Lord of the Rings TV Series Purchased by Amazon

[rogoth]

Is this parody? Like do you even watch television that isn't Ax Men? This is literally hilarious.

'is this a parody?' - no, not that i'm aware of.

'like do you even watch television that isn't ax men?' - firstly i don't know what 'ax men' is, so can't really comment on that, as far as watching television, i haven't really sat down and watched a show 'on television' for better part of a decade at this point, if i see a show i wanna watch i'll watch it online at my own leisure in my own time, whether that be binge watching an entire series in a day or spreading it out over a period of time and taking it slow so as to get more from it.

i wasn't intending to be 'hilarious' as you put it, i was intending to be informative with the utter disgrace these show runners are putting forward, and explaining what they have done to conform to tokenism in its entirety in the context of this show.

[BeepBoo]

Very few people ever even notice, unless it's the other way around for some reason.

This is simply not true, also that list has a lot of bullshit in it.

Everyone raged at prince of persia. Everyone raged at ghost in the shell. Everyone raged at Avatar the last airbender abomination (for more than JUST the whitewashing).

Most of that list is fucking PRE COLOR movies, so yes... of course it's all white-washed. That doesn't mean that would fly now or even 20 years ago. Also, listing dumb shit that is literally invented out of thin air only for movie format, like Mike Meyer's Love Guru THAT WAS FUCKING WRITTEN BY HIMSELF and is intentionally a cultural parody isn't fucking whitewashing. That's like saying Dave Chapelle playing a white guy numerous times is black-washing... like holy shit that's the whole point.

You're living under a rock if you don't think people also complain about the reverse.

[Shadowferal]

No where near as big as lotr lol, but yeah there's a fandom out there. "Earthsea series" book 1 is "A Wizard of Earthsea". I forgot what channel it was that made the series, old scifi I think? irrelevant though. But yes, folks watched it and it has a fandom, just, as mentioned, not on the scale (or even close to the scale) as lotr of course.

Lots of old sci-fi and fantasy just waiting...

[Triceron]

If only I knew what the fuck "Earthsea" was? Did anyone even watch this to get upset about it? Does whatever the fuck it's based on even HAVE a fandom?

If you actually looked it up, you'd know that yes, it does have a fandom. It's considered one of the top classic literary fantasy worlds. It's become quite an inspiration for many other fantasy worlds and stories.

[AcidicSyn]

I'm not someone who specifically goes out looking for these things. If it happens to be something I care about, I talk about it. However, if I were an earthsea fan and it was, indeed, as you say.. a whitewashing, I'd be pissed. Best example I can think of for me personally was Ghost in the Shell whitewashing. I complained all over everything about that. I fucking grew up on that show and major is a fucking asian lady-cyborg, period.

yup, it was Sokka/Kitara levels of whitewash, (Geds from the isle of Gont, which is part of an archipelago whose people are all dark bronze/red/coppery skinned. A continent away, called Karg, is where the white people are from but show ignored all that).

plus the kid couldn't even act so the show still tanked. The aforementioned Ursula I mentioned being pissed is the Author.

Anywho though, I'd suppose that means you're not one of the ones I was talking about though. For me it tends to be case by case. Take Disa, I have more of a problem with her lack of beard than the color of her skin. (I also can't stop thinking of Dis when I hear her name, the only actual named female dwarf in the written works, but she wasn't around until Third age. This might be intentional on the writers part though)

As for elves, I'm honestly more annoyed Blanchet and Weaving aren't reprising their roles than anything else. "Young Elrond" dude looked the fuckin same a thousand years ago as he does when he sails back to the undying lands come off it with this "young" nonsense. Though I mean...I guess I get it? I'm meh about it all frankly. I guess that's why I'm pretty much just hoping to see Moria restored and Dwarves not living in ruins or in exile.

[Shadowferal]

In an attempt to say that nobody reads books these days.

Show me where I posted that.

How often you read the books has literally zero to do with whether you actually finished watching the Amazon series.

Why on earth would I waste any more time on that nonsense? They got me for three and that was my limit.

[Aedruid]

Dwarf women with no facial hair what so ever and a fucking elf with a buzzcut.... Really? I guess elf have magic to trim hair like modern razor and not just blades like everyone else. People didnt have faded buzzcut, because electric clippers arent a fucking thing in medieval time, fantasy or not. People cut their fucking hair with blades. Theres no electric grooming.

100% this. When I saw the trailer I was kinda thrown off balance by the high and tight haircut + women dwarfs with no beards.... literally makes no sense. Feels more like Chronicles of Narnia story-wise in the trailer too, like wtf.

[BeepBoo]

If you actually looked it up, you'd know that yes, it does. It's considered one of the top classic literary fantasy worlds. It's become quite an inspiration for many other fantasy worlds and stories. You never heard of it? Probably because you're not as well versed in fantasy literature as you think you are.

You make the mistake of thinking I think I'm well-versed in fantasy literature. I'm only as well-versed as someone who's only exposure to music is the radio's billboard top 100. My fantasy knowledge is only as deep as the ultra-popular things that ever make it to big-time. I had no idea what the fuck game of thrones was until it had a major screen adaptation.

