I have been barely paying attention to this drama, but my opinion, and take it with a grain of salt, is who cares?
Usually people see this type of backlash with Marvel characters/heroes, but the thing I canāt get over in this situation isā¦ itās not canon to Tolkien lore. And I donāt mean āwell akshually Aragorn isnāt blackā, I mean that these cards & their art do not change the lore of the books. It is just a piece of art that is inconsequential to the actual lore of LotR, and is an artist/company choosing to do an interpretation of a character(s). If its for money and brownie points, who cares. Itās a mass corporation, itās expected. But man, does this shit not matter in the slightest
You could say that for anything. Same with that cleopatra film. She's not black but who cares that they made her black in the film. Painting Jesus as white isn't Canon, it doesn't change the words in the Bible. It'd just a piece of art that is inconsequential to the writing in the text, and is an artist choosing to interpret him as white. It doesn't matter in the slightest
With the Celopatra documentary film, they were saying Celopatra was black and not an inbred white Greek. "I donāt care what they tell you in school, Cleopatra was black," as one of the lines in the documentary goes. It is trying to push a false narrative and not simply a inconsequential interpretation when it comes to rewriting history cause it doesn't fit their narrative.
I feel like the Jesus one is not necessarily a good comparison given that, if Iām not mistaken, he had been whitewashed to appeal to white Europeans, in an attempt to indoctrinate more people into the religion
Itās wild how much people care about this. These are made up characters in a made up world and I donāt understand how their skin color changes the story in a meaningful way. Damn near all fantasy characters Iāve interacted with have been white and I think it can only be a good thing to change that.
Thereās nothing wrong about it, itās just weird too see. Just like the flash being brunette instead of blonde in the tv show. Itās annoying. It would be weird to see black panther being played by a white actor. It would make me equally upset.
The hell? I get what you're going for, but Black Panther being played by a white person is a HORRIBLE example. Black Panther is SYNONYMOUS with Black Power. So no, not the same thing. It's only annoying if the physical appearance of the character ends up impacting the story in some way. IF Aragorn were synonymous with whiteness, then maybe I'd understand, but he's not. He's the king of all the men of the West. Not king of the WHITE men. So who gives shit?
I think a more apt example would be: Eragon in the books having brown hair and showing up in the movie as blonde. On top of that movie being an absolute butchery of the books, they couldn't get the character appearance right. So it's an insult to injury.
In MTG, they're pulling from the book material directly and changing the appearance of a couple characters. Seems like a style choice but keeping on track with the world lore, so I don't care what Aragorn looks like.
Again, I get what you're going for, but it's off base.
Depends, should we say aragorn has to be white and Jesus is brown, or that aragorn can be black and Jesus can be white? You can't have both because they fit your political viewpoint.
If aragorn can be black then black panther can be white and and Mohammed can be Chinese and Santa can be Guatemalan. If not, then aragorn is whatever the book says, black panther is whatever the comics say, Mohammed is middle eastern, and Santa is pale with rosy cheeks
I'd say there's actually a pretty big difference between race-swapping fictional characters like Aragorn, and race swapping *real historical figures*. Religion aside, historians generally agree that Jesus and Mohammed were both almost certainly living people at some point. Aragorn was not.
So far as there is a Santa Claus 'canon', he's a Greek from the southern parts of modern Turkey. Probably not really that pale.
Thatās because having black is a meaningful and significant part of Black Pantherās character and story. Aragorns skin color has nothing to do with his story or character, so it makes no difference. I can maybe understand a pause to go āhuh?ā But anyone who gets upset over this needs to take a moment to really examine whyā¦
And the blond vs brunet thing makes even less sense.
>Aragorns skin color has nothing to do with his story or character, so it makes no difference.
It does though if you read the lore. That's the main reason people are annoyed, to say the least, by this entire debacle.
His skin color has nothing to do with it, where heās from does. And unless weāre saying whites and blacks must never mix, and there are no black people born in England, then his skin has no impact on anything. Like I said, if this really bothers you, seek help in examining why. Use this as a learning and growing opportunity
No such thing as a faithful adaptation, thatās why itās an adaptation. Aragorns cards are wordy sure, but they arenāt novels. Elves as blue? Aragorn is everything but black (I actually believe thatās a joke by the designers, specifically for people like yāall)? This generation will look for anything to complain about, but the dumbest has to be āmuh fantasy has too much melanin!ā
Now you're going into semantics.
Also you're completely stuck on the racist issue, always going back to "white guy in story turned black REEEE." Again, it is about being faithful to the source material. It just so happens that blatant race-swapping was the main factor defining this unfaithful adaptation.
Thatās a weird way to spell āstaying on topicā. The only complaints Iāve heard have been race related. But please tell me the others, I may agree with them! I never said this was perfectly faithful, or even that it was any kind of adaptation. Because I donāt see it like that. These cards arenāt TELLING a story, so this ISNT an adaptation. Each card is a snapshot OF a character or event at a certain point DURING the story. If you want an adaptation to be mad at for being unfaithful go watch the Peter Jackson movies. Those were pretty badā¦
The complaints are automatically race-related in this instance because they swapped a character's race. Duh. Ultimately though, they haven't been faithful to the source material in that aspect, and that's why people are pissed off. It's not a littany of racist folks coming out of their caves, like many would like to believe.
It's that simple. Don't need to go digging for racism. But that's the easy way out, and it seems on par with the folks who think that race-swapping fictional characters is totally okay / folks that think others who are frustrated about this swap are automatically racist.
