History Main / WhiteMaleLead

* In ''Series/HawaiiFive0,'' despite the diversity of the Hawaiian islands, the main lead is still a white guy (mcgarrett) and the main plots is usually about him and his white guy partner (Danno). Some seasons had an otherwise minority-majority cast but the leads were unchanged.

* In ''Series/HawaiiFive0,'' despite the diversity of the Hawaiian islands, the main lead is still a white guy - McGarrett - and the main plots is usually about him and his white guy partner (Danno). Some seasons had an otherwise minority-majority cast but the leads were unchanged.

* ''Literature/ChronoHustle'' is fairly diverse in it's cast but, while it isn't explicitly mentioned, Jack seems to be white based on the fact that his race likely would have come into play otherwise when he went to the Old West.

You may be surprised to learn that this trope has less to do with Western bias (though that's still prevalent, make no mistake) and more to do with [[MoneyDearBoy courting the international dollar]]. In the United States, for example, you're more likely to see female, non-white, and LGBT leads in TV shows, where the viewership is mostly domestic. But in big-budget blockbuster films, such actors don't do nearly as well in international markets, particularly China and Russia; Blacks and Hispanics aren't seen as relatable to the audiences there, LGBT characters are outright ''banned'' due to the countries' laws against "gay propaganda", and a woman as The Hero might upset social mores depending on the movie. As a result, Western studios often play it safe by casting a plain white male as the lead.

Tropers are reminded that '''[[TropesAreNotBad tropes are not always bad]]'''. Many works with white male leads have been praised for their positive portrayals of minority characters. And of course it's a vicious cycle of investors who want to put their money in a sure thing and studios who want to have something to point at to seem like they know what's going to sell; there's no one group to blame.

* ''Film/TheForbiddenKingdom'' takes place in ancient China, but its lead is a white male from the present day. [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Forbidden_Kingdom#Critical_reception One reviewer]] said "As a Hollywood blockbuster, ''The Forbidden Kingdom'' offers no apologies for its American-centrism. In fact, it wears it with pride like a badge of honor." It was star Jackie Chan's own idea that the protagonist be a white kid, precisely to attract interest in the West for what was basically a WireFu movie. This example is unusual in that the White Male Lead is not featured prominently in any of the advertising. The purpose of a White Male Lead in a movie with a minority-heavy cast is usually to attract white audiences, but as mentioned above, Jackie Chan and Jet Li movies usually do not have this problem.
* ''Film/BirthOfTheDragon'' was advertised as a Bruce Lee biopic, but turned out to focus more on his white friend who didn't even exist in real life.

* ''Film/NoEscape'': Despite being set in an Asian country, the film is focused solely on Jack Dwyer (played by the very white Owen Wilson) and his desire to protect his family, and not focused on any Asian character.
* ''Film/ComeSeeTheParadise'' is a story about Japanese internment camps centered on Dennis Quaid.

* Averted and parodied in ''Film/HaroldAndKumarGoToWhiteCastle''. The opening scene contains two white guys rather than the actual lead characters and sets up their storyline, [[HeroOfAnotherStory which happens almost entirely offscreen]]. The film's creators initially feared that ExecutiveMeddling would turn Harold and Kumar into "Joe and Dave." The two white guys are the movie the creators were afraid that '' Harold And Kumar'' would become.

* ''Film/{{Elysium}}'': The main character is nominally a light-skinned Hispanic man, but he's played by the very [=WASPy=] Matt Damon.

* ''Film/SpeedRacer'' casts the racer family, who are Japanese but {{Mukokuseki}} in the original anime, with white actors. Emile Hirsch is our white male lead as Speed.

* ''Film/GodzillaKingOfTheMonsters1956'': This Americanized version of the original Japanese film inserts Raymond Burr into the footage and turns him into the lead character.

