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  Image description: Supervillains clockwise from top left, Iron Man 1 (2008), The Boys TV (2020),  Batman vs. Superman Dawn of Justice (2016), and  Wonder Woman 1984 (2020). Please note the frequent use of Yellow Filter. Muslim Supervillains: A tired stereotype in the superhero genre. - I realised I haven't yet written about British Muslim actor, activist and all round great person, Riz Ahmed , appearing in a superhero movie. Of course as soon as I thought about his character in Venom (2018), I remembered that Ahmed is playing a supervillain, a bad guy; which is a typecast all too common for Muslim and MENA actors. So I decided to list all the times Muslim and Muslim background actors (also referred to as SWANA and/or MENA, which stands for South West Asia and North Africa, and Middle East and North Africa) have been given the role of 'supervillain' in live action superhero movies. Spoiler: it's a lot.  It's also more times than any Muslim actors have appeared...

  MENA background characters in superhero media: Who did it better, Disney Plus or Netflix? Surprising no one, it wasn't Disney; even the bog standard MENA stereotype is the most/only instance Disney has shown MENA in the MCU since Iron Man 1, thirteen years ago. Let's compare the nameless MENA point by point. Disney first: Falcon and Winter Soldier (2021) Marvel Studios on Disney Plus, minus points for: Racist yellow filter Meaningless dialogue that add nothing to the MENA characters Praising American military = minus 3 points to FATWS/Disney (I could list more but let's stick with the main issues)  Next up,  Netflix: Jupiter's Legacy (2021) Millarworld on Netflix,  points added for: No racist yellow filter used Meaningful discussion is had Character is shown in additional background scenes of the episode = plus 3 points to Jupiter's Legacy/Netflix As far as crumbs go toward any MENA rep, Netflix's Jupiter's Legacy won thi...

 (Image description: Kevin Feige in front of the Ms Marvel logo) ~ I was just  praising Disney for inclusive content  making the new Ms Marvel show for Disney Plus... Then barely twenty-four hours later, news from the Ms Marvel camp blows up about casting issues on the show. Important note : Most people seem absolutely happy with Iman Vellani 's casting of the lead, Kamala Khan/Ms Marvel. All of the casting issues involve supporting cast/supporting characters only. Let's unpack this. There are at least four known issues  from the casting at Ms Marvel on Disney Plus. The issues are: 1) Casting an Indian woman to play a Pakistani Muslim woman. Zenobia Shroff was cast as Muneeba Khan, Kamala's mother . This casting is confirmed . (Image descriptions: actress Zenobia Shroff, and comic panel of character Muneeba Khan) My reaction: Well, I can't find any helpful information that even tells us if Shroff is Muslim or not, so that's my first question and I h...