Lord of the Rings TV Series Purchased by Amazon

[InfiniteCharger]

Don't distort things, you plum.

I'm talking about the statement that "No amount of good writing" could make you like an adaptation in a different setting. Which is a borderline psychotic overgeneralization, and calling it "a hardliner stance" is quite frankly being kind.

And it is not an over generalization to say that you would like LOTR that is set in the jungles of Central America, because of good writing!!
Your words not mine. Otherwise you are contradicting yourself.

[Xath]

One might argue that changing the color of a dress (when it has no bearing on the plot in any way) is entirely "within reason".

Book titles are usually changed for marketing reasons. "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" apparently was deemed to sound too complicated and old-fashioned for US readers, so the publisher changed it to "Sorcerer's Stone" to sell more copies. One may disagree with that, but someone's got to sell those books. Authors who resist all such alterations tend not to be published authors for very long.

I am talking about the title of the book that contained information about Gillyweed that Moody planted but Harry was too prideful to ask his dormmates for help with the second task so it went to waste. Not the title of the movie/book itself.

The thing is it wasn't a dress at all in the book it's just an odd change and significantly takes away from the wizardly aspect of the ball.

[Adamas102]

So you agree that history does matter? So the fact that Tolkien described the history of the people's of Middle Earth in a specific manner regarding racial depictions should matter? Because that's what people are saying, no one has said that they don't want black people on the screen at all.

Real history that affected real people? Yeah, that can be important. Fake "history" of a make believe world? Not so much. Tolkien's legendarium isn't fucking history. It's fiction through and through.

As for Anne Boleyn, the show is a drama. An entertainment piece where actors act out a story. Not a documentary meant to educate people about history. It's about as much a "historical piece" as The Tudors was, where they let Henry VIII remain slim throughout its run to maintain the show's sex appeal (among many other historical inaccuracies which didn't detract from it being an entertaining show).

[VMSmith]

And the Hobbit movies in many ways do cross the line between being an adaptation and an "interpretation". I don't mind someone doing an "interpretation" but to argue that no matter what someone does to the story it is still an adaptation is just objectively false.

The Hobbit movies are absolutely more in the "interpretation" camp. I'd go so far as to say they are more of the "inspired by" sort of re-telling. They play fast and loose with the existing story, add hours upon hours of non-canonical story, create characters that never existed in the story and are absolutely unnecessary to the actual story of The Hobbit, simply to pad out the runtime for three movies. They weren't political-agenda driven changes, IMO, but they warped the story as they pleased to tell the story they wanted to tell, not Tolkien's story.

And those movies have been hammered ever since the first one came out, and not just by Tolkien purists. But fans of Tolkiens works overwhelmingly hate that trilogy of movies and have never been ashamed of being extremely vocal about it. It had nothing to do with skin color or gender of anyone and everything to do with the fact that they were categorically NOT Tolkien's actual story except in the most necessary of ways. Where the LoTR movies succeeded by only changing where absolutely necessary for the medium of film, The Hobbit movies failed because they wanted to tell someone other than Tolkien's story while using the skeleton of Tolkien's story.

What you are saying is blatantly false and you know it. This just shows you are not following reality but making up nonsense arguments that have no merit in reality. If the Japanse myth is about a Japanese person doing things specific to Japanese culture, which is unique to them, then how is that not relevant to the mythology? If there are a lot of mountains and snow in Europe and the people are pale because of that, then how is the mythology of them and their white skin not relevant to that mythology? If there is a mythology about people in the desert involving dark skin and the sun as part of that mythology, then how is that not relevant? How is an Ice Queen white as snow going to make sense in a desert or tropical environment where everyone is black? You just are making up nonsense. If Tolkien mythology is based on European mythology where fairies and elves or other characters are described as white or pale, then how can you argue that it is not relevant to make them black?

Reading this I think of the movie Moana, which was a wonderful film. The thought of including white people in a Pacific Islanders' tale makes no sense whatsoever and would only have served to distract from the film. There's nothing wrong with telling stories of people of specific racial/geographic origins and making the characters look like the people in those areas. It's actually amazing because it introduces us all to the diversity in the world that we may not be aware of. But, for some reason, it's acceptable to erase these people whenever they are of European origin, and none other. And when you dislike the fact that this one group of people are made acceptable to erase and must justify their inclusion in things to a standard no other ethnicity is held to and seek actual equality, you are called "racist".

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Real history that affected real people? Yeah, that can be important. Fake "history" of a make believe world? Not so much. Tolkien's legendarium isn't fucking history. It's fiction through and through.

So we're back to Brad Pitt as Black Panther being ok, then? Because you folk have argued that it makes no sense for T'Challa to be white and would be unacceptable. Mind yourself on that hypocrisy.

As for Anne Boleyn, the show is a drama. An entertainment piece where actors act out a story. Not a documentary meant to educate people about history. It's about as much a "historical piece" as The Tudors was, where they let Henry VIII remain slim throughout its run to maintain the show's sex appeal (among many other historical inaccuracies which didn't detract from it being an entertaining show).

You just have a special reason for every example of why it's ok to erase white people and promote others, don't you? In one breath you say real history is important, in the next you say it's "entertainment". It all depends on what you need in the moment to promote your racist ideology, isn't it?

[Adamas102]

So we're back to Brad Pitt as Black Panther being ok, then? Because you folk have argued that it makes no sense for T'Challa to be white and would be unacceptable. Mind yourself on that hypocrisy.