You may be surprised to learn that this trope has less to do with Western bias (though that's still prevalent, make no mistake) and more to do with [[MoneyDearBoy courting the international dollar]]. In the United States, for example, you're more likely to see female, minority, and LGBT leads in TV shows, where the viewership is mostly domestic. But in big-budget blockbuster films, such actors don't do nearly as well in international markets, particularly China and Russia; Blacks and Hispanics aren't seen as relatable to the audiences there, LGBT characters are outright ''banned'' due to the countries' laws against "gay propaganda", and a woman as The Hero might upset social mores depending on the movie. As a result, Western studios often play it safe by casting a plain white male as the lead.

You may be surprised to learn that this trope has less to do with Western bias (though that's still prevalent, make no mistake) and more to do with [[MoneyDearBoy courting the international dollar]]. In the United States, for example, you're more likely to see female, minority, and LGBT leads in TV shows, where the viewership is mostly domestic. But in big-budget blockbuster films, such actors don't do nearly as well in international markets, particularly China and Russia; blacks and Hispanics aren't seen as relatable to the audiences there, LGBT characters are outright ''banned'' due to the countries' laws against "gay propaganda", and a woman as The Hero might upset social mores depending on the movie. As a result, Western studios often play it safe by casting a plain white male as the lead.

No matter how diverse a show's cast or how positive its portrayal of minorities, the lead character will almost always be a conventionally heterosexual, Caucasian, vaguely Christian, and often American male. Common wisdom in the Western[[note]]And by ''Western'', we mean countries from both the Anglosphere and Western European ones.[[/note]] entertainment industry is that a show or film needs a lead character that the [[MostWritersAreMale target demographic]] can [[LeadYouCanRelateTo identify with]]. At least in the target of "Caucasian men", that despite being a diverse country, are still a majority, especially considering the same creators of content are mostly Caucasian men, and some think they are more "Identifiable", at least in places where they are majority as in the same country and more "profitable", so this is usually an EnforcedTrope. The Caucasian Male Lead is often TheHero.

You may be surprised to learn that this trope has less to do with Western bias (though that can still be prevalent, make no mistake) and more to do with [[MoneyDearBoy courting the international dollar]]. In the United States, for example, you may be more likely to see female, minority, and LGBT leads in TV shows, where the viewership is mostly domestic. But in big-budget blockbuster films, such actors don't do nearly as well in international markets. Depending on the country, LGBT characters might be banned or require a higher rating, and female leads might upset social norms. As a result, Western studios often play it safe by casting a plain male as the lead.

Tropers are reminded that '''[[Administrivia/TropesAreTools tropes are not always bad]]'''. Many works with white male leads have been praised for their positive portrayals of minority characters. And of course it's a vicious cycle of investors who want to put their money in a sure thing and studios who want to have something to point at to seem like they know what's going to "sell" to their Target. It is also due to self-insertion, whether from the same creators, writers, or producers who are mostly Caucasian men in Hollywood; there's no one group to blame.

->''"Our team consists of two black guys, two white women, and one white guy, so I guess it's pretty clear who's in charge."''

* The 2011 film ''Film/TowerHeist'' was supposed to have a mostly black and Latino cast with Creator/EddieMurphy in the lead. The lead role instead went to Creator/BenStiller.

* So far there have been two movies about the Stonewall riots that kicked off the modern LGBT rights movement. The real-life riots were headed by ButchLesbian Stormé [=DeLarverie=], black drag queen Marsha P. Johnson, and Hispanic transgender woman Sylvia Rivera, among many others. However, both movies chose to focus instead on white male leads:

* In ''Literature/{{Animorphs}}'', the eponymous group consists of a Hispanic boy (Marco), a black girl (Cassie), a white girl (Rachel), a white boy [[ShapeshifterModeLock permanently trapped in the form of a hawk]] (Tobias), a blue, male alien (Ax), and a white boy (Jake). Jake is somewhat arbitrarily chosen to be the leader in the first book, partially because he was the tiebreaking vote on what course of action the kids would take. Though, it should be noted that the series gives pretty equal POV time and attention to each character.

