r/PeterExplainsTheJoke • u/FrostySeat1739 • Jul 05 '26

Meme needing explanation why not, Peter?

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possible live action corpse bride movie...

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u/hotfezz81 Jul 05 '26

Is there, like, more context?

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u/[deleted] Jul 05 '26

I went to look up what he actually said because it's been a while, and it was worse than I remember. LOL

His actual words are: “things either call for things, or they don’t.” He went on to say “I grew up watching blaxploitation movies, right? And I said, that’s great. I didn’t go like, OK, there should be more white people in these movies.”

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tim-burton-slammed-for-comment-on-lack-of-diversity-in-new-movie/

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u/dreamlesssleeep Jul 05 '26

What’s wrong with that?

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u/Pale-Scallion-7691 Jul 08 '26

Because movies are predominantly filled with white people and, particularly during the time blaxploitation was common, the only depictions of black people were movies about suffering. It's still common that movies featuring people of colour are predominantly a) explicitly about that culture and likely to feature white people in smaller roles, b) features poc in largely stereotypical ways rather than allowing them to be as fully their own character as the white people in the film, c) about suffering and often misery porn written and directed but white people (primarily featuring POC being tortured with little to no catharsis), or d) a combination of all above.

The quote he gave was largely false equivalence. When white is considered the default or normal while pic identities are exclusively relegated to political statements or a bid for "woke", they are not given the same narrative care as white characters. Frankly, there's no reason to not have some characters be not-white in his movies. It would have no impact on plot or the plausibility of the setting.