That line was from the movie, but I believe the books said they were half-orc, half-men. That line from FOTR the movie didn’t make sense anyway, since goblin is just another word for orc.
I thought I remembered someplace in either LotR or The Silmarillion where Tolkien states that there are several breeds/tribes of orcs, and that only certain of these orcs are referred to as “goblins”.
“pearls before swine”
or shit before lemmings
I thought the goblins were the baddies that lived underground, in the mines of Moria (and other places) and the Uruk-Hai were Orc/Goblin hybrids. I’ll have to check the books tonight.
StG
I agree with Fenris about cutting Saruman the Many-Colored. Apart from being one of my favorite elements of the struggle between Gandalf and Saruman, I think it would indeed have helped the folks who haven’t read the books understand the importance of Gandalf’s transformation. As it is, I had to explain to my wife and daughters about the significance of the colors and why Gandalf being resurrected as the White is such a Big Deal. And in the process I explained that both are Maiar, which delighted my eldest daughter, Maia, to no end. 
While the OP is certainly welcome to his opinion on the matter (and of course I expect some will dislike LOTR… it’s not for everyone), I disagree strongly regarding Frodo and Sam’s exchange near the end of the film, where they talk about themselves as characters in a story. I recall that passage in the book as one of my favorites, because it was charming and clever. It’s rare in a fantasy story (even these days) to see such reflexive self-awareness, and it adds to the depth of the relationship between Sam and Frodo. In the film, though the words were different, the charm and feeling in them remained the same. That scene remains my favorite in the film, despite the excellent battle sequences and the stunning technical and artistic achievement of Gollum.
Many of the OP’s criticisms seem to completely miss the point of the film. The Two Towers is a story of finding hope in the face of a completely hopeless situation. It’s not easy to watch, because it’s not meant to be. It’s meant to be dismal, often depressing, often hopeless. That’s the point. It’s this dark tone which makes the film’s rare inspiring moments all the more moving. Disliking the movie because it’s not an easily-encapsulated action flick in which everything is resolved in the last five minutes just means you went to see the wrong movie. Go plunk down your five bucks for the latest Armageddon or Pearl Harbor clone, I’m sure that will suit your fancy.
The OP dismisses responses saying that this is the middle movie of a trilogy, and thus has little resolution (which is true), and also responses that suggest that an understanding of the books might enhance enjoyment of the film (also true in many cases). Why he would dismiss these perfectly valid points I do not know. However, based on the thread title and the tone of the OP, it strikes me that he just likes to be the dissenting opinion for the sake of being the dissenting opinion. While there are sincere reasons for disliking the Lord of the Rings films, or Two Towers itself (even though I don’t share those reasons), disliking it because many other people do like it isn’t one of them. That’s just being a drama queen.
In short, the OP obviously had some expectations of The Two Towers which were not met (a clear explanation of the history of the wizards, a resolution for the Hobbits, etc.). Those expectations, in my view, were completely unrealistic and, based on the tone of the first film, pretty unlikely. However, with those expectations in mind, of course the OP is going to be disappointed. His criticism is based on a very thin viewing of the film. I rarely say this about people, but it’s clear to me that he missed the point of the film completely. But he’s entitled to his opinion, even if it’s misguided.
All that is assuming the OP was serious… here’s hoping it wasn’t a big parody, and I’ve been whoooshed yet again. sigh
[nitpick]The only reference to the lineage of the Uruk-Hai was by Treebeard in tTT. It’s not definitive as to exactly what they are because he’s just kind of musing about the Uruk-Hai, but he said “has he [Saruman] crossed the races of orcs and men? That would be a black evil!” The terms “goblin” and “orc” are often used interchangeably in Tolkien’s writings. Still there were many tribes of orcs and some were stronger and more dangerous than others “the foul Uruks of Mordor” versus the “goblins of the Misty Mountains”.
“goblin-men” in the books refers to those Uruk-Hai who look more like men than orcs(and are therefore more useful as spies) such as “the swarthy squint-eyed southerner” at Bree. Perhaps they were early experiments with a different mix of orc cut into the man genome. [/nitpick]
Enjoy,
Steven
Run for your life. The Auks are coming…
Poor Vinnie, I am not sure you are going to live that one down.
It is cool if you don’t like the movie though. You don’t have to like it just because everyone else in the whole world thinks it is the best thing ever.