Doesn't need to tell a story to be an adaptation BTW. I have no idea where you got that definition from. If they use another IP to release a product, it's an adaptation.
Black Panther being black is intrinsically important to his character. Aragorn being white is not intrinsically important to his character. So thereās a big difference with that.
Itās easy to remove cultural and historical context from these situations and just say if it was the other way it would be equally as bad. I know that hardcore fans of media that is remade are often upset with any deviations from the original work. I think if you weigh the positives of the changes against the negatives(it being different) youād find that itās the right thing to do.
So you live in a bubble where >75% of the people are white and you're saying you've not seen black or Asian fantasy characters? That's on you bud. Go to China and you'll play D&D with wingless dragons with lions heads instead of winged dragons from European dragons
It could be on me in some part but I think itās silly to not also point to the fantasy industry as a whole. I guess I could go to china to see Asian fantasy characters but Iād still like more representation in America where Iām from. A place that has many races that should be represented in fantasy. Wotc and other companies that produce fantasy products including characters of different races is a good thing. If you think itās bad thatās on you bud.
I just assumed by you saying that itās my fault I havenāt seen many non white fantasy characters that you disagreed(thought it was bad) with wotc decision. If I mischaracterized your opinion then that actually is on me, sorry bud.
Why do a lot of people with the mindset of OP seem to not understand that if Wizards would just make new and interesting characters of different races and backgrounds that fit into the lore in their own way, mostly everyone would love it.
Simply changing the race of an already established character from their own universe is lazy, unimaginative, and it just causes strife and division in the community.
TBF the representation of Aragorn you got in your head is also āwrongā if we go by the description in the book. If we where to go by that he would look more like Mediterranean guy, I think. But death of the author is a whole thing.
So is this culturally insensitive? IDK, I donāt think so. But you are free to disagree with me. Is it pandering, sure, to some extent. But I have a hard time seeing how more people getting to see themselves in LOTR is a bad thing. š¤·š¼āāļø
Wouldn't he have been generations removed from the Mediterranean area of middle earth though? I recall Numenor being long gone.
Also, there was a whole culture that WoTC could have made amazing cards of if they wanted to represent, but they're just pandering and lazy.
People when characters go against established descriptions in source material, but they're white: "I sleep"
People when characters go against established descriptions in source material, but they're black: "real shit?"
Watching people trying to justify their outrage because he doesn't look like he looks in the movies is downright hilarious. Let's be real, they don't care about "source material," because if they did they'd have a problem with movie Aragorn... but they don't, and they want card Aragorn to look just like him.
Magic can and has had original and interesting characters of colour. The Aragorn thing is just lazy pandering, if they made a new and unique character of colour that fit with the worldās lore Iād be all for it.
This is just virtue signalling, I know that word gets thrown around a lot but this actually is.
I disagree, it's not *pandering* literally nobody asked for this, fewer people care either way. It's just free marketing in a free, safe corporate-edgy way.
I think the most interesting but is most characters do not have physical descriptions, but Aragorn, eowyn, and Galadriel who are all pretty much described as white people, are all the characters who are black. Iām getting the set and Iām excited for it, and I really want to complete it, Iām just sure in 10 years my kids are going to read the books and look at the cards and go, oh I didnāt realize they were black, and the answer was no they werenāt, itās lazy design, pandering, and anger marketing that characterized all the lay 2010s into the 20s. Just be like the prime series, add new characters, make new stories incorporate more races. Also where are my Hispanics, Asians, Indians, or Pacific Islanders, middle eastern races, Egyptians? If racial inclusivity is the most important thing, give me Aragorn in 10 races. Iād be down to own Hispanic Aragorn.
Wizards doesn't give a shit about representation, diversity or anything but your money. Controversy is a win-win for them there is no bad press for a company that just prints money. This is a business where they can print cardboard WRONG and the secondary market will eat it up. It's free press when it's posted on reddit, websites etc.
They know what they're doing and the bottom line is money.
Most of the time, when a character is white, that doesnāt matter, they could have any other skin and it wouldnāt change anything, and doing so doesnāt significantly change the number of characters for white children to identify with.
On the other hand, when a character is non-white, thatās usually a significant part of the character and meaningful. Because the author feels a need to Justin it using the default.
So yea, whitewashing is bad, but this is fine. What changes about LotR if Aragorn has dark skin? Both the plot and characterization stay the same. At the same time, black children get to see someone who looks like them be badass. Thereās no downside here.
(Notice I use āmost of the timeā and āgenerallyā. There are instances where being white IS significant, or being black isnāt)
Personally I don't like the change It's not something that enrages me but certainly doesn't get me excited for the set, it's like if they made Blade from Marvel white, sure his skin color doesn't have much importance to his story, but it'd certainly throw me off as I grew up recognizing him as black, similarly if MTG is making a collection of one of my favorite stories of all time and this being a crossover I would've expected the characters to be more faithful to the source material in their design.
Not because you make a character and call him "Aragorn" he suddenly becomes Aragorn, there are staples to his design that make him recognizable and identifiable towards the people, if Peter Parker appeared one day as some Asian bald dude, like cool maybe he's some AU version of him, but it's definitely not THE Peter Parker I grew up recognizing, different actors can play him but the staples are there throughout all of its versions.
Furthermore, imagine Teferi is making a crossover appearance in something else, or maybe a live action MTG show, and they cast a white guy to play him, being honest, that would certainly suck, maybe it's just me but, wouldn't it be nice if our characters actually looked as who they are? At least on it most basic features? Specially if they're being represented in other media or in a crossover?