Yeah, if you're ignorant enough to not understand that even though Wakanda is a fictional location it was a deliberated decision for it to be representative of African peoples and cultures as an advanced technological civilization in a continent that was raped and pillaged by predominately white colonial powers then maybe you'd think it's hypocritical to say that a white person being the main representative of said fictional nation doesn't really work.

Alright, now this part is reeeeeally important, so even if you ignore the rest of my post then at least let this part sink in:
So, you do realize that all the actors in the Anne Boleyn series are British as well, right? Even though it's just a drama it's still kinda part of their history, too. Do black British people not really count as British in your eyes? You want to talk about racist ideology, well here it is because this is a blatant attempt to forever keep minorities as second class citizens. Born and raised in Britain, but forever "wrong" to be cast in anything even resembling historical drama for their home nation. They'll always be too Indian, or too Jamaican, or too Ghanaian for you and all the other assholes in this thread trying their best to argue that this entirely fictional world should remain racially "pure". THAT is racist ideology.

For another example to bring it back to RoP, Sir Lenny Henry, born and raised in England, has been knighted by the queen and appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire for his contributions to British drama and comedy, but certain shitstains in this thread would still say he’s unfit to EVER play a fucking hobbit because in their narrow minded view Tolkien only dedicated his fictional works to white England…

You just have a special reason for every example of why it's ok to erase white people and promote others, don't you? In one breath you say real history is important, in the next you say it's "entertainment". It all depends on what you need in the moment to promote your racist ideology, isn't it?

First off, I'm not going to fault you for not having read all my other posts (I certainly don't read all the posts in this thread either), but I've said multiple times that I have no problem with all the elves, hobbits, and whatnot in this show being played by white actors. No problem. When I say that the skin color of these fantasy races is irrelevant to the story, that goes all ways. If the cast is all white, fine by me. If the cast has some people of color, fine by me. If the cast is all people of color, still fine by me. Now on to my next point...

Seriously? Erase white people? The fuck are you smoking to think having a bit more representation here and there in stories that aren't racially relevant is ANYTHING on the level of things like the blackface, whitewashing, caricaturing, and stereotyping that went on for generations in a concerted effort to disenfranchise and marginalize minorities in media. Go read a goddamn history book on racism in media before you spew out any more overly dramatic, incredibly ignorant bullshit.

[Nerovar]

And I'm not saying it is. I'm sure there's lots of issues. My point isn't that skin color is the ONLY issue, it's that it's given SPECIAL ATTENTION for no apparent reason considering it's a cosmetic detail like a gazillion others (in most cases) but while all those get handwaved away with not a care in the world, this one does not.

That doesn't mean there aren't other problems, but this debate - as you yourself said - is about this particular one.

Sure? And I've already given you reasons why this might be the case so why are you bringing this up?

And yet I'm sure you have NO PROBLEM with other minor details being not "the way Tolkien describes it". If he describes Erkenbrand's shield as red and it's grey in the movie, does that really bother anyone? If someone's horse is described as piebald but is actually dapple in the movie WHO THE FUCK WOULD CARE?

Clearly it's NOT about perfect accuracy, because some things are more important than others - and I want to question why skin color is suddenly so important, when on a narrative level it's basically as relevant as a horse being dun or bay, and nobody ever cries foul on THAT.

Well, it is more important on the level of world building because it is incongruent with what people know about the history of middle earth and it's ethnic groups. A mistake like getting the colour of a shield or horse wrong is not indicative of anything beyond that immediate thing. But if you see a character played by a POC actor walking around in Rohan you might question "does he have some ties to Harad?" because while not explicitly important to the narrative, race still exists in terms of world building and POINTS to other things like allegiance, heritage etc. whereas the colour of a shield does not. Now this is of course not necessarily true for everything. Changing a character's hair colour could be just as important in some cases.
It's the same thing with having female characters that (for all intents and purposes) act as male even though they live in a gendered society where women have a different position from men. Gender (like race) points to other things in a setting like that so breaking that mold without any sort of explanation will naturally be perceived as a jarring deviation because it makes the world seem less genuine.

Why is historical accuracy more important in a HISTORICAL setting than in a fictional one?

Tough one.

You're repeating the truism but you're not engaging with the point. When the author treats his fictional world as if it is history in order for it to have the internal consistency required for the reader to engage with it as if it was 'real' why engage with it differently? This is basically the distinction Tolkien makes between a successful secondary world and one that "failed" and thus requires willing suspension of disbelief.

You do not know anything about Japanese history, do you. The racial makeup of Japanese society was a MAJOR theme all through the Sakoku periods and beyond. It became a national obsession in the Meiji period.

No and I don't very much care when it's immaterial to the point. I qualified it with pre contact with Europeans and said without racial antognisms as we know them. So what's the point of this quip? Desperate to look smart?

But sure, let's humor the ill-informed take: no, in a narrative that ACTUALLY doesn't involve any of that, I have zero problems with diverse casting. Bring out your black and Asian Romans or whatever. Don't care. A Chinese actor playing Julius Caesar bothers me not one bit more than a German one doing it, unless the narrative makes it matter.

Except that wasn't the question. I didn't ask if you would be okay with a black/chinese Julius Caesar. I asked if you think that it would be unreasonable for other people to take issue with it.

