Why does anyone in Middle Earth take the Orcs seriously?

[Macgyvercas]

Probably because they were very successful in zerg-rushing in the books, what with it taking an unkillable army of ghosts to save Gondor during the siege.

That deus ex machina shit is because of Peter Jackson. In the book it isn't even clear whether the ghosts can physically harm anyone.

Physically, no. The weapon they use is fear. Yeah, they literally SCARE you to death.

Regardless, I think Jackson just did that to expand their role. In the book, all they had to do was take out the corsairs to be freed of their oath to Aragorn, not be a one sided [mtg_card=Wrath of God] at the Pelannor Fields.

 

[RJ 17]

Probably because they were very successful in zerg-rushing in the books, what with it taking an unkillable army of ghosts to save Gondor during the siege.

This right here pretty much says it all. The orcs are a terrifying threat that rapes and pillages where ever they go. Their armies are powerful and deadly, but some Deus Ex Machina crap ALWAYS happens to steal major victory from the.

They had Helms Deep all but in their hands, then what happens? Gandalf shows up and Deus Ex Machina's the crap outta them, turning their army into a bunch of worthless sissies. And as Amethyst pointed out, Gondor was fucked, right and proper, until a frickin' invincible ghost army of death shows up and literally sweeps the field clean of anyone/anything posing a threat to humans.

The short answer is: they're the badguys. They're always going to appear overwhelmingly deadly and powerful but end up getting crushed. Why does anyone care about any villains in the DBZ universe when everyone knows Goku's just gonna *****-slap them into submission in the end? Why does anyone care about Loki when he's got the frickin' Avengers coming after him?

 

[Terminal Blue]

This is why I tend to attack anyone who bothers to mention "racism" out of hand for the most part.

Good thing I didn't then.

snip

That was a well thought out post, but generally yeah.. I never read the Simarillion, but I have an art book which does a pretty good job of summarizing it and I generally get the mythos. The things you're saying are not new to me.

But what you've done is something I think fantasy writers do too often and which Tolkien himself certainly did, which is to offer a purely in-universe answer to literary criticism. When someone points out that the logic on which your book works is similar to that of certain real world ideas and positions, the answer is not to say "yeah, because that's how this world works". That actually just reinforces the point, because the author is solely responsible for how the world works. He or she choose every single rule or law, and there's no harm in asking why.

Why describe orcs physically as "degraded and repulsive versions of the least lovely Mongol-types" if you don't believe that there are mongol-type (or mongoloid) races? Now, I agree that orcs are just a representation of faceless, soulless evil. They're quite true to the anglo-saxon word they're based on, which just means an evil spirit or "demon". Still, the question remains - why give them a faces which resemble those of people in the real world? Why give them those characteristics?

We're also talking about a universe in which good and evil, as well as competence, mental fortitude and the ability to govern, are hereditary, and in which these things are reflected in physical attributes which are heavily associated with particular ethnic groups in the real world. Again, this makes in-universe sense because it implies a "purer" descent from divinity, but the fact remains that it was still a conscious choice to make it like that, and to have those traits expressed in such a way.

As I have said in every single post, I don't think JRR Tolkien himself was racist. I think his work lends itself a little too well to racist interpretation, but I don't think he himself was racist. I don't think this because he didn't like the Nazis, lots of racists didn't like the Nazis. In fact, Tolkien's resistance to the Nazis seems to have been on account of their perversion of what he considered to the noble traits of North European people and culture, and I have to say that's not dodging the problem.

Tolkien had some weird social views, even by the standards of his time. In many ways, he seems to have been a typical pastoral romantic, in that he despised the modern world and felt it would be better to try and recapture some imagined idyllic past. This was a fairly common attitude amongst people who studied mythology, however, it's also highly associated with ethnic nationalism and the belief that the true "essence" of a people stems entirely from their being a singular "people", with a shared ancestry, mythology and identity. I think you can probably make the link from that idea to some of the disturbing implications, which again I don't necessarily believe that Tolkien shared at all. But it's still creepy to me, because the logic underpinning his work seems to make those ideas rational.

