This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
... I have to ask for input. The reason the D&D Dark Elves are so different from the Tolkienic ones is not simplification and misinterpretation... but rather because they're not derived from the Tolkienic Dark Elves at all, but rather the Celtic and Norse Dark Elves, which actually were dark, warped versions of Elves. My first impulse is to just delete that entry because it's patently inaccurate... but the information about it being reversed in World of Warcraft is both useful and correct, but would lack context or any reason to be in this entry without the erroneous lead-in. What should I do?
Honestly, we should get rid a large part of it, because the Dark Elves in Tolkien are specifically evil elves. The only one we meet is Eol the Dark Elf, and its made clear that calling someone a dark elf is the darkest of insults. GREY ELVES are the one who have never seen the light of the Silmarils due to never going to Valinor. Or something like that the whole distinction between High and Grey elves are pretty much retconed again and again as with everything Tolkien. -Nerem
Ununnilium: IMHO, the various D&D versions of elves really do seem to be a weird takeoff on the Sindar and Noldor and such. Is there any evidence that the Drow were, in fact, taken from another source? `.`
Nezumi: Eh. Largely, elves from D&D do seem to be takeoffs of Tolkien, but the thing is... the Norse basically considered Dark Elves and Dwarves the same thing. Making Dark Elves warped, pitch-black underground versions of their kin that, although not evil, lacked some of their supposed 'high' elements. This sounds enough like D&D Dark Elves that it seems more likely than not that the D&D ones result from taking this concept and adapting it to D&D/Tolkienic sensibilities.
Nerem: Actually, I'm pretty sure the D&D version was a hybridization, as the most prominent Dark Elf, Eol the Dark Elf, is pretty much a Drow by D&D terms. He wears all black, has a black sword, lives underground, and is evil. The inconsistent thing is that Dark Elf was originally a term, like Un said, for the Elves who never saw the light of Valinor. But then this changed to just be the Grey Elves and Dark Elf became a horrible insult implying evil and treachery and probably living underground too. Also... Mordor was never very fertile. It has places described as 'slightly fertile' but was overall a blasted, dying landscape that the movies actually adapted pretty well.
Ununnilium: Actually, Grey Elves and Dark Elves were different. Dark Elves were the Moriquendi, all of those who never went to Valinor. Grey Elves were the Sindar, a subgroup of those, who got to the shore but never passed across the sea. Also, Eol didn't have a black sword, he made a sword that he gave to someone which eventually became the Black Sword, and he became known as the Dark Elf because he lived in a shadowy forest, not underground. Basically, if "Dark Elf" is based on him, it's just as much a Theme Park Version. And Mordor had a fertile part and a blasted part; the blasted part was Gorgoroth, which we did, indeed, see in the movies.
ESchwenke: I'm sorry, I just commited a breach of ettiquette. I should have looked at the discussion page first to see that this was already a debated topic. Remove as you see fit.
Prfnoff: Removed the "dark elves" section:
- One particularly enduring example is dark elves. In Tolkien, "dark elves" were those who had never seen the light of Valinor, home of the not-quite-gods. While not quite so cosmically awesome as others of their race, they were nonetheless elves. Dungeons And Dragons took the term much more literally, with a race of actual dark-skinned elves, who lived underground, worshipped an evil spider-goddess, and hated the fair-skinned High Elves. The idea was then copied by other fantasy authors.
- However, the original idea for Dark Elves goes back to Tolkien's favorite original source: Germanic Mythology. Elves came in two varieties ljosalfar (light elves) and svartalfar (black or dark elves). "Svartalfar" was most likely another term for "duergar" (dwarves) who did in fact live in an underground world called Svartalfheim or Nidhavellir.
- World Of Warcraft plays with this: both the light-skinned Blood Elves and the dark-skinned Night Elves are somewhat morally ambiguous.
- While we're on the subject, 'World Of Warcraft' itself is the theme park version of Azeroth. As big as the game world is, it's not built to scale - it's a whole lot smaller than what the "proper" Azeroth should be. When thought about like that, this could be used to fill various plot holes generated by game mechanics - the patchwork maps, weird weather patterns, the ridiculously short travel times, etc.
Also removed from the genie/three wishes section:
- Subverted in I Dream Of Jeannie, where Major Nelson had unlimited wishes.
- I Dream Of Jeanniewas not a subversion, since he was given three wishes originally, and his third was to set Jeannie free. She afterwards clung to Major Nelson and gave him unlimited wishes out of her own free will, since centuries of doing nothing but serving men had left her unable to adjust to a life of true freedom. The fact that this troper knows all this is arguably sad.
From YKTTW:
Kizor: Unless this was the sleep deprivation talking, I think I've found a metratrope: The first Mordor had great amounts of farmland away from the famous devastated parts. In the original War Of The Worlds, the Martians aren't that much above Jules Verne technology, making Earth the only possible choice for their expansion. Nevertheless, a number of Dark Land knock-offs are dark enough to be completely inhospitable despite being inhabited, and it's not always clear why the aliens don't fly on to a planet of Smurfs of something. Good storytelling concepts are recycled without the context that makes them make sense.
