A Golden Opportunity Missed

[Huinesoron]

Kuruharan's "Middle-earth: Off the Map", Episode 1 - "The Path Always Continues Onwards and Onwards"

A review by an overly-antagonistic self-proclaimed Tolkien Scholar

This show is a traversity. Where do I even START? According to the showrunners, it is supposedly "suggested by the works of J.R.R. Tolkien" (they couldn't even be bothered to write his full name!), but how does it start? With attractive people casting lustful glances at each other. Everyone knows that Jolkien Rolkien Rolkien Tolkien was a Catholic, and Catholics would never have sex. It's in Letters, and if you've read my latest blog article you'll know that it's reflected in every aspect of Middle-earth (see: LaCE, Sam Gamgee, the Female Orcs question, etc etc).

Our setting is apparently Harad, or "Harad", because it's nothing like the real one. The "characters" we meet are human, when RotK tells us exactly what they should be: "half-trolls with white eyes and red tongues". I'm not racist, but it's pretty clear JRRT was describing every non-white person in Middle-earth here, so the fact that "Pro" and "Auntie" are both attractive is in clear defiance of JRRT's written, canonical words.

The language used is 110% wrong too. Tolkien translated Westron into English, but left all other languages untranslated. That means these Fauxradrim should be speaking Haradrim - we know it exists because Gandalf had a name in it, "Incanus", so the so-called showrunner should have used this language for everything.

The "Wheel" family is a particularly egregious misnaming, because it is obvious that the Haradrim never had wheels. All technology in Middle-earth came from the elves or the dwarves, neither of which ever went anywhere near Harad, and they're never described as using wheels in the books. Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure they shouldn't have swords, armour, houses, or clothes either; they clearly stole those inventions from Gondorians. I'm not racist in saying that - it's not because they're black, it's because only white people invent stuff in Middle-earth.

Coming back to the so-called "plot", it is all completely wrong. If this is the late Second Age, then all the Haradrim should be slaves of Sauron who have been taken as slaves by Numenor and are basically just whipped all day, because Numenoreans are entirely evil by this point (it's in the books). Tolkien once described Numenor as exactly like Egypt, so we know that the slaves would have been treated like the Hebrews in Prince of Egypt. But without the singing, because if there's one thing Tolkien would hate it's songs in his stories.

My point is, I watched the whole first episode and it is ABUNDANTLY CLEAR that the so-called showrunners (if that's even their real name) have written both Numenor and Sauron out of existence. It's therefore obvious that they're going to have these Haradrim invade and conquer Lindon, probably because they're racist against white people. I don't understand how they can pretend to like Tolkien when they're definitely going to do this thing that I've just made up in my head for them to do!

I could go on. This show is a horrible mismatch of non-Tolkien ideas (Auntie says "gods" once, when there is no paganism in Tolkien's "fundamentally Catholic work"), incorrect understanding of Tolkien (Auntie says "gods" once, which is an old word Tolkien used early on but later replaced with "Valar"), and Tolkien's writing but in the wrong place (Auntie says "gods" once, but the Fauxradrim should never have heard of the Valar). The only redeeming feature is that by boycotting it I can personally prevent anyone ever adapting Tolkien ever again and get Kuruharan fired, possibly into the sun.

Tune in next week for my review of episode two, "I Chanted About Twigs, About Twigs Which Were Metallic Yellow".

-Overly-Antagonistic Self-Proclaimed Tolkien Scholar

[Kuruharan]

Originally Posted by Huinesoron

"suggested by the works of J.R.R. Tolkien"

The title card says "Basedapted on the works of J.R.R. Tolkien."

Originally Posted by Huinesoron

The language used is 110% wrong too. Tolkien translated Westron into English, but left all other languages untranslated. That means these Fauxradrim should be speaking Haradrim - we know it exists because Gandalf had a name in it, "Incanus", so the so-called showrunner should have used this language for everything.

The learned reviewer somehow failed to notice that the entire show was filmed in Haradric with Westron and English subtitles.

get Kuruharan fired, possibly into the sun.

*slathers on sun tan lotion*

[Huinesoron]

Originally Posted by Kuruharan

The learned reviewer somehow failed to notice that the entire show was filmed in Haradric with Westron and English subtitles.

If you can call that "Haradric". Carl F. Salo's purported work on that so-called language is a disgrace. Carl, if that's even his real name, should be shot into Anor (I'm using the Westron so you know how much of a scholar I am) alongside Kuruharan; you can learn more about proper Tolkienian Haradric by typing "Can you show me Suladân in 'Middle-earth: Shadow of War'?" into Ask Jeeves. (I don't use G**gle ever since I saw them running adverts for Kuruharan's traversity.)

- O-A S-P TS

[Galadriel55]

Originally Posted by Huinesoron

O-A S-P TS

Me *trying to follow the Downs in between work*: Osteoarthritis... simulated patient... [struggling a little with the last one] ...tuberous sclerosis???

