You're overthinking this. They're literally compressing the time-line of the entire second age into 50-100 years. Apparently Ultimacia is one of the writers.

 

Yeah but it gives us an idea where it falls even in the compression.

 

Tolkien Fans Are Underwhelmed By Amazon’s ‘The Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power’ Trailer

 

Okay, it's clear there's going to be a large segment of people who don't understand the lore, including the author of this article. For those who don't know said lore, this series may turn out very, very good. For the rest of us (and I'll admit, we're a minority), every moment like this will take us out of the story. If Amazon can succeed at least in making the show entertaining, that'll be half the battle won. It's just disappointing that they don't seem to be wanting to win ALL the battle.

 

‘The history of fantasy is racialized’: Lord of the Rings series sparks debate over race | Lord of the Rings | The Guardian

Basically an argument that updating the ethnicity is justified for a modern audience, because anything less is cow-towing to far-right groups. He then pulls out an example of black elves in a Nordic prose that has nothing to do with Tolkien, other than the author may have translated the story at one time.

*sigh* There's a fair amount of conflation going on in this article due to misinterpretations of fan concerns and the idea of white supremacy. While there's undeniably a small segment of the latter existing (that's kind of hard to avoid, regardless of the subject when it comes to casting choices), it's more about retaining what the author wrote and intended versus catering to a modern audience that wants to see themselves in the characters on the silver screen. In these cases, I feel rather more like another property should be pursued or else it gives the appearance that the source material is being exploited - and I dare say that's exactly what's happening, though I'll allow the series a go.

Rather, perhaps Amazon should have looked elsewhere for its Game of Thrones clone. I'm surprised Hasbro and Amazon couldn't have worked out a partnership to produce a Dungeons & Dragons TV series that allows for all sorts of modern cultural contrivances. The Adventures of Drizzt in The Forgotten Realms seems like a far more suitable rabbit hole to fall down if they're going to spend a billion dollars, especially in light of the cultural phenomenon the game system has recently become over the past several years.

 

The "intent of Tolkien" reasoning would hold a lot more water if a lot of the same commentators weren't also on record complaining about similar issues in Marvel and Star Wars in the past. Like, I think there is an "intent of Tolkien" case to be made, but it rings hollow because of the previous outrage. And I understand that there are those who are legitimately making that case who had no qualm with the other franchises, but past fan debate has poisoned the well they're drinking from.

 

This is literally a fallacy.

 

Which fallacy?

 

I can understand Marvel characters to a point. It has a long history that comes with some expectations and there are plenty of characters and storylines that can be pulled from to allow for adequate representation all around. In most cases, changing a character to meet some sort of modern audience standard isn't really necessary when you've got characters like Black Panther or She-Hulk hanging around.

I never was able to figure out Star Wars, though, when it came to race and sexuality. There's really no preset or pre-context for hardly anything. It truly can be whatever it wants to be as long as it adheres to the events and characters from live action movies predating it. Expanding the roster with all sorts of people is really a no-brainer.

 

The Argument from Motives (also Questioning Motives): The fallacy of declaring a standpoint or argument invalid solely because of the evil, corrupt or questionable motives of the one making the claim
Guilt by Association: The fallacy of trying to refute or condemn someone's standpoint, arguments or actions by evoking the negative ethos of those with whom the speaker is identified or of a group, party, religion or race to which he or she belongs or was once associated with. A form of Ad Hominem Argument, e.g., "Don't listen to her.
The Ad Hominem Argument (also, "Personal attack," "Poisoning the well"): The fallacy of attempting to refute an argument by attacking the opposition’s intelligence, morals, education, professional qualifications, personal character or reputation, using a corrupted negative argument from ethos.

 

I specifically said there's a valid case to be made. I did not attempt to refute it or invalidate it, so none of these fallacies apply.

I just said its a shame people with other motives are co-opting that valid argument for their own purposes - which they demonstrably are - and people who want to make that valid argument have to wrestle with that.

 

Maybe they don't have other motives and just don't like it. I've seen more fans who don't like it because it deviates heavily from the look and lore of the books . As I said previously this series has a huge fan base.
They made a fuss in the 70's when the cartoon movies weren't to their liking and it's only grown bigger since then after the Peter Jackson movies came out.

 

For the third time: that's true for some people, yes. But there are both kinds of people. You can easily tell the other type by their track record. They exist, and the make it harder for the other group, which I'm saying sucks for the other group.

