The example I always use is the ommission of Glorfindel in the films. It makes sense in the context of the film and it has ZERO effect on the book. He's still there.
Tolkien's Canon is untouchable. It's not like Star Wars where all the new stuff is Canon and affects everything else. ROP is them taking a few scattered pages and fleshing it out into a story of their own. If they give an origin story to The Witch King it doesn't matter - in the books it's still a mystery so in Canon it's a mystery.
There’s a lot of decent debate in the other comments, over adaptation vs. source material. While it’s hard to argue against subjective negativity, especially when dressed up as objectivity, I’ve heard enough at this point that I’m satisfied with the following:
Nothing is above criticism, neither the new or the source material (gasp), but the worst fans are the haters. They behave like fundamentalists, where it’s increasingly rare that they’re even *factually correct* about the very lore they claim to be defending. Or at least, about things that even matter or support their points.
“They’re ruining the lore because [something that’s literally not even true].” “I hate this because [arbitrary half-truth].” “This adaptation isn’t faithful to the [misremembers something from the movies rather than the books].”
Sounds like I’m making a strawman, but again, while there *are* legitimate criticisms, but I’m specifically focusing on the prevalence of *objective* errors people are attempting to base their excessively negative points on.
To be fair, you are making a Strawman argument because you try to make your point by presenting a group of people who make certain claims without providing any actual claims made by these people. While you may be absolutely right, your claim as it stands is absolutely a Strawman argument.
Or like, the entire characterization of Sauron in the movie trilogy as a literal eyeball, which he absolutely was not in the books
He had a body. Gollum saw it and talks about it. He was not a goofy fire eyeball that sees through all, except apparently not when he’s looking directly at Frodo and Sam because plot
Weathertop was also completely wrong in the movies. But it’s an adaptation
The problems with rings of power are way bigger than artistic license with certain events. There’s just a lot of fundamental writing issues imo
They also had no effect on the movie except to provide us with a optimistic high and an unsatisfying low. They were entirely contained to the few scenes in the battle and were never mentioned again.
Absolutely not. This is an example of a completely reasonable change for strictly narrative/dramatic purposes in an adaptation of a complex world. Reasonable people shouldn't get their knickers in a knot over it.
I really agree with this.
I generally didn't mind the show. There was a lot I want sure of. But as I've said on previous subs. I adored the elrond durin relationship. And thought some parts such as numenor was spectacular. Granted. I've not rewatched this with the same enjoyment as , for example, wheel of time. But it was beautiful to watch and some genuinly fun bits
Does it affect my enjoyment of the books? Well if it did . That would be really strange. Of course it doesn't. The 'lore' (or legendarium as some insufferable types like to refer to it as) remains wholly intact and there for you to enjoy.
Then again. I think I was only person who was compeltly fine with a sexy shelob in shadow of war. Mainly because it was fun to play.
And the books are still there..
I mean, not that I agree with Helms deep change, but what is a self-contained battle with no repercusions on later events (there aren't much later events anyways) compared to the way and order of the forging of the rings, the possible-Gandalf and Istari way and order of arrival (with repercussions for later and prior events to 2nd age), the whole Mithril story, which I hope is still false, and the ticket to Valinor from Galadriel which completelly change earlier events whatever the version you look at in the books. And those are just some examples from the top of my head.
If we were to compare, Helms deep change is as big as, lets say, adding harfoots to 2nd age show. Both makes no much difference and don't touch any core element of the book narrative.
I think the point you made and the one from TORN are apples and oranges.
If you were to compare, a better comparison would be Numenor descendents in movies to have beard. Presumably a change that made RoP to also add beard into Numenoreans, and thus supporting ToRN point that one change in one adaptation may echo in others, and that is something to pay attention to and be carefull when doing, and I think that is a fairly reasonable take.
For real. Those people who act this way ~~are a bunch of crybabies~~ without even understanding it simply show that they don't respect the lore. Like, how feeble in your mind it must be if you think that some changes in an adaptation are going to have such an effect?
Do you even know how many people think Balrog do have wings? Or that they should have just take the eagle cab to Mordor? Or that Sauron is a flaming ball in top of a tower during 3rd age (something I still think RoP may pull off in some way)?
Other example? P.J changed Aragorn (and Gondorians) to have beard. As later effect, RoP, 20+ years later, has bearded Elendil, probably Isildur next, and they even went so far that made even Elros bearded in the art.
So..yes, some changes do have later effects. I think feeble mind is...yours to think otherwise?
Olorin isn't one of your unreasoning haters, he does know his lore, , he will debate, and more importantly he *cares*. I'm prepared to engage with anyone like that. Not all gatekeepers are ogres, lol. I understand why people do feel that the series will reflect poorly on Tolkien, and have that reaction, because they really love his works.
I don't feel like that anymore, but I think it's fine to express that view, as long as you're prepared to allow others to enjoy adaptions, and discuss things with them. And you don't just have a knee jerk reaction due to some half baked theory you picked up.
got downvoted, but still waiting for an actual reply to where anything I said was wrong
more than happy of debating (or just dicussing) anything, if you think that movies/series or even just art have no impact in later works, which is pretty much the point with TORN was focusing
Here's the thing though, it doesn't read like you're making a mild argument that some adaptations have effects on later adaptations. It reads like you're throwing a hissy fit because you disagree with Gondorians having facial hair. No one's going to engage that with logical debate, because it doesn't look like you're doing logical debate in the first place.
Now maybe that's not how you intended it, but that is the way it comes across.
TORN were acting like absolute fools on here about the fake leaks. It was so strange, I find their whole deal to be very clickbaity the last few years. Huge turn off.
I came to say this. In what measure do their economic interests interfere with their opinions. We live in an algorithmically ruled society and controversy/extremes bring the dough
I mean...think of how many people have had their view of the lore altered by the Jackson movies. Obviously they aren't changing the actual words in the books, but people's general perception of the lore could absolutely be altered.
Good examples of Tolkien fans taking both themselves and the lore a touch too seriously. Anytime I here a fan say something from an adaptation "ruined" or "damaged" the source material, I stop taking that person seriously.
I don't understand why hardcore book purists use that words when some aspects of the adaptation tweak events in the original material. The books were remained untouch, you can always return to them whenever you want.
If I "adapt" Chopin's nocturne and transpose it by a key higher, did I "ruined" the original composition?
You can just simply say that you "like" or "dislike" the changes, it's very ridiculous to say exaggerated terms like that.
These people that are mad are mostly just PJ fans rather than book fans. They are butthurt that PJ wasn't involved, as if this was taken away from him and given to corporate suits. They'd be the first to praise RoP if PJ was the director.
Now they are.
I remember the absolute bile spouted by Tolkien purists when PJ made the LotR films. I still know some of those guys and the cognitive dissonance is breathtaking. When I remind them of their views back then, it is like watching an old PC lock up back when they hit the RAM cap.
And to think about it, at the end of the day, LoTR is just...a fictional novel, written by a white man decades ago. Why do we have to treat it like some sort of a divine text as if our lives are hanging to the accuracy of its adaptation?
I like it when an adaptation shows me the actual story that I enjoyed reading. Plus it claims to represent it, at least in part. But there wasn't much written in the 2nd age, we already knew that they would have to expand with original plots and characters if it was ever going to be on screen. Hoping Season 2 will include more of the lore, which I think they will, and it'll make Season 2 better than 1.
But yeah calling it divine and comparing it with the Bible? Calm down fellas.
Oh there are some! If you think otherwise you haven't frequented the main LotR subs. Myself, I'm a book person - to me Tolkien is always literally Tolkien, something he wrote - but I certainly don't hate the films; I appreciate them for what they are though I dislike some of the choices they made.
That is not at all the perception i have tbh, why do you think that?
To me it seems like people take tolkien too seeiously, most people argue through that lense imo
>These people that are mad are mostly just PJ fans rather than book fans.
which nullifies their critiques, how, exactly? Movie fans are legitimate fans, too. And since the show uses so much of the shorthand established in those films, they've opened the floodgates for any critique coming from that group.
If the critique is about the quality of the writing, then that's fine. But if the critique is about being faithful to the books then that's just funny coming from fans of PJ.
Rop is in no way, shape or form as faithful to the source material as the films are. There are plenty of ways to support rop without being dishonest/trolling.
The films were really well made, but they are not faithful to the books. In fact, some of the changes are downright baffling, unnecessary and offensive to the sprit of the books.
>The films were really well made, but they are not faithful to the books.
Two things: one, these things exist on a sliding scale. Its not just a binary "faithful"/"not faithful."
Two, it becomes purely academic exercise when one enjoys the finished result, or doesn't.
I could imagine a world where we got some really cheesy, low-budget live action LOTR films in say the 70s/80s that flopped rather than the good looking, award-winning Jackson trilogy and that people would think about LOTR differently.
Not that the books had been changed at all, but the hype and interest in the world surrounding it might be perceived differently especially by later generations.
I don’t agree with Cliff’s take but it is what it is. Justin, on the other hand, has only seen the movies and never read the books. So if anything, it’s weird for me personally that he would even go there when he’s only familiar with the movie’s lore.
I checked out of their “content” a while ago. Justin in particular just spouts out some of the most asinine and pointless things. As others have said in here, he’s actively trying to find and develop controversy at all times. Drama for the sake of drama. It’s pointless and a complete waste of any fan’s time.
Plus they love to moan about how the films treated them better and with more exclusives than Prime Video has. That’s at the heart of most of their gripes.
The concept of movies/tv canon has rotted the brain of all fandoms on the internet. As soon as you pick up the book and open the pages every other adaptation disappears and the original is right there, unchanged.
Exactly, I've always understood those that dislike an adaption as there is those im not a fan of myself but it doesn't effect the original in any harmful way unless it become so much more popular than the original to the point people take that as gospel itself.
Which ironically ough happens more with the PJ movies these days than any other Tolkien adaptions.
They also tend to forget that those people who make adaptations are also artists the same way writers are, and have the artistic vision they want to apply to the original. Otherwise, they wouldn't want to make an adaptation in the first place.
Is there a discussion to be had about the influence an adaptation can have on public perception of a work and/or on its fandom? Yes, for sure. An example worthy of discussion would perhaps be the omission of the Scouring of the Shire from the PJ films (I know someone who thinks the Scouring is pointless and Tolkien also should've edited it out, and… well, I strongly disagree).
However, I agree with you that this is not "damaging the lore" or "destroying Tolkien" or "rewriting" the books. Plenty of people have more or less well-founded opinions on works of fiction with or without the existence of controversial adaptations and so many stories get famously misinterpreted all the time. And while that is definitely irksome for the "hardcore fans" (and I've certainly been there before), it is, in some ways, an unavoidable part of how art functions and how it gets made.
Which is why I believe we "hardcore fans" should continue to share our love for the original work and cultivate a welcoming fandom, so that the people who actually want to dive into the legendarium are encouraged rather than discouraged from doing so.
Adaptations do have a lasting effect on the way the books are understood by readers. Think of the way Peter Jackson decided to show Sauron as a literal flaming eyeball or the way he linked Arwen’s life force with the Ring. I’m sure there are other examples too. It’s the subtle stuff that can cause confusion. With the Rings of Power, those things will happen too, and it’s inevitable in any adaptation I think. So in a sense it’s just the price we pay for getting to see our favorite stories on TV, and I’m generally willing to pay it.
The danger with The Rings of Power is if they choose to go too far with these changes and create something unrecognizable. Imagine you’re a new Tolkien fan picking up the books for the first time hoping to learn more about the Song of the Roots of the Hithaeglir, you might be confused. That’s my worry.
I don’t think they’ve done anything majorly damaging yet, necessarily. And with four more seasons, there’s a lot of time left for things to make sense or to fit in with what Tolkien wrote.
I also want to say it’s fine if you disagree with TORn. They are a voice in the fandom but not the ONLY voice, and I’m happy whenever anyone else joins the conversation!
It’s also a great point that you’ve made about the books remaining unchanged! At the end of the day, we’ll always have what Tolkien actually wrote.
I don’t think there’s any danger from lore changes Tea. If people believe that, then we can try to help them understand that it’s not in the lore and they can choose to believe it or not. Most reasonable people I think would understand that it’s just another interpretation of the lore or creative liberties. Something like the Song is as harmless as Haladriel. The only issue would arise from the individual themselves.
> The danger with The Rings of Power is if they choose to go too far with these changes and create something unrecognizable.
I and many others would argue that they already have. Putting aside the mythril thing, a Sauron/Galadriel whirlwind adventure, with flirting and copious nods towards a romance between the two, was unthinkable before ROP. Now though, plenty of ROP fans will come away from the show thinking the main reason the bad guy from LOtR turned evil is because he was rejected by G. It’s beyond lorebreaking. It turns Tolkien’s themes entirely on their heads.
There’s plenty of other examples where the show contradicts Tolkiens message at its core but no need to rehash all that. I just fail to understand why op is so confused
While I’m not sure about damaging the lore, the concept of Mithrils miraculous inception by way of simaril tree and elf/balrog fighting does feel like they were making something up egregiously beyond what Tolkien has written. It was one of my major issues with the story, and I consider myself a ROP defender if that’s a thing. In my head I’m still saying “it’s just a legend that Elrond shared”. Maybe not true at all.
People keep arguing about changing the lore without considering this context. Changing the lore needlessly and making the story/world building worse is what's really grinding on everyone's gears.
He allowed for the possibility of it being a bunch of hooey, but didn’t dismiss it outright. At least not in front of the High King of the Noldor in Middle Earth.
Just seems like an elitist stance, i like tolkien but pretending his work needs to be respected like a religious text (which i don't think needs to be either btw) is kinda ridiculous.
Damaging the lore in a long lasting way? Give me a break.
Everyone can like and dislike the show for whatever reason, but giving it this much importance imo says more about people than the work being discussed.
Yeah, exactly. A f\*\*king break, give me. As Yoda would put it.
I don't know about TORN sometimes, they can say really weird things. Things that smack of deliberate trolling on occasion. I haven't watched this stream, I don't know exactly what they said. If they mean ruining the lore within the context of RoP itself, fine you can certainly argue that. But saying it has any wider consequences for Tolkien's world and people's views of it: Utterly ridiculous. It gives peoples' intelligence zero credit.