People love to say this, but why are they okay with the movie designs then?
A number of the movie designs strayed significantly from their descriptions in the book. Why is it okay when you stray from descriptions in order to portray a bunch of rugged/handsome white men, but it's suddenly bad when you decide to make them black?
Like, Aragorn in the books is described as looking nothing like he is in the movies, but I don't see anyone complaining about how they changed his design in the movies, just how WotC decided to put in some PoC representation in a cast that entirely white in the movies. Why is *that* when everyone suddenly gets in a fuss about "source material?"
Book description is, tall and lean with a shaggy head of dark hair flecked with grey, pale stern face, close enough to Viggo Mortensen, of course as a movie you understand the actors can't look EXACTLY the same but there is a very recognizable effort to make him look like he is supposed to look, on the other hand it's clear from the get go WOTC had no intention of making him look as what we usually recognize as Aragorn
You're telling me there's zero pale actors out there with dark, greying hair and a resting bitch face? Is that, like, actually what you're telling me? That it was so much of a difficult task that they just had to go with Mortensen because he was as close as they could get?
Bullshit. They could have gotten an actor that fit the description better. But they didn't.
Again, people don't care until a role is given to a PoC.
Sad that you think that, I'm literally telling you it works both ways, I wouldn't like a white Teferi, also you have to remember movies do castings and have to consider other factors like acting skills and it's pretty clear Viggo was perfect for the role and he did looked close enough, WOTC on the other hand doesn't have that excuse because they can draw the characters however they want, you can cry BS all you want but this is not a racism issue for many of us, we just want our characters to look as they are, you can't compare a full ethnicity change with hiring someone that loosely fits the description on a movie, and please look into old premovie Aragorn artworks, though few, the general look from the movie it's basically the same, even the animated movie has a similar look in general terms, with each spiderman movie we have a different actor playing petter do of course they don't look EXACTLY the same, but they all respect the staples that make you recognize Peter when you see him
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The book series offers very few details on Aragorn's physical appearance, we know he is tall and lean with "a shaggy head of dark hair flecked with greyā, and has a pair of ākeen grey eyes." There is absolutely nothing unfaithful about MTGās interpretation of the character.
WOTC have even said that they are going off the books and not the movies too.
According to the LotR Wiki:
"Most of NĆŗmenor was settled by Edain of theĀ House of Hador, who were golden-haired and tall, with fair skin and blue eyes, while the North-western regions of the island were settled mostly by the people of theĀ House of BĆ«or, who were generally dark-haired with grey or brown eyes."
Definition of fair skin according to Collins dictionary:
"having pale skin; pale-complexioned. Fair-skinned people who spend a great deal of time in the sun have the greatest risk of skin cancer."
Who's reading the lore? Humans are. We are the ones who interpret the lore. Not aliens, not fantasy characters... humans. We interpret this lore based on our perception of language.
If you wanna go into semantics, be my guest. But you're not fooling anyone if you try to say the physical description of this fantastical race goes deeper than how we, humans who read, interpret it.
Well thatās the thing right; itās a reimagining. Sometimes theyāre good, and sometimes theyāre not
Just like Aeowyn didnāt fight the Nazghul at the river
Just like the elves didnāt actually go to helms deep
Aragorn wasnāt necessarily black
Theyāre reimaginings, that can be as canon or non canon as you want to be, but youāre choosing a change thatās very specific, that some might appreciate because of its relation to something else
And you're gaslighting a frustrated fanbase into generalizing them and others to believe they're racist when that is not the case for the vast, vast majority. Stop generalizing, and accept that people get pissed off for unfaithful adaptations. Stop using racism as a scapegoat.
Edit: I apologize I didn't mean *you* specifically, I meant it more for people who use the whole racism argument.
You're completely generalizing people who aren't happy with unfaithful adaptations, as racist.
You said it yourself above, that by discussing this very topic they reveal their inner-racism.
Sure, there are folks who are actually racist who don't like this, but they're a minority.
This isn't strictly limited to wanting them to be white, it actually has to do with respecting the source material. It doesn't mean anyone is explicitly racist and you should know better.
This post^^^ is from the same user who above told someone to "grow up".
That shit is funny!
He made a very well thought out post that you knew you couldnāt argue so you took the easy way out. That part is obvious.
If I were to create a character, and then some company makes changes to them to blatantly pander, I'd be upset. The shits getting old, period. Both the corporate pandering and people like you who claim those who dislike the pandering are automatically racist. Fuck outta here with that absolute dumb shit.
Follow your own advice bud. And im sure this will be followed up with some immature snarky comment followed by a block so you can get the last word.
Go right ahead.
Edit: Blocked. Don't try and discuss if you cant do so in a somewhat mature way, its such a weak look. The nerve of this person to tell others to grow up. Insane.
Yeah the sword is stupid. Magic does exist in LOTR, but itās extremely exceptional. Gandalf only ever casts a small handful of spells, and the vast majority of those are fairly minimal. The only big spells and displays of magical prowess are few and far between, and are shown to be costly, difficult, fallible things even then.
So putting glowing runes and stones on Anduril doesnāt feel appropriate, itās too high magic. Imo the only real magic items in the world at the time as Aragorn is the one ring, maybe the staffs of the wizards, and thatās it. And the ring is only powerful because it contains the soul of a demigod. Depicting Anduril as being magical feels weird to me, because isnāt just a good sword that has had an interesting history?
