Because Christopher Tolkien, at 93, has retired from his role as the (very, very strict) gatekeeper of J R R Tolkien’s literary estate.
I’m torn on this, because Christopher has been notoriously restrictive of any use of his father’s stories, to the point of their being choked off to just a few adaptations over the 4+ decades since his father’s death in 1973. Indeed, only 1960s contracts for movie rights, bandied about the legalsphere for years, allowed for the Peter Jackson movies to be created, for example — movies which Christopher apparently despised.
And that’s where the “torn” comes in, for while the Tolkien Estate has been so strict, it’s also thus prevented dilution of the property through a variety of bad adaptations.
It’s a dilemma — the value of the literary estate, indeed even the public knowledge and appreciation of the estate, depends to a large degree on how that estate can be further presented to new generations. But to do so runs the risk of creating something that devalues the property.
On the other hand, great works can overcome bad adaptations. There have been a lot of bad Shakespeare stage productions, and movies and TV adaptations, but the Bard lives on. More proximately, decades of third-rate movie and TV adaptations of Marvel’s works didn’t destroy the comics, and also didn’t prevent a set of highly successful movies being made of them.
Indeed, one could argue quite successfully that Peter Jackson’s LotR and even his Hobbit trilogy have reintroduced JRRT’s works to people who would never otherwise have heard of them.
Christopher Tolkien has done a remarkable job in curating and fleshing out his father’s writings, almost to a fault. If his passing the torch means that the world his father can be created can be explored by more creators, I think it worth the risk.
In historic move, Christopher Tolkien resigns as director of Tolkien Estate
It turns out a “Lord of the Rings” TV series isn’t the biggest Tolkien news of the week or the month or the year. Christopher Tolkien, son and literary heir of J.R.R. Tolkien, res…
The issue arises for any form of teaching. You get a nice, simplistic, approachable explanation or presentation of content, it's probably oversimplified and wrong.