Is The Lord of the Rings still relevant?
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If you don't already understand that if there was no tolkien, there would be no DA or warhammer, then I am afraid I can't help you.KorfZin said:
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey grossed over 1 billion dollars worldwide. It is still relevant.
There may be many imitators, but JRR Tolkien revolutionized the fantasy landscape in ways that are still utilized today. This fact makes all his books must reads for fans of the fantasy genre. This also means its still relevant. Whether you enjoy his books or not, you should at some point in your life read them.
There may be many imitators, but JRR Tolkien revolutionized the fantasy landscape in ways that are still utilized today. This fact makes all his books must reads for fans of the fantasy genre. This also means its still relevant. Whether you enjoy his books or not, you should at some point in your life read them.
In Dragon Age the Dwarves are cave Vikings who are renowned for their craftsmanship, practice ancestor worship, and generally fear open spaces (specifically the ocean with Tolkien and the surface in general with Dragon Age). The Elves were the "first race" who ruled the world with their powerful magic and impeccable engineering but now they favor dwelling in forests and are in decline because of humans.KorfZin said:
The Tevinter Imperium is quite similar to the Númenóreans, they had powerful magic and lorded over "lesser races" of Men, they even both caused apocalyptic cataclysms by defying (the) God(s) and seeking to capture the sacred realm for themselves.
The Lord of the Rings and Dragon Age are both set in worlds similar to Medieval Europe in terms of politics and technology. Both also have a general theme of the world having declined from a more advanced and prosperous state.
I'm not as familiar with Warhammer but such similarities are there as well (in grimdark form of course).
I won't argue that these settings are lesser than Tolkien's just by borrowing many themes from the High Fantasy setting, but I won't deny that the borrowing happened either. The thing about The Lord of the Rings is that it is so deeply embedded in our cultural psyche that many elements of it are simply considered to be a part of fantasy.
I'm not saying that there isn't the basis for excellent book/movie material there, far from it. I'm saying that I don't trust Hollywood writers not to f*** things up when asked to expand upon it.PromethianSpark said:
Heh, I do have to wonder how people would react to seeing Sauron's true nature as a shapeshifting smoothtalking demigod who originally had good intentions and was known for his beauty.
Why not, exactly? The myths the fantasy genre is based on existed before Tolkien. The fantasy genre existed before Tolkien. Alternative fantasy writers existed (I mentioned Michael Moorcock earlier, who was particularly dismissive of Tolkien). This argument seems to be pretty much like claiming "no sci fi without Star Wars" - you have to ignore a lot of stuff for it to make sense.PromethianSpark said:
It is sort of a "gateway book" but after a certain age, it just lost its appeal to me. Silmarillion and The Hobbit I still like though, the first for being a mythology book and the second for being a great kid story.
That said, I want to take a drill to the head of all the people I call "Tolkienfags" - people who've read LotR and NOTHING ELSE, yet still claim it's the best work of fantasy, sometimes even of literature. It's funny and sad at the same time.
Also, people have used loads of different fantasy tropes and narrative devices long before Tolkien, like M.John Harrison's Viriconium, Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast, Michael Moorcock's stuff, Robert Howard, H.P.Lovecraft, The Worm of Ouroboros (which Tolkien himself counted an inspiration) and others. The thing with Tolkien was, he was a linguist. He knew how to write beautifully and invent languages, but didn't know hot to properly develop his characters and make the world more believable, while retaining its splendor. In the end, he himself has many times said he wrote LotR, the Hobbit and Silmarillion chiefly for his own pleasure and amusement, which is why I can respect LotR, though I no longer like it. Along with the fact that it's a "gateway book" and can teach young people and kids to read and make them interested in other fantasy and late, hopefully, into classics and literature as a whole. I know it worked with me.
P.S. With its tropes and devices Star Wars is more fantasy than sci-fi, despite having ships and robots. Lucas himself has cited Tolkien as a big influence.
That said, I want to take a drill to the head of all the people I call "Tolkienfags" - people who've read LotR and NOTHING ELSE, yet still claim it's the best work of fantasy, sometimes even of literature. It's funny and sad at the same time.
Also, people have used loads of different fantasy tropes and narrative devices long before Tolkien, like M.John Harrison's Viriconium, Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast, Michael Moorcock's stuff, Robert Howard, H.P.Lovecraft, The Worm of Ouroboros (which Tolkien himself counted an inspiration) and others. The thing with Tolkien was, he was a linguist. He knew how to write beautifully and invent languages, but didn't know hot to properly develop his characters and make the world more believable, while retaining its splendor. In the end, he himself has many times said he wrote LotR, the Hobbit and Silmarillion chiefly for his own pleasure and amusement, which is why I can respect LotR, though I no longer like it. Along with the fact that it's a "gateway book" and can teach young people and kids to read and make them interested in other fantasy and late, hopefully, into classics and literature as a whole. I know it worked with me.
P.S. With its tropes and devices Star Wars is more fantasy than sci-fi, despite having ships and robots. Lucas himself has cited Tolkien as a big influence.
It's a flanderization. Sort of how Gimli was made into a drunk, comic relief character in the movies. Plus, you're referencing the Silmarillion.madwarper said:
That only speaks to how flat and one dimensional the movie was.TheMigrantSoldier said:
And, your point is... ?
Tolkien simultaneously wrote the Lord of the Rings and the history of Arda, that would be compiled after his death into the Silmarillion. You can not talk about one without talking about the other.