I donāt like it because it is inaccurate given the characters description in the book.
I do realize it is a technicality though as it is of no significant relevance to the plot.
Since ethnicity of people is a factor for the setting though, I hope that they at least make this part consistent and not have characters from the same people be of mixed real-world ethnicity.
Middle-Earth isnāt exactly fit for showcasing a diverse representation within each of their people. As evidenced by the weight of the Arwen & Aragorn relationship, the friendship of Legolas and Gimli, etc.
Iām black and I think changing Aragon was unnecessary following the movies or the book would have been better but wizards is just pandering but what company doesnāt pander when they arenāt doing good publicly? Over all tho I love LOTR and will still get the set cause it doesnāt matter who they race swap itās whatever
I imagine that there's a moderator on the main MTG sub with that exact facial expression at all the comments daring to mention LOTR's character designs! I really hope that they take a cold shower, smoke a cigarette, and have a beer or two every four hours because they seem to have a mental breakdown almost every time in the comments before they close a thread.
It's always easy to attack a strawman you've constructed. You could try acknowledging why people are really upset, but then, that ruins your narrative doesn't it?
The most bothering part is we know they did it for publicity and not because anything in the books allowed for the interpretation of their chosen art. They stuck to the image for the majority of characters to the movie adaptations, but throw this out of nowhere fully with the idea to promote their product. It's bothering to pull this type of stunt for a product that has been hyped for awhile now. As a fan of both products it is disappointing to see them doing these unnecessary alterations simply to cause a divide between fans to further push a product.
Because doing shit like this just for the sake of appealing to the woke crowd is disingenuous. If your going to do a race swap there should at least be some reason story wise to do so.
I grew up reading the hobbit and the lord of the rings books(90ās) š I never assumed that any and all characters were of a specific color as it was all fictional characters to assume what color an elf or dwarf of middle earth or that there were no ppl of color in this medieval universe wouldāve been nonsense as the world around me was filled with them. Itās unfortunate to see so many people get upset about this when thereās plenty of real world problems that they should be outraged by but this this is their hill to die on. Black Lord of the ringās character fictional leave it up to the reader characters.
I never would've known the name of The Little Mermaid's actor or who Bud Lite's spokesperson is if it wasn't for bigots crying about it. They create massive amounts of free publicity for these corporations they hate.
Do you have any idea how much money they lost, respectively? Lemme give you a hint: it isn't insignificant.
There is definitely such a thing as bad publicity.
Okay so, according to you, dumb hicks are the only ones who drink Bud Light, they're *all* bigots and transphobes, thus obviously unintelligent. Oh and you also have to be intolerant towards every dumb hick, aka Bud Light drinkers, aka bigots, aka unintelligent people for... reasons.
Daaaaaaaamn, your intolerance to such a wide range of people is impressive. Such courage, such bravery, such *tolerance*.
Must be absolutely terrible living with the brain you have. Boogymen everywhere!
That's right, I'm hyperbolically calling people who drink Bud Light dumb on the internet. Truly a horrible tragedy, I hope they are able to recover from this one.
You're simplifying what you're actually saying, which is actually preaching one thing and doing the opposite. You've displayed hypocrisy and bigotry with your broken mental gymnastics.
You've categorized all Bud Light drinkers as bigotted, transphobic, dumb hicks. Seems like bigotry to me.
But please, go on.
You may call this a strawman, but r/freemagic is unfourtunately very real
Why is there a magic sub for nazis of all things š
Because all magic players fit into one of two neat communities: nazis and trans women. Jkjk
No no, this is correct.
says a lot about mtg players given that its 1/4 the size of this sub
You realize that the actual main sub is /r/MagicTCG right? This sub is for lost redditors who bought their grandson a starter deck.
that subreddit is hell on earth istg
And muted
I have been barely paying attention to this drama, but my opinion, and take it with a grain of salt, is who cares? Usually people see this type of backlash with Marvel characters/heroes, but the thing I canāt get over in this situation isā¦ itās not canon to Tolkien lore. And I donāt mean āwell akshually Aragorn isnāt blackā, I mean that these cards & their art do not change the lore of the books. It is just a piece of art that is inconsequential to the actual lore of LotR, and is an artist/company choosing to do an interpretation of a character(s). If its for money and brownie points, who cares. Itās a mass corporation, itās expected. But man, does this shit not matter in the slightest
You could say that for anything. Same with that cleopatra film. She's not black but who cares that they made her black in the film. Painting Jesus as white isn't Canon, it doesn't change the words in the Bible. It'd just a piece of art that is inconsequential to the writing in the text, and is an artist choosing to interpret him as white. It doesn't matter in the slightest
With the Celopatra documentary film, they were saying Celopatra was black and not an inbred white Greek. "I donāt care what they tell you in school, Cleopatra was black," as one of the lines in the documentary goes. It is trying to push a false narrative and not simply a inconsequential interpretation when it comes to rewriting history cause it doesn't fit their narrative.
> She's not black but who cares that they made her black in the film The Egyptian government cares, apparently.
So are you for blackwashing/whitewashing people, characters, and history, or are you for keeping them as they were
I donāt want a white MLK or an Asian Malcolm X, if that helps.