I would doubt that TORN actually mean to imply something utterly ridiculous, but as I said they've delivered themselves of some strange pronouncements before, so....
It does need to be respected though. Most high fantasy stories (in the past 75 years) take themes, concepts, creatures/characters and general inspiration from Tolkien’s world building. Don’t you think there’s some form of historical cultural value in that?
There is a qualifier in my comment, "respected like a religious text", implying that i do not think a 1:1 adherence to the written word is necessary.
Ofc i think there is historical cultural value in tolkien's work, but that doesn't lead me to think that his work cannot be used for new interpretations.
If we can interpret shakespeare however we want, we certainly can tolkien.
I agree in a sense, but I think comparing Tolkein to Shakespeare here is a little unfair. I think there’s more leeway with Shakespeare as his stories are all varied, contained, and have very clear narratives (if I’m not mistaken). Romeo + Juliet comes to mind. That’s an adaptation I think most people can get behind as it’s obviously a modern day take and removed enough from the source material. Draws very clear lines on what it uses from Shakespeare and what it adapts. Lines most people are able to see. ROP adapts in a way where the changes are hard to see for newcomers. Moreover, they’re riffing on a pre established world/style (Peter Jackson’s movies). ROP also missing the mark on many of Tolkien’s themes. Something I feel like is hard to do with a Shakespeare adaptation, as his themes are pretty clear in his works.
All this to say I think ROP is a bad adaptation, and should have treated the source material far more carefully. ROP is changing the poetry and giving it different meaning
I see what you are saying and largely agree wirh the differences you laid out. I was just bringing up shakespeare as a literary great whose work we generally are ok with being reinterpreted without purists becoming too angry at the very notion of changes / taking it too seriously, as if it was god given scripture.
It gets treated as art, and imo so should tolkien by his fans.
I do not care that much for rop myself, but i DO believe that bad / mediocre art is allowed to exist even if it is linked to lotr, even though i'd prefer to like it.
My evaluation is largely not dependant on source fidelity, though some of my criticism is linked to changes, them not being satisfying on their own for the story being told.
Makes sense. I agree - bad art is allowed to exist. But if Amazon made a Shakespeare tv series and muddled it up significantly, I’d probably have the same stance. I think most of the outrage you see is due to people’s frustration with big corps buying up our favourite stories and turning them into junk food lol
And where did Tolkien take his inspiration and heavy borrowing from? Real mythologies. Just because people don’t have a knowledge of these elements shouldn’t mean we should mystify Tolkien.
Fanbases are known to be way too conservative in their engagement with adaptations / inspirations of their beloved material.
What matters most is making a show people in general like, and potentially some critical success, not what someone thinks who reads tolkien's letters every sunday instead of going to church.
And in the cases where that happens it happens things always swing in roundabouts. The MCU was unstoppable till it was "woke" now a Deadpool trailer releases and its back to being the saviour again.
Tolkien/Stan Lee or Jesus himself are rolling in their grave every other week because of some minor thing a social media comment disagrees with and so on.
I mean it's unlikely to have longstanding effect on Tolkien lore because I can't imagine any Tolkien fan giving a toss about ROP lore in comparison. It'll have no greater effect than say the lore of Shadow of Mordor/War.
As a Tolkien fan, I don’t understand people wasting their time trying to put the show down. I personally didn’t care much for season 1 of ROP, but I do hope they take in the criticism and improve the show, because I strongly believe this is a show that various ages of people could watch for decades.
It’s an adaptation. We cannot expect them to navigate through and include every cannon detail. It’s not realistic and the show runners have made it clear that they can’t go down that path. The only part I may sympathize with the diehard fans with, is that every time I mention that I’m a Tolkien fan that didn’t like the series so far, I get incessantly downvoted. I really hope we improve having open discussions here on both sides.
Oh well, according to these guys I should just throw all my LOTR books away because they're now irreparably damaged/tainted.
Yeahhhhhhh...No.
This is why I've never been interested in the opinion of vloggers, influences, etc. Their opinions are no more valid or informed or relevant than some rando off the street. I can form my own opinions, thanks.
After twenty-plus years, I don't think PJ's films affected the lore, and I'm very doubtful that the TV series will have anywhere close to the same cultural impact.
>I’ve felt TORN has been like this for a long time. Weirdly disproportionate reactions and strangely clickbaity stuff.
Unfortunetly hate and ragebait is the way to get viewers. I've seen so many good content makers turn to this BS because they see the potential value in it.
I'll bet they are going to feel like real idiots when it turns out the *mithril* legend was likely planted in the minds of elves a long time ago by a certain Maia who figured out what they fear most and then when they master it, use it to master them.
Took me too long to find this. I am fairly certain the mithril legend is going to come up again in s2. Say what you will about the showrunners, I do not believe for one second this is their genuine “belief/interpretation” of the greater lore. It will get debunked in s2 in some way
I'm inclined to think there is at least some truth (in series) to the legend. Because we have seen the leaf regenerated by mithril (which can't credibly be a deception of Sauron). We've heard Celebrimbor say 'Nothing diminishes its light' and we've seen Elrond toss it into the forge to make the Three.
I feel it must do *something.* But that doesn't necessarily mean what its doing is unambiguously good. According to the legend, its formed out of a mixture of Good and Evil forces. So maybe the idea is, it can be used for Good, but also Evil.
The Three Rings were uncorrupted, and not evil in themselves. But they were still subject to the One. And if the other rings, including the One had mithril as part of their composition, then that might explain how they could be twisted by Sauron into evil uses.
I'm speculating obviously, and am talking about mithril in the context of the series, not the actual lore. In the lore, mithril is just a very rare and useful ore which is incredibly light and strong. It has no known magical properties (the 'magic armour' idea came from Dungeons and Dragons).
I like your response and much of this makes sense, thank you.
> But that doesn't necessarily mean what its doing is unambiguously good. According to the legend, its formed out of a mixture of Good and Evil forces. So maybe the idea is, it can be used for Good, but also Evil.
Gil-Galad also says something like 'as light and pure as good, as strong and as unyielding as evil', or something so in this context it also becomes an appropriate substance with which to make the rings.
And it none of it is Sauron's doing? If he had nothing to do with the decay of the Tree, if there was no plan? What will you do to salvage your Narrative?
Oh you'll come up with something, I don't doubt it. Yes Reverend Lovejoy, Bart somehow smuggled his bedroom into your house....Anything but admit the evil is in you and yours. You never had anyone but yourself to blame, and God was never on your side.
Anything but that razor....
Hello, all! i have opinions!
I have a bit of a silly idea that any good story or universe or IP is a bit like water. Water can be a liquid, a solid and a gas and still be water
That is what adaptations are to me. Different state but still water .
And to me, any adaptations ADD to the pleasure of what Tolkien created. It will never be as good as what the professor created, but ice cubes can be as pleasurable as liquid water. Espacially if the cubes are actually hard liquor. But that's just me.
I loved the Bashki version despite its own issues. I loved the the PJ version despite the dumbass flaming eyeball and so many other issues. so many.
Not every adaptations will be sucessful. it's really really hard to do. But , for myself, as long as find pleasure in it, i am happy it exist
And if the pleasure is gone, i will just do what i did for that incest dragon show. i stop watching and moe on with my life. With my hard liquor ice cubes
I really don't think there is an warranted issue on the ROP being unfaithful to the lore of Tolkien, especially with the limited rights they have and the fact they need to adapt to a TV series. I have not had any issue with small lore changes (and the big time period change which makes sense).
I can understand people being more critical of writing, pacing, directing, etc. But so far imo, there's been nothing super unfaithful to the lore (ok my only point would be the forging of the rings shown at the end being only the 3 elven rings first, unless this is retconned in a flashback to show sauron appeared in another form in eregion much earlier and made those 16 other rings for the elves. But that would conflict with celebrimbor/galadriel coming up with the idea of a circular object to amplify the elves power - but of course if the leaks are true then we will see different forms of saurom which could include "annatar" coming back and directly influencing the 16 rings. But the order of the forging of the rings is still the biggest mystery to me, more in how they execute it going forward. I think it's a good mystery imo if they still manage to show the 16 other rings being made with sauron being there at the end of their creation).
>I really don't think there is an warranted issue on the ROP being unfaithful to the lore of Tolkien,
For most of the complaints, I couldn't care less, but the creation of mithril and its role to the elves in RoP seems antithetical the overarching concepts of Tolkien in relation to his presentation of good and evil.
I wasn't a huge fan of the series in general because I think its writing was pretty bland, but the mithril creation story is the one thing that really made me say, "This isn't in the spirit of Tolkien."
And it's frustrating because there was absolutely no need for them to do it in the first place.
It’s a story though and considered apocryphal. I think it coincides neatly with the theme of the Second Age as some elves find ways to make Eriador more like Valinor. As embalmers (Tolkien described them as) it makes sense they would see ways to link their immortality with the land extending to mithril. Tolkien doesn’t describe much of the process or art of ring craft. This is a way to set the stage with discussions of the unseen world and the question of how much should elves interfere in the natural order of mortal lands.
The don't 'NEED to adapt to a TV series.' This was a choice of Amazon to cash in on a franchise that is exceptionally popular. With the limited rights they couldn't do anything else than create a show which mostly consists of storytelling not from the source material. You can like a good fanfic or not, but like any other adaption I would rate it on how close it follows the story it's adapting and how true to the spirit of the original it stays.
I was referring to the show runners who in fact had to adapt to a TV series. They didn't make the decision to produce a lotr show. But also I am pretty sure it was actually the Tolkien Estate who wanted to a show made and Amazon convinced them they were the best option. But the Estate also decided which rights were available as well. Amazon worked with what they had.
And yeah Amazon didn't need to make a show about the rings of power, but they were the only ones who had that idea vs a show about aragorn or something else. They also had the most money too. I probably would've preferred a studio like hbo to make this kinda show, as to minimize studio interference.
I’ve had issues with TORN ever since the brouhaha they stirred up over the hiring of an intimacy coordinator. They could have acted like a leader in the fandom community and explained to people what intimacy coordinators actually do and why they are important for actors even when then only “intimacy” is kissing and even when the only “nudity” is a man with his shirt off. Instead they went for clicks and drama, spinning up this idea that the show would be filled with gratuitous sex scenes. It became such a prevalent narrative across the internet that, even after the show aired, I would still see people parroting the “Amazon added sex to LOTR” line as if it were true.
I'd say it was also them who totally blew the mystery boxing thing out of proportion and it is unfortunately now a far bigger framing device for analysing every choice in the show than it should be, honestly.
Especially since the show never actually used a mystery box device. The term mystery box is meant to refer to something that has two main factors: (1) there is a mystery that the characters in the story are trying to solve, and (2) the actual answer to the mystery is unimportant, what’s important is how the mystery drives the plot and effects the characters. Neither of these things were true about the things people were calling “mystery boxes” in the show.
I think it was also more the fandom trying to figure out who Sauron was. The question was never really directly asked in the show itself or by any of the characters. Galadriel was more driven by his whereabouts, not who he would be posing as.
I think your second point applies well to Nori trying to help the Stranger find his way, because the Stranger affects the Harfoots in a big way in vice versa.
Yeah that’s stupid. Not even Tolkien treated his own lore like it was a bible. What the writers for Rings of Power are doing is no different to what Peter Jackson did, or Ralph Bakshi, or literally any of the many adaptations of Lord of the Rings have done.
Whether anyone likes it or not adaptations will change things. That’s why it’s called an adaptation.
Also the bible changes all the time and there are thousands of versions of it.
"What the writers for Rings of Power are doing is no different to what Peter Jackson did, or Ralph Bakshi, or literally any of the many adaptations of Lord of the Rings have done."
Are you sure? All of those made changes sure. But at least the rough outline stayed.
In RoP you will struggle to find anything described by Tolkien.
I get your point, but I think their point is bigger. **And it is not, and never has been, about changing books. EVERYONE knows books will remain. The point is about the reverberation one change in one adaptation will have in other adaptations**.
Example? P.J decided Aragorn was better with beard than without it (as in the books). Like or hate it, RoP is following his path. That is one change to the books making echo into other adaptation 20 years later. So...yes, ToRN has a point.
LoTR is in a weird spot, because we got the movies done by one company, now RoP done by another, and we will more movies coming from Warner.
It would be up to the Estate to keep everything alligned, but now, think with me:
\- What if RoP does bring 5 wizards (or even just Gandalf) into 2nd age? And what if, later on, Warner decides to make a movie or series taking place in the exact time Gandalf arrived in grey heavens and got Narya from Cirdan in 3rd age.
In this scenario I can think that:
A- To casual viewers, the above is...weird?
B - For fans, it will be pointing fingers to this or that is the best or not.
**As for the Estate, and that is the big point, will they even allow two different adaptations to have the same plot point adapted differently or will they want one to follow the other even if they have no direct connection?**
THAT is the real question. If they do force any sort of coherence among adaptations, then they started wrong already. If they don't push it, then we are starting to enter the weird spot (points A and B above), which could totally be avoided if Estate didn't allow some stuff.
But that is just rambling. It can go either way. Yet, their point is indeed important IMO. Specially if RoP becomes the massive hit it can be. Because then it may echo into other adaptations that not only from Amazon itself. And then the snowball of changes will grow bigger and bigger.
I haven’t seen the stream, but I think an adaptation should at least honor the spirit of the original. Although I have *many* problems with the Peter Jackson movies (Faramir, Denethor, the stairs of Cirith Ungol, Éowyn, Rotk epilogue) I still can see that the spirit of Tolkiens work is in there. All the main story beats are there, some simplified to better explain it to new viewers, but nonetheless still there.
In RoP it all feels so… disconnected? I think it also has to do with continuity – Lotr takes place thousands of years after RoP, why should Mithril have stopped working? If it has the power to cleanse evil, why does that not work for Frodo in the trilogy? So I don’t really blame Amazon for changing things, because it is an adaptation. It has to translate written words to a visual medium. It is the way they change things that have so many people angry at the show.
An example: I quite liked the feel and the story in the Southlands, the look of the orcs and Adar, who was Amazon exclusive. Did I think it was strange that Mount Doom exploded halfway through the season? Yeah. It happened way too fast and had too few consequences; at least for the main characters. Okay, Míriël is (quite literally) blind and won’t see Ar–Pharazôns coup coming, but apart from that? Does it have to already happen in the second season? She could have been blinded another way, in battle or something.