** It gets to the point where one episode has a tacked-on musical number for the black Mercedes and the Asian Tina. This number is explicitly said InUniverse to have been added to give two underutilized characters something to do.

** Finn is also an example in-universe. Apparently he is the only suitable "male lead" for the Glee club at the time the other two boy members are white, but one is a CampGay and the other one is disabled. Shortly later three other boys join in, but one is Jewish, one is black and one is Asian, so Finn, the only non-minority boy, stays as the designated lead, soaking in Will's favoritism, despite definitely not being the best male singer in the group and actually being one of the worst dancers.

* ''Series/DeathInParadise'' has a racially diverse cast, with a black woman and two black men as the main characters, as well as several black side characters. The head of the show always ends up being a white man, however, with the arrival of Richard Poole, later replaced by Humphrey Goodman.

** All the Doctors through Creator/PeterCapaldi (Twelfth) were white males, though it was eventually confirmed during Creator/StevenMoffat's tenure that Time Lords can change race and sex when they [[TheNthDoctor regenerate]]. There had long been debate among fans -- and indeed, Creator/{{the BBC}}, who've considered black actors for the role -- of getting a female or alternate race in, but this quickly degraded into accusations that it would be wrecked. The announcement in 2017 that the Thirteenth Doctor would be Creator/JodieWhittaker, a white woman, caused the fanbase to erupt and [[BrokenBase break]] -- some were overjoyed, some would rather have had a male Doctor of an alternate race, some wanted a non-white woman, and some wanted another white man.

** The first {{spinoff}} ''Series/CriminalMindsSuspectBehavior'', in its pursuit to be radically different from the original series while keeping faithful to its [[StrictlyFormula basic structure]], had a BaldBlackLeaderGuy played by Creator/ForestWhitaker among an [[InvertedTrope otherwise whole white main cast]]. The character "Prophet," who had been originally envisioned as [[TokenMinority black]], was made white.
** Played straight in the second spinoff, ''Series/CriminalMindsBeyondBorders''. The team includes two white females (one played by a Hispanic actress though the character is not), a half-Asian male, a black male, and an older white male played by Creator/GarySinise, who is the team leader.

* ''Series/{{Firefly}}'': Four white men, two white women, one Latina woman, one black woman, and one black man in the main cast. The captain and pilot make up two of the white men. However, the black woman is second in command, and the captain avoids the "vaguely Christian" description by being belligerently anti-spiritual.
* Subverted in ''Series/DarkMatter'' - the show started out with the most milquetoast white guy in the racially diverse crew acting as the lead and audience sympathy character (he wakes up first and he's the only human character who doesn't have a criminal background). But then at the beginning of season 2, the writers [[spoiler: kill him off (right after a new plotline for him started, no less)]], and then they also [[spoiler: kill off]] another, much less moral recurring character the same actor was playing, just in case you thought he was supposed to take over the lead now that the rest of the crew [[CharacterDevelopment had become more sympathetic.]] And, just to drive the point home, another, new white male character who joins the crew and seems like a replacement in terms of personality gets [[spoiler: killed off even more abruptly]] after a few episodes, with the rest of the crew not even caring to find out what happened to him. A black female character gets to permanently join the regular cast instead. And the Asian female ActionGirl love interest from the first season becomes the primary protagonist (and captain of the ship). By the end of the second season, the only white male character still on the crew is the show's [[Series/{{Firefly}} Jayne-expy]], who is perfectly content just being the muscle for "Boss Lady."

