Where, if I may be so bold, do you get this particular piece of “knowledge” from, Chronos? I am aware of nothing in LotR, The Hobbit, or The Silmarillion that says anything of the sort about Glamdring…
Which particular piece? The translations of the swords’ names are given in The Hobbit when Elrond identifies them, as well as the fact that Glamdring was originally Turgon’s. The original owner of Orcrist isn’t known, but whoever it was had to have been less prestigious than the King, and probably bore a lesser sword. And I believe, though I am not certain, that it’s stated in Fellowship of the Ring that Glamdring warned of all enemies, not just Orcs.
It’s that last bit I’m challenging. I don’t think that’s true at all, and that’s the part you were asserting was incorrectly stated by the prior poster. And we don’t know that Orcrist is a lesser sword for sure; suppose that it was worn by, say, Fingolfin? (Yeah, yeah, I know, someone’s gonna point out that Fingolfin’s weapon was called _____________) 
Do all people of Middle Earth have the ability to pronounce a row of underscores, or is it a special Elf thing?
I believe it’s in The Hobbit where it’s stated that after being interred with Thorin, Oricrist glowed whenever enemies approached.
How they could tell, if it was interred with Thorin, I’m not sure. Must have had a crystal lid on the sarcophagus.
Hey, they did it with Lenin ;). Well…minus the glowing sword ( more’s the pity ).
Seems a waste of a great sword - to say nothing of the Arkenstone - to leave it sitting on anyone’s grave, regardless of how eminent he was.
Inscribed on the cover of Thorin’s sarcophagus, in Dwarven runes:
“In Case Of Emergency Break Crystal”
You lose the use of a weapon which gives one wielder some plusses in combat - it’s not like it made Thorin invincible, after all - and you gain an early-warning system that protects the entire fortress. Sounds like a fair exchange.
The word “mithral” can be seen in the 1st Ed AD&D DMG in a number of places, but one that I remember is the description of the chime of opening. If that’s not geek-cred enough, please take into account that my copy of this book has been kicking around someone else’s house for about twenty years.
All righty! Saw TTT last night.
Before I begin, I should note that as part of this viewing, I have made it a point not to read up on the filming of the movies, including the FX or any other behind-the-scene stuff. I’m too afraid of stray spoilers. This is the first “epic” genre film where I’ve been unspoiled as to the major plot points since (choie thinks back…) E.T. and Return of the Jedi, and I do not want to screw that up as I always do. This is quite difficult, as you can imagine, considering these films are years old now and, oh yeah, the book is one of the most famous classics and constantly referenced everywhere in the universe. Somehow I’ve managed to stay fresh and virginal, uh, as far as LOTR is concerned, and by Gandalf’s beard, I’m gonna do what I can to stay that way as long as possible.
Anyway. My point in saying all that is that if you’re wondering why I’m asking dumb questions instead of taking two seconds to search on Google or Wikipedia, it’s because I trust my fellow Dopers to answer the questions in a way that won’t screw with any significant future surprises. (I might add I’ve already messed up – I was just trying to spell a character’s name right for this post, and I inadvertently saw a character’s family tree that indicates who she ends up marrying. Argh.)
Warning! Below this point, spoilers for The Two Towers (the second LOTR movie) may be discussed without spoiler boxes! Newbies and Spoilerphobes beware!
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We addssss some extra spoiler room just to make sure the newbieseses and spoilerphobeseses are properly warned…
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These are my thoughts as I remember 'em:
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Actually, you know what my very very first thought of the entire movie was? Gandalf is one total badass mofo. Frodo’s dream sequence (or perhaps vision, assuming it was meant to be accurate) with Gandalf practically riding the Balrog down the chasm and beating it’s lizardy ass was a fabulous way to start the film. Loved it, loved Ian McKellan, loved the whole sequence to death! I rarely get that involved with action scenes, but this so surprised me I was hooked immediately.
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Gollum/Smeagol was absolutely bleedin’ awesome. Seriously: maybe I shouldn’t have come away with this as the most important part of the film, but dayum. I was rivetted to watching that little guy every time he was onscreen. In fact, the biggest question I have about this film is: HOW DID THEY DO GOLLUM??? I mean the creature and his face in particular – I’m assuming there was someone doing the hand bits (like when he grabs onto Frodo), but that’s not what astonishes me. It was the facial expressions. So incredibly subtle and captivating. The voice acting was phenomenal too, of course, and I know that’s Andy Serkis, but what about the face? Was it all CGI? Because if so, I am rather scared to know that we’ve gotten so subtle and realistic with creating the illusion of reality, even to the point of emotions flickering across a face.
