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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Yeah, that's a good catch; now that you mention it, but Merry and Pippin are "princelings" of the Hobbits. Bilbo's basically the top of the middle class; it's never really clear where his initial family money actually comes from Pretty sure it's mentioned at the start of the Hobbit that Bag-End was build out of the treasure from some previous Took adventure. Really enjoy those theories on Tom Bombadil. The 'oh he's just an old spirit' interpretations are so boring. Just wish there were similar theories re: the wizards. sassassin fucked around with this message at 15:30 on Feb 21, 2013 |
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Feb 21, 2013 15:27
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Ape Gone Insane posted:Have you read this? http://km-515.livejournal.com/1042.html That's the article I was talking about. Personally I found Gandalf and co. more interesting when I didn't know they were supposed to be demi-gods sent to do specifically what Gandalf ended up doing. 'He was a Maia' is the answer to every mystery regarding Gandalf, and it's all rather disappointing.
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Feb 21, 2013 22:10
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Finished reading The Fall of Gondolin (Book of Lost Tales II) last night and it's awesome, but the reuse of names is pretty distracting. Legolas, Ecthelion (supreme badass), Glorfindel... It's entirely forgiveable given when he was writing it, but it does make me wish he'd been able to return to it later and give it a full rewrite. The swarthy fellow rumoured to have a bit of orc blood in him betrays everyone? Who'd have guessed? Balrogs riding armoured Drakes into battle. A movie version would be absolutely insane.
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Apr 9, 2013 09:48
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It's a different character, in a different role. Their narratives are entirely disconnected. The whole 'he came back from the dead and travelled to ME around the time Gandalf did' thing is an awkward retcon. Or not, depending on how 'canon/finished' you consider these stories. The Fall of Gondolin is cobbled together from two Tuor texts, with the story up to his arrival at Gondolin receiving a third expanded treatment I haven't read yet. I prefer to think of it as a different dude anyway.
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Apr 9, 2013 13:16
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concerned mom posted:I think really when dealing with Middle Earth it's important to not deal in absolutes and just present all the facets because nothing's ever really concrete. Ecthelion killed Gothmog, Lord of Balrogs, by ramming the spike of his helmet into his chest and dragging him into the fountain where they both drowned. That was the 4th balrog he killed that day*. Seems pretty concrete to me  * Which put him at best like 3rd in the balrog kill-count competition.
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Apr 9, 2013 14:37
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SHISHKABOB posted:I dunno, Gothmog was the captain of Morgoth's armies, or whatever? Lord of Balrogs? I feel like Ecthelion is the top dog in terms of killing Balrogs. I guess we sort of have to assume that the Balrogs that Gandalf and Glorfindel killed were just sort of "mook" Balrogs. If I were Glorfindel I'd be ashamed to show my face again having died killing one little balrog. Tuor killed 5 in one fight, survived the battle and went off into the sunset with his wife and son. Men win.
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Apr 9, 2013 15:49
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rypakal posted:You can make arguments for Cirdan, Thranduil, and Celeborn. Cirdan is the only one we're certain came from Cuivienen. I've sort of assumed that Celeborn is probably close in age to Galadrial, and we know she was born in Valinor, so she's nowhere near as old as Cirdan. Of course, there could be hundreds of elves like Thranduil who have have absolutely no idea how old they are. If I understand elven power levels correctly, had Thranduil been that old Legolas would have been surfing around Helm's Deep or singlehandedly killing Oliphants or something. Got to the part of the Fall of Gondolin notes where Christopher Tolkien says he found a scrap of paper from J.R.R.'s later writings that says there were never many balrogs around 'at most seven'. Spoilsport.
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Apr 11, 2013 14:53
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VanSandman posted:Yeah, Glorfindel was such a non-entity Tolkein apparently forgot he had killed the bastard once already in his unpublished Silmarils and had to retcon him (don't think retcon is the right word here) for the Lord of the Rings. If you kill someone off but don't publish it, is that character really dead?