* Zig-zagged with the ''Franchise/AssassinsCreed'' franchise. The VanillaProtagonist in the present-day storyline is just AmbiguouslyBrown enough to be considered any ethnicity (including white) by those who wish, while his ancestors in the historical storyline are of various ethnicities (Arabic Hashashin, Italian, British, and Native American). He was eventually replaced by [[PlayerAndProtagonistIntegration you, the player]], starting with ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedIVBlackFlag'', which was also where the historical protagonists began to play it agonizingly straight to the point where the parade of white male leads can be hard to tell apart. This was not helped by the fact that the titles centering on a half-black woman (''AC III: Liberation'') and a black man (''AC IV: Freedom Cry'') are a GaidenGame and DownloadableContent respectively, neither of which received much promotion, to the point where few have heard of them. ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedSyndicate'' featured a woman as a co-player character alongside her twin brother, although both of them were white. To their credit, Ubisoft looks to be attempting to rectify this problem with the heavily-promoted ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedOrigins'', whose Ptolemaic Egyptian protagonist has appropriately dark skin.
* Zig-zagged in the ''VideoGame/{{Crysis}}'' series. In the first game and its sidequel, the protagonists are Nomad and Psycho, both white—but their team leader is Prophet, black. In ''Crysis 2'', the protagonist is Alcatraz, white, [[spoiler:who is ultimately absorbed by the nanosuit and overriden by Prophet's memories]]. In ''Crysis 3'', the protagonist is Prophet.

-->'''[=SuperCraig=]:''' Creator/{{Marvel}} is making a [[Film/BlackPanther2018 black superhero movie]].\\
'''The Coon:''' Yeah, ''now!'' They waited years to get to that! [[FollowTheLeader We follow their plan]] -- we do all the real people first, then we sneak the black guy in at Phase 3.

* In ''Webcomic/TheOrderOfTheStick'', Tarquin has one blind spot in his GenreSavvy dominance: he believes the hero of the story is Elan (white male), when in fact Elan is part of an ensemble and the ''de facto'' protagonist is Roy (black male). A large part of Tarquin's VillainousBreakdown is that other characters are overshadowing Elan, whom he insists ''should'' be the hero to his BigBad--and according to WordOfGod, it's no accident that Elan and Tarquin both are straight white males while the characters sidelining Elan include a black man, a woman, [[WordOfGay an individual outed as genderqueer in that very piece of Word of God]], and a Latino guest star. Tarquin not only can't stand [[ControlFreak losing control]] of his carefully-crafted narrative, he can't stand the idea that the character who best fits the White Male Lead mold ''isn't'' the lead. He pretty much just assumes that he's the leader in his own group for the same reason, even though it's clear to the reader that he's not.[[note]]His group doesn't seem to actually ''have'' a leader, with his non-white (and in 2 cases non-human) friends only playing along to the extent that they feel like it and otherwise doing their own thing.[[/note]]

* Deconstructed with Donnie [=DuPre=] from ''WebVideo/DemoReel''. He's the "main" InnocentBigot in a show that has a woman, a black man, and two foreign guys, but he's very bisexual, very nice and very woobie, really wants to be a good friend to all of them, and after some firm prodding, works to make up for his initial racist/sexist comments.

-->''Apparently in the future the liberals have extinguished all the white people,'' Coulter explained, ''I mean they got a black girl running the communications, an Asian guy driving the ship and a pointy-eared alien doing pretty much everything else. I guess we're supposed to just accept that minorities will be the new majority. This isn't an entertainment film - it's nothing but a pro-Obama, multicultural piece of propaganda. And of course it's not even realistic. Since when have black people been able to speak foreign languages? And shouldn't Sulu have crashed the ship into a quasar by now?''

* So far there have been two movies about the Stonewall riots that kicked off the modern LGBT rights movement. The real-life riots were headed by ButchLesbian Stormé [=DeLarverie=] black drag queen Marsha P. Johnson and transgender woman Sylvia Rivera, among many others. However, both movies chose to focus instead on white male leads:
** ''Film/{{Stonewall}}'' (2015) focuses on fictional Danny Winters, a white StraightGay teenager from Indiana who bused to New York City after being kicked out of his home. Filmmaker Creator/RolandEmmerlich stated in interviews that he created Danny to appeal to straight white audiences, which pleased no one. Straight white people with enough interest in queer history to see the movie in the first place knew better and weren't impressed with the whitewashing; some were also offended by the idea that they could only relate to the blandest kid possible--not even a native New Yorker but someone from the rural Midwest--rather than the colorful characters actually from that community.

