Lord of the Rings TV Series Purchased by Amazon

[rogoth]

Every country has a culture and a history to that culture. Its what defines every place you go to. If you think every European country is the same, then you havent travelled much. There is a big difference to how all countries have been built and have evolved. From our myths and folklore to our art, to our films our music, literature, and even our philosophy. I am British and as much as I love some of the things that define British culture trust me, we have a culture. And its most a imperial awful culture but its a culture that we are rooted in. Like our examples some cultures are not always good in hindsight. To throw away European culture as just all one encompassing mesh is pretty naïve. Italy is a great home of culture I suggest paying that visit.

no, i don't, and that was the entire fucking point i was making, hence my response to the person i quoted, they used a term 'european culture' which simply doesn't exist, PURELY BECAUSE OF THE MYRIAD CULTURES AND PEOPLES THAT MAKE UP EUROPE, did you even bother to read what i wrote?

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It wasn't okay, just like blackface wasn't okay, yet he had white men playing Othello, a play he specifically wrote about a black man. The point is that that's how Shakespeare put on his plays, because of the context of the society he lived in (which didn't allow women or black men on stage). So, since that's how the play was originally put on - does that mean we have to stick with that forever? Because the society didn't allow for anything else, even if Shakespeare pretty clearly wrote about everyone?

Are all the old version of Peter Pan where Peter is famously played by a woman invalid adaptation?

Is Michael Jackson's The Wiz an invalid adaptation of The Wizard of Oz?

A hypothetical: If I put on a Lovecraft story in a movie, but changed it so it wasn't racist, but kept the eldritch horror, is that an invalid adaptation?

if the project is to be historically accurate, then yes, and you make sure that both the audience and the people behind the project understand this ahead of time, because in this instance the casting of all men in all roles is not only a social commentary, it's also historical fact, you can however have the exact same story and as long as you make known ahead of time that you will be casting it 'as intended' then that's perfectly fine also, the problem with the ringding of powah project, every single interview/PR stunt dressed up as marketing pushed the narrative that they were doing a faithful adaptation of the works of JRR Tolkein, then after the heaviest and most pronounced backlash against a 'woke agenda pushing, diversity riddled mess' they have constantly flip flopped between different types of medium to describe what they are doing, going from a pure 'adaptation', to making it a 'reimagining', now it's being tagged as a story 'inspired by' the works of Tolkein, all of these things are vastly different to each other and none of them have any crossover, and yet here we are with the showrunners who have since in very recent interviews come out and said themselves they have neglected aspects of the story because it didn't fit with their narrative, they have admitted that they were changing aspects of already established lore.

and just for some kind of education for you and everyone else who uses theater productions as an arguement, pantomime productions in the UK ALWAYS have the 'panto dame' played by a man, not only is it a nod to history in that men played all roles, but it's traditional and is something that is held onto for those reasons, i doubt you would find any successful Panto production with a female 'dame'.

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nuke this retarded thread already.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dI8wt5soxXE

[Orby]

no, i don't, and that was the entire fucking point i was making, hence my response to the person i quoted, they used a term 'european culture' which simply doesn't exist, PURELY BECAUSE OF THE MYRIAD CULTURES AND PEOPLES THAT MAKE UP EUROPE, did you even bother to read what i wrote?

I'll admit, I misread then, my apologies.

Being dyslexic and down with the flu must be a bad combo for forum scrolling.

[haediff]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dI8wt5soxXE

Imagine spending your time arguing with strangers online about shit they don't have control over.

[s_bushido]

if the project is to be historically accurate

LotR isn't history. Obviously.

the narrative that they were doing a faithful adaptation of the works of JRR Tolkein, then after the heaviest and most pronounced backlash against a 'woke agenda pushing, diversity riddled mess' they have constantly flip flopped between different types of medium to describe what they are doing, going from a pure 'adaptation', to making it a 'reimagining', now it's being tagged as a story 'inspired by' the works of Tolkein, all of these things are vastly different to each other and none of them have any crossover

There is nothing contradictory about saying you want to stay faithful to the source material while reimagining parts of it to suit the story you actually want to tell. Especially given how little source material they actually have access to in the case of this production. That's how adaptations work. One day you might figure that out, but I'm not holding my breath.

And if they did actually change their messaging in an attempt to appease the bigoted fucks who see a black person and scream "woke agenda pushing, diversity-riddled mess," that would have been their mistake. Not casting the black guy in the first place. Because those people deserve no consideration beyond calling out their bullshit on WoW fan forums.

[rogoth]

LotR isn't history. Obviously.


There is nothing contradictory about saying you want to stay faithful to the source material while reimagining parts of it to suit the story you actually want to tell. Especially given how little source material they actually have access to in the case of this production. That's how adaptations work. One day you might figure that out, but I'm not holding my breath.

And if they did actually change their messaging in an attempt to appease the bigoted fucks who see a black person and scream "woke agenda pushing, diversity-riddled mess," that would have been their mistake. Not casting the black guy in the first place. Because those people deserve no consideration beyond calling out their bullshit on WoW fan forums.

1) correct, but it was written and designed to be an 'alternate' history and that's the lens it was imagined through, hence why there's not only 3 different languages fabricated in this work, they are also all well established enough to be actual legitimate languages in their own right, the same way that many languages of the world today exist, the peoples in the works have such well documented histories that you could easily see it as a real event long passed, unlike 'modern' fantasy literature which has nowhere near that level of world building or detail.

2) yeah that's fine, as long as you say ahead of time that's what you have planned all along and that's the end goal of the project, this showrunner team came out all guns blazing with the 'pure adaptation of the works of Tolkein' propaganda, and when it was made perfectly clear it was a fan fiction mess, they quickly switched gears and pushed that it was a 'reimagining' of the works and that they were looking to 'write the novel that Tolkein never wrote', and now in their most recent interviews and press releases they are actively saying that they are creating the world of middle earth 'inspired by the works of Tolkein', if they had come out and stated the truth of the matter from the getgo, i can guarantee they would have had less backlash overall than they have currently had because they set the initial expectations of 'word for word adaptation with little to no deviation', which quickly turned into the shitshow it's expected to be.

3) Amazon has a well documented 'diversity and inclusion policy' regarding any projects they work on, meaning that the showrunners are FORCED BY MANDATE to include people of colour and minorities in any project (at least 30% of the cast), which they are trying to expand to 50% by 2024, meaning that lets say for arguements sake there's a project greenlit in 2024 surrounding the events of the battle of hastings from 1066, to be historically accurate everyone involved would need to be white, but due to the MANDATE from Amazon, half the cast would need to be POC/diversity hires, which completely breaks the accuracy of the history.

this is the EXACT same thing here, the staunch defenders of this shitshow are the ones who champion this kind of racist and demeaning policy, also you're showing clearly you're unable to disassociate terms and are unable to see things from multiple angles by calling people who want these MANDATED diversity hires removed from the show and the characters they portray to be cast as they should have been originally within the context of the original works, as bigoted when in reality the vast majority of people who hold that position aren't even remotely close to being bigots, it's also not racist to want showrunners and writers to stick to the original works when writing already established characters instead of self inserting their own fucking agenda into things, which this project has done at almost every turn:

the character of Elrond in this show is one of a scheming politician, one who works in the shadows (stereotype to make the white guy appear to be a bad guy), gil-galad so far has been shown as some kind of ineffectual king and ruler of his people (stereotypes to make the white character look dumb), the new made up white guy they have cast as some no name human male, is a coward and deserter who is being given some faux redemption arc (yet more stereotypes to make the white guy look bad), and as i have already said now multiple times over, everything that has been shown so far whether that be the 'all sparkles no substance' video's with greenscreen and CGI work that looks 15 years old at this point, or the interviews and panels that have been put on, EVERYTHING show undertones of the 'woke' 'message', and all of the scenes shown so far are so far removed from anything described in the original works, it's as stated, purely fan fiction, and yet that's not what the original expectations that were set out by the showrunners.

could you please educate me and explain to me how 2 of the main female lead characters of this project are allowed to self insert their beliefs and values onto the characters they are playing?, i thought the whole point of being an actor whether that be on film or on stage was to play the character presented to you and you're to leave yourself out of it, and yet in their recent panel interviews at SDCC, the female dwarf character was shouting from the rooftops about female empowerment and how she is happy to be given a platform to advocate for that, and the other saying she is a feminism activist as well as an activist for her beliefs and thinks that her character in this project is the perfect vessel for her to showcase those beliefs, could you please break it down and dumb it down so i can understand why this is allowed and me and others calling out how stupid it is, is wrong?, because i'm genuinely at a loss here understanding this 'modern world' if this is the way things are.

[InfiniteCharger]

Holy shit are you blind.

I. Am. ASKING. YOU. For. Details. About. What. You. Wrote.

I am not saying saying what you did or did not write.

