On TES elves

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TheMinttu's avatar
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Alright can I just say how much I love the elves in the Elder Scrolls

J.R.R. Tolkien popularized elves as these otherworldly, divinely beautiful creatures which sorta established the standard for the race in all modern fantasy that came after. They're nearly immortal, distant, and to me, plain boring. Then around comes Morrowind, the game that really made me fall in love with TES, its world and its lore!! The elves of TES have a long history, and each subrace has their own cultural identity. The elves no longer just sit in their Crystal ivory towers (well I guess some of them do) and sing to their trees or whatever - they're flawed, complicated PEOPLE, and extremely proud of who they are. The haughty Altmer, the hostile Dunmer from the Ashlands, the cannibalistic Bosmer, the late Dwemer and their scientific achievements…. when was the last time any elves modeled after Tolkien's work had this much cultural diversity??

I love the fact that Bethesda actually created some of the most interesting, unusual cultures in the series for them. I love reading about them. I love their history. I love their aesthetics, which are exotic and uniquely beautiful. Just the amount of THOUGHT that has gone into creating the finer details of their cultures is incredible to me and has inspired me for the past decade.

tl;dr: hnnnngh TES elves
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GeminiBrain's avatar
well there is the silmarillion which tells quite a lot about the tolkien elves etc., a really complicated book though to read, but it's mindblowing and tragic.
I have to agree that they are kinda boring in lotr but when I read the silmarillion I changed my mind, there is quite a lot 
about them actually!