I actually think it had a lot more to do with class and its changing dynamics within British society at the time of writing than it had to do with race (someone already posted part of that letter he sent to the Germans in which he absolutely pwned them for their arbitrary racism, so I won't bother to fish it out)

I agree. However, you have to bear in mind that the two really weren't separate in British fascism. There's a reason why fascism was so attractive to the upper classes, because it seemed to vindicate the idea that those whose ancestors had ruled had done so because they were simply superior, they had been bred for it, unlike the filthy unwashed masses whose ancestors had lived like animals.

The "racial" order of fascism did not suddenly stop at the point when you had white skin or North-European ancestry.

I don't think Tolkien was a fascist, but I think he would have agreed with elements of this idea. He certainly believed in the inherent right of certain people to rule because of their ancestry, and it's explicit both in his fiction and in statements he made in general life.

 

[Ernil Menegil]

Tolkien disliked allegory in all its forms. He never wrote any of his works as an allegory of anything in particular.

He much preferred applicability, in that the experiences of the characters and the developments of his world's history could perhaps shed some light, or be relatable, to those of the real world. A bit of a Socratic exercise, in that respect. Which is to say, he never intended to have the One Ring represent the atomic bomb, or Haradrim/Easterlings/Orcs/Dwarves as Africans/Huns/UglierHuns/Jews, with the peoples of the West somehow representing the apex of civilization, or other similar interpretations. What he wanted was for people to see the people and events of this secondary world he created, and draw from it enjoyment and insight on those events that take place in the real world.

In other words, never read the works that take place in Middle Earth with an outsider, modern eye, looking for racism or class warfare or whatever other sick or virtuous ideals you may be seeking in order to justify your personal mores or interpretations. Tolkien intended to tell a story, no more, no less, a fantastical mythos that had no place or bearing in the real world. Tolkien's greatest intent was to immerse his readers into the world he created, to lead their suspension of disbelief into the wonders of the Art he wove, to make them believe in the impossible by virtue of that internal logic of the secondary world.

And that is why any and all interpretation/allegorical reading of Tolkien's works will always fail to hold water. The real world and Tolkien's world are realities that, while relatable, are entirely different, as Elves are to Men.

 

[Toaster Hunter]

Mostly plot armor, but there are other reasons as well.

Orcs are shock troops, not special forces. They use massive numbers and speed to overwhelm any obstacle, rather than individual skill. If I remember correctly from the Silmarillion (Which I haven't read in a while, so forgive me if I make a mistake), when there are no heroes present, they swarm over pretty much anything that stands in their way, and the Elves under Thingol hid themselves out of fear of being overrun. At Nirnaeth Arnoediad, the combined armies of Elves Men and Dwarves are curb stomped by orcs (There were Dragons and other things as well, but still). Hurin killed so many that they built a bridge over a river with their dead, but still kept coming.

In closing, one orc is a joke, ten is a nuisance, millions are a catastrophe, and there are always more.

 

[Therumancer]

This is why I tend to attack anyone who bothers to mention "racism" out of hand for the most part.

Good thing I didn't then.

snip

That was a well thought out post, but generally yeah.. I never read the Simarillion, but I have an art book which does a pretty good job of summarizing it and I generally get the mythos. The things you're saying are not new to me.

But what you've done is something I think fantasy writers do too often and which Tolkien himself certainly did, which is to offer a purely in-universe answer to literary criticism. When someone points out that the logic on which your book works is similar to that of certain real world ideas and positions, the answer is not to say "yeah, because that's how this world works". That actually just reinforces the point, because the author is solely responsible for how the world works. He or she choose every single rule or law, and there's no harm in asking why.

Why describe orcs physically as "degraded and repulsive versions of the least lovely Mongol-types" if you don't believe that there are mongol-type (or mongoloid) races? Now, I agree that orcs are just a representation of faceless, soulless evil. They're quite true to the anglo-saxon word they're based on, which just means an evil spirit or "demon". Still, the question remains - why give them a faces which resemble those of people in the real world? Why give them those characteristics?

We're also talking about a universe in which good and evil, as well as competence, mental fortitude and the ability to govern, are hereditary, and in which these things are reflected in physical attributes which are heavily associated with particular ethnic groups in the real world. Again, this makes in-universe sense because it implies a "purer" descent from divinity, but the fact remains that it was still a conscious choice to make it like that, and to have those traits expressed in such a way.