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Speaking of the creepy yet oddly sympathetic little dude, I loved the relationship developing between him and Frodo. I would’ve liked to see Frodo try to explain his actions after the forbidden pond incident, but it’s possible Frodo was getting too sucked in by the Ring to explain his apparent treachery (though he really saved Smeagol’s life). Or perhaps it’s just that Jackson really needed to save the time so that we could see more of those damn boring tree thingies. (Sorry. I imagine the Ents (?) are Very Important to the mythos and all, and total props to them for putting the pain down on Mordor’s defenses at the end, but oh my God, I groaned inwardly every time the action – such as it was – cut back to Pippin and Merrie and what looked like the enchanted trees from Oz. Not only was it dull as hell, the effects were so blah. After such wonderful special effects, I was taken aback at how muppety these trees looked.)
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Annnnnd my man Brad Dourif does indeed play to type. Although here he’s not so much a psycho, which is really his metier, but a scummy sychophant slimebag. Not a bad sorta-British accent, though it came and went. I had to give a huge laugh with his name. I mean, Grima Wormtongue? Seriously? Gee, there’s an ambiguous name for you. How does a guy like that ever fool anyone? If he really wanted to succeed as a counselor, he should’ve renamed himself Stalwart Owlbeak or something like that. (And keep in mind my favorite character in the Harry Potter books is Remus Lupin, so I know about guys who unfathomably keep their real names despite it giving away their biggest, darkest secret.)
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One thing that does bother me a bit about these two films, and I don’t know if it’s Tolkien or Jackson to blame here: The baddies are so repulsive and one-note. You’ve got the ultimate big bad Sauron, whose motives are utterly vile, plus Sarumen ditto; hideous orcs and their wolfbeasts and this Wormtongue dude and the Nazgul and the Uber Orcs whose name I forget… Meanwhile, the good guys are all fabulously gorgeous and pretty much ideal, brave, noble souls, with the notable exceptions of the guys I’m calling the Mir brothers (as in Boro- and Fara-). I know I shouldn’t compare this to the Narnia books or HP – these are the two main fantasy series I have any experience in, not counting Pern and some Piers Anthony books – but all of these have more flawed heroes, so it seems. At least, Edmund Pevensie is pretty dark at times, and almost everyone in the Potterverse is jam-packed with flaws. Plus several of the HP foes have some sympathetic, or at least understandable, motives. In the LOTR films I’ve seen so far, it’s just Boro/Fara who seem to have some darker tendencies, on the goodies’ side, unless you count Smeagol and (sorta) Frodo too, but they’re mainly struggling against magical forces, not their own natures. I understand that in the next film Aragorn has some insecurities about being the heir to Gondor. I just find myself wishing that the characterizations were a little more … dense and subtle. It’s probably just that the films have to cover so much territory; I imagine the books are much better in this regard? Or are these meant to be stock, archetypical characters, as in mythology?
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Hey! It’s Karl Urban, playing, uh, the Rohan king’s nephew! It’s Xena cameo #2. First Borias showed up in the first film, now Caesar/Cupid. If the late lamented Kevin Smith were with us, we might’ve seen quite the trifecta of sexy Xena lovers.
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This film is just gorgeous. Absolutely amazing cinematography and effects. I don’t see many modern movies at all, so my experience about what films are like these days, effects-wise, is minimal. Never saw 300 or The Dark Knight Returns or whatever the other big Event Movies are. The last “modern” film I’ve seen was Harry Potter: Goblet of Fire. All this is to say that I have literally no idea how much of the scenery was New Zealand au natural or if the whole thing was fashioned in a computer. But it looked breathtaking and however it was put together onscreen, I completely understand why folks are captivated by these films. Even if the story sucked, which it certainly doesn’t, I’d be happy to just ogle the screen for hours. (Though not 3.5 of 'em, admittedly.)
