‘Harry Potter’ HBO series eyes Paapa Essiedu for Severus Snape role

[littlepotter 74,657]

1 hour ago, SpadesToStart said:

The race thing aside, why are they casting such a beautiful man? Snape is the OG incel, he’s supposed to be kinda fugly

Like..?? regardless of race he just does not look like any iteration of snape. Obnoxious people being like "actually black people can have a pale complexion 🤓☝️" well this specific actor isn't so what now

[bpmMonkey 4,564]

1 hour ago, weed said:

Passive aggressive queen!

To my defense, I started venturing out in Vers territory !

[weed 71,983]

7 minutes ago, bpmMonkey said:

To my defense, I started venturing out in Vers territory !

Haha!

[HotLikeMexico 4,693]

I just don’t get why people get so bent out of shape over casting choices like this. If he’s nails the role why tf does it even matter. Like enjoy it or don’t. It’s not that serious. 

[Roughhouse Dandy 9,723]

Some of yall are so disappointing. Simply be normal for once when black people are the subject. It shouldn't be that difficult to do especially on this website but several of yall act like it's an impossible task. 

1 hour ago, littlepotter said:

Like..?? regardless of race he just does not look like any iteration of snape. Obnoxious people being like "actually black people can have a pale complexion 🤓☝️" well this specific actor isn't so what now

Makeup exists. And if they don't use makeup to give him a pale look it doesn't matter if he looks different anyway. If they miscast everyone and tank the show that's fine too. It's a TV show adapted from a children's book that's keeping an aggressively bigoted woman rich. 

[gumzy3000 7,022]

If it's based on a real life person then they need to respect the race of that said person. If it's a fictional character then we should have a lot more leeway in terms of that characters race, unless it explicitly states somewhere they look a certain way. It isn't that complicated people. 

Also, last time I checked, UK was a diverse nation with London being of the most multicultural cities in the world. 

If you feel uncomfortable about this casting, you are racist. 

[Ziggy 10,848]

Here’s my thing: just about ANY character could be made to flip races but I think Snape being white is pretty important. He’s a poor white person who above anything clings to wizard supremacy (which is an analog for white supremacy) as his dominance over petunia when they’re kids and as he’s treated like **** at school it makes him an incel type driven to wizard Hitler. I think dimensionally to his character him being white is more interesting *unless* you rewrite certain aspects of his story (not major but some). But like I said I think for nearly any other character race is irrelevant. But snape and the malfoy’s and Voldemort and bellatrix? I think being white is a very very integral piece of the characterization.

 

im not mad at all but i do think in a story about racial prejudice, race casting does legitimately play a role for certain characters (but if they do this he’s a great actor so thats fine also)

 

EDIT: I’ll happily hear if others think this better illuminates the character; maybe I’m not thinking hard enough on it! I think hermione is a case where being marginalized, making her Black amplifies a lot of the arcs of her story but for Snape it kinda muddles them imo. Death in Sandman is a great example where I felt the race of Death makes no difference so race shouldn’t have weight in casting. But I’m open to hearing different regarding snape   

Edited December 5, 2024 by Ziggy

[Creyk 17,358]

40 minutes ago, Roughhouse Dandy said:

And if they don't use makeup to give him a pale look it doesn't matter if he looks different anyway. If they miscast everyone and tank the show that's fine too.

Would you say this if they cast one of the black characters to be played by a white actor?

[Roughhouse Dandy 9,723]

11 minutes ago, Creyk said:

Would you say this if they cast one of the black characters to be played by a white actor?

If the color of a fictional person's skin is unimportant to their character, I'd feel similarly. Why does it matter? It doesn't. 

[littlepotter 74,657]

48 minutes ago, Roughhouse Dandy said:

Some of yall are so disappointing. Simply be normal for once when black people are the subject. It shouldn't be that difficult to do especially on this website but several of yall act like it's an impossible task. 

Makeup exists. And if they don't use makeup to give him a pale look it doesn't matter if he looks different anyway. If they miscast everyone and tank the show that's fine too. It's a TV show adapted from a children's book that's keeping an aggressively bigoted woman rich. 

How do you expect people to engage with you in a good faith conversation if you've just called them abnormal people beyond salvation just a sentence earlier? I truly couldn't give a damn about the show or who they cast but i said obviously people who do are going to disagree with the casting when you take a character who'd been described as literally pale sickly looking to the point of being colorless and give it to someone who doesn't fit that image in their head. Being condescending is not advancing any dialogue, just patting yourself on the back for being superior to "those racists" (while address a poc lmao). There's obviously going to be people motivated by pure racism but it's not right to paint everyone with a differing opinion with the same brush. For example i loved that they cast hermione as a black woman in the play (back when i still cared about the series before they were tarnished by the terf hag) because her description does fit that perfectly well.

[Roughhouse Dandy 9,723]

16 minutes ago, littlepotter said:

you've just called them abnormal people beyond salvation just a sentence earlier?

That's incorrect. I said *act* normal and some of yall *act* like it's impossible. I'm calling out gross actions and you're taking it as an inherent character trait. Which may or may not be the case for you but my words didn't mention any of that. You also quoted something about racism and I didn't call anyone racist. 

And I'm not expecting anyone to "engage with" me anyway. Idk where you're getting this stuff from. You're going into hyperdrive defending yourself against accusations that weren't pinned on you.

Edited December 5, 2024 by Roughhouse Dandy

[ThisGuyTony 29,389]

I haven’t read the books or seen the movies in years but I remember Snape being cold and unlikeable (in the beginning at least?)

Google said: “Appearance: Tall and lanky with greasy black hair that frames his face, sallow skin, a large hooked nose, and uneven yellow teeth 

Personality: Cold, calculating, precise, sarcastic, and bitter”

This actor is giving none of that.  But who knows until we actually see a trailer/some scenes. 

[littlepotter 74,657]

26 minutes ago, Roughhouse Dandy said:

That's incorrect. I said *act* normal and some of yall *act* like it's impossible. I'm calling out gross actions and you're taking it as an inherent character trait. Which may or may not be the case for you but my words didn't mention any of that. You also quoted something about racism and I didn't call anyone racist. 

And I'm not expecting anyone to "engage with" me anyway. Idk where you're getting this stuff from. You're going into hyperdrive defending yourself against accusations that weren't pinned on you.

Great then if we're gonna play semantics, define and give examples of "gross actions" because that seems like an overstatement.

Quoting me and not expecting me to think you're addressing me is weird. And people should be able to defend their point of view without being painted as going into "hyperdrive," if that's what writing a paragraph is nowadays.

[River 107,936]

I fear it may turn into a diversity turns stereotypical kind of case.

Black actor, potions, they will turn it into a stereotypical voodoo story, it's so typical hollywood kind of thing to do and they will do zero research about it.

[Roughhouse Dandy 9,723]

8 minutes ago, littlepotter said:

Great then if we're gonna play semantics, define and give examples of "gross actions" because that seems like an overstatement.

Quoting me and not expecting me to think you're addressing me is weird. And people should be able to defend their point of view without being painted as going into "hyperdrive," if that's what writing a paragraph is nowadays.

It's not semantics; it's reading comprehension. Gross actions like questioning if a fictional character's skin color is justified like a skin color needs to be justified here in the first place. 

I wrote a general statement and then quoted you and wrote a specific response to you. Your quote came after the first statement for a reason. 

No one said you can't defend your point of view but defending yourself against accusations that weren't even brought up (by me at least) is extra. So yeah. Hyperdrive.