I have no doubt that Agnes got the role because she is talented. I also have no doubt that she will do a good job with the role she has been given. I bear her no ill will. But it doesn’t change the fact that ONCE’s already *super* problematic treatment of POC in their TV show (all white cast, POC who either die instantly, die before episode end, or turn out to be evil or filler) just got a lot more problematic.
The casual audience will not care. But, as someone who is not, I care.
Doesn’t help when, let’s face it, a lot of people still consider some Latinos to be white depending on their appearance. Especially looking at someone like Lana or Nicole. To make matters more complicated, Latino is more of a generalization of a mix of different ethnicities that originate from Latin America. Therefore, each person of Latino descent varies, because it’s really just lumping a bunch of different cultures into one convenient category. This article explains it better than I can. I’m not saying I personally agree with all of this, but I had to throw this out there.
In all honesty, I think they cast Agnes (if she is Lily) not for her race, but because she does look like Lana when she has dark hair, whether she’s of Latino heritage or not. That is if the fan speculation that she was intentionally cast to look like a young Regina to parallel her in episode 405 is at all 100% accurate. That picture posted in the thread earlier isn’t a good representation of how she could look on the show itself. These are taken from Agnes’ own Instagram.
Speaking of Nicole, she tweeted about the episode title. I guess she’ll be returning to film a flashback?
😉 RT“@AdamHorowitzLA: How about another #OnceUponATime #titlespoiler? Hope to see ya March 1! pic.twitter.com/976FvcjSzY”
— Nicole Muñoz (@NicoleMunoz94) February 18, 2015