Future Lord of the Rings films should acknowledge the book’s queer leanings - "Viewed through a 21st-century prism (perhaps even a 1930s one) the entirely male-centric events of Lord of the Rings – the bonding, the emotional connections in time of peril, the torment of choosing between heterosexual romance and the company of men – have obvious queer connotations. That does not mean Tolkien wrote them in such a way: it is possible to argue that the author saw the hobbits as childlike innocents, mere sprites who lived long, long ago, in the mists of a sexless, Eden-like, ancient faerie. When the writer describes Tom Bombadil telling the halflings to “run naked on the grass” while he hunts, in a chapter that never made it into the movies, it’s hard to imagine that Tolkien had anything particularly carnal in mind. (The hobbits dutifully obey, by the way.)... it would also be an error to present Tolkien’s world without reference to the realities of 21st-century society. Few batted an eyelid when Jackson invented a romance between an elf and a dwarf in his ill-fated Hobbit prequel, so why shouldn’t some of Middle-earth’s denizens be queer? Tolkien’s world in Lord of the Rings is divided into white men, dwarves and hobbits from a European-style continent, and darker races of men from the east and south (along with their Orcish allies) who have fallen under the spell of the evil Sauron. Clearly recreating this vision for a 21st-century adaptation would be just as inadvisable as making everyone straight"
As Tolkien's friend CS Lewis said, "Those who cannot conceive Friendship as a substantive love but only as a disguise or elaboration of Eros betray the fact that they have never had a Friend"
I don't know what world the writer is living in - I saw many people complain about the elf-dwarf romance
When you're transparent about your political motivations
Meme - "Tolkien's new book confirms LGBT relationships in Middle Earth?" "So there is a form of nonsexual love called friendship where people feel closely connected to each other"
"This is clearly about gayness"
Why Lord of the Rings Is the Best Trilogy Ever
Lord of the Rings at 20: How Peter Jackson Trilogy Was a Big Gamble - "Doing three films simultaneously was a practical decision. Jackson and Walsh had scouted some stunning New Zealand locations that were remote; this meant special roads had to be built to access them, and the roads would then be erased, to restore the sites’ original condition. It didn’t make sense to do that three times... Jackson accomplished something no other filmmaker has ever done: He significantly improved his country’s economy, by boosting both filmmaking and tourism."
The Lord of the Rings films are rooted in Tolkien’s pandemic experience - "Tolkien was a member of the Lost Generation, a cohort of literary greats whose work is generally characterized by disillusionment, both with society as a whole and with optimism as a principle. And that’s no great wonder, given the political, economic, and natural disasters that formed the bounds of their lives. So it’s interesting that Tolkien’s work is one of the most illusioned texts of his time. Tolkien spent most of the Great Depression years writing The Hobbit, which debuted in 1937. By the time he’d finished The Lord of the Rings, which was published in the mid-1950s, it was an epic of hope in the face of relentless devastation... Tolkien believed that the history of mankind was a story of a decline from paradise, and the legendarium of Middle-earth is a reflection of that. Evil begets more evil, good begets just enough good to stop it, and both are always dwindling in power. The world changes for the worse in ways that cannot be undone... But blockbuster film didn’t embrace the sincerity of the Lord of the Rings movies — the way they elevated deep and pure emotions to the level of an adult epic — in the same manner. There are still a few films of that kind that break into the cultural consciousness, either as cult favorites (Pacific Rim) or unexpected successes (Mad Max: Fury Road), but they are the exception to the Marvel Studios/DC Films/Sony Pictures/HBO rules of self-referential, self-effacing, sometimes-even-fully-cynical fantasy and hero tales."
The Gamer Features Editor Ben Sledge Accuses The Lord Of The Rings Creator J.R.R Tolkien Of Using Anti-Semitic Stereotypes, Calls Fans Racists - "Before Sledge gets to his accusations, he makes the ironic statement, “Before we get any further, I want to make this clear: whether you’re trolling, gatekeeping, plain old racist, or all of the above, you have no place in this fandom.”"
