How Corporate Greed is Destroying Tolkien's Legacy

In this video we explore the beliefs of J. R. R. Tolkien in correlation to new media set in Middle Earth, as well as the use of the Lord of the Rings IP, without giving proper respect to Tolkien himself and his vision.

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Anomalous Hedges by The Mini Vandals

Lobe by The Mini Vandals

Vespers on the Shore by The Mini Vandals

In Memory of Jean Talon by The Mini Vandals

To Loom is to Love by The Mini Vandals

Shadome by The Mini Vandals

Anomalous Hedges by The Mini Vandals

[superslayerguy]

I feel like the soul of Tolkien’s work will live on. All these films and merchandise have just made people more interested in the books, and through that, more and more people learn what it’s really about and reject all the corporate crap.

[seancrane]

Trust me, You're not offending any Americans when critcizing the greed and lack of soul present in our corporations. Only idiots would take offence.

[luismancerapascual]

As an older Tolkien fan, I was afraid of this since the success of the original movies, but I've overcome my sadness over the pillage with this thought: Thanks to the current hype on Tolkien"s work, his legacy will live on. Like Shakespeare, or any other great, his work will many times be misused, but it will be remember. And there will always be those who will remember it rightly

[Durin_Son]

Sauron has a new name in the fourth age and it's name is Amazon.

[docopoper]

The whole thing is such a reflection of Tolkien's work itself. A huge theme of the legendarium is that while the pure magnificent works of the past are lost or destroyed, the subcreations based on those works in some way carry more depth of beauty than the original more pure and less tainted work. (i.e. the two lamps becoming the trees becoming the sun and moon)

I think in a way JRR Tolkien was feeling like one of the elves lamenting the changing of the world and all of the corruption of men. I would argue that a huge amount of beauty has been subcreated from Tolkien's works. And while we do see our own tyrannical figures corrupting and debasing the work as we speak, we are also seeing many people exploring his work, discussing it, and importantly adding depth and meaning that was not there originally. And that is enhancing and deepening the work. It will be very messy once the IP rights of Tolkien's work expires, but I really look forward to that day so that we may see the beautiful subcreative gems which capture the light of Tolkien's work and reflect it in new and beautiful colours.

I think it can often be too easy to get caught up on thinking about the Morgoths of the world and to miss the good that is happening more quietly in the world. Back in Tolkien's time most people were lamenting the evil of the world wars. But far less focus was being paid to the good Tolkien himself was doing. Or to the different goods many other people were doing which aren't even as remembered as Tolkien. We have the same numbers of such people nowadays. Largely they are fighting for different things than at that time, but there are still a lot of good people in this world.

[jvercouillie]

I think that the point is not to see if the PJ trilogy or the Amazon Series have some points in common with Tolkien's works, but it is to see if the goal is the same.
What is the goal of Tolkien's works according to Tolkien ? It is to heal the world. LR (I've always used the abbreviation LOTR) is a fairy tale, according to JRRT's vision of a fairy tale and as such, - I am not giving a definition - it is a fictional story happening with the Faërie (Magic, you could say) in which the reader dives without noticing that he does. In that way, the fairy tale is authentic and able to heal the reader through (for example) evading the present times, and consoling from the harshness and ugliness of the modern life. And that is a noble goal because in this spiritual retreat, being consoled from his sadnesses, the reader is able to notice what's wrong with the present times, and he finds the desire to fix it at his own scale, just like JRRT did by writing for us.
I don't know about you, but as for me, I've always felt healed by the reading of Tolkien's works, like refreshed, having forgotten the wrong ways of the ugly world and aspiring to the good ways of fairer world. I could almost say that I would wish a "faerier" world. I think it makes us more human, in the noble sense.

[TheFirstManticore]

I remember the popularity of LOTR during the early hippie days. They took the "pipe weed" and applied it to marijuana; this was when marijuana was first called "weed." And clearly pipe weed is not cannabis!

[AndreasSelzer]

Another reason why they hate Tolkien was because he was a Christian. That is also why they ignore
his beliefs.

[Churchmilitant]

As an american, (I'm an Orthodox Catholic first, an american second). I firmly agree with Tolkien's critique of my country.

[PaszerDye]

I don't doubt he would have hated the PJ movies, but ultimately, films are a collaborative process. While they did away with most of the spiritual & philosophical tones he wanted portayed in favor of widespread cinematic languages & ideas most people would be ammenable to, such as action scenes & battles, to strictly adhere to his filmic idea of LotR that mirrored the books and the world straight out of his own mind would be tyrannical even as the author. Again, movies are collaborative, and in letter 328 you mentioned Tolkein saying that the stories no longer belong to him, and to a degree, he trusts that people who truly love these stories will defend its soul from the corporations & mass consumerism that will inevitably mutate it. With respect to the trilogy, Peter Jackson & co., have done their best to realize & manifest a faithful rendition of the books as best as they could without being outrigh clones of Tolkein himself. While not perfect to utmost criteria & expectations, it is a masterpiece of its craft and shining beacon for acheivements. And not least of all, the trilogy remains a gateway to the books.

[Greyman-oj]

I love Tolkien his views are very eye opening and still relevant to today. I completely agree with him on his views especially in his way of thinking.

[Dan-vijp]

If he didnt like Walt Disney's work he would have lost his mind over the Amazon hatchet job of his life's work.

[cordyceps]

I don't even know if it's greed at this point. Every decision looks like it was intentionally done to lose money.

[raphaellapointe]

Tolkien may have hated the Peter Jackson trilogy, but I don't think he would have hated it as much as this hypothetical movie from the 50s. He mentions crazy stuff happening like Boromir floating for some reason or the movie not paying enough attention to the journey of the Ringbearers, a detail that I think the Jackson films got right, though yes, he would have hated Saruman's death as much.

[nathan]

Fortunately, the books are still the books and the LOTR movies are still the LOTR movies, no matter what anyone does now.

[CrusaderKing]

I agree that these companies don’t have the best intentions with Tolkiens, but there are many Americans who lament the state of things today and long for traditional family, Faith, and community. God Bless 🙏🏻 Love seeing the good boy at the end. 👍

[gustyko]

Pretty amazing video (as always), I admire the way you of explaining this things, without making it sound like a hateful fanboyist rant, or something like that. 🙂

[bobbyokeefe]

If Tolkien was alive, he'd probably hate Tolkien's vision.

[lucabarbieri]

I Love your channel and how much you teach us about Tolkien's work and philosophy. Keep it up!

[StoryScreenMovieReviewPodcast]

I know from certain who individuals who have connections to the show that it was a nightmare behind the scenes. people were fired left and right, writers couldn't agree what story they wanted to tell, the show was originally about a young Aragorn, some wanted to adapt the Silmarillion but didn't have the adaption rights to the book, the Tolkien estate giving them a long list of things they could and couldn't do on the show such as referencing the movies (even though the showrunners wanted to connect ROP to the movies) writers being fired because they wanted to insert more woke elemets into the show and was met with disapproval, Tolkien selling out to Bezos on his tantalizing and money venture in making LOTR into the next Game of Thrones (which we all know how highly successful that was) a Tolkien scholar being fired, COVID19 impacting everything, the originally being 10 episodes but somewhere being changed to 8 instead, Jeff Bezos allegedly visiting the set and was furious on what he saw and demanded changes to be made in the middle of shooting. All in all, this show was produced with everyone's hands tied behind their backs, not really knowing what they wanted to do and the clock was ticking, and the best they could come up with was fan fiction.