When it comes to the actual structure and dynamics of narratives, yes, absolutely. Most people know fuck all about narratology.

What's wrong with that? You wouldn't trust Johnny Random to explain to you how a nuclear reactor works, yet somehow everyone is equally qualified to dissect the sociocultural complexities of a narrative? Get real.

Not what we were talking about. You don't need to study literary science to know if a fictional world is adapted in a faithful way. A layman doesn't need to know what the word "diegesis" means to figure out that there are no cars in middle earth. Does this mean they will understand if e.g. the Christian themes of Tolkien are being respected? Not likely. But that's not what we were talking about.

But that's not what your original response said, at all. NOW you're actually quoting, before you were just making shit up. Also, I did not equate things simply like that; and to portray it as though I did is some serious bad-faith arguing. If you want to quote (which I encourage) do it correctly. I could take some statements you made, too, and just put a = in between to make you sound like a buffoon.

Feel free to rephrase it then if you think I'm mischaracterizing you.

I'm fine with people just admitting they don't like something. I'm all about honesty in that respect - what I have a problem with is people PRETENDING they have good reasons when they don't. If you just want to say "I know it doesn't matter for the story, but it bothers me that there's a black person in there", by all means. You do you.

I'm not the racism police. I'm just pointing out when people portray certain points to be what they don't seem to actually be.

You can totally hold the position of "I don't want to see black people in my fantasy because I don't like that", with all the consequences that come with it.

You're not the racism police. You're just trying to railroad everyone who takes issue with this deviation from the original setting into admitting to be racist "with all the consequences that come with it". Come on, dude.

It'd be great to get something more than "it's just jarring, idk man", because that is - again - just saying "I know it doesn't matter, but it's bothering me" which is exactly what I'm getting at: people's biases at work.

I'm just asking to clarify: You think the gender swap example would be okay then and people disagreeing with it would be merely do so based on their sexist biases?

I'd suggest you read the sentence again, because that's not what I'm saying.

I'm not saying "no one has a problem WITH ANYTHING BUT skin color", I'm saying "there's a great number of problems nobody has a problem with, but they DO have a problem with skin color". Those are not identical statements, because I in no way exclude OTHER problems also being relevant, like you're trying to make it sound like.

This is the whole Instagram meme where someone goes "nobody has a problem with oranges yet somehow they hate kiwis" and your reply is "SO YOU'RE SAYING PEOPLE ONLY HAVE PROBLEMS WITH KIWIS? WHAT ABOUT THE PEOPLE WHO HATE LEMONS, YOU IDIOT!".

I have to respond like this because you present this as a very vague generalization. I don't know which deviations you are talking about that "nobody" cares about but I'm pretty sure for every single one you can find people complaining in some forum. As to why it receives more attention, I think I have already answered that above.

I have a problem with commercial exploitation of virtue-signaling, too; especially if it's used to gloss over poor quality. But me hating the exploitation of diversity doesn't mean I hate diversity, and I like to be very clear about how those are, indeed, very distinct problems that can't just be conflated.

Cool. Neither do I. I very much like diversity when it suits a setting. However, it's not a requirement or even a moral necessity for me to force it onto fictional worlds that aren't really compatible with it.

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Your last post has quotes which are falsely attributed to me but belong to @InfiniteCharger

[Adamas102]

Well, it is more important on the level of world building because it is incongruent with what people know about the history of middle earth and it's ethnic groups. A mistake like getting the colour of a shield or horse wrong is not indicative of anything beyond that immediate thing. But if you see a character played by a POC actor walking around in Rohan you might question "does he have some ties to Harad?" because while not explicitly important to the narrative, race still exists in terms of world building and POINTS to other things like allegiance, heritage etc. whereas the colour of a shield does not. Now this is of course not necessarily true for everything. Changing a character's hair colour could be just as important in some cases.

The implication being that too many people are too ignorant to see a POC without automatically assuming that they don’t belong, regardless of context. I mean, which Harad are we talking about anyway? The literary one that was more inspired by Ethiopia, or the Arab version from the movies? Or does it not really matter because anyone with lighter skin than “fair as silver and snow” is just going to be part of the faceless horde of “other” anyway?

That also kinda falls apart when the people of color are playing elves, dwarves, and hobbits (decidedly NOT human characters that should not at all be confused with Haradrim by people familiar enough with the books to even know who Haradrim are to begin with).

I very much like diversity when it suits a setting.

See my post above for why this argument is a dangerous one to use since it strips identity from a lot of people simply for not being the right skin color.

This is just drama and entertainment, after all. The literature and history aren’t being erased, nor do the demographic breakdowns of ages long past need people like you to stand up for them.

[Biomega]

Sure? And I've already given you reasons why this might be the case so why are you bringing this up?

Because YOU ASKED.

Well, it is more important on the level of world building because it is incongruent with what people know about the history of middle earth and it's ethnic groups.

Based on what, the three times skin color is mentioned in passing? You have one reference about "dark humans" in the East, and suddenly ANY dark human ANYWHERE could ONLY have come from the East?

That's exactly how racism works, friendo.

You're repeating the truism but you're not engaging with the point.

Which should be a clue. Apparently it isn't. Mull it over some more, you'll figure it out.

No and I don't very much care when it's immaterial to the point. I qualified it with pre contact with Europeans and said without racial antognisms as we know them.