I AM ASKING YOU. ASKING. ASKING.

Got it now? Is that enough to get through?

I made the point specifically that I am not racist for writing a story about "3 white men in the woods". That is literally fundamental to the story I wrote and your head exploded. That isn't my problem. Somehow you can't understand that a story about 3 white men where only white men can be cast for the role is possible. It causes you no end of conflict and consternation that this is even possible and you sit here and pretend that this requires a question and answer session about "well what do you mean by white men" "can it be black men also" "what about other men who might be midgets".

You are being absurd.

No.

QED above.


Because that's an arbitrary characteristic like any other. Pick something else if height doesn't work for you. The point is that you can never be 100% text accurate, and this is an example of something that while not text-accurate, doesn't bother anyone. Yet skin color does.

I wrote a story specifically about 3 men and their skin color that is fundamental to the story. You are now all discombobulated and won't just admit that in this specific situation that casting only white men for the role is the only logical way to stay true to the original story.

Seriously, I don't get why you have so much angst about admitting that there are stories that would require casting all white actors.
This isn't impossible, unnatural or racist. You know that was the point and just wont accept that this scenario is made up and yes purposely invalidates whatever "narrative" you were talking about, so you sit here and pretend you don't understand the point when everyone reading this understands the point.

That said it is fine to say that my example doesn't apply to Tolkien but to argue that you don't understand the point of my example is what is just you being deliberately dishonest.

Skin color is not an arbitrary characteristic for an individual person in real life or in fiction. Everyone has their own physical characteristics. And by extension certain stories set in or based on certain time periods and regions would imply a certain set of characteristics. A story set in a Northern European setting would logically have mostly people with white skin. England is a Northern European setting and Tolkien was writing a mythology for England. There weren't very many non white English in England 2,000 years ago. Just because Tolkien didn't specifically say "this or that person is white skinned" doesn't mean that these things are not what he intended.

And even if he was explicit in pointing out the skin color of every single character, these studios would change something anyway
Which is ultimately my point because what the studios want is not necessarily what Tolkien wanted.

This is you just demanding that a story set in Europe cannot cast mostly or all white people because according to you, white skin is an arbitrary characteristic in ancient Europe. Wrong. It is not.

You can say whether you are OK with "diverse" actors playing certain roles all you like, but as I keep pointing out, characters like Tar Miriel were explicitly written as being white, this is not subjective or up to interpretation. Because if that is true, then in this fantasy world it is OK for her to be green skinned with scales then. If you are so open to changes to "arbitrary" characteristics, then make her purple then if it doesn't matter to the so-called "narrative". All I am saying is that this line of thinking is far from what Tolkien intended and is simply people injecting their own stuff into Tolkien that don't belong there. Not to mention all the other changes made to the timeline for the sake of this story.

As you yourself said before, if the writing is good and it fits the narrative, then setting this story in the jungles of Central America would still be Tolkien. Because according to you, what the author wrote doesn't matter as much as "the narrative" and "writing".

That's all.

This has nothing to do with your hypothetical 3-white-men story. This is a general point.

Of course it does because you know full well there are stories written by authors with only white people in it and you are just trying your best to pretend that this isn't possible in order to claim that skin color is just an arbitrary characteristic and doesn't matter in casting because of whatever narrative the people adapting it are doing. That is literally all you are saying, which means source material isn't the final say and not of primary importance in these decisions.

I'm not sure I believe that you genuinely didn't understand the point I'm making.

If you REALLY and HONESTLY did not understand, I am very sorry. Clearly you have some kind of intellectual disability, and I should not have railed on you. That's my bad, and I'll refrain from doing so any further.

If you're just pretending you don't understand, then fuck right off.

You are the one who has been arguing with me about skin color for a few pages now. Stop talking that BS that this is about a person's height.
We both know what this is about and it isn't about how tall an actor is. You just keep trying to change the point because you know that you are trying to make your subjective opinion the definitive fact of how casting works in entertainment. I gave you the link to the actual policy of Amazon when it comes to hiring. All this nonsense about what I do and don't understand is just you avoiding the point that this has nothing to with what you think. I gave you the literal policy and how it applies to this show. Meaning in this case, when it comes to diversity in casting, the source material is not the primary authority and it is up to Amazon to decide when and how to cast for specific roles and whether or not they will stay faithful to the source material in the process. Your argument that somehow this is just about "narrative" in a vacuum and not specific DEI policies is wrong, especially when it goes against source material. You may be OK with it, but again there are substantial changes being made to the source material, skin color in casting is only one part but the end result is still the same: drastically different from what Tolkien wrote. There is no debate about this. There is nothing subjective about this.

I'm not. I have no idea if it's true, since I don't recall the original, but that doesn't really matter. I'm entirely willing to humor the point, and say she was written explicitly and in no uncertain terms as white. 100% on board with that.

The point is, DOES THAT MATTER for the narrative, or is it just some cosmetic detail like many others, MANY of which are often ignored when casting for adaptations and nobody cares.

So you would have to show that either:

1. Her being white has a narrative function and is not just a cosmetic detail
-or-
2. No other cosmetic detail can ever be changed either, about anything in any adaptation

I'm fine with a demonstration for either one.

Tolkien wrote a detailed genealogy for line of Numenorean Kings. That is the source material from which we know about this character. It is literally a genealogy, showing the family tree from the first King and Queen all the way to Tar Miriel who died at the destruction of Numenor. For her to be black, would mean others in that family tree would also have to be black. There is no way for her to just pop up as black in the middle of a line of people who are not black. Her cousin is Ar Pharazon who is also in this series and is not black. So how is it possible for a black woman to show up in a family tree that is white? It doesn't make sense. And this shows that the source material clearly defines the reason and purpose for these characters and why their relationships as Numenoreans are important. There is no "other" narrative to this. Again, Amazon has made substantial changes to this.

The Line of Elros: Kings of Númenor is a chapter in the book Unfinished Tales, written by J.R.R. Tolkien and published posthumously by his son, Christopher Tolkien. Less an actual tale, it resembles more a chronicle, consisting of a complete list of the Kings of Númenor from the kingdom's foundation, in the year S.A. 32 to its destruction, year 3319.
[edit] Synopsis

Before the list is detailed, the author and publisher write about the length in life of Elros Tar-Minyatur's line, which was around 400 years and makes the distinction with the other lines of Númenóreans, who's life span was considerably shorter, 200 years or less. But in the latest writing on this subject the distinction in longevity is greatly diminished. To the Númenórean people as a whole is ascribed a life-span some five times the length of that of other Men What follows is a list of the Númenórean kings, a total of 25. For each of them a short description is made, in which are mentioned the years of their birth, their death and the length of their rule, plus other notable events, if such existed.

https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/The_...f_N%C3%BAmenor

Elros was the son of Eärendil, the great hero of the First Age, and his wife Elwing. He was the twin brother of Elrond and both were Half-elven.[3] Choosing to live as a mortal Man, he became a lord of the Edain and the first King of Númenor, taking the name Tar-Minyatur.

https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Elros

Eärendil the Mariner was one of the Half-elven, and an important figure in the legends of the Elder Days. Descended from all Three Houses of the Edain, he was the first known person to reach Aman in the First Age after the Noldor went into exile. He was crucial in the War of Wrath and the patriarch of the line of the Kings of Númenor through his son Elros.

https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/E%C3%A4rendil

The Edain was the name given by the Elves to the noble Men of the First Age who fought alongside with the Elves in the Wars of Beleriand.

....

The tribes of Men became Elf-friends, they entered the service of the Eldar of Beleriand and were ennobled and consisted of the Three Mannish noble Houses:

The House of Bëor: these descended from the Lesser Folk, they were dark-haired and stoutly built, and most resembled the Noldor of all Elves. They were first discovered by Finrod Felagund, King of Nargothrond, and under his guidance later made their way to the lands of the Noldorin lord Amrod, in a place later known as Estolad, the Encampment. They remained loyal to the House of Finarfin, and later settled in the lands of Dorthonion.
The Second House, later known as the Haladin or the House of Haleth. They were a reclusive folk, dark-haired but smaller in stature than the Bëorians. They were unrelated to the other two Houses and kept separate from the other Men. They settled in Thargelion before later receiving permission to settle in the Forest of Brethil, part of Doriath. They mostly kept out of the wars.
The Folk of Marach, later best known as the House of Hador. They descended from the Greater Folk and thus were related to the First House. They were tall and golden-haired, and most resembled the Vanyar of all Elves. They were a very numerous and war-like tribe, and the Green-elves of Ossiriand feared them. They later settled in Hithlum by way of Estolad. They were loyal to Fingolfin and to his son Fingon.

