Taking a page out of Rachel Zegler’s book, a few days before the release of the live-action How To Train Your Dragon movie, actress Nico Parker sends the movie under the bus and fires back at the fan backlash surrounding her character, Astrid.
In the original animated movie, Astrid is a Viking, and she’s blonde and has blue eyes. Well, the live-action remake changes that and uses Nico Parker, who is of mixed race. To go along with that, they changed Astrid’s eye and hair color to match Parker.
The fan backlash
Back in November, when the first-look footage was revealed, which included Nico Parker as Astrid, fans weren’t thrilled with the race swap. And it’s hard to blame the fans for that, as that’s what Hollywood has been doing for years, and it has nothing to do with making a good story, but all about serving up that DEI agenda. Maybe Universal got DEI funding for How To Train Your Dragon?
That said, Nico Parker is blaming the fans, and she says she doesn’t care what they think.
DEI casting means it has injected DEI into the story too. Close your wallets.
— Rosary Warrior John F Trent 🇻🇦 (@jftrent) November 20, 2024
Parker Responds to Critics of Inclusivity and Her Role
“I just don’t care”
The 20-year-old actress recently spoke with The Times of London in a featured interview.
“There’s some people that really love the animated movies and really want to see an exact play-by-play of that film, and I hope that you can watch [the new version] and find something that you love about it, regardless,” she said. “But for the people that just hate inclusivity, hate change — when it comes to that side of things, I just don’t care.”
She continued, “If I wouldn’t value your opinion on most things in life, I can’t value your opinion on my hair. If I did, I would go mad.”
Parker Reflects on Representation and Hopes to Drive Change
Parker was born into a filmmaking family, as her father is director Ol Parker, and her mother is actress Thandiwe Newton (Westworld). She said that growing up, there was little representation in Hollywood for “mixed race or Black icons,” but she finds it “really special” to see how much things have changed.
“There’s still a long way to go — for women in general, in terms of new parts, original material and female-led stories,” Parker added. “But I think that everything’s changing. I’d like to think that I could contribute to that change at some point.”
How to Train Your Dragon opens June 13. The first batch of reviews have been mixed. Dean DeBlois directs. Starring includes Mason Thames as Hiccup and Gerard Butler returning as Chief Stoick.