As I have said in every single post, I don't think JRR Tolkien himself was racist. I think his work lends itself a little too well to racist interpretation, but I don't think he himself was racist. I don't think this because he didn't like the Nazis, lots of racists didn't like the Nazis. In fact, Tolkien's resistance to the Nazis seems to have been on account of their perversion of what he considered to the noble traits of North European people and culture, and I have to say that's not dodging the problem.

Tolkien had some weird social views, even by the standards of his time. In many ways, he seems to have been a typical pastoral romantic, in that he despised the modern world and felt it would be better to try and recapture some imagined idyllic past. This was a fairly common attitude amongst people who studied mythology, however, it's also highly associated with ethnic nationalism and the belief that the true "essence" of a people stems entirely from their being a singular "people", with a shared ancestry, mythology and identity. I think you can probably make the link from that idea to some of the disturbing implications, which again I don't necessarily believe that Tolkien shared at all. But it's still creepy to me, because the logic underpinning his work seems to make those ideas rational.

I actually think it had a lot more to do with class and its changing dynamics within British society at the time of writing than it had to do with race (someone already posted part of that letter he sent to the Germans in which he absolutely pwned them for their arbitrary racism, so I won't bother to fish it out)

I agree. However, you have to bear in mind that the two really weren't separate in British fascism. There's a reason why fascism was so attractive to the upper classes, because it seemed to vindicate the idea that those whose ancestors had ruled had done so because they were simply superior, they had been bred for it, unlike the filthy unwashed masses whose ancestors had lived like animals.

The "racial" order of fascism did not suddenly stop at the point when you had white skin or North-European ancestry.

I don't think Tolkien was a fascist, but I think he would have agreed with elements of this idea. He certainly believed in the inherent right of certain people to rule because of their ancestry, and it's explicit both in his fiction and in statements he made in general life.

Well, fantasy has oftentimes been criticized because it's very nature puts it beyond critical analysis. It doesn't mean anything unless it's creator sets out to intentionally have it mean something, and can by it's very nature be set up to mean nothing other than to entertain the reader. This is why so many academic types totally loathe fantasy, science fiction, etc...

If you want to get touchy about real issues, the bottom line is that anything can be considered analogous to something going on in real life. Anything you can think up in fantasy, has probably had something similar happen for real, or is similar to an issue happening (or has happened) somewhere in reality. Many fantasy and science fiction authors also use real events and cultures and such for inspiration for things that happen in their books, what kinds of tactics might be used ins specific situations for example, or how sides might break down around a specific issue, but they don't nessicarly follow the real history, as the sides and situation might be entirely differant. For example if your writing "Warhammer 40k" you might use real world fascist regimes as inspiration for some of the things going on, but unlike the real world what we generally see as "bad guys" in the first world, are the good guys there, and are justified by an incredibly hostile enviroment. Sure, it's the bloodiest and most cruel regime ever imagined (in it's own hype) but it's that way for a reason, and is far better than what would happen if it didn't exist to fight off the Warp Demons, Genocidal exterminator robots, and other forces. It kind of evolved into what it is, for a "greater good", and understanding that is why it's "dark fantasy".

In perhaps a more touchy context, look at comic books. In comics you oftentimes see what amounts to a Hitler-esque master race speil by the GOOD GUYS. You look at all the mutant registration/civil war crap for example and the side most people are lead to find more sympathetic are the guys who basically argue that those people who have super abillities should be beyond regulation and control, and expected to only engage in self-policing.... trust in their generosity that some of them will keep you mere norms safe. When you get down to it "Professor X" Civil War era "Captain America", and "Magneto" are all pretty much what amount to master race extremists that believe in a totally differant set of rules for the "gifted" the big differance being in how far they take it. Magneto for example wants to enslave all normal humans (well most of the time), Professor X merely thinks the ordinary laws and societal rules should not apply and you should all rely on him and his special police force to keep everyone safe... at least until the passage of time erases all th genetic dead ends, Captain America pretty much has no position except that he thinks if you have powers it's pretty much okay to run around in a mask and do whatever the hell you want unless someone else in a mask is around to stop you, he was ultimatly kind of like the anarchist version of Professor X during this, he doesn't have a police force (of a sort) to donate since he kind of said that organized teams like The Avengers shouldn't be used for that if I remember, ironic since that's kind of what they had been doing for years.

