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| Some movie-goers were upset that a white male was not a central heroic figure in 'The Last Jedi.' |
THE SUPPOSED fan backlash that chased Kelly Marie Tran from social media may have been the work of Russian trolls and non-human bots in support of right wing and racist agendas, concluded a study from the University of Southern California.
Salon reports the study by researcher Morten Bay analyzed tweets aimed at ridiculing Kelly Marie Tran, the first women of color to be cast in a lead role in theStar Wars franchise.
“The study finds evidence of deliberate, organized political influence measures disguised as fan arguments,” Bay writes. “ The likely objective of these measures is increasing media coverage of the fandom conflict, thereby adding to and further propagating a narrative of widespread discord and dysfunction in American society.”
According to the South China Morning Post more than half of the tweets analyzed came from non-human bots with a number being Russian trolls. Some 960 twitter accounts were analyzed by Bay.
Bay concluded only about 10 percent of the tweets he analyzed came from legitimate Twitter accounts.
In December 2017, AsAmNews reported a fan page was taken over by racists who posted bigoted messages about Tran.
The Russian cyberwarfare campaign that used some fans' criticism of The Last Jedi as a launching pad for more insidious motives. The online vitriol had a common thread with Russia’s earlier Facebook disinformation campaigns, initiated during the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
“Some [trolls] were less focused on politics of party or specific issues and more on identity politics, posting anti-feminist or anti-homosexuality messages, and tweets of a racist nature were also frequent among the accounts in this category,” the study explains in order to sow discord among Americans.
The Last Jedi’s director, Rian Johnson, retweeted the paper, writing “what the top-line describes is consistent with my experience online”.
He added: “And just to be totally clear: this is not about fans liking or not liking the movie – I’ve had tons of great talks with great fans online and off who liked and disliked stuff. That’s what fandom is all about. This is specifically about a virulent strain of online harassment.”
The Last Jedi’s director, Rian Johnson, retweeted the paper, writing “what the top-line describes is consistent with my experience online”.
He added: “And just to be totally clear: this is not about fans liking or not liking the movie – I’ve had tons of great talks with great fans online and off who liked and disliked stuff. That’s what fandom is all about. This is specifically about a virulent strain of online harassment.”
The best answer to fan criticism, Russian or otherwise, is to produce a sequel starring Kelly Marie Tran. She'll be back in the Star Wars: Episode IX when it hits theaters on December 20, 2019.
Views From the Edge contributed to this report.
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