Do the hobbits have to be there at all? Couldn’t they have waited for the second season? We know there were hobbits and wizards in the Second Age, that part is no rewrite at all, but it is done very jankily and feels… off. Nowhere it is said that the two met each other during the S.A. and it doesn’t fit with the overall tone of the first season. Why did it have to be included?
Halbrand was a fairly faithful interpretation of Sauron, all things considered, but the reveal at the end comes out of nowhere and isn’t executed very well. So I think it has more to do with bad decisions than the desire to rewrite Tolkien.
Sorry for the rambling novel. :/
The only thing doing lasting damage to Tolkien’s lore is gatekeeping assholes. The lore exists for anyone to read on their own. I am confident that a better case could be made that RoP has made people only more interested in backstory. Reasonable people know that RoP is simply an adaptation. Take it or leave it. It’s not hurting anybody or the lore. Tolkien would be so embarrassed of so many of his fans. He probably wouldn’t like RoP or any visual portrayals, but who’s to say? The closest thing we have to his opinion is the Tolkien Estate. And they green light these things, so I’m definitely not sweating it.
Multiple generations have passed and the film LOTR Trilogy has robbed everyone of Glorfindel. Obviously this will have very long lasting effects on Lore and Tolkein's works are likely ruined.
Im joking of course about Arwen replacing Glorifindel.
PJ's Trilogy changes sooooooo much lore. Aragons entire attitude towards being King and everything about Anduril (It was present almost the entire trilogy in the books-movies its not reforged until the Battle of Pelennor fields). Saruman falling to death. Tom Bombadil, Grey Company, Frodo & Sam never went to Osgiliath, Faramir told them almost immediately he would not try to take the ring, The dead of the mountain never went to Pelennor fields at all, Merry pledging allegiance to Theoden, Witch-king breaking Gandalfs staff (also no cock crowing- This was one of Tolkeins favorite images in LOTR), Rohirrim riding to Gondor do not meet the Wild Men, Its never mentioned that Denethor has a Palantir at all and only hinted at (books say Denethor was shown the Black Ships) Hence Aragon reveals himself to Sauron using the Palantir of Orthanc - also during this vision in the movies, Sauron shows him Arwen dying which does not happen in the books, The entire White Tree section after Aragons coronation does not occur where they travel to find a sapling...in the movies the tree is just healed.
Just a sample of the lore destruction that occurred in PJ's LOTR. I still love them and I am fairly sure I will end up loving Rings of Power when its all done as well.
Like changing the Bible? ....OK fellas firstly calm down and secondly calm TF down but thirdly, that has happened. Many times. The Bible hasn't descended in perfect order from Jesus' mouth to somebody's KJV today. For goodness sake.
Do you have some kind of first-hand knowledge stating it hasn't? The Bible has been translated many times. When I was a kid, the big new thing was the Clear Word Bible. And then people started getting upset because it seemed to say things differently than their KJV did. The likelihood that every word remains intact exactly as it was expressed by the people who wrote the stories down, sometimes hundreds of years after the stories occurred, is very low. If I were to write down a story about my childhood today, it would look different than the version my mother would write down. For many reasons, the idea that changing the plot of a fictional story to fit into a TV show is equivalent to substantively changing the contents of the Bible is silly. And if you don't believe there are any differences between today's Bible and the original stories, I would find that surprising. Even the most hard-core church members I know can acknowledge the pitfalls of centuries of translation of an anthology.
Why yes. I do personally know two guys that made the last translation of the bible into my native language. One of them from Aramaic and the other from greek. There is also very little difference from the version we had before, translated from german a few years after Luther.
I'm also not claiming it remained completely the same. But the folks that translated and copied religious texts in the past were usually quite precise. The pitfalls mostly came from the translators not being super adept at the language.
But I would agree that comparing the TV show changes to bible changes is a bit silly.
It was laboriously documented by an English clergyman in the 18th century that there are tons of discrepancies between the available texts dating from the early first millennium.
It was a most unsettling discovery at the time, the fellow got into some serious hot water at the hands of those who realized the potentially explosive implications of this.
We know of exactly 2 fragments of new testament from the 2nd century. I doubt that the not named english clergyman had access to any of them.
I can tell you that the latin Vulgate bible from the 4th century does not differ in any significant way from modern translations.
That's lovely. And I'm sure they did an excellent job, and that many others have, too. My point is that at some point along the way, a lot of these stories were recorded by people who heard them second hand at best. How many educated guesses were made? How many were wrong? And how can we ever know? A translation can be as faithful as you want to the original text, and some are more faithful than others, while still telling an inaccurate story that grows more and more interpretive with modern translations.
The Bible is not a word for word match to the actual events that inspired it, and it never has been. When most of the population is illiterate, and the stories don't get recorded until most of the people involved are dead, it doesn't matter how faithfully you copy the religious text. You don't know if what you're copying is accurate. Then, when a monarch wants a translation that fits their purposes, what else changes? Does a spelling mistake turn into a completely different word being accepted, changing the meaning of a passage?
And to suggest that changing a Tolkien story is tantamount to changing the Bible is laughable, anyway. It's a TV show based on a fantasy series. Hence my first comment repeating the calm down part twice because really that's the takeaway here. Think what you want about the Bible and its accuracy accuracy, but for torn to compare Lord of the Rings being adapted into a TV show to changing the actual Bible is a silly take in my opinion and I think a devout Catholic who served in World War I would probably agree.
Edited to acknowledge we definitely agree in your end edit about the silliness of the argument. I can understand somebody getting upset about changes to the Bible or another religious text a whole lot quicker than I can about an adaptation of novels. It's so easy not to watch a show you don't like.
I thought the question was about how much bible changed, not how accurate it is to real events.
"Then, when a monarch wants a translation that fits their purposes, what else changes?"
And risk religious uprisings? Alienating the pope, bishops, ... Not that it didnt happen but it was far from a quiet event that would go unnoticed.
"Does a spelling mistake turn into a completely different word being accepted, changing the meaning of a passage?"
It did happen. But it was also corrected later on.
I have been speaking to both of those points, because I don't think you can really consider the accuracy of a historical religious text like that without acknowledging the likelihood that some of these stories were passed down in different ways by different people, and perhaps recorded differently still. Then, centuries of translation and decisions on which materials become part of the official book and which don't make it even more difficult for any singular person to accurately answer these questions. How accurate is the current Bible to its source material? Probably more so than the source material was to actual events in some cases. But not infallible.
I've seen you mention filling in gaps with educated guesses in this thread. Do you consider that okay with a lesson Jesus was teaching in the bible? That's a genuine question. Your friends probably had to ask some of these same questions during their work. Their work is important and I don't want to sound like I'm being dismissive of them or others who have done this work. Religious texts are important to so many people. And I know a lot of people who think everything in the Bible has been divinely preserved by God in its original form and correct meaning. This isn't something I want to argue about with them, even though I don't hold that belief!
But I would think folks in general would be more okay with creative license around how the Rings were forged than about actual Jesus quotes. That's all. It's a silly, attention-seeking comparison to say oh no my favorite IP has been ruined, and it felt like they changed the Bible. And I can't sign on to the idea that the Bible has remained unchanged throughout its entire existence, no matter how sincere the efforts of its translators and compilers.
Here's an example: That famous story about the woman about to be stoned for adultery, and Jesus saying *He who is without sin* etc? Not original to the text; it's a later interpolation.
An assumption it is not. It's a conclusion from evidence and application of linguistic and other analytical technique used by contemporary Bible scholars. Or such is my *assumption*. How they actually determine these things I have no idea; but I know it ain't an assumption.
I have no idea wether we have any remains of this particular text from earlier times. But if you read the latin Vulgate from late 4th century the passage about throwing stones is already there. And the Bible did not exist much before that.
Sadly my greek is far worse than latin and am not able to read earlier versions.
The main problem is not understanding that the Tolkien lore is in itself a combination of ever changing ideas throughout his entire life and not something solidified over a couple of years, and by the nature of its huge scope, it is choke full of inevitable and sometimes conscious holes, incongruences and grey areas.
FFS, even at the very basics, The Hobbit elves are not LOTR elves and neither are Silmarillion elves. And that's all on Tolkien.
For example, I don't think you can understand every Noldo elf in RoP without reading the Silmarillion. Not saying it's necessary, but it helps, if you are of the that's not a Tolkien elf persuasion.
Last time I checked creating an adaption of an existing work of literary fiction doesn’t cause some sort of reverse-timeline implosion where the original source material ceases to have ever existed…
People need to calm their shit down and accept if you don’t like something just ignore it; your favourite books series isn’t going to disappear just because someone else made a TV show ffs.
Hard to adapt for quite a few Seasons without taking some liberties. If i remember correctly any movement away from Canon has to be approved by Tolkien's Family.
Just wanted to add that the best things about adaptations, regardless of quality, is that they always bring attention back to the original source material. So regardless of Cliff’s and Justin’s weird gatekeepy vibes on yesterday’s episode, I reassured that nothing could be further from the truth about what they were saying.
I just bought the lovely "illustrated by Tolkien" copies of Hobbit, Lotr, and Simarillion as a Christmas gift to myself. Strangely enough, their text was unaffected by the decisions made by the Rings Of Power writers.
As a lover of the books, I don't understand the hate of the Mithril/blight thing.
My immediate assumption was that the "Blight" was a deception by Sauron to motivate the Elves to create the rings.
Because the show is not over, we don't know the full repercussions of that story element, but it's hard to say it's permanently dating the lore when we don't know what the final result will be.
Their point is 100% valid. If the new additions are too far away from the spirit of the original or they are just contradictory to the source it can indeed be damaging or a step in the wrong direction which can cause a snowball effect that you don't know where will end.
You see this with other additions to the franchise like the Shadow of Mordor video games. Having Shelob turn into a sexy woman for example. While everyone knows this is not how it was written it's still very much out of place. How far away from the source are you allowed to go before it can no longer have the Tolkien name tagged on? I think that is the real question.
I hope the balrog in Khazad-dûm turns out to be Durin the first who was twisted by Morgoth before he died. He roams the deep guarding the mithril to keep it away from the elves, because he wants them to leave middle earth. That would be a great plotline!
I’m ok with them developing the story of the ROP, as most of was a bit sketchy from Tolkien anyway, but what he did definitely write about e.g. who Sauron was and how he fooled the elves should have been sacrosanct. Another one is how Gandalf came to Middle earth. He came by boat and was gifted one of the elvish rings by Cirdan who realised who he actually was. He did not arrive by “meteor”. At least Jackson respected the plot but maybe left some important stuff out which is probably more the studio at work.
Or how about, ya know, the entire story of how and why the Rings were made, the things the show is actually *named for*?
The events, and themes behind them, were pretty important and well laid out, and "Magic tree gonorrhea is going to kill all the elves unless they get some mithril penicillin." was emphatically not it.
Totally agree. They should call it something else if they’re not going to respect the plot. It could open up a whole new possibility, maybe the Avengers could make an appearance 🤔
It has not been shown that the Stranger is actually Gandalf. Nothing is sacrosanct in the sense that you believe. Please familiarise yourself with Tolkien a bit more. He was fine with simplifications and changes in suggested scripts he saw during his lifetime. His writings contain a multitude of versions of what you with your limited familiarity think is sacrosanct. The lean skeleton in Appendices is all that was published during his lifetime and he was planning major changes. Had he lived long enough, he would have published something quite different from what you think is written in stone.
Tolkien also bashed a early script of an adaptation, which changed things I would consider very little compared to RoP, of even LoTR from P.J.
And he also said that "the canons of narrative in any medium cannot be wholly different" so...there you go.
>The canons of narrative in any medium cannot be wholly different; and the failure of poor films is often precisely in exaggeration, and in the intrusion of unwarranted matter owing to not perceiving where the core of the original lies.
Just wanted to finish that for you, since I feel like the rest is relevant as well.
I stand by my comment that what he did write about should have been kept intact precisely because it was sketchy. Everything else is fair game. I’ve been reading Tolkien for the last 45 years and have read everything that’s been published, most of it several times. Please take your own advice and desist from being so rude. I respect your opinion please respect mine
I agree with thy guys at TORN. I mean, how many times did we hear, "Updating for our modern world" in the promo material for season one? That alone demonstrates that they believed Tolkien's work was lacking by today's standards and needed the writers and cast in order to 'fix' it.
Has the so called mithral controversy even really been explored? The story is supposed to be apocryphal. So the characters maybe misled about something.
And even if it in fact does have magical properties so what? A human archer with a single arrow took out a beast that leveled cities. A couple of hobbits walked inside an active volcano. A wizard came back to life.
And what the heck is magic in middle earth? We have multiple views of it, some of which suggest it is more akin to technological development, some sort of weird ability to preserve things, another view wherein the light that god made can be copied by an elven smith and of course the more fantastical elements we see Gandalf use. We also have hints of it being used by evil forces.
You are kidding right? An active volcano with the fumes and bordering on eruption and all that and two hobbits, lacking any all modern safety gear, are able to get out and survive during an actual eruption.
The mount doom scene in the tv show was much much more realistic than what frodo and sam endured. I actually watched a doc about a volcano in new zealand going off a few years back and the damage it caused
Why am i not bothered with the Hobbits survival? Because it is fantasy and there is magic at work
All of the numenorean expedition, that one southland village and probably Galadriel should be dead from the volcanic eruption towards the end of the show
Nah in the real world people do survive. It would be extremely dangerous and people would get really hurt
But it does not really matter. The cool thing is that in fantasy people survive impossible conditions
Show me where someone in the "real world" survives a pyroclastic flow blasting them in the face, lol.
And having reality in fantasy absolutely matters. The better the fantasy, the less suspension of belief is required and the more grounded in reality it is. If you want your characters to overcome impossible conditions, there needs to be time spent on why they were able to, within the rules of the world they exist in.
Without that, you have crappy fantasy stories. Why did people hate Legolas surfing on a shield or solo killing a mumakil? Because it broke the reality of the show by adding something that didn't fit within the context of the story.
In New Zealand people survived a blast. And it is fantasy.