The point is that if you try and make real world sense out of fantasy and equate it with real political positions and issues and such, it becomes a huge mess. It's also one of the reasons why I use comics as an example because in a lot of those cases they try and make "real world issues" in a comic sense, but if you actually try and interpet it that way it falls apart and the good guys we're cheering for usually wind up seeming more psychotic than anything. Professor X in paticular seems like he would fit right in running "Aryan Nation"... but that's also kind of why your not supposed to analyze it that deeply.


When Tolkien was writing I think his descriptions were intended to invoke images someone at the time could understand and wouldn't be too far outside of their experience. There wasn't a huge sword and sorcery culture at that point, nor were there a lot of fantasy artists. Tolkien is writing about something similar to a huge barbarian horde, being directed at the more civilized peoples, much like happened historically, where the Mongols more or less took over most of their known world using very basic "horde" tactics. His description is pretty clear, and brings a barbaric image to mind, as well as an implication of the kinds of tactics being used by the Orcs.

To be honest, a lot of vintage fantasy authors used very similar techniques in their writings, which are crude more than being racist. They don't have the advantage of the culture they themselves spawned. To put it into perspective Fritz Leiber was arguably worse than Tolkien, this was a guy who had his norse-inspired barbarian-Skald hero Fafrd hail from a place known as "Cold Corner" (I kid you not), the "Mingols" were also a problem.... understand this is not a satire, it was dead series, but if you read it now you might not realize that if you don't stop to consider how bloody old it is.

Today someone like Tolkien might be more descriptive by giving Orcs pig faces or whatever, but that kind of imagery probably wouldn't have worked back then... I'll also be honest in saying that I prefer the cheez inherant in vintage naming conventions compared to a lot of modern authors who need to give everything multi-paragraph descriptions and long names that look like they slammed their forehead into the keyboard 4 or 5 times.

In closing I'll also say that if you want to get technical, by modern morality it's pretty much impossible to have any bad guys in fantasy or otherwise without being offensive to someone or some point of view. That's one of the reasons why I don't put much stock in it, Utopian morality only works in a Utopia. At the end of the day I don't really feel a lot of guilt about being judgemental IRL, and yes that makes me a bigot to many.

I'm also one of those people who likes to point out some of the cautionary tales in fantasy and science fiction. Being accepting of and tolerant of everything is not a good thing. Consider that one of the villains in science fiction most accepted as being utterly stupid, is the corperation from "Aliens". This is the corperation that wants to preserve/study/understand these utterly malevolent xenomorphs that exist to pretty much destroy everything not them, it always goes wrong. The guys calling for Xenomorph genocide are right... and there is a lesson to be learned thre, there is a point at which something just should not be preserved... and yes, at least according to some of the spin off Materials the Xenomorphs are sentinent (with intelligence varying between the differant types), they actually kind of understand what they are doing on a basic level (which makes them so dangerous) they just don't care because it's the foundation of their existance. Another one from books (rather than movies and spin off materials) is the old "Man Kzin Wars" which begins where humanity manages to more or less get it's magic want solution and evolves into ultra-liberal space hippies. The groovy existance of mankind is disturbed when they run into this race of felinoids called the Kzin who basically don't want to co-exist, make love not war, and dance around with flowers in their hair, sharing peace and equality with all other forms of life. In the end humanity winds up re-learning war, which is what it was arguably evolved for, and teaching these self-declared "apex predators" how it's done... in what is probably one of the longest running science fiction series ever (I think we still see new stories in that universe coming out once in a while even).

