Re-Imagining High Fantasy

Come along as we reimagine some of the greatest high fantasy hits, in a low fantasy setting.

Cover Art: Sephiroth

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Middle Earth and Tolkien

Tolkienian Fantasy is possibly the most well-known variation in the classical High fantasy genre and it is his stories that are true to the many tropes associated with High Fantasy. The world within which his stories took place, called Middle Earth, was designed to be visually beautiful, filled with lush, dense forests, beautiful mountain ranges, and massive lakes. Middle earth is filled with many races and creatures of all kind, humanoids such as elves, dwarves, goblins, trolls, and many more inhabit this land, and magic is a powerful resource. For such a setting to be recreated in a low fantasy world, we need to match the glory of the castles and towns of Tolkien’s Middle Earth and our own towns. Iceland is a very good location for such recreation, with its inherent natural beauty. I’d choose a bored man, stuck in the cyclical capitalistic hell, to play the role of Bilbo Baggins. A man who is exhausted, but oddly comfortable with the idea of working 50 hours a week. He would be the one who must go on this fantastical adventure to discover himself, and find friendships and comradery in other travellers who share his path. The adventures by Tolkien have always been about the journey, rather than the end goal. They are about discovering aspects of ourselves that we previously did not know existed, and coming to accept those different aspects of our personality. They are also about discovering one’s strengths and weaknesses and accepting them. Tolkien does not write grand heroes with endless courage and wit. He writes about a common man who is put in a position where trying his best is the only way to survive.

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The Golden Compass

Based on Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy, The Golden Compass is a film that heavily leans into the fantastical and imaginative side of things. Set in an alternate version of the modern world, much of the film’s charm lies in its fine blend between magic and a fully realized steampunk setting. Elements such as intricate clockwork machinery, airships, and talking polar bears are commonplace; it is only natural that things would turn out drastically different in a low fantasy re-imagining of the show. To start, we need but only look at the Golden Compass itself, the highly sought-after mechanism that can supposedly answer any question. Instead of limitless knowledge held within a complex stopwatch-like apparatus, a traditional low fantasy approach would look at it as a pre-compiled, readily available source of information, catering to a specific and possibly dangerous field. It might not even be a compass, rather one would think up of it as a more familiar albeit mystical resource; be it someone’s long lost journal locked up in the darkest recesses of an ancient temple or be it a simple word of mouth legend whose importance has not yet been deciphered or recognized.

The film does not hold back when it comes to depicting logic-defying magic in the several battles it portrays. In a more down-to-earth interpretation, it is possible that the abundant number of talking familiars and steampunk-induced air locomotion may not have even existed. Magic would be kept to a minimum and in such a case; the journey to the north would have been considerably longer. Things would have played out differently and detours would be taken for each party to anticipate the flow of the other. In conclusion, the film would have a far more focused scope for the resolution of conflicts, and much like the source material; it may have laid a lot more emphasis on the criticism of the Catholic Church.

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I hope you enjoyed finding out how we would engage and change these stories to fit into our very own world, rather than some far of fantasy land. What other stories would you like to bring into our own world, from a distant fantasy setting? Let us know in the comments down below !!