Blatant LoTR Copy-Cats

[Lenya]

If you write a stunning fantasy with good foundations, where everything is connected and everyone loves it, you'll have to live with the fact that your idees will get stolen. Like Wayfarer said, it's all connected.

[Beren3000]

An obvious Lotr copy-cat is Book 1 of The Wheel of Time for the following reasons:

-The whole sleepy, insulated village motif
-A stranger coming to the village to sweep the heroes off their feet
-Nazgul/ Myrddraal
-For those of you conspiracy theorists out there: Merry and Pippin / Mat and Perrin

[Pytt]

Yeah, when thinking about it, I've come across more things from Lotr and Tolkien in the WoT books, though I don't remember them now. But I suppose, you can't read a book like that and then write a in some ways similar book, without taking abit from Tolkien.

[Lenya]

Yip, totally agree. I have also seen some striking resemblenses in the to and can unfortunately not think of any at the moment but I remember something about a few names on the map that bothered me.

[Wayfarer]

Originally Posted by Minielin

Meaning no fiction can possibly be wholly original or without strong influences of past works? I'd agree with that... I can't think of a case that's otherwise, really.

Yep.

It may be a cynical stance to take, but I'm really of the opinion that it's humanly impossible to create something original. One fiction is inspired by another fiction, which is inspired by a third, which is inspired by yet another, and so on down the line until somewhere in the depths of time someone was inspired to tell that first fiction, based on real events (which may or may not become twisted in the retelling).

Humanity has the limited ability to discover new things, and to that degree new story-concepts come along every so often, but even relatively new (to the common perception) ideas such as the Engine or the Computer are already going through their nth iteration.

There really is nothing new under the sun.

[Nurvingiel]

Which begs the question... who wrote the first original work?



(I do agree with you guys though. )

[me9996]

Originally Posted by ElemmÃ*rë

Gandalf and Obi-wan Kenobi...

There are a lot, many more I can't think of right now, but you can't always put it down to copy-cats. Some of these things are simply recurrent themes that not even Tolkien created, and I'm not about to accuse him of copying from Norse mythology or Christian theology...

Saruman and Count duku?
Luke skywalker and Aragorn?
Merry and Twedledee?

[Lenya]

Originally Posted by me9996

Merry and Twedledee?

love that. (though it is an insult to all Merry fans)

[Nurvingiel]

*bump*

That's a good point about languages Pytt. The history and languages of Middle-earth really do make it seem like its own world. That's actually why I didn't think of it as an alternate history for the longest time.

[Thehoundsofdeath]

Originally Posted by ItalianLegolas

Okay, in school my class had to watch "The Wizard of Oz", and me and my fellow LoTR nerds noticed some very obvious very much alike/stolen portions of the movie that were very much like the LoTR books! One such example is the "object of power", in the Wizard of Oz, the ruby slippers, in LoTR, the ring. Another one, would be a a huge gate where all the witches minions(which are orc look-alikes) march through, you guessed it, an enormous BLACK GATE, very much like the one that is the entrance to Mordor! My final such copy-cat is the appearance of short people, in the Wizard of Oz, the munchkins, in LoTR, the Hobbits!

I guess my point is, has anyone else noticed such LoTR look-alikes, or am i the only one?

Rather late in the thread to point this out, but the film of "The Wizard Of Oz" was originally a book that was written in 1900, so could not have been influenced by Tolkien, who did not publish anything until many decades later.

[Lefty Scaevola]

Even the 1939 movie (which made the Muchkins small people, which they were not in the liturature) predated the the publication of LoTR, and the screen play was largely written before the Hobbit was released.

[me9996]

Originally Posted by Lenya

love that. (though it is an insult to all Merry fans)

Well if Merry is Tweedledee, then who is Pippin?

And one thing about the so called "Orc look-alikes" I don't think Tolkien ever discribes the orcs as being green.

In the "Wizard of Oz" movie the minions are closer (In apearence) to Russian revolutionaries than orcs!