* So far there have been two movies about the Stonewall riots that kicked off the modern LGBT rights movement. The real-life riots were headed by ButchLesbian Stormé [=DeLarverie=] and two {{Transgender}} women of color: Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, among many others. However, both movies chose to focus instead on white male leads:

* Played straight in ''VideoGame/GearsOfWar'' 1 through 4 (and the spin-off, ''Judgment''), then subverted in ''Gears 5.'' Standard WhiteMaleLead JD Fenix turns out to be a DecoyProtagonist, with Kait Diaz (a Hispanic woman from a FantasyCounterpartCulture being the game's actual main character.

** For what it's worth, Magic has subverted this trope just as often as it's upheld it. For example, the darker-skinned Gideon Jura was TheHero of the Gatewatch, while Jace was more commonly TheSmartGuy. Many blocks have focused on leads that were neither white, male, nor straight. ''Kaladesh'' and ''Fate Reforged'' get special mentions here; ''Kaladesh's'' primary protagonists where the biracial, pansexual female Planeswalker Chandra Nalaar and her middle aged south Asian mother Pia, while ''Fate Reforged'' introduced Alesha, Who Smiles at Death, Magic's first canon trans character who also isn't white (hailing from a FantasyCounterpartCulture to the Mongol Horde).

You may be surprised to learn that this trope has less to do with Western bias (though that can still be prevalent, make no mistake) and more to do with [[MoneyDearBoy courting the international dollar]]. In the United States, for example, you may be more likely to see female, minority, and LGBT leads in TV shows, where the viewership is mostly domestic. But in big-budget blockbuster films, such actors don't do nearly as well in international markets. Depending on the country, LGBT characters might be banned or require a higher rating, and female or minority leads might upset social norms. As a result, Western studios often play it safe by casting a plain male as the lead.

** ''Film/{{Stonewall}}'' (2015) focuses on fictional Danny Winters, a white StraightGay teenager from Indiana who bused to New York City after being kicked out of his home. Filmmaker Creator/RolandEmmerlich stated in interviews that he created Danny to appeal to straight white audiences, which pleased no one. Straight white audiences with enough interest in the subject to see the movie in the first place knew better and were offended that racial and gender minorities were getting shafted in a film about their own history.

* Applies to ''Series/TheMagicians2016''. Its main character, Quentin, is one of two white men in a fairly diverse cast -- the other, Eliot, starts the series as openly into men. Quentin is later revealed to be bisexual, however. This trope is also lampshaded by an old-timey character who recognizes Quentin as the traditional AudienceSurrogate.
-->'''Hyman:''' But Quentin, I mean, [you're] the outsider let into the inner sanctum of secret knowledge. As someone born in 1902, I find a heterosexual white male hero very relatable.

* Dave from ''[[WebAnimation/SAtina Satina Wants a Glass Of Water]]''...[[ProtagonistTitle sort of]].

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* Booker [=DeWitt=] from ''VideoGame/BioshockInfinite'' is able to walk about Columbia because he is neither an ethnic minority nor Irish. He has Native American heritage, but there's no indication of this at all in the advertising materials or on the game's cover.

* Played straight in ''VideoGame/GearsOfWar'' 1 through 4 (and the spinoff, ''Judgment''), then subverted in ''Gears 5.'' Standard WhiteMaleLead JD Fenix turns out to be a DecoyProtagonist, with Kait Diaz (a Hispanic woman from a FantasyCounterpartCultura being the game's actual main character.

* ''Series/{{The Wire}}'' features a majority African-American cast, but the clear lead character is Jimmy [=McNulty=], played by the white actor Dominic West.