This is how much Tolkien actually wrote about the history of Middle Earth. This is why he is so respected for his work. To arbitrarily just drop a black woman into this, with no explanation as to how that was possible, when both the Edain and Noldor are described as "fair" doesn't make absolutely any sense. But according to you this doesn't count as important to whatever "narrative" Amazon is making up. He even created a language for the Elves and culture and histories for each of the various family lines. This isn't just some old random story that is being adapted with no well defined back story and history. It is a very unique work which is why people are calling out Amazon on their changes to the source material because it ruins everything else Tolkien wrote.

For example, Miriel was never a queen of Numenor:

Tar-Míriel was the only child of the late-marrying Tar-Palantir, the twenty-fourth King of Númenor.[1] By the Law of Succession, established by Tar-Aldarion, she should have become the fourth Ruling Queen of Númenor. However, after her father's death, Míriel's cousin Pharazôn took her unwillingly as his wife and seized the Sceptre of Númenor for himself, taking the title of Ar-Pharazôn the Golden. He changed Míriel's name to Ar-Zimraphel.

Ar-Pharazôn in his pride brought a mighty fleet to Middle-earth to challenge Sauron for dominion of the land. Sauron pretended to humble himself before the King and was taken as captive to Númenor. Soon Sauron had fully corrupted the King and had persuaded the aging king to seek immortality and assail Valinor itself. The Valar called upon the One, who cast Númenor into the sea. It is said that Tar-Míriel strove to reach the sacred peak of the Meneltarma before the inundation of the island, but the great wave swept her away from the steep side of the Holy Mountain.

https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Tar-M%C3%ADriel

Something which I've never denied nor ever endorsed. But that's not what I'm talking about. I've said what I am talking about explicitly, WITH INSTRUCTIONS, about 10 times now. I really cannot see how it's unclear, unless you're deliberately ignoring it

If you aren't talking about Amazons Rings of Power then why on earth are you in this thread and replying to me? This is you again changing goal posts and now making BS up about not talking about specifically to the source material which in this case is Tolkien. You are absolutely talking ridiculous nonsense if you are claiming NOT to be talking about Tolkien and the source material of his work.

Finally you have said something accurate.

Fine. Then lets just agree to disagree then. I don't believe substantial changes to source material qualify as an "adaptation" and I say this for many things from comics, to manga, to anime and anything else. So you aren't changing my mind and I am not trying to change your mind.

I can only repeat: you have no fucking clue what you're talking about. R&J is not an original story. It's an adaptation of previous materials, told in a different setting. That's, you know, PROVEN FACT.

Doesn't matter if it is original. It is a story about white people in Europe with no non white people in it. Stop trying to change the point.
You keep doing this because you just cannot stand the idea that someone may write a story about only white people in Europe.
Obviously this causes you the most utmost consternation and displeasure because you refuse to admit that this is possible.

The tragic plot of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet (1595-96) was by no means original. It was based on a famous folktale which appeared in many different versions in 15th- and 16th-century Europe. Arthur Brooke’s 3,020 line poem, The Tragicall Historye of Romeus and Iuliet (1562), is the first English translation of that tale, and it served as a key source for Shakespeare.

Set in the ‘fruitfull hilles’ of Verona, Brooke’s poem describes the ‘deadly’ feud between two wealthy, noble families – Capulet and Montague. Against this backdrop of ‘blacke hate’, he tells the ‘unhappy’ tale of a beautiful youth, Romeus Montague, whose heart is entrapped by the wise and graceful Juliet Capulet. (pp. 1v–2r).

On the title page, Brooke claims to have based his work on Matteo Bandello’s Italian Novelle (1554), though he actually seems to have used a French translation by Boaistuau (1559). In his letter ‘To the Reader’, Brooke also says he had seen a similar tale ‘lately set foorth on stage’ (p. iiir), perhaps referring to an earlier play about Romeo and Juliet, which has not been discovered.

https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/b...eus-and-juliet

The inspiration for Romeo and Juliet itself is a story about white people in Europe. And also inspired by other stories about white people in Europe. Contrary to whatever you are trying to divert this conversation into.

The thing I've stated explicitly in big letters and with instructions to read a half dozen times. You may find it if you look.

Oh thats right, setting Middle Earth in the Jungles of Central America is perfectly fine as long as the writing is good and the narrative is well developed.
that is what you said. And no, that isn't Tolkien. There is no point debating this. I already said we just will agree to disagree.

No. I've never said anything about an "other" narrative, in any way shape or form. I've said I need NARRATIVE REASONS for something to be relevant, I've never claimed or suggested that there is more than one narrative going on somewhere or somehow.

Narrrative reasons just means making up whatever story you want no matter what the source material says.
This is what we have been talking about and I absolutely understand you. But I don't agree. I have said it.
You aren't convincing me otherwise.

Engage with WHAT I SAID, please. Stop making shit up.

You literally just said that you are fine with substantial changes to the source material did you not? That means "the narrative" is whatever the people adapting a story want it to be and that justifies casting whoever they want for whatever reason they want. What on earth makes you think I don't understand that point. There is nothing I am making up. Like I said, you are fine with the Middle Earth set in Central American jungles as long as the writing is good and the narrative well developed. So I am not making it up. You just keep denying that this is literally the implication of what you just agreed to a few sentences ago in your same response. Like I said, there is no point debating this with me I just don't agree with you. You can like what you want, but that is not how I look at "adaptations".

And I've said, repeatedly, that something being not like it is in the original isn't relevant unless there's a NARRATIVE REASON for it to be relevant. Everything else is just cosmetic details that can be AND ARE changed in all adaptations, all the time. If you have a good reason not to change something, then that's fine and it shouldn't be changed. BUT ONLY IF YOU ACTUALLY HAVE A GOOD REASON.

Again this is the point and you are going in circles here. I don't understand why you keep pretending I don't understand your point. Like I said, I totally disagree with you on it.

You have made it abundantly clear that you don't care how much the source material has changed.

To which you replied:

Finally you have said something accurate.

So I am not making up anything. "Narrative" in this context only means "source material" because that is the narrative that you start from when adapting something. All this back and forth when you know full well we are talking about Tolkiens work as the source of the narrative and how an adaptation should stick to that as the source of any "narrative". There is no "other" narrative because there is no other original work of Tolkien. Whatever "new narrative" Amazon creates to justify whatever casting or stories or changes to lore they make is not Tolkien is all I keep saying. And I know you disagree, so lets just stop with this back and forth. It isn't going to change either one of our mines on this point.

That's a false statement. The CASTING PROCESS should not be exclusionary; that doesn't mean the SOURCE MATERIAL is. At most you could say it's "not racially diverse", which is a very different thing. That doesn't mean it's "exclusionary" or "not inclusive", because it's not contemporary and thus not held to the same standards of inclusivity. But a contemporary casting process IS. YOU are smuggling in the racism by using the wrong words to describe things.

That doesn't make any sense. If the source material is about 3 white men in the woods or lovers from two feuding white families in Italy then the casting cannot be open to ANYBODY that makes no logical sense. If the story is about midgets living in a halfway house, then you can't claim that the casting for the actors playing those midgets is open to anybody, midgets or otherwise. Your point makes no sense. Give it up. It is not even logical or factual.

When a production company publishes a casting call for a specific role things like gender, build, race and other things are often listed as part of that casting call. It is not "open to everybody". You are just making up nonsense.

1. Create a Casting Plan

For the purposes of the checklist, we’re going to assume you’ve already got a screenplay to work with. If it’s your own work, you’ll know better than anyone how the characters look in your mind’s eye and who will be suitable to portray them in the real world; if not, sit down with the screenwriter and draw up casting profiles for each of the lead roles. The profiles should include:

Age range (can be extremely variable depending on the project)
Gender
Ethnicity
Height and weight
Distinctive characteristics (unusual hairstyles, tattoos, etc.)
Special skills (such as dancing, singing or the ability to perform stunts)

It should be noted that, at this stage, you only need to focus on the leading roles. More often than not, actors for the smaller parts are selected from those who auditioned for larger parts but, for whatever reason, weren’t successful for those roles.

https://www.nyfa.edu/student-resourc...ors-checklist/

So you making up this argument that skin color and physical traits don't matter just is not accurate at all to how casting works. And it depends on the studio and or production team as to how specific they want to be in defining the characteristics required for a specific role.

You're playing it fast and loose with terminology here without understanding what it really means.

See above. I don't even know why you pretend that anyone can't go online and see examples of casting calls where they very specifically state what attributes they are looking for such as gender, age, ethnicity and so forth. I don't know why you are even trying to argue these things don't factor into it when everybody knows that it does.

Also, you completely ignored my request for you to please demonstrate that you understand my argument, despite me being VERY clear about it. So that probably means you know your argument holds no water, but if you admit as much, you look like a racist tool.

I already made that clear above. You don't feel source material is the final authority in an adaptation and therefore substantial changes can be made and still be called an "adaptation". I have said this multiple times. Stop acting like I don't understand what you are saying because I do.

