He even wrote poem for fallen one
Culture Marxists Coming to Ruin Tolkien
- Thread starter Aldarion
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He even wrote poem for fallen one
f1onagher
Well-known member
I figured this was inevitable the moment Christopher was no longer around to protect his father's legacy. That being said, does anyone here remember the woke Discworld series BBC made last year? No? Me neither. Also, remember how quickly the final season flop of GoT utterly cleansed popular culture of its colon clog? And hey, are those MCU tv series outperforming their movie counterparts?
Things are popular for a reason and altering them leads to flat nothing burgers that are promptly discarded and forgotten. If the mental inbreds in Hollywood think they can mutilate Tolkien for the sake of a quick buck... well maybe they'll get the buck, but the cultural legacy will be lucky to make it as deep as GoT.
Things are popular for a reason and altering them leads to flat nothing burgers that are promptly discarded and forgotten. If the mental inbreds in Hollywood think they can mutilate Tolkien for the sake of a quick buck... well maybe they'll get the buck, but the cultural legacy will be lucky to make it as deep as GoT.
Aldarion
Neoreactionary Monarchist
I don't think it is just about the quick buck, though. These mental inbreds are Marxists, which means that a conservative, Christian tale like Tolkien's, is essentially a personal insult for them.
Indeed.They are like soviets - thanks to my family i knew how they behaved.They must destroy what they do not stole,and when they could not destroy,they shit on it.
Those poor idiots are just neosoviets.Or rather orcs.Tolkien do not wrote about fall of Gondor,becouse it included people behaving like orcs.Just like in our times.
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Wild songs from 1841 - out of many other poems there,Der Spielman/The Fiddler/ wrote about his pact with satan.
Later,at least two other poems - Invocation of One in despair and the Pale Maiden - atlhought there he only wrote that he is going to hell.
So I saw this on the Social Medias so of course it was archived.
Comic Book Resources (CBR.com) last October 22nd released an article titled '10 Ways Lord of the Rings Aged Poorly" with the archived link below.
There's no real anachronistic arguments in the article btw, it's just general whining. Unless CBR.com honestly things that modern fiction and entertainment doesn't have plot cul-de-sacs, characters that lack "agency" and minor characters that only show up for short periods of time... much less stories that have "slow starts." But anyways... here's the list:
10. Tolkien Has Plot Cul-de-Sacs for the Sake of Worldbuilding: Apparently having CAMEOS of famous characters that barely show up in LOTR later is a symptom of old fiction. Nowadays properly constructed fictional settings just add them as post-credit stingers. WTF Tolkien?
9. Random Characters Show Up For a Short Amount of Time in Lord of the Rings
8. Tolkien's Heroes Seem Invincible: The author believes a story where all of the main characters survive is "outdated based on newer books."
7. Some of Lord of the Rings Main Characters Lack Agency: The author cites Merry and Pippin.
6. The Story Takes Awhile to Get Started
5. The Lord of the Rings Books Lack Diversity: Yessssss here we go.
4. Some Races In The Lord of the Rings are Inherently Evil: This is a higher ranked concern then Diversity!
3. The Geography of Middle Earth is Concerning: And I quote "Some critics of Tolkien's work have pointed out some potentially concerning connections between where certain groups live in Middle Earth and real-life biases. Geographically, there is a largely East vs. West dynamic in the books, which is even directly referenced in the text. In the books, the good characters are from the West, and the bad characters are from the East."
2. Tolkiens Work Features Uncomfortable Racial Terminology:
1. Tolkiens World Features Very Few Women: 😔
What else is interesting is that, while doing a search for the title of this article, apparently ScreenRant released an article with the ALMOST EXACT SAME TITLE back in 2019. Apparently this was missed by everyone since it wasn't archived...until now.
Here is Screenrants "10 Things From Lord of the Rings That Hasn't Aged Well" as opposed to Poorly. So I guess ScreenRant is being more positive?
archive.is
It's important to note the ScreenRant article is actually mildly critiquing the Peter Jackson movies however and most of the concerns actually are ones of substance (ie some of the CGI is dated, the Hobbit movies weren't as good as the original trilogy etc) while still whining about the lack of diversity.
Comic Book Resources (CBR.com) last October 22nd released an article titled '10 Ways Lord of the Rings Aged Poorly" with the archived link below.