You're trying to create a situation that didn't exist, and was never real. The point here isn't "to sound smart", it's to show you that you KNOW FUCK ALL about the topic, and that's why in your mind your ludicrous concoction makes sense - when it doesn't to anyone who's actually familiar with what was going on.

THAT'S THE POINT - to show you that you're doing nothing but construct fallacious illusions of a history that was never the way you want to make it out to be, and only SEEMS that way to you because you're approaching it full of bias.

Except that wasn't the question. I didn't ask if you would be okay with a black/chinese Julius Caesar. I asked if you think that it would be unreasonable for other people to take issue with it.

Since you're apparently not capable of abstraction: no I don't think it's reasonable for other people to take issue with it, UNLESS it's relevant to the narrative in which case I take issue with it, too, and so should others.

Not what we were talking about. You don't need to study literary science to know if a fictional world is adapted in a faithful way.

I'll throw the "not what we're talking about" right back at you. Faithfulness of adaptations is a red herring. It's meaningless because ALL adaptations differ, and it's purely about how. This is about much more complicated issues than "the dress is red in the book but blue in the movie", which to most average people are not going to be either easily accessible OR immediately obvious.

QED, really.

Feel free to rephrase it then if you think I'm mischaracterizing you.

You're changing MY words, and then you want ME to go and rephrase what I said?

That's pretty bold for someone who goes black people = just jarring to me, don't know why don't know how, just are.

You're not the racism police. You're just trying to railroad everyone who takes issue with this deviation from the original setting into admitting to be racist "with all the consequences that come with it". Come on, dude.

If there is no good narrative reason, then demanding that certain skin colors not be present IS racist, yes.

Not sure why that's a big problem, but I guess for some people skin color really does just create visceral responses they're not ready to deal with.

I'm just asking to clarify: You think the gender swap example would be okay then and people disagreeing with it would be merely do so based on their sexist biases?

If there is no narrative reason, then yeah it would just be bias. If it doesn't matter to the story, then swap away. And if you have a problem with it, you better have a GOOD reason, and "I have no reason I just don't like it" is EXACTLY what you said: a sexist bias.

I have to respond like this because you present this as a very vague generalization. I don't know which deviations you are talking about that "nobody" cares about but I'm pretty sure for every single one you can find people complaining in some forum.

Really? You think any complaint has validity just because ONE person SOMEWHERE complained about it at some point?

But sure, let's humor the bad-faith take anyway: what I'm talking about are minor cosmetic details that practically no one ever notices: hair color, eye color, someone being an inch too tall or too short, someone being a few years older or younger, someone not having crooked teeth, whatever. Cosmetic shit of no relevance that is broadly accepted as a quotidian deviation from the original of no relevance, except that it fits the EXACT SAME claims of "not faithful to the original" that people use to argue against skin color.

However, it's not a requirement or even a moral necessity for me to force it onto fictional worlds that aren't really compatible with it.

And the entire argument boils down to which settings really AREN'T compatible with it, and which settings are, but people make up bad reasons to claim otherwise. Like somehow a black elf means people are confused about whether or not they're evil, and that's not racist no no no it's all IN THE TEXT.

[Nerovar]

The implication being that too many people are too ignorant to see a POC without automatically assuming that they don’t belong, regardless of context. I mean, which Harad are we talking about anyway?

This has nothing to do with people being ignorant. If anything, you're the one who is ignorant of the history and peoples of middle earth.

The literary one that was more inspired by Ethiopia, or the Arab version from the movies? Or does it not really matter because anyone with lighter skin than “fair as silver and snow” is just going to be part of the faceless horde of “other” anyway?

That also kinda falls apart when the people of color are playing elves, dwarves, and hobbits (decidedly NOT human characters that should not at all be confused with Haradrim by people familiar enough with the books to even know who Haradrim are to begin with).

Ignoring that the appearance of Elves is explicitly described, this would only shift the problem. Why would Elves and Dwarves living in the same parts as Men look "diverse" when the appearance of Men is tied to geography?

See my post above for why this argument is a dangerous one to use since it strips identity from a lot of people simply for not being the right skin color.

I'm sorry but if you think it is dangerous that some people expect actors to roughly represent the look and feel of a certain time period or fictional world, you have lost the plot. It's not any more racist than me (as a dude) not being able to play Catherine the Great is sexist.

This is just drama and entertainment, after all. The literature and history aren’t being erased, nor do the demographic breakdowns of ages long past need people like you to stand up for them.

I don't know who you are talking to. I never claimed that anything is being erased and I'm not standing up for anything except my own preference when it comes to being faithful in portraying secondary worlds.

[InfiniteCharger]

Reading this I think of the movie Moana, which was a wonderful film. The thought of including white people in a Pacific Islanders' tale makes no sense whatsoever and would only have served to distract from the film. There's nothing wrong with telling stories of people of specific racial/geographic origins and making the characters look like the people in those areas. It's actually amazing because it introduces us all to the diversity in the world that we may not be aware of. But, for some reason, it's acceptable to erase these people whenever they are of European origin, and none other. And when you dislike the fact that this one group of people are made acceptable to erase and must justify their inclusion in things to a standard no other ethnicity is held to and seek actual equality, you are called "racist".