So much gatekeeping and projection
Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power - Why Fandom Has To Embrace Change - "Twenty years ago, there was a similar backlash – including from a teenage me – when Jackson’s films made Arwen a more prominent character than in the books. Looking back, I realize my objections were based on ignorance (of Tolkien’s Appendices, and of the adaptation process in general), unexamined sexism, and entitlement... This sense of fan ownership and attachment isn’t a new phenomenon. In 1893 20,000 readers of The Strand magazine cancelled their subscription upon the death of Sherlock Holmes. In 1980 both critics and Star Wars fans expressed dissatisfaction with The Empire Strikes Back because it changed what had been established in the previous film. The difference here is that these responses weren’t connected to a burgeoning right-wing movement, which is where we find ourselves today. Lord of the Rings has already been co-opted by the far right... There is a significant portion of fandom who are not in a position to be reasoned with. Report them, block them, move on. They cannot create anything new, only distort and destroy what we already have."
When you don't understand the source material and insist on ruining everything with your agenda, just want to spite your political opposites and accuse them of doing what you are guilty of
Perma Banned - Posts | Facebook - "Eowyn: Manages to kill Witch-King, even though Witch-King killed hundreds and her father just moments earlier.
Galadriel: The most powerful existence in Middle Earth during LOTR, even stronger than Sauron at his peak.
Middle Earth: Has Humans (Westron, Easterlings, Haradrim, Umbar etc), Elves, Dwarves, Goblins, Orcs (Gundabad, Uruks, Uruk-Hai etc), Trolls, Ents, Hobbits, Sentient Spiders.
Late Tolkien: *wrote his books drawing on his Anglo-Saxon history knowledge to create a fantasy parable of Medieval Europe*
Amazon: *Not stopping them from destroying a dead man's work to fit their fancy politics, even though their statements are based off lies and observably absolutely no Tolkien fan cared or wanted it.*
Funny how these media talk about how "fans complained" this and that...yet never really prove or substantiate their claims. You know, Late-Tolkien a few times mentioned in his books that a specific "not very nice" faction could not get stronger by creating things from scratch...but rather corrupting things that already exist. Hmmm Saw this coming from miles away when I heard Amazon was "rebooting LOTR" last year."
The Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power Showrunners Admit They Don't Have The Rights To The Silmarillion Or Unfinished Tales - "The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power showrunners JD Payne and Patrick McKaye admitted their show does not have a number of rights that depict events from the Second Age of The Lord of the Rings world... they only have the rights to The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, The Return of the King, the appendices, and The Hobbit... One wonders why in the world someone would endeavor to bring to live-action the Second Age when you don’t have the rights to the key materials that document the Second Age. Well, McKay has an answer, “There’s a version of everything we need for the Second Age in the books we have the rights to.”... the show’s first trailer and the initial images first published by Vanity Fair reveals they have already egregiously contradicted those books. They turned Galadriel into a commander of the Northern Armies. A northern army was created by King Ondoher and led by him when he defended Gondor from an invasion by the Wainriders of Rhovanion. Ondoher’s creation of this northern army and its use in defending against the Wainrdiers was detailed in Unfinished Tales. Galadriel was not a commander although “she did look upon the Dwarfs also with the eye of a commander, seeing in them the finest warriors to pit against the Orcs,” as Tolkien noted in Unfinished Tales. There is a difference between being a commander and looking upon someone with the eye of a commander... The show also introduces us to a Dwarf princess named Disa. In Appendix A, Tolkien wrote, “Dís was the daughter of Thráin II. She is the only dwarf-woman named in these histories. It was said by Gimli that there are few dwarf-women, probably no more than a third of the whole people.” “They seldom walk abroad except at great need, They are in voice and appearance, and in garb if they must go on a journey, so like to the dwarf-men that the eyes and ears of other peoples cannot tell them apart. This has given rise to the foolish opinion among Men that there are no dwarf-women, and that the Dwarves ‘grow out of stone,’ he added. Disa does not look like any of the other dwarves the show featured. Another clear egregious contradiction. Nevertheless, Payne and McKay once again showed their hubris and pride that they could do Tolkien’s story better than Tolkien. McKay previously revealed his hubris when he told Vanity Fair, “Can we come up with the novel Tolkien never wrote and do it as the mega-event series that could only happen now?” In this new Vanity Fair article, Payne adds, “We took all these little clues and thought of them as stars in the sky that we then connected to write the novel that Tolkien never wrote about the Second Age.” Interestingly, they try to justify their hubris by claiming, “We worked in conjunction with world-renowned Tolkien scholars and the Tolkien estate to make sure that the ways we connected the dots were Tolkienian and gelled with the experts’ and the estate’s understanding of the material.” However, the production canned Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey. It’s unclear why he was canned. Vanity Fair suggested it was over a NDA breach claiming he gave “an apparently unsanctioned interview to a German fan site that July, opining on what the show could and could not explore. Not long after that, Shippey was no longer involved with the series.” Who knows if that theory is true, but canning a prominent Tolkien scholar and then touting you worked with them to justify your egregious contradictions from Tolkien’s lore is despicable."