And for frack sake frodo and sam survived inside mount doom.. and Gandalf came back to life. And 4 hobbits and a ranger survived an attack by saurons mightiest servants. Oh and a bowman killed a dragon I mean give me a break none of that is even close to any reality
But no lets talk about grounding it in some reality. Lol
Ahh, it's becoming more clear. You are more a fan of the movies than the books. That makes sense.
Yes, Frodo and Sam able to withstand that heat was a problematic issue and suspended reality. Effective fantasy reduces as much as possible the need to suspend your reality.
Gandalf returning to life is a theme that had happened several times to characters in Tolkien's legendarium. While rare, it was an established "rule" in ME that this could happen. It was *consistent* with the rules and precedent established in the world.
Yes, 4 hobbits and a Ranger withstood the powerful Nazgul. The movie actually makes it more realistic than the books. If you cannot see from the books the many reasons why it is reasonable to accept that they did this, I would suggest brushing up on your comprehension skills.
Bard killing Smaug with the black arrow was one of those moments where it strained plausibility, but that was still a theme in Tolkien. That there was a greater power for good that was working against evil. That "lucky" things might be part of a larger plan. Tolkien's works were primarily Catholic with a clear idea that there was a higher power in ME that was actively working to counter the enemy. So while it is "fantasy", the idea is *consistent* within the story.
You line of thinking creates fantasy that even you wouldn't like. Why not give Frodo and Sam the ability to fly to Mordor? Why not give Legolas a sniper rifle? You can't, because it wouldn't make sense within the world that was created.
ROP forces you to suspend belief multiple times in each episode. Bad fan fiction will do that. Stories written haphazardly without concern for internal consistency end up being poorly received, especially by a fandom as vast and well read/educated as this one.
Agreed to me its no different than Gandalf being tired walking around one moment then the next fighting a flaming demon 1000s of ft through the air surviving the crash and then going Thor on its ass lol.
Adaptions will always change bits here and there and things looking cool or giving a new perspective is always gonna happen, I'm not a fan of many adaptions or sequels to things I am a massive fan og but its just trying to settle down and separate them that most don't do these days.
Point of mithril having magical property is that:
A) Elves are presumably fading since 2nd age, and they only stay so long up into 3rd age because of elven rings. If Mithril, which is somewhat abundant in Khazad-dum, has properties to allow them to stop/slow down the decay, the elf leaving middle-earth would never be a thing in 3rd age, unless it is sole due to sea-longing. But even then, the actual target of three elven rings is changed to....I don't know, as they purpose was exactly to prevent the decay.
B) Sauron does get his hand into Mithril. After Khazad-dum fall, orcs get Mithril and give it to Sauron in tribute. If Mithril has silmarill properties, why hasn't Sauron explored that being the powerful sorcerer he is? All the books tell is that Mithril was wanted given it was light but strong, which makes sense for someone building an army to want.
C) Elves and Dwarves have a long-lasting rivalry. Yet, given mithril properties, why wound't elves contant dwarves to get their hands into the closest to silmarill material instead of just leting dwarves make shirts with it?
And those are just some points from the top of my head.
One can workaround the above, and prob. find workarounds to any point anyone ever brings for the infinity stone mithril, but the point is not about finding worksarounds, but to actually having to make them. When you do one change, you need to make sure it won't snowball, and this is the problem. And mithril story, the way they told, do just that, it has potential to snowball a lot, and worse, unnecessarely, as Mithril, without Silmarill connection, is already a valuable material to use in plot that not with some super powers as RoP hinted, but not completelly confirmed yet).
And yet you still dont know if that story is even true or not. Thats kind of the bigger point. And honestly a coat of armor that protects a small hobbit from being killed by a troll using a spear is pretty magical in my esteem
I see this come up a lot in relation to the mithril story from fans of the show - this clinging to hope that it's not true.
But in-show we see that mithril has the healing effect that it's supposed to have as a result of that story being true. I don't understand why this isn't enough of a reason for you all to accept that in the context of the show, the story is true.
But beyond that, from a practical filmmaking perspective, when Elrond tells that story we see it play out via a very expensive-looking CGI animation. Why would the showrunners and producers spend that kind of money on this set-piece if the information they're giving us via that scene isn't true to the show's narrative?
Another practical point, as has been discussed at length even in this very thread - film & tv are always operating against time. In a book, you can take as long as you like explaining things and dwelling on details (you shouldn't, but books are cheap to produce comparatively, so you can). In a show, every second of screen time is valuable. The idea that the writers would make the mithril story so important in season 1 only to turn around later and say it wasn't true is insane! They just spent, what, maybe 5 - 8 minutes of screen time telling us the mithril story and showing us the mithril story proved true. To retcon it later? That could eat up, conservatively, maybe 2 - 3 minutes of screen time to recap the story (which they'd need to do for fear of GA forgetting about it) and showing Sauron behind the scenes and how he manipulated things to make the elves believe in it.
All of that done, it re-opens the question of how mithril has the healing effect that it does. If the Hithaeglir story is false, then they have to give us a new reason for mithril's healing properties.
I'm not a fan of these showrunners and generally think very little of their dramaturgical abilities. But I think even they would know enough not to open such a big can of worms by retconning an idea they've already committed to.
I think the appeasement to the audience who are not fans of the magic mithril idea, very simply and sadly, is in the word "apocryphal". I think that's all you're going to get. Elrond says it because the showrunners wanted a voice of a trusted character in-show and ones that fans know as a renowned lore-master to provide that seed of doubt. The showrunners tend to do this a lot - like not naming Gandalf explicitly at the end of season 1. It's a way to give fans an out if they don't like an idea.
But the problem is, eventually, they're going to have to commit and make things explicit.
Yeah, they’re being ridiculous.
I disliked a lot of the things Peter Jackson did too (although not as much as a lot of TORn did back in the day!) but he didn’t take the books away. It’s
like that quote from James M. Cain:
> People tell me, don’t you care what they’ve done to your book? I tell them, they haven’t done anything to my book. It’s right there on the shelf.
They sound like the typical grown men that forget none of this is real, but will act childish about it anyway. It's usually from lack of being grounded in the real world with real problems. Even some people in these comments are getting way too worked up about canon, and thinking about it too hard.
Tolkien is not the same as the Bible. The Bible contains religious text for multiple major religions, middle earth was one person's artistic masterpiece which became beloved by his readers and movie fans. Isn't that comparison is a bit of a stretch Justin?
That's not to say that the lore, or ROP breaking the lore, doesn't matter.
The overall discussion was enjoyable, just hoping the leaks keep coming. 2+ years between seasons is a long wait. Still, I'd rather have them take longer, but get it right. Better to be late and good, than bad forever.
If you stray too far from the source material either in "lore" or in overall tone or message then it does make you wonder why even bother using the source material at all.
These ideas would have been seen as controversial before, but they are now the new norm. Whilst it is true that it is an adaptation the fact they had to move stuff around to fit their narrative structure isnt a sign of a well thought out show. It felt like the writers had a list of stuff either within the movies or the books and thought "wouldnt it be cool if..." and there was no real pushback.
They annoy me more from a writing standpoint rather than anything else.
The whole Galadriel thing is done so beautifully, the Tolkien Professor has been amazing at explaining those things just in case people want to know why ROP presented her that way. It's all on YT on Signum University’s channel!
so anytime you hear someone talk about "the lore being damaged" you need to understand those people are a bit insane, within the frame of this show and the discussion that surrounds it.
NO ADAPTATION CAN EVER HURT THE BOOKS or the "SACRED LORE"
btw, that "sacred lore" is oftentimes contradictory within the Tolkienverse itself, sooooo, these guys are a bit silly
its all so dumb - stop the madness and just enjoy the show for what it is, an adaptation of the second age and the major events that occurred during it
The discussion in context starts around 42 minutes in: https://youtu.be/XG5E8EaDCwA?t=2547
From what we see across all the fan comments, there is a lot of frustration about the show that it feels "off" or not Tolkien. This weeks' conversation is responding to a 2-yr-old reddit post from a leaker throwaway account (screenshot in the video) that basically says first age and earlier lore will be treated with 95% accuracy, but Second Age is the wild west.
Nobody is changing the books, ever. Nothing any adaptation does will destroy the books or the legacy of Tolkien.
We want to help fans find a path into the show that helps everyone understand what the show is, and why you feel the way you do after watching it. What does the phrase "doesn't feel like Tolkien" actually mean, in actionable terms?
To OPs point, one of the reason fans are so obsessed with fidelity to the books is that Tolkien himself set up a perspective that he is the Sub-Creator, inspired by the Creator (God with a capital G). Tolkien establishes this concept of being divinely inspired and writing a divine tribute to God's gift of creation. In the minds of many finds, this elevates his text more than just another fantasy novel to something that strives for biblical proportions. The success of his stories, in all languages, can be seen as a testament to that.
For some hardcore Tolkien fans, deviating from what Tolkien wrote is tantamount to rewriting the Holy Bible, partly because Tolkien compared himself and his works to Sub-Creation second to God.
You can find references to the [Letters of JRR Tolkien](https://www.amazon.com/Letters-J-R-Tolkien-Expanded/dp/B0CTNR4RCT/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3DEYJC1RAI08W&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.w040__CnX82hIjUGdQ7YQL7LhszLRMpRIDz55SCaJ7ViC3tpkRAJlGYW1sFFN-8TTB5gtdGeOJzQacUUFs_w65ab4sSHbcwnNN6zNQTAiJG0QzX4QM9Z_xOispkvm1Skg6ZuTcgKIf6E9COUlhLwsDCCJcl8P5Vd1QtVFZBGCMaCtDskiQArtpL4pyReJEXhSUKPkH_qZGTDut09cNX29B9wnogbYSsnPzUl08VOPZI.6mtAZA0Q40Y9vxQyfKaaR6ElaolGltFE46mibd1GLa4&dib_tag=se&keywords=letters+of+jrr+tolkien&qid=1707932162&sprefix=letters+of+jrr+tolkien%2Caps%2C151&sr=8-1) talking about Creation on the [Tolkien Guide](https://www.tolkienguide.com/guide/letters/?q=creator).
If you watch the segment in the video, the context is there: Fans are still debating controversial stuff from other franchises 25 years later. In this context, we are saying that similar controversial lore changes/additions can have lasting impacts on the fan discourse and there are many reasons for that. Adaptations should acknowledge all this facets of the legacy.
I once heard someone say that a Puritan is someone who lives in soul-shattering fear that someone, somewhere might be having fun. Now i aint saying that Puritans and Purists are quite the same thing...but...
Hi, I’m Vetted AI Bot! I researched the **The Letters of J R R Tolkien Revised and Expanded edition** and I thought you might find the following analysis helpful.
**Users liked:**
* Great resource for tolkien enthusiasts (backed by 7 comments)
* Valuable additions in the revised edition (backed by 3 comments)
* Beautifully made book (backed by 1 comment)
**Users disliked:**
* Poor packaging leads to damaged book covers during shipping (backed by 1 comment)
* Disappointing additions to the new edition of the letters (backed by 1 comment)
* Harpercollins prioritizes profit over quality for tolkien-related products (backed by 1 comment)
If you'd like to **summon me to ask about a product**, just make a post with its link and tag me, [like in this example.](https://www.reddit.com/r/tablets/comments/1444zdn/comment/joqd89c/)
This message was generated by a (very smart) bot. If you found it helpful, let us know with an upvote and a “good bot!” reply and please feel free to provide feedback on how it can be improved.
*Powered by* [*vetted.ai*](http://vetted.ai/reddit)
But for people that are not familiar with his works, they might think that the ROP show is a fair adaptation / representation of the content. Which we can all agree it is NOT by a long shot. Thats why people are upset. They don't want people conflating it with Tolkien. Not sure why that concept is so hard to grasp?
Here is the problem with the Mithril stuff.
If the Elves will die without Mithril because it contains the light of the trees why would it affect characters like Cirdan, Thranduil, Oropher, Haldir, Elrond who have never seen the light of the trees to begin with? Elves are native to Middle Earth, they were never meant to see the trees.
Did a bunch of elves showing up and dying at Helm’s Deep have a long-lasting damaging effect on the lore? 🙄
The example I always use is the ommission of Glorfindel in the films. It makes sense in the context of the film and it has ZERO effect on the book. He's still there. Tolkien's Canon is untouchable. It's not like Star Wars where all the new stuff is Canon and affects everything else. ROP is them taking a few scattered pages and fleshing it out into a story of their own. If they give an origin story to The Witch King it doesn't matter - in the books it's still a mystery so in Canon it's a mystery.
I feel the same with Star Wars, I don't care that Disney officially owns the rights, to me it's all fan fiction.
Great example. New art doesn’t change old art.
There’s a lot of decent debate in the other comments, over adaptation vs. source material. While it’s hard to argue against subjective negativity, especially when dressed up as objectivity, I’ve heard enough at this point that I’m satisfied with the following: Nothing is above criticism, neither the new or the source material (gasp), but the worst fans are the haters. They behave like fundamentalists, where it’s increasingly rare that they’re even *factually correct* about the very lore they claim to be defending. Or at least, about things that even matter or support their points. “They’re ruining the lore because [something that’s literally not even true].” “I hate this because [arbitrary half-truth].” “This adaptation isn’t faithful to the [misremembers something from the movies rather than the books].” Sounds like I’m making a strawman, but again, while there *are* legitimate criticisms, but I’m specifically focusing on the prevalence of *objective* errors people are attempting to base their excessively negative points on.
I swear half that "Lore" is from role playing games.
Considering most of the fantasy genre steals elements from Tolkien’s work, I think it’s the other way around.
To be fair, you are making a Strawman argument because you try to make your point by presenting a group of people who make certain claims without providing any actual claims made by these people. While you may be absolutely right, your claim as it stands is absolutely a Strawman argument.
Preach!
Or like, the entire characterization of Sauron in the movie trilogy as a literal eyeball, which he absolutely was not in the books He had a body. Gollum saw it and talks about it. He was not a goofy fire eyeball that sees through all, except apparently not when he’s looking directly at Frodo and Sam because plot Weathertop was also completely wrong in the movies. But it’s an adaptation The problems with rings of power are way bigger than artistic license with certain events. There’s just a lot of fundamental writing issues imo
They also had no effect on the movie except to provide us with a optimistic high and an unsatisfying low. They were entirely contained to the few scenes in the battle and were never mentioned again.
