Someone racist might say something like "I don't like asians". This is completely different from someone saying, "I didn't like it when they changed Luke Cage into an asian guy". The second statement doesn't imply that the person dislikes asians.

@currentthor2015 said:

I would be absolutely fine with Billy being a different race. Heck if someone told me that they could magically make Billy like his old self again and get the name Captain Marvel back, but in return he would change race I'd say yes in less then a second. Things like race, sexuality, and other such labels mean nothing to me, especially in the face of losing what's truly important about a character.

Why isn't Jimmy nerdy and wearing a bow tie?!

Comic Vine won't let me delete my duplicate comment, so let's just pretend I'm so angry I posted this twice

@geewhiz: They probably felt this actor was right for the role

As for the comics that's just continuity, Jimmy Olsen is currently established and as such is drawn to look the way he has been established in that current continuity.

She looks hot and super.

Wait, they changed Jimmy's race?

*rolls eyes*

@geewhiz said:

Once again, not liking someone based solely on race is the definition of racism. If a person likes a character then superficial matters like race are of no importance, unless that character's story or background is specifically tied into that race.

I always wanted to know more about Ron in the Daily Planet. And as this Jimmy looks really nothing like Jimmy, in either dress sense or skin color why not make him Ron and explore that character?

Jimmy Olsen joining Perry White in becoming African-Americanized.

I wonder whose next?

We could always go with Elaine's insight:

she looks better in that pic with Olsen, than in that first costumed pic. But, TBH I think Ally McBeal looks Hotter, & would rather her be in the suit.

Couldnt we have gotten Kara as PowerGirl instead. This show will never get out from Superman's shadow, & since he exists in the show people will just be waiting for him to suit up, unless they actually have the nerve to turn Kal-El evil as Ultraman, with him trying to conquer earth & also maybe Kandor, & try to breed a race of powered people with Kara. I've always felt the evil anti-matter/earth-3 versions of Kal & Kara or even Billy & Mary Batson should have been incestous.

I just hope we get Matrix, & Cir-El. & can Kara wear a logoless version of Linda Danvers' costume please?

Smallville made changes to Jimmy & that was awful as well.

Reading all these comments, I see why the comic nerd community gets bad rep sometimes. Yall make me facepalm.

~MiB

I'd be shocked if this gets more than one season.

You completely miss the point again. They do not dislike the new Luke Cage because he is asian. They disliked the fact that they change the race from the comic book version.

I'm getting the feeling that you are going to use the argument that Luke Cage is black and his race is important to his character but not to someone like Jimmy Olsen.

Race is actually an important part of any person -- even for white people. I'm Chinese-American and if I were magically born with a different race then my life experiences would be completely different and I would argue that I would not be the same person. I would imagine it be the same for someone of any race -- yes, even for white people.

For example, a ginger like Jimmy Olsen might be of Scottish descent so he might have grown up with special memories of his mother making him his favorite Scottish meals. This would be completely different if they changed him to asian where he might have memories like:

1) Walking home from 7-11 with his weekly comic books and a honking car drives by and when he looks up the people in the car are squinting their eyes and yelling "ching chong".

2) Visiting relatives on holidays and getting red envelopes with money in them.

I'm all for increasing diversity in comics. I have stated that the best way to do this is to introduce new characters or use existing characters who satisfy the diversity requirement.

Why not introduce a new character? Introducing a new character has many benefits. It increases the universe with good characters while not removing/changing currently loved characters. Smallville introduced Chloe Sulliven who is a very popular character. Instead of changing Hal Jordan into a black person DC Comics created a new character name John Stewart who is now a very popular character. No one who shares your opinion has ever commented on why they would be against this approach.

Or why not cast him as Ron Troupe? What would be the drawback of doing that?

Why is Jimmy Olsen Black??

DC, cut this shit out. First it was Wally West, cool, whatever, timeline reboot.