You may be surprised to learn that this trope has less to do with Western bias (though that can still be prevalent, make no mistake) and more to do with [[MoneyDearBoy courting the international dollar]]. In the United States, for example, you may be more likely to see female, minority, and LGBT leads in TV shows, where the viewership is mostly domestic. But in big-budget blockbuster films, such actors don't do nearly as well in international markets. Depending on the country, LGBT characters might be banned or require a higher rating, and female or minority leads might upset social norms. As a result, Western studios often play it safe by casting a plain white male as the lead.

** Subverted in ''Son of Neptune'' - Frank is the official leader of the quest. And again in House of Hades, when Jason promotes Frank to praetorship to lead the ghost army.

** For what it's worth, Magic has subverted this trope just as often as it's upheld it. For example, the darker-skinned Gideon Jura was TheHero of the Gatewatch, while Jace was more commonly TheSmartGuy. Many blocks have focused on leads that were neither white, male, nor straight. ''Kaladesh'' and ''Fate Reforged'' get special mentions here; ''Kaladesh's'' primary protagonists where the biracial, pansexual female Planeswalker Chandra Nalaar and her middle aged south Asian mother Pia, while ''Fate Reforged'' introduced Alesha, Who Smiles at Death, Magic's first canon trans character who also isn't white (hailing from a FantastyCounterpartCulture to the Mongol Horde).

* Played straight in ''VideoGame/GearsOfWar'' 1 through 4 (and the spinoff, ''Judgment''), then subverted in ''Gears 5.'' Standard WhiteMaleLead JD Fenix turns out to be a DecoyProtagonist, with Kait Diaz (a Hispanic woman from a FantasyCounterpartCultura being the game's actual main character.

* Played straight in ''VideoGame/GearsOfWar'' 1 through 4 (and the spinoff, ''Judgment''), then subverted in ''Gears 5.'' Standard WhiteMaleLead JD Fenix turns out to be a DecoyProtagonist, with Kait Diaz being the game's actual main character.

* ''Film/{{Elysium}}'': The main character is nominally a light-skinned Hispanic man, but he's played by the very [=WASPy=] Matt Damon in a notable aversion to LatinoIsBrown.

No matter how diverse a show's cast or how positive its portrayal of minorities, the lead character will almost always be a conventionally heterosexual, Caucasian, vaguely Christian, and often American male. Common wisdom in the Western[[note]]And by ''Western'', we mean countries from the both the Anglosphere and Western European ones.[[/note]] entertainment industry is that a show or film needs a lead character that the [[MostWritersAreMale target demographic]] can [[LeadYouCanRelateTo identify with]]. At least in the target of "Caucasian men", that despite being a diverse country, are still a majority, especially considering the same creators of content are mostly Caucasian men, and some think they are more "Identifiable", at least in places where they are majority as in the same country and more "profitable", so this is usually an EnforcedTrope. The Caucasian Male Lead is often TheHero.

Tropers are reminded that '''[[Administrivia/TropesAreTools tropes are not always bad]]'''. Many works with white male leads have been praised for their positive portrayals of minority characters. And of course it's a vicious cycle of investors who want to put their money in a sure thing and studios who want to have something to point at to seem like they know what's going to "sell" to their Target. It is also due to self-insertion, whether from the same creators, writers or producers who are mostly Caucasian men in Hollywood; there's no one group to blame.

* Universal's ''Film/FortySevenRonin'', based on the Japanese historical legend of UsefulNotes/The47Ronin starring the mixed race (neither of them Japanese) Creator/KeanuReeves as a British-Japanese "[[ButNotTooForeign half-breed]]" who is [[OriginalCharacter original to the film]]. He was originally going to be a supporting character, but ExecutiveMeddling had additional scenes shot to make him the main character.

* In the original novel ''Literature/OneFlewOverTheCuckoosNest'', the narrator is the Native American Chief Bromden. [[Film/OneFlewOverTheCuckoosNest The film version]] centers on the white male Randle P. [=McMurphy=] without any narration from the Chief. This is a case of PragmaticAdaptation, because Chief Bromden is a SupportingProtagonist who does not speak for the vast majority of the film (and it's a surprise reveal in the movie that he actually can), while the main conflict in both the book and the film revolves around [=McMurphy=] and Nurse Ratched, not Chief.

