Andy Serkis Ignores Tolkien's Diversity For 'All Whites' Movie

Andy Serkis

By the time you read this post you'll probably have seen or heard that people around the world asked Andy Serkis why he's not casting any actors of color for The Hunt for Gollum. Serkis dismissed these points of view as "political correctness", completely ignoring the fact that J.R.R. Tolkien described Middle-earth's peoples as very diverse in ethnicity and skin color. And that includes the Shire hobbits, most of whom were brown-skinned.

Xenite.Org Gets A YouTube Channel

After years of people asking me if I'll ever create a YouTube channel (for Tolkien and Middle-earth fans), I've decided to experiment with an AI-generated podcast.

This is a risky step but the reason why I don't just create videos completely by myself is that I'm too busy to spend much time on such projects.

On the other hand, I've noticed more than a few YouTube videos that appear to mirror many of my articles very closely.

They Want J.R.R. Tolkien To Be A Fascist

J.R.R. Tolkien opposed fascism

It's bad enough that white supremacists have hijacked J.R.R. Tolkien's legacy and perverted it into an emblem of their sick ideology. But now social media influencers have taken up the cause of labeling J.R.R. Tolkien as a fascist. He was neither a white supremacist nor a fascist.

SF-Fandom Forums Are Now Mobile-friendly

If it has been a while since you last visited the SF-Fandom forums, you may want to know we're now mobile-friendly. While I still prefer to browse the forums from a desktop computer, it's now much easier to login and post from a mobile phone. No more pinching and zooming required.

Chinese Dramas Have Been On Our Minds

If you're not familiar with #cdramas, be prepared to discover a whole new dimension to fantasy entertainment. If, on the other hand, like millions of fans around the world, Chinese Dramas are old news to you, that's okay. SF-Fandom is no stranger to the #cdrama phenomenon. So let me share some of the passion with you.

Stargate Has Been On Our Minds

Stargate article on SF-Fandom.Com

One of the greatest shows of science fiction television in the past few decades was Stargate SG-1. The show took audiences to new worlds but kept them grounded in the present day, on Earth as we know it, and it explored themes that are still relevant 25 years later. The loyal fanbase has been begging for a revival, reboot, continuation, or spinoff for many years.

Innovating New Ideas for Science Fiction Writers

Dr. Tony McCaffrey

After you've watched enough scifi movies and TV shows, or read enough books, you reach a point where you can name the plot point in 3 guesses or fewer. There's something to be said for a good, old-fashioned time travel story but - come on - how many good, old-fashioned stories do we need? Dr. Tony McCaffrey has set out to spur innovation among science fiction writers, and SF-Fandom is proud to help.

SF-Fandom Turns 20 Years Old This Month

SF-Fandom is 20 years old.

Let the joyous news be spread! SF-Fandom at last is ... alive and well. After 20 years of fan discussions and debates about everything under the sun, the SF-Fandom Science Fiction and Fantasy Forum Communities are going strong. But you knew that already because we recently updated the site.

It's not easy to run a Web forum. There are so many technical details you must keep up with in the background. Every time you feel like you've caught up on the hosting, software updates, other esoteric things something changes on the Web. And then you have to start all over again.

New Look and Content for SF-Worlds

SF-Worlds.Com as it looks in 2021.

Before there was SF-Fandom.Com there was SF-Worlds.Com. The first "sister site" to Xenite.Org, SF-Worlds began as a resource for entertainment news. In the 1990s the original Netscape company created the RSS format. RSS was short for "Rich Site Summary", although in the years since people have redefined it to mean "really simple syndication". The RSS format was used by many sites to publish news stories for distribution on other sites.

SF-Worlds published RSS widgets with entertainment news of interest to science fiction fans. Unfortunately, the dot-com meltdown of the year 2000 drove many experimental Internet companies out of business. The RSS feeds stopped working and we had to find something else to do with the site. Over the years, it became a repository for old articles and ideas that - for whatever reason - didn't work on other sites. But SF-Worlds has always had a loyal following.

SF-Fandom Has a New Look

SF-Fandom's Home Page, 2021

2021 marks the 20th year that SF-Fandom has been online. We launched the domain in 2001 to create a home for the old Xenite.Org science fiction and fantasy forums. We expanded the number of forums, changed software, and recruited a team of moderators to help us keep things moving smoothly.

Of course, there have been ups and downs. Many forum sections have come and gone, but through the years SF-Fandom has always been there for people who want to talk about their favorite SF topics in safe, non-toxic discussion groups.

We've lost a few people along the way, including Dixie Harrison - co-founder of SF-Fandom - and Paul Goode, an amazing Andre Norton fan who always had kind words for everyone.

SF Fandom Web Forums Have Moved

We have upgraded our Web forums and moved them to their own subdomain.