Then Perry White, cool, movie series reboot... I guess

But what the hell Jimmy Olsen now?

Seriously, I'm a black dude. I love the whole diversity thing, but why change characters who've been the same for roughly 6-7 decades???

@geewhiz: Once again, if your a fan of the character the race shouldn't matter.

And once again, if you dislike someone because of their race, that is racism.

Why not introduce a new character?

Because they aren't.

Dude it's just why? Why Jimmy Olsen? Anybody who knows Superman knows that dude and knows how he should look. It's been that way for about 70 years. This is such a huge change and for no reason. Because in the N52 he's also the exact same. In every piece of media he's been in he's the spunky superman buddy. Why the sudden change?

People don't have a problem with the color of his skin, they have a problem with the lack of explanation. WHY???

I really like the Ron Troupe character. From what I remember, he was a very nice guy (those are the types of characters I like).

Jimmy Olsen being sexy doesn't work for me...

@geewhiz: All of my reading of him comes from Superman Adventures based on the animated series. He was a nice guy, great even. One issue is him, Clark and Jimmy talking to those who saw the battle between Superman and Kalibak. He helped a guy rebuild his car all while taking notes for a story.

Liking those type of characters is great. Always need more like them.

@geewhiz: Different Earth. You guys are comic book fans, you know that there are Earths where Batman and Superman are women, black or kids.

In this continuity, Jimmy is black.

I'll never understand the outrage over insignificant characters being changed.

@deathandgrim said:

What do you mean why? the actor who tried out for the role and got the part happened to be black, that's why.

Better yet who cares?

So CW has iZombie, Arrow, and Flash...CBS has Supergirl...And FOX has...(shudders)...Gotham and Lucifer. Seems the DC shows are scattered all over the place and the Marvel ones remain a cohesive unit.

I predict that it will not be getting a second season.

I wish more TV shows would feature more nice characters like Ron Troupe -- I think the world would be a better place. A lot of people seem to think nice characters are boring and prefer the "bad" characters.

I don't care that Jimmy is black -- what bugs me is that it's so counter to his character for him to be this ultra cool, tall, handsome guy.

This.

Aside for that nitpick, looks good. I'm really looking forward to this show.

There are people besides @inferiorego who watch Gotham?

no, i know exactly what you mean dude. "National City", "CatCo", i don't want to sound lik a stereotypical fan but there is such a thing as taking creative liberties a little too far. but since it's Supergirl, i'm still going to give it a chance.

You can't even see Jimmy's freckles.

Beata

Look pretty meh

Why I enjoyed The Flash's characters all the mains are good people with no hidden motives or reasons for helping. They do it cause they enjoy it or they feel it's their duty to help. I roll my eyes at the good is bland, grim is deep logic some people spew out.

Do you think if this Jimmy wasn't bald, he'd have red hair?

Why does it matter that much if the character traits are still the same?

SO many comic characters are white because so many of them were created in a time when racism was still a hugeeee issue. So I'm all for characters getting a race change. F it.

~MiB

Again, the same result can be achieve through either the introduction of new characters or using existing characters like Ron Troupe. This approach has none of the negative effects of changing a character. Yet none of you guys have ever offered an explanation of why you prefer the alternate approach of changing an existing character.

Case in point. Instead of making Alan Scott gay, why not introduce a new gay character to become another Green Lantern? When they made Alan Scott gay, it changed so much about the existing character (who married and had 2 children named Jade and Obsidian) that it really felt like the Alan Scott many knew and loved never existed.

@madeinbangladesh said:

I wouldn't say it was because of racism, it really just came down to it not crossing people's minds.

As for the whole Jimmy debate, changing the race of a character one way or another doesn't bother me, it's when they change the race AND the characterization that I feel a bit uncomfortable. Jimmy has been race switched and by the look of this guy he won't be a nerdy type either, so both the look and traits of the character are changed, so why not simply create a new character? Nothing remains of the old one anyway, so what's the point of using the name.