There's no real anachronistic arguments in the article btw, it's just general whining. Unless CBR.com honestly things that modern fiction and entertainment doesn't have plot cul-de-sacs, characters that lack "agency" and minor characters that only show up for short periods of time... much less stories that have "slow starts." But anyways... here's the list:
10. Tolkien Has Plot Cul-de-Sacs for the Sake of Worldbuilding: Apparently having CAMEOS of famous characters that barely show up in LOTR later is a symptom of old fiction. Nowadays properly constructed fictional settings just add them as post-credit stingers. WTF Tolkien?
9. Random Characters Show Up For a Short Amount of Time in Lord of the Rings
8. Tolkien's Heroes Seem Invincible: The author believes a story where all of the main characters survive is "outdated based on newer books."
7. Some of Lord of the Rings Main Characters Lack Agency: The author cites Merry and Pippin.
6. The Story Takes Awhile to Get Started
5. The Lord of the Rings Books Lack Diversity: Yessssss here we go.
4. Some Races In The Lord of the Rings are Inherently Evil: This is a higher ranked concern then Diversity!
3. The Geography of Middle Earth is Concerning: And I quote "Some critics of Tolkien's work have pointed out some potentially concerning connections between where certain groups live in Middle Earth and real-life biases. Geographically, there is a largely East vs. West dynamic in the books, which is even directly referenced in the text. In the books, the good characters are from the West, and the bad characters are from the East."
2. Tolkiens Work Features Uncomfortable Racial Terminology:
1. Tolkiens World Features Very Few Women: 😔
What else is interesting is that, while doing a search for the title of this article, apparently ScreenRant released an article with the ALMOST EXACT SAME TITLE back in 2019. Apparently this was missed by everyone since it wasn't archived...until now.
Here is Screenrants "10 Things From Lord of the Rings That Hasn't Aged Well" as opposed to Poorly. So I guess ScreenRant is being more positive?
10 Things From The Lord Of The Rings That Haven't Aged Well
archived 21 Jan 2023 22:58:48 UTC
It's important to note the ScreenRant article is actually mildly critiquing the Peter Jackson movies however and most of the concerns actually are ones of substance (ie some of the CGI is dated, the Hobbit movies weren't as good as the original trilogy etc) while still whining about the lack of diversity.
ParadiseLost
Well-known member
10. Tolkien Has Plot Cul-de-Sacs for the Sake of Worldbuilding: Apparently having CAMEOS of famous characters that barely show up in LOTR later is a symptom of old fiction. Nowadays properly constructed fictional settings just add them as post-credit stingers. WTF Tolkien?
9. Random Characters Show Up For a Short Amount of Time in Lord of the Rings
8. Tolkien's Heroes Seem Invincible: The author believes a story where all of the main characters survive is "outdated based on newer books."
7. Some of Lord of the Rings Main Characters Lack Agency: The author cites Merry and Pippin.
6. The Story Takes Awhile to Get Started
5. The Lord of the Rings Books Lack Diversity: Yessssss here we go.
4. Some Races In The Lord of the Rings are Inherently Evil: This is a higher ranked concern then Diversity!
3. The Geography of Middle Earth is Concerning: And I quote "Some critics of Tolkien's work have pointed out some potentially concerning connections between where certain groups live in Middle Earth and real-life biases. Geographically, there is a largely East vs. West dynamic in the books, which is even directly referenced in the text. In the books, the good characters are from the West, and the bad characters are from the East."
2. Tolkiens Work Features Uncomfortable Racial Terminology:
1. Tolkiens World Features Very Few Women: 😔
Let's critique this for a moment.
Points 10 and 9 are bad because LOTR is primarily milieu driven. For those curious, milieu stories are stories that are primarily concerned with the setting of the story above even the plot or the characters. The main protagonist of the Lord of the Rings isn't really Frodo, but rather Middle Earth itself.
Point 8 is silly, as treating death as the only emotional stake is... not a hallmark of mature writing. There are quite literally worse things than death; I can think of a number of stories where the protagonist dying might legit be a happier ending.
Point 7 is kind of runs into the same issue as 10 and 9, in that the author misunderstands that this is a milieu story. But also, in an ensemble cast of characters like LOTR has, I don't see the issue with two very minor characters, who are very poorly equipped to have much effect on the plot, not having much effect on the plot.
