Elon Musk Has An Epic Take on Amazon’s ‘Rings of Power’
Tesla founder and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is a self-professed nerd, and has talked about his love for J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings books. The classic fantasy novels are a favorite of his, ever since he first read them as a child to combat loneliness while growing up in South Africa. Now, he is none too pleased with Amazon’s live-action series adaptation now playing on Prime Video, and he is speaking out about it.
In a recent series of tweets, Musk chimed in on the Rings of Power series, and its deviation from the books it is based on. In particular, its depiction of Galadriel as a warrior elf and the central character, a far cry from Tolkien’s books. Cate Blanchett played the character in Peter Jackson’s Oscar-winning film adaptation, while Morfydd Clark portrays the character in the new Amazon version (which can be seen here).
As his tweets make clear, Musk isn’t impressed by Amazon’s take on the books, or Galadriel’s character in particular. “Tolkien is turning in his grave,” Musk said. “Almost every male character so far is a coward, a jerk or both. Only Galadriel is brave, smart and nice.”
Amazon to Critics: You’re Racist!
Musk’s criticism is not unique. Producers of the series have championed their “updates” to the story to make it more “relevant” to modern audiences. That included changing female characters to be more dominant and warrior-like, as well as adding diverse races to the cast. However, the show’s slow pace, overly-dramatic performances, and underwhelming storyline has led to criticism from fans that the “woke” approach has affected the quality. They also accuse producers and stars of using diversity as a shield to deflect criticism of the sub-par, disappointing series so far.
Case in point: the official Amazon Lord of the Rings social media accounts continually post messages equating criticism of the show with racism and sexism.
There’s also some personal rivalry involved. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is also the founder of Blue Origin, a private space tourism company that seems to lag behind Musk’s SpaceX in terms of accomplishments. Blue Origin even filed a lawsuit after SpaceX won a NASA contract, and Elon Musk has criticized Bezos’ company in the past.
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