JRR Tolkien Discussion

[Silver Nemesis]

[thecolorsblend]

I wasn't going to go there. Because apparently, there's no way to have an honest and even-handed discussion about this without someone making insane accusations about your character.

But... this truly is getting close to the worst case scenario. There are other elements of the cultural Marxist playbook that aren't (yet) known to be in the mix. But if the casting decisions are any indication, the signs aren't looking positive.

Luckily, I'm not disappointed at all in this news. Because I was skeptical about this series from early days. There are many unchronicled (or under-chronicled) years of Middle-earth history. And at this point especially, I think that stuff is best left to the imagination.

This show will be an expensive but glorious train wreck. And no, I won't watch it, not even from morbid curiosity.

[The Dark Knight]

And no, I won't watch it, not even from morbid curiosity.

Seconded.

[Silver Nemesis]

The Amazon series really doesn't upset me or make me angry for the simple reason that it's pure fan fiction. Literally. It's like those slash fiction stories written by shippers about Sam and Frodo being gay. Those fans want to impose an aspect of their own worldview onto Tolkien's mythology – an aspect which is absent from the canon – so they write fan fiction. The makers of this TV show are doing the same thing, and the end product is equally apocryphal. The fact they've licensed the brand name doesn't matter. It's still non-canonical fan fiction, plain and simple, and that's all it will ever be.

[Silver Nemesis]

If these are the 'superfans' the Amazon show is targeting, then it really is DOA.

They'd have to be monumentally blind not to see that this has disaster written all over it. Amazon's got deep pockets, so we can expect the MSM to launch a wave of defensive damage control articles any day now. The substance of those articles will amount to corporate shilling and labelling the show's detractors with the usual –ist and –obe ad hominems. A cast member, preferably female and non-white, will also make a show of quitting social media due to claims of bullying, and the MSM will seize upon her victimhood to garner sympathy for Amazon and smear the entire Tolkien fanbase as racist misogynistic trolls. Ultimately the show will bomb, garnering high critic ratings but low audience scores. The studio will lose millions of dollars, the fans will laugh harder than Ray Liotta in Goodfellas, and the MSM will decry the outcome as a triumph for the far right and toxic fan entitlement.

[thecolorsblend]

SN, there is a pattern to this sort of thing.

https://disneystarwarsisdumb.wordpress.com/2018/11/28/the-phases-of-a-geeker-gate-4th-edition-plus-countermeasures

[The Dark Knight]

I had been feeling good about LOTR for a number of years. Jackson's films have their detractors from Tolkien purists, but those complaints are going to look incredibly minor in comparison to what's coming.

Inserting modern wokeness into a sword and arrow timeline cuts deep against the very foundation of what Tolkien established. If they can't accept that, his world isn't for them.

'Broadening the appeal' means alienating the core fanbase. This comment from a so called medieval scholar states "I think a lot of fans are pushing back against where the show may be going, because it conflicts in some cases with their mental image of Middle-earth."

On the contrary, Amazon are pushing back against the makeup of Tolkien because it conflicts with THEIR mental image of "what the world actually looks like", as the show's executive producer Lindsey Weber put it.

Tom Shippey, who worked with Jackson on his films, was brought on to ensure the show would remain faithful to the source material. He left the project. To justify this show they need to make villains out of the Tolkien fanbase.

The core message of Tolkien is the decay of the West, and we are seeing that right now. The past is bad and needs to be 'fixed'. Build back better, they say. Everything they touch withers and dies. But enough time passes and it becomes the accepted norm. That's what they want.

"The world is changed. I feel it in the water. I feel it in the earth. I smell it in the air. Much that once was is lost, for none now live who remember it."

[Silver Nemesis]

I've just been admiring some of Tolkien's paintings, and they're as beautiful as his writing.

It's impressive enough that he was gifted with such a powerful imagination, but it's even more impressive that he possessed the artistic talent to express his creativity in different mediums, spanning poetry, prose, illustrations, maps and paintings. HarperCollins has announced the publication of a new edition of The Silmarillion that will contain some of his original art: https://www.thebookseller.com/rights/rights/harpercollins-to-publish-new-edition-of-the-silmarillion-illustrated-by-tolkien

I already own a copy of The Silmarillion, but I might buy this new edition anyway. It's a book that's always worth rereading and Tolkien's art should justify the price of a second purchase. It'll be in shops this October.

[thecolorsblend]

ME has done a round up of the early reviews. And to say they're "not all positive" is a pretty big understatement.

For comparison, I watched some Gollum clips from Towers on YouTube a few days ago. Now yes, some of that mo-cap/CGI stuff is a bit chintzy by modern standards. But the character himself (not to mention Towers as a film) is overflowing with life and energy. Jackson, Walsh and Boyens knew what they were up to with the trilogy. And so, they bent over backwards to absurd degrees to make sure they gave the material their best possible effort. Nothing less than their absolute best was allowed into the films.

For any of you struggling with disappointment about this Amazon thing, I invite you to reread the books or rewatch the LOTR trilogy to remind you that there is good in Tolkien. And it's worth fighting for. Or, lacking that, it's worth ignoring substandard Amazon nonsense to remain focused on the many good things he's written.

[The Dark Knight]

Tolkien's books and Jackson's trilogy are it for me (The Hobbit films to a lesser extent, but I'll include them too). I consider myself a fan of the world but the Amazon show may as well not exist as far as I am concerned. Rings of Power could easily be Game of Thrones or House of the Dragon, neither of which I have any desire to watch and just can't be bothered with. But I won't lie - even when I ignore the show it can't help but impact upon how I think about the sanctity of the overall brand.