Streaming is a global phenomenon and these services are in almost every country around the world, yet they don't hire and promote that many artists and creators from all over the world to make new content. In their minds, they still believe that European centered stories and programs, including those from the Americas, are the gold standard for entertainment for everyone around the world. Therefore including non Europeans in those stories, when they literally shouldn't be there, is just pushing European culture and history as the default for everyone and not really about promoting diversity. Sure, I can go watch Korean fantasy shows on streaming or Chinese fantasy shows where diversity isn't a prerequisite, but those shows are mostly just licensed from those countries not truly created by the streaming services in house.

Therefore, given that, adapting a fictional story set in an a world based on African culture and history is not a priority. Because they know that most of their money comes from European and American audiences and would rather take the lazy route of randomly including black folks in European stories to get a wider audience. That means they don't see the need to adapt any of the numerous stories, myths and legends based in Africa or even Native American ones because they feel it is too niche, for the cost. Because in reality the idea that somebody needs to see themselves in these stories based on their skin color or other attributes is something mostly made up by the executives, social justice degree employees and leftist academics. That has never been true in real life, but that is why they put so much effort into marketing this stuff a certain way to make it seem more important than it really is. For them, being able to change Tolkien then becomes the holy grail of such made up "achievements" as if it is special and important to anyone but themselves that they changed characters for this reason. It is only important to them because it represents a very lofty achievement in European fantasy literature and therefore as part of indoctrinating everyone into seeing European culture as the pinnacle of creativity, they need to inject these things into it. Not to mention it is simply lazy because they know Tolkien is already popular so they can spend less time and effort than actually creating something new and diverse from scratch. Which results in this idea that you only to see yourself in European culture and history no matter if your history and culture is not from Europe. And that is as offensive in many ways as what they claim to be "fighting" against.

[Adamas102]

I'm sorry but if you think it is dangerous that some people expect actors to roughly represent the look and feel of a certain time period or fictional world, you have lost the plot. It's not any more racist than me (as a dude) not being able to play Catherine the Great is sexist.

Yes, it’s dangerous when you tell people that they’ll never be X enough because their skin is the wrong color. It’s one of the many excuses historically used to marginalize minorities and here you are spouting it like your incredibly fragile suspension of disbelief is in anyway more important. Talk about ignorance borne from privilege…

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That means they don't see the need to adapt any of the numerous stories, myths and legends based in Africa or even Native American ones because they feel it is too niche, for the cost.

Except they do adapt those as well, they just typically cast white American, European, and Australian actors in all the main roles because money.

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Which results in this idea that you only to see yourself in European culture and history no matter if your history and culture is not from Europe.

So yeah, basically confirming that you don’t think non-white people can ever identify as European. That, for instance, Americans and Australians are more worthy of portraying Europeans than people who were actually born and raised in Europe because “culture” (which of course in this context really just means “skin color”).

[Nerovar]

Because YOU ASKED.

Where?

Based on what, the three times skin color is mentioned in passing? You have one reference about "dark humans" in the East, and suddenly ANY dark human ANYWHERE could ONLY have come from the East?

What am I supposed to assume? That they grew on a tree? That Tolkien lied to me and the people of Middle Earth don't actually look the way he described them?

Which should be a clue. Apparently it isn't. Mull it over some more, you'll figure it out.

Good job dodging the point once again. Even cropped the quoted part.

You're trying to create a situation that didn't exist, and was never real. The point here isn't "to sound smart", it's to show you that you KNOW FUCK ALL about the topic, and that's why in your mind your ludicrous concoction makes sense - when it doesn't to anyone who's actually familiar with what was going on.

It's called a hypothetical. You merely decided to act stuck-up and somehow brought up examples that took place AFTER the period I specified in the hypothetical (not that it would matter for the hypothetical to begin with). You simply couldn't resist ""flexing"" your historical knowledge as if it was a substitute for actually making a point.

Since you're apparently not capable of abstraction: no I don't think it's reasonable for other people to take issue with it, UNLESS it's relevant to the narrative in which case I take issue with it, too, and so should others.

I am plenty capable of abstraction. It has just become apparent over the course of this conversation that I have to deliberately ask you to directly answer the question like I'm talking to a child so you don't weasel out later on and cry crocodile tears about me misrepresenting you.

I'll throw the "not what we're talking about" right back at you. Faithfulness of adaptations is a red herring. It's meaningless because ALL adaptations differ, and it's purely about how. This is about much more complicated issues than "the dress is red in the book but blue in the movie", which to most average people are not going to be either easily accessible OR immediately obvious.

It's meaningless TO YOU. Your conceptions about literature and drama likely don't apply to the average person reading LOTR or watching an adaptation. You can play Ship of Theseus with any fictional universe or story as much as you like. People will most likely not jive with it. The only reason why you brought up academia to begin with was to that you could grandstand while acting like you have some sort of authority to fall back on even though it was from the very start completely irrelevant to what we were talking about.

You're changing MY words, and then you want ME to go and rephrase what I said?

This is generally how it works. If you tell me that I misunderstood your point then I'm going to ask you to rephrase it for me as to clear up the misunderstanding. Shocking.

That's pretty bold for someone who goes black people = just jarring to me, don't know why don't know how, just are.

You probably think this is some witty ironic statement but in reality this is the position you wanted to ascribe to me from the very start of this conversation.

If there is no good narrative reason, then demanding that certain skin colors not be present IS racist, yes.

Thank God that faithfulness to a setting (be it historic or fictional) is as good a reason as any.

