fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #3129 ]

[ SECRET POST #3129 ]

⌈ Secret Post #3129 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 026 secrets from Secret Submission Post #447.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Uh Thranduil and Denethor seemed pretty evil to me.

They're really not, especially in book!canon. I mean, I can understand where the idea came from; the movies did a terrible job with both of them. But, even if you agree with movie!canon, in fic it's taken to an extreme that just isn't either character.

In fic, Thranduil is a rapist and terribly abusive and actually evil so that Legolas can be appropriately woobified and Aragorn (or whoever) can swoop in and rescue him. Ditto Denethor's portrayal.

These two are complicated characters but they are not evil. Indeed, with everything we know about elves and about Thranduil's history, he is likely a very warm and loving father who cares very much about his people.

And I could write pages about Denethor. There's an argument that Thranduil is a straight-up good guy, but Denethor has layers of gray to him that make it easy to ignore the good of him. He is more of a tragic figure. But neither is evil.

Wait, do you know they aren't assholes, or is that just your head!canon? I mean, I grant books can give more nuanced interpretations, but to some extent, book canon is different from movie canon, and in movie canon, there was next to nothing redeemable about either character. Does that make them violent rapists? Well no, not in canon. But if you want to write a rape!fic, you might as well make the asshole characters do the deed.

No, it's not my headcanon. I can quote you all the relevant passages from the books. And, to be clear, I am talking from the book perspective. I have been from the start (I only quoted movie to respond to the comment I received). Especially when you consider Thranduil, the evil!Thranduil and evil!Denethor that I encountered was back when LOTR came out, which was before the Hobbit movies completely bastardized Thranduil's character. Impressions from the movies for him weren't around so there was only the book, and in the book he is a good person (Bilbo decides if he's going to die, he'd rather die defending Thranduil than anybody else).

(Seriously, I started going over the book characterization for these two to support my claim but it was turning into an essay, so if you really want me to prove that this isn't a headcanon, I can. Suffice to say, it's more than a more nuanced reading of the books: the movies fucked up their characterization and they're not like that in the books.)

It's not as if I don't understand where these bad characterizations came from but that doesn't make them any less wrong. And it wasn't just the one-off fic where someone wanted to make them evil for the sake of the fic; there was a vocal part of fandom back in the early 2000s (and to some extent still today) that insisted these two are actually evil - that it was completely consistent with their characters to be physically abusive to their children. So, that made them the worst characterizations in my fandom.

Then I think you're failing to grasp the nuances of their characters. If you've only seen the movie versions, then that's sort of understandable because they were definitely more villainous and less subtle. But that's not book canon. Even in the films, you can pick up on the concept that while they both did despicable things, it's simplifying who they are to label them as "evil". I think that's the point Tolkien was trying to make, that people are capable of evil acts for reasons other than just reveling in evil.

So what would be wrong with writing them as irredeemable assholes, since that's what they are in the movies? They are two separate canons, and at very least, in the movies, they are pretty much villains.

DA

Well, that's up for debate if they're irredeemable assholes in the movie; I didn't see it that way and I know many others who feel the same way. And there's nothing wrong with writing them that way but it's still bad characterization. They're not villains. They're antagonists.

You seem weirdly defensive about this.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ SECRET POST #3129 ]

Re: Worst character interpretation you've ever seen?

Re: Worst character interpretation you've ever seen?

Re: Worst character interpretation you've ever seen?

Re: Worst character interpretation you've ever seen?

Re: Worst character interpretation you've ever seen?

Re: Worst character interpretation you've ever seen?

Re: Worst character interpretation you've ever seen?