Minotaurs on the Dawn Treader doesn't make sense? Is that the complaint I'm hearing?
Narnia is a fantasy series. It doesn't have to make sense all the time. If we wanted something completely realistic we woundn't need books or movies we could just live our own lives in the real world. Part of the magic of the books is that it isn't the real world. If we analyzed the books as closely as the movies and if we hadn't heard them when we still had child-like imaginations I'm quite sure we would be able to poke many holes in the original stories as well.
Off the Top of my head let's see:
Animals don't talk
Mice don't grow to be 2 ft.
If they did they still wouldn't make good warriors
A star can't have a daughter
kids winning a war against trained soldiers is not likely
water can't turn people to gold
Wardrobes/ Pictures/ Random Pools ect. do not lead to magical worlds
Boys can't turn into dragons
The list could go on. Fantasy and too much logic just don't mix.

I love Narnia, I think it's fantastic. However, I think that if you apply too much logic to it you inevitably kill much of its magic. It's not meant to be taken so seriously in a logical sense. Of course the spiritual aspect of it is dead serious but that's an entirely different matter.

Personally, I think in the PC book it's wrong for Caspian to judge creatures by the actions of their ancestors considering he is Telmarine royalty which is best known among Narnians for tyranny. Forgiveness and reconciliation are Christian concepts which I am glad the film-makers picked up on and added in. I am glad to see minotaurs and other Narnian creatures on the DT as it is the best way to show that Narnia is peaceful again and has found unity as a country without actually going to Narnia.

As for minotaurs having hooves and thus not having sea legs, I personally don't see why that argument is valid. Obviously, the Minotaurs wear clothes in the Narnia movies. It's completely possible they may wear boots of some sort, if need be. People don't naturally have good traction it's what they put on their feet that has the traction, I imagine the same could be done for minotaurs.

p.s. sorry for writing a book

Fantasy and too much logic just don't mix.

I beg to differ, at least in the case of the Chronicles of Narnia fantasy. Fantasy has it's on "set of rules". Yes, things can happen in the books that obviously could never happen in real life (Talking animals, wardrobes leading to new worlds, a star having a daughter, etc), but they fit in with the fantasy "rules", like of course animals can't really talk, but in the world of Narnia, they can. Lewis is writing the books, so he makes up the rules and we go along with them.

The only thing on your list that I thought was valid was the idea of kids fighting in wars and winning (well, of course they had Aslan to help). Unless they had some kind of magical powers, Lewis writes this and we still think "well, that doesn't make sense, even though Lewis said so."

Sooo to get to my point, Lewis never said that Minotaurs would be on the Dawn Treader, and probably because we wouldn't think it made sense, unless he was REALLY good at explaning it.

The main reason why I don't think the minotaurs should go on the DT is becuase it's really unpractical. They're large animals, they take up a lot of room, they probably eat a LOT, their *ahem* "waste" would have to be dealt with. I'm also going to make a guess that they probably wouldn't like to be cooped up in small spaces for a long time, so being stuck in a ship might not be ideal for them.

If the film makers do have them on board, the only way I would be okay with it is if they have a very good argument for why, and how. And if they don't explain it, I'm sure more then a few people will be wondering how that would work out. I'm not going to die or have a fit if they are on the Dawn Treader, and I doubt that would be the biggest worry I have for the movie. I'll merely be a bit "oh well".

So yeah. Hope this post wasn't TOO confusing

You are totally justified Bookwyrm, minotaurs are always evil in Lewis's true vision of Narnia.

"Alsan's creatures by the Stone Table include an assorted mix of humans, animals, and mythological creatures; among these last are four centaurs and "a bull with the head of a man". A few pages later we read of other creatures who are also a mix of animal and human, but they fight on the witch's side.

When creatures appear whose bodies are a mix of half animal, half human, how does Lewis decide whether they will serve good or evil? Throughout the Chronicles, creatures with a human head and animal body are good; creatures with a human body and animal head are bad.

This symbolically represents the standard Renaissance concept of reason over passion, emphasized so repeatedly by Milton in Paradise Lost -that in the great chain of being, reason should always be elevated over passion and control it.

Some of the witch's creatures... are minotaurs, with human bodies and bull heads, symbolizing their perverse commitment to passion over reason; thus they join the side of evil."

That's from The Keys to the Chronicles by Professor Marvin D. Hinten

Adamson thought "minotaurs are cool" so he put them into the movie with absolutly no regard to the moral, literary, and scholarly traditions that Lewis loved and wanted to pass on to children!!!

NL101, if I was pulling from weird or obscure sources that Lewis didn't know about you might have a point. But I am referencing all the same sources that Lewis drew upon (Classical Pagan, Christian, Islamic, Persian, Medieval Syncretism etc.). Unlike Tolkien who deliberately camouflaged his sources, Lewis flaunted them. He even had Father Christmas (Santa to Americans ) in his books for goodness sakes.