There’s plenty to debate. The OP listed several points in the movie with which he had a problem. He offered his opinion, and then he supported it with observations from the film. Anyone who disagree with him can either rebut those observations, offer a differing interpretation, or show other areas of the film that were strong enough to mitigate its weaker areas. Merely offering an opinion is a waste of time. Everyone has an opinion; it’s up to you to prove that your opinion is worthwhile. Otherwise, why should I care?
(That’s the general “you”, not you in particular, Sol.)
Damn, my post here last night seems to have vanished into the ether.
First of all, Vinnie, I mostly agree with your assessment of the movie.
Second: don’t expect that having read the book would rescue the movie. Having read the trilogy a dozen or more times over the past 35 years (yep, it’s been that long since my first visit to Middle-Earth :)), I can tell you that the TTT movie is so loosely based on the book that their limited association is more confusing than helpful.
You Tolkien fans know what I’m talking about. Remember when Frodo has his why-keep-going moment in Osgiliath, and Sam gives him that “as long as there’s some good in the world” cornball speech to buck him up?
Not only did that bit of dialogue not take place in the book, but they never go to that place in the book, because the place they’re at (Osgiliath as a viable city) doesn’t exist in the book. And Faramir doesn’t try to take them anywhere in the book, and he doesn’t want to capture the Ring for his father in the book, and so on. At this point, you’re so far from the plotline of the book (and for no apparent reason) that you’d need a frickin’ palantir to see the frickin’ book. But we don’t have one yet in the movie, so we’re SOL.
And FWIW, that bit of dialogue does a lot to undermine what Polycarp and Avalonian were talking about regarding Frodo, Sam, and Gollum.
When we do get stuff from the book, it seems that it’s there just to touch base. (“The fans will kill us if we leave the Ents out, so we’ll put them in, briefly, but we’ll turn them into Tim Benzedrine*-style conscientious objectors who have no idea that Saruman’s been doing nasty things to their trees - but at Helm’s Deep, we’ll replace them with an army of Snooty, er, High Elves.” “We’ll have Theoden in there, but even after Gandalf heals him, we’ll turn the king of a warrior people into a friggin’ wimp.” “We’ve got to have Eowyn in there as a love interest, but we’ll have a bulimic-looking chick who couldn’t even lift a sword IRL play her.” AAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! (said the Nozdrul, who coincidentally was named Argh. ;)))
IMHO, the FOTR movie was a good-but-not-great adaptation of the book, with too many for-seemingly-no-purpose departures from the book. TTT largely deserves to be MST3Ked. And the depressing thing is, TTT, which was based on a book that was largely one of action and movement, was the movie they had the best shot of doing right.
*[sub]Bored of the Rings parody of LOTR’s Tom Bombadil, who isn’t in the movie anyway. [/sub]
Well, in the movie, Osgiliath wasn’t a viable city, but it was a defensible point, and Faramir did in fact have a contingent of men with him there (and he retreated just before the battle of the Pelennor fields). The Nazgul king did show up there on a flying steed. And the movie version actually brings Frodo and Sam closer to the alternate route (Minas Morgul) right on the road to Mordor. Additionally, this sets up the conflict between Denethor and Faramir better (IMO), and reminds us how tempting the ring is. I re-read the books between seeing tTT the first time and the second time, and I really liked what they did in the movie (in fact, I really see it as an improvement).
I see how you could interpret it this way, but I think there’s another way that makes it cooler and solves the problem–I think at the beginning of tTT when Frodo wakes up after “dreaming” about Gandalf falling, it wasn’t really a dream; it was a vision. I mean, obviously it’s a dream on the outside, but I think Gandalf has been falling for ALL that time–all throughout while his friends stopped by at Lorien and battled at Amon-Hen and split up and on and on… he’s still falling. I think it’s a cool way to show the FINAL end of the fall (at the freakin center of the earth or something) to have Frodo sort of sense it all that time later. Of course, that’s merely an interpretation.
Sniff. He is kind of having his soul eaten away…
You would have them ABANDON Merry and Pippin!?! Oh goodness. I might burst into tears. They may not be of much use (ostensibly–since this is a very arguable point considering their later contributions at Eisengard, and in the Rohan and Gondor guards) BUT… they must needs stay alive! Their friends are tres noble, as are they w/ the ents.
She says: [I fear] a cage.
He says: You are a daughter of kings; I do not think that will be your fate.
I don’t think he’s telling her literally that she’ll “royally” kick ass in battle, just that she will not end up cooped up with an unlived life. “You have great things in store for you honey.”
Well, if they were going to save Rohan, first they had to save King Theoden, who, in this version, was a little worse off than in the book–so “exorcising” him was just a necessary step in the quest for the salvation of mankind.
