Stan Lee Gives His Thoughts On Michael B. Jordan As The 'Human Torch' In FANTASTIC FOUR
Michael B. Jordan's casting as the 'Human Torch' in Josh Trank's Fantastic Four was viewed as controversial by some. With the movie now less than two weeks away, the character's creator has weighed in on the decision. So... was Stan a fan?
By Minty -
Jul 27, 2015 09:07 AM EST
Source: EW
Michael B. Jordan's casting as the 'Human Torch' in Josh Trank's upcoming Fantastic Four reboot caused quite a stir in the fanboy community. While many praised Fox for their efforts to increase diversity onscreen, a few complained about the drastic deviation from the character's appearance in source material. Jordan himself recently weighed in on the controversy in the form of a heartfelt letter. In it, he added that "if Stan Lee writes an email to my director saying, “You’re good. I’m okay with this,” who am I to go against that?".
EW have since contacted the legendary comic book writer for his own thoughts on the matter - and it seems like he's a huge fan of Jordan's casting. However, he was also able to empathize with those who weren't quite on board with the casting yet - claiming that the majority of the criticism has not come out of racial prejudice, but because lots of comic book fans are very wary of change.
“It was more than okay, I thought it was a great idea! They’re outraged not because of any personal prejudice. They’re outraged because they hate to see any change made on a series and characters they had gotten familiar with. In Spider-Man, when they got a new actor, that bothered them, even though it was a white actor. I don’t think it had to do with racial prejudice as much as they don’t like things changed.”
“But I think they’re gonna get to love this character. So I’m not the least bit worried about it. I always tried to pepper these groups with as much racial diversity as possible because that’s the way the world is.”
Hopefully with Mr. Lee's glowing endorsement, those fans on the fence will finally be able to embrace the change. Are you excited for Fantastic Four? You can catch Jordan suiting up with the rest of his teammates when the movie opens in theatres August 7.