[Adamas102]

3) Amazon has a well documented 'diversity and inclusion policy' regarding any projects they work on, meaning that the showrunners are FORCED BY MANDATE to include people of colour and minorities in any project (at least 30% of the cast), which they are trying to expand to 50% by 2024, meaning that lets say for arguements sake there's a project greenlit in 2024 surrounding the events of the battle of hastings from 1066, to be historically accurate everyone involved would need to be white, but due to the MANDATE from Amazon, half the cast would need to be POC/diversity hires, which completely breaks the accuracy of the history.

Finally got around to looking this one up and of course you are completely full of shit. First off, that 30% is for "above-the-line" roles (directors, writers, and producers). It does NOT apply to actors. Secondly, it isn't a mandate given the wording "should ideally include" making it more of a suggested target. It's also limited to teams of 3 or more people, which should be obvious since you can't split one person.

The part that has to do with actors is "Casting actors whose identity (gender, gender identity, nationality, race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability) aligns with the character they will be playing."

To apply that to your example of a movie covering the Battle of Hastings, that means the entire cast should be comprised of English and French actors. That being said, like all real world battles that make their way into movies and TV shows, it's never going to be historically accurate so that's just a pointless bar to set to begin with. The battle lasted about 8 hours so either that's going to have to be condensed or you're going to end up with a 8 really boring one hour episodes (because of course condensing timelines is butchering the source material).

Oh, and one last thing: production on this show began 3 years before this policy went into effect.

[Bakis]

I feel kinda meh of the trailers so far. I like what they did to the orcs and the reason why it make perfect sense to stray from the bulky orcs in latest lotr and hobbit movies. When I think of it that is the only part that struck me as they nailed it in the trailers. Really never triggered a hype in me.

Looked like a weird diversity reel along with a meteor and some snow/ash falling. And with diversity I dont mean black, white, midgets, pointy ears, whatever but the settings of the shots. Was kinda all over the place in terms of being a trailer with no thread making it somewhat coherent unless one read books or interviews by producers or other in the production team.

A trailer should be (at last to some extent) about a build up of what to expect in a broad sense not a nothingburger of showcasing 'look at all the different stuff we did'.

[rogoth]

Finally got around to looking this one up and of course you are completely full of shit. First off, that 30% is for "above-the-line" roles (directors, writers, and producers). It does NOT apply to actors. Secondly, it isn't a mandate given the wording "should ideally include" making it more of a suggested target. It's also limited to teams of 3 or more people, which should be obvious since you can't split one person.

The part that has to do with actors is "Casting actors whose identity (gender, gender identity, nationality, race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability) aligns with the character they will be playing."

To apply that to your example of a movie covering the Battle of Hastings, that means the entire cast should be comprised of English and French actors. That being said, like all real world battles that make their way into movies and TV shows, it's never going to be historically accurate so that's just a pointless bar to set to begin with. The battle lasted about 8 hours so either that's going to have to be condensed or you're going to end up with a 8 really boring one hour episodes (because of course condensing timelines is butchering the source material).

Oh, and one last thing: production on this show began 3 years before this policy went into effect.

no it didn't, this policy has existed since Prime Video has existed, the current iteration may be new but the actual mandated policy has been around for a long time now, furthermore, the iteration you have typed out here is not the current iteration, it's the current iteration that's publicly available, the new iteration (which has been verified to exist internally), with the 2024 expected rollout timeline, is the version i'm referring to, and even if you take the current policy iteration as gospel, then the casting of the black dwarf/elf and other main cast characters who are non white make even less sense, because their identity doesn't match in any way shape or form 'the character they will be playing' as it has been shown multiple times from multiple people that the races they belong to in the lore don't have any of these 'diverse' types within them, so please explain to me how this all works because based on this policy, and the utter moronic writing of these characters as shown so far, their entire existence is contradictory.

- - - Updated - - -

I feel kinda meh of the trailers so far. I like what they did to the orcs and the reason why it make perfect sense to stray from the bulky orcs in latest lotr and hobbit movies. When I think of it that is the only part that struck me as they nailed it in the trailers. Really never triggered a hype in me.

Looked like a weird diversity reel along with a meteor and some snow/ash falling. And with diversity I dont mean black, white, midgets, pointy ears, whatever but the settings of the shots. Was kinda all over the place in terms of being a trailer with no thread making it somewhat coherent unless one read books or interviews by producers or other in the production team.

A trailer should be (at last to some extent) about a build up of what to expect in a broad sense not a nothingburger of showcasing 'look at all the different stuff we did'.

but that's all they have, so of course that's what they are gonna lean on heavily and hope it's enough to stem the tide of backlash they have rightfully brought upon themselves.

[Adamas102]

no it didn't, this policy has existed since Prime Video has existed, the current iteration may be new but the actual mandated policy has been around for a long time now, furthermore, the iteration you have typed out here is not the current iteration, it's the current iteration that's publicly available, the new iteration (which has been verified to exist internally), with the 2024 expected rollout timeline, is the version i'm referring to, and even if you take the current policy iteration as gospel, then the casting of the black dwarf/elf and other main cast characters who are non white make even less sense, because their identity doesn't match in any way shape or form 'the character they will be playing' as it has been shown multiple times from multiple people that the races they belong to in the lore don't have any of these 'diverse' types within them, so please explain to me how this all works because based on this policy, and the utter moronic writing of these characters as shown so far, their entire existence is contradictory.

Ah, a conspiracy theory… Never mind the fact that it would be nonsensical to have a secret diversity policy that was stricter and more constraining than their public one that they are being held accountable to. That public one is also the one with the 2024 50% target, so it sounds a lot more like reactionaries misinterpreting the public policy than the existence of some secret internal one.

Also, that public policy doesn’t contradict the casting of the show. There are no people on this planet that match the “nationality and race/ethnicity” of Tolkien elves, dwarves, hobbits, or Numenorian’s. I mean, you do understand that “white” isn’t the race or ethnicity of an elf, right? No matter how much you want to push the idea that Middle-earth is supposed to be England, the fact of the matter is that it isn’t. It’s a fantasy world filled with fantasy peoples and fantasy creatures.

[rogoth]

Ah, a conspiracy theory… Never mind the fact that it would be nonsensical to have a secret diversity policy that was stricter and more constraining than their public one that they are being held accountable to. That public one is also the one with the 2024 50% target, so it sounds a lot more like reactionaries misinterpreting the public policy than the existence of some secret internal one.

Also, that public policy doesn’t contradict the casting of the show. There are no people on this planet that match the “nationality and race/ethnicity” of Tolkien elves, dwarves, hobbits, or Numenorian’s. I mean, you do understand that “white” isn’t the race or ethnicity of an elf, right? No matter how much you want to push the idea that Middle-earth is supposed to be England, the fact of the matter is that it isn’t. It’s a fantasy world filled with fantasy peoples and fantasy creatures.

so in summary, despite the fact the original author of the works explicitly called his creation an 'alternate history for England' meaning that the peoples in his works unless directly stated otherwise should always be those of England during the relevant time period that this work was made to represent, and yet here you are arguing about that fact, and if it's such a non issue, why not go all out and cast all the elven characters in this show with CGI/greenscreen work to make them all have blue skin, to really make that diversity stand out, i mean since it's such a non issue to you i can't really see why you would have any problem with such a thing, i mean if you get that 'just right' colour of blue it can be pretty 'fair' and 'beautiful' to look at right?

once again i'm going to reiterate this because you seem to keep ignoring it and denying it, but none of the 'fantasy peoples' of this 'fantasy world' that are being used as main characters are 'black skinned', they are all unilaterally Caucasian with the people of Rohan being similar in appearance to the Celts, the people of Gondor being similar in appearance to that of the Greeks, and lets not forget that Eru Illuvatar, the one god of the entire Tolkein universe made elves in his image, and he is depicted in most media as the stereotypical Judaeo-Christian 'wizened Caucasian male', meaning that based on the time period that they are trying to shoehorn this show into, none of the elven factions had, had enough time to even remotely come close to racially diversifying assuming they even wanted to at all to begin with.

[Biomega]

You are being absurd.

I asked simple, clarifying questions.

I am not trying to trick you or inveigle you into some revealing response. I asked a question, and somehow you wrote 2 full paragraphs across 2 replies dodging an answer, and accusing me of making assertions when all I did was give YOU a chance to explain things so I WOULDN'T make assertions.

Talk about absurd.

I wrote a story specifically about 3 men and their skin color that is fundamental to the story.

And that was all I was asking. If you wrote it specifically so that the skin color matters, then there's a narrative reason to cast white people, and we don't have a problem casting white people. Which I've always and repeatedly mentioned anytime casting came up.