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Jan 9, 2017 10:55
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Arwen sucks in the films, it's so dumb to have a super powerful badass show up at the climax of the first act and then transform into the hero's meek stay-at-home girlfriend for the rest of a trilogy. Glorfindel would have objectively been better, because he didn't have another completely different, gratingly contradictory role to play alongside the cameo. Using Legolas as Bakshi did would have been even better. Frodo not riding Asfaloth alone diminishes his character and arc.
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Jan 10, 2017 16:09
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They both have more dialogue than any female character.
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Jan 10, 2017 19:57
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SHISHKABOB posted:Saruman's death scene in the extended cut is pretty good, especially with Treebeard's janky line coming right after it. It's garbage and Christopher Lee hated it. Legolas murders Grima.
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Feb 1, 2017 22:58
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PMush Perfect posted:Edit I even understand giving most of Glorfindel's importance to Arwen and shoving a romance plot into the films. It's not a sin to want there to be more than one named female character in the film who actually does something important, and considering that Aragorn and Arwen do end up together, it's kind of understandable to want it to be more than something completely out of left field. The film doesn't actually give any of Glorfindel's importance to Arwen. While the characters appear at the same time in the narrative, Glorfindel's role is largely expositional, warning of dangers, and providing (stupid) suggestions during council. He is also a symbol of the brilliant (and now impotent) past. He is one of the Mighty Firstborn, powerful and "Wise", and therefore of absolutely no use in the quest to save the world. Arwen instead takes the pieces for her movie role from Aragorn, a horse, Elrond & Gandalf, and most annoyingly Frodo, whose important moment of defiance (quickly overwhelmed) at the ford is lost in favour of an awful line that would have made all but the hackiest hacks cringe (Phillipa Boyens naturally loves it). She then reverts to book Arwen for the rest of the trilogy.
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Feb 3, 2017 12:36
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VanSandman posted:The movies were fun, and literally any character development for Arwen is better than none. Why? Character development that runs counter to that character's purpose in the story isn't a good thing. It makes the narrative weaker. Had she appeared at Helm's Deep in the finished film the changes to Fellowship would have worked a lot better, but that would take a fat elven dump all over Eowyn's arc. Elves aren't progressive, and certainly shouldn't be emulated.
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Feb 4, 2017 10:43
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Fellowship is on TV and it's really, really bad who knew?
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Feb 4, 2017 22:37
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PMush Perfect posted:I'm curious what does and doesn't work about it for you? Aside from your hateboner for Arwen, I mean. There's literally no subtlety to it, so outside the action scenes characters are constantly saying and doing stupid things. Most of the scenes are borderline farce with a serious soundtrack. Gandalf causes an avalanche by yelling his rival's name and then asks Frodo if the party should go down the scary mines that Frodo knows nothing about. It hits plot points and landmarks with a hammer, and changes so many scenes in the details that it feels like they only had access to a cliff notes version of the book (the dwarf would be the one who wants to go to the mines, right? That sounds right) For the time it was made that was probably the best they could do, because taking fantasy seriously was in itself a huge step, and PJ's straightforward commitment to bombast and spectacle led to new standards being set for cgi, costuming & set design etc. But The Two Towers (Extended) is the only good one, because it includes actual character work (Boromir & Faramir & Dad, Eowyn, Gollum... kinda, I hate his cartoonish overacting tbh, but there's an actual fleshed out character there), and a proper massive action setpiece worthy of PJ's approach. What's this, a ranger caught off his guard? I do not fear them *branch cuts her cheek but she doesn't flinch* If you want him, come and claim him! Daddy please I want to marry him! I hate you! I'll run away! sassassin fucked around with this message at 23:37 on Feb 4, 2017 |
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Feb 4, 2017 23:34
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Teriyaki Hairpiece posted:What if he really really really enjoys the prancing of Tom Bombadil? I skip those chapters. Tom is evil and no good can come from listening to him.