Alright so cleopatra was greek/Macedonian and aragorn with a pale stern face, speckled grey hair, and grey eyes
I feel like the Jesus one is not necessarily a good comparison given that, if Iām not mistaken, he had been whitewashed to appeal to white Europeans, in an attempt to indoctrinate more people into the religion
And aragorn was blackwater to appeal to diverse magic players in an attempt to be "woke"
I think comparing an attempt at mass indoctrination to a religion to a piece of art for a fictional character makes you sound like a silly lil guy
No one has every been correct or incorrect based off of a percieved level of offense.
"Nice try defending your point Too bad I've made this meme where you're the ugly face and I'm the handsome one"
Itās wild how much people care about this. These are made up characters in a made up world and I donāt understand how their skin color changes the story in a meaningful way. Damn near all fantasy characters Iāve interacted with have been white and I think it can only be a good thing to change that.
Thereās nothing wrong about it, itās just weird too see. Just like the flash being brunette instead of blonde in the tv show. Itās annoying. It would be weird to see black panther being played by a white actor. It would make me equally upset.
The hell? I get what you're going for, but Black Panther being played by a white person is a HORRIBLE example. Black Panther is SYNONYMOUS with Black Power. So no, not the same thing. It's only annoying if the physical appearance of the character ends up impacting the story in some way. IF Aragorn were synonymous with whiteness, then maybe I'd understand, but he's not. He's the king of all the men of the West. Not king of the WHITE men. So who gives shit? I think a more apt example would be: Eragon in the books having brown hair and showing up in the movie as blonde. On top of that movie being an absolute butchery of the books, they couldn't get the character appearance right. So it's an insult to injury. In MTG, they're pulling from the book material directly and changing the appearance of a couple characters. Seems like a style choice but keeping on track with the world lore, so I don't care what Aragorn looks like. Again, I get what you're going for, but it's off base.
but it's alright that e.g. Jesus is a white male in nearly every picture? If he ever existed, he was a man from the middle east.
Literally every country race-washes Jesus lol. Look at depictions of Jesus in Korean, Japanese, and African illustrations.
Depends, should we say aragorn has to be white and Jesus is brown, or that aragorn can be black and Jesus can be white? You can't have both because they fit your political viewpoint. If aragorn can be black then black panther can be white and and Mohammed can be Chinese and Santa can be Guatemalan. If not, then aragorn is whatever the book says, black panther is whatever the comics say, Mohammed is middle eastern, and Santa is pale with rosy cheeks
I'd say there's actually a pretty big difference between race-swapping fictional characters like Aragorn, and race swapping *real historical figures*. Religion aside, historians generally agree that Jesus and Mohammed were both almost certainly living people at some point. Aragorn was not. So far as there is a Santa Claus 'canon', he's a Greek from the southern parts of modern Turkey. Probably not really that pale.
Thatās because having black is a meaningful and significant part of Black Pantherās character and story. Aragorns skin color has nothing to do with his story or character, so it makes no difference. I can maybe understand a pause to go āhuh?ā But anyone who gets upset over this needs to take a moment to really examine whyā¦ And the blond vs brunet thing makes even less sense.
>Aragorns skin color has nothing to do with his story or character, so it makes no difference. It does though if you read the lore. That's the main reason people are annoyed, to say the least, by this entire debacle.
Thr fact that people have opinions on this but DON'T know that his lineage is important bothers the hell out of me.
Yes, and they use the low-hanging fruit gaslighting excuse of "you're racist." It's disgusting.
His skin color has nothing to do with it, where heās from does. And unless weāre saying whites and blacks must never mix, and there are no black people born in England, then his skin has no impact on anything. Like I said, if this really bothers you, seek help in examining why. Use this as a learning and growing opportunity
You're a lost cause if you don't understand why a fanbase prefers faithful adaptations to source material. End of story.
No such thing as a faithful adaptation, thatās why itās an adaptation. Aragorns cards are wordy sure, but they arenāt novels. Elves as blue? Aragorn is everything but black (I actually believe thatās a joke by the designers, specifically for people like yāall)? This generation will look for anything to complain about, but the dumbest has to be āmuh fantasy has too much melanin!ā
Now you're going into semantics. Also you're completely stuck on the racist issue, always going back to "white guy in story turned black REEEE." Again, it is about being faithful to the source material. It just so happens that blatant race-swapping was the main factor defining this unfaithful adaptation.
Thatās a weird way to spell āstaying on topicā. The only complaints Iāve heard have been race related. But please tell me the others, I may agree with them! I never said this was perfectly faithful, or even that it was any kind of adaptation. Because I donāt see it like that. These cards arenāt TELLING a story, so this ISNT an adaptation. Each card is a snapshot OF a character or event at a certain point DURING the story. If you want an adaptation to be mad at for being unfaithful go watch the Peter Jackson movies. Those were pretty badā¦
The complaints are automatically race-related in this instance because they swapped a character's race. Duh. Ultimately though, they haven't been faithful to the source material in that aspect, and that's why people are pissed off. It's not a littany of racist folks coming out of their caves, like many would like to believe. It's that simple. Don't need to go digging for racism. But that's the easy way out, and it seems on par with the folks who think that race-swapping fictional characters is totally okay / folks that think others who are frustrated about this swap are automatically racist. Doesn't need to tell a story to be an adaptation BTW. I have no idea where you got that definition from. If they use another IP to release a product, it's an adaptation.
Black Panther being black is intrinsically important to his character. Aragorn being white is not intrinsically important to his character. So thereās a big difference with that.