You can now visit the SF-Fandom Forums at this location:

https://forums.sf-fandom.com/

Middle-earth News: Christopher Tolkien Resigned from Tolkien Estate, and More

Christopher Tolkien submitted his resignation as a director for the Tolkien Estate (established 2012) effective August 29. The news only came to light for the vast majority of us in the past 1-2 days. Tolkien Brasil was the first Website to publish the story, although the Middle-earth Blog at Xenite.Org is being credited by many sites with being the first. Well, we were the first English language blog to carry the news. I think the Tolkien Brasil folks may have learned about the news from a Reddit discussion, but I didn't think to check with them.

You Can Help Finance an Independent SciFi Film - And You Should

Benjamin Capps is an actor and independent film producer who is looking for help in financing his next project.  He needs to raise about $10,000 by the end of April.  The film is called "Civet" and it's a "sci-fi horror movie", according to Capps.  He has already produced a 9-minute film called "It Grows Dark" (see below) that has earned him some attention, so it's not like I'm suggesting you give a complete unknown producer a shot.

Happy Birthday to Xenite.org

It has been just a little over 20 years since I launched the Xenite.Org Network. I'd like to say "how time flies when you're having fun" but, damn, it feels like it's been twenty years since it all began. Technically, it has been longer. I can trace my "Web"-like experience back to the first days I uploaded files for sharing on CompuServe. And, in fact, it was CompuServe where I published my first Website in 1996. But Xenite.Org is where things really started happening and I hope people will appreciate the long retrospective article I wrote titled "20 Years of Science Fiction and Fantasy: The Many Faces of Xenite.Org". While it runs to 6,000 words, the 10th Anniversary special feature included many articles and took about half a day to get through. It was worth it.

Gaming and Fantasy Movies on the Xenite.Org Network

I love going to the movies when the movies are good to go to.  Of course, until you see the movie you have no idea of whether you'll enjoy it.  This weekend the critics seem to have come out in force against "Independence Day: Resurgence" and I have to ask what those people have been smoking (to borrow a line from "Avatar").  Having now seen this movie I can say unequivocably that I love it.  What is everyone's beef with it?  Does Will Smith really have to be in the flick?   Absolutely not.  Life goes on without your favorite actors and heroes in the real world.  It can do the same thing in fictional worlds.  And I shared a lot of my good positive vibes about "Independence Day: Resurgence" at A1 Movie Reviews.  I encourage you to check it out.

Captain America and Elrond Too

You can never go wrong with a superhero movie, except when you go wrong with a superhero movie.  Until Jon Favreau convinced me a man could fly in an iron suit I had little hope that anyone in the film-making industry would take the superhero genre seriously.  I enjoyed the first "Fantastic Four" movie but not everyone else did.  "Iron Man" was the first universally hailed film from superheroland.

This year's highly disappointing "Batman vs. Superman" movie left me wondering if we had not seen the best that Hollywood could produce in the superhero genre.  But "Captain America: Civil War" has restored my faith in the Marvel Studios, Disney, and superhero movie makers.  The DC universe is simply cursed with really bad choices for directors and screen writers (much like Star Wars cannot shake Lawrence Kasdan from its shoe).

Star Wars: The Adjusted Numbers

Yes, yes, yes. We can all agree that "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" has broken all box office records and stands firmly atop the franchise in terms of first-run (raw) box office dollars. Yay for Force Awakens!

But let's get serious here.  People who trash "The Phantom Menace" continue to live in some sort of weird fantasy dream state because they not only say "Phantom Menace" was bad, they claim "The Empire Strikes Back" was good.  Well, if it was so good, why didn't anyone want to watch it at the theater?

More Star Wars Bloggery as Force Awakens Fever Takes Hold of the Web

It's really hard to NOT get swept up in "Star Wars Fever". I've already purchased tickets for Friday and we're looking forward to having a great time at the cinema.  But as a blogger and as a science fiction fan I could not resist the temptation to write as much about Star Wars this week as I could squeeze in time for (and that wasn't much).  In between client projects and other work I managed to create the new Star Wars Movies section on Xenite.Org but I had already started that earlier this year.  I wanted something fresh, unplanned, and spontaneous.  So last night I came up with a couple of ideas and it didn't take very long to write them.

Star Wars from Flash Gordon to Fan Films

Star Wars is upon us and we are all excited to be seeing the new Disney movie.  But after dragging my feet for many years I have decided to set the record straight on a few Star Warsian things.  I am sick and tired of seeing every media Website drag "The Phantom Menace" through the mud as if it is a bad movie.  The truth is that "The Phantom Menace" is the most popular of all the Star Wars films, but apparently the people who like to trash-talk and bad-movies have cowed all the real fans into silence.  So we have added a new Star Wars movies section to Xenite.Org's Movies Portal and we pull no punches in deflating the nonsense that has been circulating around which movies are best and most popular.

November 2015 Science Fiction and Fantasy Stuff

If you have not dropped by the SF Fandom forums in the last week or two, you might want to check out this discussion on Tolkien's views on Nazism, Socialism, and Communism. I thought it was an interesting question from user badlands and I took a stab at explaining what I think Tolkien might have thought of these political ideologies. In fact, I could not rule out any possible connection to Tolkien's fiction. What do you think? Might Morgoth and Sauron have represented something more than just "dark lords"?