Why not just fucking answer the question when I asked it, instead of going on a 1,000-word tirade about how I'm being a racist all of a sudden.

Seriously, I don't get why you have so much angst about admitting that there are stories that would require casting all white actors.

Because I'm not. I've repeatedly said that I'm 100% fine with casting white people if the story has a narrative reason for them to be white (and the same goes for any other characteristic). I've even used CAPS to make that clear, and asked you about 12 times to please make sure you understand this.

Which apparently you didn't, since here you are AGAIN getting it wrong, despite me being very explicit about it for two days. You really don't want to read what I'm saying, do you.

Skin color is not an arbitrary characteristic for an individual person in real life or in fiction.

In a lot of fiction, yeah, it absolutely is. Just like many other characteristics about fictional characters usually are. They're not IRRELEVANT, but they have no larger narrative function and can easily be changed without substantially altering anything about the narrative. And for many characteristics, changing them is a matter of course in adaptation, and something entirely trivial that barely anyone even notices let alone complains about.

This is you just demanding that a story set in Europe cannot cast mostly or all white people because according to you, white skin is an arbitrary characteristic in ancient Europe. Wrong. It is not.

I'm just going to shorthand this from now on, and mark every time you claim something I never said by simply going: Lie.

You can say whether you are OK with "diverse" actors playing certain roles all you like, but as I keep pointing out, characters like Tar Miriel were explicitly written as being white, this is not subjective or up to interpretation.

Nor is it something I ever denied. Nowhere have I ever said "she's not written as white", in fact I SPECIFICALLY said I was 100% fine with humoring the notion even if it wasn't in the text.

My point is that it doesn't matter even if it's in the text. Not unless it also has an actual narrative function, rather than being a cosmetic detail; in which case sure, preserve it.

You keep going on these insane rants trying to come up with reasons against something I never said. Save your time writing those, and instead READ MY FUCKING WORDS.

Of course it does because you know full well there are stories written by authors with only white people in it and you are just trying your best to pretend that this isn't possible

Lie.

You are the one who has been arguing with me about skin color for a few pages now. Stop talking that BS that this is about a person's height.
We both know what this is about and it isn't about how tall an actor is.

Are you one of those people physically incapable of realizing what an analogy is, or how abstractions allow for larger points outside of the concrete?

Must be that. The alternative would be... frightening.

All this nonsense about what I do and don't understand is just you avoiding the point that this has nothing to with what you think.

No, it's mostly about you demonstrating again and again that you're either incapable or unwilling to parse my statements, as evidenced above (and I'm sure below). I've even made a fun game out of it, and you still didn't read what I said. So... yeah.

drastically different from what Tolkien wrote. There is no debate about this. There is nothing subjective about this.

Like this, for example. This is not something I ever disputed or denied, in any way. Yet you bring it up every two paragraphs, despite me telling you for two days that I never denied it in any way. Shit like THAT is why I'm saying you are not paying attention and/or are not comprehending something.

To arbitrarily just drop a black woman into this, with no explanation as to how that was possible, when both the Edain and Noldor are described as "fair" doesn't make absolutely any sense.

That's easily fixed. Just drop more black people in. Wouldn't be how Tolkien wrote it, but also wouldn't change anything of relevance to the story. IF that mattered for an adaptation anyway, which chances are it won't because the audience doesn't sit there with a genealogy, nor would they have to assume the written genealogy is the same as the one in the adaptation - since clearly there's already a visible difference, so why couldn't there be more. It wouldn't confuse anyone except the people who suddenly scream "BLACK PERSON! IN A FANTASY SETTING! AAAAAH!" and cower in fear.

If you aren't talking about Amazons Rings of Power then why on earth are you in this thread and replying to me?

I'm very confused. Is this a language problem? Do you not know what "endorse" means or something? How did you go from what I said to me suddenly not talking about RoP? What?

Fine. Then lets just agree to disagree then. I don't believe substantial changes to source material qualify as an "adaptation"

I've said before that I use that term purely in its descriptive sense, not as a genre category. If you want to call it "inspired by" or "related to" or whatever else instead of "adaptation" that doesn't bother me, because I'm not attached to that terminology, nor do I base anything in my argument on any strict sense of that word. I use it purely as shorthand for "take story X and use it to make story Y", beyond that I don't give a hoot about the label you put on it because it's not relevant to anything I'm saying or interested in.

This is also something I've already explained in detail, by the way. But which you (evidently) also simply didn't read. That makes me sad.

Doesn't matter if it is original. It is a story about white people in Europe with no non white people in it.

And how do you think it became that way?

RIGHT. By taking a story from SOMEWHERE ELSE that had OTHER PEOPLE IN IT and putting NEW PEOPLE in that fit the CONTEMPORARY IDEA OF PEOPLE.

Now where have we encountered this process before...

It's kind of ironic since you're dismantling your own argument here, let me enjoy the moment a little.

Oh thats right, setting Middle Earth in the Jungles of Central America is perfectly fine as long as the writing is good and the narrative is well developed.

Well one might argue that changing the setting WOULD run into narrative reasons for preservation (whereas skin color wouldn't)... But in principle, pretty much, yeah. It'd be hard to do and still have it be good writing, but if someone can pull it off - kudos to them, absolutely okay with it.

And no, that isn't Tolkien.

And if that was ever a concern for me, I'd have a problem with it. But it's not. Tolkien's just a name, works of art don't have to care about that. If it's a good story, it's a good story, even if it's miles away from the original. And a bad story is a bad story, even if it bends over backwards to try and be accurate.

Narrrative reasons just means making up whatever story you want no matter what the source material says.

Lie.

What on earth makes you think I don't understand that point.

Your replies. Which are either GROSSLY ignorant, or deliberately and dishonestly inaccurate. I'm not sure which at this point.

Like I said, you are fine with the Middle Earth set in Central American jungles as long as the writing is good and the narrative well developed.

That one is actually true. I'm impressed.

There is no "other" narrative because there is no other original work of Tolkien. Whatever "new narrative" Amazon creates to justify whatever casting or stories or changes to lore they make is not Tolkien is all I keep saying.

That's YOUR take. You accused ME of thinking like that, which I don't. And I've said repeatedly - and for once, you've acknowledged this - that truth to the source material is not of interest to me, because it's a red herring (for reasons I've explained many times). Claiming that accuracy is an argument is either logically inconsistent (since it will fail at ANY level of adaptation) or it's an outright smokescreen for other arguments (usually racist ones, in the skin-color debate).

That doesn't make any sense. If the source material is about 3 white men in the woods or lovers from two feuding white families in Italy then the casting cannot be open to ANYBODY that makes no logical sense.

Which, again, is something I've REPEATEDLY and EXPLICITLY acknowledged by saying that if there ARE GOOD REASONS to keep certain skin colors etc. then that's fine. And that I was PURELY talking about those narratives where there ARE NO good reasons.

Which you'd know if you'd, you know, READ MY FUCKING REPLIES. This isn't the first time this was explained to you. It's not even the tenth time. I'm hoping for lucky number 30 at this point, even a monkey will get it by that point.

So you making up this argument that skin color and physical traits don't matter

Lie.

I already made that clear above. You don't feel source material is the final authority in an adaptation and therefore substantial changes can be made and still be called an "adaptation". I have said this multiple times. Stop acting like I don't understand what you are saying because I do.

As you can see from the above replies, you've VERY CLEARLY not understood my argument at all.

I'd suggest reading over things again, but I've done that twenty times now and you still seem to not be able to parse a simple statement that's been repeated and repeated and repeated and repeated and repeated...

This is getting more sad than aggravating now.

[Adamas102]

so in summary, despite the fact the original author of the works explicitly called his creation an 'alternate history for England' meaning that the peoples in his works unless directly stated otherwise should always be those of England during the relevant time period that this work was made to represent, and yet here you are arguing about that fact

Except it's not a fact. Not at all.

Tolkien made it a point to say that both the geography and "historical period" of Middle-earth were imaginary. Set on Earth, but given the geography it's not at a time that we have ever known in our history, and he never actually called his creation an "alternate history" either. He wanted to make a mythology, and like all mythologies it exists in an ancient but relatively arbitrary time of pre-history. Tolkien's decision to place his setting on Earth as opposed to "remote globes in 'space'" was more to lend the setting a sense of familiarity rather than attempt to relate all of it to specific peoples and places.

He placed Hobbiton at the same latitude of Oxford (not necessarily IN the location where Oxford now exists), and it's pretty well accepted that conceptually it's meant to mirror an idyllic version of England. Everywhere else is loosely scattered with only vague corresponding latitudes which aren't meant to be taken as direct relation to the places in question. For instance, he placed Minas Tirith at the latitude of Ravenna, Italy, and closer to Belgrade in distance from the Shire, but that doesn't mean that the people of Minas Tirith are meant to directly resemble any of the peoples along that latitude.

