D&D Movie/TV (Yet another) D&D Movie Speculation thread.

[generic]

I'm not sure if someone has asked this question yet, but what things would the movie need to contain in order to be a real D&D movie, in your opinion?

In my opinion, a D&D movie would need to integrate the elements of a specific game setting, characters whose personalities and abilities are influenced by D&D novels and by the game, antagonists familiar to D&D fans, and a certain "non-cheesy" set of elements that would make monsters terrifying, rather than cheesy.

 

[Quartz]

They mostly raided East Africa. White slaves were much rarer.

Absolutely not true. Barbary pirates regularly raided Cornwall, the south coast, Ireland, even as far as Iceland.

And if they did, what's you point? That because Arabs enslaved whites racism against blacks doesn't matter.

No, to treat black as a special colour is nonsense. It is those who treat it as such who are the racists.

 

[Jester David]

Absolutely not true. Barbary pirates regularly raided Cornwall, the south coast, Ireland, even as far as Iceland.

Read what I said again. I didn't say Europe was NOT raided. I said they mostly raised Africa. Arab slave traders took as many as five times as many Africans as they did Europeans.

The Barbary pirates did mostly take Europeans. But these were often from Mediterranean nations (given the Barbary pirates were from North Africa). But, again, this was only a portion of the total Arab slave trade.

And the Arabic slave trade wasn't based on race or religion. It was based on availability. They took whomever. They didn't view Caucasians as inherently inferior. They didn't make laws designed specifically to oppress white people. They didn't work to keep the children of their slaves oppressed for several generations afterwards.

No, to treat black as a special colour is nonsense. It is those who treat it as such who are the racists.

I don't even know where to begin....

Okay, yeah, on paper all people should be equal.
In practice, system racism still exists. And there are numerous examples of black people being treated unfairly throughout the United States. The statistics for these are damning and horrifying.
African Americans are still treated poorly. And denying that reality is deny a serious problem that affects tens of millions of people.

It's not saying they're "special", it's acknowledging that they're still not treated fairly and equally.

 

[Henry]

True, and I think that the portrayal of Drow will gradually start to shift.

I know many people (new players) who now think that drow have greyish-purple skin, and always have in D&D lore.

Not to get too deeply into it, but When I was growing up I never had the impression that Dark Elves were supposed to have black skin — thanks to Errol Otus, I always pictured them as having deep violet or navy blue skin, similar to the shades of color of the black light posters that were extremely popular at the time, extremely alien in appearance and not like a human at all — certainly not like any of the shades of dark skin of the people I grew up around. It wasn’t until much later that I read the actual text description and saw it was called out as “dead black.” I’ve never made the assumption that any character with skin that wasn’t “caucasian” was supposed to be a stand in for all people who weren’t, and taken as an stereotype.

 

[gyor]

Read what I said again. I didn't say Europe was NOT raided. I said they mostly raised Africa. Arab slave traders took as many as five times as many Africans as they did Europeans.

The Barbary pirates did mostly take Europeans. But these were often from Mediterranean nations (given the Barbary pirates were from North Africa). But, again, this was only a portion of the total Arab slave trade.

And the Arabic slave trade wasn't based on race or religion. It was based on availability. They took whomever. They didn't view Caucasians as inherently inferior. They didn't make laws designed specifically to oppress white people. They didn't work to keep the children of their slaves oppressed for several generations afterwards.


I don't even know where to begin....

Okay, yeah, on paper all people should be equal.
In practice, system racism still exists. And there are numerous examples of black people being treated unfairly throughout the United States. The statistics for these are damning and horrifying.
African Americans are still treated poorly. And denying that reality is deny a serious problem that affects tens of millions of people.

It's not saying they're "special", it's acknowledging that they're still not treated fairly and equally.

Why are you trying to make it a contest? Enslaving Africans was evil, enslaving Europeans was evil, ect..., that it was more Africans then Europeans doesn't make it more moral some how to enslave Europeans. It's all bad. It's not a contest.

