Hi All. I have been watching a lot of House lately, and just started “Extrodinary Attorney Woo”. I am curious to know what you all think of their portrails of Autism. Is it pandering? Representation? Romantisation?
Also see “The Good Doctor”, “Atypical”, “Love on the spectrum” etc.
Do you have an example of a good character represention?
I’m guessing it is very hard for a neurotypical actor/writer/director to correctly represent autism, as its not something they actually experience? So it ends up falling back to cliches?
It’s almost all clichés and stereotypes. Autistic people are the model disabled person in media the same way Asian people are the model minority. Autistic characters are almost exclusively difficult for neurotypical characters to connect with, they have some sort of “super power” (Sheldon Cooper and Quantum Physics, Shaun Murphy and the human body, Raymond Babbitt and counting cards, Gary Bell and wavelengths…), often having difficulty with eye contact, and usually with physical, visual, or auditory sensitivities.