Point 6 is basically "Wah, I have ADHD and can't read anything that isn't triggering nonstop dopamine hits in my brain." Also, I don't think LOTR's start is nearly as slow as some of its middle parts, so I don't get the issue.
Point 5 seems to have missed the part where this takes place in a fantasy world based on medieval England and Scandinavia.
Point 4 is inaccurate, as Tolkien himself took issue with the idea that all orcs are evil, but good orcs just never really had an opportunity to appear in the story. Also, orcs aren't even a natural race, they are an artificially created race, which is quite different.
Point 3 is correct, but also kind of silly and still a common trope - see the North/South dichotomy in Game of Thrones. Westeros/Essos is also kind of obvious.
Point 2 is simply the use of the traditional literary idea of blackness/darkness being associated with evil. I can understand why someone would feel uncomfortable with it/why a modern author wouldn't use it, but you'd have to be awfully dense to think Tolkien was talking about actual black people - and I don't think someone that dense would pick up a book as big as LOTR in the first place.
Point 1 is because Tolkien's LOTR is based off of traditional Nordic tales like Beowulf, where women rarely had much of a part. Even then, Tolkien definitely gave woman characters more agency and more of a part than the traditional stories he based LOTR off of did.
Absolutely; Tolkien's superlative creativity was very much focused on the building of a comprehensive world mythology, which was not even remotely completed by the time of his death. Then again, it was very much a life-work which probably would never have ended even if he lived many, many more years. If he lived much longer, he would simply have continually increased the scope of things, perhaps fleshing out lands further away or piling in even more years of backstory.
I would say that the "early middle" of LoTR is the slowest part, and it *does* rather drag on. Tolkien was a brilliant worldcrafter; his actual writing is often painfully dry and dragged on by enormously extraneous detail.
This is also a criticism that is literally as old as the books themselves; Anthony Boucher had famously commented in a literary review of The Two Towers shortly after its publication that the book "makes inordinate demands upon the patience of its readers" with passages which "could be lopped away without affecting form or content", although he also raved that no other writer "has ever so satisfactorily and compellingly created his own mythology and made it come vividly alive , described in some of the most sheerly beautiful prose that this harsh decade has seen in print."
Tolkien's backstory with regard to the origin of the orcs is vague and contradictory; Tolkien's earliest writings quite expliccitly stated they were created from rock and stone by Melkor as evil counterpart/imitations of the Elves, but later material compiled into the Silmarillion stated that they were corrupted Elves, although this later material also stated that this was an in-character belief and no one in Middle-Earth knew for certain.
Tolkien's later out-of-character comments do show that he was deeply uncomfortable with the idea of an entire race being inherently evil, but he never clearly resolved this discomfort in actual published material, and he certainly never actually said that there were any good orcs, only that the cruelty, viciousness, and hate of the orcs was based on them being imbued by Morgoth's hatred for all free living things (i.e. that it was an external factor as opposed to innate to their species, but that it was an external factor that affected all orcs).
Actual black people in LOTR would be the "Far Haradrim" (as opposed the "Near Haradrim" who are Middle Eastern analogues), although in an out-of-character comment, Tolkien apparently said that Africa proper is the "hot countries" which lay even further south than Harad. Still, Harad clearly extends as far south as the equivalent of Northern Africa, and the Far Haradrim are quite explicitly described as black.
The whole alliance between Harad and Sauron is. . . not actually explained in the books or the movie, beyond some fragmentary backstory of being formerly ruled by the Numenoreans and subsequently conquered by Gondor. Tolkien did say that the two "Blue" wizards had travelled East and South to oppose Sauron's plans in these regions, which would have been into Harad, but he declared that he didn't know what happened to them (in keeping with the keyfabe of the Red Book), other than they presumably failed.
A fair point certainly, and I'll add that in the books, Eowyn didn't get treated as a helpless civilian the way she does in the movie version of The Two Towers. Instead, Theoden leaves her in charge when he leaves Meduseld with every immediately ready Rider, so she spends the next few weeks organizing a civilian evacuation to the White Mountains escorted by every Rider in the region who didn't go with the King. In other words, even though her role is "offscreen", it gives her far more authority and agency (she is explicitly named regent, and it's clearly indicated she is expected to remain in command if Theoden does not return), although she is still vocally frustrated at not being part of the war party.
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