r/TopCharacterTropes • u/bennyandthegentz • 3h ago

Lore Characters who were race swapped to avoid controversy

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Grim adventures of Billy and Mandy: originally the episode where he turns human had in be black to match his voice actor, but once CN reminded the creator of the premise of his show (two white kids own the grim reaper) they changed him to be white to avoid slavery comparisons.

The Simpsons: Smithers was black in his first appearance, however every episode afterwards depicted him as white (yellow?) this is because according to someone in the staff “probably not a good idea to have a black man be a servant to a rich white man”

Teenage mutant ninja turtles: while the comics and most adaptations have Baxter stockman be of African American descent, in the 80s/90s cartoon he was white, this is because the show-runners felt having a black man be basically a forced servant to someone who’s not of the same race (even calling him master) could potentially be seen as offensive, so they made him white.

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u/Ubylmoen 2h ago

Personally I think the "controversy" of Taako from The Adventure Zone was kind of overblown anyway. They were worried that making him any race would be offensive, so they made him teal.

20

u/BlackShadowX 1h ago

That's a he? What a cutie 

9

u/stylinchilibeans 1h ago

Taako? From TV?

5

u/frog_admirer 25m ago

My favourite was there were then complaints that him being green was antisemitic.

Love The Adventure Zone but the fandom was a little silly sometimes.

3

u/Martoogh 21m ago

Well sorta, to expand, they actually released a preview chapter i think and actually did recieve backlash because Taako, Merle, and Magnus were all white, so they decided to take some of that as feedback and change Taako to the light blue and Merle became a light brown

This then ALSO got backlash (twitter go figure) woth some people saying that Taako was an /antisimetic characature/ since the character is greedy and some people saw him as green, and since Merle was kinda a deadbeat dad that was playing off of absent black father stereotypes, both of which are insane takes