Posts Tagged ‘Racism’

Even Obama isn't safe from Japanese 'comedy'.

Capcom isn’t ignorant. It makes entertainment media for the world market and is aware of the issues involved; but maybe not fully. No matter how much you educate yourself on the subtleties of issues as historical and as deeply felt as race you can never truly appreciate it without living it. Resident Evil 5′s imagery does contain negative or offensive implications to some, but I suspect all of the scenes people are reacting to are iconic images drawn from other media (primarily cinema). The white muscle bound hero, the zombies in African tribal ware, the rioting mob even the (incredibly out of place) victimisation of a white blonde woman are all Hollywood tropes. While any individual element could be dismissed or explained the cumulative effect of all of them viewed concurrently become difficult to ignore. Capcom’s awareness drove them to create their paper thin narrative explanations for their design choices, but these became thinner with each passing digression.

Let’s face it this isn’t the first time Capcom has made use of racial iconography.

Darren takes on the iPhone discussion, yet some how manages to keep it retro with Pole Position and Wonder Boy. I try to keep things more current we head back to Resident Evil 5 and rub on a little Madworld. Then we avoid talking about the Watchmen.