Robert: That's related to Adaptation Decay, but not quite the same — what fanon does to canon on a bigger scale. The Theme Park Version perhaps? The Tropemaker has been boiled down to a few tropes, used without coherence, like a middle-Earth theme park. We can include the other instances of the imitators missing the point of the original work under that heading.
Kizor: Yes, I did make the discussion page and leave the trope page in order to see how it should be done. Also I was distracted by shiny things. And it worked! Hooray!
Tulling: "Caucasian" is a term that really makes little sense when referring to fictional non-human beings. Especially when contrasted with purple. I believe "fair-skinned" is more descriptive.
Ununnilium: Yes, but, see, I was trying to avoid using "fair-skinned" two times in three sentences. >>
BT The P: Albinoid? Pale? Crackeresque? Honkish?
Looney Toons: Melanin-deficient? Bleached? <grin>
Kizor: White?
Tulling: Paleface?
Seth: I like white, you know it is the common description for a white person. Political correctness sucks.
Kizor: Agreed. I'll recuse myself from the decision, though. My country's, what, 98% white?
Ununnilium: Would this go in here? There was a New Warriors comic a couple years back that had evil robot versions of famous scientists, and Robot Einstein made a big deal of how he invented... quantum physics. Except, of course, that Einstein had nothing to do with quantum physics, and, in fact, was against the entire idea; as he said, "God does not play dice with the universe." Indeed, modern physics is basically about trying to reconcile Einstein's theories of relativity with quantum physics.
Boobah: Not so fast, bucko. Einstein's experiments on the photoelectric effect proved that energy at least was quantized. He didn't particularly like all the implications, and didn't actually create any of what we now know as Quantum Physics, but he certainly pointed out that there was a there there.
Ununnilium: Oh, definitely. But this had him bragging about how he'd created it, making inventions based on it, et cetera, et cetera. Not once was anything else mentioned.
- And, of course, the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Walt Disney World is the Theme Park Version of Pirates Of The Caribbean.
Licky Lindsay: but real pirates came before either.. which is what I assume that sentence you're mocking was referring to.
Harpie Siren: Ahh... true, but, as stated in the Pirate artical, fictional pirates are The Theme Park Version of real pirates...
World Of Warcraft inverts this: The purple-skinned Night Elves are heroic protectors of nature, while the "white"-looking Blood Elves are corrupt and ruthless magic addicts.
Not exactly the night elf lleader desecreated and angered nature by palnting an evil tree in a selfish attempt to regain imoraltiy. A large portion of the mobs more so then blood elves with nagas'satyrs,harpies all being evil night elves.
Many blood elves are portrayed in a positive light like the farstriders and are magic addicts because they'll die if they don't get their fix.
Zarnks
That Other 1 Dude: Contested:
- Many of Tim Burton's films are The Theme Park Version of German Expressionist cinema, featuring intentionally drab colour schemes, identical character designs, and extremely jagged architecture, while at the same time pumping them with things that will sell to a modern audience, like Wangst, the occasional Crowd Song, and Happy Endings. Batman Returns even features a character named Max Schreck.
Man Without A Body, how can someone's style be considered the Theme Park Version of an entire genre especially when they aren't advertised as such? Wouldn't that be more of an influence? This really just seems more like a Take That! then anything else, especially since Tim Burton films often don't have Happy Ending or Wangst. In fact here's a better question: What in the hell is this article about anyway, and what defines something as "The Theme Park Version". It's really hard to tell when the main article is so anecdotal and the examples don't seem to have anything unifying characteristics.
thatother1dude: OK, what is the rationale for keeping this? There doesn't seem to be any solid definition, and most of the ones I could think of we already have tropes for. Also, no one answered that question I asked just above this comment (or had anything in this discussion since then), and I made that nearly two years ago.
Madrugada: Trying to winnow out the germ from all the natter, I get: "A complex concept, era, work, or situation is stripped down to only those aspects that are the most photogenic, exciting, fun, cool, or sexy. These are the only elements that are used in creating a new work. One of the clearest examples is the way Disneyland reduced the life and times of the Pirates of the Caribbean to rum and fighting."
Anonymous Mc Cartneyfan: Madrugada appears to have it. I tend to think of it as "Flanderization of a work as a whole." It seems clear enough...
Janitor: Declining cut. 174 wicks, and it is quite clear.
thatother1dude: "Flanderization of a work as a whole". No, it is not clear to put the terms of a trope in the terms of another trope who's definition is increasingly meaningless and who's use it continuously shoehorned. Having lots of wicks does not make something a valid trope, or at least not one that should have examples. I'm going to Take It To The Forums now, or else no one is going to read this for another two years.
Westrim; Y'know, instead of complaining and immediately trying to get it deleted, perhaps you should try getting the article improved and cleaned up first, either by yourself (though since you couldn't see the relatively clear definition, maybe not) or someone else. This is a well established article that you are trying to just delete with no attempts to improve it. Time passing without any talk on the discussion page means little as most stuff doesn't need much discussion, or is hashed out in the edit explanation.