In one letter, Tolkien imagined the story of LotR taking place 6,000 years ago which would put it in the late Neolithic era, before the Bronze Age, before the Celts, Romans, and Anglo-Saxons, and CERTAINLY before anything even resembling the medieval European vibe that you seem to think this setting MUST adhere to. A couple years after that letter, Tolkien set Bel. 310 (when the Fathers of Men entered Beleriand) as being 16,000 years ago which in turn puts LotR around 9,000 years ago. So yeah, you can take your "relevant time period" bullshit and cram it.

As for the people of such a time, interestingly enough the genetic markers that are the main contributor to the lightening of European skin originated between 11,000 to 19,000 years ago, with strong selection for it possibly having occurred only 5,000-6,000 years ago. So according to Tolkien's timeline, the men of the 1st and 2nd Age should generally be dark skinned, with light skin only really becoming more prevalent later in the 3rd Age. In his letters he did specify that the clothing of the Numenorians closely resembled that of the Egyptians so them being a variety of skin tones would certainly fit.

and if it's such a non issue, why not go all out and cast all the elven characters in this show with CGI/greenscreen work to make them all have blue skin, to really make that diversity stand out, i mean since it's such a non issue to you i can't really see why you would have any problem with such a thing, i mean if you get that 'just right' colour of blue it can be pretty 'fair' and 'beautiful' to look at right?

Oh cool, another one of those racist dog whistles.

Yes, blue. Because being inclusive of brown PEOPLE is akin to just picking a random color from a box of crayons. Do you clowns even listen to the shit you spew?

[s_bushido]

Oh cool, another one of those racist dog whistles.

Yes, blue. Because being inclusive of brown PEOPLE is akin to just picking a random color from a box of crayons. Do you clowns even listen to the shit you spew?

No, they don't...to the point where he doesn't even realize he's torpedoing his own argument.

Would anyone care if black actors were cast to play elves when everyone portraying a member of that race was painted blue anyway? Probably not any more than people cared that white actors were cast to play brown Klingons. But since elves/dwarves/hobbits are portrayed as having regular human skin-tones, and black/brown people are regular humans (shocking revelation, I know), there's nothing preventing those characters from being portrayed by those actors.

[InfiniteCharger]

I asked simple, clarifying questions.

I am not trying to trick you or inveigle you into some revealing response. I asked a question, and somehow you wrote 2 full paragraphs across 2 replies dodging an answer, and accusing me of making assertions when all I did was give YOU a chance to explain things so I WOULDN'T make assertions.

Talk about absurd.


And that was all I was asking. If you wrote it specifically so that the skin color matters, then there's a narrative reason to cast white people, and we don't have a problem casting white people. Which I've always and repeatedly mentioned anytime casting came up.

Why not just fucking answer the question when I asked it, instead of going on a 1,000-word tirade about how I'm being a racist all of a sudden.

It is implicit in the statment "3 white men in the woods". How is it not obvious that the title of the story tells you everything you need to know?
The first time I mentioned it I am pretty much sure I phrased it as a title of this imaginary book. Either way just from the way it was being described it was obvious the point I was getting at regardless. It just is very dishonest to sit here and not understand the OBVIOUS point I was trying to make with that scenario.

Because I'm not. I've repeatedly said that I'm 100% fine with casting white people if the story has a narrative reason for them to be white (and the same goes for any other characteristic). I've even used CAPS to make that clear, and asked you about 12 times to please make sure you understand this.

Except in this case, we are talking about Tolkien and again, not to beat a dead horse, the issue is whether Tolkien's narrative was intended to be based around people looking similar to those in ancient England and therefore white, especially for the Elves and Numenoreans. I believe it was and that is the crux of the issue. Other people may want to interpret it differently but my point is that there is nothing inherently racist if that is what he intended.

Which apparently you didn't, since here you are AGAIN getting it wrong, despite me being very explicit about it for two days. You really don't want to read what I'm saying, do you.

Again, you are losing the point of the discussion, which again, is specifically about Tolkien and whether most of the primary characters of his story were intended to be white. We aren't talking purely abstract theoretical concepts here. You keep going back and forth between subjective arbitrary discussions about "narrative" when we are talking about a specific narrative written by Tolkien. The only reason I mentioned characters being all white is because there is nothing wrong with Tolkien or any other author having or intending the narrative in their story to primarily involve people with white skin. It isn't complicated and doesn't require a long back and forth. If you don't think that the intended that then FINE. But I don't agree with you. Again, there is no need for all this back and forth when you know that this is the ultimate point of this whole discussion. I am just saying there is nothing WRONG with that being what he intended nor is there anything WRONG with casting the show based on that, meaning with mostly white people.

In a lot of fiction, yeah, it absolutely is. Just like many other characteristics about fictional characters usually are. They're not IRRELEVANT, but they have no larger narrative function and can easily be changed without substantially altering anything about the narrative. And for many characteristics, changing them is a matter of course in adaptation, and something entirely trivial that barely anyone even notices let alone complains about.

OK. But again, we are talking about Tolkien and I do not agree that these characteristics are arbitrary because hes spent a lot of time fleshing out this world and the "races" in it to a very detailed degree. That is not arbitrary. And that is what makes Tolkien unique as an author. Again, just to avoid this back and forth, there are two things at work here: 1) whether Tolkien intended certain races of characters to be white and 2) whether you accept changes to that in order to make some of them non white. Those are two fundamentally and separate issues. You keep trying to argue that in this case the former issue of whether they were intended to be white is some how arbitrary because YOU may be OK with it. But that is not what makes it arbitrary. It is only arbitrary if the author writing it intended it to be arbitrary. And I do not believe that Tolkien intended those things such as skin colors for certain characters to be arbitrary. Whether you are OK with changing those characteristics in an adaptation is a totally separate issue. This is where this discussion keeps going off the rails. I don't really care if you are OK with changes but at least agree that authors do often specifically describe the physical characteristics of their characters to be a certain way. This is not always arbitrary.

I'm just going to shorthand this from now on, and mark every time you claim something I never said by simply going: Lie.

If it is not a lie then why are you sitting here telling me that skin color is arbitrary in a work of fiction based on ancient Europe? Please explain how you can argue that roles should "not exclude anybody" unless you believe that non whites should be able to play roles defined as white? How are you not seeing that this is what you said? And again instead of going into another tit for tat, the ultimate point like I said before is that these characteristics are not always arbitrary and authors often intend characters to look a certain way. It doesn't matter whether you see it that way or not or are OK with it in terms of an adaptation. I am not debating you about whether you are OK with something being changed in an adaptation. I am debating you about whether Tolkien intended many of his main characters to be white and whether that is racist or not along with the idea of casting actors who are white to play those roles. You seem to feel it is arbitrary. I do not. Lets just leave it at that.

Nor is it something I ever denied. Nowhere have I ever said "she's not written as white", in fact I SPECIFICALLY said I was 100% fine with humoring the notion even if it wasn't in the text.

My point is that it doesn't matter even if it's in the text. Not unless it also has an actual narrative function, rather than being a cosmetic detail; in which case sure, preserve it.

You keep going on these insane rants trying to come up with reasons against something I never said. Save your time writing those, and instead READ MY FUCKING WORDS.

You literally just said "Not unless it also has an actual narrative function, rather than being a cosmetic detail" as if to say that these things are open to interpretation and the source material doesn't matter. This whole discussion is about sticking to the source material, but you keep trying to inject arbitrary things into it like "narrative function" and "cosmetic detail" in order to make up new ways to interpret what was written. If the characters were written as white by the author then that is part of their narrative and how they wanted them to look. There is no "other" narrative or characteristic other than that. You keep acting like what the author literally wrote doesn't matter. So don't say that isn't something you didn't say when you literally just said it.

Lie.

Are you one of those people physically incapable of realizing what an analogy is, or how abstractions allow for larger points outside of the concrete?

An analogy that does nothing to elaborate the point about skin color which is obvious.

Must be that. The alternative would be... frightening.

No, it's mostly about you demonstrating again and again that you're either incapable or unwilling to parse my statements, as evidenced above (and I'm sure below). I've even made a fun game out of it, and you still didn't read what I said. So... yeah.

Like you explicitly said above, you believe these things are open to interpretation. You keep saying it. Stop saying I am unable to read when you LITERALLY just said:

My point is that it doesn't matter even if it's in the text. Not unless it also has an actual narrative function, rather than being a cosmetic detail; in which case sure, preserve it.

I said I disagree with that statement. You just refuse to accept that I disagree with you. This is not a misunderstanding. You are being dishonest.

Like this, for example. This is not something I ever disputed or denied, in any way. Yet you bring it up every two paragraphs, despite me telling you for two days that I never denied it in any way. Shit like THAT is why I'm saying you are not paying attention and/or are not comprehending something.


