7 Times Hollywood Whitewashed (And Straightwashed) Comic Book Characters
7. The Ancient One: Whitewashed
Marvel Studios
The most famous and indeed recent instance of whitewashing did, of course, come with 2016's Doctor Strange. British actress Tilda Swinton was cast in the role, who in the comics was originally a Tibetan Monk.
Granted, the original depiction of the character in the OG Strange series has faced its own fair share of criticism, but Marvel's decision to erase the character's Tibetan heritage felt calculated, and even cynical, with Robert Cargill in particular having surmised that the effort to change the character of the Ancient One came from the fear that China - itself having suppressed Tibet for decades - would ban the film from being screened.
It's no excuse, whichever way you look at it, especially in light of Marvel's other, more recent controversies...
WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well.
In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.
