Okay so explanation, in the adventure module Vecna: Eve of ruin it gives a picture of Vecna before he became a lich, and he is some Draco Malfoy looking guy. However, in lore he was a member of a people known as the Flan who are described as having "bronze-colored complexion, varying from a light copper shade to a deep brown hue. Eyes are typically dark brown, black, brown, or amber. Their wavy or curly hair is usually black, brown-black, dark brown, or brown."
Also, his mother, named Mazell, was described as "Mazell was a slender, mature woman with bronze skin, black hair, dark eyes, and tattoos on her face, neck, arms, and chest."
So, it's likely that Vecna would have some of these traits as well and not be so pasty and blonde. The only way I can see him being white would be if he was mixed raced which is possible, but it should be mentioned his mother lived in a Flan city so it's unlikely.
But anyways I don't actually think this was purposeful by the writers or the artist, I think they just didn't know the lore for Vecna and just made him look like that because they felt like it.
And he looks cool. Aragorn's race isn't even important to his character, so no harm in the race swap. It's cool to see character I love re-imagined in a different light.
Anyone who makes a deal of it is weird. You, are weird for making any kind of deal about this.
Genetically the Numenoereans were basically humanity until 2-3 thousand years prior. You'd have to make every human black for Aragorn being the pinnacle of Numenor blood to make any sense.
It doesn't make sense given how the rest of the world is structured ethnically. There's both Rhun and Harad, which both are basically exclusively PoC. It doesn't really matter much, but it doesn't make any sense with any consistent world building for the heir to a bloodline-based monarchy (that stayed pretty isolated genetically to the point where Aragorn lives like, 4 times the length of a 'normal' human due to his extremely undiluted bloodline) to be black unless the majority of middle earth is primarily black too. And middle earth is basically the fantasy series with the most reliance on consistent world building.
However, I do get you that it's not a huge deal. But there's not a way that it makes sense with the worldbuilding, and the worldbuilding here is very intentional and it's one of the biggest selling points of the series, so that being treated as disposable or changeable is going to ruffle some feathers in a way that isn't "I don't like seeing black people in fantasy".
Giving Aragorn a BMW 750i with cruise control and heated seats wouldn't be important to his character, but still fucks with the story because it contradicts the world.
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u/TieberiusVoidWalker Karsus Expert Nov 08 '24
Okay so explanation, in the adventure module Vecna: Eve of ruin it gives a picture of Vecna before he became a lich, and he is some Draco Malfoy looking guy. However, in lore he was a member of a people known as the Flan who are described as having "bronze-colored complexion, varying from a light copper shade to a deep brown hue. Eyes are typically dark brown, black, brown, or amber. Their wavy or curly hair is usually black, brown-black, dark brown, or brown."
Also, his mother, named Mazell, was described as "Mazell was a slender, mature woman with bronze skin, black hair, dark eyes, and tattoos on her face, neck, arms, and chest."
So, it's likely that Vecna would have some of these traits as well and not be so pasty and blonde. The only way I can see him being white would be if he was mixed raced which is possible, but it should be mentioned his mother lived in a Flan city so it's unlikely.
But anyways I don't actually think this was purposeful by the writers or the artist, I think they just didn't know the lore for Vecna and just made him look like that because they felt like it.