YJ02
Well Known GateFan
well they are not - they were made to be. as it seems that Tolkien's final decision (as close as he got to one) as published in HISTORY OF MIDDLE EARTH series is that orcs are tortured and changed Elves, they were originally born as not evil- they had a choice as all 'children of illuvatar' do, however most who became Orcs did not have a choice - they were captured and made into what they are
IRL comparisons- Orcs are soldiers of a evil power; were the members of the Wehrmacht (NOT SS)- or better, are the current rank and file of the Russian army 'necessarily evil'?
no
And as this guy 'nerd of the rings' so aptly wraps it up in this video, there are many examples of Orcs wanting something more than just being soldiers of Morgoth or Sauron. It even partly made it to Jackson's movies
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFlCgq67lD8
And many forget that the manner in which we see Saruman 'hatching' Uruk Hai in the movies is completely wrong and not in keeping at all with Tolkien. yet i do not see the current mob of "anti's " saying a thing about that or any of Jackson's other sins
and on how Orcs look, we largely have the imaginations of various artists and then Jackson's orcs as the 'standard' for how they look
in Tolkien's 'reality', Orcs would look more like Adar
a big problem is modern perceptions of Tolkien based on art and films, which themselves misrepresented Tolkien's work
NOW THERE is plenty wrong with this show, the biggest issues to me are the reasoning for the fading of the elves = connection to Mithril. and the apparent absence of Galadriel's husband, overall, it is ""in keeping" with Tolkien's work esp since it is set in the second age of which he only wrote so much source material -all very limited
also, they are prevented from directly naming or referencing any first age occurence other than what we did see- like Galadriel in Amman and the mention of Beleriand and other first age place names. that automatically untethers things a bit
still wondering where that bit will come in- the part from a casting call that made so many people upset yrs ago
the one that went something like "" needed.. extras to play roles in a fantasy series.. must be willing to wear prosthetics/ heavy makeup daily and to be willing to be in scenes involving murder/ public sexual activities, etc""
the only thing i can think of where that might fit is the Fall of Numenor and how ar pharazon brought a captured Sauron there who basically wormed his way into the Court and caused society to totally fall