Poll: Which universe is more robust: Tolkien, or Star Trek?

[DirkGently]

Neither. Ian M. Banks' "Culture".

 

[Woodsey]

They're not even comparable.

Tolkien's is far more complete.

I'd say the Star Wars universe is much more of a comparison than Star Trek, especially with the expanded universe (obviously just the 6 films would be an unfair comparison as they only follow one story).

What is the extended universe?
Is there books on it?

It's the combination of every single story ever created relating to Star Wars that's been accepted as canon.

Wookieepedia has all the different articles with characters, stories, etc. (like wikipedia does on the real world). It's got 70985 articles.

 

[Lemeza]

From the two here I would say Tolkien but I think that another VERY robust world is Pratchett's Discworld. There's nothing in the Discworld that isn't explanied in some book or another.

 

[esperandote]

Im not familiar with star trekbut i'll dare saying the middle earth. Besides if what you mentioned it has lots of side stories and even a genesis, the silmarillion.

 

[oliveira8]

Alot of Tolkein's ideas came from him reading robert e. howard

No it did not. He was once seen reading a pulp magazine but he never made a big fuss about it.

His inspirations came from Beowulf and celtic/nordic mythology. Gandalf is modeled after Odin.

 

[DuplicateValue]

Alot of Tolkein's ideas came from him reading robert e. howard

No it did not. He was once seen reading a pulp magazine but he never made a big fuss about it.

His inspirations came from Beowulf and celtic/nordic mythology. Gandalf is modeled after Odin.

Yeah he even wrote his own stories of Norse mythology. It was published lately I think.

 

[Cowabungaa]

While other universes may have its own lore and beloved characters, not many have most (if not all) of its inhabitants' cultures and geography totally mapped out, from their daily attire to formal dresses, languages, greetings, every nook and crannies of every villages and the deepest crevices on every hill and dale. Heck, even their entertainments and mediums have all the rules clearly laid out!

If you go by that rule, I'd go for the Star Wars universe. Haven't seen any other universe that beats the Star Wars one detail-wise.

 

[Mr Wednesday]

I think I'm just going to develop a one size fits all answer to these kind of threads.

Superman would win.

 

[nezroy]

Actually, Tolkien's son contributed a great deal to the world too, fleshing it out a lot.

Most of that was (or was supposed to be) pulled from Sr.'s notes and other unpublished materials. And everything Jr. added beyond that pretty much sucked

 

[fudgebo]

I vote neither and go with star wars

 

[similar.squirrel]

I'd have to go with Tolkien's universe. Star Trek is still evolving, to my knowledge. LOTR has stayed put, except for the movie trilogy and that MMO that seems to have gone off the radar.

 

[saxist01]

Neither, Trek has huge problems with the basics of Teleportation and Replicators. Middle earth fails on the sheer amount of resources that would be needed to support any of their armies.
That's before you go into the basics of Psychology on either Universe. An Earth that has multiple religions but no currency versus an Earth that has historical characters that are still alive?

If you wanna know where the resources come, and I don't know if you really do, check out the Atlas of Middle Earth. You'll read about the vast grazing and farming fields of Rohan, the Lithlad (I believe) in southern Mordor, and really the fields around Minas Tirith were farm lands, as were the areas south of the White Mountains (again, I think from memory).

 

[saxist01]

It's a tough call. I lean towards Tolkien, even though I may not agree with his views on good and evil (seeing some creatures as inherently one or the other based on species rather than personality).
*snip*

But if you think back to The Silmarillion, there were many "good" entities that leaned towards evil such as Sauron who was, by the standard of our own world, an angel of sorts (a Maiar).
Also even Manwe (I think it was him, I can't really remember) betrayed Iluvatar (God), by creating the Dwarves before the secondborns (men) had arrived.

Also, the people of Numenor, who were descendants of the brave men that fought alongside the hosts of the Valar, were washed away by the Gods for their evil actions in later years.

Actually, the dwarves were created by Aule. But yeah, anyone saying Tolkien created card-board cut-outs of good and evil, haven't looked into either Boromir, Gollum, or even Turin.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Im totally gonna point out that the Tolkien universe has agricultural shit goin' on, just gotta read into it.

It's less the agriculture and more the sheer logistics of keeping an army of that size sheltered, fed and armoured, well before you go into weirdness like longevity, mithril and Balrogs.

Im not sure which universe you are talking about with the currencey but i'm pretty sure that middle earth has money.

Star Trek doesn't have any money (allegedly), that's why they had to invent some in DS9 for the Ferengi. Credits have no real place.

At least you don't get universe resets all the time in Tolkien though.

 

[MrSnugglesworth]

Star Trek has its own language.


THAT PEOPLE MOTHERFUCKING SPEAK!!!


But Middle Earth may have that, I just don't know.

 

[Clashero]

I think the poll should be changed to Arda rather than just Middle-Earth. There's a lot of stuff going on at Valinor as well.

Tolkien alone, in a little over half a century, equalled the creative output of an entire country. Plus, he only has one planet to work in. Trek has an entire universe.

 

[Clashero]

Star Trek has its own language.


THAT PEOPLE MOTHERFUCKING SPEAK!!!


But Middle Earth may have that, I just don't know.

Quenya and Sindarin. Some people know dwarven as well, I believe.

 

[MrSnugglesworth]

Star Trek has its own language.


THAT PEOPLE MOTHERFUCKING SPEAK!!!


But Middle Earth may have that, I just don't know.

Quenya and Sindarin. Some people know dwarven as well, I believe.

See, spoke to soon.


Oh well.