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Boy, those -Mir brothers are troublesome, aren’t they? I must say I’m curious about Faramir, who *omg I must interrupt because holy crap he is adorable!!!squeeeee!!! *. Er, sorry. Little case of Fangirlus Hormonus Eruptus. (It’s just that he really looks like David Thewlis’s prettier younger brother, and since I’m a big Thewlis fan, this is a very good thing.) Um, what was I saying? Oh yeah. I loved the moment when Faramir questioned Frodo about whether he was troubled by Boromir’s death – before, of course, Frodo knew who Faramir was Boro’s bro. Clever. Also, whoa re: the scene where Faramir points his sword at the Ring and lifts it from Frodo’s chest. That was actually scary. I fully expected him to yank it off Frodo’s neck. He was really struggling there, and since we barely know him as a character except that he’s willing to capture and kill Frodo/Smeagol, respectively, I wasn’t sure which way he’d go. And boy, Elijah Wood sure knows how to act scared. (Which is fortunate as that’s pretty much all Frodo does, alternating with looking nauseous because of something the Ring is doing to him and looking soppily at Sam.)
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So now we get all the backstory about why Elrond doesn’t want Arwen to wait around for Aragorn. At last it makes sense. Of course, I’d already learned it from you guys. Seems like this stuff should’ve really gone into the first movie; felt a little out of place to switch to Arwen/Elrond when they weren’t in the rest of the film.
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Not for nothin’, but Eowyn is worth a dozen Arwens. I like her moxie, and she does wield a sword rather well. Though I gotsta ask: is Aragorn really gonna hog all the women in the movie? What’s Legolas, chopped liver? I mean he seems a little asexual, which perhaps is common to elves in general, but still. I don’t see why Eowyn automatically fell for Aragorn when they literally just met and had no real conversation. Again, it seems Jackson isn’t spending much time on quieter character moments that might explain their emotions. But this may be a book issue, not just Jackson. Dunno.
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It’s the little things that are awesome. I loved how when the Ents (not sure if I got the name correct) brought down the dam and the river came pouring out, we briefly see one Ent who was on fire rush forward and bend down to put himself out. Trees got brains!
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As I said up above, I’m not a big action fan. But the battle with 10K orcs was all kinds of incredible. The moment when we see the 300-or-so Rohans, plus the Elves (about how many of them were there?), and of course Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli, were all waiting by the wall and we just hear the pounding march of the army of 10,000 … wow. Perhaps one of the finest “moment of dread before the battle begins” I can remember. The whole time Jackson kept cutting back to the seemingly ceaseless throng of the enemy, I was constantly saying: This is hopeless. There is no way they stand a chance, these poor bastards. And sure enough, the fight was brutal and relentless. Kinda surprised none of the good guys were so much as injured, apparently. Though I knew that lead Elf guy was gonna bite the bullet. He did everything but say to Aragorn, “Damn, I’m too old for this! I’m two weeks from retirement to the Undying Lands!”
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Okay, Gimli and Legolas are great together. I laughed big when Gimli shouts proudly over to Legolas, “I’ve got two under me belt already!” and Legolas is all, “Dude, I’m o n seventeen!” And then a second later: “Nineteen!!!” Badass.
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I found myself a little disappointed that the battle royale ended so very quickly after the backup army arrived. I suppose it was pretty much a rout, so that wouldn’t have been very interesting to watch. Plus, in fairness, there’s a limit to how much fun it would’ve been to see an army of guys we’ve never met before vs. nameless, personality-less orcs.
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For a gardener, Samwise is hella longwinded. (I know, like I should judge?) I wouldn’t mind if he wasn’t such a sap, but oy, I’m sorry, but Sam/Frodo are cringeworthy here at the end. God. Please guys, reassure me that Peter Jackson doesn’t have awful instincts? Please tell me this agonizingly long and hokey “cheer up Mr. Frodo, all the stories say that the heroes have to struggle to see a new dawn” speech is some much-treasured part of Tolkien that Jackson just had to include lest the fans riot or something? Sam just kept going on and on and Frodo’s eyes got wider and wetter (if possible), and then they coup de grace me with the brutal “oh no, Sam, the children will say, tell me the story of Samwise the Brave! Fwodo couldn’t have done it without his Sammy!” crap that just makes me hope Gollum gets his hands around both their necks. (I don’t want to feel like this – Frodo’s been my favorite character!) Am I a bad evil person for getting irritated with this stuff? I’d understand it if these were kids’ books, but ugh. Not even the massively Christian allegorical Narnia books ended with anything this anvilicious.
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No, seriously: Shut. Up. Sam.