As much as I am defending the work in this thread, it can't really be denied that tolkien is a horrible writer.Vladimir Stamenov said:
The problem with using the eagles to deliver the ring is that there's no guarantee that the ring won't seduce an eagle and cause you a world more problems. Sauron also had other flying creatures beyond the Fell Beasts, the Nazgul are sent out to sniff out the ring because they can sense it and wouldn't keep it for themselves but if you just need to kill a few eagles he has those, cold drakes, maybe a few balrogs (I forget) and extremely impressive fortifications.RJ 17 said:
The only reason that they were even able to get the ring into Mount Doom is because Sauron didn't see such a small force coming (if the Fellowship had stayed together they'd probably have failed) and because hobbits are strangely resistant to the ring (if the hobbits hadn't have been present at Rivendell they'd most likely have failed). Taking the ring to Mordor in a way that Sauron could see coming would have been suicide, bear in mind that when Frodo puts on the ring at the end of the film, less so int he book admittedly, Sauron is literally only a minute from getting the ring back when it is destroyed.
For a start, Star Wars is not really sci fi, its fantasy, but your analogy was not really appropriate at all, its more like 'no sci fi without H.G. Wells'. Was Wells the first science fiction writer? Nope. Still the godfather of the genre though. But the most important thing is the formula, which tolkien has imparted to the fantasy genre, which is so embedded in it, its hard to think of it existing without. Eldritch Warlord did a pretty good job of outlining the hall marks of this formula in DA to you.Kolyarut said:
Dark elves, elves and trolls, even orcs, on the other hand are take from Celtic or Scandinavian folklore, so no props to Tolkien for subtly reimagining the elves and not at all the trolls and orcs.PromethianSpark said:
What I think the worst thing with all the unconditional Tolkien love since LotR came out, is that due to people gobbling it up like they did, fantasy and epic fantasy more specifically, have been an unholy mess of a shithole populated by copy-pasted commercialised shit which people buy like there's no tomorrow. I know people have a lot of love for D&D, but despite having some awesome ideas, it's guilty of this too. All the Eddings, Paolinis, Terry Brookses
D) and so on are just poison to originality. There have always been the odd original books and ideas, especially in recent years, but to this day most fantasy books are the same dreck over and over again, to the point that when a book just subverts EXTREMELY tired tropes, it's lauded for it. In conclusion, I will quote Yahtzee: ?There's something terribly weird about the standard fantasy setting--not least of which the fact the phrase "standard fantasy setting" can be uttered without irony.?P.S. Captcha: reach higher. Preachin' to the choir, bro.
Yes and noKolyarut said:
Creatures bearing the names existed beforehand, but there is almost no resemblance at all.
Case in point, the following images are of various elves in the original Germanic folklore, they pretty much were just men with unusual abilities.
It wasn't until Tokien that they became the ethereal somewhat hippie-like creatures we recognize today in high fantasy. Hell, it wasn't until Tolkien that high fantasy was a thing at all.
P.S. You don't see nearly as many Star Wars references in otherwise unrelated sci-fi works as you get with Tolkien's books. It would be more appropriate to compare it to the works of H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, or Isaac Asimov. The first of those three was particularly influential in laying down the groundwork for pretty much every following work of science fiction.
P.P.S. George Lucas described the Lord of the Rings as one of his primary inspirations. In fact, "Endor" is elvish for "Middle Earth"
It's not hard sci fi (the "sci" is light to nonexistent) but by any sensible measure the spaceships and interplanetary travel makes it sci fi - and I really don't see anything but the vaguest, vaguest storytelling formula from H.G. Wells in Mass Effect, Transformers or Men in Black (to pick three very random examples).PromethianSpark said:
I'm not hugely familiar with the Dragon Age setting, but yes, it does seem to be more overtly influenced by Tolkien themes than most modern fantasy. The main recurring trend I see elsewhere though, in fully developed settings that aren't using very surface level fantasy elements as set dressing, is Tolkien aversion - people seem keen if anything to avoid a lot of this stuff.
Also - I'd query the Medieval Europe point - what I know about Tolkien's stuff always seemed far more Dark Ages in its setting (like Arthurian legend), where almost all contemporary fantasy tends towards a much later period (things like proper plate armour and crossbows are late medieval inventions).
Exactly. In fact, if you want to think of the real inspiration of tolkiens elves you really need to look at the fairies from irish folk lore.Heronblade said:
I mentioned H.G. Wells as well as the most apt comparison.
I'm going to take a gamble here and play the ace up my sleeve, a book I've never read.Heronblade said:
1924's The King of Elfland's Daughter ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_King_of_Elfland%27s_Daughter ) is a pre-Tolkien fantasy novel featuring questing, elves, and magic swords, about a man who falls in love an elven princess. Tolkien didn't invent as much of this stuff as he's sometimes given credit for.
Also worth mentioning are the Conan stories in the 1930s, which set the ground for detailed fantasy words with fallen empires, swords and sorcery.
Lord of the Rings is one of the cornerstones of modern fantasy, even if there are tons of books that have done fantasy better and tons of books that presents better stories it's still ingrained in a good deal of modern fantasy books, movies and games. It's still relevant, but you could still say it's outdated, surpassed or overrated without being wrong.
The only author I have seen to match his brilliance is Robert Jordan.
The only author I have seen to match his brilliance is Robert Jordan.
Yes. There is no way that dragon age has as rich of a lore as LoTR. Heck a lot of the fantasy games like dragon age are still kinda loosely based on LoTR and draw inspiration from the mythos. Maybe warhammer might have as much depth and quantity lorewise as LoTR but I don't think its as popular