Media previews

[Eldy]

Finally got around to reading the EW Númenor article. Perhaps most significantly, we get confirmation of Pharazôn's non-canonical son, apparently named Kemen, whom leaks suggest will have a romance with Eärien (Elendil's daughter). It's curious that Pharazôn's son would have a Quenya name (meaning "earth"; sometimes spelled cemen).

Elendil is apparently a "sea-farer," like his son. However, Isildur is "at a crossroads," trying to find his way in the world. This not a subplot that screams, is in the direct line of succession to the most important noble title in the country, so I have to wonder if the Lordship of Andúnië is being downplayed.

I still think Míriel's helmet looks goofy, but I really like the sun motif they're going with for Númenor (and especially the Númenórean monarchy). To me, it recalls "Fíriel's Song" from The Lost Road: "For Elves they made the Moon, but for Men the red Sun." I hope to see lots of contrasting Moon/Sun symbolism representing Elves and Men, respectively.

Cynthia Addai-Robinson says, "[Tolkien] explores many themes, but one of them is the idea of people of different ethnicities, backgrounds, and walks of life all coming together for a common cause." That's not how I would describe the story of book!Númenor, a brutal colonial empire, but I suspect Addai-Robinson was referring more to the Last Alliance.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I have to wonder if the Lordship of Andúnië is being downplayed.

Or eliminated altogether. Will they make it clear that Elendil and Isildur are directly descended from Elros? It would be a major disappointment if they didnot. Indeed, how could they not?

I really like the sun motif they're going with for Númenor (and especially the Númenórean monarchy). To me, it recalls "Fíriel's Song" from The Lost Road: "For Elves they made the Moon, but for Men the red Sun." I hope to see lots of contrasting Moon/Sun symbolism representing Elves and Men, respectively.

Thank you for mentioning this. I strongly concur!

[Eldy]

Always great to talk to someone who knows "Fíriel's Song" exists!

Or eliminated altogether. Will they make it clear that Elendil and Isildur are directly descended from Elros? It would be a major disappointment if they did. Indeed, how could they not?

Yeah, it's one of those things I can't imagine not including, but I've found my reaction "they couldn't possibly do THAT!" to be an unreliable guide for successfully predicting things about ROP.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Needless to say, there was a missing not in my post. I'll edit it in there but not in your quote of it!

[Anduril]

Cynthia Addai-Robinson says, "[Tolkien] explores many themes, but one of them is the idea of people of different ethnicities, backgrounds, and walks of life all coming together for a common cause." That's not how I would describe the story of book!Númenor, a brutal colonial empire, but I suspect Addai-Robinson was referring more to the Last Alliance.

Yeah. And various flavors of "European-inspired" people too... When "non-Europeans" joined in, like half of them betrayed everyone else, but that was in the First Age. What doubletalk, but as expected of Amanda Waller. I don't actually blame the actress, that was a joke. Yes we would like to see the Easterling and Southron resistance down though the centuries highlighted but this seems like this ain't gonna happen this time with the simplification of things. How many years this is after Morgoth gets kicked out? I suppose the reader can rationalize it with enough of the folk of Bór surviving and merging with the Edain and there hasn't been enough time since Morgoth's defeat and Númenor's founding for all the peoples to merge. But you just know the show people didn't think that deeply.

[Eldy]

If the goal is to have a racially diverse Númenor, I think the least disruptive solution, from a Lore perspective, is just to dial down the Númenóreans' ethnic chauvinism and depict them as freely intermarrying with the peoples of Middle-earth they're connected to via maritime trade, even at the level of the royal family (see e.g., Míriel's and Pharazôn's markedly different skin tones). I don't believe Tolkien wrote about non-Númenóreans living in Elenna, besides passing references to slavery during the Sauronian period, but it's hard to imagine this globetrotting thalassocracy not hosting foreign visitors. If McPayne wanted to play that up, I wouldn't find it terribly objectionable, though I'll throw in a token grumble about the idea of whitewashing Númenórean colonial crimes, lest my hobby horse feel neglected.

On the other hand, we should note that, in Tolkien's own words, "[t]he Númenóreans were not of uniform racial descent. Their main division was between the descendants of the 'House of Hador' and the 'House of Bëor.' These two groups originally had distinct languages; and in general showed different physical characteristics. Each House had, moreover, numerous followers of mixed origin." (NoMe, p. 323) Tolkien discussed the history of and differences between the First Age Hadorians and Bëorians at length in the essay Of Dwarves and Men, though in that case the impression is given that it was primarily the Bëorians who were of mixed descent, reflected in part by their variation in skin color. My favored interpretation—adopted only recently, after someone on another forum pointed this out—is that the Bëorians were related to both the Hadorians and the "Swarthy Men," the First Age Easterlings, based on the phenotypes Tolkien described. (Unfortunately, it's almost 3:30 a.m. here, but if anyone cares I can dig out the quotes for this tomorrow.) However, we're talking about stuff that happened before the Edain reached Beleriand, and the intermingling of peoples only accelerated later on. The distinction between Hadorians and Bëorians had already begun to break down by the end of the First Age, especially in the upper classes. Even without knowing exactly when ROP is set, I'd expect there to be vanishingly few, if any, Númenóreans of "pure" Hadorian or Bëorian descent.

Of course, it's also possible the show will simply not concern itself with this level of worldbuilding detail as far as skin color is concerned.