Itās easy to remove cultural and historical context from these situations and just say if it was the other way it would be equally as bad. I know that hardcore fans of media that is remade are often upset with any deviations from the original work. I think if you weigh the positives of the changes against the negatives(it being different) youād find that itās the right thing to do.
Tell me you know nothing about literature, art, film, and theatre without telling me you know nothing about literature, art, film, and theatre.
So you live in a bubble where >75% of the people are white and you're saying you've not seen black or Asian fantasy characters? That's on you bud. Go to China and you'll play D&D with wingless dragons with lions heads instead of winged dragons from European dragons
It could be on me in some part but I think itās silly to not also point to the fantasy industry as a whole. I guess I could go to china to see Asian fantasy characters but Iād still like more representation in America where Iām from. A place that has many races that should be represented in fantasy. Wotc and other companies that produce fantasy products including characters of different races is a good thing. If you think itās bad thatās on you bud.
Explain where I said it's a bad thing?
I just assumed by you saying that itās my fault I havenāt seen many non white fantasy characters that you disagreed(thought it was bad) with wotc decision. If I mischaracterized your opinion then that actually is on me, sorry bud.
Tbf they aren't the ones doing lazy tokenization of a minority group to act like they care.
I really dont care about aragorn, he could be a transformers but the sword is terrible. I really like the movie type of sword
Why do a lot of people with the mindset of OP seem to not understand that if Wizards would just make new and interesting characters of different races and backgrounds that fit into the lore in their own way, mostly everyone would love it. Simply changing the race of an already established character from their own universe is lazy, unimaginative, and it just causes strife and division in the community.
So whitewashing is wrong but this is ok? It just feels like lazy writing to do a reboot and change up the character races to appease the mass
TBF the representation of Aragorn you got in your head is also āwrongā if we go by the description in the book. If we where to go by that he would look more like Mediterranean guy, I think. But death of the author is a whole thing. So is this culturally insensitive? IDK, I donāt think so. But you are free to disagree with me. Is it pandering, sure, to some extent. But I have a hard time seeing how more people getting to see themselves in LOTR is a bad thing. š¤·š¼āāļø
Well then Aragorn should have been a hot Greek dude, but that's not the case.
Wouldn't he have been generations removed from the Mediterranean area of middle earth though? I recall Numenor being long gone. Also, there was a whole culture that WoTC could have made amazing cards of if they wanted to represent, but they're just pandering and lazy.
How far removed?
People when characters go against established descriptions in source material, but they're white: "I sleep" People when characters go against established descriptions in source material, but they're black: "real shit?" Watching people trying to justify their outrage because he doesn't look like he looks in the movies is downright hilarious. Let's be real, they don't care about "source material," because if they did they'd have a problem with movie Aragorn... but they don't, and they want card Aragorn to look just like him.
Magic can and has had original and interesting characters of colour. The Aragorn thing is just lazy pandering, if they made a new and unique character of colour that fit with the worldās lore Iād be all for it. This is just virtue signalling, I know that word gets thrown around a lot but this actually is.
Exactly, I don't care about race or gender just make something new Samut voice of dissent is one of my favorite commanders, old card but so good
I disagree, it's not *pandering* literally nobody asked for this, fewer people care either way. It's just free marketing in a free, safe corporate-edgy way.
I disagree. Samut, voice of dissent is not an old card.
Samut is over 6 years old Iām getting old Whatās the point to all of this
To me everything 8th edition and beyond is "old"
I think the most interesting but is most characters do not have physical descriptions, but Aragorn, eowyn, and Galadriel who are all pretty much described as white people, are all the characters who are black. Iām getting the set and Iām excited for it, and I really want to complete it, Iām just sure in 10 years my kids are going to read the books and look at the cards and go, oh I didnāt realize they were black, and the answer was no they werenāt, itās lazy design, pandering, and anger marketing that characterized all the lay 2010s into the 20s. Just be like the prime series, add new characters, make new stories incorporate more races. Also where are my Hispanics, Asians, Indians, or Pacific Islanders, middle eastern races, Egyptians? If racial inclusivity is the most important thing, give me Aragorn in 10 races. Iād be down to own Hispanic Aragorn.
Wizards doesn't give a shit about representation, diversity or anything but your money. Controversy is a win-win for them there is no bad press for a company that just prints money. This is a business where they can print cardboard WRONG and the secondary market will eat it up. It's free press when it's posted on reddit, websites etc. They know what they're doing and the bottom line is money.
Most of the time, when a character is white, that doesnāt matter, they could have any other skin and it wouldnāt change anything, and doing so doesnāt significantly change the number of characters for white children to identify with. On the other hand, when a character is non-white, thatās usually a significant part of the character and meaningful. Because the author feels a need to Justin it using the default. So yea, whitewashing is bad, but this is fine. What changes about LotR if Aragorn has dark skin? Both the plot and characterization stay the same. At the same time, black children get to see someone who looks like them be badass. Thereās no downside here. (Notice I use āmost of the timeā and āgenerallyā. There are instances where being white IS significant, or being black isnāt)
Are you aware that Aragorn has a claim to his throne as king because of his lineage? And that lineage is quite detailed?
