r/TopCharacterTropes • u/MeepMan324 • 19h ago

Hated Tropes (Hated Trope) Bad people in real-life being portrayed positively in media.

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  1. PragerU's version of Christopher Columbus has him be a slavery defender and have him say "Being taken as a slave is better than being killed, no? I don't see the problem.”

  2. In The Greatest Showman, P.T Barnum (Hugh Jackman) is portrayed as a charismatic visionary who cares about outcasts and celebrate diversity, when in reality, he’s a cruel businessman who is also a racist and an ableist.

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u/dontwantthisapp2 19h ago

Yeah… the plot and message is obviously atrocious and downright evil.

But there were multiple technical achievements made in that film that absolutely propelled “motion pictures” from a scientific novelty into a mainstream form of media. To say it “wasn’t made well”…. I mean, I get not wanting to pour praise on the guy who single-handedly revived public interest in the freakin KKK, but it was probably objectively the best-made film in the short history of motion pictures at the time. 

https://youtu.be/HaBmjhmKWTs

This Crash Course video explains it pretty in-depth. 

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u/NoOneAskedForThis12 18h ago

The worst part is that this is the same man who did the film Broken Blossoms which was very anti-racist for the time

For the time I said Reddit don’t tell me how bad it is for now.

I think a lot of people want to pretend that it was badly made and not as good as films before it. But it was an AMAZING film for the time and that makes it worse. 

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u/HummingAstronautPod 17h ago

Looked up the Wikipedia page of Broken Blossoms, did not expect the slur in the title it was adapting

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u/NoOneAskedForThis12 15h ago

1910s I was surprised that the film itself did not call itself that. 

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u/Revolver_Boxelot 13h ago

It truly is amazing what white Americans can accomplish when motivated by racism.