[Anduril]

Yeah I know. But still, context. First Age humans are more wonky than by the time the Third Age rolls around but there's still the West vs East symbolism, the men in the West having the true tradition of and kinship with the elves and the somehow-analogues of the English being the most directly connected of them. The Easterlings of the First Age are even more vaguely described than the Southrons and Easterlings of the Third but I suppose the "swarthy" ones would have looked more Mediterranean/Middle Eastern and thus the Beorians who were swarthier would have looked more like southern Europeans. Even in the Third Age most of the "Swarthy Men" we see are from the Near Harad regions, not Far. Those terms are too general... would have been ripe for worldbuilding attempts but alas.

[Inanna]

I’m not chiming because I don’t know enough. But I’m reading and learning from your exchanges.

[Alatar]

But you just know the show people didn't think that deeply.

Just a drive by to point out that just because someone doesn't reach the same conclusions or make the same choices you would, that does not necessarily make them wrong, uneducated or less serious in their world-building. These are people who are spending a lot of money, have several people working on this material full time, with input from many fans and scholars*. THey are not trying to get this wrong. They just have different opinions to you (and probably me, but I'll wait to see it before deciding that)

*Also, the constant jump by certain sections of fandom to claim these are not "real" scholars is the worst kind of self important toxic gate-keeping

[Anduril]

I'm not saying they're trying to get it wrong. They already believe they're in the right.

As for the legitimacy of scholars and even "big name fans" working for and/or supporting the show, I've never claimed any of them were "fake". Still, I literally don't recognize most names of the few scholars (from academia etc.) I've seen and I don't know or care about the Youtube channel sort of fans. The names I know and would trust more are the likes of Hammond and Scull etc. and of course Shippey who was fired. So the ones with published books to their name, not just talking about stuff online. Maybe it's just a generational fandom thing and they got or courted mostly newer blood than the ones active before the movies. I don't go to Youtube for talking heads, I go there for music etc.

Then this may be a bit off topic but having scholarly consultants doesn't necessarily guarantee quality. That "historical style" King Arthur movie from 2004 had scholars consulting on it but the wider scholarly community largely considers them cranks with crank theories and the movie relies on those theories. In the end it was still an ahistorical fantasy, just now more misleading due to the "based on true events" tag.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

There is no evidence that Shippey was fired.

I feel confident that the showrunners are very knowledgable about Tolkien's work, despite the changes that they inevitably will make.

[Eldy]

I don't think they've given the names of any scholars who may or may not be consulting on the show, besides Shippey, who was only involved relatively early on. That's probably a smart decision, given the vitriol (and worse) directed at the scholars—including Dimitra Fimi, who most certainly has non-online publications—who spoke with Vanity Fair but had no affiliation with Amazon. That said, I'm not terribly concerned with whether there are people with formal academic credentials who have input on the creative direction of the series. Many published scholars who write about Tolkien, including some of those who offer fascinating insights into his work thanks to their knowledge and experience with other kinds of scholarship, know relatively little about the in-universe, faux-historical details of the legendarium that fans tend to have in mind when fretting about Lore accuracy. (Lest this come across as me taking cheap shots, Michael Drout made a somewhat similar point in his distinction between "Tolkien Studies" and "Middle-earth Studies" in the introduction to the J.R.R. Tolkien Encyclopedia, where he made the case for the importance of improved communication between those engaging in "scholarship about Tolkien the author and his works of literature" and those who focus on "analysis of Tolkien's invented worlds, histories, languages, creatures, etc." Though there are, of course, plenty of people with a foot in each camp.) To be clear, this is not a criticism of academics! I love Lore, but it's not the be-all and end-all of understanding Tolkien. Moreover, in my view, it's more important the show tell a good story than for that story to hew as closely as possible to the text.

[Eldy]

Yet another EW article and photos, this time of Míriel and Durin IV. The article is an interview with production designer Ramsey Avery.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Cool, thanks!

[Eldy]

EW is on a roll today: their article about Simon Tolkien's involvement with ROP just went up 20 minutes ago, along with a photo of Elendil and Galadriel. Simon Tolkien, one of Christopher's sons, is a lawyer and a novelist. He had a considerably more positive take on Jackson's LOTR than his father did.

In a statement to EW, Tolkien also celebrated the partnership, saying, "I have enjoyed assisting Amazon Studios in connection with the series, and in particular providing input to JD Payne and Patrick McKay on matters including my grandfather's original writing."

[Eldy]

Cool, thanks!

I'm enjoying the new pictures, though I'm getting Sept of Baelor vibes from the (?)throne room set. Fortunately it looks less cramped than that set from GoT, though it's hard to say from a partial shot like this. I hope that the set design will help convey the scale and grandeur of Númenórean civilization. The Minas Tirith throne room set in ROTK—well, Minas Tirith in general, really—didn't capture the scale of book!Gondor, though it feels churlish to complain when (going by fuzzy memories of the behind-the-scenes features) I'm not sure there was a large enough usable space in New Zealand to have constructed a substantially larger set at that time.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I'm one of the few people on the planet who has neither seen a second of the Game of Thrones show nor read a word of the Song of Ice and Fire book series, so I didn't even know what you were referring to by "Sept of Baelor vibes" until I read your post further.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Yet more from EW.
How Simon Tolkien helped guide The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power

[Voronwë the Faithful]

And there is this:

[Eldy]

Hopefully there will be some interesting answers there! That comes two hours after the main ROP event in Hall H (10:30 a.m. PDT* on Friday). I haven't heard anything about that being streamed, though. Even if they do, any special preview footage (other than a trailer) they might show will almost certainly be excluded from the stream.


* I assume the graphic also meant PDT, not PST, or else there will be a lot of confused and frustrated people tuning in an hour early.