 

Yes they do exist, but by my count, they are eclipsed by fans more worried about accuracy. You give them more credence than they deserve. They are a far smaller number than you are implying.

 

A lot of them are thought leaders in certain fan spaces. I think we don't give them enough credence for the damage they so often inflict on the overall discourse. When I say you can know them by their track record, I'm talking about more-or-less public figures whose track record can be looked up. Not just random people in a comments section.

 

Again your exaggerating the amount and the control they have. The current trend by Hollywood is to attack the fans when they don't get the feedback they want. That's why they scream "trolls!" and took away the like dislike ratio on youtube. They don't like any negative feedback. So they claim there are all these people out there hating their shows or movies for reasons that if you actually research it, you won't find many comments of the types they are claiming in the forums or the youtube comments.

They just spent millions of dollars making this, how dare people not like it and support it 100%.

When the truth is they forgot they were in the business of entertainment and a large section of their audience are saying they don't like or aren't entertained by what they are making.

There has been too much of Hollywood making movies for their little bubble or making entertainment by corporate committee and then being surprised by the backlash when the people they claim to be making it for, don't like it, because they have altered or changed it too much. When you use a property that already has a huge fan base and you don't cater to the fans don't be surprised when they tell you what they think is wrong. These are the people who's money they are trying to get. Well if they don't like it you aren't going to get their money. And telling them they are all horrible people who don't get your vision and what you are trying to do isn't going to get them to give you their money either.

 

I mostly find the discourse around this stuff exhausting. Not the healthy/constructive criticism, but the outrage culture. I keep seeing headlines and YouTube thumbnails that say stuff like "Fans are NOT happy about the new LOTR show...an INSULT to Tolkien!!!". But...did anyone care a month ago? Was this show even on anyone's radar? Was anyone asking for it? It's not like the Hobbit, where fans were let down after waiting to see an adaptation of it for decades. I dunno, maybe someone has been eagerly awaiting an adaptation of the LOTR appendices. If you were, I guess I don't blame you for being upset. To me it just feels like really expensive fanfiction that isn't even worth being mad about. My reaction was mostly just a shrug of the shoulders, and "Eh, it looks kind of generic. Never really needed it anyway".

One small argument I could make in favor of the changes is that it could be viewed as a different continuity than Tolkien's world, or even Peter Jackson's world. Like, no one really gets mad that the Thor movies changed the races and nationalities from the mythology, and reinterpreted the supernatural aspects to be more scientific. It's just understood that it's Marvel's modernized take on Thor, aimed at a different audience than the mythology was. I don't really see why there couldn't be some alternate version of Middle Earth that happens to be a bit more diverse.

 

I'm personally leaning toward this. IF the story is decent, I'll shovel it over to interesting auxiliary media along with video games like Shadow of Mordor and such. If the story is crap, I'll just handwave it off and forget about it. Either way, it's disappointing as I'd love to add another volume to the film collection...but this probably isn't it. Best wait for the anime War of the Rhohirrim.

But...

Were a lot of fans excited about a return to Middle Earth? yes.

Did they know it was just an adaptation of the appendices? No. (I know a lot of people thought it might be about adventures right before the Hobbit and such. Or the Silmarillion, as I originally thought.)

Did a lot of fans think they'd probably find a way to botch the lore? Yes.

I REALLY think a lot of the push back is all just confirmation of the fan's overall expectations.

 

Which is the guilt by association bit I mentioned. The fanbase is too large to paint as bigots like others have been, so one has to poison the well by suggesting that complaints should be ignored because some people are bad. It is a bad faith argument.

That is your fault for not pruning your Playlist appropriately. I never see any of that kind of stuff because I never click on it and actively tell youtube I am not interested in it. Heck, I hear more about these channels from people who complain about them than people who are upset about the changes.

 

i want to do this with certain aspects of franchises i enjoy but the problem always comes when things from that crap bleed over and become a constant. a new portrayal of a classic character, a change to the franchises status quo or core value, or in some cases a complete rewrite of history.

if i fall for a franchise i don't want to stay a fan in only one section of it. i want it to continue on. it's hard to forget about something crap when it's permeating into the future of said franchise. it's hard to stay on as a fan when every new entry destroys it and in some cases rewrites it...see terminator.