11 ms·

although i wouldn’t have worded it the same way, there’s definitely something true in your comment. I’m still amazed that people keep torturing stories made at

by bsaul 4y ago

although i wouldn’t have worded it the same way, there’s definitely something true in your comment. I’m still amazed that people keep torturing stories made at different eras with different mentalities to try and promote today’s philosophy instead of coming with original materials. If you want diversity and black people on screen, why not create stories about the amazing empires that ruled the african continent in the past, rather than rewrite parts of LOTR ?

cloutchaser 4y ago
> amazing empires that ruled the african continent in the past because then you'd have to confront that african empires had slaves too
- prepend 4y ago
  I think that would be an interesting story. And I think, with time, we’ll get more of these stories.
rglullis 4y ago
Because that would require all these studios to actually create new things and take risks. And that's not what these corporations are known for, right?
prepend 4y ago
I have a morbid fear that studios want the “conflict” as it’s 1) news and any news is good news, 2) set up a right vs wrong narrative that puts their tv show on the right side against whatever jerks are being racist/sexist/whatever. So it seems like a non-creative way to get free promotion, but I think it distracts from storytelling. The example I remember is how bad the 2016 ghostbusters reboot was. And the studio had this whole narrative about how sexist trolls were maligning the movie and this got repeated with any criticism. It seemed like astroturf that highlighted a small amount of internet sexist complaining and used it to smear any criticism for any reason. That seems like something that would be attractive to a beancounter-type.
- bsaul 4y ago
  very interesting theory... I used to attribute those choices to lazyness and "playing it safe", but your point is a reall possibility. I sincerely hope you're wrong though.
Akronymus 4y ago
>... instead of coming with original materials. I personally think they are simply not capable of making something engaging, BECAUSE they feel the need to promote todays philosophy over good storytelling. (They as in the streaming services)
titzer 4y ago
> I’m still amazed that people keep torturing stories made at different eras with different mentalities to try and promote today’s philosophy instead of coming with original materials. Been happening since forever. Jesus was a dark-skinned Middle-easterner. It's funny that in nearly every story over the world of people who have claimed to seen Jesus in a miracle, he appears as their own race!
- rglullis 4y ago
  There is a difference between making projections of mythical, transcendental figures and outright retconning a character just to support a certain narrative. We can not prove anything about Christ's appearance and Christian values do not change based on that. So it's only natural that people will represent Him as they are used to see their own people. It is a whole other game to change the description of a character with a well-established description and a set context.
treis 4y ago
Because there's not wildly successful books with wildly successful movies about the amazing empires that ruled the African continent. And it's hardly rewriting parts of LOTR to have a black actor portray Legolas. Everything is still the same except the color of the guys skin. You'll be fine.
- zpeti 4y ago
  Back around 2015, it was that, switching out characters as black. Fine. 2022 it's something much more sinister. It's the entire postmodern philosophy mixed with equity forced into stories. LOTR is about good and evil and the triumph of good. It doesn't dismantle what good or evil is, it doesn't question everything, it's just a great story. Unfortunately modern writers cannot bring themselves to write stories like this anymore, everything has to be questioned, everything has to be changed, everything sacred has to be unsacred, everything beatiful has to become ugly. It's hard to put it into words. But it is happening. People in the media industry really have lost all sense of good storytelling.
  - treis 4y ago
    >Back around 2015, it was that, switching out characters as black. Fine. That's what the GP is complaining about. And I don't get why that rates a "Fine". What's wrong with race neutral casting? > 2022 it's something much more sinister. It's the entire postmodern philosophy mixed with equity forced into stories. LOTR is about good and evil and the triumph of good. It doesn't dismantle what good or evil is, it doesn't question everything, it's just a great story. You can't look at Tolkein's life and the LOTR and then just call it a great story. You can see the echoes of his personal experience in the work. It's no different than today.
- hef19898 4y ago
  If they had a black Legolas in LotR and Hobbit, sure, why not. Since they didn't, well, having a black Legolas just destroys continuity. But who am I complaining about missing continuity, after all we have the latest Dr. Strange with the sole purpose of including the Fantastic 4 and X Men into the MCU without invalidating the entirety of the MCU so far.
prometheus76 4y ago
This parasitic move is intentional and done for several reasons. A brief summary of what I mean: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFxu3Q71NvE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFxu3Q71NvE
- zpeti 4y ago
  Yeah, this is a great explanation. And it's not just characters they destroy, but beauty, any past tradition whether good or bad. It really is about dismantling everything. (and somehow magically once you dismantle everything some sort of equity based marxism is what we're supposed to have). Why is marxism as a philosophy immune to dismantling? That's the million dollar question...
scoutt 4y ago
Aside for the lack of new, original and iconic characters and stories, we are living in a bad period for reboots of our favourite stories to be re-made and re-written by americans. I only hope it will end soon.
runarberg 4y ago
You do know that Lord of the Rings is a fiction right? It happens in a reality where literal magic exits. I mean does the story specify the skin color of every character? Does it say that every elf is white skinned? I mean this is in a magical world, for all we know hobbits skin tone changes with age like that of Chimpanzees, being light when they are young, and darker as they get older. Or maybe non-binary genders are actually quite common among wizards. There is plenty of room for diversity in a fictitious universe. In fact a lack of diversity requires the special reading here, not the other way around. Then the story is literally about a bunch of races solving a problem by working together. I mean the text it self literally celebrates diversity. Why wouldn’t you depict that in your casting?
- b112 4y ago
  Different species, not races.
  - runarberg 4y ago
    Sorry, I’m used to use the word race in a fantasy setting and species in a natural setting. A race in a fantasy world is any species a character of that story can belong to. This gets confusing e.g. in Star Trek where races exist in the fantasy sense and in a cultural sense (e.g. Being black (cultural race) is as much a part of Benjamin Sisko as being a human (biological race) is).
    - b112 4y ago
      Yes, I agree. I just feel it important here, as the divides are huge, both culturally and especially physicallly, than what we used to think of as 'race' between humans.
  - mrob 4y ago
    In Lord of the Rings, humans, elves, and orcs can all interbreed, so they are all the same species.
    - 4y ago
thaumasiotes 4y ago
> If you want diversity and black people on screen, why not create stories about the amazing empires that ruled the african continent in the past That'd be a hell of a story. Compare the extent of an actual African empire: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mali_Empire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mali_Empire

