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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
[adrotate group="5"]That picture posted in the thread earlier isn’t a good representation of how she could look on the show itself.
They asked the actress to dye her hair dark in order to resemble the original Latina actress. Sorry, but it leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. Minorites and POCs already are highly ostracized in OUAT and now they are taking makeup and dyes and making a white woman into something she is not when there are perfectly wonderful actress who would still do a bang up job but wouldn’t be this *wrong*
This isn’t a matter of her looking Latina eventually…she’s Hungarian, Russian and German. That’s great. But it’s not what the character was originally. Would be having his conversation if Lily was originally black and they asked Agnes to adopt Black-Face.
"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"I also think there is a horrible precedent here if Agnes is indeed adult Lily. The precedent being, that the casting department does not necessarily have to care if they cast someone who doesn’t match the original actress who portrayed said character.
Imagine for a moment if we heard the news that Mulan was coming back. Yay!
Mulan gets a happily ever after or whatever but instead of bringing back Jamie Chung, like we would all expect, someone else replaces Mulan and the actress is not Asian. (Not Korean, Japanese, Chinese or even Filipino).
Mulan is black or white, stepping into the role. And we remember that she came from an Asian village in Once Upon a Time.
I realize the original character description for Lily did not specify her ethnicity but when we met the character on screen in Breaking Glass, she was 100% Latina. That I can remember. It should be upsetting to everyone that a small role like Lily was ret-conned and turned into someone else so incredibly different than the character she originally portrayed.
The point is, you can’t fool your audience into thinking that this is the same character because she’s not the same character. Just because we only saw Lily in one episode very early this season does not mean that we forget what she looked like. I certainly don’t.
Race issues aside, it’s not like the show has never cast an adult actor who didn’t resemble the child actor. Take August and Pinocchio for example. Jakob Davies with his ginger hair and green eyes doesn’t look at all like Eion Bailey with his blue eyes and brown hair. So I think that the audience could believe that Agnes is adult Lily, especially if she dyes her hair dark.
"That’s how you know you’ve really got a home. When you leave it, there’s this feeling that you can’t shake. You just miss it." Neal Cassidy
Race issues aside, it’s not like the show has never cast an adult actor who didn’t resemble the child actor. Take August and Pinocchio for example. Jakob Davies with his ginger hair and green eyes doesn’t look at all like Eion Bailey with his blue eyes and brown hair. So I think that the audience could believe that Agnes is adult Lily, especially if she dyes her hair dark.
It’s not a matter of belief in looks. I have no issue if adults don’t look exactly like their younger counterparts. Jakob and Eion didn’t look alike, but they were the same *race*
Just because the show has an extremely poor history of ostracizing POC doesn’t mean they get a pass just because “the show is bad at it anyway.” I don’t lessen criticism when they do the same things over and over, you add to it.
"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"I am disappointed to learn that Agnes is likely playing Lilith. Horrible miscasting and disrespectful of the ethnicity of the child version of the character, whether or not the child actor was chosen to remind of us of Regina.
Last year when I was on a different board, I too had theorized that Lilith was the black fairy or a demon when she first appeared in OUAT…I actually said that maybe Lilith and the Blue Fairy came from the same ball, with Lilith being the dark husk and the the Blue Fairy representing the light (referencing the bible here). In Once, if they don’t do a ball of darkness and light, then I am pretty sure they have the same point of origin, and are maybe sisters/two sides of the same coin.
If not, then maybe she is Blue’s daughter after all, as someone else had said.
Keeper of Regina's bravery
I’m excited to see Lily return. But, will she have a vendetta against Emma? Or, will they renew their friendship as adults.
Well, I think they may be in that grey zone when Emma encounters Lily again in the present day. Lily said to Emma, “You promised. Friends forever no matter what.” But young Emma had made that promise before she found out that Lily had lied about being a foster kid, because despite being an orphan once, Lily had had an adoptive famly. It seemed like Lily really wanted Emma’s friendship, so it will be interesting to see what Lily wants from Emma now after Emma never contacted her again. There is also the theory that Lily (aka Lilith) is the anti-Savior to Emma’s Savior role. If Lily is magical like Emma (as Lily’s star birth mark would suggest), then they could become magical rivals.
"That’s how you know you’ve really got a home. When you leave it, there’s this feeling that you can’t shake. You just miss it." Neal Cassidy
There is also the theory that Lily (aka Lilith) is the anti-Savior to Emma’s Savior role. If Lily is magical like Emma (as Lily’s star birth mark would suggest), then there could become magical rivals.
This is an interesting idea.
For light to exist there must first be darkness (or the other way round!). I wonder whether for Emma to be created as the savior, there had to be an equal and opposite created, too, and this opposite also needed to be sent to our world somehow.
(Though I think their have been plenty of anti-Saviors already…Peter Pan, Zelena etc).
Keeper of Regina's bravery
Jakob and Eion didn’t look alike, but they were the same *race*
Just because the show has an extremely poor history of ostracizing POC doesn’t mean they get a pass just because “the show is bad at it anyway.” I don’t lessen criticism when they do the same things over and over, you add to it.
Yup, I agree.
Going off of something @TheWatcher wrote in another thread based on the latest A&E interview: What if Lily is the present-day sorceress in a long lineage of sorcerers? This would mirror the way Rumple is currently the dark one in a long lineage of dark ones, with Zoso and others having gone before him.
"That’s how you know you’ve really got a home. When you leave it, there’s this feeling that you can’t shake. You just miss it." Neal Cassidy
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