Meghan Markle slams Austin Powers and Kill Bill for promoting negative Asian stereotypes
Meghan Markle is digging into the problematic portrayal of Asian characters in Hollywood movies.
The Duchess of Sussex vanished from the airwaves in the wake of Queen Elizabeth II’s death, but now she’s back for a new instalment of her Spotify podcast Archetypes.
The 41-year-old star took aim at Hollywood in her latest episode for promoting 'Asian stereotypes'.
The TV actor slammed Mike Myers' Austin Powers and Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill for their caricature of Asian women 'as over sexualised' and 'aggressive'.
After a four-week break from podcasting, the former royal sat down with journalist Lisa Ling and comedian Margaret Cho in an episode called 'Dragon Lady' to disassemble the anti-Asian slurs in Los Angeles.
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Markle roasted the two decade old films for 'presenting caricatures of women of Asian descent'.
The former actor was specifically referring to Goldmember which features Japanese women Fook Mi, portrayed by Diane Mizota, and Fook Yu, played by Carrie Ann Inaba.
Tarantino's 2003 cult hit Kill Bill starred Lucy Liu as the murderously violent Yakuza leader O-Ren Ishii.
"Movies like Austin Powers and Kill Bill presented these characters of Asian women as oftentimes over sexualised or aggressive,' Markle said.
"And it's not just those two examples, there's so many more."
Of course, Markle made sure there was time to bring up her favourite topic of all: herself.
She said growing up in Los Angeles the city was full of culture'.
She also revealed to her panellists of how she went to a Korean spa as a teenager and was made to walk around naked at her mother's behest.
Markle added: "Just be yourself no matter what any societal framework or archetype or loud voice coming from a small place tells you that you should be. Be yourself. Your full complete whole layered, sometimes weird, sometimes awesome, but always best and true self."
She ended with: "Just be you. You're so much greater than any archetype."
Topics: Meghan Markle, Racism, Spotify, World News, US News, The Queen
Rachel Lang