Amazon Prime Video Uses Vanity Fair To Attack Critics Of The Lord of The Rings: The Rings Of Power As "Trolls" - "One would think that when adapting a piece of fiction that has a storied history, one might think it would have been natural to reflect what Tolkien actually wrote rather than “what the world actually looks like.” It begs the question as why Amazon would even want to adapt Tolkien if they didn’t want to actually reflect what he wrote. Interestingly, the puff piece by Vanity Fair then paints people who wanted Prime Video to stay true to Tolkien’s work as “trolls.”... They go on to try and deride the fans by citing a so-called Tolkien scholar named Mariana Rios Maldonado. Maldonado is not a Tolkien scholar, but is rather a PhD student at the University of Glasgow who “is interested in ethics, feminist theory, and encountering the Other in Tolkien’s works.” That sounds like a social justice warrior if there ever was one. If that didn’t convince you, Maldonado also happens to be “the Equality and Diversity Officer for the University of Glasgow’s Centre for Fantasy and the Fantastic.” Nevertheless, Vanity Fair, and one suspects Amazon by association, prop up this feminist as a Tolkien scholar to attack their fans. Maldonado tells Vanity Fair, “Obviously there was going to be push and backlash, but the question is from whom? Who are these people that feel so threatened or disgusted by the idea that an elf is Black or Latino or Asian?” Well, that’s actual fans of Tolkien’s work who want an adaptation of it to stay true it. What a tough question. And wanting to stay true to the work does not mean you or threatened or disgusted to imply as such shows you what kind of Tolkien scholar this person is, their first thought is to attack people. Sounds like a Tolkien villain named Grima Wormtongue. Not only does Vanity Fair and by association Amazon Studios attack The Lord of the Rings fans, but they also reveal that the casting changes were cause for fans to be concerned that if you can’t get that right, you won’t get the rest right either. And that appears to be the case as Vanity Fair reports that showrunners “[JD] Payne and [Patrick] McKay have compressed events into a single point in time.” That’s right they’ve completely done away with Tolkien’s timeline... Ironically, Vanity Fair noted how important the timeline and details were to Tolkien earlier in the article when they stated, “These timelines, genealogies, and notes on language and culture became so important to Tolkien that he even stalled the publication of the final book, The Return of the King, to complete them.”"
'Go woke, go broke': Lord Of The Rings fans debate the franchise's most diverse cast ever - "Many of his literary influences stemmed from the folklore of Norsemen, the Celts and the Anglo-Saxons, which are viewed by many people as typically white ethnic groups... A seemingly aggrieved enthusiast replied underneath Amazon's Rings Of Power trailer: 'Go woke go broke. How about you just respect the source material.'... a quote thought to derive from Tolkien himself also circulated on the social media platform, reading: 'Evil cannot create anything new, they can only corrupt and ruin what good forces have invented or made.' Others, however, created a contrasting narrative, with one fan tweeting: 'Imagine being upset about a black elf in a series where the trees talk and wizards ride on eagles'. Another lengthy insight read: 'Silly comments. Whether it is good will depend entirely on the writing and plot, not the gender or race of the actors or the fact the visuals might deviate from your preferences. 'That said, most of these shows have bad writing, so we'll see.'... Executive producer Lindsey Weber explained: 'It felt only natural to us that an adaptation of Tolkien's work would reflect what the world actually looks like. 'Tolkien is for everyone. His stories are about his fictional races doing their best work when they leave the isolation of their own cultures and come together.'...