I only know lord of the rings and got into it (reading the silmarillion) because the movies came out during my childhood and were super popular.

[Aedruid]

yup, it was Sokka/Kitara levels of whitewash, (Geds from the isle of Gont, which is part of an archipelago whose people are all dark bronze/red/coppery skinned. A continent away, called Karg, is where the white people are from but show ignored all that).

plus the kid couldn't even act so the show still tanked. The aforementioned Ursula I mentioned being pissed is the Author.

Anywho though, I'd suppose that means you're not one of the ones I was talking about though. For me it tends to be case by case. Take Disa, I have more of a problem with her lack of beard than the color of her skin. (I also can't stop thinking of Dis when I hear her name, the only actual named female dwarf in the written works, but she wasn't around until Third age. This might be intentional on the writers part though)

As for elves, I'm honestly more annoyed Blanchet and Weaving aren't reprising their roles than anything else. "Young Elrond" dude looked the fuckin same a thousand years ago as he does when he sails back to the undying lands come off it with this "young" nonsense. Though I mean...I guess I get it? I'm meh about it all frankly. I guess that's why I'm pretty much just hoping to see Moria restored and Dwarves not living in ruins or in exile.

By the time we all see the show, we're all going to be rooting for Moria to be destroyed. I can only imagine what nonsense is going to take place.

[AcidicSyn]

Lots of old sci-fi and fantasy just waiting...~snipped image~

and yet they just keep rebooting and reusing everything they can.

Though I did hear a rumor that someone might try to take another stab at Eragon, that's a reboot I might support but elsewise....the pool is DEEP, no need to keep skimming the surface.

Okay I lied I would also support an Earthsea reboot but the timeskips between books are so big they'd need a new Ged each time

- - - Updated - - -

By the time we all see the show, we're all going to be rooting for Moria to be destroyed. I can only imagine what nonsense is going to take place.

okay well first off that's just depressing.

Secondly, Durins bane isn't woken/released until something like a thousand years into the third age under Durin the VI soooooo..... neener neener?

Then again they do keep talking about compressed timelines and I would not put it past them to just decide the Balrog waking up early would just be super-duper cool to see and do it anyway.

Now I'm worried about one more thing in this show, thanks for that.

[rogoth]

I wasn't aware of the details regarding the timeline until just now. I get that and I can see legitimate criticism regarding it. I just don't understand why you are so upset about diversity that you have a Woke Checklist. It seems like a sad, angry way to exist.

first off, i want to make this abundantly clear right here and right now, i have NOTHING whatsoever against these actors/actresses who have been hired purely as token characters to check a woke bingo card, it's not their fault, this backlash rests solely on the shoulders of the people put in charge of this project who did nothing with it until AFTER Christopher Tolkein died as he was maintaining that it be true to the source material, once he was gone, the entire show staff was fired, writers were hired, other staff were hired to replace those who were fired, they removed the foremost Tolkein scholar in the world from the project and hired a gender and politics activist who calls herself a 'PHD scholar of Tolkein', who herself doesn't even know the lore that Tolkein made, so this tells you all you need to know about how much they care about the source material.

secondly, and i wanna make this as plain as i can, NOWHERE in any of the written works surrounding middle earth (of which i have read 90% of them), are there any references to these kinds of characters, there's certainly NOTHING whatsoever written in the Return of the King appendices that this show is based off of, and even if there was one line of original text stating that it was possible for these characters to exist (again, there isn't), it doesn't remove the fact that the dwarven character is a beardless one, as described in the source material, the only time you would see a beardless dwarf is when it was shaven as a sign of humiliation and usually before the dwarf in question was exiled from their home, this is how every single dwarf in the source material works, so how then is it magically acceptable to have a FEMALE dwarf, who is naturally black, a biological IMPOSSIBILITY, with no beard, in a position of power?, as i have said now multiple times, her character goes against 4 or 5 different laws governing how these fictional races should look and behave as per the source material, the same extends to the elf character, nowhere in any of the source material does it state that any elf had short hair, every single elf is described as being tall and fair, with long flowing hair, how then all of a sudden does a random black elf show up (yet another biological impossibility), with a fade buzzcut when during the time period this world is set in, the only implements for cutting were knives/daggers/swords/axes, how does that work?

lastly, as i said above, if they had invented a totally new faction for this dwarf princess to exist in, that had lived apart from the rest of dwarf society for generations and had developed their own traditions and traits, while it would be a far cry from the original source material, it's the only way i can think of to explain this random black dwarf in a sea of white dwarves (and yes i used the words 'woke' and 'tokenism' because she is thus far the only black character of that racial set of characters making her a literal definition of the word 'token' character).

part of the reason people are so up in arms over the race aspect of this debacle is because only in America are people so fascinated and fixated on making sure 'insert race or minority person here' is represented in media, most other places around the world if they are ADAPTING an already established story tend to stick to what that story demands, the examples given recently of a famous tribal story from Africa being adapted and all the characters replaced with white actors not only would it not make sense, it would piss off EVERYONE who was familiar with the source material, this quite literally has nothing to do with the various 'isms' and 'ists' that the predominantly American media associated with this project are throwing around to name call fans who disagree with this utter shitshow of a project.

