The Academy Awards are set to be handed out this weekend, and Barry Jenkins's poignant coming-of-age film Moonlight has been nominated for eight of them. However, an ill-advised tribute to the critically acclaimed film from Skybound Entertainment — one of the production companies behind AMC's The Walking Dead — has viewers seriously pissed with the whitewashing.
In a now-deleted tweet, the production company put the poster for Jenkins's film next to a shot of Walking Dead character Carl Grimes, coloured with the same tint scheme used in Moonlight's graphics, Indiewire reports. Though the offending tweet was quickly deleted, it is already spreading like wildfire across social media, and you can see it above.
This quickly led to viewers interpreting the mock-up as whitewashing and cultural appropriation. The negative online response to the image was also quick and resoundingly negative, as you can see below.
In a now-deleted tweet, the production company put the poster for Jenkins's film next to a shot of Walking Dead character Carl Grimes, coloured with the same tint scheme used in Moonlight's graphics, Indiewire reports. Though the offending tweet was quickly deleted, it is already spreading like wildfire across social media, and you can see it above.
This quickly led to viewers interpreting the mock-up as whitewashing and cultural appropriation. The negative online response to the image was also quick and resoundingly negative, as you can see below.
"The Walking Dead" poster homage to #Moonlight is instantly blasted for whitewashing https://t.co/rRILNToKPB pic.twitter.com/Ua1D1iyZkt
— IndieWire (@IndieWire) February 24, 2017
@stronglines ok so bc there's blk people in walking dead let's make a moonlight homage poster?
— Kat (@petthekat) February 24, 2017
lmao it looks like the walking dead twitter acct deleted that horribly misguided moonlight tweet but i'm sure there's a screenshot somewhere
— audrey-wan kenobi 👑 (@hipstrparamedic) February 24, 2017
😷 Take something Black (AND QUEER in this case), and put a white face on it. Like always... Ugh.@IndieWire https://t.co/UNJnq2Y0p2
— Black. Queer. God. (@AdamantxYves) February 24, 2017
