‘Magic: The Gathering,’ ‘Lord of the Rings’ crossover causes outrage over Aragorn artwork

wegotthiscovered.com:

Only less than 30 days remain until Magic The Gathering releases its Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle Earth set, and not everyone is happy with how the trading card game showcased the artwork of one of the book’s key characters.

Leading up to the set’s release, Magic The Gathering showcased some of the art of the franchise’s characters that will be included in this trading card collection, most notably a singular copy of the one ring with text writing in the Black Speech of Sauron. Recently, another character had its art showcased — Aragorn, son of Arathorn and king of Gondor.

"And Aragorn gave it a new name and called it Andúril, Flame of the West." pic.twitter.com/zi1JQBCHjb

This take on a Lord of the Rings king has people divided on the character’s appearance and this might be because there is a difference in how he looks on the cards, compared to how he’s adapted in the films. In the Lord of the Rings film trilogy, he was played by American actor, Viggo Mortensen. The character, as he appears on the cards, is Black.

In response to the racist hate this character art has received, one Twitter user pointed out that Aragorn being a person of color isn’t new. In the ’70s animated adaptation of the books, the character was also different from the live-action version many are familiar with. Yes, The Lord of the Rings was adapted before the Peter Jackson films. Shocking right? In the animated films, he was played by John Hurt and had a much darker complexion.

Cool art, a different take on our Ranger, obv given how much Viggo Mortensen owned the role in the Jackson Trilogy.Sure hope people aren't being weird in the comments about the 2nd adaption of Aragorn that also happens to be a person of colour, like in the late 70's