It might bug some people to say this, but there are cultures in the real world I just do not like and consider evil. In fantasy I don't have a problem with just flat out accepting a group as being bad, and taking the story and it's lessons (if there are any) as intended. I also don't think that making an "evil race" based on a historical culture or whatever is in any way racist, since it's hardly one sided, over the years there has been fantasy where some version of any culture has fought pretty much any other culture, from the position of both the good and bad guys. It's just easy to start screaming when you think a group resembles you too closely (and frankly if the culture is evil in the story, that in my mind is a warning sign for some self relfection on yourself and your society, but that's a personal statement, understanding why other than "the guy writing this is racist" is how things get changed for the better without major conflict), and it should almost always be ignored. For example native americans have been used as both good guys and bad guys in fantasy, when it's a good guy it's no big deal, when it's a bad guy or victim people cry foul. That's like someone screaming about how it's wrong that American culture is being portrayed as evil in a zombie movie making a metaphor about cosumerism, or where the CIA needs to be stopped from doing [insert action clique of the week]. It
goes around and around. There is a natural tendency for people to only want to embrace positive stereotypes (say scotsmen being good Engineers, which inspired Roddenberry to create Scotty), and cry bloody murder about the negative ones (say portraying scotsmen as a bunch of backwoods goat molesting morons who act as barbarian foils in a story), it all evens out in the end, especially when it's fantasy. There are times when you just have to be able to laugh at yourself, especially when something is obviously being exagerrated for a story. The point is if describing Orcs as being similar to Mongols isn't a big deal, if it was, we'd probably have to hunt down the guys that did "Team America: World Police" (probably one of the biggest slams on the US ever... by Americans no less) for going much, much, further.

 

[Therumancer]

snipsville

You're a tad off on using Weyland Utani as an example in your point; Weyland Utani's bioweapons people didn't want to study the Xenomorphs for posterity or to save them for humanitarian reasons. They wanted them because they figured they could make money off of selling them as living terror weapons. They weren't hippies trying to save the poor endangered species, they were capitalists who saw dollar signs from the death that xenomorphs could bring. Ripley and co. were correct not just because xenomorphs are killing machines who exist to eat, infect, and lay eggs, but they were correct to kill them so that people like Carter Burke couldn't propagate them as weapons.

Besides, xenomorphs just do what they were born to do; prey on other species, infect, lay eggs, repeat. They're nothing but instinct and cunning. Weyland Utani is far worse. "I don't know which species is worse, I mean, you don't see THEM fucking each other over for a goddamned percentage!"

Depends on how far you want to go into "Alien". The corperation is involved in most versions of it, and the reasons have ranged from generally wanting to study them "think of what we can learn" to arguements about their right to exist alibet usually by those that had some belief they could get something out of them. There was even story line (novels) where they wanted to keep them around simply to extract a drug called "fire" from glands in the aliens purely for recreational reasons. While the corp was involved, that one was largely driven by civilian criminals if I recall, and they used enviromental arguements to defend why the aliens should be preserved.

Also, the aliens are a bit more than that, of course it depends on the writer and which direction they went in. The movies do not specify if the aliens are self aware or not, however some of the books and comics do, the version that attacked "Stromwatch" prior to the launch of "The Authority" in the Wildstorm universe were based off of the sentinent ones which is why they were capable of taking down some of the most powerful and well prepared superbeings on the planet (though numbers were also a factor).

 

[talker]

because for instance, it's quite unusual for an isolated village to have many guards. and when you're being attacked by a band of warriors with a face that would give granny a heart attack, it's would be best to grab as much of your stuff as you can and make a run for it.

and as for armies, orcs are spawned in big pools in Mordor, so they're really no end to them unless you nuke the place. or destroy the ring, that would work too.

 

[beastro]

That was a very interesting read but there's a famous Tolkien quote/reply to weather his work is an allegory of modern events...he seems to disregard all allegory, new or old;
''
For instance, many people have suggested that The Lord of the Rings is an allegory for the World Wars. But the author, J. R. R. Tolkien, emphatically stated in his introduction to the second edition, "It is neither allegorical nor topical.... I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done so since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence."
''

I'm not an English major so maybe I am getting allegory confused with something else? 'elves bringing light to the west'...'westerns civilisations perspective of the east', 'reflect spread of islam' etc. Is that allegory or is that something else?

I'm well aware of his disgust of allegory (something I agree with him on). His work wasn't allegory but it's clear where his inspirations in real life came from, both from his personal experiences, his Christian perspective and his perspective on European history.

Tolkien was very adamant in trying to create his own, unique world (which he largely did, especially linguistically), but he still drew from many sources despite claiming not to have done so, but everyone does.

He disavowed any inspiration of the One Ring coming from Wagners ring in Des Ring des Nibelungen, but they still share almost exactly the same characteristics and properties, while you merely have to take one look at the map of Middle Earth to see its similarities with our world (His overall work was set tens of thousands of years before recorded history with the continents of the Fourth Age being almost exactly like what they look like today).

