The criticisms against the casting of Alexandra Shipp as Storm are not valid at all…

This is response to people harassing Alexandra Shipp on social media for playing Storm in the X-Men films, saying she is not “black enough” and/or that her casting was example of colorism. Not to point out that they are jerk(which they are) but that their are arguments are not really good.

Colorism Argument

I’ll start off by saying that her casting has nothing to do with colorism. Shipp was likely chosen because she looks believable as a younger version of Halle Berry. They both have similar complexions. Did people seriously believe that a dark skinned actress would make sense as younger version of Halle Berry’s Storm? Did people forget that these are prequels to the mansion scene at the end of DOFP, which still had Halle Berry playing Storm? Did they not see the previous X-Men films?

Some would counter this by saying Halle Berry’s casting was the result of colorism. Which is still a garbage argument because the first choice for Storm’s was Angela Bassett, a dark skin woman. Here is an interview with X-Men and X2 screenplay writer, David Hayter.

Angela Bassett was our first choice for Storm, but her agents wanted more money than we had at the time. Same with Rachael Leigh Cook for Rogue.



https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/x-men-screenwriter-hugh-jackmans-wolverine-casting-drama-982045



So they were perfectly fine with a dark skin actress as Storm. But she was too expensive and they went with a cheaper actress.

Not Dark Enough Argument

Now let’s to get to the argument of Shipp being too light to play Storm because the character is a black African. Problem is Storm has been drawn in the comics with a light brown complexion years before Berry was cast. It depends on the colorist like any other comic book character. And there are black African ethnic groups that have similar or even lighter complexions than that. Such as the San people in Southern Africa.

Some would counter this by saying that Storm is definitively dark skinned because she is Kenyan…except Kenyan is a nationality and not an ethnicity. Storm is also not a native Kenyan anyway. Her mother is a princess of a tribe in Kenya but her father was a US American. Storm was born in Harlem and spend her childhood in Cairo of Egypt. She didn’t start living in Kenya until she was a preteen.

The tribe of Storm’s mother is not from a real african ethnic group and it’s not even indigenous to Kenya. It’s a fictional ancient line that practices sorcery, who have white straight hair and blue eyes like Storm. In New Mutants #32 Storm has an ancestor named Ashake who was present in ancient Egypt, thousands of miles away from the site of Kenya. They have also been present in Meroë as shown in Epic IllUstrated #12 - The Dark Stratgem. They seem to have spread out across east Africa.

And finally, Storm doesn’t just have light hair color, straight hair texture, and light eyes. Its stated in-universe that her facial feature don’t even resemble the average black African. She has a very narrow nose instead of a wide one and it’s highlighted in Uncanny X-Men #133, where Jean imagines Storm as a slave from the Antebellum era. The slave version of her has a wide nose while the real one doesn’t.

Closing Point

We are talking about a character that is from a fictional ethnicity who don’t look anything like real african ethnic groups besides having brown skin. So as long as the actress has brown skin and is of African descent the casting shouldn’t really matter beyond that.