It began way back when Michael B. Jordan's name first surfaced as a contender to play Johnny Storm in Fantastic Four, but the outcry against it reached a new level when he was recently confirmed. Director Josh Trank, who worked with Jordan on Chronicle, and 20th Century Fox are moving away from the traditional Caucasian interpretation of the character, while mixing things up by casting Kate Mara as Storm's sister, the Invisible Woman. Jordan has always taken the criticisms in stride, and during a conversation in Rome with Cinefilos he seems to be rolling with the punches just fine...
Jordan: "It was expected. You kinda know going into it that people are used to seeing something one way, it's a continuity thing more than anything. People don't like change too much. But annoyed? Eh, you just kinda accept it, it is what it is. You can't make everybody happy. You just gotta accept that and know. I'm an actor, I have to do my job. I'm going to do my job the best I can and the way I've been doing it my entire life, my entire career. I grew up a comic book guy, I read comic books as a kid growing up, and the Fantastic Four/Human Torch is one of my favorite characters so I'm going to give it my everything. I can't wait. I don't really let it bother me at all. I just want to go into it and do the best job I can. We'll see what happens."
I think he's being generous saying this is mostly about continuity when there is clearly a racial component to much of the outrage. The previous Fantastic Four films had Chris Evans and Jessica Alba as siblings, and there's no combination of DNA that could have made them look like family. In particular Alba was a far cry from the blond-haired blue-eyed Susan Storm and there wasn't any screaming about that.
Jordan also spoke about his reasons for taking on the role, and it turns out he's a bit of a comic book geek, too...
Jordan: "The Human Torch is, 'yknow, that's fun. That's going to be a good time…To play a superhero? That's dreams coming true. It's not going to be hard. It's going to be fun to kind of show a side of me that I don't really get to show on screen, to be a little bit lighter, funnier, just more personality. It's going to be fun."
Fantastic Four will star Jordan, Mara, Miles Teller, Jamie Bell, and opens June 19th 2015.
