4 ms·

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

by 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.
- treis 4y ago
  >Since they didn't, well, having a black Legolas just destroys continuity Again it's just skin color. Little bit dramatic to call that destroying continuity.
  - zpeti 4y ago
    - treis 4y ago
      >How about the repeated obsession with female characters who can easily beat up men? The thing you complain about is in the source material. Remember? "No man can kill me", "I am no man", stab stab stab. >But watching these women beat up men is laughable tbh. Maybe ask some famle survivors of domestic violence how they feel about this. How is that any different than tiny weak Hobbits killing giant spiders and otherwise being the heroes of the story? Weak actually being strong is a repeating theme across the fanatasy/superhero/comic genre. And since they're primarily written by physically weak nerds the motivation is obvious. Now that women are being included in the process they're doing the same thing for the same reasons.
      - zpeti 4y ago
        Storytelling, that's how. Which doesn't exist. What you'll notice is that in better storytelling, there will be an explanation of why the hobbit can beat the giant spider. Outsmarting it, being invisible with a ring, whatever. Good storytelling means you make the impossible seem possible. Now, all we have is token women who we all know are there because they are women, beating up men in ridiculously impossible ways, with no explanation of how. It's just that the writers want you to know that women are strong grrrrr. Because feminism. Well, it makes for terrible cinema.
        hef19898 4y ago
        We see a ton of bad story telling, agreed. How women are protrayed is not among the reasons. Disclaimer: I have been handled pretty easily by women in BJJ and kickboxing / boxing drspite being 20 kg heavier and a head taller. And I am not un-trained. Get over it, competent and strong women do exist. Edit (because I have to get of my chest): The latest Dr. Strange is propably the best example of bad story telling I've seen in a long time. I quit the MCU after Black Widow (I like the character and Scarlett Johansson) and swore to maybe watch the next Thor, max. Until I saw Dr. Strange was already free on Disney+, and I needed some distraction. All that bad film did was making me not watch any MCU film ever again...
jl6 4y ago
I didn’t think Legolas was in this new series at all?
bsaul 4y ago
"there's not wildly successful books with wildly successful movies about the amazing empires that ruled the African continent" I guess that's the interesting problem the studios and equality advocates should try to solve. To me, what they're doing right now is close to an insult to the african-american community. It's like saying "there are really no original cultural production coming from your community, nor anything remotely interesting in your past writing about, so we'll have to recycle ours to make some room".
xdennis 4y ago
> Everything is still the same except the color of the guys skin. That's exactly what people mean when they say wokesters use people's cultures as skins, with no content. If you wanted to add African representation, let's say Zulu, you'd add something specific to Zulu culture: people, language, songs, stories, etc. But instead they just change some skin colours in an existing story. That's not representation, that's just skin.
- tomtheelder 4y ago
  I think the counterargument would be that casting people of different races isn't really supposed to be about culture at all. In theory it's meant to provide a sense of inclusion to those who might not look like the characters as they were intentionally written. As in: "LOTR is still for me, even if I don't look like a European." I don't really want to get into the validity/efficacy of that. I just don't really have an informed opinion. But I do think that's the reasoning. I think that wanting to have a more diverse cultural backdrop for the stories we tell is something I can definitely get behind, but I don't think it's really that related to having a more racially diverse cast for a story with a decidedly Anglo/Euro origin.
  - chimineycricket 4y ago
    >"LOTR is still for me, even if I don't look like a European." What? Is there a law that says I can't enjoy art that doesn't include my skin color? If there's a TV series about Nelson Mandela, would you be okay with a white actor playing him? What about Rosa Parks? It's for inclusion right?
  - bsaul 4y ago
    The problem is that racially diverse cast while keeping the same euro-centric stories is all they've been doing for the past 15 years, because all they really care about is looking "nice". If they produced movies with original storylines more regularly, then every minority would naturally find something they could relate to, simply because author would naturally produce contents aligned with their time. Instead of that, studios give the impression of beeing hostage of the "diversity mob" which demand its payback on every single content. It's just pathetic, and a missed opportunity for truely great and interesting content.