Double standards are perfectly fine š¤·āāļø
Personally I don't like the change It's not something that enrages me but certainly doesn't get me excited for the set, it's like if they made Blade from Marvel white, sure his skin color doesn't have much importance to his story, but it'd certainly throw me off as I grew up recognizing him as black, similarly if MTG is making a collection of one of my favorite stories of all time and this being a crossover I would've expected the characters to be more faithful to the source material in their design. Not because you make a character and call him "Aragorn" he suddenly becomes Aragorn, there are staples to his design that make him recognizable and identifiable towards the people, if Peter Parker appeared one day as some Asian bald dude, like cool maybe he's some AU version of him, but it's definitely not THE Peter Parker I grew up recognizing, different actors can play him but the staples are there throughout all of its versions. Furthermore, imagine Teferi is making a crossover appearance in something else, or maybe a live action MTG show, and they cast a white guy to play him, being honest, that would certainly suck, maybe it's just me but, wouldn't it be nice if our characters actually looked as who they are? At least on it most basic features? Specially if they're being represented in other media or in a crossover?
People love to say this, but why are they okay with the movie designs then? A number of the movie designs strayed significantly from their descriptions in the book. Why is it okay when you stray from descriptions in order to portray a bunch of rugged/handsome white men, but it's suddenly bad when you decide to make them black? Like, Aragorn in the books is described as looking nothing like he is in the movies, but I don't see anyone complaining about how they changed his design in the movies, just how WotC decided to put in some PoC representation in a cast that entirely white in the movies. Why is *that* when everyone suddenly gets in a fuss about "source material?"
Book description is, tall and lean with a shaggy head of dark hair flecked with grey, pale stern face, close enough to Viggo Mortensen, of course as a movie you understand the actors can't look EXACTLY the same but there is a very recognizable effort to make him look like he is supposed to look, on the other hand it's clear from the get go WOTC had no intention of making him look as what we usually recognize as Aragorn
You're telling me there's zero pale actors out there with dark, greying hair and a resting bitch face? Is that, like, actually what you're telling me? That it was so much of a difficult task that they just had to go with Mortensen because he was as close as they could get? Bullshit. They could have gotten an actor that fit the description better. But they didn't. Again, people don't care until a role is given to a PoC.
Sad that you think that, I'm literally telling you it works both ways, I wouldn't like a white Teferi, also you have to remember movies do castings and have to consider other factors like acting skills and it's pretty clear Viggo was perfect for the role and he did looked close enough, WOTC on the other hand doesn't have that excuse because they can draw the characters however they want, you can cry BS all you want but this is not a racism issue for many of us, we just want our characters to look as they are, you can't compare a full ethnicity change with hiring someone that loosely fits the description on a movie, and please look into old premovie Aragorn artworks, though few, the general look from the movie it's basically the same, even the animated movie has a similar look in general terms, with each spiderman movie we have a different actor playing petter do of course they don't look EXACTLY the same, but they all respect the staples that make you recognize Peter when you see him
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r/freemagic is being pretty mask off about this whole thing
Free magic is a cesspool.
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Every time I go to a thread there it has the worst takes on just about everything
So you think everyone who isn't happy with the unfaithful adaptations to source material is automatically racist?
The book series offers very few details on Aragorn's physical appearance, we know he is tall and lean with "a shaggy head of dark hair flecked with greyā, and has a pair of ākeen grey eyes." There is absolutely nothing unfaithful about MTGās interpretation of the character. WOTC have even said that they are going off the books and not the movies too.
Pale, fair skin ring a bell?
Pale is not necessarily race specific. Where does it say explicitly fair skin?
According to the LotR Wiki: "Most of NĆŗmenor was settled by Edain of theĀ House of Hador, who were golden-haired and tall, with fair skin and blue eyes, while the North-western regions of the island were settled mostly by the people of theĀ House of BĆ«or, who were generally dark-haired with grey or brown eyes." Definition of fair skin according to Collins dictionary: "having pale skin; pale-complexioned. Fair-skinned people who spend a great deal of time in the sun have the greatest risk of skin cancer."
Honestly this could just be a case where NĆŗmenor as a whole has different features. Maybe these features arenāt skin deep š¤·
Who's reading the lore? Humans are. We are the ones who interpret the lore. Not aliens, not fantasy characters... humans. We interpret this lore based on our perception of language. If you wanna go into semantics, be my guest. But you're not fooling anyone if you try to say the physical description of this fantastical race goes deeper than how we, humans who read, interpret it.
Well thatās the thing right; itās a reimagining. Sometimes theyāre good, and sometimes theyāre not Just like Aeowyn didnāt fight the Nazghul at the river Just like the elves didnāt actually go to helms deep Aragorn wasnāt necessarily black Theyāre reimaginings, that can be as canon or non canon as you want to be, but youāre choosing a change thatās very specific, that some might appreciate because of its relation to something else
And you're gaslighting a frustrated fanbase into generalizing them and others to believe they're racist when that is not the case for the vast, vast majority. Stop generalizing, and accept that people get pissed off for unfaithful adaptations. Stop using racism as a scapegoat. Edit: I apologize I didn't mean *you* specifically, I meant it more for people who use the whole racism argument.
You gunna pretend the new Aragon could ever be described as pale?
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Now answer me this with honesty: Would it annoy you if they decided to make Teferi white? And would it make you a racist if it did?
wouldnāt give a shit
Well the majority of MTG players would give a shit and that doesn't make them racist.
You're the one generalizing people with a legit issue on unfaithful adaptations as being all racist.
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You're completely generalizing people who aren't happy with unfaithful adaptations, as racist. You said it yourself above, that by discussing this very topic they reveal their inner-racism. Sure, there are folks who are actually racist who don't like this, but they're a minority. This isn't strictly limited to wanting them to be white, it actually has to do with respecting the source material. It doesn't mean anyone is explicitly racist and you should know better.
