Dee Jay is back in Street Fighter 6, is he better than we remember?

Today we're going to talk about a returning character to Street Fighter 6. Dee Jay made his first appearance in Super Street Fighter II: The New Challengers in 1993. The new challengers the title referred to were T. Hawk, Fei Long, Cammy, and Dee Jay. Capcom was in the planning stages of Street Fighter III, and those four were the earliest characters slated to be inserted into the series. Several of the fighters in the SF series were inspired by pop culture, whether they were film characters, or actual martial artists. Dee Jay was no different. The character was created by James Goddard. The Capcom employee was Co-Lead Designer for Street Fighter II: Champion Edition. The studio had long sought to add a kickboxer to the game. The last time a fighter of that style was featured was with the non-playable Joe in the original SF from 1987.

For inspiration Mr. Goddard looked at Billy Blanks who is an actual martial arts practitioner, and fitness guru. Billy's first major role was as the villain Khan the Great in The King of Kickboxers. The film came out in 1990, after Final Fight, but before SFII was released. Billy's next starring role was in TC 2000. In that film he played Jason Storm. The film debuted in August 1993, Super SFII would come out a month later. Many people mistake TC 2000 as the film that inspired Dee Jay, but there's no way a studio could create a character, and their move set in less than a month. Blanks had a great physique, and a trademark fade that was made for game characters. Although there were a few notable Black martial arts film stars in the late '70s like Ron Van Clief, and Jim Kelly, there weren't too many in the late '80s/early '90s. Blanks (and Wesley Snipes) helped spark a new trend for actors like Michael Jai White, Marrese Crump, and Lateef Crowder. As for the character I think his new design was a bit better than his original.

Dee Jay had ditched the fade, and braids for natural hair. This was a nice touch. He was also wearing the colors of the Jamaican flag (green, yellow, and black) on his pants, and the Pan-African colors on his shirt. You know by now that I believe that the most memorable characters were assigned solid colors. Wrapping a character in a multi-colored national flag might be pandering, or a good substitute depending on your perspective. The reason I think for Dee Jay’s multicolored costume in this game was because yellow with black accents were already assigned to Sean in Street Fighter III, and green with yellow trim was assigned to his sister Laura in Street Fighter V. The updated look also includes gold jewelry around his neck, along with a medallion that reads MAXIMUM. This was a nod to his original costume. The studio had originally wanted to put MANTIS on the side of his pants, as in praying mantis. The problem with this was sprite mirroring, the N, and S would have been flipped on the screen. Maximum reads the same when mirrored vertically. The sticking point for me with the character was his stupid grin. It harkened back to an uglier time in US history, and I'm not talking about the '90s.

I am for more minority representation in the series. With that said I would like to see it in a positive light. I did not appreciate the gimmicks, and racial overtones applied to El Fuerte, Birdie, T. Hawk, and Hakan. Also I thought that there could be fat representation without it being used for the sake of comedy like Rufus. I had talked about the perpetually grinning Dee Jay, and the stereotypes behind black characters in Japanese games earlier on the blog. Younger readers may not be aware of it, especially out-of-touch Japanese developers, but the grinning black character was a trope from the days of Jim Crow. In short, to make a Black character more appealing (less threatening) to audiences he often had to be presented as a grinning entertainer. Even if Dee Jay now wore the colors of the Jamaican flag, and sported natural hair, he also wore a lot of jewelry, and never lost that wide grin. I’ve no doubt he would be fun to play with in the game. I also have no doubt that the new developers meant no harm in his return. I just hope that if the studio takes more careful consideration when adding minorities into the franchise. What do you think of Dee Jay? Are you eager to see his return, or would you rather have seen a different, or new character instead? I’d like to hear about it in the comments section. If you would like to sponsor me please visit my Patreon page and consider donating each month, even as little as $1 would help make better blogs and even podcasts!