"I think that there is a general pattern of “white-ifying” everything. Just because they make Heimdall black in the Thor movies doesn’t really make a counterargument. In fact, the amount of what they call “racebending” that goes on in Hollywood is extraordinary. I mean, I have sat down with agents who will tell me straight up, “Listen, you write about Dominicans in New Jersey. We can make an indie film about this, but nobody in Hollywood wants to see anything but white leads.” And so when I heard that they wanted to cast all white characters in Akira, it just really shows you how little the dream factory of our popular culture has caught up with the diverse reality of our present. I mean, the nation in which we live — and the world in which we live — is so extraordinarily more like a future than the futures that we’re being sold on the screen and on television."
— Junot Díaz Aims to Fulfill His Dream of Publishing Sci-Fi Novel With Monstro | Underwire | Wired.com
