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Of all the things to complain about in that episode, I wasn't expecting Númenoreans expressing xenophobia in the same dumb way that xenophobia is always expressed to be on the list at all. This is a mass-market television show. They want to make sure that viewers notice the important parts. "The people of Númenor irrationally resent elves" is a major theme, so just in case you hadn't noticed it already, they put a scene in near the beginning with like a hundred extras where a guy is irrationally resenting elves. "Galadriel treats every situation like it's the battlefield" is a consistent trait of her character from the start of the show, but for those in the back, they had Halbrand state it outright, so that when she stops doing that it'll be more noticeable that she changed. (Though I do think that having him mansplain Miriel's situation was unfortunate.) This coming Friday I bet we're going to have Poppy say something about being treated like a part of Nori's family. I'm the last person you'll ever hear say "turn off your brain," but I think that it is important to recognize the signals a story sends about how it is going to be told.
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Sep 19, 2022 00:39
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Hammerstein posted:Is it? Because the fantasy series I read has been promoting the idea that cooperation and friendship across ethnic boundaries ultimately leads to the achievement of mutual goals. And in one of the Faramir chapters the author even finds kind words for a fallen enemy from a hostile country. In this TV show, the protagonists are generally open to cooperation with outsiders, whereas their antagonists tend to be more guarded or hostile.
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Sep 19, 2022 01:47
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Ravenfood posted:Not sure why they went with xenophobia when the perfectly good motive of envy and distrust was right there. Xenophobes often feel envy and distrust for foreigners.
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Sep 19, 2022 02:14
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Hammerstein posted:Rebuke it? I pointed out your error when you described Tolkien's work as Tolkien's work contains many important instances of characters who express fear and hatred of other races. It also contains many important instances of characters pointedly refraining from doing this. You might say that xenophobia, which is to say the fear and hatred of other races, is a very common topic for his work to discuss; you might more poetically express that his work is dripping with it.
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Sep 19, 2022 02:30
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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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Phy posted:What the hell do people who actually know wizards and barbarians airbrush on the side of their van, anyway? Tigers.
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Sep 22, 2022 19:36
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Here's what I think: the creators of the show clearly know their poo poo back to front; however, to a degree possibly even greater than when Peter Jackson did it, they took concepts that were subtle and nuanced in the source material, and represented them instead very bluntly. I can go along with that, though I hear more often from people who cannot. It's important to know which kind of viewer you are in order to decide whether and in what spirit to watch it.
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Oct 20, 2022 00:15
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If an elf's name starts with F, they're kind of a cock; if their name starts with C, they're a mega-cock, and if their name starts with M, they're relatively cool.
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Jan 15, 2023 07:55
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He did not succeed in rejecting the Ring, but he did succeed in something far more important, which everyone is called to do, not just those who end up stuck going on an adventure where they contend with supernatural evil.
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Jan 20, 2023 09:05
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And what if that reforging had been ordered by King Theseus of Athens?
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May 31, 2023 05:44
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An also-good film adaptation of The Lord of the Rings could have made many different decisions about how to translate certain really bookly elements to film.
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Jun 16, 2023 22:49
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CommonShore posted:These are the kinds of things that I think would be better served by pulling the narrative eye back to the hobbits, who are understanding things from the outsider's perspective. Pippin can witness (with the audience looking over his shoulder) the soldiers of Gondor standing strong in formation against a wall of orcs but then breaking into disorder when the Nazgul descend on them, and he can witness Gandalf bringing them together and holding them strong against the same effect later. Sergei Bondarchuk's Pelennor
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Jun 17, 2023 01:06
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Pippin is hereditary nobility.
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Jun 17, 2023 05:41
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The idea was to convey that the decisive element of the battle was that Aragorn showed up with some ghosts. There are many ways to express that visually, but each of them requires a different visual language to have been established. The one that was chosen was to show them winning by inflicting irresistible violence on the enemy, which has the advantage of being really easy to understand at a glance. It could have been done differently, but it would mean changing a lot of other things.
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Jun 22, 2023 18:16
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JRPG Torkelson.
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Aug 8, 2023 21:59
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I love John Boorman.
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Oct 2, 2023 19:13
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Sam and Rosie had a record-setting thirteen kids, so I doubt it was a sham marriage.
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Oct 13, 2023 01:53
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Oracle posted:That is nowhere near record setting if you look at the hobbit family trees. I think the Old Took cranked them out like a factory. Gerontius only had twelve kids.
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Oct 13, 2023 02:13
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The story isn't interested in being a love story, but there is plenty of room for a romantic drama if you like. Or a romantic comedy, if you ignore the part where you know the ending is that Frodo gets increasingly ill from his wounds, resigns as mayor, writes his will, and sails to Valinor. Think of it: Sam torn between his down-to-earth childhood friend who was always secretly into him, and the wealthy and glamorous socialite with a heart of gold. Tolkien was obviously inspired by Archie comics.
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Oct 13, 2023 19:22
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Durin and Elrond were what got me to stick with the show to the end despite everything. Hell, they were so good that I'll probably even watch season 2.
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Oct 23, 2023 00:56
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All Noldor are princes compared to those Avari peasants.
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Oct 24, 2023 16:39
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"Death of the Author" relates to the specific question of "What does this work mean?" which is not the only question that is interesting to ask about a work, and only means that what the author said they meant is not evidence that should be privileged above anything else merely on the basis of who said it.
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Oct 25, 2023 19:05
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Goku would not have claimed the ring for himself. He would hand-deliver it to Sauron in order to make him a stronger enemy to fight.