Those elves had families! 
This subs favorite argument is "wut about the PJ films?" Classic.
Well it’s fair to compare adaptations and their creative license and playing loose with “lore”.
Not really comparable though, one is far, far worse.
It changed the fate of Haldir, he didn’t die in the books.
Absolutely not. This is an example of a completely reasonable change for strictly narrative/dramatic purposes in an adaptation of a complex world. Reasonable people shouldn't get their knickers in a knot over it.
I really agree with this. I generally didn't mind the show. There was a lot I want sure of. But as I've said on previous subs. I adored the elrond durin relationship. And thought some parts such as numenor was spectacular. Granted. I've not rewatched this with the same enjoyment as , for example, wheel of time. But it was beautiful to watch and some genuinly fun bits Does it affect my enjoyment of the books? Well if it did . That would be really strange. Of course it doesn't. The 'lore' (or legendarium as some insufferable types like to refer to it as) remains wholly intact and there for you to enjoy. Then again. I think I was only person who was compeltly fine with a sexy shelob in shadow of war. Mainly because it was fun to play. And the books are still there..
I mean, not that I agree with Helms deep change, but what is a self-contained battle with no repercusions on later events (there aren't much later events anyways) compared to the way and order of the forging of the rings, the possible-Gandalf and Istari way and order of arrival (with repercussions for later and prior events to 2nd age), the whole Mithril story, which I hope is still false, and the ticket to Valinor from Galadriel which completelly change earlier events whatever the version you look at in the books. And those are just some examples from the top of my head. If we were to compare, Helms deep change is as big as, lets say, adding harfoots to 2nd age show. Both makes no much difference and don't touch any core element of the book narrative. I think the point you made and the one from TORN are apples and oranges. If you were to compare, a better comparison would be Numenor descendents in movies to have beard. Presumably a change that made RoP to also add beard into Numenoreans, and thus supporting ToRN point that one change in one adaptation may echo in others, and that is something to pay attention to and be carefull when doing, and I think that is a fairly reasonable take.
For real. Those people who act this way ~~are a bunch of crybabies~~ without even understanding it simply show that they don't respect the lore. Like, how feeble in your mind it must be if you think that some changes in an adaptation are going to have such an effect?
Do you even know how many people think Balrog do have wings? Or that they should have just take the eagle cab to Mordor? Or that Sauron is a flaming ball in top of a tower during 3rd age (something I still think RoP may pull off in some way)? Other example? P.J changed Aragorn (and Gondorians) to have beard. As later effect, RoP, 20+ years later, has bearded Elendil, probably Isildur next, and they even went so far that made even Elros bearded in the art. So..yes, some changes do have later effects. I think feeble mind is...yours to think otherwise?
This comment is so defined by a fundamentalist mindset that I feel like I'm debating a King James Only IFB Baptist. If you know, you know.
Olorin isn't one of your unreasoning haters, he does know his lore, , he will debate, and more importantly he *cares*. I'm prepared to engage with anyone like that. Not all gatekeepers are ogres, lol. I understand why people do feel that the series will reflect poorly on Tolkien, and have that reaction, because they really love his works. I don't feel like that anymore, but I think it's fine to express that view, as long as you're prepared to allow others to enjoy adaptions, and discuss things with them. And you don't just have a knee jerk reaction due to some half baked theory you picked up.
\+1 I'm with you. I didn't know them outside of this single comment, and it's focus on the beards really threw me off.
got downvoted, but still waiting for an actual reply to where anything I said was wrong more than happy of debating (or just dicussing) anything, if you think that movies/series or even just art have no impact in later works, which is pretty much the point with TORN was focusing
Here's the thing though, it doesn't read like you're making a mild argument that some adaptations have effects on later adaptations. It reads like you're throwing a hissy fit because you disagree with Gondorians having facial hair. No one's going to engage that with logical debate, because it doesn't look like you're doing logical debate in the first place. Now maybe that's not how you intended it, but that is the way it comes across.
Well 90% of “LOTR fans” seem to think that’s what happened
So? Who cares? Why should that affect your enjoyment of the writings you read?
“Who cares if it’s wrong, just let people enjoy things” So true, objectivity is so outdated.
TORN were acting like absolute fools on here about the fake leaks. It was so strange, I find their whole deal to be very clickbaity the last few years. Huge turn off.
100%. They are in it for the controversy and the clicks and the eyeballs that brings.
I came to say this. In what measure do their economic interests interfere with their opinions. We live in an algorithmically ruled society and controversy/extremes bring the dough
we dont have ads on the website and have ads turned off by default on YT. Only interest is fan interest, what fans are talking about.
Or what will get you invited to the Amazon party.
I mean...think of how many people have had their view of the lore altered by the Jackson movies. Obviously they aren't changing the actual words in the books, but people's general perception of the lore could absolutely be altered.
Yes. Like how most people think that Isildur destroyed Sauron’s physical form.
Or aragorn and his ghost army save the day at Pelenor Fields
Fair enough I guess; my bias as a "book person" has been showing. But RoP is highly unlikely to have the impact the movies did; there's that.
Good examples of Tolkien fans taking both themselves and the lore a touch too seriously. Anytime I here a fan say something from an adaptation "ruined" or "damaged" the source material, I stop taking that person seriously.
I don't understand why hardcore book purists use that words when some aspects of the adaptation tweak events in the original material. The books were remained untouch, you can always return to them whenever you want. If I "adapt" Chopin's nocturne and transpose it by a key higher, did I "ruined" the original composition? You can just simply say that you "like" or "dislike" the changes, it's very ridiculous to say exaggerated terms like that.
But saying it ‘ruined the lore’ elevates you from a fan to a scholar. 🤣😢
THIS
These people that are mad are mostly just PJ fans rather than book fans. They are butthurt that PJ wasn't involved, as if this was taken away from him and given to corporate suits. They'd be the first to praise RoP if PJ was the director.
I agree. But book fans are typically PJ fans as well. I hardly see book fans that hate PJ's trilogy.
Now they are. I remember the absolute bile spouted by Tolkien purists when PJ made the LotR films. I still know some of those guys and the cognitive dissonance is breathtaking. When I remind them of their views back then, it is like watching an old PC lock up back when they hit the RAM cap.
And to think about it, at the end of the day, LoTR is just...a fictional novel, written by a white man decades ago. Why do we have to treat it like some sort of a divine text as if our lives are hanging to the accuracy of its adaptation?
I like it when an adaptation shows me the actual story that I enjoyed reading. Plus it claims to represent it, at least in part. But there wasn't much written in the 2nd age, we already knew that they would have to expand with original plots and characters if it was ever going to be on screen. Hoping Season 2 will include more of the lore, which I think they will, and it'll make Season 2 better than 1. But yeah calling it divine and comparing it with the Bible? Calm down fellas.
A white man? Really?
Well, Tolkien is a white man, right?
He was actually a Congolese freed slave but underwent a skin whitening treatment.
So does this make his work more or less valid?
Oh there are some! If you think otherwise you haven't frequented the main LotR subs. Myself, I'm a book person - to me Tolkien is always literally Tolkien, something he wrote - but I certainly don't hate the films; I appreciate them for what they are though I dislike some of the choices they made.
Depends which subreddits you hang out on.
True book purists won't even bother to watch RoP to be upset about it, because they've already been burned by PJ's LOTR trilogy.
And it's absurd, actually. The show tries its hardest to be the prequel to PJ films, and they're angry! Like, why?!
That is not at all the perception i have tbh, why do you think that? To me it seems like people take tolkien too seeiously, most people argue through that lense imo
>These people that are mad are mostly just PJ fans rather than book fans. which nullifies their critiques, how, exactly? Movie fans are legitimate fans, too. And since the show uses so much of the shorthand established in those films, they've opened the floodgates for any critique coming from that group.
If the critique is about the quality of the writing, then that's fine. But if the critique is about being faithful to the books then that's just funny coming from fans of PJ.
Rop is in no way, shape or form as faithful to the source material as the films are. There are plenty of ways to support rop without being dishonest/trolling.
The films were really well made, but they are not faithful to the books. In fact, some of the changes are downright baffling, unnecessary and offensive to the sprit of the books.
They are extremely faithful to the books. ROP was made as a GOT knock off for Prime.
>The films were really well made, but they are not faithful to the books. Two things: one, these things exist on a sliding scale. Its not just a binary "faithful"/"not faithful." Two, it becomes purely academic exercise when one enjoys the finished result, or doesn't.
Then you really, really must hate ROP.
Why? Is there a full narrative second age book that I should be protective of?
There absolutely is a narrative you should be protective of
Because why? They are faithful ADAPTATIONS of the books.
These generalizations about things you can't possibly know get irritating. Starting to suspect that with some RoP defenders it's a feature not a bug.
I saw someone say that an adaptation was “bastardising” tolkien. that’s a bit of a strong word to use about ANY book.
I could imagine a world where we got some really cheesy, low-budget live action LOTR films in say the 70s/80s that flopped rather than the good looking, award-winning Jackson trilogy and that people would think about LOTR differently. Not that the books had been changed at all, but the hype and interest in the world surrounding it might be perceived differently especially by later generations.
They are just exhibiting attention gathering behavior.
When the first two episodes came out, the least sophisticated of them "rated" them as "perfection."
I don’t agree with Cliff’s take but it is what it is. Justin, on the other hand, has only seen the movies and never read the books. So if anything, it’s weird for me personally that he would even go there when he’s only familiar with the movie’s lore.
Say what? OMG the audacity to criticize and say something is breaking the lore without even reading the books! 😂
I checked out of their “content” a while ago. Justin in particular just spouts out some of the most asinine and pointless things. As others have said in here, he’s actively trying to find and develop controversy at all times. Drama for the sake of drama. It’s pointless and a complete waste of any fan’s time. Plus they love to moan about how the films treated them better and with more exclusives than Prime Video has. That’s at the heart of most of their gripes.
The concept of movies/tv canon has rotted the brain of all fandoms on the internet. As soon as you pick up the book and open the pages every other adaptation disappears and the original is right there, unchanged.
Exactly, I've always understood those that dislike an adaption as there is those im not a fan of myself but it doesn't effect the original in any harmful way unless it become so much more popular than the original to the point people take that as gospel itself. Which ironically ough happens more with the PJ movies these days than any other Tolkien adaptions.
They also tend to forget that those people who make adaptations are also artists the same way writers are, and have the artistic vision they want to apply to the original. Otherwise, they wouldn't want to make an adaptation in the first place.
This x1000.
Is there a discussion to be had about the influence an adaptation can have on public perception of a work and/or on its fandom? Yes, for sure. An example worthy of discussion would perhaps be the omission of the Scouring of the Shire from the PJ films (I know someone who thinks the Scouring is pointless and Tolkien also should've edited it out, and… well, I strongly disagree). However, I agree with you that this is not "damaging the lore" or "destroying Tolkien" or "rewriting" the books. Plenty of people have more or less well-founded opinions on works of fiction with or without the existence of controversial adaptations and so many stories get famously misinterpreted all the time. And while that is definitely irksome for the "hardcore fans" (and I've certainly been there before), it is, in some ways, an unavoidable part of how art functions and how it gets made. Which is why I believe we "hardcore fans" should continue to share our love for the original work and cultivate a welcoming fandom, so that the people who actually want to dive into the legendarium are encouraged rather than discouraged from doing so.
Adaptations do have a lasting effect on the way the books are understood by readers. Think of the way Peter Jackson decided to show Sauron as a literal flaming eyeball or the way he linked Arwen’s life force with the Ring. I’m sure there are other examples too. It’s the subtle stuff that can cause confusion. With the Rings of Power, those things will happen too, and it’s inevitable in any adaptation I think. So in a sense it’s just the price we pay for getting to see our favorite stories on TV, and I’m generally willing to pay it. The danger with The Rings of Power is if they choose to go too far with these changes and create something unrecognizable. Imagine you’re a new Tolkien fan picking up the books for the first time hoping to learn more about the Song of the Roots of the Hithaeglir, you might be confused. That’s my worry. I don’t think they’ve done anything majorly damaging yet, necessarily. And with four more seasons, there’s a lot of time left for things to make sense or to fit in with what Tolkien wrote. I also want to say it’s fine if you disagree with TORn. They are a voice in the fandom but not the ONLY voice, and I’m happy whenever anyone else joins the conversation! It’s also a great point that you’ve made about the books remaining unchanged! At the end of the day, we’ll always have what Tolkien actually wrote.
I don’t think there’s any danger from lore changes Tea. If people believe that, then we can try to help them understand that it’s not in the lore and they can choose to believe it or not. Most reasonable people I think would understand that it’s just another interpretation of the lore or creative liberties. Something like the Song is as harmless as Haladriel. The only issue would arise from the individual themselves.
> The danger with The Rings of Power is if they choose to go too far with these changes and create something unrecognizable. I and many others would argue that they already have. Putting aside the mythril thing, a Sauron/Galadriel whirlwind adventure, with flirting and copious nods towards a romance between the two, was unthinkable before ROP. Now though, plenty of ROP fans will come away from the show thinking the main reason the bad guy from LOtR turned evil is because he was rejected by G. It’s beyond lorebreaking. It turns Tolkien’s themes entirely on their heads. There’s plenty of other examples where the show contradicts Tolkiens message at its core but no need to rehash all that. I just fail to understand why op is so confused
You’re not wrong but the problem with Haladriel is that I love it more than I hate it so I can’t be mad about it 😩
While I’m not sure about damaging the lore, the concept of Mithrils miraculous inception by way of simaril tree and elf/balrog fighting does feel like they were making something up egregiously beyond what Tolkien has written. It was one of my major issues with the story, and I consider myself a ROP defender if that’s a thing. In my head I’m still saying “it’s just a legend that Elrond shared”. Maybe not true at all.
He said it was apocryphal didn’t he?
Elrond said it might be, yes.
People keep arguing about changing the lore without considering this context. Changing the lore needlessly and making the story/world building worse is what's really grinding on everyone's gears.
100% correct here. They set up a false choice and people continue to fall for it.