Clearly then this whole discussion is surrounding the works of Junior Respiratory Therapist. Best known for his publication on... LOsaRTan? C"lotr"imazole? His work on Sildenafil though is known only to much smaller circles.

That's it. I think I'm onto something. That's how I'm gonna be coping with too much caring about this show, from all sides and from myself included. As well as any ridiculousness from the show itself. Any excitement is gonna be "autocorrected" to medication names. Sample run-down of the new and improved trailer:

Eltroxin and Celebrex look up at the sky, demonstrating full neck range of motion. Bromazepam and Aripiprazole hold hands, evidencing good motor function of the upper limb. Mirtazapine and Galantamine peer ominously into an empty blister pack. Norepinephrine... dunno what she does, but she is a prime example of familial short stature. Meeple. Coming to the pharmacy near you this fall, much like the flu shots.

Or, to cycle back to the thread's topic: In the land of Haldol, on the shores of Lumbar, Antiemetics and Prokinetics were debating what to do with Sandoz's growing power...



I'm nuts. Sorry. But also not sorry. This is what happens when brain is overtired. Happy to do more if you'd like! ^.^

[Michael Murry]

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

Me *trying to follow the Downs in between work*:
...
His work on Sildenafil though is known only to much smaller circles.

Good call out on Sildenafil. I had a lot of fun with that one eleven years ago when Peter Jackson set about casting for a "warrior" female elvish love interest for his "Hobbit" films. He thought he needed a fan-fic/Mary-Sue combination Arwen/Éowyn that Tolkien didn't write anything about so he started out with "Itaril" (later abandoned for "Tauriel") which name I thought suggested creative interpretive possibilities latent in the side-effects of prescription drugs:

Elvish Erectile Dysfunction

03-08-2011
TheMisfortuneTeller
Haunting Spirit
Join Date: March 2011
Posts 63

The very name of the character sounds like a synthetic drug with numerous debilitating side-effects, something like Sildenafil: a drug first developed to treat angina but, because of its unanticipated side effects, marketed instead as an oral treatment for erectile dysfunction -- notwithstanding "reports of vision loss in people taking PDE5 inhibitors" (Wikipedia).

Since Tolkien's Elves have pretty much given up on Middle-earth and haven't reproduced much in several thousand years, the whole concept of "young" elves who "fall in love" with each other (before catching the last boat to the Undying Lands) sounds too ludicrous to contemplate. Nonetheless, even the ridiculous can inspire poetic -- if not pharmacological -- possibilities. Consider:

Itaril,
What cheesy swill:
A damsel dim and shallow.

Itaril,
Sildenafil:
Viagra for the fallow.

Itaril,
Progammed to kill,
Yet gooey as marshmallow.

Itaril,
An elf-chick thrill,
Synthetic, sick, and hollow.

Itaril,
A bitter pill,
Impossible to swallow.

Michael Murry, "The Misfortune Teller," Copyright © 2011

For my part, since I do not willingly contribute to the Jeff Bezos Amazon TV thing I will leave to other, more masochistic souls, the task of viewing and reporting on this series of "based-on/suggested-by" presentations. Hopefully, some creative poetic interpretations will suggest themselves and I can have some more polemical fun with this stuff.

[Kuruharan]

Originally Posted by Huinesoron

If you can call that "Haradric". Carl F. Salo's purported work on that so-called language is a disgrace. Carl, if that's even his real name, should be shot into Anor (I'm using the Westron so you know how much of a scholar I am) alongside Kuruharan; you can learn more about proper Tolkienian Haradric by typing "Can you show me Suladân in 'Middle-earth: Shadow of War'?" into Ask Jeeves. (I don't use G**gle ever since I saw them running adverts for Kuruharan's traversity.)

- O-A S-P TS

The learned reviewer is evidently unaware that deep in the bowels of Marquette University a recent document has been discovered bearing Tolkien's handwriting and the almost illegible title (in pencil) of "On Harad."

In this essay Tolkien extensively sketched out the various languages and cultures of Harad.

We were given exclusive access to this document in the development of the show.

[William Cloud Hicklin]

Or another opportunity missed, as Steininger points out- why watch The Rings of Power when you could use the time to watch Der Ring des Nibelungen instead?

[Kuruharan]

Originally Posted by William Cloud Hicklin

Or another opportunity missed, as Steininger points out- why watch The Rings of Power when you could use the time to watch Der Ring des Nibelungen instead?

Well, there's that too...

[Gil-Galad]

As I make my way through RoP, I have noticed that the characters I have been enjoying the most are the non-canon ones, whereas most of my misgivings has been towards the Canon ones, particularly Galadriel. This has lead me to wish they did a "stories from Middle-earth" style, filling in the gaps in the book story such as what has happened to the men that served Morgoth.