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Feb 4, 2017 23:35
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webmeister posted:They aren't the greatest movies ever made, but they're about as good as could be reasonably expected I think. I'm not such a pessimist that a green cgi ghost tide is the most I believe the world is capable of. Desolation of Smaug is the second best PJ LotR movie.
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Feb 5, 2017 13:10
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Kemper Boyd posted:Having re-watched the LotR movies and the Hobbits, the flaws (poor scriptwriting, lack of direction) show up in the LotR movies but the cast elevates the hell out of the material. Even Liv Tyler who does the best she can with the awful stuff she's given. Theoden's written completely incoherently, but Bernard Hill salvages and elevates the lovely and ill-timed lines he gets. Theoden is a sad, grieving old man who is under the influence of at least one wizard's spell for most of his screentime. Talking incoherently is a feature, not a bug. "I've fought many wars in my time, I know how to defend my own keep" annoys me, though. What wars, Theoden? When he's dying he talks about having earned his place beside his forefathers, his inadequacy issues are kind-of important to his suicidal arc (but not as important as the wizards spells). PMush Perfect posted:I'm hard pressed to think of any moment where a member of the Fellowship had acting that pulled me out of the moment. (With the exception of 'they're taking the hobbits to Isengard', but I can blame the internet for that.) Merry chews his way through most of his lines ("Wh-at wa-as th-at???"), Aragorn's all-over-the-place accent, Legolas talking nonsense during the council.
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Feb 7, 2017 11:52
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SHISHKABOB posted:No I think they just enjoy talking about the movies. A lot of people take any criticism (in the traditional meaning of the term) of media they enjoy personally, and so throw out insults and wild accusations of agendas/bias in return. It's a shame but what can you do? Data Graham posted:I've always liked his "No father should have to bury his son" bit. It's new material that stands with one foot in the legendarium and one foot in other storytelling traditions and other modern movies, and it really somehow ties them together—brings LotR into the world of "mainstream entertainment"—in a way I wasn't expecting. As has been said, Bernard Hill did very well with the material he was given. The line itself isn't anything special, it's elevated by how he delivers it. There aren't many moments in these films where characters feel genuinely human and vulnerable.
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Feb 7, 2017 17:22
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euphronius posted:Man I just don't get where this 30,000 year old immortal elf queen is coming from. PJ's elves are nowhere near strange enough, or gay enough (in the way Sam would use the word, not the way it would be used to describe Sam). He cast all these actors-of-a-certain-age with gravitas, has them do low, slow, wooden delivery of lines... where does that even come from? His choice for Gil-Galad is a crime. I thought movie directors loved "casting" pretty teenage boys for parts?
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Feb 7, 2017 23:08
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Ginette Reno posted:Celeborn's portrayal is my favorite. The actor sounds high as a kite. Haldir, who has never been hugged before, and his robot army.
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Feb 9, 2017 12:56
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Kemper Boyd posted:It's that his actions make no sense, like the whole "I will not risk open war." Theoden goes on an emotional rollercoaster due in part to how PJ interpreted Saruman's hold on him. After Gandalf frees him from the magic beard and cataracts, he discovers his son is dead and the lands are in disarray, and Eomer is gone, and so the first stage naturally has to be fear of more loss, and retreat. In the book the "spell" is different. Theoden is driven to inaction using that fear, through the words of Grima. It's not prosthetics, but the knowledge that he has been betrayed and abandoned, his son is dead etc. that keeps him pinned to the throne. Gandalf then drives that fear away, gives him the Fire back (the figurative fire that is the explicit power of his magic ring), and Theoden is a suicidal maniac bent on the destruction of his and every other people until his timely death.
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Feb 11, 2017 20:59
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chernobyl kinsman posted:he does literally shoot a beam of light out his staff at the nazgul in the books He shoots a fireball that burns some of Legolas' arrows when fighting the Wargs in Hollin, too.