Not sure why that's a big problem, but I guess for some people skin color really does just create visceral responses they're not ready to deal with.

Yeah, I think I'm just gonna block you and move on from this shitshow. Keep fighting the good fight.

If there is no narrative reason, then yeah it would just be bias. If it doesn't matter to the story, then swap away. And if you have a problem with it, you better have a GOOD reason, and "I have no reason I just don't like it" is EXACTLY what you said: a sexist bias.

So if someone made an adaptation of LOTR where every characters was race and gender swapped any person who goes "Wait a second, this isn't what I had in mind when I read the books. Not interested" is a racist, sexist chud. This is cartoonishly silly.

Really? You think any complaint has validity just because ONE person SOMEWHERE complained about it at some point?

But sure, let's humor the bad-faith take anyway: what I'm talking about are minor cosmetic details that practically no one ever notices: hair color, eye color, someone being an inch too tall or too short, someone being a few years older or younger, someone not having crooked teeth, whatever. Cosmetic shit of no relevance that is broadly accepted as a quotidian deviation from the original of no relevance, except that it fits the EXACT SAME claims of "not faithful to the original" that people use to argue against skin color.

Already explained why these things can be qualitatively different and why some are more likely to be brought up.

And the entire argument boils down to which settings really AREN'T compatible with it, and which settings are, but people make up bad reasons to claim otherwise. Like somehow a black elf means people are confused about whether or not they're evil, and that's not racist no no no it's all IN THE TEXT.

Here you go making shit up again.

Yes, it’s dangerous when you tell people that they’ll never be X enough because their skin is the wrong color. It’s one of the many excuses historically used to marginalize minorities and here you are spouting it like your incredibly fragile suspension of disbelief is in anyway more important. Talk about ignorance borne from privilege…

I will never be Queen Catherine the Great. I will never be Black Panther. I will never be Guan Yu. Woe is me.

[Adamas102]

I will never be Queen Catherine the Great. I will never be Black Panther. I will never be Guan Yu. Woe is me.

Do you suddenly identify as a woman? Someone of African or Chinese descent? Or is this just more of your pathetic attempt at white victimhood while telling other people that they can never really be part of their birth nation because “wrong skin color”?

[Biomega]

What am I supposed to assume? That they grew on a tree? That Tolkien lied to me and the people of Middle Earth don't actually look the way he described them?

No. This is what you're doing:

-Tolkien described some men in the East as "dark-skinned"
-he did not describe the men of Rohan as "dark-skinned"
-therefore, ANY human with dark skin MUST be from the East

Which is logically fallacious. The only reason you're jumping to that conclusion is racism.

AND EVEN IF he HAD described the men of Rohan as ALL white-skinned (as opposed to just some of them), that STILL wouldn't mean you couldn't just change it for a TV series because skin color, EVEN IF EXPLICITLY MENTIONED, is not made into a narrative element by Tolkien anywhere and in any way, and is purely a cosmetic detail that HE never endowed with ANY meaning beyond that.

Good job dodging the point once again. Even cropped the quoted part.

Less rolling of eyes, more using what's behind the eyes, I'd say. You'll figure it out eventually.

It's called a hypothetical. You merely decided to act stuck-up and somehow brought up examples that took place AFTER the period I specified in the hypothetical (not that it would matter for the hypothetical to begin with). You simply couldn't resist ""flexing"" your historical knowledge as if it was a substitute for actually making a point.

You're trying to use HISTORY as an argument, then come up with a HYPOTHETICAL that never existed in history the way you describe it. And when someone points out that you got it all wrong, your defense is "you're just trying to sound smart, derp derp derp!" which in all honesty is not much of a challenge when you bring drivel like that to the table.

I am plenty capable of abstraction. It has just become apparent over the course of this conversation that I have to deliberately ask you to directly answer the question like I'm talking to a child so you don't weasel out later on and cry crocodile tears about me misrepresenting you.

Yes, who's crying here, exactly. You're trying to do literal readings of complex points to which I can only reply "I am not a crocodile wtf do you not even know crocodiles can't type ".

Is this just trolling at this point?

It's meaningless TO YOU.

It's meaningless because claiming faithfulness as an argument WHILE ALSO accepting without protest or issue the fact that ALL adaptations change SOMETHING is logically inconsistent and argumentatively dishonest.

I'm not making wild claims here, I'm giving you reasons. YOU are the one who refuses to give reasons for claims.

This is generally how it works. If you tell me that I misunderstood your point then I'm going to ask you to rephrase it for me as to clear up the misunderstanding. Shocking.

So what you're saying is you don't understand it and want me to explain again? Just re-read it. It's still there.

You probably think this is some witty ironic statement but in reality this is the position you wanted to ascribe to me from the very start of this conversation.

Nothing ironic about it. That's literally what you said.

Thank God that faithfulness to a setting (be it historic or fictional) is as good a reason as any.

If it actually was applied consistently, it would be.

But you can't go "We can't do X because it's not the same as it was written in the book!" but then completely gloss over 2,000 other things that ALSO aren't as it was written in the book but don't bother you.

My point is that you're just PRETENDING it's about faithfulness to the original, and that the real reason is something else. Because if it was ACTUALLY about faithfulness, not only would other things have to bother you that quite evidently bother practically no one, but you'd also NEVER be satisfied, because the practical necessities of ANY adaptation WHATSOEVER demand changes of SOME kind, period.