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Nov 8, 2023 21:05
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For human dwellings, the general vibe is sub-Roman: if you're in a city, there are signs that the city was once much grander; if you're in the countryside, you may hear stories that it was once more common to trade with very distant lands; and if you're on the frontier, the wilderness you're advancing into has ruins of constructions more opulent than you can imagine being built today.
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Nov 29, 2023 03:21
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The theme of subcreation requires that Orcs, too, are children of Eru. Elves, who mostly wrote the historical texts, are uncomfortable with what it really means for Melkor and his abominations to have been part of the divine plan for Arda all along. Basically the dilemma Tolkien ruminated on until his death was theodicy, famously not an easy problem to solve. That's why I think that assuming an unreliable narrator is the most elegant solution.
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Jan 3, 2024 18:05
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Try this one: Orcishness is a spiritual condition, not a race. This condition has been observed in modern times as well, with distressing frequency. One can succumb to it more or less easily under certain social conditions, and the various Dark Lords understood that better than anyone and set it up on purpose, perhaps with a little bit of the leftover essence of Morgoth to speed things along by inducing despair. So some Orcs are Elves, and some are Men, and some are Dwarves, and perhaps there's some other, lesser-known Children out there as well. Some were born into an Orcish society and look the part, while others still carry on the practices of their native society, whose rulers' alignment with the Shadow they enthusiastically complied with. Those raised Orc could defect, though their prospects would be grim even if they succeed and far worse if they fail, and to even think about it they'd need to overcome conditioning arising from the worst generational trauma ever. Noldor and Sindar writers don't believe that Elves could go over to the Shadow, and more importantly don't want to believe, and yet for all his might and art, Morgoth's power to dominate stops short of depriving other beings of free will.
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Jan 4, 2024 06:20
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The Ainulindale is the Vanyar equivalent of Genesis, and then the Quenta Silmarillion uses the Noldor equivalent of the Iliad as the backdrop for four legends: Beren and Luthien, The Fall of Gondolin, The Children of Hurin, and the mostly unwritten Voyage of Earendil. Understanding the moral status of the Noldor in all of this does kind of require the full context of how the story ends, as well as keeping track of the various elvish factions. One thing is certain, however: as long as everybody involved was immortal, none of them were going to feel any particular sense of urgency to resolve the situation.
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Feb 8, 2024 06:15
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The lifespan of the Elves is the lifespan of Arda. They have all been called to dwell in an earthly paradise inhabited by their demiurgic benefactors and barely sullied by evil, and if they succumb to violence they get to convalesce there. So, by and large, they really like the world and living in it. Plus it's going to be around for a very long time, even if it's not literally forever. So they're generally okay with immortality. Men have a harder lot, so death is something of a consolation to them.
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Feb 14, 2024 04:47
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This show was set up with an immense budget and a mandate to produce something extravagant, and that resulted in great casting, costuming, set design, and other production-related things. That's a rare opportunity. It'd be a shame to give up on the whole thing just because the screenwriting was stupid. If a retcon is what it takes to get them into a position to salvage things, well, it'd hardly be the first time a good TV show had a rotten first season. Really, despite everything, I want them to succeed.
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Feb 19, 2024 08:19
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I think the basis of this argument is a failure to understand the proverbial mysterious ways in which Eru works.
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Feb 28, 2024 19:09
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Balrog wings are chicken wings that are as spicy as the Flame of Udûn, and the big controversy is about whether it's a misnomer for a variation on that dish to be called "boneless wings" since they contain no wing meat.
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Feb 29, 2024 02:43
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There's material from a discarded epilogue where Aragorn says in a letter that instead of Samwise he ought to be called Fullwise.
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Feb 29, 2024 20:18
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Any time Gandalf isn't on the page, the other characters should be saying, "Tell me, where is Gandalf? For I much desire to speak with him."
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Mar 8, 2024 07:03
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And he's been snoring like the Three Stooges the entire time.
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Mar 9, 2024 19:00
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What could be more Tolkienian than dialog originally written for one character ending up delivered by another in a different context?
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May 7, 2024 16:27
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It's a pragmatic adaptation, and while it loses some subtlety in comparison to the source material, it's hard to imagine anyone with the budget to do a better job actually wanting to do a better job.
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May 7, 2024 23:13
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Compared to other Maiar, Gandalf is subtle.
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May 8, 2024 20:29
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I loved the way HFR looked and I didn't get why everybody else in the entire world, as far as I could see, thought it looked bad.
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May 10, 2024 01:28
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Oracle posted:It looked like a poorly lit soap opera dude. The frame rate was too high for the quality of the set, costumes or what was attempting to be portrayed. It showed too much. We could see the wizard behind the giant floating head spitting fire. Hyper realism just has no place in live action fantasy as it currently stands. Were the sets and costumes notably lower in quality than the ones used in the Lord of the Rings films? Because, by reputation, those had a level of fidelity of construction that was sufficient for any level of fidelity of presentation, up to and including looking at them up close with the naked eye. The lighting I'll grant might have something to do with it. More pictures taken means more illumination is needed, and a brighter set would be difficult to photograph in a way that looks familiar. However, if that were the problem, that would also result in still shots, and the standard frame rate version, looking bad too, and I never saw people complaining about those. They always just talk about the frame rate. zoux posted:Because it looks like it was shot on video tape The only way it resembled video tape was by having a higher frame rate. That's just a circular argument.
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May 10, 2024 08:00
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