Wednesday, February 14, 2018

Viewing intention

I've changed my mind - Black Panther has received such good reviews, with many noting that its funny in parts, that I've decided to see it.   Probably tomorrow night.

In other personal media consumption news:  am making my way through the second season of The Good Place, and am knocked over by how great and clever this reboot of season one continues to be.   One observation - the transformation of Jason (from silent, serious monk to dumbest doofus on TV) has given me some of the biggest laughs and perhaps deserves some sort of acting award.  (Some guy writes at length here as to why he also finds the character his favourite in the show.)    And here's the actor talking about the role - amusingly, he sees it as almost a breakthrough because it's the opposite of most Asian characters on TV and movies now:
Do you think Jason subverts stereotypes?
Definitely. I think when they were coming up with Jason/Jianyu, they were trying to figure out something different and one of the things that popped up was that you don’t really see a lot of dumb Asian guys on mainstream television. He’s usually intelligent or the model minority. I’m not saying playing Jason is pioneering, but it’s so great for me to do because it’s not a stereotype. Getting to put a bit of a twist on that and showing a different dynamic towards an Asian character is really cool. And I feel that the fans like the fact that I’m not some super-smart student.
You’re not the IT guy.
Exactly. And I’ve had my fair share of those, so I guess you just have to go through the ranks before you get to be Jason Mendoza.

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