– In Spielberg's latest film adapted from Ernest Cline's novel, quite a few structural and other changes are made to the book's story: puzzles and challanges for the easter egg keys are changed, characters are introduced differently their characterizations are different. But of all the things the film omits, the sexuality and backstory of its lead lesbian character is the most glaring. (spoilers ahead, but the picture above shows it as do all the posters for the film ft. Lena)
– Lena Waithe plays a character who goes by the alias of "Aech", best friend of the lead character Wade, described as being
"a tall, broad shouldered Caucasian male with dark hair and brown eyes" in the VR universe The OASIS, featuring a deeper, digitally altered voice. For most of the film we don't see Aech in person, but when Wade has to find his allies in real life late in the book, he learns his best friend is actually a black lesbian.
– In the book: Wade approaches Aech's van expecting to find his friend resembling his online avatar, and to his surprise, she introduces herself as Helen Harris. They sit down and have a conversation about it while Helen explains that she was kicked out of her mother's house when she learned about her sexuality, and that she hid behind her online avatar so she wouldn't face discrimination and could make money from digital tournaments to stay off the streets. Wade says he was surprised, but that they're best friends no matter what (in a very "I don't see color/sexual orientiation" way IMO, but nonetheless). Wade also later refers to Helen’s avatar as “he” through the end of the book because he’s used to doing so.
– In the film: Wade and Helen meet in an alleyway while he's being chased. Helen has to quickly convince Wade she's Aech by sharing things about their friendship only she would know, and then the two of them run off, but never talk about her backstory as the action for the third act ramps up. (not to say the book is a paragon of rep or anything lol)
– The film does include a brief moment, but doesn't go far enough: Halfway through the movie during one of the challenges for the keys, Wade, Aech enter a challenge about the film
"The Shining" and are transported to a digital Overlook Hotel.
Aech (before the reveal has happened, who appears as her avatar) explains she's never seen the film before, and everyone quickly gets separated as the elevators open and blood comes pouring out like from the film. Aech is swept into Room 237, famous for the naked woman that tries to seduce Jack Nicholson's character. The woman is the same here and approaches Aech, who's confused but then almost leans in for a kiss before seeing she's a decaying corpse, like in the film, and then runs away as the woman fails to stab her. This moment doesn't go anywhere or come up again and was not in the book. We've come so far. Lefou
WHO?– This omission follows other recent films: Tessa Thompson's Valkyrie in Thor: Ragnarokhaving a scene showing her bisexuality cut (also recently left out from the DVD release), and
Black Panther also cutting a scene featuring Aya (a lesbian in the comics) flirting with Okoye. Both those films produced those scenes but simply left them out, while
RPO seems to have left explicit mention of Helen's sexuality out of the script altogether. It's also a second for Spielberg, who infamously cut back on the central black gay relationship in his adaptation of
The Color Purple.– A few critics have noted it's a missed opportunity both for Helen's character and for the ability to talk about how marginalized people might express themselves in a digital universe, rather then strictly being a straight male fantasy. Just about everyone either didn't notice or care.
“I took a deep breath and crossed the slush-covered sidewalk, feeling a strange combination of dread and excitement. As I approached the RV, a door near the center of the right side slid open and a short stepladder extended to the pavement. I climbed inside and the door slid shut behind me. I found myself in the RV’s tiny kitchen. It was dark except for the running lights set into the carpeted floor. To my left, I saw a small bedroom area at the back, wedged into a loft above the RV’s battery compartment. I turned and walked slowly across the darkened kitchen, then pulled back the beaded curtain covering the doorway to the cab.
A heavyset African American girl sat in the RV’s driver seat, clutching the wheel tightly and staring straight ahead. She was about my age, with short, kinky hair and chocolate-colored skin that appeared iridescent in the soft glow of the dashboard indicators. She was wearing a vintage Rush 2112 concert T-shirt, and the numbers were warped around her large bosom. She also had on faded black jeans and a pair of studded combat boots. She appeared to be shivering, even though it was nice and warm in the cab.
I stood there for a moment, staring at her in silence, waiting for her to acknowledge my presence. Eventually, she turned and smiled at me, and it was a smile I recognized immediately. That Cheshire grin I’d seen thousands of times before, on the face of Aech’s avatar, during the countless nights we’d spent together in the OASIS, telling bad jokes and watching bad movies. And her smile wasn’t the only thing I found familiar. I also recognized the set of her eyes and the lines of her face. There was no doubt in my mind. The young woman sitting in front of me was my best friend, Aech.
