And it's true that endless examples of this can be found. From Will Smith in "The Legend of Bagger Vance", to The Oracle in "The Matrix", to Whoopi Goldberg on "Star Trek: TNG", to Morgan Freeman in "Robin Hood", to Morgan Freeman in "The Shawshank Redeption", to Morgan Freeman in "Bruce/Evan Almighty...
Yet somehow this didn't sit well with me: not the phenomenon but the very concept itself. "Aren't we supposed to strive towards not seeing colour?" I though, though that's a rather arrogant view if this truly indicates a problem.
Eventually I realised that I was uncomfortable with how the question is being posed, implicitly asking "How many examples of this character being black can you think of?" And, lo and behold, a slew of black examples are returned as the answer. I wondered what one might find if, on the other hand, one searched for such characters from any ethic background?
So that's what I did. Went through my list of favourite movies, noting where I could each character that fit the definition above, the results of which are in the table at the end of this post, and a racial summary shown in the chart at left. This wasn't a formal study, of course, and from about 250 films only 30 characters came to mind. Part of the difficulty again stems from the definition of a "magical helper". The help offered must be altrustic, i.e. not befitting the character himself—at the same time, the character is defined as one-dimensional, with no background, existing solely to help the protangonists. But, without knowing the character's background, how can we know his reasons for helping? For example, in "It's a Wonderful Life", (spoilers ahead), we know Clarence helps George Bailey in order to get his wings—had the story not given us that background on Clarence, would his help then become altruistic, and his character become a magical helper? Despite that, from these rough results in seems that far more of these characters are Caucasian than of African origin; in fact, the number of these helpful characters played by black-skinned people is about the same as the number played by animals. And this shows the crux of my issue with this question: what would be the "correct" percentage of African characters to play this part? If examples of this character were invariably white, wouldn't the complaint become that Africans are never shown as altruistic characters with the virtues of patience and understanding? I posit that there is no "correct" ratio of ethnicity here, no more than there would be a correct ratio of hair-length, age, occupation or anything else unrelated to the character's part in the story.
| Role | Actor | Race |
| Red | Morgan Freeman | African American |
| The Wolf | Harvey Keitel | Caucasian |
| Obi Wan Kenobi | Alec Guiness | Caucasian |
| R2D2 & C3P0 | -- | Robot |
| Motivational Speaker | Brian Cox | Caucasian |
| Tim Roth's Supervisor | -- | African American |
| Oogway | -- | Animal |
| Various sea creatures | -- | Animal |
| Miracle Max & Wife | Billy Crystal | Caucasian |
| Silent Bob | Kevin Smith | Caucasian |
| Turnip Head the Scarcrow | -- | Object |
| Journalist | Philip Seymour Hoffman | Caucasian |
| The Sphinx | Wes Studi | Native American |
| Rufus | George Carlin | Causcasian |
| S. R. Hadden | John Hurt | Caucasian |
| Shepherd Book | Ron Glass | African American |
| Nick | Robert Prosky | Caucasian |
| Sylva | Natascha McElhone | Caucasian |
| Curly Washburn | Jack Palance | Caucasian |
| The Hermit | Tommey Tweed | Caucasian |
| Gaby LaRoche | Syme Jago | Caucasian |
| Sebastian | Samuel E. Wright | Animal |
| Lisle Von Rhoman | Isabella Rossellini | Caucasian |
| Peter Malloy | Tom Selleck | Caucasian |
| Mary Poppins | Julie Andrews | Caucasian |
| Nikola Tesla | David Bowie | Caucasian |
| Wilson | Volleyball | Object |
| Andrew the Butler | Roddy McDowall | Caucasian |
| Del Paxton | Bill Cobbs | African American |
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