Reports of an on-set 'intimacy coordinator' — a sure sign of sex scenes, which were very much not part of Tolkien's vision — have set alarm bells ringing across Middle-earth... Not merely content with demanding a dragon's hoard of gold for the TV rights, the Tolkien estate laid down the law on what the new series could and couldn't do. The screenwriters have described how difficult it was to construct a narrative in which, in order to be faithful to Tolkien, every season should span 200 years and see the mortal human characters die off. Tolkien's heirs made it clear that while they would tolerate some immortal characters (such as the elf queen Galadriel) appearing in the new production, using mortal characters such as Frodo or Bilbo Baggins in the prequel was forbidden. The estate also insisted Amazon dispense with such Tolkien stalwarts as wizards and hobbits, as neither played much part in the Second Age. But Amazon was able to address modern sensitivity about racial representation by introducing the harfoots, a type of hobbit that Tolkien did mention and specified had darker skins than their peers. Amazon has been obsessively secretive about its new series in the hope this will generate interest. When, in 2019, the venture's dedicated Tolkien scholar, British medievalist Tom Shippey, gave a reportedly unapproved interview to a German Tolkien fan website and offered a few hints on what might be in the series, he was removed from the project."
Fantasy and sci-fi means there're no rules you need to follow, which is why Rey was a Mary Sue and the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy was incoherent
Wasn't Tolkien racist for not being inspired by non-white cultures?
Why There's So Little Hype for Amazon's Rings of Power Series
Meme - "One of the commonly cited issues with Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings series from the early 2000s is its lack of diversity, but it looks like that's about to change.
LORD OF THE RINGS TV SHOW ACTOR SAYS IT WILL BE MULTICULTURAL, DIVERSE, AND FEATURE STRONG FEMALE CHARACTERS"
The Babylon Bee: "Prophecy fulfilled
Amazon's New Lord Of The Rings Series To Include Bisexual Transgender Elf In Wheelchair"
Rumor: The Lord Of The Rings Scholar Tom Shippey Fired For Telling Prime Video They Were "Polluting The Lore" - "When Prime Video first announced The Lord of the Rings series in July 2019, they revealed Shippey was part of the production as a Tolkien Scholar. However, back in February, Vanity Fair led their readers to believe that Shippey was canned for giving an “unsanctioned interview to a German fan site” where he opined “on what the show could and could not explore.”... “It’s because I heard from three separate sources that he would weekly tell the Bobbsey Twins of Payne and McKay that Prime was polluting the lore.” Not only would Molho detail this rumor regarding Shippey’s firing, but he would also excoriate Prime Video for including nudity in the show as revealed in a number of behind-the-scenes photos from the production as well as a newly released photo from the show. Molho says, “The professor never once hinted at carnal nudity or lascivious sexuality ever in his writing. Period. End of statement.” He later stated, “This John Ronald Reuel Tolkien we’re talking about. A man who never sold out his writing or what he believed for cheap thrills of exposed nipples.”... “Then they tell us, ‘No, there’s not going to be any types of Game of Thrones style sex.’ And then they bring on an intimacy coordinator. They’re saying that’s just for some kissing scenes, not for the LGBTQ scenes, which we are going to explore. Not going to be for the nudity or sex scenes, which we are going to explore. No. But we hired an intimacy coordinator. And they put out a casting notice in New Zealand.” Towards the end of his video, Molho also noted Prime Video believes “this is the perfect opportunity to not only dishonor Tolkien, to use the Estate — the Tolkien Estate, who all they care about is cashing a check — but this is a way to cement our legacy and honor Bezos’ command, “Bring me Game of Thron
es.”"
