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Hammerstein posted:Rebuke it? I pointed out your error when you described Tolkien's work as yes, those are important because of the wider world is full of fear and hatred of other races
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Sep 19, 2022 04:18
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAtQkqdSS0s a pretty good interview on toldinstone with this medievalist guy i hadn't heard of before but who does a good takedown of other fantasy (got) and why tolkien's work is different
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Sep 19, 2022 09:02
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Shibawanko posted:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAtQkqdSS0s Ah, that's Bret Devereaux, he writes this interesting blog: https://acoup.blog/ It's well worth a read
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Sep 19, 2022 09:16
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Bongo Bill posted:Xenophobes often feel envy and distrust for foreigners. I meant the envy of the elves' seeming favor and health and immortality and casual physicality and the mistrust caused by them seemingly withholding gifts. Way cooler angle, coupled with the elves response being "no you don't understand, your gift was death and that's so cool. We dont know what that means but anyway, im going to go live out my life in paradise." Specific envy and mistrust, not the same language modern xenophobes use. Hell, theu can use some of that too if they want (elves coming to take your loved ones because rheu are way sexier than you), but they missed out on a really neat facet from the book.
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Sep 19, 2022 11:07
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The analogy to modern immmigration doesn't work because Elves are implicitly elite, few in numbers, etc. If not immortality envy, the hostility should take a cue from Eomer's superstitions around Lorien, or from antisemitism through conspiracy theories around shadowy puppetmasters, everyone being suspected of being an elf friend, etc. Honestly the focus on the superior performance of elvish workers feels closer to pop culture portrayals of luddism, or maybe "China's gonna take over the world!"-style yellow peril. I wouldn't say it's fundamentally too banal for Middle-Earth but it brings attention to "what was Aragorn's tax policy?" kind of questions (in this case, around the concept of what does the elves' economy and production of goods look like) that I'm sure the show has no interest in answering. YaketySass fucked around with this message at 12:36 on Sep 19, 2022 |
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Sep 19, 2022 12:34
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YaketySass posted:The analogy to modern immmigration doesn't work because Elves are implicitly elite, few in numbers, etc. If not immortality envy, the hostility should take a cue from Eomer's superstitions around Lorien, or from antisemitism through conspiracy theories around shadowy puppetmasters, everyone being suspected of being an elf friend, etc. Honestly the focus on the superior performance of elvish workers feels closer to pop culture portrayals of luddism, or maybe "China's gonna take over the world!"-style yellow peril. They even did it a bit better in the first episode when the guy in the tavern got all mad that Arondir was investigating them. He's pissed off that Arondir is all suspicious of something his great great great great whatever did, and Arondir, of course, remembers it. There is a lot of "you think you're loving better than us" in his rant and it made sense. Of loving course the people would be galled by elven arrogance, and they could have used that for Numenor too.
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Sep 19, 2022 12:41
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lol that they made numenorians into southpark rednecks another lol that karendriel was put in jail for wanting to speak with the manager
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Sep 19, 2022 13:16
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Aragorn would have a coherent and totally boring tax policy though, because he is the ruler of a feudal land with a relatively established and grounded economy that is clearly understood by the author to work. There is nothing interesting about his tax policy. Elrond or Sauron's though, that's more fascinating.
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Sep 19, 2022 13:44
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people have gotten real mad about one clumsy line that is immediately supplanted by pharazon doing a billion times better of a job than the blacksmith guy. And yeah its a dumb thing to say, it will also be a dumb thing to say when pharazon is telling the people "actually Morgoth was the good guy and our ancestors were wrong"
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Sep 19, 2022 14:42
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its an incredibly stupid line
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Sep 19, 2022 15:41
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said by a stupid man, who gets shown as such by the much smarter man immediately thereafter
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Sep 19, 2022 15:47
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They're gonna have to work hard to beat "He's twitchin because he's got my axe in his nervous system!"
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Sep 19, 2022 15:49
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and im not even saying its a good set of lines, its clumsy and too on the nose but its pretty obvious what the intent was so whatever. They have to get across that there are people who will be susceptible to anti elf poo poo and those that will not be, and dues like that blacksmith are rubes that Pharazon can easily sway later on in the show. eventually numenor is so stupid that they let sauron set up temples to morgoth and convince them to make the biggest army ever and sail to valinor. "a blacksmith is a dumb racist" is hardly incongruent with this path.
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Sep 19, 2022 15:53
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Data Graham posted:Remember the developmental versions of Saruman's speech trying to sway Gandalf? quote:"Against it, there is no hope. With it, there is such hope as we never had before. None can now doubt its victory, which is near at hand. We fought in vain—and foolishly. We knew much but not enough. We looked always at it from the outside and through a mist of old falsehood and hate; and we did not consider its high and ultimate purpose. We saw not the reasons, but only the things done, and some of those seemed evil; but they were done under necessity. There has been a conspiracy to hinder and frustrate knowledge, wisdom, and government." (Treason of Isengard 150) src: https://www.tor.com/2019/11/14/exploring-the-people-of-middle-earth-saruman-man-of-craft-and-fallen-wizard/ alcaras fucked around with this message at 16:03 on Sep 19, 2022 |
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Sep 19, 2022 15:53
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This isn't even the first time the show has broached the topic of the Elf equivalent of labor. 80 years before he got drafted, Arondir was "a grower." Elrond was sent to Lindon and Celebrimbor was disappointed that Gil-Galad had not sent a workforce to build his fancy furnace.
