EPT
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Whether in a video game, a book, a television series, or a movie, narrative is of the utmost importance. No one wants to read, watch, or play through a lackluster story because the story is the reason we’re putting in the effort. However, when nerds really love something, they invest themselves in more than just a story. We delve into the backstory, the history, the lore of the story’s universe.
Lore has two functions. Firstly, it instills the world of a narrative with character and a sense of reality within the fiction. Secondly, it opens the universe to new narratives and theories through well-defined context. One of the best examples of the power of lore is J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. Tolkien wanted to tell more tales within Middle Earth, some of which became a book called Simarillion. Yet its story is almost entirely unreleated to the quest in Lord of the Rings. Frankly, it’s barely a story at all. Instead it is the history of Middle Earth’s First Age, a history that (to lore-obsessed nerds) is as compelling and engrossing as the opus whose context it provides. The references, the characters, the soul behind the world of Lord of the Rings clamours for further exposition and grounding which the Simarillion delivers. The realm of Middle Earth, as depicted in LotR, is so big and detailed that it is a fertile ground for new stories, whether they be in Tolkien’s Unfinished Tales, in Lord of the Rings Online (a free-to-play MMO), or in fanfiction. One of the reasons for the incredible popularity of Tolkien’s world is the space it has for the imagination of its fans, which derives from its complex lore. Lore is an essential element to any good fiction because of the flexibility, opportunity, and devotion it creates.
So I get really confused when creators fuck with it.
In a culture rife with remakes, sequels, and cross-media adaptations, lore is one of the first elements of an IP to get tossed out on its ass. These infractions upon a story’s contextual consistency range from minor to egregious, but either way they occur frequently and this drives me completely bonkers.
Let’s take a painful look at some examples of lore’s corruption in great works of fiction. (Be warned: spoilers ahead)
Most lore inconsistencies don’t rip cavernous holes in the fabric of the universe, but only open slightly off-putting plot holes. One such misstep comes from Avatar: The Legend of Korra, a series with a particularly complex and detailed world. In Avatar: The Last Airbender (the prequel to Korra), the viewers are shown that the zenith of firebending is the ability to wield lightning. When Iroh attempts to teach Zuko about lightning techniques, he remarks that lightning usage “requires peace of mind and complete absence of emotion,” traits which prevented Zuko from mastering the skill. This meant that Team Avatar’s enemies possessed a strength that became one of the greatest dangers to the Team’s mission. The lack of that power on the side of good was significant throughout the show and required special preparation to address. However, in The Legend of Korra, lightning generation is commonplace, a skill used by factory workers rather than masters of firebending. In fact, Mako demonstrates a particular talent for lightning, even though he is absurdly emotional and violently lacking in peace of mind. While this plot hole doesn’t condemn the whole IP, it diminishes the importance of the technique in the original series. This trivialization bothers me, especially considering the consistency of most of the universe.
The transistion from page to screen often results in lore (or storyline) changes that, while minor, can result in injury the overall narrative. Lord of the Rings suffered quite a few of these, though the scope of the story makes such cuts inevitable. These revisions included the omission of characters such as Tom Bombadil and Glorfindel, the Entmoot’s decision (and the scene which changed their minds), and the premature deaths of Saruman and Wormtongue, who had to be ousted from the Shire in the books. None of these particularly annoy me (I never liked those last couple RotK chapters), but the loss of those key moments does affect the perception of what is canon in LotR. Neither was A Song of Ice and Fire immune to such reworks as it became HBO’s Game of Thrones. Examples include the use of the chain in Blackwater Bay going unmentioned, both Shae and Jeyne Westerling differing immensely from their depictions in the novel (the latter being entirely replaced), and Sansa’s protector, Sir Dontos, only appearing in a cameo at the beginning of Season 2. While many of these changes are made due to time or budget constraints, some seem to me like unnecessary modifications that unfairly morph the perceptions of characters and events in these worlds.