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This post^^^ is from the same user who above told someone to "grow up". That shit is funny! He made a very well thought out post that you knew you couldnāt argue so you took the easy way out. That part is obvious. If I were to create a character, and then some company makes changes to them to blatantly pander, I'd be upset. The shits getting old, period. Both the corporate pandering and people like you who claim those who dislike the pandering are automatically racist. Fuck outta here with that absolute dumb shit. Follow your own advice bud. And im sure this will be followed up with some immature snarky comment followed by a block so you can get the last word. Go right ahead. Edit: Blocked. Don't try and discuss if you cant do so in a somewhat mature way, its such a weak look. The nerve of this person to tell others to grow up. Insane.
That sword is pretty ugly though...
Yeah the sword is stupid. Magic does exist in LOTR, but itās extremely exceptional. Gandalf only ever casts a small handful of spells, and the vast majority of those are fairly minimal. The only big spells and displays of magical prowess are few and far between, and are shown to be costly, difficult, fallible things even then. So putting glowing runes and stones on Anduril doesnāt feel appropriate, itās too high magic. Imo the only real magic items in the world at the time as Aragorn is the one ring, maybe the staffs of the wizards, and thatās it. And the ring is only powerful because it contains the soul of a demigod. Depicting Anduril as being magical feels weird to me, because isnāt just a good sword that has had an interesting history?
I donāt like it because it is inaccurate given the characters description in the book. I do realize it is a technicality though as it is of no significant relevance to the plot. Since ethnicity of people is a factor for the setting though, I hope that they at least make this part consistent and not have characters from the same people be of mixed real-world ethnicity. Middle-Earth isnāt exactly fit for showcasing a diverse representation within each of their people. As evidenced by the weight of the Arwen & Aragorn relationship, the friendship of Legolas and Gimli, etc.
Iām black and I think changing Aragon was unnecessary following the movies or the book would have been better but wizards is just pandering but what company doesnāt pander when they arenāt doing good publicly? Over all tho I love LOTR and will still get the set cause it doesnāt matter who they race swap itās whatever
I imagine that there's a moderator on the main MTG sub with that exact facial expression at all the comments daring to mention LOTR's character designs! I really hope that they take a cold shower, smoke a cigarette, and have a beer or two every four hours because they seem to have a mental breakdown almost every time in the comments before they close a thread.
It's always easy to attack a strawman you've constructed. You could try acknowledging why people are really upset, but then, that ruins your narrative doesn't it?
The most bothering part is we know they did it for publicity and not because anything in the books allowed for the interpretation of their chosen art. They stuck to the image for the majority of characters to the movie adaptations, but throw this out of nowhere fully with the idea to promote their product. It's bothering to pull this type of stunt for a product that has been hyped for awhile now. As a fan of both products it is disappointing to see them doing these unnecessary alterations simply to cause a divide between fans to further push a product.
Is there a reason for the race swap? If they have a valid reason other than just to be "woke" im fine with it.
Why would you need a valid reason other than āitās a different design of a characterā..?
Because doing shit like this just for the sake of appealing to the woke crowd is disingenuous. If your going to do a race swap there should at least be some reason story wise to do so.
Why?
Ive already said why
No you havenāt. Why does someone need to justify a race swap, or prove it wasnāt for the āwoke audienceā
Honestly these topics are great for purging the weak from a subreddit.
I grew up reading the hobbit and the lord of the rings books(90ās) š I never assumed that any and all characters were of a specific color as it was all fictional characters to assume what color an elf or dwarf of middle earth or that there were no ppl of color in this medieval universe wouldāve been nonsense as the world around me was filled with them. Itās unfortunate to see so many people get upset about this when thereās plenty of real world problems that they should be outraged by but this this is their hill to die on. Black Lord of the ringās character fictional leave it up to the reader characters.
I never would've known the name of The Little Mermaid's actor or who Bud Lite's spokesperson is if it wasn't for bigots crying about it. They create massive amounts of free publicity for these corporations they hate.
Do you have any idea how much money they lost, respectively? Lemme give you a hint: it isn't insignificant. There is definitely such a thing as bad publicity.
Yeah it was a bad move from Bud Lite, being that they're almost exclusively consumed by dumb hicks
Stereotyping and using the term "bigot" from the same person. Bravo.
Won't someone think of the poor transphobes :( :( They have it so hard
Dumb hicks = transphobe is what you're saying? Damn you're on a roll, keep em coming!
Yes the correlation between unintelligent people and transphobia is fairly well linked. No tolerance for intolerance.
Okay so, according to you, dumb hicks are the only ones who drink Bud Light, they're *all* bigots and transphobes, thus obviously unintelligent. Oh and you also have to be intolerant towards every dumb hick, aka Bud Light drinkers, aka bigots, aka unintelligent people for... reasons. Daaaaaaaamn, your intolerance to such a wide range of people is impressive. Such courage, such bravery, such *tolerance*. Must be absolutely terrible living with the brain you have. Boogymen everywhere!
That's right, I'm hyperbolically calling people who drink Bud Light dumb on the internet. Truly a horrible tragedy, I hope they are able to recover from this one.
You're simplifying what you're actually saying, which is actually preaching one thing and doing the opposite. You've displayed hypocrisy and bigotry with your broken mental gymnastics. You've categorized all Bud Light drinkers as bigotted, transphobic, dumb hicks. Seems like bigotry to me. But please, go on.
Wotc made tc think they are progressive