I think they sort of explain this.
Legolas: You mean not to follow them…
Aragorn: Frodo’s fate is no longer in our hands.
Gimli: Then it has all been in vain. The Fellowship has failed.
Aragorn: Not while we hold true to each other. We will not abandon Merry and Pippin to torment and death…
Et cetera. But anyway, Aragorn just realizes what Galadrial told Frodo–that he has to complete his quest on his own little lonesome in the end.
I hope I didn’t trash you! 
I hate to contradict someone who’s read LotR a dozen times … mostly because I hate to be wrong, but here goes anyway.
Osgilliath does exist as a city in the book. Faramir speaks of the eastern half of the city falling to Mordor’s forces, and the imminent fall of the western part. They don’t go there in the book, but then in a book, there’s no difference between a character describing a battle and actually being there.
Sam’s speech also exists in the book. I’m not sure how closely the words match, but the part about the heroes in stories just being people who didn’t give up, I’m positive is there somewhere.
The palantir is in the movies. Did you see the first movie?
I think Peter Jackson has made two excellent movies, and has done an excellent job of adapting from the books. In particular, Merry and Pippin are the catalyst for the ents going to battle against Isengard. Jackson paints that more broadly than Tolkien does, but he was probably afraid the subtlety would be lost on moviegoers otherwise. (cf. OP for examples of subtleties lost. 
)Also, in both book and movie, Faramir is presented with the same choice that Boromir had had, and proves himself superior. Yes, he shows more hesitation in the movie, but that was so they could go to Osgilliath to show what was happening there, rather than just talk about it. Where some people see pointless deviations from the story, I see reasoned compromises. In fact, I think Frodo’s departure from the Fellowship (FotR movie, TTT book) is actually done much better in the movie version, as are one or two other things!
I, for one, am eagerly looking forward to the conclusion.
Or not.
Contradict away. Reading the trilogy that many times certainly doesn’t make me special. And you did catch me in at least one error!
Elrond, at the Council of Elrond, says: “And on a time evil things came forth, and they took Minas Ithil and abode in it, and they made it into a place of dread; and it is called Minas Morgul, the Tower of Sorcery. Then Minas Anor was named anew Minas Tirith, the Tower of Guard; and these two cities were ever at war, but Osgiliath which lay in between was deserted, and in its ruins shadows walked.” (I, 238.) According to the Appendix, Minas Ithil fell a thousand years before the events of LOTR.
I think we’re talking about two different things here. There’s the place where Frodo and Sam talk about what their tale would be like, if a tale were made out of their adventure. This happens in the book on the stair of Cirith Ungol (II, 320-22), and in the movie as Frodo and Sam, along with Gollum, are on their way through the woodlands from Osgiliath back toward Mordor. In that conversation, Sam does say about the characters in tales, “I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn’t. And if they had, we wouldn’t know, because they’d have been forgotten.” But that’s nothing like his sappy words to Frodo at Osgiliath in the movie.
And in the book, Sam’s responding to Frodo saying: “I don’t like anything here at all: step or stone, breath or bone. Earth, air, and water all seem accursed. But so our path is laid.” Which is completely different from Osgiliath in the movie, where Frodo, discouraged, is asking whether there’s any point in going on. Frodo’s anguish, in the book, is of a different sort entirely: his burden eventually stands between him and even any memory of more ordinary and pleasant times. He knows his doom, and after the Council of Elrond, never remotely considers abandoning it, but at the same time he is no plaster saint: he is completely open about what the Ring and his quest are doing to him.
You’re right. My apologies.
I guess this is at the heart of my problem with the movies. If you’re going to do a movie of a literary masterpiece, one of the things you’re reckoning with is the reality that the book’s a masterpiece because the writer was subtle, and said things deep down in his words, and not in crayon strokes on the surface.
While I feel that there are moments when Jackson has tried to say it in brushstrokes, what I see here on the whole is The Cartoon Guide to Middle-Earth: the Council of Elrond becoming a near-riot, rather than that tense silence into which Frodo finds himself saying he will take the Ring. Saruman’s Wicked Witch of the West moment. Gimli’s repeated dwarf-tossing. (Dave Barry nailed that.) Gandalf and Saruman’s WWF Smackdown.
You’ve got a point there - but if he hadn’t, they would have altered the plot beyond repair.
But in the book, Osgiliath was practically a footnote - far easier to drop entirely than, say, the Barrow-Downs. There’s no need to mention it at all.
I’ve yet to see one that I took that way. The deviations have been just that, IMHO - deviations.