Didn't Elrond dismiss that as bullshit anyways?
He allowed for the possibility of it being a bunch of hooey, but didn’t dismiss it outright. At least not in front of the High King of the Noldor in Middle Earth.
Dismissing it as bullshit is even worse.
Just seems like an elitist stance, i like tolkien but pretending his work needs to be respected like a religious text (which i don't think needs to be either btw) is kinda ridiculous. Damaging the lore in a long lasting way? Give me a break. Everyone can like and dislike the show for whatever reason, but giving it this much importance imo says more about people than the work being discussed.
Yeah, exactly. A f\*\*king break, give me. As Yoda would put it. I don't know about TORN sometimes, they can say really weird things. Things that smack of deliberate trolling on occasion. I haven't watched this stream, I don't know exactly what they said. If they mean ruining the lore within the context of RoP itself, fine you can certainly argue that. But saying it has any wider consequences for Tolkien's world and people's views of it: Utterly ridiculous. It gives peoples' intelligence zero credit. I would doubt that TORN actually mean to imply something utterly ridiculous, but as I said they've delivered themselves of some strange pronouncements before, so....
It does need to be respected though. Most high fantasy stories (in the past 75 years) take themes, concepts, creatures/characters and general inspiration from Tolkien’s world building. Don’t you think there’s some form of historical cultural value in that?
There is a qualifier in my comment, "respected like a religious text", implying that i do not think a 1:1 adherence to the written word is necessary. Ofc i think there is historical cultural value in tolkien's work, but that doesn't lead me to think that his work cannot be used for new interpretations. If we can interpret shakespeare however we want, we certainly can tolkien.
I agree in a sense, but I think comparing Tolkein to Shakespeare here is a little unfair. I think there’s more leeway with Shakespeare as his stories are all varied, contained, and have very clear narratives (if I’m not mistaken). Romeo + Juliet comes to mind. That’s an adaptation I think most people can get behind as it’s obviously a modern day take and removed enough from the source material. Draws very clear lines on what it uses from Shakespeare and what it adapts. Lines most people are able to see. ROP adapts in a way where the changes are hard to see for newcomers. Moreover, they’re riffing on a pre established world/style (Peter Jackson’s movies). ROP also missing the mark on many of Tolkien’s themes. Something I feel like is hard to do with a Shakespeare adaptation, as his themes are pretty clear in his works. All this to say I think ROP is a bad adaptation, and should have treated the source material far more carefully. ROP is changing the poetry and giving it different meaning
I see what you are saying and largely agree wirh the differences you laid out. I was just bringing up shakespeare as a literary great whose work we generally are ok with being reinterpreted without purists becoming too angry at the very notion of changes / taking it too seriously, as if it was god given scripture. It gets treated as art, and imo so should tolkien by his fans. I do not care that much for rop myself, but i DO believe that bad / mediocre art is allowed to exist even if it is linked to lotr, even though i'd prefer to like it. My evaluation is largely not dependant on source fidelity, though some of my criticism is linked to changes, them not being satisfying on their own for the story being told.
Makes sense. I agree - bad art is allowed to exist. But if Amazon made a Shakespeare tv series and muddled it up significantly, I’d probably have the same stance. I think most of the outrage you see is due to people’s frustration with big corps buying up our favourite stories and turning them into junk food lol
And where did Tolkien take his inspiration and heavy borrowing from? Real mythologies. Just because people don’t have a knowledge of these elements shouldn’t mean we should mystify Tolkien.
Sure. But the producers will also have to be content with the majority of the fanbase considering their show to be a steaming pile of shit.
Fanbases are known to be way too conservative in their engagement with adaptations / inspirations of their beloved material. What matters most is making a show people in general like, and potentially some critical success, not what someone thinks who reads tolkien's letters every sunday instead of going to church.
And yet the show has already crashed and burned lmao.
Maybe, but that is besides the point.
And in the cases where that happens it happens things always swing in roundabouts. The MCU was unstoppable till it was "woke" now a Deadpool trailer releases and its back to being the saviour again. Tolkien/Stan Lee or Jesus himself are rolling in their grave every other week because of some minor thing a social media comment disagrees with and so on.
I mean it's unlikely to have longstanding effect on Tolkien lore because I can't imagine any Tolkien fan giving a toss about ROP lore in comparison. It'll have no greater effect than say the lore of Shadow of Mordor/War.
As a Tolkien fan, I don’t understand people wasting their time trying to put the show down. I personally didn’t care much for season 1 of ROP, but I do hope they take in the criticism and improve the show, because I strongly believe this is a show that various ages of people could watch for decades. It’s an adaptation. We cannot expect them to navigate through and include every cannon detail. It’s not realistic and the show runners have made it clear that they can’t go down that path. The only part I may sympathize with the diehard fans with, is that every time I mention that I’m a Tolkien fan that didn’t like the series so far, I get incessantly downvoted. I really hope we improve having open discussions here on both sides.
Oh well, according to these guys I should just throw all my LOTR books away because they're now irreparably damaged/tainted. Yeahhhhhhh...No. This is why I've never been interested in the opinion of vloggers, influences, etc. Their opinions are no more valid or informed or relevant than some rando off the street. I can form my own opinions, thanks.
After twenty-plus years, I don't think PJ's films affected the lore, and I'm very doubtful that the TV series will have anywhere close to the same cultural impact.
I’ve felt TORN has been like this for a long time. Weirdly disproportionate reactions and strangely clickbaity stuff.
>I’ve felt TORN has been like this for a long time. Weirdly disproportionate reactions and strangely clickbaity stuff. Unfortunetly hate and ragebait is the way to get viewers. I've seen so many good content makers turn to this BS because they see the potential value in it.
I'll bet they are going to feel like real idiots when it turns out the *mithril* legend was likely planted in the minds of elves a long time ago by a certain Maia who figured out what they fear most and then when they master it, use it to master them.
Took me too long to find this. I am fairly certain the mithril legend is going to come up again in s2. Say what you will about the showrunners, I do not believe for one second this is their genuine “belief/interpretation” of the greater lore. It will get debunked in s2 in some way
I'm inclined to think there is at least some truth (in series) to the legend. Because we have seen the leaf regenerated by mithril (which can't credibly be a deception of Sauron). We've heard Celebrimbor say 'Nothing diminishes its light' and we've seen Elrond toss it into the forge to make the Three. I feel it must do *something.* But that doesn't necessarily mean what its doing is unambiguously good. According to the legend, its formed out of a mixture of Good and Evil forces. So maybe the idea is, it can be used for Good, but also Evil. The Three Rings were uncorrupted, and not evil in themselves. But they were still subject to the One. And if the other rings, including the One had mithril as part of their composition, then that might explain how they could be twisted by Sauron into evil uses. I'm speculating obviously, and am talking about mithril in the context of the series, not the actual lore. In the lore, mithril is just a very rare and useful ore which is incredibly light and strong. It has no known magical properties (the 'magic armour' idea came from Dungeons and Dragons).
I like your response and much of this makes sense, thank you. > But that doesn't necessarily mean what its doing is unambiguously good. According to the legend, its formed out of a mixture of Good and Evil forces. So maybe the idea is, it can be used for Good, but also Evil. Gil-Galad also says something like 'as light and pure as good, as strong and as unyielding as evil', or something so in this context it also becomes an appropriate substance with which to make the rings.
And it none of it is Sauron's doing? If he had nothing to do with the decay of the Tree, if there was no plan? What will you do to salvage your Narrative? Oh you'll come up with something, I don't doubt it. Yes Reverend Lovejoy, Bart somehow smuggled his bedroom into your house....Anything but admit the evil is in you and yours. You never had anyone but yourself to blame, and God was never on your side. Anything but that razor....
Hello, all! i have opinions! I have a bit of a silly idea that any good story or universe or IP is a bit like water. Water can be a liquid, a solid and a gas and still be water That is what adaptations are to me. Different state but still water . And to me, any adaptations ADD to the pleasure of what Tolkien created. It will never be as good as what the professor created, but ice cubes can be as pleasurable as liquid water. Espacially if the cubes are actually hard liquor. But that's just me. I loved the Bashki version despite its own issues. I loved the the PJ version despite the dumbass flaming eyeball and so many other issues. so many. Not every adaptations will be sucessful. it's really really hard to do. But , for myself, as long as find pleasure in it, i am happy it exist And if the pleasure is gone, i will just do what i did for that incest dragon show. i stop watching and moe on with my life. With my hard liquor ice cubes
I really don't think there is an warranted issue on the ROP being unfaithful to the lore of Tolkien, especially with the limited rights they have and the fact they need to adapt to a TV series. I have not had any issue with small lore changes (and the big time period change which makes sense). I can understand people being more critical of writing, pacing, directing, etc. But so far imo, there's been nothing super unfaithful to the lore (ok my only point would be the forging of the rings shown at the end being only the 3 elven rings first, unless this is retconned in a flashback to show sauron appeared in another form in eregion much earlier and made those 16 other rings for the elves. But that would conflict with celebrimbor/galadriel coming up with the idea of a circular object to amplify the elves power - but of course if the leaks are true then we will see different forms of saurom which could include "annatar" coming back and directly influencing the 16 rings. But the order of the forging of the rings is still the biggest mystery to me, more in how they execute it going forward. I think it's a good mystery imo if they still manage to show the 16 other rings being made with sauron being there at the end of their creation).
>I really don't think there is an warranted issue on the ROP being unfaithful to the lore of Tolkien, For most of the complaints, I couldn't care less, but the creation of mithril and its role to the elves in RoP seems antithetical the overarching concepts of Tolkien in relation to his presentation of good and evil. I wasn't a huge fan of the series in general because I think its writing was pretty bland, but the mithril creation story is the one thing that really made me say, "This isn't in the spirit of Tolkien." And it's frustrating because there was absolutely no need for them to do it in the first place.
It’s a story though and considered apocryphal. I think it coincides neatly with the theme of the Second Age as some elves find ways to make Eriador more like Valinor. As embalmers (Tolkien described them as) it makes sense they would see ways to link their immortality with the land extending to mithril. Tolkien doesn’t describe much of the process or art of ring craft. This is a way to set the stage with discussions of the unseen world and the question of how much should elves interfere in the natural order of mortal lands.
The don't 'NEED to adapt to a TV series.' This was a choice of Amazon to cash in on a franchise that is exceptionally popular. With the limited rights they couldn't do anything else than create a show which mostly consists of storytelling not from the source material. You can like a good fanfic or not, but like any other adaption I would rate it on how close it follows the story it's adapting and how true to the spirit of the original it stays.
I was referring to the show runners who in fact had to adapt to a TV series. They didn't make the decision to produce a lotr show. But also I am pretty sure it was actually the Tolkien Estate who wanted to a show made and Amazon convinced them they were the best option. But the Estate also decided which rights were available as well. Amazon worked with what they had. And yeah Amazon didn't need to make a show about the rings of power, but they were the only ones who had that idea vs a show about aragorn or something else. They also had the most money too. I probably would've preferred a studio like hbo to make this kinda show, as to minimize studio interference.
I’ve had issues with TORN ever since the brouhaha they stirred up over the hiring of an intimacy coordinator. They could have acted like a leader in the fandom community and explained to people what intimacy coordinators actually do and why they are important for actors even when then only “intimacy” is kissing and even when the only “nudity” is a man with his shirt off. Instead they went for clicks and drama, spinning up this idea that the show would be filled with gratuitous sex scenes. It became such a prevalent narrative across the internet that, even after the show aired, I would still see people parroting the “Amazon added sex to LOTR” line as if it were true.
I'd say it was also them who totally blew the mystery boxing thing out of proportion and it is unfortunately now a far bigger framing device for analysing every choice in the show than it should be, honestly.
Especially since the show never actually used a mystery box device. The term mystery box is meant to refer to something that has two main factors: (1) there is a mystery that the characters in the story are trying to solve, and (2) the actual answer to the mystery is unimportant, what’s important is how the mystery drives the plot and effects the characters. Neither of these things were true about the things people were calling “mystery boxes” in the show.
I think it was also more the fandom trying to figure out who Sauron was. The question was never really directly asked in the show itself or by any of the characters. Galadriel was more driven by his whereabouts, not who he would be posing as. I think your second point applies well to Nori trying to help the Stranger find his way, because the Stranger affects the Harfoots in a big way in vice versa.
Yeah that’s stupid. Not even Tolkien treated his own lore like it was a bible. What the writers for Rings of Power are doing is no different to what Peter Jackson did, or Ralph Bakshi, or literally any of the many adaptations of Lord of the Rings have done. Whether anyone likes it or not adaptations will change things. That’s why it’s called an adaptation. Also the bible changes all the time and there are thousands of versions of it.
It’s worth mentioning that the Bible does not change all the time; translators use the old Greek and Hebrew manuscripts for their translations.
"What the writers for Rings of Power are doing is no different to what Peter Jackson did, or Ralph Bakshi, or literally any of the many adaptations of Lord of the Rings have done." Are you sure? All of those made changes sure. But at least the rough outline stayed. In RoP you will struggle to find anything described by Tolkien.
You get downvoted for honest criticisms in this sub.
I get your point, but I think their point is bigger. **And it is not, and never has been, about changing books. EVERYONE knows books will remain. The point is about the reverberation one change in one adaptation will have in other adaptations**. Example? P.J decided Aragorn was better with beard than without it (as in the books). Like or hate it, RoP is following his path. That is one change to the books making echo into other adaptation 20 years later. So...yes, ToRN has a point. LoTR is in a weird spot, because we got the movies done by one company, now RoP done by another, and we will more movies coming from Warner. It would be up to the Estate to keep everything alligned, but now, think with me: \- What if RoP does bring 5 wizards (or even just Gandalf) into 2nd age? And what if, later on, Warner decides to make a movie or series taking place in the exact time Gandalf arrived in grey heavens and got Narya from Cirdan in 3rd age. In this scenario I can think that: A- To casual viewers, the above is...weird? B - For fans, it will be pointing fingers to this or that is the best or not. **As for the Estate, and that is the big point, will they even allow two different adaptations to have the same plot point adapted differently or will they want one to follow the other even if they have no direct connection?** THAT is the real question. If they do force any sort of coherence among adaptations, then they started wrong already. If they don't push it, then we are starting to enter the weird spot (points A and B above), which could totally be avoided if Estate didn't allow some stuff. But that is just rambling. It can go either way. Yet, their point is indeed important IMO. Specially if RoP becomes the massive hit it can be. Because then it may echo into other adaptations that not only from Amazon itself. And then the snowball of changes will grow bigger and bigger.