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Feb 12, 2017 17:31
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euphronius posted:Iirc two entire episodes were just on the meeting with Gildor et al It's a very interesting part and way more important than side-story filler like Moria and Helm's Deep.
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Jul 22, 2017 00:04
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SHISHKABOB posted:ok, why? Tolkien himself considered Helm's Deep easily-omitted filler, and Moria is mostly backstory/character stuff for a side-character and build up to the death of a guy who comes back to life like 40 pages later!
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Jul 22, 2017 23:14
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euphronius posted:It closes off the dwarf story that was key in the hobbit which is important We have different definitions of important, clearly. "What are they up to now?" bits aren't as important as Frodo & Gildor's chat about the actual quest to come. It serves mainly as reinforcement of earlier post-Hobbit Bilbo material and gives context to a Gimli character that the the PJ films made completely different without any harm to the main narrative. As you say it all could have been resolved in the appendices without any harm to the actual story. Goldberry is old man williow.
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Jul 23, 2017 00:26
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PJ's The Hobbit movies are much more faithful to the books than his The Lord of the Rings, they just fell under a much harsher lens having come later, and not having the novelty/innovation factor. Tauriel is even a good addition because unlike almost every other character she has an observable arc and development (Thorin and Bilbo's will-they won't-they bromance is extremely clumsy by comparison). It's also one of the more obvious cases of a director putting his sexual fantasies up on screen. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Jul 23, 2017 22:00
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sunday at work posted:Other than the massive changes in tone, characterization, hours of new material, bloated action scenes, and new or over developed characters that added nothing to the story. Apart from the "new or overdeveloped characters" these are all present in the Lord of the Rings films, too, and action-adventure Arwen at Helm's Deep was filmed but thankfully only made the cutting room floor. It's remarkable just how much they changed for the films that people don't notice now (or then). Apart from Bilbo's farewell speech and Smeagol's argument with Gollum little else appears on screen as it does in print. Frodo leaving The Shire is entirely different, Bree has very different tone, the flight to the ford is different (and misses out an important moment of defiance for Frodo, and so he spends 3 movies looking merely weak and sickly). The Council of Elrond is dramatically different. We have a young Frodo and an old Gimli. Faramir, Theoden, Denethor etc. It's a long, long list of changes. Ignoring whether those changes are "good" or "bad" The Hobbit films are overall more faithful (in tone, characterisation etc.) to the source material, even with a bunch of stuff added to fill them out.
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Jul 24, 2017 10:01
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PMush Perfect posted:Please tell me about the personality of each dwarf in Thorin's company as-written. They don't really have them, which means it's harder to be unfaithful to the book when they get a tiny bit in the films. Bombur is a fatty. Fili and Kili are young and brave/stupid enough to die. They did change things up by making Thorin young and *the one who leads the Moria expedition decades later* old, but that's not as significant a change as what happened to Gimli the young and increasingly-wise warrior, who earns the respect and love of a strong, good-looking older man.
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Jul 24, 2017 10:54
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Are Tolkien's dwarves supposed to be the super-stocky d&d variety in the first place? They're small bearded folk, he never said they couldn't be sexy. PJ's LotR Elves are almost all stoic robots unfamiliar with human emotions (ala Vulcans, or Data) but his Thranduil is wonderful and angsty teenage rear end in a top hat Legolas is (if not true to the books) closer to Tolkien's versions of Elves whose egos and tantrums constantly hosed things up for everyone.
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Jul 24, 2017 11:36
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euphronius posted:Thorin was descended from Durin. It's possible he looked young even when over a hundred years old or whatever. Nothing in the film suggests that the angry man on a quest to avenge his father and grandfather and learn to become a real leader to his people is *actually* really old but just looks young. It's a deliberate change from the old dwarf of the book for whom the quest is sort of a last gasp/bucket list/legacy thing, and leads to some contrivances (like the "last light of Durin's day oh no the quest has failed let's all go home") falling flat.
