Elon Musk Says ‘Tolkien Is Turning in His Grave’ Over Depiction of Male Characters in ‘Rings of Power’

Elon Musk has added his voice to those who are upset about Amazon’s new “Lord of the Rings” prequel series, “The Rings of Power.” But, where some are complaining about the diverse casting of the show, the Tesla CEO says the franchise’s original author, J.R.R. Tolkien “is turning in his grave” over a seeming lack of masculinity in the male characters.

On Monday, Musk tweeted out a short thread, beginning with “Tolkien is turning in his grave,” without any kind of context. But, in a follow-up tweet, Musk clarified that he was not enjoying any of the male characters in the show.

“Almost every male character so far is a coward, a jerk or both,” he wrote. “Only Galadriel is brave, smart and nice.”

Galadriel is, of course, a woman. The character is a warrior elf — and the lead of the series — played by Welsh actress Morfydd Clark. Male characters of note include the elf politician Elrond (played by Robert Aramayo) and Durin (Owain Arthur), a dwarven prince.

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In a third tweet, Musk turned his attention back to his ongoing battle with Twitter, posting a screenshot of some replies to his tweet, and saying “90% of my comments are bots.” Musk is currently in the process of trying to back out of his $44 billion deal to buy the social media platform, largely citing the prevalence of spam or fake accounts, a.k.a. “bots,” on it.

In his original attempt to dissolve his buyout of the social media giant, Musk claimed in an SEC filing that Twitter didn’t provide sufficient data regarding the total number bots on the site. The filing noted that, “While Twitter has provided some information, that information has come with strings attached, use limitations or other artificial formatting features, which has rendered some of the information minimally useful to Mr. Musk and his advisors.”

In the photo Musk posted of his replies, only two accounts can be seen — though the second gets cut off at the bottom — but they appear to be spamming the post with the same replies, with a YouTube link attached.

Musk’s criticism of “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” comes as the show is also facing criticism from some fans for its diverse casting, including the first non-white elf character in any adaptation.

The first two episodes of the series are now streaming on Prime Video.

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