Alien Warrior = Dark Skin?

[Tea Earl Grey Hot]

I've noticed a peculiar trend in sci fi shows set in space. The character in the staring crew that is of the "honorable warrior" type often has dark skin. In several cases, the character is even played by a black actor.

Some examples that come to my mind (are there more?):

D'Argo from Farscape:



Worf from Star Trek TNG and DS9



Teal'c from Stargate SG-1



Ronon from Stargate Atlantis



And maybe this is a bit of a stretch but I think Chewbacca fits into this pattern

[Napoléon]

[BrokenQuill92]

Weird I never noticed. There is actually a trope for that.

---

It's called "Proud Warrior Race Guy"

[Tea Earl Grey Hot]

Ah, I forgot Try from Andromeda:

[Autumnlicious]

Ah, I forgot Try from Andromeda:

Tyr

[Tea Earl Grey Hot]

Tyr

Oh, I know. Autocorrect did that.

[vorlon13]

If Worf and Tyr want to stop by and go all warrior on my ass, I wouldn't worry about the racial angle till they were done.

---

Oh, forgot Chewbacca, he can come by too !!

[Autumnlicious]

Counters:

Martok


Bra'tac of Chulak


Those two clear hit the "Alien Warrior" trope.

In the context of Andromeda, Captain Dylan Hunt is not "human". He is a heavy worlder-Paradine hybrid. He is later more of an Alien Warrior as his role changes towards discovering the Paradines.




Harper and Becca are the Human "Badass Normal" tropes.

[One Above All]

I assume that "dark" means "darker than Caucasians". The question is, why would aliens be as light or lighter than Caucasians, when skin color can go from white (no or little pigment) to black (lots of pigment)? Which do you think is more likely:
Getting the number 3, when someone else spouts a random number between 1 and 10, or getting any number except 3?
Yes, there are more actors with "dark" skin who play aliens than Caucasians. That's just because, statistically, you'd be more likely to find non-Caucasians than Caucasians. Actually, if you focus on just one skin tone (and not a whole spectrum, as you're doing in the OP), you're more likely to find every skin tone except that one. Assuming all skin tones are equally distributed amongst the species, of course. Given that these are "aliens" we're talking about, I think it's the best bet.

...Or it's just plain old racism. Take your pick.

[Anomalocaris]

If the Chinese made sci if soap operas, I bet a good portion of aliens would be white and very few would have Asian looking skin tones.