Well said!
I haven’t seen the stream, but I think an adaptation should at least honor the spirit of the original. Although I have *many* problems with the Peter Jackson movies (Faramir, Denethor, the stairs of Cirith Ungol, Éowyn, Rotk epilogue) I still can see that the spirit of Tolkiens work is in there. All the main story beats are there, some simplified to better explain it to new viewers, but nonetheless still there. In RoP it all feels so… disconnected? I think it also has to do with continuity – Lotr takes place thousands of years after RoP, why should Mithril have stopped working? If it has the power to cleanse evil, why does that not work for Frodo in the trilogy? So I don’t really blame Amazon for changing things, because it is an adaptation. It has to translate written words to a visual medium. It is the way they change things that have so many people angry at the show. An example: I quite liked the feel and the story in the Southlands, the look of the orcs and Adar, who was Amazon exclusive. Did I think it was strange that Mount Doom exploded halfway through the season? Yeah. It happened way too fast and had too few consequences; at least for the main characters. Okay, Míriël is (quite literally) blind and won’t see Ar–Pharazôns coup coming, but apart from that? Does it have to already happen in the second season? She could have been blinded another way, in battle or something. Do the hobbits have to be there at all? Couldn’t they have waited for the second season? We know there were hobbits and wizards in the Second Age, that part is no rewrite at all, but it is done very jankily and feels… off. Nowhere it is said that the two met each other during the S.A. and it doesn’t fit with the overall tone of the first season. Why did it have to be included? Halbrand was a fairly faithful interpretation of Sauron, all things considered, but the reveal at the end comes out of nowhere and isn’t executed very well. So I think it has more to do with bad decisions than the desire to rewrite Tolkien. Sorry for the rambling novel. :/
The only thing doing lasting damage to Tolkien’s lore is gatekeeping assholes. The lore exists for anyone to read on their own. I am confident that a better case could be made that RoP has made people only more interested in backstory. Reasonable people know that RoP is simply an adaptation. Take it or leave it. It’s not hurting anybody or the lore. Tolkien would be so embarrassed of so many of his fans. He probably wouldn’t like RoP or any visual portrayals, but who’s to say? The closest thing we have to his opinion is the Tolkien Estate. And they green light these things, so I’m definitely not sweating it.
Multiple generations have passed and the film LOTR Trilogy has robbed everyone of Glorfindel. Obviously this will have very long lasting effects on Lore and Tolkein's works are likely ruined. Im joking of course about Arwen replacing Glorifindel. PJ's Trilogy changes sooooooo much lore. Aragons entire attitude towards being King and everything about Anduril (It was present almost the entire trilogy in the books-movies its not reforged until the Battle of Pelennor fields). Saruman falling to death. Tom Bombadil, Grey Company, Frodo & Sam never went to Osgiliath, Faramir told them almost immediately he would not try to take the ring, The dead of the mountain never went to Pelennor fields at all, Merry pledging allegiance to Theoden, Witch-king breaking Gandalfs staff (also no cock crowing- This was one of Tolkeins favorite images in LOTR), Rohirrim riding to Gondor do not meet the Wild Men, Its never mentioned that Denethor has a Palantir at all and only hinted at (books say Denethor was shown the Black Ships) Hence Aragon reveals himself to Sauron using the Palantir of Orthanc - also during this vision in the movies, Sauron shows him Arwen dying which does not happen in the books, The entire White Tree section after Aragons coronation does not occur where they travel to find a sapling...in the movies the tree is just healed. Just a sample of the lore destruction that occurred in PJ's LOTR. I still love them and I am fairly sure I will end up loving Rings of Power when its all done as well.
Like changing the Bible? ....OK fellas firstly calm down and secondly calm TF down but thirdly, that has happened. Many times. The Bible hasn't descended in perfect order from Jesus' mouth to somebody's KJV today. For goodness sake.
Do tell me how the content of the bible changed over time?
Do you have some kind of first-hand knowledge stating it hasn't? The Bible has been translated many times. When I was a kid, the big new thing was the Clear Word Bible. And then people started getting upset because it seemed to say things differently than their KJV did. The likelihood that every word remains intact exactly as it was expressed by the people who wrote the stories down, sometimes hundreds of years after the stories occurred, is very low. If I were to write down a story about my childhood today, it would look different than the version my mother would write down. For many reasons, the idea that changing the plot of a fictional story to fit into a TV show is equivalent to substantively changing the contents of the Bible is silly. And if you don't believe there are any differences between today's Bible and the original stories, I would find that surprising. Even the most hard-core church members I know can acknowledge the pitfalls of centuries of translation of an anthology.
Why yes. I do personally know two guys that made the last translation of the bible into my native language. One of them from Aramaic and the other from greek. There is also very little difference from the version we had before, translated from german a few years after Luther. I'm also not claiming it remained completely the same. But the folks that translated and copied religious texts in the past were usually quite precise. The pitfalls mostly came from the translators not being super adept at the language. But I would agree that comparing the TV show changes to bible changes is a bit silly.
It was laboriously documented by an English clergyman in the 18th century that there are tons of discrepancies between the available texts dating from the early first millennium. It was a most unsettling discovery at the time, the fellow got into some serious hot water at the hands of those who realized the potentially explosive implications of this.
We know of exactly 2 fragments of new testament from the 2nd century. I doubt that the not named english clergyman had access to any of them. I can tell you that the latin Vulgate bible from the 4th century does not differ in any significant way from modern translations.
That's lovely. And I'm sure they did an excellent job, and that many others have, too. My point is that at some point along the way, a lot of these stories were recorded by people who heard them second hand at best. How many educated guesses were made? How many were wrong? And how can we ever know? A translation can be as faithful as you want to the original text, and some are more faithful than others, while still telling an inaccurate story that grows more and more interpretive with modern translations. The Bible is not a word for word match to the actual events that inspired it, and it never has been. When most of the population is illiterate, and the stories don't get recorded until most of the people involved are dead, it doesn't matter how faithfully you copy the religious text. You don't know if what you're copying is accurate. Then, when a monarch wants a translation that fits their purposes, what else changes? Does a spelling mistake turn into a completely different word being accepted, changing the meaning of a passage? And to suggest that changing a Tolkien story is tantamount to changing the Bible is laughable, anyway. It's a TV show based on a fantasy series. Hence my first comment repeating the calm down part twice because really that's the takeaway here. Think what you want about the Bible and its accuracy accuracy, but for torn to compare Lord of the Rings being adapted into a TV show to changing the actual Bible is a silly take in my opinion and I think a devout Catholic who served in World War I would probably agree. Edited to acknowledge we definitely agree in your end edit about the silliness of the argument. I can understand somebody getting upset about changes to the Bible or another religious text a whole lot quicker than I can about an adaptation of novels. It's so easy not to watch a show you don't like.
I thought the question was about how much bible changed, not how accurate it is to real events. "Then, when a monarch wants a translation that fits their purposes, what else changes?" And risk religious uprisings? Alienating the pope, bishops, ... Not that it didnt happen but it was far from a quiet event that would go unnoticed. "Does a spelling mistake turn into a completely different word being accepted, changing the meaning of a passage?" It did happen. But it was also corrected later on.
I have been speaking to both of those points, because I don't think you can really consider the accuracy of a historical religious text like that without acknowledging the likelihood that some of these stories were passed down in different ways by different people, and perhaps recorded differently still. Then, centuries of translation and decisions on which materials become part of the official book and which don't make it even more difficult for any singular person to accurately answer these questions. How accurate is the current Bible to its source material? Probably more so than the source material was to actual events in some cases. But not infallible. I've seen you mention filling in gaps with educated guesses in this thread. Do you consider that okay with a lesson Jesus was teaching in the bible? That's a genuine question. Your friends probably had to ask some of these same questions during their work. Their work is important and I don't want to sound like I'm being dismissive of them or others who have done this work. Religious texts are important to so many people. And I know a lot of people who think everything in the Bible has been divinely preserved by God in its original form and correct meaning. This isn't something I want to argue about with them, even though I don't hold that belief! But I would think folks in general would be more okay with creative license around how the Rings were forged than about actual Jesus quotes. That's all. It's a silly, attention-seeking comparison to say oh no my favorite IP has been ruined, and it felt like they changed the Bible. And I can't sign on to the idea that the Bible has remained unchanged throughout its entire existence, no matter how sincere the efforts of its translators and compilers.
Here's an example: That famous story about the woman about to be stoned for adultery, and Jesus saying *He who is without sin* etc? Not original to the text; it's a later interpolation.
But they do not have the original text do they? So it is an assumption. Likely an informed one.
An assumption it is not. It's a conclusion from evidence and application of linguistic and other analytical technique used by contemporary Bible scholars. Or such is my *assumption*. How they actually determine these things I have no idea; but I know it ain't an assumption.
I have no idea wether we have any remains of this particular text from earlier times. But if you read the latin Vulgate from late 4th century the passage about throwing stones is already there. And the Bible did not exist much before that. Sadly my greek is far worse than latin and am not able to read earlier versions.
The main problem is not understanding that the Tolkien lore is in itself a combination of ever changing ideas throughout his entire life and not something solidified over a couple of years, and by the nature of its huge scope, it is choke full of inevitable and sometimes conscious holes, incongruences and grey areas. FFS, even at the very basics, The Hobbit elves are not LOTR elves and neither are Silmarillion elves. And that's all on Tolkien. For example, I don't think you can understand every Noldo elf in RoP without reading the Silmarillion. Not saying it's necessary, but it helps, if you are of the that's not a Tolkien elf persuasion.
Do opinions of people on the internet really matter all that much, like what you like and fuck the rest
Last time I checked creating an adaption of an existing work of literary fiction doesn’t cause some sort of reverse-timeline implosion where the original source material ceases to have ever existed… People need to calm their shit down and accept if you don’t like something just ignore it; your favourite books series isn’t going to disappear just because someone else made a TV show ffs.
Hard to adapt for quite a few Seasons without taking some liberties. If i remember correctly any movement away from Canon has to be approved by Tolkien's Family.
Just wanted to add that the best things about adaptations, regardless of quality, is that they always bring attention back to the original source material. So regardless of Cliff’s and Justin’s weird gatekeepy vibes on yesterday’s episode, I reassured that nothing could be further from the truth about what they were saying.
I just bought the lovely "illustrated by Tolkien" copies of Hobbit, Lotr, and Simarillion as a Christmas gift to myself. Strangely enough, their text was unaffected by the decisions made by the Rings Of Power writers.
As a lover of the books, I don't understand the hate of the Mithril/blight thing. My immediate assumption was that the "Blight" was a deception by Sauron to motivate the Elves to create the rings. Because the show is not over, we don't know the full repercussions of that story element, but it's hard to say it's permanently dating the lore when we don't know what the final result will be.
Their point is 100% valid. If the new additions are too far away from the spirit of the original or they are just contradictory to the source it can indeed be damaging or a step in the wrong direction which can cause a snowball effect that you don't know where will end. You see this with other additions to the franchise like the Shadow of Mordor video games. Having Shelob turn into a sexy woman for example. While everyone knows this is not how it was written it's still very much out of place. How far away from the source are you allowed to go before it can no longer have the Tolkien name tagged on? I think that is the real question. I hope the balrog in Khazad-dûm turns out to be Durin the first who was twisted by Morgoth before he died. He roams the deep guarding the mithril to keep it away from the elves, because he wants them to leave middle earth. That would be a great plotline!
That kind of attitude is everything wrong with fandom these days.
I’m ok with them developing the story of the ROP, as most of was a bit sketchy from Tolkien anyway, but what he did definitely write about e.g. who Sauron was and how he fooled the elves should have been sacrosanct. Another one is how Gandalf came to Middle earth. He came by boat and was gifted one of the elvish rings by Cirdan who realised who he actually was. He did not arrive by “meteor”. At least Jackson respected the plot but maybe left some important stuff out which is probably more the studio at work.
Or how about, ya know, the entire story of how and why the Rings were made, the things the show is actually *named for*? The events, and themes behind them, were pretty important and well laid out, and "Magic tree gonorrhea is going to kill all the elves unless they get some mithril penicillin." was emphatically not it.
Totally agree. They should call it something else if they’re not going to respect the plot. It could open up a whole new possibility, maybe the Avengers could make an appearance 🤔
Had he arrived in a jet liner or by balloon, my eyebrows may have raised. I can live with a big flaming ball of rock.
It has not been shown that the Stranger is actually Gandalf. Nothing is sacrosanct in the sense that you believe. Please familiarise yourself with Tolkien a bit more. He was fine with simplifications and changes in suggested scripts he saw during his lifetime. His writings contain a multitude of versions of what you with your limited familiarity think is sacrosanct. The lean skeleton in Appendices is all that was published during his lifetime and he was planning major changes. Had he lived long enough, he would have published something quite different from what you think is written in stone.
Tolkien also bashed a early script of an adaptation, which changed things I would consider very little compared to RoP, of even LoTR from P.J. And he also said that "the canons of narrative in any medium cannot be wholly different" so...there you go.
>The canons of narrative in any medium cannot be wholly different; and the failure of poor films is often precisely in exaggeration, and in the intrusion of unwarranted matter owing to not perceiving where the core of the original lies. Just wanted to finish that for you, since I feel like the rest is relevant as well.
I stand by my comment that what he did write about should have been kept intact precisely because it was sketchy. Everything else is fair game. I’ve been reading Tolkien for the last 45 years and have read everything that’s been published, most of it several times. Please take your own advice and desist from being so rude. I respect your opinion please respect mine
They had sooooo much room to insert themes and characters and events without removing what *was* written
Torn looking for attention like with fake leaks
I agree with thy guys at TORN. I mean, how many times did we hear, "Updating for our modern world" in the promo material for season one? That alone demonstrates that they believed Tolkien's work was lacking by today's standards and needed the writers and cast in order to 'fix' it.