That's easily fixed. Just drop more black people in. Wouldn't be how Tolkien wrote it, but also wouldn't change anything of relevance to the story. IF that mattered for an adaptation anyway, which chances are it won't because the audience doesn't sit there with a genealogy, nor would they have to assume the written genealogy is the same as the one in the adaptation - since clearly there's already a visible difference, so why couldn't there be more. It wouldn't confuse anyone except the people who suddenly scream "BLACK PERSON! IN A FANTASY SETTING! AAAAAH!" and cower in fear.

Why should they have to "drop more black people" into the story if they already weren't there? If Tolkien wrote the family tree of the Numenoreans, then that means that their biological relationship to each other is an important part of the overall narrative of middle earth. It also means that they share biological characteristics as being related by blood and that this is important to the narrative that Tolkien wrote. So obviously you wouldn't have people popping up in this family tree that don't share common characteristics. And in terms of the narrative function of this it is to show how they all inherited the gift of longer than normal lifespans due to being descended from a half elven ancestor. All of this is fundamental and integral to the story. Obviously skin color and other phyiscal characteristics would be similar as well. Therefore, these things are not arbitrary and changing one character to be black makes no sense in a vacuum, which means you now have to make up a whole new narrative to justify that characters existence by explaining how she came to be part of that bloodline. All of which takes away from the original intent of Tolkien which was to show how all of these characters shared traits as being descended from half elves. That is not arbitrary and a core part of the narrative. Black skin isn't part of that narrative.

I'm very confused. Is this a language problem? Do you not know what "endorse" means or something? How did you go from what I said to me suddenly not talking about RoP? What?


I've said before that I use that term purely in its descriptive sense, not as a genre category. If you want to call it "inspired by" or "related to" or whatever else instead of "adaptation" that doesn't bother me, because I'm not attached to that terminology, nor do I base anything in my argument on any strict sense of that word. I use it purely as shorthand for "take story X and use it to make story Y", beyond that I don't give a hoot about the label you put on it because it's not relevant to anything I'm saying or interested in.

This is also something I've already explained in detail, by the way. But which you (evidently) also simply didn't read. That makes me sad.

You are free to have your own views and opinions on what qualifies as a good "adaptation". But again, the point was I disagree with you. This is not an issue of misunderstanding. We don't have to agree and you aren't going to clarify yourself in some way for me to agree with you. I understand your point but disagree with it. That's all. You aren't going to convince me to change my views on this. Be honest and just admit that I understand and disagree with you.

And how do you think it became that way?

RIGHT. By taking a story from SOMEWHERE ELSE that had OTHER PEOPLE IN IT and putting NEW PEOPLE in that fit the CONTEMPORARY IDEA OF PEOPLE.

Now where have we encountered this process before...

It's kind of ironic since you're dismantling your own argument here, let me enjoy the moment a little.

These stories were all about white Europeans was the point. You haven't provided any evidence otherwise. LOL

Well one might argue that changing the setting WOULD run into narrative reasons for preservation (whereas skin color wouldn't)... But in principle, pretty much, yeah. It'd be hard to do and still have it be good writing, but if someone can pull it off - kudos to them, absolutely okay with it.

Yes so you agree you dont mind such substantial changes to source material. The point though is that wouldn't be Tolkien anymore. That is an objective fact. Your subjective opinion on whether or not it "could" work is irrelevant to that.

And if that was ever a concern for me, I'd have a problem with it. But it's not. Tolkien's just a name, works of art don't have to care about that. If it's a good story, it's a good story, even if it's miles away from the original. And a bad story is a bad story, even if it bends over backwards to try and be accurate.

Fine. That's your opinion. But that doesn't mean that it is "faithful" to Tolkien. Two different things. Everybody is not going to agree on what makes a good "adaptation" of Tolkien. Even his family members haven't all agreed. When it comes to any work of art everyone can have their on subjective opinion. I am just stating that the lore and story of Tolkien in terms of what he actually wrote is not subjective in terms of how characters look, their languages, customs, histories, etc.

Lie.

You just said you would be OK with LOTR set in the Amazon Rain Forest if the writing and narrative was good. Stop saying I am lying about that.
Just scroll up and you can read it.

Your replies. Which are either GROSSLY ignorant, or deliberately and dishonestly inaccurate. I'm not sure which at this point.


That one is actually true. I'm impressed.

You do understand that the Amazon rain forest example shows that you agree it is fine to make substantial changes to source material. So obviously I am not being ignorant. You are just again talking BS like someone doesn't understand you, as if I understood you I would agree with you. No, I understand you and don't agree with you. Your opinion is yours, not mine. I am not obliged to agree with it.

That's YOUR take. You accused ME of thinking like that, which I don't. And I've said repeatedly - and for once, you've acknowledged this - that truth to the source material is not of interest to me, because it's a red herring (for reasons I've explained many times). Claiming that accuracy is an argument is either logically inconsistent (since it will fail at ANY level of adaptation) or it's an outright smokescreen for other arguments (usually racist ones, in the skin-color debate).

So there is no debate then. You don't care about wholesale changes to the source material being called an "adaptation". I do. There is no point continuing then. This isn't a debate. We aren't going to agree. You keep trying to pretend that somehow I am "obliged" to agree with you. No I am not. This is not an issue of misunderstanding at all.

Which, again, is something I've REPEATEDLY and EXPLICITLY acknowledged by saying that if there ARE GOOD REASONS to keep certain skin colors etc. then that's fine. And that I was PURELY talking about those narratives where there ARE NO good reasons.

Which you'd know if you'd, you know, READ MY FUCKING REPLIES. This isn't the first time this was explained to you. It's not even the tenth time. I'm hoping for lucky number 30 at this point, even a monkey will get it by that point.


Lie.


As you can see from the above replies, you've VERY CLEARLY not understood my argument at all.

I'd suggest reading over things again, but I've done that twenty times now and you still seem to not be able to parse a simple statement that's been repeated and repeated and repeated and repeated and repeated...

This is getting more sad than aggravating now.

Again, bottom line and you have said it over and over, you don't mind substantial changes to the source material as an "adaptation". I disagree with that. There is no point to further discussion because I am not going to agree with you on that especially regarding Tolkien.

[DarkAmbient]

Holy walls of text...

[InfiniteCharger]

This is some of the most nonsensical ranting I've seen so far in this thread. What the fuck do Tom Cruise, James Bond (a character that has undergone a lot of modernization and has changed drastically from when he was written, and may well be played by a person of color soon), and Spider-man (a character who has been portrayed with a lot of diversity in print runs and movies) have anything to do with this?

James Bond has always been white and popular around the world and is based on a character from novels going back over 70 years. Peter Parker as Spiderman has always been white and is the best selling character in Marvel comics. None of these characters as white had a problem being popular was the point. You haven't proven otherwise.

And it's not about whether every story should have an increase in diversity when adapted to the screen, or anyone saying diversity is required. What you're trying to argue is that THIS story specifically needs to not have ANY diversity in its cast, and you're apparently basing that on "because that's how it was originally written" and "look at these other well liked white characters/people". Obviously neither of those are good reasons for purposefully excluding actors based on their skin color when they can do the job just fine otherwise.

Studios like Amazon have diversity mandates So that means a certain amount of diversity is required, regardless of what the source material says. That implicitly means injecting diversity into the story of Tolkien as a number of the actors and actresses for this show have come out and said. Which again, implies that Tolkien's work somehow wasn't popular already without that and potentially racist for not explicitly including that kind of diversity.

That's NOT inserting culture. When the Peter Jackson movies came out, did you complain about people like Viggo Mortensen, Elijah Wood, and Sean Astin inserting "American culture" into Tolkien? From the British cast of the Fellowship we had English, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish representation from various generations, yet you seem to have been ok with that diversity. The elves were mostly Australians and New Zealanders, but apparently no cultural issues there either, right?

We are talking about modern Britain having a lot of immigrants from various parts of the world, unlike ancient England. The main characters and stories from Middle Earth were intended to reflect the population of England and is based on European mythology. While there are other parts of the continent of Middle Earth that would be similar to Africa and Asia, those areas were not the main setting for his stories. So there is diversity in his world, but the main stories of the Elves, Hobbits and Dwarves are based around the mythology and people indigenous to England and Europe.

None of these people were from the same generation as Tolkien, much less identify as whatever "ancient Europeans" you think their characters are inspired by. They're MODERN actors who do their best to play the roles they're given. That extends as well to the cast of this show. And again, the only issue you seem to have is with the color of their skin, which again has nothing to do with culture here.

They are of European descent so obviously they represent the characteristics of ancient indigenous Europeans. Unless you are claiming that Africans and Asians are indigenous to England? England being in Northern Europe would have an indigenous population adapted to Northern environments, which means light to white skin is the point. Just like populations indigenous to Africa would have dark skin because Africa straddles the equator. This isn't arbitrary.

