Neil Gaiman Wades in on Rings Of Power Racist Backlash With a Tolkien History Lesson

Like many recent movies and TV shows, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power has come in for quite a bit of online backlash for some of its casting choices, mainly centering on the casting of Black actors in the series. The newest series based on the works of J.R.R. Tolkien features a race called the Harfoots, who are ancestors of Hobbits and include characters played by the likes of Lenny Henry, Markella Kavenagh, and Sara Zwangobani, among others. It is this casting that some have taken issue with, but as someone who has recently faced such comments about his Sandman series, author Neil Gaiman has hit back at those making comments about race by using Tolkien’s own text against them.

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The Rings of Power is not directly telling a story written by Tolkien but is instead adapting the history of Middle Earth and creating a new narrative around it. However, most of the characters are derived directly from Tolkien’s many appendices and additional histories of his world, and that includes the race of Harfoots. As a fan of Tolkien, Neil Gaiman has addressed online complaints about the casting of the likes of Henry by calling out online trolls as not having ready Tolkien’s description of the Harfoots. He said across two Twitter posts:

“Tolkien described the Harfoots as “browner of skin” than the other hobbits. So I think anyone grumbling is either racist or hasn’t read their Tolkien. Your mileage may vary. Tolkien didn’t say “The Harfoots spent longer in the sun than any of the other hobbits and were a lot more tanned.” He said they were “browner of skin.””

Related: The Rings of Power’s Galadriel Star Addresses Complaints About Character’s Action Scenes

Neil Gaiman Has Previously Fended Off Trolls Criticizing the Cast of The Sandman

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The Rings of Power is just the latest in a long line of TV shows to be review bombed and criticized for their casting choices regarding Black, Asian or other actors of minority race, as well as the gender-swapping of roles from male to female. Neil Gaiman has seen this kind of online attack more than most with the recent release of Netflix’s The Sandman, which faced many comments around a Black actress playing Death and a woman playing Lucifer.

Gaiman previously defended the casting in the show, hitting back at those who decided to share their belief that the changes were wrong and should not be allowed. The author said of his inability to just ignore this type of trolling:

“I know the rule is you’re meant to ignore the trolls and not feed the trolls. But I would look at people sounding off on Sandman who were obviously not Sandman fans. What I would watch would be 60,000 Sandman fans going, ‘Of course you’re doing it this way. Of course you have a non-binary Desire, Desire was always non-binary, that’s brilliant casting.’ Or ‘Gwendoline as Lucifer, what amazing casting.’ And then you’d get five or six people trying to make a lot of fuss who never read Sandman in the first place. And I mostly decided I was done with it. Occasionally I do feel like I’m taking an enormous sledgehammer to squash the tiniest ants, and you really shouldn’t,” he said. “But then again, they can be really irritating sometimes, and I’m proud of what we made.”

The Sandman is currently available on Netflix, while The Rings of Power is premiering new episodes each week on Amazon Prime Video.

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