Yes, but they did it in the comics as the original Nick Furys son, making it a separate character. Now, if Black Batman (Christ, that sounds exactly like the 70s problem I just mocked, doesn't it?) was someone other then Bruce Wayne, I could see it.
As for the movies, Samuel L. Jackson is the general publics first look at Nick Fury. Really, before this he was mostly known to comic fans, and people who saw the 90s movie with David Hasselhoff (To people who saw that and managed to repress it, I regret nothing. I WILL NOT SUFFER ALONE). Batman, meanwhile, has constant media saturation going back to the 60s and the Adam West series. Most people already have a mental image of Batman, and that's enough to cause a bit of disconnect.
Personally, I think the stories are better when the character is black, white, asian, indian, male, female, gay, straight, bi, catholic, muslim, Buddhist, Athiest, Communist, Republican, etc and so on, not because 'we'll fill a demographic or cater to a minority' but because that's who the character is. Despite my sarcasm about how poorly comics tend to manage that, there have managed this. The Post Infinite Crisis Blue Beetle comic, the Cassandra Cain Batgirl run, Faiza Hussain from the MI-13 series, and right now there's the new Ms. Marvel comic, which has a legacy character in the form of a Pakistani-American teenager who, in a single issue, provided a better look at muslim characters then comics have managed in years, and something several other forms of media could learn from.
Forget altering existing characters to fit the role you want. Make someone new who's meant to be there.
As for the movies, Samuel L. Jackson is the general publics first look at Nick Fury. Really, before this he was mostly known to comic fans, and people who saw the 90s movie with David Hasselhoff (To people who saw that and managed to repress it, I regret nothing. I WILL NOT SUFFER ALONE). Batman, meanwhile, has constant media saturation going back to the 60s and the Adam West series. Most people already have a mental image of Batman, and that's enough to cause a bit of disconnect.
Personally, I think the stories are better when the character is black, white, asian, indian, male, female, gay, straight, bi, catholic, muslim, Buddhist, Athiest, Communist, Republican, etc and so on, not because 'we'll fill a demographic or cater to a minority' but because that's who the character is. Despite my sarcasm about how poorly comics tend to manage that, there have managed this. The Post Infinite Crisis Blue Beetle comic, the Cassandra Cain Batgirl run, Faiza Hussain from the MI-13 series, and right now there's the new Ms. Marvel comic, which has a legacy character in the form of a Pakistani-American teenager who, in a single issue, provided a better look at muslim characters then comics have managed in years, and something several other forms of media could learn from.
Forget altering existing characters to fit the role you want. Make someone new who's meant to be there.