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Whew! Now that Sam and Frodo are finally offscreen, I’m intrigued and very nervous by Smeagol’s decision to get “her” to punish the tricksy hobbitses for betraying him. Apparently a new villain is about to be introduced in RotK? Cool. Looking forward to that, especially because there haven’t been many female characters in this who aren’t earth mothery. Plus, as I said, Frodo and Smeagol are my favorites (now that Boromir’s dead), so the indication of a new plot (other than still more “we’re off to see the Mordor” trekking) is exciting. I still have literally no idea how Frodo hopes to get into Mordor and survive long enough to drop the Ring into the fire of doom or whatever. Now that he’s dumped all his protectors, this just seems like the world’s most reckless, hopeless plan. That’s what makes this such a great cliffhanger.[/list]
And now a list of questions, as before.
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I didn’t quite understand how Faramir figured out the whole Ring story, unless Smeagol’s spewing of “my precioussss” led him to suss things. Are we to assume that Smeagol spilled the beans off-camera, or is it evident that the folks at Gondor are now aware of the Ring’s existence due to the grapevine? For that matter, how did Faramir even learn that his brother was dead? That must be one helluva great grapevine.
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What did Faramir’s lieutenant mean by saying that “if you let them go, your life will be forfeit”? Isn’t that a bit harsh to say to the Steward’s son? Doesn’t the son – and presumably the heir, since Boromir’s dead – have some sort of discretion here?
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More of an observation, but maybe it’s something I missed: is it me or was it an awful coincidence that these exiled Rohanites whom Legolas, Aragorn and Gimli meet happened to have two riderless horses to give away to Aragorn and Legolas? It would’ve made sense if the exiles were escorting cattle and horses with them, but I didn’t see any other riderless horses – just the two that seemed to appear out of nowhere, conveniently for our heroes.
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Please don’t answer if this is gonna be explained better in a later movie, but: I really don’t understand Saruman’s plan. This is a common problem for Big Bad Dudes: they just seem Big and Bad because we’re told they are, and because they run around killing people. But what’s the endgame here? Darth Vader and the Empire apparently clamp down on free trade, I gather; Voldemort hates the muggle side of him and is a big ol’ racist, so that’s why half-breeds of all sorts and muggles will be enslaved or killed; the baddies in Pern were usually just trying to maintain their petty kingdoms or tithings. But I’m not seeing what Sauron and Saruman want. At first I thought it was just to rule over Middle Earth and enslave everyone so they can keep ruling Middle Earth. But then Saruman seems bent on killing everyone, man, hobbit, elf and dwarf. What’s the fun of ruling Middle Earth if you don’t have anyone to rule except orcs?
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What were the orcs riding? They were called “wolves” but obviously they have some special name that I must’ve missed.
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How exactly did Thedrus (the king’s son) die? Clearly Wormtongue killed him or had him killed, but I don’t think it was explained how this occured.
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Where did Gandalf disappear to after fixing the king? I mean obviously he went riding to gather an army, but to where? And speaking of the army, who the heck were all those thousands of people with Karl Urban?
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Don’t forget my original question, which was: how did they create the awesomeness that was Gollum/Smeagol?
Well, them’s my thoughts. Sorry for being so wordy, but if all y’all are LOTR fans, longwinded is probably not a problem. I hope to get to ROTK early next week at the latest, so in the meantime, please remember to keep ROTK spoilers in boxes? If at all possible, anyway. Thanks!
Sounds like you had fun, choie!
My numbers don’t line up with yours–I’m just responding as I go.
1.) For Gollum, they filmed two versions of every scene: one with Andy Serkis, and one without him. So a lot of the CG work is adapted directly from his performance, with the help of mocap.
2.) *Two Towers *is my favorite movie of the three, mostly because the Helm’s Deep battle is so freakin’ badass. I often skip past the Ents and a lot of the Frodo ‘n’ Sam stuff. 
So, important, but can get kind of tedious.
3.) Inre Brad Dourif’s accent… He used it through the entire shoot, even off-camera. When they were finally done, several people refused to believe that his normal American dialect was his real one, saying that he was clearly faking it.
4.) IIRC, all of the scenerey is straight out of New Zealand. It really is that gorgeous. Lucky jerks.
5.) Faramir guessed of Boromir’s death when they found his horn, split in two. This is referenced in the dialogue between Faramir and Frodo. He doesn’t know it for sure, but he suspects it.
6.) They had two horses because two of their men were killed in the fight with the uruk’hai (which Eomir said). It’s not a completely deus ex machina convenient number–there are three of them, and two horses.