Meme - "Saw a tweet about hobbits being anarchists because they have no king. Here's the thing. Gondor had no king until a bunch of hobbits went through a heck of a lot of trouble putting one loyal to them on that throne. They're not anarchists. They're the CIA."
Meme - ""[She] was a WoMaN OF GREAT BeAUTY, smalLer Than WERE MosT WOMEN OF ThaT LaNd, WITh BRIGHT Eyes..."
"Tar-Miriel The Queen, fairer Than siLver OR Ivory OR pearls" - JRR ToLkien
TOLKIEN *White woman*
amazon *Black woman*"
Clearly the fans just hate People of Colour on the screen, which is why they also hated Black Panther and Shang Chi and bitched about them /s
Meme Authoritarian Left: Orcs
Obeys and follows their diefied leader
Armies are mass-produced and are given the bare minimum
They all have the same maggoty bread
Authoritarian Right: Men
Literally waited almost a thousand years for their king
Easily corrupted if offered power
Thinks they know what's best for everyone
Centre: Hobbits
Doesn't care for magic rings
Just wants to be left alone to eat, drink and smoke pipe-weed
Libertarian Left: Elves
Lives in trees
Can't tell their gender for the most part
Whole race leaves before things get dicey
Libertarian Right: Dwarves
Only cares for gold and ore
Will literally mine so much that they wake ancient demons
Hide in their mountains away from sunlight"
‘The history of fantasy is racialized’: Lord of the Rings series sparks debate over race - "The question, Thomas says, is not merely of accuracy, but of authenticity, and given that race is an arbitrary construct anyway, it’s not somehow less authentic to cast Black actors than it is to cast white ones"
Of course the Guardian pretends that "harassment" only comes from "the right", pretends there is no contradiction with canon and conveniently forgets to mention the hypocrisy of how race-swapping used to be denounced as bad
Facebook - "it also feels relevant to talk about how selective this diversity is, and where they chose to NOT incorporate it. Specifically, all dark skinned characters are heroes, or at the very least on the side of good. Meanwhile the three evil human/elf characters we've seen so far are all white. They also made all the orcs white skinned, with some having blue eyes. This despite Tolkien describing orcs with green, brown and black skin. This is of course not a coincidence, but very much deliberate choices. Some might find it a bit harsh, but there's no other way of saying it: Rings of Power is anti-white."
CHRISTOPHER STEVENS reviews The Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power - "The Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power (Amazon Prime) is so staggeringly bad, it's hilarious. Everything about it is ill-judged to a spectacular extreme. The cliche-laden script, the dire acting, the leaden pace, the sheer inconsistency and confusion as it lurches between styles – where do we start? Let's start with the budget: a billion dollars. Let that sink in. One thousand million bucks, about £860,000,000, such a colossal investment even for Amazon that industry rumour says the brand is gambling its entire future as a film production company. If this show fails, say insiders, executives could be forced to shut down Amazon Studios... it's impossible to guess whether The Rings Of Power is meant for children, for hardcore fans or for general viewers – because it fails them all. One fight sequence features elf princess Galadriel in acrobatic action against an angry troll, who pops up from off-stage like an adversary in a Dungeons & Dragons boardgame. Galadriel (Morfydd Clark) cartwheels and whirls her enchanted sword before despatching the giant fiend with a bloodless blow. It's highly stylised, like a Japanese manga cartoon. An episode later, the healer Bronwyn (Nazanin Boniadi) and her son fight an orc, and this time the violence is as brutal as anything in Game Of Thrones... Bronwyn and her boyfriend Arondir the elf share some marvellous exchanges: 'I must follow the passage,' he tells her, pointing to an underground cavern. 'You don't know what's down there!' she cries. 'That,' he replies portentously, 'is the reason I must go.' Without a shred of irony, Galadriel declares to her elf platoon, 'The order is given! We march at first light!'... Even when there's no dialogue, some of the acting is abysmal. Galadriel's elf patrol, caught in a snowstorm, battle their way across the screen with their arms outstretched like a troupe of mimes. At least they're not talking. Most of the elf scenes are rigid, as two characters in robes take it in turns to dump mounds of exposition over each other's heads."