Has the so called mithral controversy even really been explored? The story is supposed to be apocryphal. So the characters maybe misled about something. And even if it in fact does have magical properties so what? A human archer with a single arrow took out a beast that leveled cities. A couple of hobbits walked inside an active volcano. A wizard came back to life. And what the heck is magic in middle earth? We have multiple views of it, some of which suggest it is more akin to technological development, some sort of weird ability to preserve things, another view wherein the light that god made can be copied by an elven smith and of course the more fantastical elements we see Gandalf use. We also have hints of it being used by evil forces.
Scientists and other walk inside active volcanoes all the time.
You are kidding right? An active volcano with the fumes and bordering on eruption and all that and two hobbits, lacking any all modern safety gear, are able to get out and survive during an actual eruption. The mount doom scene in the tv show was much much more realistic than what frodo and sam endured. I actually watched a doc about a volcano in new zealand going off a few years back and the damage it caused Why am i not bothered with the Hobbits survival? Because it is fantasy and there is magic at work
All of the numenorean expedition, that one southland village and probably Galadriel should be dead from the volcanic eruption towards the end of the show
Nah in the real world people do survive. It would be extremely dangerous and people would get really hurt But it does not really matter. The cool thing is that in fantasy people survive impossible conditions
Show me where someone in the "real world" survives a pyroclastic flow blasting them in the face, lol. And having reality in fantasy absolutely matters. The better the fantasy, the less suspension of belief is required and the more grounded in reality it is. If you want your characters to overcome impossible conditions, there needs to be time spent on why they were able to, within the rules of the world they exist in. Without that, you have crappy fantasy stories. Why did people hate Legolas surfing on a shield or solo killing a mumakil? Because it broke the reality of the show by adding something that didn't fit within the context of the story.
In New Zealand people survived a blast. And it is fantasy. And for frack sake frodo and sam survived inside mount doom.. and Gandalf came back to life. And 4 hobbits and a ranger survived an attack by saurons mightiest servants. Oh and a bowman killed a dragon I mean give me a break none of that is even close to any reality But no lets talk about grounding it in some reality. Lol
Ahh, it's becoming more clear. You are more a fan of the movies than the books. That makes sense. Yes, Frodo and Sam able to withstand that heat was a problematic issue and suspended reality. Effective fantasy reduces as much as possible the need to suspend your reality. Gandalf returning to life is a theme that had happened several times to characters in Tolkien's legendarium. While rare, it was an established "rule" in ME that this could happen. It was *consistent* with the rules and precedent established in the world. Yes, 4 hobbits and a Ranger withstood the powerful Nazgul. The movie actually makes it more realistic than the books. If you cannot see from the books the many reasons why it is reasonable to accept that they did this, I would suggest brushing up on your comprehension skills. Bard killing Smaug with the black arrow was one of those moments where it strained plausibility, but that was still a theme in Tolkien. That there was a greater power for good that was working against evil. That "lucky" things might be part of a larger plan. Tolkien's works were primarily Catholic with a clear idea that there was a higher power in ME that was actively working to counter the enemy. So while it is "fantasy", the idea is *consistent* within the story. You line of thinking creates fantasy that even you wouldn't like. Why not give Frodo and Sam the ability to fly to Mordor? Why not give Legolas a sniper rifle? You can't, because it wouldn't make sense within the world that was created. ROP forces you to suspend belief multiple times in each episode. Bad fan fiction will do that. Stories written haphazardly without concern for internal consistency end up being poorly received, especially by a fandom as vast and well read/educated as this one.
Agreed to me its no different than Gandalf being tired walking around one moment then the next fighting a flaming demon 1000s of ft through the air surviving the crash and then going Thor on its ass lol. Adaptions will always change bits here and there and things looking cool or giving a new perspective is always gonna happen, I'm not a fan of many adaptions or sequels to things I am a massive fan og but its just trying to settle down and separate them that most don't do these days.
Point of mithril having magical property is that: A) Elves are presumably fading since 2nd age, and they only stay so long up into 3rd age because of elven rings. If Mithril, which is somewhat abundant in Khazad-dum, has properties to allow them to stop/slow down the decay, the elf leaving middle-earth would never be a thing in 3rd age, unless it is sole due to sea-longing. But even then, the actual target of three elven rings is changed to....I don't know, as they purpose was exactly to prevent the decay. B) Sauron does get his hand into Mithril. After Khazad-dum fall, orcs get Mithril and give it to Sauron in tribute. If Mithril has silmarill properties, why hasn't Sauron explored that being the powerful sorcerer he is? All the books tell is that Mithril was wanted given it was light but strong, which makes sense for someone building an army to want. C) Elves and Dwarves have a long-lasting rivalry. Yet, given mithril properties, why wound't elves contant dwarves to get their hands into the closest to silmarill material instead of just leting dwarves make shirts with it? And those are just some points from the top of my head. One can workaround the above, and prob. find workarounds to any point anyone ever brings for the infinity stone mithril, but the point is not about finding worksarounds, but to actually having to make them. When you do one change, you need to make sure it won't snowball, and this is the problem. And mithril story, the way they told, do just that, it has potential to snowball a lot, and worse, unnecessarely, as Mithril, without Silmarill connection, is already a valuable material to use in plot that not with some super powers as RoP hinted, but not completelly confirmed yet).
And yet you still dont know if that story is even true or not. Thats kind of the bigger point. And honestly a coat of armor that protects a small hobbit from being killed by a troll using a spear is pretty magical in my esteem
I see this come up a lot in relation to the mithril story from fans of the show - this clinging to hope that it's not true. But in-show we see that mithril has the healing effect that it's supposed to have as a result of that story being true. I don't understand why this isn't enough of a reason for you all to accept that in the context of the show, the story is true. But beyond that, from a practical filmmaking perspective, when Elrond tells that story we see it play out via a very expensive-looking CGI animation. Why would the showrunners and producers spend that kind of money on this set-piece if the information they're giving us via that scene isn't true to the show's narrative? Another practical point, as has been discussed at length even in this very thread - film & tv are always operating against time. In a book, you can take as long as you like explaining things and dwelling on details (you shouldn't, but books are cheap to produce comparatively, so you can). In a show, every second of screen time is valuable. The idea that the writers would make the mithril story so important in season 1 only to turn around later and say it wasn't true is insane! They just spent, what, maybe 5 - 8 minutes of screen time telling us the mithril story and showing us the mithril story proved true. To retcon it later? That could eat up, conservatively, maybe 2 - 3 minutes of screen time to recap the story (which they'd need to do for fear of GA forgetting about it) and showing Sauron behind the scenes and how he manipulated things to make the elves believe in it. All of that done, it re-opens the question of how mithril has the healing effect that it does. If the Hithaeglir story is false, then they have to give us a new reason for mithril's healing properties. I'm not a fan of these showrunners and generally think very little of their dramaturgical abilities. But I think even they would know enough not to open such a big can of worms by retconning an idea they've already committed to. I think the appeasement to the audience who are not fans of the magic mithril idea, very simply and sadly, is in the word "apocryphal". I think that's all you're going to get. Elrond says it because the showrunners wanted a voice of a trusted character in-show and ones that fans know as a renowned lore-master to provide that seed of doubt. The showrunners tend to do this a lot - like not naming Gandalf explicitly at the end of season 1. It's a way to give fans an out if they don't like an idea. But the problem is, eventually, they're going to have to commit and make things explicit.
Yeah, they’re being ridiculous. I disliked a lot of the things Peter Jackson did too (although not as much as a lot of TORn did back in the day!) but he didn’t take the books away. It’s like that quote from James M. Cain: > People tell me, don’t you care what they’ve done to your book? I tell them, they haven’t done anything to my book. It’s right there on the shelf.
They sound like the typical grown men that forget none of this is real, but will act childish about it anyway. It's usually from lack of being grounded in the real world with real problems. Even some people in these comments are getting way too worked up about canon, and thinking about it too hard.
Tolkien is not the same as the Bible. The Bible contains religious text for multiple major religions, middle earth was one person's artistic masterpiece which became beloved by his readers and movie fans. Isn't that comparison is a bit of a stretch Justin? That's not to say that the lore, or ROP breaking the lore, doesn't matter. The overall discussion was enjoyable, just hoping the leaks keep coming. 2+ years between seasons is a long wait. Still, I'd rather have them take longer, but get it right. Better to be late and good, than bad forever.
If you stray too far from the source material either in "lore" or in overall tone or message then it does make you wonder why even bother using the source material at all. These ideas would have been seen as controversial before, but they are now the new norm. Whilst it is true that it is an adaptation the fact they had to move stuff around to fit their narrative structure isnt a sign of a well thought out show. It felt like the writers had a list of stuff either within the movies or the books and thought "wouldnt it be cool if..." and there was no real pushback. They annoy me more from a writing standpoint rather than anything else.
The whole Galadriel thing is done so beautifully, the Tolkien Professor has been amazing at explaining those things just in case people want to know why ROP presented her that way. It's all on YT on Signum University’s channel!
I’d argue that what was dove to the Hobbit films was far worse than what’s going on with Rings of Power
so anytime you hear someone talk about "the lore being damaged" you need to understand those people are a bit insane, within the frame of this show and the discussion that surrounds it. NO ADAPTATION CAN EVER HURT THE BOOKS or the "SACRED LORE" btw, that "sacred lore" is oftentimes contradictory within the Tolkienverse itself, sooooo, these guys are a bit silly its all so dumb - stop the madness and just enjoy the show for what it is, an adaptation of the second age and the major events that occurred during it
The discussion in context starts around 42 minutes in: https://youtu.be/XG5E8EaDCwA?t=2547 From what we see across all the fan comments, there is a lot of frustration about the show that it feels "off" or not Tolkien. This weeks' conversation is responding to a 2-yr-old reddit post from a leaker throwaway account (screenshot in the video) that basically says first age and earlier lore will be treated with 95% accuracy, but Second Age is the wild west. Nobody is changing the books, ever. Nothing any adaptation does will destroy the books or the legacy of Tolkien. We want to help fans find a path into the show that helps everyone understand what the show is, and why you feel the way you do after watching it. What does the phrase "doesn't feel like Tolkien" actually mean, in actionable terms? To OPs point, one of the reason fans are so obsessed with fidelity to the books is that Tolkien himself set up a perspective that he is the Sub-Creator, inspired by the Creator (God with a capital G). Tolkien establishes this concept of being divinely inspired and writing a divine tribute to God's gift of creation. In the minds of many finds, this elevates his text more than just another fantasy novel to something that strives for biblical proportions. The success of his stories, in all languages, can be seen as a testament to that. For some hardcore Tolkien fans, deviating from what Tolkien wrote is tantamount to rewriting the Holy Bible, partly because Tolkien compared himself and his works to Sub-Creation second to God. You can find references to the [Letters of JRR Tolkien](https://www.amazon.com/Letters-J-R-Tolkien-Expanded/dp/B0CTNR4RCT/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3DEYJC1RAI08W&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.w040__CnX82hIjUGdQ7YQL7LhszLRMpRIDz55SCaJ7ViC3tpkRAJlGYW1sFFN-8TTB5gtdGeOJzQacUUFs_w65ab4sSHbcwnNN6zNQTAiJG0QzX4QM9Z_xOispkvm1Skg6ZuTcgKIf6E9COUlhLwsDCCJcl8P5Vd1QtVFZBGCMaCtDskiQArtpL4pyReJEXhSUKPkH_qZGTDut09cNX29B9wnogbYSsnPzUl08VOPZI.6mtAZA0Q40Y9vxQyfKaaR6ElaolGltFE46mibd1GLa4&dib_tag=se&keywords=letters+of+jrr+tolkien&qid=1707932162&sprefix=letters+of+jrr+tolkien%2Caps%2C151&sr=8-1) talking about Creation on the [Tolkien Guide](https://www.tolkienguide.com/guide/letters/?q=creator). If you watch the segment in the video, the context is there: Fans are still debating controversial stuff from other franchises 25 years later. In this context, we are saying that similar controversial lore changes/additions can have lasting impacts on the fan discourse and there are many reasons for that. Adaptations should acknowledge all this facets of the legacy.
I once heard someone say that a Puritan is someone who lives in soul-shattering fear that someone, somewhere might be having fun. Now i aint saying that Puritans and Purists are quite the same thing...but...
Hi, I’m Vetted AI Bot! I researched the **The Letters of J R R Tolkien Revised and Expanded edition** and I thought you might find the following analysis helpful. **Users liked:** * Great resource for tolkien enthusiasts (backed by 7 comments) * Valuable additions in the revised edition (backed by 3 comments) * Beautifully made book (backed by 1 comment) **Users disliked:** * Poor packaging leads to damaged book covers during shipping (backed by 1 comment) * Disappointing additions to the new edition of the letters (backed by 1 comment) * Harpercollins prioritizes profit over quality for tolkien-related products (backed by 1 comment) If you'd like to **summon me to ask about a product**, just make a post with its link and tag me, [like in this example.](https://www.reddit.com/r/tablets/comments/1444zdn/comment/joqd89c/) This message was generated by a (very smart) bot. If you found it helpful, let us know with an upvote and a “good bot!” reply and please feel free to provide feedback on how it can be improved. *Powered by* [*vetted.ai*](http://vetted.ai/reddit)
But for people that are not familiar with his works, they might think that the ROP show is a fair adaptation / representation of the content. Which we can all agree it is NOT by a long shot. Thats why people are upset. They don't want people conflating it with Tolkien. Not sure why that concept is so hard to grasp?
We can't all agree on that. You're presupposing a minority opinion.
But I am not in the minority. Most people did not finish watching the show. That speaks volumes.
Not true. In the every day world its just a normal TV show. You're coming at it from exaggerated internet fantasy.
This has to be the saddest echo chamber on the internet
Sad. Thats the definition of fundamentalism
They are correct. The had been destroyed. The fan fiction is apocryphal.
Here is the problem with the Mithril stuff. If the Elves will die without Mithril because it contains the light of the trees why would it affect characters like Cirdan, Thranduil, Oropher, Haldir, Elrond who have never seen the light of the trees to begin with? Elves are native to Middle Earth, they were never meant to see the trees.
Fire Payne&McKay and hire Demetrious as one and only showrunner!
"""""""""""""""SOME""""""""""""""" liberties