I will grant you that Lewis himself didn't have Minotaurs on the Dawn Treader, but other than Reepicheep he doesn't include any other Native Narnians. So I don't see that as a good enough reason to exclude Minotaurs from an adaptation that would of course want to include Narnians on a Narnian vessel.

Great points Wolfloversk. Love the "Minotaur Shoes" .

Booky, I'm not ignoring the quotes. I think you are stretching them to make them say something that isn't even implied, as we KNOW (for a fact) that many beings in the WW's army joined Caspian in the fight to liberate Narnia from Miraz. So when the quote says "that sort", it is referencing directly the Demonic Spirits and Cursed Beings that are indeed intrinsically evil.

And as Wolfy points out, many Pagan mythic creatures took on more sinister connotations in the newer monotheist religions (including Fauns and Satyrs). But the Bull-headed demigod existed long before even Classical Paganism and wasn't always considered evil in pre-Classical Paganism.

AIOM, I appreciate that you're defending the idea of Minotaurs on the Dawn Treader , but Logic isn't the problem. Lewis was perfectly content to include Logic in his Fantasy stories, it was Scientific Reductionism he took issue with. And I too believe Reductionism has no place in a Fantasy story.

So it's fine for those who enjoy thinking of Rational Explanations for the improbable to postulate how a Minotaur could be a seafarer (shoes , and the physics of two legged "bulky" hoofed creatures balancing ), but its not a necessity for an Imaginative tale. Which, I believe, is the actual point you were trying to make.

T4S, Professor Hintern makes a well reasoned argument for Minotaurs being intrinsically evil in Lewis's conception, and I can't dismiss it out of hand. But it is in the end only his assertion that Lewis would have conceived of Minotaurs as only being evil. Lewis didn't just study Classical Pagan, Medieval, and Renaissance thought (though that was his main focus). He was WELL aware of pre-Classical Pagan thought in which Animal headed beings were NOT considered evil.

And too boot, Lewis was a Sensualist who loved his tobacco and his ale. He cannot be easily be put in a box as Prof Hintern attempts to do. Yes, Lewis no doubt thought that Reason should rule Passion (as did Enlightenment thinkers), yet he was always dubious that Reason should suppress Passion, and the Imagination.

GB

well, it's not like we can change things now.
"What's done is done." -Asaln, LWW movie

the movie has been filmed and there are minotuars on the ship. so we will have to see how it comes out!

Whew, hot topic.

Argument 1: Minotaurs are inherently evil.

Maybe. Lewis drew a lot from mythology and the one story I've read about a minotaur the minotaur wasn't EVIL so much as just really angry. I think I would be too if I was stuck in a labyrinth and all of these heroes kept coming to kill me.
And Lewis liked to make some of his creatures good that weren't necessarily good in the original mythology. I was always rather surprised that satyrs were good (except the one in LB) as they're not the highest on the moral list in my humble opinion.
As far as whether or not Lewis would have said minotaurs were inherently evil (like a wer-wolf or hag) as opposed to sometimes evil (like satyrs, dwarfs, and spirits of trees), I don't think it's 100% definitive.
I PERSONALLY feel that minotaurs should never have been "good guys" in PC and they're there solely because it was a favorite creature design from LWW. There were soooo many far more interesting mythological creatures they could have used instead.
But for the sake of this argument, they're already in PC, they might as well be in VDT.

Argument 2: Reepicheep was the only non-human aboard the ship

Kind of surprised this argument isn't coming up more in this thread but maybe that's because we're only talking minotaurs and not fauns, dwarfs, satyrs, etc.
Personally I think this is the most legit argument against the presence of minotaurs as it's the most clear departure from the book.
However, perhaps the reason it's not coming up as much is because people have the same opinion as me and have no problem whatsoever with other mythical creatures being aboard the ship.

Argument 3: As minotaurs have hooves they become a liability aboard the ship as they'd have no traction on wet wood.

Yeah... Well.... I actually agree 100% with this argument. Storms aside (because NOBODY has traction aboard a ship during a storm), I just cannot picture a hooved creature walking around on a wet slippery MOVING wooden surface without sliding all over the place. (And if you've never been aboard a ship before, the surface is almost ALWAYS wet.)
However, Lewis put Mr. Tumnus on the Splendor Hyaline in The Horse and His Boy. Tiny goat-like hooves would have even less surface to provide friction than horse hooves. So as far as I'm concerned, in Lewis's world, hooved creatures can be on boats.