[Shadowferal]

By the time we all see the show, we're all going to be rooting for Moria to be destroyed. I can only imagine what nonsense is going to take place.

The hero we really want:

[MakeMeLaugh]

22k dislikes on that amazon teaser trailer and all those comments with a Tolkien quote is just pure gold, amazing!

[DarkAmbient]

For a billion dollar show, why does the new Lord of the Rings trailer look so cheap?

Early footage from Amazon’s wildly expensive new fantasy series ‘The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power’ suggests CGI demons have already stolen its soul, writes Kevin E G Perry

Beside a vast waterfall, a woman dangles precariously from a frozen cliff face. As the wind whips around her, she leaps and drives a golden spike into the ice. When she looks up, towards the camera, we know in an instant that she will be alright from the look on her CGI-smoothed visage. There is no danger, because nothing here is real. The only place our new hero looks likely to fall is deep into the uncanny valley.

The trailer for Amazon’s much-anticipated new series The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power hit screens during the Super Bowl this weekend, giving fans an early glimpse at exactly what the world’s first billion dollar television show looks like. The answer? A cut scene from an old Final Fantasy computer game. It is hard to conjure up a sense of jeopardy when your characters, in this case Swedish-born Welsh actor Morfydd Clark’s young Galadriel, have ended up looking like one of Mark Zuckerberg’s creepy, dead-eyed Meta avatars wrapped in a billowing cloak of special effects. Sure, royal elves aren’t necessarily supposed to look human, but you’d think after spending all that money she’d at least look like she has a pulse.

[Xath]

Are you suggesting you don't hate the female dwarf because she doesn't have a full beard? Only reason to bring it up in relation to me simply saying that people do indeed read books.


Criticism is fine. What tends to go on isn't really criticism, though. Certainly not constructive criticism.


Dude, I've read the Wheel of Time thread lol Claims/accusations for such were duly warranted. Did you ever even get around to actually finishing it yet? Looks like that thread can finally die now that this is the new thing to whinge about. How fickle people are.

And, if I ignore you, it'll generally be because what you posted didn't need a reply, didn't warrant a reply, or I didn't care enough to reply. But sure, that's just me turning those that don't think exactly like me into scary villains! You tend to just come across as a miserable old man that likes shaking his cane at modern media. People like you are why I barely come to this specific sub-forum, and its a shame that there are so many like you.

You trolled the wheel of time thread just like you are doing now ftfy

[Dhrizzle]

Yes, but it's okay, because the videogame never took itself seriously. It exists as its own thing and it's meant for fun, it's not meant to be an adaptation. It's basically its own universe.

Meanwhile this show is supposed to be an adaptation of the Second Age and is supposed to fill the gaps of the Second Age. So if this show has writing on the level of "Sauron and Celebrimbor hug and merge together, the Eye of Sauron turns blue to represent their struggle", which is a complete retcon/reimagining of the story, that would be a problem. Because this show actually takes itself seriously.

In other words, you can ignore the videogame as non-canon, but you can't ignore this TV show as non-canon, because it's meant to fill in the gaps of the Second Age...

If you accept Tolkien's writings as canon and this series disagrees with Tolkien's writings then you can 100% take it as non-canon just like the video games.

[Xath]

If you want a valid reason, black people are have been struggling to get decent representation for decades, and they still struggle to get roles and even get nominated less than other people. Then you decide to take away their already reduced representation by assigning black roles to white actors? That is a bad look. It is a false simmetry.

Now you might dislike or disagree with it, which is another discussion that is off limits for this forum, but the reasoning is sound at least.

Serious question here what do you think is the racial makeup of the US and without Google what minority group has the largest population.

[Veggie50]

100% this. When I saw the trailer I was kinda thrown off balance by the high and tight haircut + women dwarfs with no beards.... literally makes no sense. Feels more like Chronicles of Narnia story-wise in the trailer too, like wtf.

The buzzcuts a bit weird yea… the lack of female beard is very defensible ino though… it’s one of those things that works on the page, but not on screen. The character would lose all charisma.

[Xath]

Minority characters are cast with white actors literally all the time; this list is a fraction of Hollywood white washing: https://www.washingtonpost.com/poste...o-wasnt-white/

Very few people ever even notice, unless it's the other way around for some reason.

Any time an article starts with 1915 it can be tossed in the trash. Whitewashing is also super fucking annoying good current examples of this are the ancient one and the major.

[Nask]

FEMALE dwarf, who is naturally black, a biological IMPOSSIBILITY.

If you are going to go for this "biological impossibility" angle you'd have to count out a lot of stuff in Silmarillion, LOTR, hobbit. What you wanted to say is "only things I DEEM PROPER" can be in. I don't remember anything about dwarves not being able to born with dark skin, you know, in a fantasy world where some humans live many times the normal lifespan, where elfs are a thing, god is thing, magic, ghosts, and so on.