The interesting thing about how Tolkien used his inspiration is how he mixed things up. I mentioned how Minis Tirith and the Battle of the Pelennor Fields resembled the great Battle of Vienna in 1683, but he also mixed in hints of the other legendary Battle of the Catalaunian Fields. Attila lost the battle and retreated, only to merely regrouped to begin another invasion of the Roman Empire after it's internal politics had rendered it incapable of resisting him, only for Attila to suddenly retreat from Italy and then die of a nose bleed.

Also in the battle the Romes greatest ally, Theodoric I, king of the Visigoths died and through that mixed in prophecy like hose the Witch King wouldn't fall to the hand of a Man: Attila was given an ambiguous prophecy over the death of one of the leaders of his enemy and he looked on it was the death of Aetius and thus would guarantee victory, only it resulted in Theodoric's death and he read too much into the prophecy.

Add into that another battle saving charge that won the day, this time after Theodoric's death that was led by his son.

The other mix is what was done with Minas Morgul and Osgiliath, which both serve as shades of Constaninople, and with Osgiliath and the last between it and Minas Tirith being a form of Balkans. Minas Morgul was placed right at the foot of the enemy, it fell and quickly became the most important fortress for Saurons army just as Constantinople, famous for it's walls and many sieges, just like Vienna fell to the Ottomans. Osgiliath was constantly fought over and control over it swayed back and forth like the Balkans did, but the Constantinople connect comes from two things:

1: It was the second capital of the two kingdoms after Arnor felled and the original capital of the Dunedain, Annuminas, was overrun and reduced to ruin when all but a few of Elendils descendants abandoned it and moved their center of power to Gondor, the Southern Kingdom, like the Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire (and then the only Roman Empire after the West disintegrated - like Arnor).

2: It was also a city which straddled the largest river in Middle Earth, like how Constantinople was situated on the Bosporus and controlled all activity throughout the the Turkish Straits from it to the Sea of Marmara and the Dardanelles.

I could go on, but look at Harad too, especially the northern reaches of it.

Tolkien even reused a historical name by calling the pirate allies of the the Corsairs of Umber, just like the Corsairs of the Barbary Coast on North Africa, while mixing in the Black Numenoreans and their port capital of Umber which are clearly meant to reflect how the Roman North African provinces of the Roman Empire fell and how it's former inhabitants adopted Islamic and Arab ways. Umber and how Gondor lost it and paid heavily for it due to a costly war and a deadly plague reflect Justinian's attempt to regain Carthage for the Byzantines and the plague which took place during his rule (and was so named after him) that devastated their empire reducing it to a shadow of it's former self for centuries to come.

If you're still not convinced, look at this map and look at the mountain ranges surrounding Mordor: http://rhodesmill.org/brandon/static/2009/google-middle-earth-corrected-big.jpg

Don't you find them very similar to Anatolia: The "homeland" of the Ottoman Empire which they'd conquered from other people. Further south and east lay Nurn, a land rich and fertile (like a certain "Crescent" South and East of Anatolia) whose people Sauron enslaved to farm and feed his armies living in the wasteland of Gorgoroth.

Tolkien was inspired by the wars between East and West, a deep reverence for Western Civilization, set his main themes around Christian morality and its world view (Doesn't matter how mighty individuals may be or how strong armies are, Mankind cannot defeat evil without God and where the powerful fail, Christ-like meekness will win out), the horror and cruel necessity of war which requires good men to do bad things and finally, Just Wars more often than not center on killing and dying at the hands of other man who aren't evil themselves, but are the servants of those who are.

 

[bartholen_v1legacy]

Well, only the main characters have the "hero's aura", that's why Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin can take on monstrous orcs two times their size.

Everyone who isn't a major character is fucked.

Try to remind me... at what point do actually any of them do that? Okay, Sam gets his big moment in Cirith Ungol, but for the most part they don't fight much.

OT: Did you miss the parts in Two Towers where the Uruk-hai mess stuff up big time? Burning the villages, blowing up Helm's Deep's wall, breaching the keep etc.? Or the taking of Osgiliath in Return of the King, or the attempt to re-take it? The breaching of Minas Tirith? And when did a group of 10 people slaughter an entire battalion of orcs?