In what context did Tolkien say "evil cannot create anything new"? - "It doesn't appear to be anything that Tolkien ever said or wrote, but a paraphrase:
"No, they eat and drink, Sam. The Shadow that bred them can only mock, it cannot make: not real new things of its own. I don't think it gave life to the orcs, it only ruined them and twisted them; and if they are to live at all, they have to live like other living creatures." -- The Return of The King
For the Orcs had life and multiplied after the manner of the Children of Ilúvatar; and naught that had life of its own, nor the semblance of life, could ever Melkor make since his rebellion in the Ainulindalë before the Beginning: so say the wise. -- The Silmarillion
In fact, it appears to de a direct quote from TV Tropes"
Why Tolkien’s elves had long hair: The final evidence! - "Whenever Tolkien described a specific elven character he always wrote long hair. In the only drawing we know of where Tolkien painted an elf, he had long dark hair flowing behind him... If the above quotations and Tolkien’s own illustration are not proof enough that the hair of elves were long, here are some further evidence from his writings... Tolkien stated that all the Noldor had long dark hair, and that Finwë (one of the Noldor) did not have longer or more beautiful hair than the other races of elves. Thus, it seems quite clear that all elves must indeed have had long abundant hair! It’s also the case that many of the Noldor have “hair names” – Finwë, Fingolfin, Finarfin, Findis, Fingon, Finrod, Finduilas, all contain “fin” which is “hair”. This is no doubt significant... There are 29 hits for ”hair” in the Silmarillion only, describing how the hair of elves was ”long” and of ”great length”... if long hair was so common and prized even among men, just imagine how it would be among the elves! Did Tolkien ever even describe a character as having short hair? I don’t think so and couldn’t find any, except for hobbits. But we have numerous descriptions of long hair, both in elves and men... “That doesn’t have to mean that some elves didn’t have short hair, since Tolkien never specifically stated that ALL elves had long hair?” No, not necessarily, but there simply are no evidence for short haired elves whatsoever, in contrary to the heavy proofs stating that they had indeed long hair. We don’t have any evidence that some elves didn’t have purple hair either, and it would be weird to make it the new standard, when hair colors they actually had is regularly described... Either the people in Amazon working on character designs have something personal against long-haired men, or they are just looking for ways to provoke the fanbase and put their own mark on it. One thing is certain: Amazon is definitely aiming to provoke on many levels, and I don’t think it will benefit them, as long as they don’t let it make sense lorewise"
So much for Arondir, the elf with a buzz cut. Or indeed the rest
Meme - "It began with the forging of the great films. Threads were given by Tolkien, immortal, wisest and fairest of all beings. Rights were granted to Jackson, great miner and craftsman of the mountain of lore. And nine, nine hours were gifted to the race of men, who above all else, desire quality. But they were all of them deceived, for another show was made. In the land of Amazon, in the fires of Mount Prime, the Dark Lord Bezos forged in secret a master flop. And into this show he poured his money, his greed and his will to dominate all film. One show to ruin them all. THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RINGS OF POWER"
Adding Asian actors to Amazon’s ‘Lord of the Rings’ would be too ‘politically correct’ - "Chinese cultural observers said it would be too “politically correct” for Amazon’s Lord of the Rings TV series to force in a role played by an Asian actor and might trigger some racial problems if the newly added role was a negative one. The comment came after Chinese Canadian actor Ludi Lin posted on Twitter on Thursday, complaining that the mega-budget fantasy series did not have any Asian actors. “It’s going to be difficult to justify building a ‘huge world’ without any characters that look Asian. Turn that imagine on us. It’s not hard, we’re right here”... “Middle-Earth is an imaginary world created by Tolkien, just like Chinese writer Wu Chengen’s literature work Journey to the West. It would be too ‘politically correct’ to force in a white actor if a white actor criticized Journey to the West for not having any white actors,” Shi Wenxue, a film critic, told the Global Times... He suspected that the Asian actor was trying to use the call for “diversity” to hype his own popularity. “If the role played by an Asian actor was an ugly one like a dwarf or a half-human half-animal, some Asian-American groups might try to boycott it, calling it ‘racist.’” Shi pointed out that discrimination against Asians and Asian stereotypes in the US have a long history. For example, the film Crazy Rich Asians, which had an all-Asian cast, is a typical work full of Asian stereotypes."
