scififan2009

It is possible that the writers are just trying to tell a story and they never intended to upset anyone.

Austenphile

What ethnicity would be part dragon? I'm not sure they ever planned for her to have a father. I do think this storyline was planned. But they might have had second thoughts about having a blonde white actress as the light character while a latina had absorbed all her darkness. I think keeping Lily latina might have been even more offensive for this storyline. Or perhaps they were not even thinking about ethnicity when they hired younger Lily. Honestly I never noticed or thought about hers (or Regina's or Marian's) ethnicity until I read people talking about it.

koodles

It's not really about the writers, it's about the casting and A&E's responsibility as directors of this show to not do offensive things like change the ethnicity of a character from Latina to white just to force the storyline to make sense.

I mean this show already has so little diversity. And I agree with DR76 that probably a big purpose for Ursala on this show was to bring a POC character even though they got rid of her as fast as they could. I mean Ursala and Cruella seem to be pretty inconsequential to the overall plot but Cruella gets to stick around way longer and have more scenes while Ursala's story wrapped up after only a couple episodes.

I get that it's a fairy tale but the ethnicities of the actors are real. For those of us who aren't white it really does matter to see someone who represents your background on screen even if the ethnicity doesn't come up in dialogue. Because frankly in today's media it still isn't very common to see diversity.

scififan2009

I'm sorry you feel that way.

Austenphile

I am very sorry you feel that way. And as much as I would like to think otherwise, I do realize race is a sensitive subject for many. My not noticing isn't because I am white (though I am) but because I lived so many years in a Northern California suburb that was so diverse (there was even a Chinese Peruvian family that spoke Spanish despite Asian ethnicity) that I honestly just don't think about race any more. I do apologize if any of my comments came across as insensitive.

koodles

No no, we can just forget about it. I didn't mean to come across as too preachy or to upset anyone with my comments.

Another poster brought up an opinion about Ursala that I agreed with. I also wanted to present my opinion of Agnes's casting because I noticed that discussion happened on the previous thread because her casting was finally confirmed and I wanted to present my opinion on that.

I'm hoping the professional TV critics will bring up A&E's insensitive choice when the Lily episode airs. More than anything I hope they never do something like this again because it is offensive. Normally I just roll my eyes at their clearly unplanned storylines and the plot holes that arise but this time I found their efforts to force their storyline to work really upsetting. And just to clarify I like Agnes Bruckner. I think she's a great actress and have nothing against her.

But this isn't the best forum to discuss so let's move on and I won't bring it up again.

T'Lynn

All of Season 4 is planned in advance. Lily was always meant to be Maleficent's daughter. That didn't change. Writers rooms don't make up things as they go along .. the entire story for the season was outlined last summer.

I think they picked the best actresses for the part. They may have had Agnes in mind and casted Nicole because she did the best despite her being "the wrong ethnicity"

Kristin is white and there is no father established so the ethnicity of the character would match the mother.

That's all I'm going to say on this argument because I've fallen down this rabbit hole before and no one is going to change their mind.

scififan2009

I hope the sorcerer is her father. It would connect everything they've set up for this season perfectly.

Austenphile

I was thinking today how much I wish William Shatner would have a cameo because he's such a fanboy. I would love it if he played the sorcerer.

T'Lynn

That would be awesome!

He live tweets every episode and is such a fan ... I'm sure he would agree to play the Sorcerer as long as he has scenes with Regina. And if he could have a love scene with Regina he'd do it for free.

scififan2009

Still not entirely sure whether the sorcerer is good or bad, or just indifferent to everything. But if he was the one who assigned the role of author to all the others, I guess that makes him the boss of everything.

koodles

Not bringing up race again but I disagree that A&E plan the entire season in advance. I think think they planned all of S1 in advance. I think we can all agree that S2 was clearly made up as they went along because they got the rights to NVL. But I think since S3 they plan the season in arcs. I think they set up a couple of things in the first part of the arc that they will cover in the 2nd part, but I disagree the entire season and all of the storylines are planned before they start shooting for the season. If it was I don't think things would appear so sloppy.

T'Lynn

Sorry, I respect your opinion but I disagree. I have a friend that writes for a cable series and that's not how writers rooms work.

The entire season is mapped out at the beginning so they can decide how the arc will fit into the number of episodes they have. The major plot points they want to hit on are outlined from the beginning. It's possible that slight changes could be made to accommodate schedules. In Season 2 they had the rights to all the Neverland stuff at the beginning of the season because Captain Hook arrives 4 episodes in. They can't have the rights to Hook but not Pan and Neverland, they just wanted Hook to be more involved than the rest.

I do think that from season to season they change their minds (obviously Frozen wasn't planned from the beginning) but overall arc of the season stays the same. They may scrap some story lines or find they want to explore a relationship more (or have their actors get in an accident and have to rewrite him out of scenes) but the season arc for Lily was planned.

lianamed

I do believe certain things were planned in advance, and others they made up as it came long. IMO, the Zelena-Marian thing (or at the least the idea of it) was planned, since Sean's wife twitted, back then, something about 'what if Marian is Zelena'. I do, however, believe the whole 'Frozen' thing wasn't planned at all, and I have my doubts if 'Lily' being Maleficent's daughter was planned, because, IMO, this whole 'Snowing kidnapping a baby so that their daughter could never be even 'tempted' of being dark' was something they thought about after 4A was written, and Lily was already cast.

Of course, I can't know it for sure, but that's how it looks like to me, as a viewer. After they decided Lily was Maleficent's daugher with no father and containing all of Emma's dark side, they realized it could be considered offensive to have a latina playing her, since almost all POC characters in the show but Lancelot are (or were in Regina's case) evil at some point.

koodles

I think every showis different though in their process and just from what I see many of the storylines in the 2nd arc don't seem planned very well and weren't really set up right in the first arc.

I don't have time now to go back and look for the articles or panel recaps but I'm almost positive A&E explained that they got the rights to Hook at the end of S1 production and then later midway through S2 production they gained the rights to Peter Pan and NVL.