 

[gyor]

I mean, the rather non-conservative WotC thought it would be a good name for a book in 2001, and that was written by one of their wokier writers in the extremely cosmopolitan Seattle environment rather than whitebread rural Wisconsin, so that's hardly something we can hold against Gary uniquely.

Gygax was a rough writer given to purple prose and ham-fisted obviousness. The over-the-top bigotry of his Medieval scholar stand-in is one example of this.

The Drow thing seems largely to have originated with an ink inversion of a standard Elf: what is black on the Elf ink drawing becomes white space, what is white space becomes black ink. A bit of 70's psychedelia, more than any racist statement.

My recommendation for the movies would be to not touch the Drow topic, as there is plenty of space to avoid it. if they must come up, make non-Drow Elf characters obviously African in features (which has D&D precedent anyway). The issue is less that they are black, though, and more the (probably unintentional) echo of the "Mark of Cain" bit from racist lore in regards to Lolth, which seems hard to get around.

My suggestion is that WotC stop worrying about being "woke" and just tell a really good story with compelling characters. Making being "Woke" the top priority over setting, story, characters, and regular fans, has been a disaster for IPs like Ghostbusters, Marvel Comics (not marvel studios), and EA games, for example.

Don't worry about people being offended by Drow, that is there problem,, they are seeing things in it that aren't there.

 

[gyor]

Double post, happy holidays everyone.

 

[Jester David]

Why are you trying to make it a contest? Enslaving Africans was evil, enslaving Europeans was evil, ect..., that it was more Africans then Europeans doesn't make it more moral some how to enslave Europeans. It's all bad. It's not a contest.

C'mon.
Yeah, it was amoral and evil. No it's not a contest.

But, as the post that started this particular conversation went:

Would it be racist if the heroes were black and the drow white?

What do you think?
Does the the Barbary slave trade and the existence of white slaves in the past make things "even" with the African-American slave trade? Does the fact Arabs took Irish and European slaves mean that it's okay to have the only people of colour in a film be villains?

 

[generic]

My suggestion is that WotC stop worrying about being "woke" and just tell a really good story with compelling characters. Making being "Woke" the top priority over setting, story, characters, and regular fans, has been a disaster for IPs like Ghostbusters, Marvel Comics (not marvel studios), and EA games, for example.

Don't worry about people being offended by Drow, that is their problem,, they are seeing things in it that aren't there.

Your suggestion is both logical and completely illogical.

The premise is logical, but your arguments are illogical.

It's easy to say that WotC should stop worrying about being PC and "woke" for a mass audience.

However, this is a film that will be produced for a "mass market" audience, i.e. one that does not understand the tropes and traditions of D&D.

It is my belief (as it is evidently yours) that the Drow were not born of racism (on Gary's part).

However, critics and common audiences may interpret the Drow as being a racist creation.

Once again, I don't think that Drow are as problematic as many posters have suggested. They certainly are, but perhaps not to the extent that has been discussed.

However, many, many critics and audiences are not made up of D&D fans.

They will see (as you say) "...things that are not there".

 

[gyor]

Your suggestion is both logical and completely illogical.

The premise is logical, but your arguments are illogical.

It's easy to say that WotC should stop worrying about being PC and "woke" for a mass audience.

However, this is a film that will be produced for a "mass market" audience, i.e. one that does not understand the tropes and traditions of D&D.

It is my belief (as it is evidently yours) that the Drow were not born of racism (on Gary's part).

However, critics and common audiences may interpret the Drow as being a racist creation.

Once again, I don't think that Drow are as problematic as many posters have suggested. They certainly are, but perhaps not to the extent that has been discussed.

However, many, many critics and audiences are not made up of D&D fans.

They will see (as you say) "...things that are not there".

Normal people won't, and the "woke" part of the audience is too small to matter economically, and they, will find something to complain about no matter what WotC does.