Gina Rodriguez has been dragged for making alleged anti-Black comments in the past. (Photos by Michael Buckner/Getty Images/Wikipedia)
Actress Gina Rodriguez drew the ire of some in the Afro-Latin community this weekend when she pitched a problematic superhero movie plot highlighting the conquests of none other than Christopher Columbus.
Speaking with Latino magazine Remezcla, Rodriguez gushed about the opportunity to share the big screen with fellow actors of color Oscar Isaac and Tessa Thompson in the new sci-fi thriller “Annihilation.” She and Thompson have become the best of friends, she said, calling it “very empowering” to have another woman of color on set.
It was nice having “another Latina around, another woman that understood the importance of our presence there and how much we weren’t taking it for granted — and to protect one another,” she told the magazine.
When asked what story she would tell if given the chance to create a superhero flick starring other actors of color, she had this to say.
“I think it would be about Christopher Columbus coming over, the migration of the Spaniards, and the influence of the mixes [of people] in South America and in the Caribbean, Rodriguez said. “That’s were [where] my superhero movies would lay, like the 1400 or 1500’s.”
Her idea of a pre-colonization blockbuster didn’t blow over too well, however. Neither did her comments on Marvel’s “Black Panther,” which she suggested would have been better had more Latino actors been cast.
dique migration. that's cute. but be clear: COLONIALISM.
— marjua (@_MsEstevez) February 18, 2018
https://twitter.com/tsnmijaky/status/965748900249219072
AND THEN sugarcoating the spanish raping indigenous and black people and forcing them to assimilate as “the influence of the mixes of people in south america and in the caribbean”
— jaky 🦂 (@tsnmijaky) February 20, 2018
https://twitter.com/bad_dominicana/status/966343982627385344
Gina Rodriguez been trash that wants to piggy back on black success and the success of black women, while allowing them to prop her mediocre ass up.
— KimmyJan (@Johnny__Wadd) February 21, 2018
https://twitter.com/gIossyfenty/status/966178898961723394
Better luck next time Gina.