A wave of emotion washed over me. Shock gave way to a sense of betrayal. How could he—she—deceive me all these years? I felt my face flush with embarrassment as I remembered all of the adolescent intimacies I’d shared with Aech. A person I’d trusted implicitly. Someone I thought I knew.
When I didn’t say anything, her eyes dropped to her boots and stayed on them. I sat down heavily in the passenger seat, still staring over at her, still unsure of what to say. She kept stealing glances at me; then her eyes would dart away nervously. She was still trembling.
Whatever anger or betrayal I felt quickly evaporated.
I couldn’t help myself. I started to laugh. There was no meanness in it, and I knew she could tell that, because her shoulders relaxed a bit and she let out a relieved sigh. Then she started to laugh too. Half laughing and half crying, I thought.
“Hey, Aech,” I said, once our laughter subsided. “How goes it?”
“It’s going good, Z,” she said. “All sunshine and rainbows.” Her voice was familiar too. Just not quite as deep as it was online. All this time, she’d been using software to disguise it.
“Well,” I said. “Look at us. Here we are.”
“Yeah,” Aech replied. “Here we are.”
An uncomfortable silence descended. I hesitated a moment, unsure of what to do. Then I followed my instincts, crossed the small space between us, and put my arms around her. “It’s good to see you, old friend,” I said. “Thanks for coming to get me.”
She returned the hug. “It’s good to see you too,” she said. And I could tell she meant it.
I let go of her and stepped back. “Christ, Aech,” I said, smiling. “I knew you were hiding something. But I never imagined …”
“What?” she said, a bit defensively. “You never imagined what?”
“That the famous Aech, renowned gunter and the most feared and ruthless arena combatant in the entire OASIS, was, in reality, a …”
“A fat black chick?”
“I was going to say ‘young African American woman.’ ”
Her expression darkened. “There’s a reason I never told you, you know.”
“And I’m sure it’s a good one,” I said. “But it really doesn’t matter.”
“It doesn’t?”
“Of course not. You’re my best friend, Aech. My only friend, to be honest.”
“Well, I still want to explain.”
“OK. But can it wait until we’re in the air?” I said. “We’ve got a long way to travel. And I’ll feel a lot safer once we’ve left this city in the dust.”
“We’re on our way, amigo,” she said, putting the RV in gear.
“OK, Aech,” I said. “Tell me your story.”
She flashed her Cheshire grin and took a deep breath. “The whole thing was originally my mother’s idea,” she said. Then she launched into an abbreviated version of her life story. Her real name, she said, was Helen Harris, and she was only a few months older than I was. She’d grown up in Atlanta, raised by a single mother. Her father had died in Afghanistan when she was still a baby. Her mother, Marie, worked from home, in an online data-processing center. In Marie’s opinion, the OASIS was the best thing that had ever happened to both women and people of color. From the very start, Marie had used a white male avatar to conduct all of her online business, because of the marked difference it made in how she was treated and the opportunities she was given.
When Aech first logged into the OASIS, she followed her mother’s advice and created a Caucasian male avatar. “H” had been her mother’s nickname for her since she was a baby, so she’d decided to use it as the name of her online persona. A few years later, when she started attending school online, her mother lied about her daughter’s race and gender on the application. Aech was required to provide a photo for her school profile, so she’d submitted a photorealistic rendering of her male avatar’s face, which she’d modeled after her own features.
Aech told me that she hadn’t seen or spoken to her mother since leaving home on her eighteenth birthday. That was the day Aech had finally come out to her mother about her sexuality. At first, her mother refused to believe she was gay. But then Helen revealed that she’d been dating a girl she met online for nearly a year. As Aech explained all of this, I could tell she was studying my reaction. I wasn’t all that surprised, really. Over the past few years, Aech and I had discussed our mutual admiration for the female form on numerous occasions. I was actually relieved to know that Aech hadn’t been deceiving me, at least not on that account.
“How did your mother react when she found out you had a girlfriend?” I asked.
“Well, it turns out that my mother had her own set of deep-seated prejudices,” Aech said. “She kicked me out of the house and said she never wanted to see me again. I was homeless for a little while. I lived in a series of shelters. But eventually I earned enough competing in the OASIS arena leagues to buy my RV, and I’ve been living in it ever since. I usually only stop moving when the RV’s batteries need to recharge.”
As we continued to talk, going through the motions of getting to know each other, I realized that we already did know each other, as well as any two people could. We’d known each other for years, in the most intimate way possible. We’d connected on a purely mental level. I understood her, trusted her, and loved her as a dear friend. None of that had changed, or could be changed by anything as inconsequential as her gender, or skin color, or sexual orientation."
ONTD, what would your version of a gay "Ready Player One" look ike?Sources:12345