On the other side of the coin are the reprehensible lore betrayals which are occasionally committed when a universe is expanded. Among the worst backstory blasphemies are those perpetrated in the Star Wars prequels. Though there are many ways in which Episodes I, II, and III violated Lucas’s original masterpieces, one colossal fuckup was the inclusion of Midi-chlorians, a symbiotic organism whose quanitity in their host measured its propensity for the Force. In Episode I, Obi-Wan revealed that Anakin possessed more Midi-chlorians than even Yoda (A RIDICULOUS ASSERTION), illustrating his potential strength as a Force wielder and revealing his identity as the Chosen One of an ancient Jedi prophecy. Yet the original series described the Force as a mystical energy field, a… force (of nature) that “…surrounds and penetrates us. [That] binds the galaxy together.” IT WAS NEVER SOMETHING IN YOUR BLOOD. The Force used to be a faith, an inexplicable phenomena, an element of a fantastical universe whose mystery made the Jedi order that much more awesome. It didn’t need explanation to be cool. Turning the Force into psychic syphilis shot all our established knowledge about it directly in the face. Not only does it require us to recontextualize our understanding of the force powers, it impels all future stories to choose between Lucas’ idiotic canon and “inauthenticity” within their own narratives. This. Is. Awful.
As bad as the prequel trilogy is, it was the plot of Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm and its blatant disregard for the extensively-detailed history in the original Starcraft that prompted me to write this post. Heart of the Swarm (allegedly) tells the Zerg portion of the Starcraft 2 story, specifically that of Sarah Kerrigan, the leader of the alien Swarm. However, to understand the magnitude of the offense committed against the Starcraft universe, we must revisit the backstory of the original game. The manual of Starcraft (1) describes the Zerg as a worm-like, parasitic species that latch onto other creatures, control them, and genetically “improve” them. In the beginning, a technologically-advanced race known as the Xel’Naga, who sought to foster a “perfect species,” asserted that the Zerg possessed a “purity of essence” which made them the perfect candidates for living perfection (moreso than their former proteges, the Protoss). To guide their growth, the Xel’Naga synthesized a hive mind for the species known as the Overmind. The Overmind shared the Xel’Naga’s desire of evolutionary perfection and pursued it by assimilating the creatures it encountered in the universe and folding their beneficial traits into the Swarm. The manual even enumerated from which planet each unit originated and illustrated how each species transformed into the demonic warriors of the Zerg Swarm. Though the Xel’Naga considered their goals achieved, they also fell prey to the Zerg as soon as the Overmind grew aware of its watchers and their vigil. I loved this story. It was awesome. The Zerg possessed an entirely alien nature and it made them interesting and a great rival to the other species, who aspired to their own strange ambitions.
Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm threw most of my beloved lore out the goddamn airlock. The Zerg which remained on the homeworld of Zerus were no longer the crawling parasites, but frilly, jungle-dwelling (Zerus was a volcanic world) clones of the beasts in your own army (which the Zerg acquired on outer damn planets). The “primal zerg,” as they appear in HotS, wouldn’t exist in the original game’s stellar canon. The original Zerg adapted and assimilated species over many years of evolution. They didn’t devour creatures’ “essence” then immediately grow new limbs and fangs. Furthermore, the Overmind was not a creation of a “rogue Xel’Naga bent on destruction,” as HotS claims, but the decision of a shortsighted, overly-scientific race to perfect a species that proceeded to murder them. Neither were the Xel’Naga creatures of god-like powers capable of universal annihilation or subjugation as the “prophecized horror” Amon is rumored to be. They were a species that played at godhood, but were absolutely trampled by their “children.” TWICE. If a whole race of Xel’Naga couldn’t hold off the primitive Protoss, there’s no possible way that one could dominate the Zerg and use them to dismantle the futuristic, psychic Protoss. Yet that’s what fucking happens (at least during the prophecy in Wings of Liberty, the Terran campaign). Starcraft 2 took a wonderful, comprehensible, unique lore and stabbed it directly in the back, invalidating their own great work. It crushed me to play it and watch the lore (and, consequently, the story) I loved die.
When past lore is invalidated by present ideas, all I can do as a fan is question why. I wish I could ask the writers what their vision was when they purposefully altered greatness. Did they find it insufficient? Did they want to change its direction? Were they fans of the original (as I was) at all or was working on the new installment simply another job? I just don’t understand what was wrong with the established lore and I don’t understand what is gained by the revisions, especially the ones that seem to actively harm the IP. Sacrificing lore is one of the biggest mistakes I feel can be made with a franchise since there’s such a huge benefit when a story also has an interesting history. I just wish that the forces in control felt the same way.
You can read this and other rants at the N3rd Dimension.