Nothing’s wrong with that; the main difference is that Frodo actually winds up in the water in the movie. That’s not much of a deviation at all, and I’m willing to give Jackson the wholesale benefit of the doubt on changes on that level. But stuff like Aragorn falling off a cliff - WTF is that all about?!
I think we’ll have to agree to disagree.
And I will go see the last movie because, well, I have to see how the train wreck comes out. That is the doom laid on me, and I will see it through to the end.
I think you’re doing yourself a disservice. If you find the movies so horrid, you shouldn’t subject yourself to them. Leave that to the vast majority of others who disagree with you and are helping to make the movies the incredible successes they deserve to be.
RTFirefly
I’m curious what you’re referring to when you say, “Saruman’s wicked witch moment”.
Will you explain please?
Thank you.
Well said all of you…
I personally would like to know what an adaptation means to all of you. Being a fan of the film making process, I have studied some things here and there. While i do not wish to rag or drag or punch or bite, i do have some comments.
A lot of Two Towers is done in dialogue (in the books). I just finished reading the first half of it today and only noted the Warg attack as the deviation. However, it wasn’t really a deviation since Erkenbrand, another hero of the Riddermark, was pushed back to Helm’s Deep by Wargs and orcs. What Peter Jackson was doing here was trying to combine some scattered elements together that would make the tale easier to tell. It isn’t a sin necessarily, and it does its own justice. Personally, it would have been hard to then introduce Erkenbrand as well as his group of men, as well as the Huorns who are not Ents but almost like them. It would have taken another hour to develope those two points alone.
What PJ has done is made the books accessible to all audiences. There are some people who don’t read the books but get a kick out of the movies, because it isn’t extremely complex. The book on the other hand gives a lot of complexity and can confuse.
A slight Hijack from the debate here: Has anyone noticed the color changes throughout the movies? For example, elements in FOTR went from bright blues and greens to gloomy blues and then bright brown and yellowed woods. And then in Two Towers things just blended and became pale. Maybe it is just me, but i like the device there. End hijack.
To me, all these movies are are an adaptation, a retelling of a story. I am sure as the greeks passed on their legends down through the ages, things became modernized. So is today. A classic tale is being retold and given to today’s society, which almost abhors complex subtleties, albeit unconcious abhoring(spelling?)
And with that i take a nice long breath.
I haven’t found it either, but I’m sure it’s there some place. After getting the FOTR DVD, watching it a few times to get the dialog more firmly entrenched in my head, then skimming the books again, I have found a good many, if not all, of the really memorable bits were lifted directly from Tolkien, though not necessarily in the same context nor even by the same character. Two examples that drove this home for me:
Gladriel’s opening monolog (“The world is changing. I can feel it in the earth. I can feel it in the water . . .”) was said by Treebeard to Galadriel when she popped by Fangorn after the wedding.
Pippin’s (?) comment upon seeing Dwarrowdelf (Now, there’s an eye-opener and make no mistake) was said by Sam outside Moria when the party was beset by wargs and Gandalf blasted the alpha-warg with a fireball from his staff.
The action scenes may be PJ’s but the really memorable lines are JRR’s.
And why not?
DD
Im pretty sure the original post was a joke as some of the spellings and descriptions are almost to fantasically wrong to be a real problem for Vinny. And secondly having read some of the arguments to and for the movies i would have to say people who don’t like the movies but who love the books are being to narrowminded and unrealistic.
I didn’t like the fake Aragon death, but i can accept it and both (i) understand why PJ did it and (ii) enjoy the rest of the film. Why are people so quick to criticise, in two excellent 3 1/2 hour films based on some of the greatest works of literature ever PJ has made some of the most amazing films ever, and not just through sheer action but and excellent script (helped largely by Tolkein, although the speech about pity and death in Moria was far more effective in Moria than in the shire IMO) and excellent cinematography, and costume design etc.
However despite all this people still expect him to explain the most complex, and difficult parts to the regularly movie go-er(?). The extended DVDs are for the hardcore fans as they include most of the bits we want. The films in the cinema are for fans, AND for people who just want to see the films, and in that context they work amazingly.
I still find the books even better than the films, but sometimes its nice to watch your imagination take shape in something you can watch and become more involved in certain areas, or see things explained that perhaps weren’t so clear before.
I just think if your going to love all of Tolkeins work, a man who clearly lived outside the realms of realism and believed in imagination and escapism and then write off PJ’s own work because it doesn’t conform to your ideals is effecitivly missing one of the major themes of the Lord of the Rings.
who is Tom? : )