There was some uproar recently about how Matt Lucas, who'd done blackface in the fairly recent past, was being added to Doctor Who at the same time as Pearl Mackie. It resulted in a lot of British folks stepping and being like "uh, yeah, most white comedians over here have done blackface at some point, Matt Lucas is…

I mean, that's just racism having changed since the 70s, not people getting more sensative. People haven't toned racist characters down from Archie, they're just putting more modern-appropriate racist dialogue in their shows—and yeah, a lot of that shit these days is hidden behind smokescreens and toned down just…

I can't speak for every Indian who thought Stevens was one of them, but I think the line of thought goes "oh, well, he's yet another Indian actor asked to play up his accent and take a stereotypical role", not "Stevens' preformance is coming from a real authentic place".

Look man it's the era of peak TV and infinite streaming, inevitably something's gonna fall by the wayside, and I have no compunctions about one of them being a show everyone agrees hasn't been good for almost two decades.

Really dude? Really? There's no shows on right now with racist main characters? Not a one? You can't think of a single example? Especially none with creators who claim they're being satirical?

Yeah, I think it's a simple matter of—like, if you were an Indian in the 80s, who did you complain to? Did you write to the network? Complain to your friends? Who's gonna know about that?

The problem being, of course, that "being mean to minorities" isn't a reaction against trends, it is the trend, and one that still hasn't ended. Telling jokes at the expense of minorities is the status quo, just as hiring practices and housing practices and police brutality at the expense of minorities is the status…

In theory I agree with you that The Simpsons is dated and keeping it around unchanged only makes that more evident, but you're serving it with this weird side order of "Apu's depiction was acceptable in the 80s" that I just can't get behind.

Alright then, I guess it makes sense if that's your take the solution you go to is "add another Indian character."

I don't watch The Simpsons, but I seem to recall a different Indian comedian came on the show to do an episode revolving around Apu being a stereotype. Which is, I think, the worst possible way to handle this sort of thing, in the same vein as those weird points in Transformers or Marvel Comics where in-universe women…

I did, eventually. It was okay.

I grew up with her, too. :(

[hamilton reference]

Sigourney Weaver has apparently been instructed on penalty of death not to act. Which seems about right for a show run by the Daredevil season 2 guys.

In the words of the great Kevin Wagner Murphy:

Well, yes, but it's not like the episodes that aren't his are a notable improvement.

Scott Buck wrote three episodes.

That's fair. I may not agree with your assessment of the new series, but I respect you giving the new kids the same chance to grow and improve that the original cast got.

you realize of course there are multiple guys making the show and writing episodes

Shout Factory always wants to pimp them. Hasn't stopped them from being absent from about a decade's worth of ComicCons while the show was off the air. And I have a tough time believing promoting a live show day-of is gonna do much to increase ticket sales.