And... They're happy when the Witch is dead, unlike the orcs who become somewhat aimless.

[Curubethion]

Originally Posted by me9996

Saruman and Count duku?

Er...I rather blame that one on Christopher Lee.

[Jon S.]

Originally Posted by Khamûl

And The Sword of Shannara is the most blatant rip-off of Tolkien I've ever read. It's also the only book by Terry Brooks I've ever read.

The SoS was basically the vehicle Brooks used to learn the craft of writing. It is very definitely a blatant LOTR ripoff and by far, in my view, his least satisfying effort. For SoS is to Brooks as Meet the Beatles was to the Fab 4. You really should give Brooks another chance.

As for the general thrust of this thread, I would quote Steppenwolf:

Just before we go, I'd like to mention Junior Wells
We stole his thing from him, and he from someone else

Or if you prefer Ecclesiastes:

9 What has been is what will be,
and what has been done is what will be done;
there is nothing new under the sun.
10 Is there a thing of which it is said,
"See, this is new"?
It has already been,
in the ages before us.

[Morwen]

People have probably already said this, but POTTER.
I mean, Voldemorts massive cave-lake thing? Moria.
The Dark Lord? THE DARK LORD.
Dementors? Black Riders.
Dumbledore? Gandalf.
Harry's scar "getting heavier when the enemy is near"? THE RING.
Harry's sidekicks? Frodo's sidekicks.
Need I say more?

[Midge]

i did notice that in some of them. Particularly the dementors and the Nazgul - the dementors in the book were described as looking EXACTLY the way Peter Jackson had the Nazgul looking, if only de-cartoonified.

[Wilhelm]

I don't want to call anyone a copycat as we all build our own ideas on the ideas that came before us. I prefer to think of this thread as a place to identify similar themes...

That said, I do note that there are some notable similarities between Gurthang and Stormbringer (A cursed black sword wielded by an antihero, Elric of Melniboné, in several Micheal Moorcock books). Stormbringer ends up killing everyone close to Elric. There are many more similarities which I won't go in to here.

The weird part is that Moorcock was certainly not out to copy JRR as the first novel with Stormbringer in it was published in 1963. The Silmarillion was released in 1977. I don't believe Tolkien copied Moorcock either.

Ultimately, I believe both authors took their inspiration (directly or indirectly) from an old Finnish tale (Kullervo).

[EllethValatari]

(hello, everyone! I'm sorry to have missed most of this debate-I was traveling through Italy for a couple weeks and internet was scarce )


So, we've taken a specific thought and made it general, and the main question now is, "are fictional stories really copycats of each other?" (correct me if I'm reading completely outside the lines)

As I've written about in numerous essays, I think fiction is so well-liked because it reflects reality, without being real. It illustrates the rights and wrongs of our world by putting them in a different light: when we step into someone else's shoes what we originally saw ends up looking much different. The differentiating element in fictional stories is what specific idea, problem, etc. the story is illustrating. On the other hand, they all seem to be copycatting each other because they are all "copycatting" the same thing. There is such a place as hell ruled by Satan, and fictional stories reflect hell in their own way...Harry Potter has the huge cave-like structure controlled by Voldemort, LotR has Moria ruled by Sauron. In this way, HP isn't copycatting LotR-and the same applies to most other examples.

[Earniel]

Originally Posted by Wilhelm

Ultimately, I believe both authors took their inspiration (directly or indirectly) from an old Finnish tale (Kullervo).

I am unfamiliar with the Kullervo tale (the Kalevala is on my to-read-list), but I am fairly convinced that Tolkien modelled Gurthang on Tyrfing, the cursed sword central in the Hervarar saga. Interestingly enough the saga also includes a shieldmaiden.

[Wilhelm]

Hi Eärniel,

Kullervo is a character in Kalevala whose situation closely parallels Turin's (accidental incestuous relationships, a sword that agrees to take it's wielder's life, the sister throwing herself into a gorge/river...)

Tryfing is certainly a possible source as well.