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Jul 24, 2017 13:15
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I'm not really trying to argue that they're better adaptations, just more faithful. They keep more intact than LotR does. The Hobbit isn't a realistic and grounded book, taking "their vision of the world more from cartoons than from fairy-stories" is appropriate. The sequences where the dwarves slaughter all-comers are great (especially Bombur's barrel ride). Bilbo's just making stuff up because he wasn't there.
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Jul 24, 2017 13:46
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I think we can all agree that the Tolkien estate is right to keep The Silmarillion etc. out of the hands of Hollywood.
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Jul 24, 2017 14:01
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Data Graham posted:preview edit: I'm probably getting sniped as I type this by posts making clear that this is all tongue in cheek and I'm being a dork so I thought better of you before you said this. Stand by your walls of text.
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Jul 24, 2017 14:03
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Data Graham posted:But PJ and crew did almost precisely zero that was a direct and unaltered "filming of the text", and I think it was all the better for it The problem with RotK especially is they changed a lot of big visual moments that would have been amazing on screen into... nothing much. Like when the corsair ships appear on the river and instead of unfurling the banner Halbarad has been carrying for the whole movie, Aragorn just pops up, says hi, and a green blob washes over everything. It's bad cinema. Some of the changes are good, some are very good, but a lot feels like change for changes sake that accomplish not a whole lot.
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Jul 24, 2017 14:12
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euphronius posted:They do change some of the lines and characterizations in lotr but the imagery and set pieces are straight from the book and more what I was referring to. It's paint by numbers basically from moria on. How long ago did you last read the books? Helm's Deep is very different, Gondor is completely different. Maybe my paint by numbers edition of the book was different from yours but they don't look the same at all to me. Off the top of my head there's only one scene in TTT & RotK that's lifted directly from the page (Gollum vs. Smeagol argument). It's surprising just how much was changed looking back.
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Jul 24, 2017 14:17
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:The main problem with Jackson's Hobbit adaptation isnt just that it's absurdly overlong and "scraped over too much bread", it's that it fundamentally rewrites the core of the story. They made a Thranduil miniature and it's on a horse ffs. I refuse to believe that Arwen in Fellowship is an improvement on anything. It's nonsense that serves only to show how powerful a character is in a way that's never significant again in the films (doubling down on the problem with Glorfindel's character instead of fixing it). From the cringey opening line, to the magical costume change, to stealing one of the only powerful character moments Frodo gets (also in terms of practical power stealing those of Elrond, Gandalf and Asfaloth) with a line just as lame and designed purely for the trailer and then crying over Frodo... it's a really, really bad sequence. Look how cool she is that branch cut her and she didn't flinch! Good points about The Hobbits.
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Jul 24, 2017 16:17
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The real way to fix that part is to replace Glorfindel with Boromir.
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Jul 24, 2017 17:11
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:There are a lot of small cuts and ellipses made in Fellowship but relatively few of them are actual contradictions or changes to the base story. Arwen for Glorfindel is a direct change, and a major one, but one that can be defended for a lot of reasons (the female love interest should probably appear before the appendix). She appears in the Council of Elrond chapter in the books. Making her a temporary action hero and wizard extraordinaire doesn't add anything to the "romance" story (really both books and films treat her as just a prize for Aragorn following her introduction, rather than an actual "love interest" involved in the narrative). Eowyn's the female romantic lead of the series, and a decent one (since she has depth and an actual arc).
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Jul 24, 2017 18:02
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Data Graham posted:And better than the books in that regard since there she literally gives up everything that makes her Éowyn as soon as she catches the eye of the handsome prince If you mean she gives up her foolish romantic view of bloodshed, battle & "glory" then yes, but it's not Faramir's attention that changes her, it's Pelennor Fields. Witnessing the death of Theoden, facing down the Witch King of Angmar and almost dying in the process makes her grow up and her reward is the best guy in the books. She's one of the few characters with a real arc. sassassin fucked around with this message at 20:31 on Jul 24, 2017 |
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Jul 24, 2017 20:13
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