I'd say the orcs are a perfectly credible threat.

 

[IronMit]

.

That was a very interesting read. Much appreciated.
I guess when he said he hates allegory he was just saying the one ring and the rising power in the east has nothing to do with Hitler. lol.


I can appreciate the Christian morality aspect; I remember in the film, Gandalf and Frodo talking about weather they should kill Golum and Faramir's speech after he killed an 'enemy';
'and if he was really evil at heart...and what lies and threats led him from his long march from home'.

I need to read the book again...I read half of it in my teens and it went over my head.
If I remember the book seems to assume you know about the world already. Am I supposed to read another book first? or the appendixes..wikipedia every character/location/event refered to? or just read through it?

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Morgoth corrupted elves out of jealousy into imperfect replicas dubbed orcs.
I suppose it's like Michael Keaton in Duplicity: the more clones you make, the crappier results you get.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Well, only the main characters have the "hero's aura", that's why Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin can take on monstrous orcs two times their size.

Everyone who isn't a major character is fucked.

Try to remind me... at what point do actually any of them do that? Okay, Sam gets his big moment in Cirith Ungol, but for the most part they don't fight much.

OT: Did you miss the parts in Two Towers where the Uruk-hai mess stuff up big time? Burning the villages, blowing up Helm's Deep's wall, breaching the keep etc.? Or the taking of Osgiliath in Return of the King, or the attempt to re-take it? The breaching of Minas Tirith? And when did a group of 10 people slaughter an entire battalion of orcs?

I'd say the orcs are a perfectly credible threat.

Well, the battle at Balin's tomb pretty much has them swarmed by orcs and a cave troll. At a certain point Frodo, Merry, and Pippin are hiding, but Sam is knocking 'm down like he's playing whack a mole.

It's no real critisism though. The action scenes are still very engaging.

 

[Proverbial Jon]

The Orcs are simply not a credible threat. If a small band of people can take on and kill an entire battalion of them, how are they even a threat to an actual army? Even when they outnumber the good guys 10 to one, they still get slaughtered.

I just saw the Hobbit and it suffered from this "stormtrooper syndrome" just as badly as LOTR did.

The Hobbit movie is highly dramatised and suffers for a lot of its embellishment. In the books the entire Dwarf party, along with Bilbo and even Gandalf are all pretty useless when it comes to fighting. They're forever running from something, being captured or just generally getting into trouble. Considering they are a large group of burly dwarves, they're pretty useless in combat!

The Hobbit film's finale in the book was far less dramatic. They were all in separate trees, they weren't hanging over a dangerous precipice and there wasn't a giant, legendary orc hunting them. It was literally only a few wargs and some goblins and yet they all considered themselves completely doomed until the eagles dropped out of the sky to grab them. Gandalf didn't even call the eagles in the book either, they really had no options.

 

[Terminal Blue]

Well, fantasy has oftentimes been criticized because it's very nature puts it beyond critical analysis. It doesn't mean anything unless it's creator sets out to intentionally have it mean something, and can by it's very nature be set up to mean nothing other than to entertain the reader. This is why so many academic types totally loathe fantasy, science fiction, etc...

I'm not talking about writing expressing conscious beliefs or writing a manifesto. I'm not saying that Tolkien must have been a fascist or was actively advocating that Chinese people were pure evil or that North-Europeans were inherently noble and beautiful. But if Tolkien was looking for a way to make the orcs appear "ugly" or "debased" and what he came up with was "mongoloid", or if he was looking for a way to indicate nobility and good breeding and what he came up with was stereotypical nordic/anglo-saxon traits, that raises some questions, does it not? It says something about his unconscious beliefs, the things he simply assumed or took for granted. He may have set out to just "entertain an audience" (although I don't think that was purely the motivation) but the way he did so, the things he imagined would entertain the audience still tell us about him.

It's also my experience that academics love fantasy and science fiction (particularly the latter). The number of times I've seen people namedrop sci-fi novels or movies in academic articles is staggering. In fact, science fiction is almost by definition a projection of ourselves, it's us working out our hopes and fears about our own society on a blank slate we call the future. Even completely pulpy sci-fi (I'd almost go so far as to say especially that) has something to say about how we see the world we live in.