by treis 4y ago

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.

treis 4y ago
>Since they didn't, well, having a black Legolas just destroys continuity Again it's just skin color. Little bit dramatic to call that destroying continuity.
- zpeti 4y ago
  - treis 4y ago
    >How about the repeated obsession with female characters who can easily beat up men? The thing you complain about is in the source material. Remember? "No man can kill me", "I am no man", stab stab stab. >But watching these women beat up men is laughable tbh. Maybe ask some famle survivors of domestic violence how they feel about this. How is that any different than tiny weak Hobbits killing giant spiders and otherwise being the heroes of the story? Weak actually being strong is a repeating theme across the fanatasy/superhero/comic genre. And since they're primarily written by physically weak nerds the motivation is obvious. Now that women are being included in the process they're doing the same thing for the same reasons.
    - zpeti 4y ago
      Storytelling, that's how. Which doesn't exist. What you'll notice is that in better storytelling, there will be an explanation of why the hobbit can beat the giant spider. Outsmarting it, being invisible with a ring, whatever. Good storytelling means you make the impossible seem possible. Now, all we have is token women who we all know are there because they are women, beating up men in ridiculously impossible ways, with no explanation of how. It's just that the writers want you to know that women are strong grrrrr. Because feminism. Well, it makes for terrible cinema.
      - hef19898 4y ago
        We see a ton of bad story telling, agreed. How women are protrayed is not among the reasons. Disclaimer: I have been handled pretty easily by women in BJJ and kickboxing / boxing drspite being 20 kg heavier and a head taller. And I am not un-trained. Get over it, competent and strong women do exist. Edit (because I have to get of my chest): The latest Dr. Strange is propably the best example of bad story telling I've seen in a long time. I quit the MCU after Black Widow (I like the character and Scarlett Johansson) and swore to maybe watch the next Thor, max. Until I saw Dr. Strange was already free on Disney+, and I needed some distraction. All that bad film did was making me not watch any MCU film ever again...

jl6 4y ago

I didn’t think Legolas was in this new series at all?

bsaul 4y ago

"there's not wildly successful books with wildly successful movies about the amazing empires that ruled the African continent" I guess that's the interesting problem the studios and equality advocates should try to solve. To me, what they're doing right now is close to an insult to the african-american community. It's like saying "there are really no original cultural production coming from your community, nor anything remotely interesting in your past writing about, so we'll have to recycle ours to make some room".

xdennis 4y ago

> Everything is still the same except the color of the guys skin. That's exactly what people mean when they say wokesters use people's cultures as skins, with no content. If you wanted to add African representation, let's say Zulu, you'd add something specific to Zulu culture: people, language, songs, stories, etc. But instead they just change some skin colours in an existing story. That's not representation, that's just skin.

tomtheelder 4y ago
I think the counterargument would be that casting people of different races isn't really supposed to be about culture at all. In theory it's meant to provide a sense of inclusion to those who might not look like the characters as they were intentionally written. As in: "LOTR is still for me, even if I don't look like a European." I don't really want to get into the validity/efficacy of that. I just don't really have an informed opinion. But I do think that's the reasoning. I think that wanting to have a more diverse cultural backdrop for the stories we tell is something I can definitely get behind, but I don't think it's really that related to having a more racially diverse cast for a story with a decidedly Anglo/Euro origin.
- chimineycricket 4y ago
  >"LOTR is still for me, even if I don't look like a European." What? Is there a law that says I can't enjoy art that doesn't include my skin color? If there's a TV series about Nelson Mandela, would you be okay with a white actor playing him? What about Rosa Parks? It's for inclusion right?
- bsaul 4y ago
  The problem is that racially diverse cast while keeping the same euro-centric stories is all they've been doing for the past 15 years, because all they really care about is looking "nice". If they produced movies with original storylines more regularly, then every minority would naturally find something they could relate to, simply because author would naturally produce contents aligned with their time. Instead of that, studios give the impression of beeing hostage of the "diversity mob" which demand its payback on every single content. It's just pathetic, and a missed opportunity for truely great and interesting content.