This "argument" is a smokescreen; that's why I call it a red herring.

Yeah, I think I'm just gonna block you and move on from this shitshow. Keep fighting the good fight.

Ah yes, "I don't know how to respond to this, so I'll just ignore it". Fingers up the ears, lalalala the bad man and his logic can't hurt my precious biases anymore.

So if someone made an adaptation of LOTR where every characters was race and gender swapped any person who goes "Wait a second, this isn't what I had in mind when I read the books. Not interested" is a racist, sexist chud. This is cartoonishly silly.

How to tell me you have understood nothing without saying "I understood nothing", I guess. You're incapable of answering in anything but tangents or hyperboles, aren't you.

Already explained why these things can be qualitatively different and why some are more likely to be brought up.

Yes, see above. You made an argument that's logically inconsistent, and never mind the racist part about it.

Here you go making shit up again.

Like what? If you think I'm misrepresenting you, correct me. If you're not doing that I can only assume I hit the mark and you're afraid to out your views further. Which, fair enough, don't blame you.

I will never be Queen Catherine the Great. I will never be Black Panther. I will never be Guan Yu. Woe is me.

If you were an actor, and the ONLY reason people denied you a role was "sorry you're white", then yeah, woe would be you. That's not how it works in the examples you've given, of course, which I'm sure you may know - you picked false examples on purpose to sound smug, but ignored the fact that I have said repeatedly and in many places that all this only holds true for narratives where it DOESN'T matter what race/gender/whatever someone is; you bringing up characters where it DOES matter shows you either 1. didn't understand shit about what was said or 2. did understand but know you can't refute it, so you're trying to strawman things in a desperate attempt to salvage your non-point.

Or maybe it's both, who the fuck knows.

[Lady Atia]

The Hobbit movies are absolutely more in the "interpretation" camp. I'd go so far as to say they are more of the "inspired by" sort of re-telling. They play fast and loose with the existing story, add hours upon hours of non-canonical story, create characters that never existed in the story and are absolutely unnecessary to the actual story of The Hobbit, simply to pad out the runtime for three movies. They weren't political-agenda driven changes, IMO, but they warped the story as they pleased to tell the story they wanted to tell, not Tolkien's story.

And those movies have been hammered ever since the first one came out, and not just by Tolkien purists. But fans of Tolkiens works overwhelmingly hate that trilogy of movies and have never been ashamed of being extremely vocal about it. It had nothing to do with skin color or gender of anyone and everything to do with the fact that they were categorically NOT Tolkien's actual story except in the most necessary of ways. Where the LoTR movies succeeded by only changing where absolutely necessary for the medium of film, The Hobbit movies failed because they wanted to tell someone other than Tolkien's story while using the skeleton of Tolkien's story.




Reading this I think of the movie Moana, which was a wonderful film. The thought of including white people in a Pacific Islanders' tale makes no sense whatsoever and would only have served to distract from the film. There's nothing wrong with telling stories of people of specific racial/geographic origins and making the characters look like the people in those areas. It's actually amazing because it introduces us all to the diversity in the world that we may not be aware of. But, for some reason, it's acceptable to erase these people whenever they are of European origin, and none other. And when you dislike the fact that this one group of people are made acceptable to erase and must justify their inclusion in things to a standard no other ethnicity is held to and seek actual equality, you are called "racist".

- - - Updated - - -



So we're back to Brad Pitt as Black Panther being ok, then? Because you folk have argued that it makes no sense for T'Challa to be white and would be unacceptable. Mind yourself on that hypocrisy.



You just have a special reason for every example of why it's ok to erase white people and promote others, don't you? In one breath you say real history is important, in the next you say it's "entertainment". It all depends on what you need in the moment to promote your racist ideology, isn't it?

First, the Hobbit Trilogy was awesome and they mostly added stuff from the Silmarillion/FotR into it, the only exception was the Nazgul part which iirc would contradict the books. And Tauriel, but she was an actually good addition since the original book had no female characters in it, sadly.

Secondly, holy moly "erasing white people" in movies is not racist ideology. It's 2022, how can people be so damn ignorant and right-winged?! Tolkien strongly opposed Nazi racial theories, no clue how anyone can use his name and say shit like this.

[Al Gorefiend]

Where?


What am I supposed to assume? That they grew on a tree? That Tolkien lied to me and the people of Middle Earth don't actually look the way he described them?


Good job dodging the point once again. Even cropped the quoted part.


It's called a hypothetical. You merely decided to act stuck-up and somehow brought up examples that took place AFTER the period I specified in the hypothetical (not that it would matter for the hypothetical to begin with). You simply couldn't resist ""flexing"" your historical knowledge as if it was a substitute for actually making a point.


I am plenty capable of abstraction. It has just become apparent over the course of this conversation that I have to deliberately ask you to directly answer the question like I'm talking to a child so you don't weasel out later on and cry crocodile tears about me misrepresenting you.


It's meaningless TO YOU. Your conceptions about literature and drama likely don't apply to the average person reading LOTR or watching an adaptation. You can play Ship of Theseus with any fictional universe or story as much as you like. People will most likely not jive with it. The only reason why you brought up academia to begin with was to that you could grandstand while acting like you have some sort of authority to fall back on even though it was from the very start completely irrelevant to what we were talking about.


This is generally how it works. If you tell me that I misunderstood your point then I'm going to ask you to rephrase it for me as to clear up the misunderstanding. Shocking.


