Thanks for sharing!

I haven’t watched this film, but I seem to always see material about it. And whenever I go to Barnes & Noble it’s always present on the ‘Netflix’ table. In my head I’m like “Ayy more representation for Young Adult/Teenage Kids of Color!” and then just carry on.

Your points are pretty interesting. I do find it kind of peculiar that Jenny Han, Korean-American, deliberately wrote almost all of the characters as Caucasian. And why the protagonist is written as mixed-race with a deceased Korean mother. But then again, My Name’s Bennett and I Ain’t in It (aka I’m not Korean or White so I’ll mind my business on that one).

I think after the success of Crazy Rich Asians people are itching for more positive representation, but more than that — compelling story lines to go with it. From a Black perspective, I love seeing more diversity in movie production and casting, and we’ve been seeing more and more of it recently. I think Asian-Americans are starting to finally break into that as well. However, I really hope that my Non-Black friends of color don’t fall into the trap of “Oh, we’re being represented positively so this is good enough!” We went through it (still go through it, honestly) and it’s really annoying to see one (positive representation) without the other (great casting and compelling story line). So I can definitely imagine your feelings towards “To All the Boys I Loved Before” as it fills in one bubble of being a nice movie but leaves a big empty space when it comes to diversity and inclusion.

Great read!