Argument 4: Minotaurs would be resource hogs (or cows )

Somebody out their has met real minotaurs and knows how much resources they would use up? Or is this based on Lewis's detailed analysis of how much a centaur eats with its two stomachs and all that? Ok, ok, I suppose that if minotaurs were real, they would very likely use more resources than a human. BUT in this case, there would be a tradeoff as minotaurs were made to be far stronger than humans (based on Asterius single-handedly holding up the gate in PC) and would make up for it in rowing power, warrior power, etc etc. There are only 2 minotaurs in the movie (which isn't many) and they'd probably replace maybe 4-6 men. This is not a valid argument imho.

So my conclusion is that if I had my way, minotaurs would never have been in PC in the first place. But they were and there's nothing I can do to change that, and if they're going to put several mythical creatures aboard the Dawn Treader anyways, I've got no real problem with minotaurs being part of the crew. Seriously I think my reaction when I found out was something along the lines of "oh, ok."

I'd also like to make a final admin note here. As this topic is going round and round and round with pretty much the same arguments from both sides and from the same people, I'm maybe starting to detect maybe some mild irritation starting to build? Please remember to keep the respect rule in mind when you're debating and it's not worth getting upset over. People have a right to their opinions whether or not you agree with it.

Fantasia Kitty, I couldn't be having any more fun with this debate . It's quite entertaining to build up a detailed case for an issue that isn't all that important in the bigger scheme of things. It's a pleasant departure from debating serious overly-dramatic issues on other forums .

In the end, apparently a Minotaur is on board the ship in the film. So it doesn't make a lot of difference either way what we think about it I guess. But I can only hope that its presence doesn't spoil anyone's enjoyment of the film .

GB

Yes, there was something that was bothering me when i first found this out and this morning I was trying to think of what it was. Thanks to Fantasia Kitty it was the Arguement #2.
I loved that reepicheep would be the only non-human aboard the DT. I do hope he has more screen time and not let a minotaur be Caspian's top.

Excellent points have been made on all sides, but the questions of how much do Minotaurs eat and would they be able to balance can be argued until the cows come home without really resolving anything because none of us actually knows a Minotaur (at least, I sure hope not ), and so we will probably never know the answers to those questions. As for whether or not Minotaurs are evil, I think that if they are not evil, than there should have been good Minotaurs in LWW. There were not, and so I don't think there should have been any in PC.
However, I don't think any of those arguments really matter. My only question is why are they on the voyage in the first place? If this were real life, what purpose would a Minotaur have on the ship other than just being there to look cool? Wait, that's it. There are Minotaurs on the ship because they look cool. And that's why Fauns and Satyrs are on the ship, because they look cool. At least the Dwarfs would actually be useful on the voyage as smithies (although I always thought fire was a ship's worst enemy and so having a bunch of smithies on the ship doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me). Because they look cool is not a good reason to have any of the creatures on the ship. Coolness should not be a factor. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why I object to Minotaurs aboard the Dawn Treader. [excessive use of smilies permitted in this message to lighten the mood and let the Watchful Admin know that there is no friction present here (I hardly ever use smilies )]

I wonder that they might be there because of a battle sequence.

Of course there's going to be unneeded battle sequences. That's a given.

^We don't know that for sure yet, and we won't until the movie is out.

Oh, there will most likely be a battle sequence somewhere, although on what scale we have no idea. It'd be hard to imagine a fantasy movie without a battle. A battle may or may not be necessary (we won't know until we are talking about it after we see it). But I had meant my post as more of a response to Daughter of the King. The Minotaurs probably are there mostly just to be cool , but they'll surely have a purpose of some kind--like the Minotaur who held up the gate in Prince Caspian the Movie. I imagine they're also in VODT because they'll be fighting in a battle sequence.

(please parden the slight deviation from the topic in the last half of post)

The enemy of my enemy is not my friend! Now I wonder why in PC there weren't some Minotaurs fighting against the Narnians??!?!? Our culture is obsessed with inherently evil creatures being good... Vampires, Minotaurs same thing, they're all evil inherently.

I mean this could get as warped/crazy and Pirates of the Carribian. BTW big fan of pirates just don't want Narnia to be that way. Were one second your enemy is your friend and then your enemy again.

I can see the ending of LB going like this. Tirian, Eustace, and Jill with the help of the evil dwarfs bring back Jadis to help destroy Tash, Jadis and Tirian fall in love and they all go into the lala land because we're all good none of us are evil we're all inherently good we can't help that we got brain washed

Anyone care to take bets on the likelihood people will be riding Jewel in LB?

Oh that part in the LB comes after Jadis is captured by the Telmariens and Tirian (prince charming) comes and rescues Jadis riding on the back of Jewel.

And all of this is the fault of deviating from the book in the first place Minotaurs today will equal Jadis Tirian tomorrow, and I say do we really want that?!?!?? Do you really want that?

Minotaurs AREN'T inherently evil . Don't get me started on that again .

GB