* ''Film/PacificRim'': Pan-Pacific Defense Corp is very multinational (American, Japanese, German, Russian, Australian and Chinese) but the protagonist is a white man. This was reversed in the sequel, ''Film/PacificRimUprising'', where Creator/JohnBoyega is cast as the protagonist whose father is Creator/IdrisElba's character.

* Played with in ''Literature/GivesLight''. The main character is a light-skinned Native American boy (his father is Shoshone and his mother was white). As a result other children on the reservation see him as white, and because he was raised off of the reservation (but by the aforementioned Native American dad) he doesn't always fit in with them.

[[folder:Live Action TV]]

* ''Series/{{Community}}'': The first season gives the most focus to Jeff Winger, played by Creator/JoelMcHale, as he transitions from lawyer to college student. While the the focus spreads more evenly to the rest of the cast starting in the second season, he remains the group's de facto leader for the show's run.
* ''Series/DeathInParadise'' has a racially diverse cast, with a black women and two black men as the main characters, as well as several black side characters. The head of the show always ends up being a white man, however, with the arrival of Richard Poole, later replaced by Humphrey Goodman.

* ''Series/TheSingoff'''s third series was won by a now famous group called Music/{{Pentatonix}}. Despite all the singers being diverse and talented, the lead singer during the show was definitely the conventionally good looking white male.
* The ''Franchise/LawAndOrder'' franchise usually has one of these, typically from a salty, no-nonsense, working class background, plus or minus an [[ActionGirl Olivia Benson]] or two. The exception is season 13 of ''Series/LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' when Olivia Benson moves into the role of lead character, and the male lead, Nick Amaro, is Latino.

* Jim from ''Series/TheOfficeUS'' isn't exactly the only white male at his small paper company in small town Pennsylvania, but he often served as being the young, attractive, savvy [[SitComCharacterArchetypes wisecracker]] who would make fun of the middle aged eccentric losers around him. Naturally, the [[SpotlightStealingSquad spotlight gets stolen from him]] on a regular basis. After a good deal of CharacterizationMarchesOn, he's learned to be NotSoAboveItAll.

* As diverse as ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' tried to be in the [[TheSixties racially charged 60s]], they still had to have a white man as the Captain; the [[ExecutiveMeddling meddling executives]] wouldn't even stand for a female NumberTwo. This was followed by Jean-Luc Picard in ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' and Jonathan Archer in ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise''. It was averted with ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'', in which the eponymous space station is commanded by BaldBlackLeaderGuy Benjamin Sisko, and ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'', in which the eponymous ship is captained by the female Kathryn Janeway. Michael Burnam is the lead but not the captain of ''Series/StarTrekDiscovery'', and a Black woman. ''Series/StarTrekPicard'' is the most straightforward example yet, with Picard as the ''only'' white male among the main cast.

** The [=UnSub=] in "Broken Mirror" lampshades this when he "profiles" the team while taunting them during one of his phone calls, deriding Morgan as simply a "side of beef" and telling Elle she had no chance of "joining the all boys' club."

** Played straight in the second spinoff, ''Series/CriminalMindsBeyondBorders''. The team includes two white females (one played by a Hispanic actress though the character is not), a half-Asian male, a black male and an older white male played by Creator/GarySinise, who is the team leader.

* ''Series/{{Elementary}}'': Despite genderbending and racebending Watson (Lucy Liu) and having a host of genderbent original characters from the Sherlock canon and the racial diversity expected of a New York show, Sherlock Holmes remains the White Male Lead.

