Fox Studios and Marvel revealed the cast of the new Fantastic Four reboot yesterday to much anticipation. House of Card’s Kate Mara will assume the role of Sue Storm/The Invisible Woman, Project X’s Miles Teller will play Reid Richards/Mr. Fantastic, Jumper’s Jamie Bell will be portraying Benn Grimm/The Thing and Fruitvale Station’s Michael B. Jordan is Johnny Storm/The Human Torch. In an era that seems to be a comic book-to-big screen renaissance – that is, franchises being re-cast and re-imagined – these fresh-faced Fantastic Four actors actually make sense. Jordan got to flex supernatural powers in the slept on Chronicle, where a mysterious crystalline object gives him telekinetic and flight capabilities. Bell got to showcase his sci-fi chops in Jumper. And while Mara and Teller might be in foreign territory here, their dramatic and comedic talents will add a rich texture to the Fantastic family dynamic. Coming on the heels of the announcement that Jessie Eisenberg has been tapped to revive Lex Luthor in the upcoming Superman vs. Batman, these casting choices appear way less baffling.

But leave it up to comic book purists to spark outrage over controversy that just isn’t there. Thousands took to Twitter to brandish their 140-character pitchforks to defend the honor of the comic canon they shield so dearly from alteration. How could, they asked, Fantastic Four remain true to the source material if a black actor is playing Johnny Storm, a character originally drawn as white by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby in 1961? I don’t know, maybe the same way the last Fantastic Four films from 2005 and 2007 weren’t a spit in the face to the comic even though Jessica Alba, who is of Mexican descent, played Sue Storm (also originally drawn as white). Or how Michael Fassbender, an Irish Catholic, still managed to capture the angst and stoicism of the young Magneto in X-Men: First Class, regardless that Magneto’s experience as a Jew who survived concentration camps has a direct correlation to his mutant capabilities. I guess if you are a racially ambiguous babe or a handsome green-eyed man, racist nerds are kosher with putting “original source material” in the backseat for you.

In a medium that lives by the ethos “continuity be damned!” and dead characters are resurrected in ways that seem silly and implausible even by comic book standards (Punisher, anyone?), the fact that purists draw a line in the sand with black actors donning the suits (or flames) of white characters doesn’t hold up to the “original source material” alibi. You know why? Because we only see this caliber of outrage and boycotts when it is actors of color. Just in the past few years alone we watched Donald Glover get thrown under the bus for being attached to The Amazing Spiderman reboot. Idris Elba playing Heimdall in the Thor franchise is still causing vocal ire. And let’s not forget the shame surrounding Amandla Stenberg’s casting in The Hunger Games. Even though author Suzanne Collins explicitly described Rue’s complexion as olive-skinned throughout the novel, fans still raced to social media to air their displeasure. I remember vividly (and this was two years ago) seeing a tweet that read: “I always pictured Rue as sweet innocent white girl. Now it’s some black kid”. As if sweet/innocent and black were mutually exclusive.

I hope this new Fantastic Four is a smash hit both critically and commercially so that comic book fans realize that personality traits and back-story create the fiber of a FICTIONAL character, not whatever colored pencil the illustrator used to brighten the page of a comic book. Johnny Storm is brash, cocky yet vulnerable; three universal traits possessed by all races. I’m sure a competent actor such as Michael B. Jordan can convey those qualities on screen just as naturally as Chris Evans did before him. Fans must embrace these liberties taken with fiction. White shouldn’t be accepted as default, especially when dealing with the influence these comics have on the imagination (an imagination that shapes how they view the real world) of young children. Children who will be a part of our own legacy. That is the original source material worth fighting for.