@LoriQuaid The reason for this is very simple:
It was often secondary characters that had orange hair, as an easy way to distinguish them from the main, and background characters.
This sort of thing is used a lot in comic, and anime too.

Fast-forward to current year, and "the message" is pushed into every piece of media.
Slowly at first... Turning a main character black would be too much even for the normie fans.
So a secondary character, one that was often ginger/red-head was race-swapped instead.

They would've done it with a main character if they thought it would work, but Miles Morales (who still isn't Spider-man, and never will be) proved it cannot be done.

That is why lead characters are now being replaced entirely.
Superman is succeded by his gay son, Hawkeye has a daughter (probably gay too, most people in comics are these days), Ironman is killed-off and the black female Ironheart takes his place, etc...