A lot of people care, he is an iconic character.

@sirneko said:

Yeah, and changing his race doesn't diminish that in any way.

I just hope it's not boring.

Does for me and a lot of other people.

@sirneko said:

Well that's your issue, one that I encourage you to work on.

So long as the character acts like Jimmy Olsen, he's Jimmy Olsen.

Same with me. Another reason why I enjoy The Flash is that superhero shows have finally moved beyond the "I have to keep my identity a secret to protect those I care for and love". I like that the main character is not alone and has friends who know his secret and they all help each other.

@geewhiz: I seriously get the whole keeping it a secret from friends/family attitude as at the end of the day it is to protect them. But on the other hand having those closest to you in the loop is an amazing thing. Flash has Joe his boss/father figure who can make excuses for him at work or to anyone on a personal level. Cisco and Catlin cover both tech and medical and are once again friends who can back Barry's play no matter the situation. Eddie while new to the info still has covered Barry's back.

Just having that bubble of allies who not only care about him as a hero but as an individual gives Barry a lot of advantages most heroes do not have.

Eddie is another character I really like. He seems like a really good guy and I like the way he handled it when he found out that Barry and Iris marries in the future. I do worry that the writers will turn him "bad" because of his relation to Reverse Flash. In the real world we've seen people who lashed out at the world because things didn't go the way they wanted in life -- they basically have the attitude "I'm going to ruin it for other people too so the world will know my pain".

I thought that might happen, it is a common trope and it does happen in real life but Eddie for the most part took it like an adult. It hurt him yes, and he was devastated when he got told but he seems to have accepted it and wants to move on and cut his losses rather than lie to himself and lead to further hurt down the road. Would love it if show had him continue be a good guy and support Barry and Iris despite conflict only to find someone right for him.

You asked who cares, I gave an answer.

I reeeeeeally just wanted to post a ton of silverage superman comic covers at this point. you know super-fatso, oldman superman, big brain superman, etc... they just turned him into anything they wanted back then :P

I can understand the changes and ''TV-verse'' thing since DC has a multiverse where things are different as we saw.

What I worry though it effects the main canon ( like Wally West change who doesn't act even remotely like Wally West people loved and wanted back )

Also don't forget the demographic the shows and movies trying to pull to the characters and the comics. I remember Batman , Superman and Justice League animated series ( which are legendary ) colored my expectations from the comics and characters when I was young because they were what drawn me into the comics. Sure there were other influences too but say if you are watching these different depictions and then you read the comics where characters have existed for decades are so different you get '' well what did I watch then ? ''

I think of the big picture. Characters like Wally, Jimmy and such , there is a reason why people wanna see them as they used to be. It is familiarity and it is the feeling of '' I know this guy and care about him '' rather than putting a name on a different skin. Sounds insulting right ? Thats how it feels like, putting a big name into someone else's skin to pull attention.

Sadly for this Jimmy Olsen from the trailer, I can only say he is a guy who knows Superman , works at Daily Bugle and thats it. There is nothing else that tells me he is Jimmy ( oh sorry , JAMES ) Olsen.

Hell even Smallville did the switch-o-roo with the Olsen who died being the older brother and the real Jimmy from the comics comes later as the little brother who would grow to be THE Jimmy Olsen and that was cool. I doubt they can pull the same cool move here.

Now that we put the usual ''why people don't like stark changes like this '' question reasonably explained. It think trailer showed promise and it has the feeling of Kara ( a young girl who didn't have the guidance Clark had with Kents ) trying to find her way but also trying to fit in. I am wondering which Verse they will tie her into though. Will it be Flash-Arrow stuff or her own ? Because both has cons and pros.

What cameos we might see... they show only the siluoettes of Clark so they won't have to bring a new Superman actor, which is understandable with the movies and all. Potential is high as long as they won't fall into the same Soap-opera traps that will progressively get worse. Just look at Arrow O.o