You do, apparently. Plenty of people have no problem accepting him as a hobbit if the only difference between him and Ian Holm is the color of their skin.

I have a problem with giving Harfoots which are technically Hobbits a major role in the 2nd age when they had none in the source material. And therefore, regardless of skin color, they shouldn't have a prominent role in those stories. Using Lenny Henry as an argument for "diversity" doesn't justify that change. And if they really cared about it, then why not make whole large groups of elves black, whole groups of Numenoreans black and whole groups of Dwarves black instead of just 1 or 2? If you are going to go in then go all the way in. Either way, none of that is what Tolkien intended is the point and it isn't necessary to make his work popular.

Apparently you're unaware of how adaptations actually work, otherwise you wouldn't be suggesting something as childish as every adaptation of book to screen is a "butchering" of the source material. And yes, this all has to do with Tolkien since it's based in the world he started creating using the creatures and characters he made a few notes about. Adaptations are NEVER required to be 100% faithful translations of the original sources because what works for one medium might not work for another quite as well. This show (like the movies) is drama, and the literature only forms a basis for what gets adapted to the screen.

It depends on the actual work being produced. Everything is not labeled a literal "adaptation". Marvel movies are not "adaptations" because they are new stories using characters and stories from the comics but in a separate universe. So they don't have to be literally the same. Transformers movies are just a franchise using characters from a cartoon series in new stories. Not a literal adaptation. When you actually talk about literal "adaptations" that narrows things down a lot. Some stories are just "inspired by" and not "adaptation". Meaning, when someone says they are "adapting" something they typically mean staying as close as possible to the source material. That doesn't mean 100%. This show is no longer calling itself an "adaptation" because they don't have the rights to most of Tolkien's work to adapt in the first place and because they have already acknowledged they are doing their own thing. It was them claiming to be literally writing the novel that Tolkien never wrote that got them called out to begin with. Because people like the themes and stories of Tolkien as one of the best selling novels of all time. Therefore if you claim to be "adapting" that, this is what they expect to see. Not some other made up story with sprinkles of Tolkien here and there.

[UnifiedDivide]

I wonder why, after so long with it not really even being mentioned in the thread outside of a handful of times months ago, there is this (seemingly sudden) massive push on "alternative history for England" As I recall, it was simply meant to be a "fictional place with its own history, people, and languages," and isn't meant to be placed into our own history, anthropologically speaking.

As an Englishman, am I meant to care more about it supposedly being an "alternate history" for my country?

[Serpha]

All I can say after seeing clips and pictures of this show, all male elfs look really bad, round and square faces. Maybe it's just me but shouldn't they have more of oval, long faces with smooth skin? So far they look like meth addicts and Galadriel looks below average. And the ears...

- - - Updated - - -

Holy walls of text...

Some people have clearly way to much time on their hands.

[Biomega]

It is implicit in the statment "3 white men in the woods".

No it's not. That's why I asked the question.

And instead of just ANSWERING like a reasonable human being, you wrote an essay about fifty things I never said.

Except in this case, we are talking about Tolkien and again, not to beat a dead horse, the issue is whether Tolkien's narrative was intended to be based around people looking similar to those in ancient England and therefore white, especially for the Elves and Numenoreans.

The issue is whether it MATTERS, not whether it's MENTIONED.

Which you apparently STILL don't see a distinction between, despite me repeating it so often.

OK. But again, we are talking about Tolkien and I do not agree that these characteristics are arbitrary because hes spent a lot of time fleshing out this world and the "races" in it to a very detailed degree. That is not arbitrary.

You're too hung up on the word "arbitrary" (which YOU introduced into this in the first place, not me). The question I'm asking is DOES IT MATTER for the story, not whether or not Tolkien just rolled the dice or had something in mind. There's a whole catalog of cosmetic details authors choose for NON-arbitrary reasons but that nevertheless have NO SUBSTANTIAL NARRATIVE ROLE of any kind - things like for example hair color, height, eye color, the color of clothing, and so on and so forth. All cosmetic details that were chosen to be JUST SO by authors, yet in the grand scheme of the narrative are usually of no to negligible importance narrative (and, as always, in cases where they're NOT negligible, they should be retained). My point is that for most stories, skin color is on exactly that level of relevance - a cosmetic detail, not a plot driver.

That does NOT mean I'm saying it's "arbitrary", and it does NOT mean I'm saying "the author just did this because they're racist!". All I'm saying is that given the story at hand, there seems to be no substantial function to that particular characteristic, and as such, it's one of the many many details that can freely be changed without significantly affecting anything about the story.

That's EXACTLY what happens in adaptations for any number of details without substantial relevance to the narrative, and no one ever raises a problem about THOSE; yet they somehow DO for skin color.

1) whether Tolkien intended certain races of characters to be white

The problem is right here.

You've never offered ANYTHING of substance to show why their skin color MATTERS to anything in the narrative.

All you've ever put forward was "Tolkien wrote them/intended them to be white" and "making them non-white would not be how it is in the original".

Which is the exact same argument you could make for any number of OTHER cosmetic details that also have no relevance to the actual narrative, and no one ever seriously complains about THOSE. Why is skin color different?

If it is not a lie then why are you sitting here telling me that skin color is arbitrary in a work of fiction based on ancient Europe?

The reason I put Lie. on things is, as I explained, because it's you claiming something I never said.

Like what you're saying there.

I'll continue to do this, so please don't bother offering statements I never made; if you disagree, all you need to do to disprove me is quote something. Should be simple, right?

Please explain how you can argue that roles should "not exclude anybody" unless you believe that non whites should be able to play roles defined as white?

I feel insulted that you're now asking me to please explain what I've BEEN EXPLAINING in clearly marked, clearly pointed out form, FOR THREE DAYS.

Kindly re-read the 20 or so times I literally explained this exact thing.

You literally just said "Not unless it also has an actual narrative function, rather than being a cosmetic detail" as if to say that these things are open to interpretation and the source material doesn't matter.

The FACT of whether or not something is described as X in the source is not open to interpretation.

Whether or not X is RELEVANT to the narrative in some substantive way, that absolutely is.

And if your position is that skin color IS relevant to the narrative, all I'm asking is that you back up that claim with more than "well that skin color is what it says in the text", which is a tautology.

This whole discussion is about sticking to the source material

No it isn't.

YOU are trying to MAKE it about that, because your entire argument is "well it's not like that in the text!" and you have nothing else to support your position.

As I've explained many times, truth to the source material by itself is not an argument, just a red herring - because of the existence of a huge amount of details that are quite clearly irrelevant to the plot and are changed ALL THE TIME in any kind of adaptation without anyone complaining. That PROVES that JUST going "but the teeeeext!" isn't sufficient to argue anything; you need to show why a detail is RELEVANT, too, in order to make any sort of point.

An analogy that does nothing to elaborate the point about skin color which is obvious.

So that's a "yes" then, on being incapable of parsing analogies?

Why should they have to "drop more black people" into the story if they already weren't there?

To address the problem of "omg how is there ONE SINGLE BLACK PERSON all of a sudden I AM SO CONFUSED!" that you invented as a rather hyperbolic hypothetical. Which, as I've explained in that same paragraph, isn't actually something that'd ever happen, but even IF IT DID, it has the simple fix above.

The point being that yours is not a sensible objection to begin with.

You are free to have your own views and opinions on what qualifies as a good "adaptation".

HOLD ON.

I was talking about the LABEL "adaptation". Now you are suddenly talking about what makes a GOOD adaptation.

Those are not the same thing, poppet. Not even close.

Please argue HONESTLY.

These stories were all about white Europeans was the point. You haven't provided any evidence otherwise. LOL

Because I'm not disputing that point. Never have. I'm not arguing about the facts, I'm arguing about their RELEVANCE.

Which you'd know if you were interested in parsing my statements, rather than just making your own. "LOL".

The point though is that wouldn't be Tolkien anymore. That is an objective fact. Your subjective opinion on whether or not it "could" work is irrelevant to that.

You keep making about things I'm not and never was talking about. I've literally said so, many times.

Why? Why do you keep going back to things I've already SAID MANY TIMES I don't dispute and am not arguing against?

"But this hat is BLUE!"

"Yes, yes it is. Does that matter, though?"

"Dude, stop saying the hat isn't blue, IT IS FUCKING BLUE!"

"I... I know. I've said it is. But why is that relevant?"

"LMAO I can't even, you clown, THE HAT IS BLUE, it SAYS SO RIGHT THERE are you for real."

"I don't deny that. But is the color actually important?"

"Holy shit how are you still trying to say the hat isn't blue IT IS BLUE, BLUE, BLUE it says in the text EVERYWHERE that it is fucking BLUE!"

This is kind of surreal at this point.