When Amazon digs its own grave
Rings of Power: The new hobbits are filthy, hungry simpletons with stage-Irish accents. That’s $1bn well spent - "for Irish viewers the $1 billion series evokes less welcome memories. It features a race of simpleton proto-hobbits, rosy of cheek, slathered in muck, wearing twigs in their hair and speaking in stage-Irish accents that make the cast of Wild Mountain Thyme sound like Daniel Day-Lewis. Twenty minutes in, I’m having flashbacks to that 1997 EastEnders episode with the fightin’ villagers and donkeys walking the streets... If they don’t quite keep livestock in the livingroom, they are otherwise a laundry list of 19th-century Hibernophobic caricatures. The accents embark on a wild journey from Donegal to Kerry and then stop off in inner-city Dublin. The Harfoots themselves are twee and guileless and say things like: “Put yer backs into it, lads.” One is portrayed by Lenny Henry, a great comedian and actor who deserves better than having to deliver lines such as “De both of ye, dis does not bode will” (in an appalling Irish accent). Scouring the internet, there is no evidence of any Irish actors having been involved... The portrayal of “Irish” characters as pre-industrial and childlike – simpletons, really – threads neatly into the Anglosphere’s rich tapestry of disdain for Celtic peoples. It brings us all the way back to the 70s – the 1870s. There’s an early scene in which we see the Harfoots, wearing filthy rags, scrabble in the ground for food. What is this, Famine cosplay? The Scots get it too in The Rings of Power. Stand-ins for the dwarfs, they are portrayed as aggressive and argumentative. It gets to the point where I expect Durin, prince of Khazad-dûm, to whip out a deep-fried Mars bar. Every other “mad Jock” cliche has already been ticked off. This all tracks with JRR Tolkien’s disdain for Celtic culture. “They have bright colours,” he said of Irish and Welsh mythology, “but are like a broken stained glass window reassembled without design”. Perhaps he protested too much. Many scholars today draw a line between Tolkien’s elves – willowy immortals from across the sea – and the Irish Tuatha Dé Danann, a semidivine race immune to sickness or age. The parallels between the Irish mythological figure Balor of the Evil Eye and Sauron, the flaming-red iris of Barad-dûr, are similarly obvious. And Tolkien’s great romantic tragedy, Beren and Lúthien (which was inspired in part by the author’s own romance with his wife, Edith Bratt), carries echoes of the old Gaelic epic The Pursuit of Diarmuid and Gráinne. So if anyone should sound “Irish” it is the elves. They even have a high king. Instead, and of course, these noble sophisticates have upper-class English accents. The grubbier humans sound like Lancashire mill workers – not as cultured as the elves but a long way ahead of the O’Harfoots in the pecking order. Somehow the Victorian caste system has been smuggled into a 21st-century American fantasy series."
Too bad. No one cares about white people
Fans are left underwhelmed by hotly anticipated The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power - "Diehard LOTR fans took to Twitter to admit they 'had trouble' even getting through the first episodes of Amazon Prime's billion-dollar Tolkien epic, while others described the characters and plot as 'dull.'"
IMPRESSIVE: Amazon's $1-billion LOTR flop currently has a lower audience approval than Joseph R. Biden - "You can ignore the critic rating. These days, it only serves as a benchmark of whether or not something is woke trash or just trash trash. If the critics love it but the audience hates it, it's just gonna be a boring, preachy thing that's basically woke Sunday School. If both hate it, it's just bad film."