* Subverted in ''Series/DarkMatter'' - the show started out with the most milquetoast white guy in the racially diverse crew acting as the lead and audience sympathy character (he wakes up first and he's the only human character who doesn't have a criminal background). But then at the beginning of season 2, the writers [[spoiler: kill him off (right after a new plot line for him started, no less)]], and then they also [[spoiler: kill off]] another, much less moral recurring character the same actor was playing, just in case you thought he was supposed to take over the lead now that the rest of the crew [[CharacterDevelopment had become more sympathetic.]] And, just to drive the point home, another, new white male character who joins the crew and seems like a replacement in terms of personality gets [[spoiler: killed off even more abruptly]] after a few episodes, with the rest of the crew not even caring to find out what happened to him. A black female character gets to permanently join the regular cast instead. And the Asian female ActionGirl love interest from the first season becomes the primary protagonist (and captain of the ship). By the end of the second season, the only white male character still on the crew is the show's [[Series/{{Firefly}} Jayne-expy]], who is perfectly content just being the muscle for "Boss Lady."
* ''Series/{{Narcos}}'': The story of Pablo Escobar's ride and fall is told from the perspective of the white American DEA Agent Steve Murphy. However, the first two seasons are a bit of a SidelongGlanceBiopic, and Murphy is himself something of a FirstPersonPeripheralNarrator, since the real main character is Escobar. Once Escobar goes down, and the real Murphy left Colombia, the focus switches to other villains, and our main character becomes Murphy's Mexican partner, Javier Pena.

* Zig-zagged with the ''Franchise/AssassinsCreed'' franchise. The VanillaProtagonist in the present-day storyline is just AmbiguouslyBrown enough to be considered any ethnicity (including white) by those who wish, while his ancestors in the historical storyline are of various ethnicities (Arabic Hashashin, Italian, British and Native American). He was eventually replaced by [[PlayerAndProtagonistIntegration you, the player]], starting with ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedIVBlackFlag'', which was also where the historical protagonists began to play it agonizingly straight to the point where the parade of white male leads can be hard to tell apart. This was not helped by the fact that the titles centering on a half-black woman (''AC III: Liberation'') and a black man (''AC IV: Freedom Cry'') are a GaidenGame and DownloadableContent respectively, neither of which received much promotion, to the point where few have heard of them. ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedSyndicate'' featured a woman as a co-player character alongside her twin brother, although both of them were white. To their credit, Ubisoft looks to be attempting to rectify this problem with the heavily-promoted ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedOrigins'', whose Ptolemaic Egyptian protagonist has appropriately dark skin.

* Deconstructed with Donnie [=DuPre=] from ''WebVideo/DemoReel''. He's the "main" InnocentBigot in a show that has a woman, a black man and two foreign guys, but he's very bisexual, very nice and very woobie, really wants to be a good friend to all of them, and after some firm prodding, works to make up for his initial racist/sexist comments.

-->''Apparently in the future the liberals have extinguished all the white people,'' Coulter explained, ''I mean they got a black girl running the communications, an Asian guy driving the ship and a pointy-eared alien doing pretty much everything else. I guess we're supposed to just accept that minorities will be the new majority. This isn't an entertainment film - it's nothing but a pro-Obama, multicultural piece of propaganda. And of course its not even realistic. Since when have black people been able to speak foreign languages? And shouldn't Sulu have crashed the ship into a quasar by now?''

* ''Literature/ChronoHustle'' is fairly diverse in it's cast but, while it isn't explicitly mentioned, Jack seems to be white based the fact that his race likely would have come into play otherwise when he went to the Old West.

* A theory known in some internet communities as the Galbrush Paradox posits that the reason that straight white male characters (especially leads) are so ubiquitous is that they are the only type of characters who creators feel like they write as realistically flawed, and that often the people demanding better representation for women, minorities, LGBT, etc. end up calling for the creators' blood when those characters are portrayed as [[FlawlessToken anything less than perfect]]. The name comes from the ''VideoGame/MonkeyIsland'' series of video games, as the theory explains that if the protagonist Guybrush Threepwood was a woman named Galbrush instead, the developers would be called misogynists if they portrayed her as the exact same hopeless dumbass that Guybrush is.