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Sep 19, 2022 17:16
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WoodrowSkillson posted:and im not even saying its a good set of lines, its clumsy and too on the nose but its pretty obvious what the intent was so whatever. They have to get across that there are people who will be susceptible to anti elf poo poo and those that will not be, and dues like that blacksmith are rubes that Pharazon can easily sway later on in the show. Yeah, but you can still have a dumb racist saying "The Jews/Elves control the weather!" instead of "Day'll take er jerbs!" There's a decent throughline of "One elf coming here will end up with elven boots on all our necks!" eventually leading to "That Sauron guy we fought and took prisoner is totally right! We gotta take this fight to Valinor to beat them Elves at the source!" Everyone fucked around with this message at 18:41 on Sep 19, 2022 |
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Sep 19, 2022 18:39
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yeah like i said its clumsy but i dont think its a big deal at all
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Sep 19, 2022 18:41
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WoodrowSkillson posted:yeah like i said its clumsy but i dont think its a big deal at all It's not. It's just kind of unnecessarily dumb. I mean "They'll take our jobs!" would have a lot more resonance if it Dwarves instead of Elves because a Dwarven blacksmith is going to be way better at it than Racist Not-A-Forged-in-Fire-Champion will be.
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Sep 19, 2022 18:44
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YaketySass posted:The analogy to modern immmigration doesn't work because Elves are implicitly elite, few in numbers, etc. If not immortality envy, the hostility should take a cue from Eomer's superstitions around Lorien, or from antisemitism through conspiracy theories around shadowy puppetmasters, everyone being suspected of being an elf friend, etc. Honestly the focus on the superior performance of elvish workers feels closer to pop culture portrayals of luddism, or maybe "China's gonna take over the world!"-style yellow peril. Numenoreans aren't the rustic horse nomads who think elves are dangerous mysteries not meant for mortal eyes. They were the grand advanced empire of Men, literally blessed by the gods, who saw themselves as peers to the Elves in skills and accomplishment, with the Faithful having more humility about it and the Kings' Men less. They're not in an era where elves have largely receded from mortal view or gone West, but where they have active thriving kingdoms. Except for of course what they can't have: the immortality. The line was clumsy, but "These tireless unaging beings want to take what you value" is absolutely on--point for how people envious of those properties would easily talk. And the line being clumsy was part of the point anyway since it was just a setup to be dismissed by a "We'll show them who's better!" alternative.
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Sep 19, 2022 20:32
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I think Tolkien undercuts his villains a lot in LoTR. Gandalf builds the ring up as a threat and a few chapters later Bombadil treats it like a toy. Then the council of Elrond builds it up again and then Galadriel and Faramir let it go without breaking a sweat. The Ring Wraths are scary but get their asses kicked by Gandalf, Glorfindel, Legolas and Eowyn. The only person they actually manage to hurt is a hobbit. Sauron and Saruman are built up as huge military threats but lose every battle. These are all explained in the text but still I think Sauron would have been more threatening if he succeeded at something every once in a while.
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Sep 20, 2022 19:52
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Unless I'm misremembering, wasn't he losing the offscreen battles too? Erebor and Dale lost their kings but Erebor was withstanding the siege, and Lorien actually managed to repel their invasion all the way back to Dol Goldur. The idea is that he was holding back the true bulk of his forces, but still.
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Sep 20, 2022 20:12
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There's Osgiliath, at least. And he came back from the dead, gathered his nine mentally dominated former kings, and formed a bunch of alliances (possibly through force and intimidation) with a number of powerful peoples; there's ample reason to be afraid of him, in the abstract. He just loses every time a named character gets involved (except Boromir).
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Sep 20, 2022 20:22
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Sauron doesn't need to win to inflict misery on people.
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Sep 20, 2022 20:22
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OctaviusBeaver posted:I think Tolkien undercuts his villains a lot in LoTR. Gandalf builds the ring up as a threat and a few chapters later Bombadil treats it like a toy. Then the council of Elrond builds it up again and then Galadriel and Faramir let it go without breaking a sweat. The Ring Wraths are scary but get their asses kicked by Gandalf, Glorfindel, Legolas and Eowyn. The only person they actually manage to hurt is a hobbit. Sauron and Saruman are built up as huge military threats but lose every battle. These are all explained in the text but still I think Sauron would have been more threatening if he succeeded at something every once in a while. well he did up until that point in time. Angmar utterly defeats Arnor despite their own eventual defeat, Gondor fights a long slow losing war for centuries/decades in ithilien, and up until the battle of 5 armies things were going great for sauron in the north too. and yeah, tolkien kinda misses an opportunity byu having all of that happen in places the avg reader either misses or only reads after the main book is over.
