Asians on the internet made it known that they thought the casting for the film โThe Great Wallโ was a great big mistake. And they were very snarky about it.
This week, people took to Twitter to throw shade at Matt Damon for his lead role in the movie. They trolled the actor by sarcastically thanking him for โsaving Chinaโ through the trending hashtag #ThankYouMattDamon.
In the movie, which hits theaters on Friday, Damon and Pedro Pascal play mercenaries who stumble into the Great Wall and get involved in a battle between Chinese warriors and supernatural monsters.
Because Damon plays one of the heroes, and his face has been splashed across promotional posters, โThe Great Wallโ has drawn an outpouring of criticism. People have accused the movie of perpetuating the white savior trope.
The New York Times points out that the movie, which was a collaboration between Chinese and Hollywood companies, was actually casted to avoid pandering, an issue that strikes a chord with Chinese audiences. Films have been criticized in the past for putting Asian actors into roles that donโt appear meaningful to the storyline, the outlet notes.
But with Asian representation sorely lacking in Hollywood โ and audiences having to endure casting choices like Scarlett Johansson as the lead in the film adaptation of the Japanese anime series โGhost in the Shellโ and Emma Stone as a quarter-Hawaiian, quarter-Chinese woman in โAlohaโ โ Asian Twitter clearly had it up to HERE.
Check out some of the fire tweets below: