteness there, but I don't think it's very thoughtful if so. haven't gotten to season 4 yet so I can't speak to that!
Reading this, I started thinking of Chloe Bennet (Skye/Daisy in MARVEL AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.)—who is originally presented as White though the actor herself is mixed-race Chinese/Anglo-American (her birth name is "Chloé Wang", and she was a pop singer under her birth name in China when she was younger). As the series went on, her mixed-race parentage became more overt, and they had her dealing more with Ming-Na Wen's Melinda May.
I remember saying the show could use more non-White representation in Season 1, then somebody pointed out to me Bennet's heritage.
Thanks for the excellent piece. Worth noting that in the books, the Belters are very tall and very lanky, so much so that any real amount of gravity is too much for them. The show had to find real 21st-century actors, so no weirdly shaped Belters who couldn’t even handle visiting Earth.
I'll be interested to hear, as you continue to watch later series, whether your analysis changes. It's always going to be a space opera, whose basic trope is good vs evil, but as I recall it gets more complicated than it first appears.
I have watched the first two seasons and especially in the first season I was uncomfortable with the depiction of the UN woman as heartless and brutal. Her character improved in the second season, but I agree with your point that there’s plenty of people who don’t need more reasons to dislike the UN and women. I have been considering watching more seasons. I like the mystery of the substance, the name of which I can’t remember as it’s been a couple of years since I watched it. Will you be watching and writing more about it?
I love sci fi and I tried to watch this because so many people recommended it but all this stuff really bugged me (in a more inchoate way than you describe) so I couldn’t get into it.
that's interesting; they may play up Holden's fame less in the tv show. there is still that dynamic where he's the most important one for reasons that are very unclear though.
Maybe I'm being too generous, but I've always seen Holden as at least partly Asian / East-Asian. In-universe he has the DNA of 12 different adults, but I concede that he looks pretty white.
Personally, where I had seen whiteness as a subject (if at all) was in Amos and (in season 4) Murty, as acknowledging whiteness as a colonialism and brutality hidden by marks of authority.
In general, Season 4 is a bit more relevant. Although both the "official," corporate interests and the refugee-coded settlers are ethnically diverse, the Belters are much *more* diverse and the corporatists are strongly coded white. In general I feel that season did a good job of threading a needle between current issues and the theoretical potential issues of the show's premise.
The actor Steven Strait is white; he has some Italian heritage which may be why he reads possibly POC? obviously if they wanted a non white actor they could have cast one though.
Amos is I think insistently positioned as a servant/retainer/bodyguard, not as an authority figure. There's maybe something about working class whiteness there, but I don't think it's very thoughtful if so. haven't gotten to season 4 yet so I can't speak to that!
Reading this, I started thinking of Chloe Bennet (Skye/Daisy in MARVEL AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.)—who is originally presented as White though the actor herself is mixed-race Chinese/Anglo-American (her birth name is "Chloé Wang", and she was a pop singer under her birth name in China when she was younger). As the series went on, her mixed-race parentage became more overt, and they had her dealing more with Ming-Na Wen's Melinda May.
I remember saying the show could use more non-White representation in Season 1, then somebody pointed out to me Bennet's heritage.
Thanks for the excellent piece. Worth noting that in the books, the Belters are very tall and very lanky, so much so that any real amount of gravity is too much for them. The show had to find real 21st-century actors, so no weirdly shaped Belters who couldn’t even handle visiting Earth.
they do say that belters can't handle earth's gravity...but yeah, they don't try to make them physically different.
I'll be interested to hear, as you continue to watch later series, whether your analysis changes. It's always going to be a space opera, whose basic trope is good vs evil, but as I recall it gets more complicated than it first appears.
I have watched the first two seasons and especially in the first season I was uncomfortable with the depiction of the UN woman as heartless and brutal. Her character improved in the second season, but I agree with your point that there’s plenty of people who don’t need more reasons to dislike the UN and women. I have been considering watching more seasons. I like the mystery of the substance, the name of which I can’t remember as it’s been a couple of years since I watched it. Will you be watching and writing more about it?
I seem to be hooked for now! So may write more about it...
the substance is the protomolecule, fwiw.
I love sci fi and I tried to watch this because so many people recommended it but all this stuff really bugged me (in a more inchoate way than you describe) so I couldn’t get into it.
that's interesting; they may play up Holden's fame less in the tv show. there is still that dynamic where he's the most important one for reasons that are very unclear though.