"Sorry but Benedict Cumberbatch is totally amazing and Star Trek is a dumb action franchise now, so what's the big deal? We don't even know the new backstory for Khan, and the first film already destroyed pre-existing continuity. All this outrage when the film isn't even out yet is silly. It's not even close to a Akira or Avatar whitewash. Also, Cumberbatch! He could've played Ip Man in the Wong Kar-Wai biopic and I wouldn't have complained (maybe). Just dub the Chinese in post. CUMBERBATCH4EVER"

upsettingshorts:

mesmerizedish:

racebending:

The “big deal” is:

• That Star Trek, a franchise known for it’s progressiveness, has regressed in casting and representation to the standards from the 1960s.  Khan was a character of color.  Regardless of how Star Trek decided to cast this character ~fifty years ago, using the racist casting practices oof yesteryears, there is no valid, non-discriminatory reason for the franchise to regress to that now.
• That aside from Faran Tahir’s brief role in the first five minutes of Trek09, there are no prominent South Asian characters in this franchise, so when a character is named Khan Noonien Singh you’d hope they would be able to find an actor of South Asian descent out of all of the ones that are out there.
• That it’s Paramount again, not feeling like they need to learn anything from whitewashing incidents like “The Last Airbender.”
• That Benedict Cumberbatch is a white man with British and Hollywood crossover appeal; he has access to countless roles that are blocked off actors of color— including hundreds of Star Trek characters…and this just happens to be one of the most prominent characters of color at all in science fiction.  If they won’t even cast people of color for iconic bad guys…
• That the Cumberbatchness of Benedict Cumberbatch somehow outweighs the importance of calling out discrimination.  But that’s not “silly,” to you, nah, the people who are upset about racism are the silly ones.  

That’s why this is a big deal.

And if you think “the first film already destroyed pre-existing continuity,” then you didn’t understand a thing.

If they wanted to cast Benedict Cumberbatch, were willing to take a risk, and exercised a single creative bone in their body… they would have remade Star Trek V (a movie that ought to be remade, unlike Khan) and cast him as Sybok.  

As it stands, it’s pretty egregious whitewashing the role for reasons stated.  The fact Khan is a proponent and product of eugenics it makes it even worse.