>>122102
I disagree with the orcs part. In Frieren's world demons are a kind of monster that developed on its own according to regular evolutionary principles by specializing on aggressive mimicry and magic, meanwhile Middle Earth's orcs truly are the result of evil corruption from fallen higher beings. The former is only a mockery as much as a flytrap mocks flowers.
I'd like to point out as well that there is no clerical school of magic in Tolkien or even a priesthood, much less a profession of academic sorcerers, those are taken from elsewhere. Clerics in particular are a super D&D thing, the way they conduct miracles and relate to their god is actually kinda weird, especially here where they're chosen at random and have to make sense of it. The two stories share the gradual disappearance of elves too but the relationship there is rather superificial, in Frieren they're simply dying off due to autism and war while in Tolkien there's some fundamental astral destiny stuff going on with the fëa and hröa and other things that elude me, as well as in Frieren magical powers among men increasing as time goes on running contrary to what happens in Middle Earth.
I think Tolkien's influence on Frieren is exaggerated, perhaps because of how sincere the two are. It still lines up with Dragon Quest and Lodoss far more closely, both ultimately stemming from D&D. Same as Dungeon Meshi and Goblin Slayer.
>>122103
I'd argue the maou of current otaku media is more of an occupation than a true force of evil or antichrist figure like a dark lord proper is. More of a commander, king, or emperor, formally recognized as such by everyone around them.
So you find Helck starting off with a tournament to decide who the new maou will be, an office that in its setting implies no evil, it's simply the king of the inhumans. In Hataraku Maou or lv1 Maou after they've stopped being regnant they slide away to pass their time doing something else entirely. Sauron would never do that, because he's THE DARK LORD and his fallen nature defines him, he's truly the devil with Christian temptation and all, whereas such evil is often missing from Jap characters bearing the title. A lot of the time there's a catch to it which makes it differ from a DL, maybe it was a matter of circumstance, there was a misunderstanding, they were never evil to begin with, akshually it's the humans that are evil, or it's simply a joke.
A perfect example I believe is the maou from Maoujou, whose crime is... kidnapping a princess. And that's it really, he's playing defense, concerned with game design to match the heroes' advance, and doesn't try to pull any kind of invasion or anything or corruption or what have you even as they fly all the way to the capital. All he is, is the 王 of the 魔, hardly a harbinger of ruin for anyone in the story. The one feature he can be said to share with Sauron is leadership, but not a single other thing. He's also part of a royal family, succeeding his father, so even there he's rather mundane. Compare this with the opposing yuusha-tachi who aren't necessarily the chosen ones either but rather fulfilling an occupation too, a small group of people given the responsiblity of fighting back. See Himmel failing to take out the sword but going on to achieve victory anyways.
All in all there are commonalities, but that's because all of fantasy as we know it originates with Tolkien. It was certainly shaken up by RPGs, it seems replays became popular in the late 80s and THE replay, Lodoss, was first published in 1988, which I consider to be the true forefather of Jap high fantasy, Slayers too started coming out in 1989. Even the fat fucking elf references Lodoss right at the start. Meanwhile Wheel of Time would be published in 1990 and A Song of Ice and Fire in '91, I think those are some important points of divergence that could explain the state of things. Earlier stories like The Sword of Shannara and Conan did go into D&D, and therefore into Jap fantasy, but past the 80s it seems that's where we could draw the line.
A perfect example I believe is the maou from Maoujou, whose crime is... kidnapping a princess. And that's it really, he's playing defense, concerned with game design to match the heroes' advance, and doesn't try to pull any kind of invasion or anything or corruption or what have you even as they fly all the way to the capital. All he is, is the 王 of the 魔, hardly a harbinger of ruin for anyone in the story. The one feature he can be said to share with Sauron is leadership, but not a single other thing. He's also part of a royal family, succeeding his father, so even there he's rather mundane. Compare this with the opposing yuusha-tachi who aren't necessarily the chosen ones either but rather fulfilling an occupation too, a small group of people given the responsiblity of fighting back. See Himmel failing to take out the sword but going on to achieve victory anyways.