What is your favorite Lore Interpretation in Media?

[ObsidianJones]

We all know of Santa Claus. What he does, what he's about. We know the lore. Magical fat dude who is kind and wants to reward good children with gifts.

But with different story tellers comes with different ways to present the character. It's a concept that's always fascinated me, and I want to get some of your opinions.

I'll start off at the top... or the bottom as it were. My favorite Interpretation of Satan comes from the movie Constantine. The clip I will link will contain spoilers for the movie if you haven't watched it. It's pure popcorn B-movie fun. If you don't take it seriously, you might get some enjoyment out of it.


This Satan is a Maniac ball of ID, unable to keep his extremes in check. And he revels in it. I'm strictly on team Good Guy, but he was a pleasure to watch.

 

[BrawlMan]

I like the interpretation of Hindu/Buddishm in Asura's Wrath. Shame that the true ending was paid DLC that got cut out. Chakravaratin was still an awesome boss fight though. He's like a combination of God, Buddha, and Satan.

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I also liked the Mysterious Stranger.

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Bayonetta's interpertation of Heaven and Hell is a fucking beast. Ironic, because Platinum is more accurate with the presentation of how angels are depicted in the Bible, than most media. Whether it be film, other games, comics, books, and TV.

 

[happyninja42]

We all know of Santa Claus. What he does, what he's about. We know the lore. Magical fat dude who is kind and wants to reward good children with gifts.

But with different story tellers comes with different ways to present the character. It's a concept that's always fascinated me, and I want to get some of your opinions.

I'll start off at the top... or the bottom as it were. My favorite Interpretation of Satan comes from the movie Constantine. The clip I will link will contain spoilers for the movie if you haven't watched it. It's pure popcorn B-movie fun. If you don't take it seriously, you might get some enjoyment out of it.


This Satan is a Maniac ball of ID, unable to keep his extremes in check. And he revels in it. I'm strictly on team Good Guy, but he was a pleasure to watch.

I wish I had more input for this thread, as I like the premise, but i'm just not a history/lore from real life kind of guy, so none of it really sticks.

I guess....hmm...I guess the one that comes to mind, was the interpretation of Middle Eastern mythology and religion, as portrayed in Dune? How the Fremen, had roots very deep in the Middle East, and it was reflected in the words they used, and the very loose framework of some of their culture. It was obvious from Frank's writing that it had changed drastically in the 10s of thousands of years, and being on an entirely different planet. But I thought that was an interesting portrayal of it.

The Mars trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson, again had a variation on Middle Eastern culture, specifically Zen-Sunni if I recall correctly. How they became a variation of desert nomads, but how it had adapted for Mars.

Yeah I can't think of many others.

Oh! Um, I guess the Norse mythology as depicted in God of War 4? That was a fun spin on things, painting the Norse as the bad guys.

 

[Trunkage]

Satan in Lucifer. Vengeful, lawful, righteous, compulsive and incredibly horny

Many pantheons in Stargate. From Sumerian to Eygtian to Norse to Chinese

 

[SckizoBoy]

It's been a while, but the ancient Greek pantheon in Xena: Warrior Princess and Hercules was delightfully hammy.

 

[Kyrian007]

Specifically my favorite Satan was Viggo Mortensen (yup, pre-Aragorn) from The Prophecy. I remember watching the movie for the first time with some college buddies. We hadn't even read the back of the VHS box so all we knew is that it was a horror movie about a war between heaven and hell. Christopher Walken shows up on screen and we're all saying, "is he Satan? I'll bet that's Satan." But he's not, he's Gabriel. And then you see Viggo for the first time, and within one second we were all in immediate agreement, "THAT'S Satan."

 

[XsjadoBlayde]

Peter Stormare has such villainous vibes, and just goes with it; something I respect from an actor's perspective, considering there's so many detatched weirdos out there who just assume you are your characters and will harass or attack you for your fictional behaviour, it's a gamble against an invisible wave of mortally gullible assholes each time. I mean, wasn't it so common for American actors to refuse to play bad guys that fed the trope of the "British actor villain" ultimately? Refusing to do their comparitively cushioned bloody job out of fear and pride, total cowards (Unlike customer service/retail workers who have no choice but to represent their greedy soulless corporate overlords to the tory public just to get through surviving the month). That's basically where I lay my sympathy for the devil anyway.

Hm, Santa was mentioned but not followed up on. So will do the the crappiest laziest thing due to brain not doing good stuff today, and slipstream that example by adding the CGI family film who had a tattooed Russian with machetes for santa, though it's been a while and this memory keeps saying the accent was put on, but it could just be a terrible memory, but a lot of CGI films don't bother with authentic accents, so I don't know. Oh, it was put on, just read. Of course.

But also Krampus

 

[Palindromemordnilap]

I liked the Puck that popped up in Gargoyles. Equal parts trickery to malice, very powerful but easily bored and distracted

 

[ObsidianJones]

I wish I had more input for this thread, as I like the premise, but i'm just not a history/lore from real life kind of guy, so none of it really sticks.

I guess....hmm...I guess the one that comes to mind, was the interpretation of Middle Eastern mythology and religion, as portrayed in Dune? How the Fremen, had roots very deep in the Middle East, and it was reflected in the words they used, and the very loose framework of some of their culture. It was obvious from Frank's writing that it had changed drastically in the 10s of thousands of years, and being on an entirely different planet. But I thought that was an interesting portrayal of it.

The Mars trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson, again had a variation on Middle Eastern culture, specifically Zen-Sunni if I recall correctly. How they became a variation of desert nomads, but how it had adapted for Mars.

Yeah I can't think of many others.

Oh! Um, I guess the Norse mythology as depicted in God of War 4? That was a fun spin on things, painting the Norse as the bad guys.

Don't worry, I got you fam.

My favorite Interpretation of God. Futurama.


My favorite Interpretation of the Hero Team. Nextwave. Why the hell aren't you up on Nextwave?!

Spoiler

Why are the best things in life always the shortest?

 

[Xprimentyl]

Pan in Guillermo del Toro's 2006 fantasy film Pan's Labyrinth. Unsettling and ambiguous in his intent and an appearance both threatening and beautiful. This character has stuck in my mind for years; I still don't know what to make of him.



Also, same film, the Pale Man. Not sure if he's a direct interpretation from any specific lore, but if you've seen the film and don't agree he's one of the most horrific things ever put to screen, you might be a psychopath. His whole scene is a case study in anxiety.

 

[gorfias]

This may be boring but this presentation blew me away. In terms of looks and character, this guy, to me, was Superman ripped right off the comic book pages. While I like Brandan Rorth fine, I have no idea why they thought him a dopple ganger for Christopher Reeves.