by bsaul 4y ago

cloutchaser 4y ago

> amazing empires that ruled the african continent in the past because then you'd have to confront that african empires had slaves too

prepend 4y ago
I think that would be an interesting story. And I think, with time, we’ll get more of these stories.

rglullis 4y ago

Because that would require all these studios to actually create new things and take risks. And that's not what these corporations are known for, right?

prepend 4y ago

I have a morbid fear that studios want the “conflict” as it’s 1) news and any news is good news, 2) set up a right vs wrong narrative that puts their tv show on the right side against whatever jerks are being racist/sexist/whatever. So it seems like a non-creative way to get free promotion, but I think it distracts from storytelling. The example I remember is how bad the 2016 ghostbusters reboot was. And the studio had this whole narrative about how sexist trolls were maligning the movie and this got repeated with any criticism. It seemed like astroturf that highlighted a small amount of internet sexist complaining and used it to smear any criticism for any reason. That seems like something that would be attractive to a beancounter-type.

bsaul 4y ago
very interesting theory... I used to attribute those choices to lazyness and "playing it safe", but your point is a reall possibility. I sincerely hope you're wrong though.

Akronymus 4y ago

>... instead of coming with original materials. I personally think they are simply not capable of making something engaging, BECAUSE they feel the need to promote todays philosophy over good storytelling. (They as in the streaming services)

titzer 4y ago

> I’m still amazed that people keep torturing stories made at different eras with different mentalities to try and promote today’s philosophy instead of coming with original materials. Been happening since forever. Jesus was a dark-skinned Middle-easterner. It's funny that in nearly every story over the world of people who have claimed to seen Jesus in a miracle, he appears as their own race!

