I think it's reasonable to object to the casting, especially for those who enjoyed the originals. People form an emotional attachment to stories.
What I find striking in this whole culture wars thing is how asymetrical it is: there's no principles, it's always white/western people being wrong (well, I suppose that's a principle too). Example: when fans of Stephen King's The Dark Tower objected to casting a black actor for the white gunslinger, these same people who complain about white-washing called the objecting people racists and what not. They even went as far as stating that it was only in the fans' minds that the gunslinger was white, that he could equally well have been black, thereby betraying that they'd never even read the series.
Personally, I enjoyed Ghost in the Shell despite its flaws, and I'm pretty sure I'm also going to enjoy The Dark Tower, despite the fact that it's radically changing a central part of the plot of the books.
Well, like I said. For me it's not a matter of what's right or wrong, just the fucking with of characters that I care about because the same Hollywood stars in every other movie have to be in this one too. I grow tired of the monotony.
The Gun Slinger was definitely white in the long series of comic books which Stephen King helped create, so I'm not sure how anyone can say that it was just in their minds. But any adaptation of a epic series of novels into a couple hours of film is going to have to change drastically anyways. And I'm usually excited to see Idris Elba in something. GITS was already in movie format, and the core of the story could have been done justice.
What I find striking in this whole culture wars thing is how asymetrical it is: there's no principles, it's always white/western people being wrong (well, I suppose that's a principle too). Example: when fans of Stephen King's The Dark Tower objected to casting a black actor for the white gunslinger, these same people who complain about white-washing called the objecting people racists and what not. They even went as far as stating that it was only in the fans' minds that the gunslinger was white, that he could equally well have been black, thereby betraying that they'd never even read the series.
Personally, I enjoyed Ghost in the Shell despite its flaws, and I'm pretty sure I'm also going to enjoy The Dark Tower, despite the fact that it's radically changing a central part of the plot of the books.