The point is that if you try and make real world sense out of fantasy and equate it with real political positions and issues and such, it becomes a huge mess. It's also one of the reasons why I use comics as an example because in a lot of those cases they try and make "real world issues" in a comic sense, but if you actually try and interpet it that way it falls apart and the good guys we're cheering for usually wind up seeming more psychotic than anything.

I think that's different.

I'm not a huge comic fan, but I was 40k fan for a long time and I have been so, I think, through each "era" of its development cycle. However underplayed it is, however, it has always been a parody. It's a parody in the same way the pulp-cyberpunk British comics like 2000AD on which it was originally based are parodies. It's escapist in the sense that it invites us not to seriously empathize and cheer along with mass genocide because genocide is cool, but because it treats things we fear in a way which makes them less horrific. The carnage of 40k is so over the top, so relentless and so cartoonish that it doesn't matter, it has no emotional resonance.

40k doesn't demonstrate our unconscious belief in the necessity of genocide. It demonstrates our conscious belief in the wrongness of genocide through our need to escape the horror of it. It's the same reason we watch horror movies despite the fact that we're (generally) not in favour of serial killers, it makes light of something which we find repulsive and terrifying and it helps us, indirectly, to feel more secure about it.

Now, comic books.. yeah.. I think there is a case for comic books occasionally reflecting or providing a platform for the deeply held (and often thoroughly unpleasant) beliefs of their authors. However, I think the comic industry as a whole, from my outsiders perspective, seems pretty aware of this. Why is "Watchmen" considered a classic? Is it simply because people think Rorschach is cool?

What's far more indicative than any of these things of the unpleasant assumptions and underlying rationality of people in our own society is the relentless "go to foreign places and kill anyone with dark skin" narratives peddled by hollywood and the video game industry, or the constant throwaway use of female characters as nothing more than an objective or a "goal" for the protagonist. These are not conscious beliefs or ideas, they're unconscious elements of how we put stories together. They're things we don't have to think about, which really are just there to entertain the audience, but in doing so they say something about the people who create and consume them. They say something about what does appeal to the audience.. and that's more the level I'm talking about here.

Tolkien is writing about something similar to a huge barbarian horde, being directed at the more civilized peoples, much like happened historically, where the Mongols more or less took over most of their known world using very basic "horde" tactics.

You're not doing the Mongols very much credit there. At a time when standard European military tactics hadn't evolved beyond "ride at them with a pointy stick" the Mongols were incredibly tactically sophisticated. They consistently defeated European and Islamic armies of equal numbers simply through mobility and tactical superiority.

Additionally "Mongol-type" is a specific term. It refers to the three main racial characterizations of later scientific racial theory, which are.

Caucasian (People from Europe, the Middle-East, Central Asia and India)
Mongoloid (People from China, Japan, South-East Asia, Mongolia/Tibet, Siberia and Native Americans)
Negroid (People from sub-Saharan Africa and aborigines)

The Mongol-type races are simply what would be colloquially known as the "yellow-type" races or (as we would now call them) "East Asians" and "Native Americans" lumped crudely into one category, not specifically people from Mongolia.

Today someone like Tolkien might be more descriptive by giving Orcs pig faces or whatever, but that kind of imagery probably wouldn't have worked back then... I'll also be honest in saying that I prefer the cheez inherant in vintage naming conventions compared to a lot of modern authors who need to give everything multi-paragraph descriptions and long names that look like they slammed their forehead into the keyboard 4 or 5 times.

Mervyn Peake. All I'm going to say.

Seriously, if you don't know who I'm talking about, go and grab a copy of Titus Groan. You may kill yourself within a few pages, going by what you've said, but you may well come away with a whole new perspective on the origins of certain trends in fantasy writing.

For example native americans have been used as both good guys and bad guys in fantasy, when it's a good guy it's no big deal, when it's a bad guy or victim people cry foul.

I wouldn't say that.

I'd say the backlash is much more about stereotypes and whitewashing. Disney's Pocohontas Twilight: Breaking Dawn part 2 and even Dances With Wolves have certainly not escaped criticism for their portrayal of native Americans simply because the characters in question were presented as the good guys.