rglullis 4y ago
There is a difference between making projections of mythical, transcendental figures and outright retconning a character just to support a certain narrative. We can not prove anything about Christ's appearance and Christian values do not change based on that. So it's only natural that people will represent Him as they are used to see their own people. It is a whole other game to change the description of a character with a well-established description and a set context.

treis 4y ago

Because there's not wildly successful books with wildly successful movies about the amazing empires that ruled the African continent. And it's hardly rewriting parts of LOTR to have a black actor portray Legolas. Everything is still the same except the color of the guys skin. You'll be fine.

zpeti 4y ago
Back around 2015, it was that, switching out characters as black. Fine. 2022 it's something much more sinister. It's the entire postmodern philosophy mixed with equity forced into stories. LOTR is about good and evil and the triumph of good. It doesn't dismantle what good or evil is, it doesn't question everything, it's just a great story. Unfortunately modern writers cannot bring themselves to write stories like this anymore, everything has to be questioned, everything has to be changed, everything sacred has to be unsacred, everything beatiful has to become ugly. It's hard to put it into words. But it is happening. People in the media industry really have lost all sense of good storytelling.
- treis 4y ago
  >Back around 2015, it was that, switching out characters as black. Fine. That's what the GP is complaining about. And I don't get why that rates a "Fine". What's wrong with race neutral casting? > 2022 it's something much more sinister. It's the entire postmodern philosophy mixed with equity forced into stories. LOTR is about good and evil and the triumph of good. It doesn't dismantle what good or evil is, it doesn't question everything, it's just a great story. You can't look at Tolkein's life and the LOTR and then just call it a great story. You can see the echoes of his personal experience in the work. It's no different than today.
hef19898 4y ago
If they had a black Legolas in LotR and Hobbit, sure, why not. Since they didn't, well, having a black Legolas just destroys continuity. But who am I complaining about missing continuity, after all we have the latest Dr. Strange with the sole purpose of including the Fantastic 4 and X Men into the MCU without invalidating the entirety of the MCU so far.

prometheus76 4y ago

This parasitic move is intentional and done for several reasons. A brief summary of what I mean: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFxu3Q71NvE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFxu3Q71NvE

zpeti 4y ago
Yeah, this is a great explanation. And it's not just characters they destroy, but beauty, any past tradition whether good or bad. It really is about dismantling everything. (and somehow magically once you dismantle everything some sort of equity based marxism is what we're supposed to have). Why is marxism as a philosophy immune to dismantling? That's the million dollar question...

scoutt 4y ago

Aside for the lack of new, original and iconic characters and stories, we are living in a bad period for reboots of our favourite stories to be re-made and re-written by americans. I only hope it will end soon.

runarberg 4y ago

You do know that Lord of the Rings is a fiction right? It happens in a reality where literal magic exits. I mean does the story specify the skin color of every character? Does it say that every elf is white skinned? I mean this is in a magical world, for all we know hobbits skin tone changes with age like that of Chimpanzees, being light when they are young, and darker as they get older. Or maybe non-binary genders are actually quite common among wizards. There is plenty of room for diversity in a fictitious universe. In fact a lack of diversity requires the special reading here, not the other way around. Then the story is literally about a bunch of races solving a problem by working together. I mean the text it self literally celebrates diversity. Why wouldn’t you depict that in your casting?

b112 4y ago
Different species, not races.
- runarberg 4y ago
  Sorry, I’m used to use the word race in a fantasy setting and species in a natural setting. A race in a fantasy world is any species a character of that story can belong to. This gets confusing e.g. in Star Trek where races exist in the fantasy sense and in a cultural sense (e.g. Being black (cultural race) is as much a part of Benjamin Sisko as being a human (biological race) is).
  - b112 4y ago
    Yes, I agree. I just feel it important here, as the divides are huge, both culturally and especially physicallly, than what we used to think of as 'race' between humans.
- mrob 4y ago
  In Lord of the Rings, humans, elves, and orcs can all interbreed, so they are all the same species.
  - 4y ago

thaumasiotes 4y ago

> If you want diversity and black people on screen, why not create stories about the amazing empires that ruled the african continent in the past That'd be a hell of a story. Compare the extent of an actual African empire: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mali_Empire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mali_Empire