You probably think this is some witty ironic statement but in reality this is the position you wanted to ascribe to me from the very start of this conversation.


Thank God that faithfulness to a setting (be it historic or fictional) is as good a reason as any.


Yeah, I think I'm just gonna block you and move on from this shitshow. Keep fighting the good fight.


So if someone made an adaptation of LOTR where every characters was race and gender swapped any person who goes "Wait a second, this isn't what I had in mind when I read the books. Not interested" is a racist, sexist chud. This is cartoonishly silly.


Already explained why these things can be qualitatively different and why some are more likely to be brought up.


Here you go making shit up again.


I will never be Queen Catherine the Great. I will never be Black Panther. I will never be Guan Yu. Woe is me.

Peter Jackson would NEVER have been allowed to have an all white cast of characters in the original trilogy if it were made today. Not a chance in hell, he'd infuriate people. It was a different time, Tolkien's era was a different time. Those times have changed. You're going to have to accept and appreciate the times we live in now. Strong female leads are the in thing now for Hollywood (amazing, it was like 5 years ago people thought a female superhero couldn't be the title star), strong black female leads are empowering to many people. The strong female is going to give the men of the film the business each and every time.

You might shit a brick, but we're going to end up with a black James Bond any year now. Accept it, be happier, be less racist.

[Nerovar]

Peter Jackson would NEVER have been allowed to have an all white cast of characters in the original trilogy if it were made today. Not a chance in hell, he'd infuriate people. It was a different time, Tolkien's era was a different time. Those times have changed. You're going to have to accept and appreciate the times we live in now. Strong female leads are the in thing now for Hollywood (amazing, it was like 5 years ago people thought a female superhero couldn't be the title star), strong black female leads are empowering to many people. The strong female is going to give the men of the film the business each and every time.

You might shit a brick, but we're going to end up with a black James Bond any year now. Accept it, be happier, be less racist.

Not sure if this is supposed to be a post-ironic shitpost or not.

[InfiniteCharger]

Except they do adapt those as well, they just typically cast white American, European, and Australian actors in all the main roles because money.

Which proves the point they only care about money and in Tolkien's case, prestige, not actual diversity and only promote it when convenient.

So yeah, basically confirming that you don’t think non-white people can ever identify as European. That, for instance, Americans and Australians are more worthy of portraying Europeans than people who were actually born and raised in Europe because “culture” (which of course in this context really just means “skin color”).

I think you misunderstand what I mean by identify. Anybody can identify with LOTR as it is without seeing themselves personally in it as some native of ancient Europe with some personal tie to that history or culture. There is a difference. I can identify with Greek mythology just fine, but that doesn't mean that I identify as Greek, same with Chinese mythology, Indian mythology and other mythologies. That doesn't mean I need to literally see myself in it as part of my own self identity as a person, but of course anyone can imagine themselves as anything. Diversity means diverse settings, based on diverse mythologies and characters that are true to those, not just putting every culture into Tolkien. And if you do add all of that into Tolkien then it is no longer Tolkien's world but a different world inspired by Tolkien. Again, the idea here is that because Tolkien is an important work of European literature that is already popular they would rather shoehorn their own ideas into it versus making something "diverse" of their own based on other mythologies from other places. It implies those other cultures and mythologies don't have the same value to them.

According to the logic of your post a person can only identify something if characters in it look just like them. So if they don't have someone who is bow legged or someone with spina bifida or someone with vitiglio or someone who has mixed Indian and Mexican ancestry or someone who has a specific shade of skin color or someone who has a certain hair texture, they cant "identify" with it. That is absurdly false and you know it. And nobody is going to include that in general story telling, so arguing that this needs to be done for Tolkien and only for Tolkien and other European fiction and fantasy is nonsensical.

[Biomega]

Which proves the point they only care about money and in Tolkien's case, prestige, not actual diversity and only promote it when convenient.

And if they'd stayed true to the original material 100%, they'd have done it for the love of the books and NOT because they thought it would increase their profit margin and they only care about money. RIGHT?

Yes, big AAA entertainment corporations are in it for the moolah. That is a shocker to all of us.

You know what you might ask yourself? If they're doing diverse castings "only for the money"... what is it, exactly, that makes that work? Could it be there's people who reward such choices with a purchase, indicating that it is, perhaps, not such a bad idea and something many people actually appreciate?

Or are those people's opinions somehow not worth as much as the opinions of people who don't like diversity?

[Al Gorefiend]

Not sure if this is supposed to be a post-ironic shitpost or not.

Not at all. I anticipate and expect all remakes and revivals to follow this same suit. When Peter Jackson's trilogy gets old enough for a new Hollywood director to want to remake it, you'll have the Fellowship of the Ring composed entirely of characters that share no physical traits amongst one another for maximum inclusivity. Gandalf the Yellow, Aragorn the disenfranchised Eastern European, Legolas the Legless, finest archer in a wheelchair. Gimli the fat stupid comic relief who stays the only white character. Faramir and Boromir as proper "brothers", the Hobbits all of varying pronouns. That gives everyone in the audience someone they can identify with, which is the way movies should have always been made. No more role casting specifically for an actors background or skin, but more for their merit as professionals actors.

Honestly, wanting an entire ensemble cast to be all white people is pretty racist of a want, doesn't bode well with today's standard of excellence in visual media.