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Sep 20, 2022 20:23
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frodos mission is the only one that matters and it almost fails a few times
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Sep 20, 2022 20:32
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Arc Hammer posted:Numenorean Matt Berry. I'd watch the show if it had Matt Berry in it. Data Graham posted:I've been stuck 2/3 through The Great Hunt for about 6 months now Corey Olsen's got no room to talk about a series that just spreads and spreads with no clear end in sight... if you're going a sentence at a time, you're outpacing his podcast at this point. Bongo Bill posted:80 years before he got drafted, Arondir was "a grower." I assume that's what he told the human girl, anyway... look, Middle Earth is a lot colder than Valinor!
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Sep 20, 2022 20:44
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Shibawanko posted:frodos mission is the only one that matters and it almost fails a few times Yeah, once the Ring is found (and is known to be found) the game is "if the Ring doesn't get dunked Sauron wins by default." I guess if Saruman, Gandalf, or Galadriel took it they could "win" but as has been discussed their victory would be marred by their own corruption. Evil still triumphs.
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Sep 20, 2022 20:46
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If I step in the ring to fight 1991 Mike Tyson, the bell rings, and he suddenly slips on a banana peel and knocks himself out, that doesn't mean he wouldn't have absolutely crushed my skull or that I should be cocky about the rematch.
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Sep 20, 2022 20:49
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Boromir dies, Theoden dies. Denethor dies. Hama dies (rip to a real one). Tom Bombadil makes the world seem a lot larger than it otherwise would. He shows there are mysteries and powers in the world beyond just Sauron and the ring. He's a key piece of world building in that sense.
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Sep 20, 2022 21:58
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He’s basically the tutorial guide after the party wipes to the Old Man Willow boss (the devs made the fight unwinnable)
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Sep 20, 2022 22:02
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Pham Nuwen posted:Corey Olsen's got no room to talk about a series that just spreads and spreads with no clear end in sight... if you're going a sentence at a time, you're outpacing his podcast at this point. Hey I want different things from different people  quote:I assume that's what he told the human girl, anyway... look, Middle Earth is a lot colder than Valinor! 
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Sep 20, 2022 22:11
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euphronius posted:He’s basically the tutorial guide after the party wipes to the Old Man Willow boss (the devs made the fight unwinnable) Wasn't there some weird online theory a few years back that Tom Bombadil was somehow going to be the next Great Evil after Sauron?
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Sep 20, 2022 22:21
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Everyone posted:Wasn't there some weird online theory a few years back that Tom Bombadil was somehow going to be the next Great Evil after Sauron? The one I saw was playful speculation of the "Certainly not Tolkien's intent but a valid reading of the text" sort. The same person also did "The Star Wars prequels indicate that Episode 4 is about Obi-Wan, R2, and Chewie trying to decide whether Luke should be helped as a Jedi or killed to prevent his fall to the Dark Side." https://km-515.livejournal.com/1042.html
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Sep 20, 2022 22:58
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Killer robot posted:The one I saw was playful speculation of the "Certainly not Tolkien's intent but a valid reading of the text" sort. The same person also did "The Star Wars prequels indicate that Episode 4 is about Obi-Wan, R2, and Chewie trying to decide whether Luke should be helped as a Jedi or killed to prevent his fall to the Dark Side." drat. I wish this had been the subject of Rings of Power.
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Sep 21, 2022 00:31
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Pham Nuwen posted:I'd watch the show if it had Matt Berry in it. Just hear me out here. Matt Berry as Tom Bombadil. Tell me that's not perfect casting. Can you hear it in his voice now? Ho! Tom Bommmmm-badil.
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Sep 21, 2022 04:32
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Killer robot posted:The one I saw was playful speculation of the "Certainly not Tolkien's intent but a valid reading of the text" sort. The same person also did "The Star Wars prequels indicate that Episode 4 is about Obi-Wan, R2, and Chewie trying to decide whether Luke should be helped as a Jedi or killed to prevent his fall to the Dark Side." Thanks. That's always a fun read, and I was trying to find it but could only come up with this one: quote:At last, the mystery of Tom Bombadil's identity has been solved. Which isn't the same at all.
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Sep 21, 2022 05:47
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Funky See Funky Do posted:Just hear me out here. Matt Berry as Tom Bombadil. Tell me that's not perfect casting. Can you hear it in his voice now? Ho! Tom Bommmmm-badil. I'm listening. Please continue.
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Sep 21, 2022 08:50
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Wow! A ring! I wonder if its evil has power over me. *puts it on each finger one after another. No..
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Sep 21, 2022 10:20
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Just have him play every character
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Sep 21, 2022 11:33
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Radical 90s Wizard posted:Just have him play every character I'm just running through random lines and they all work in his voice. No exceptions. Fool, of a Took! In place of a Dark Lord, you would have a Queen! A one man legendarium. Let's make it happen.
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Sep 21, 2022 12:21
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