Critical Miss: Lord of the Wrongs
- Thread starter The Wooster
- Start date
Yep part of the reason why I didn't like it as it wasn't true to the history it was trying to tell which further proves my point on this whole "Staying true" to the source.Fronzel said:
Samwise wasn't black in the book but it did state his skin was darker than the average hobbit then again he was a gardener so he probably got a tan.
Sorry if I come off a bit hostile there but this attiude to race is dangerous as it sugar coats the whole damn problem by saying "Oh no see we like you! look we put a black man into the film! we aren't racist honestly!" (not saying you have this attitude but it seems the author of this bland comic does)
Make a character black because it suits the character not just to seem not racist.
You remember that 2% of people that saw the newest Star Trek movie and hated it? A lot of the producers and media just chalked it up to people that wouldn't be happy no mater what they did because they were too worried about all the details (i.e. Trekies).Gingerman said:
I believe you are in that 2%. If you don't like it that much based on principle, don't watch it. I, on the other hand, will see it and may or may not enjoy it based on the overall product, just like the majority of the world.
I know there's a joke in there about the female Nazgul, but I just can't figure out what it is. Just the fact they were all men?
The logical compromise then is to make a cosmetically similar but obviously inferior Nazgul for the females. It worked for Warhammer after all.Zhalath said:
Well if i wanna see "you can play a role even though if you don't exactly fit the physical description of it, but you can do what the character does, no matter of your skin color and shit" i dont pay for a million dollar movie, i just watch a cheap LARP ....teh_Canape said:
Dammit im sick of these British sterotypes! Im going to go kill a ************.. now.. wheres my teapot?!
I'm not very familiar with LotR mythology, so perhaps you could explain a few things to me. First, is the Shire the only place where Hobbits are found? If so, is the Shire located on an isolated island or otherwise completely different from the rest of Middle Earth? If the answer to either of those questions is "no", and evolution as we understand it truly takes place on middle earth as you seem to be saying, then I don't see why there wouldn't be non-white Hobbits. If Hobbits aren't exclusive to the Shire, then you likely would see the occasional non-white, just as you saw the occasional Moorish merchant/travelling scholar/physician in Medieval England. If they are supposedly exclusive to the Shire, and the Shire isn't geographically isolated and/or unique in some way, then it's likely that other Hobbit-like peoples would have evolved to fill the same evolutionary niche that Hobbits filled in the Shire, similar to Neanderthals in our world. That is, of course, assuming that evolution in LotR works in the same way as on our world, if at all, but if it doesn't, then it somewhat damages your "evolved the skin pigment" argument.Gingerman said:
Adunaphel. Invented by Iron Crown Enterprises. Tolkien, by contrast, maintained that the Nazgul were all "kings, sorcerers and warriors old". "King" and "sorceror" are both masculine (the female terms would be, respectively, "queen" and "sorceress"), and the witch-king wouldn't have been so skeptical at the idea of a female warrior if he had been working with one since the Second Age. That would be like Aragorn suddenly forgetting that hobbits existed and asking Arwen what those four midgets were doing at his big celebration.Ernil Menegil said:
Or a anti-semitic Australian...Gingerman said:
But then, Saving Private Ryan had how many European accented people?
And Robin Hood would have spoken with the Midlands Nasal twang - but we couldn't have Darth Vader speaking in Dorset tones, could we m'dear?
Firstly I'm going to say I will be going to see the Hobbit regardless of who they hire as I trust Jackson will make a good film, the appearance of Asian or black Hobbits will just irk me slightly but wont stop me from enjoying the film.
@Cannon
Hobbits are found outside the Shire but not by much (as in close by) as they like staying where they are unlike we humans. Middle Earth is but a small part of the world it inhabits, it just so happens to have a similar climate to that of Europe with hotter countries being quite remoteish unless you had a very good boat (as you'd have to travel via Mordor if you want to get in by land) And it was only really countries such as Gondor that could of traded with these people as Rohan and the Shire are land locked.
So basically Hobbits as a race have not travelled far enough to justify becoming black or Asian they've mostly kept to where they have been for hundreds of years. Middle Earth's setting isn't that easy to travel around, for instance the mystical homeland of the elves is where America is for us... yet no one but the elves has the means to get there.
On the subject of Star trek sorry but the core principles of star trek were still there with a few nagging details which no one in the right mind would care about for example, Legola's eyebrows or Galdalfs beard not being as long as it should be they're small details that I didn't care about because what made Gandalf Gandalf was still there.
Were as if we were to make Gandalf's character have ebony black skin, be female and have a large afro but still have him act the same it would seem VERY out of place nevermind not being in anyway true to the source apart from personality.
When this cropped up a few weeks ago I asked a lot of people to describe a hobbit to me they all said small, white with English accents oddly enough it wasn't just the white people who I asked that said this.
I'm all for artistic license but you do not change parts what makes a character who they are just to seem not racist but by doing so shows that you really are a racist.
Edit: Also I'm well aware Mel Gibson is not Scottish but even with his bad accent he still played the character fairly well as he looked the part as well as acted it. Also perfecting accents is rather hard and finding big named actors to fit the roles even more so, so I can forgive small details such as accents but I cant forgive big details as over all appearence
@Cannon
Hobbits are found outside the Shire but not by much (as in close by) as they like staying where they are unlike we humans. Middle Earth is but a small part of the world it inhabits, it just so happens to have a similar climate to that of Europe with hotter countries being quite remoteish unless you had a very good boat (as you'd have to travel via Mordor if you want to get in by land) And it was only really countries such as Gondor that could of traded with these people as Rohan and the Shire are land locked.
So basically Hobbits as a race have not travelled far enough to justify becoming black or Asian they've mostly kept to where they have been for hundreds of years. Middle Earth's setting isn't that easy to travel around, for instance the mystical homeland of the elves is where America is for us... yet no one but the elves has the means to get there.
On the subject of Star trek sorry but the core principles of star trek were still there with a few nagging details which no one in the right mind would care about for example, Legola's eyebrows or Galdalfs beard not being as long as it should be they're small details that I didn't care about because what made Gandalf Gandalf was still there.
Were as if we were to make Gandalf's character have ebony black skin, be female and have a large afro but still have him act the same it would seem VERY out of place nevermind not being in anyway true to the source apart from personality.
When this cropped up a few weeks ago I asked a lot of people to describe a hobbit to me they all said small, white with English accents oddly enough it wasn't just the white people who I asked that said this.
I'm all for artistic license but you do not change parts what makes a character who they are just to seem not racist but by doing so shows that you really are a racist.
Edit: Also I'm well aware Mel Gibson is not Scottish but even with his bad accent he still played the character fairly well as he looked the part as well as acted it. Also perfecting accents is rather hard and finding big named actors to fit the roles even more so, so I can forgive small details such as accents but I cant forgive big details as over all appearence