7.) I believe the orcs were riding worgs (wargs?).
8.) As far as I recall, endgame for Sauron is Total World Domination. He controls everything to his own evil ends, moohoohahaha and all that.
So many questions…
Watch the bonus discs for TTT’s extended edition release to see more on how they did Gollum. Fascinating!
Orcs ride wargs.
Theodred was injured in battle, and expired without the assistance of Grima, son of Galmod, called “Wormtongue” by his detractors.
Gandalf rode off to tell Eomer to get his fanny back to Helm’s Deep, and bring friends.
Saruman felt he couldn’t defeat Sauron, so he decided to ally himself with Sauron, and do his bidding. And if he got the opportunity to snatch the ring for himself, then well…
A few Rohirrim were slain when they attacked the orcs who kidnapped Merry and Pippin. Their horses, quite valuable warsteeds were of course not to be left wandering on their own. But Eomer was impressed by Aragorn, and loaned the steeds.
Faramir’s lieutenant knew how pissed dad can get.
Other points will be made in the final movie, that should pull some things together for you, and confuse other things
Yeah, not much is said about that fight in the book, but it was indeed epic on-screen.
Andy Serkis isn’t just providing a voice: He’s doing the whole thing. They motion-captured all of his movements, gestures, facial expressions, etc., and used that to create the computerized Gollum. Computer graphics can do pretty much anything except human faces at this point, but faces (since we’re so familiar with them) still look a little off. But that’s OK when you’re making a character who’s supposed to look a little off.
First of all, it’s inherent to the Ents’ nature that they’re boring, and they like it that way. They were a lot less hasty yet in the books: An Ent’s full name takes about three months to say. Second, that’s not the defenses of Mordor they’re trashing, but of Isengard, Saruman’s holding. Nasty though it is, it’s just a pale imitation of Mordor.
His “real name” is Grima son of Hama. Wormtongue is just what everyone else calls him, for obvious reasons.
In the books, Faramir isn’t particularly dark, either: He says even before he knows what Frodo’s burden is, “I would not take it were it lying by the side of the road”, and then even when he finds out, he keeps to his word. On the other hand, Galadriel has quite the backstory: In her youth (about 20 millennia ago), she was the classic rebel without a cause.
Aragorn is, if you’ll believe it, a virgin. When Elrond first found out that Arwen was in love with him, he cursed him that he would not have any woman, until he wielded the scepter and wore the crown (the scepter being the royal emblem of the Northern Kingdom, and the crown of the Southern).
Yeah, that was in the books, too, and all of us fanboys let out a little “squee” when we saw it.
That was in the book, but you’ve got to realize that it works a lot better in print than on the screen.
She was originally at the end of The Two Towers, but they had to move Her to the third movie to make room for other things. But no, She’s not at all Earth-mothery.
He was by the river when Boromir’s funeral boat floated past. It’s not entirely clear to him whether it’s a dream or real, but either way, he believes it. And certainly, Boromir’s real horn washed up on the shore, cleft in twain.
They’d recently fought a battle versus orcs, and lost more riders than they did horses.
The usual fare, become the most powerful SOB anywhere and try to take over the world. He’s horribly outclassed by Sauron, of course, but he doesn’t realize that.
They’re called Wargs. They’re a type of wolf, but nearly as intelligent as the orcs, with their own language and all.
In battle versus Saruman’s forces. I don’t think Wormtongue actually had anything to do with it, though he probably wasn’t too upset.
As I understand it (from watching the bonus materials), it’s 99% New Zealand au naturel. It appears to be an *amazing *place.
Very astute observation. The force is strong in this one. 
Theodred was wounded in battle; Wormtongue probably made sure his wounds were fatal.
That’s where he went – to find Eomer and his Merry Men.
Motion capture…they planted little sensors all over Andy Serkis while he interacted with the actors, then computerized him (ie, it was magic).
Snerk. Kssh. Snrkklll…
That’s son of Galmod.
He’s the greatest thief in the world, right?
Ah! Thanks to Shot From Guns, Qadgop the Mercotan, Chronos and jsc1953 for the answers and comments so far!
I did indeed have lots of fun. I think I liked this one even better than the first film, although it seems there was more to nitpick in it (the sappiness and Ents). I was much more engaged. Probably just because I know the characters now and am not being somewhat overwhelmed by all the info of a totally new universe.
Thank goodness I’m not the only one. I felt like a very bad audience member, not being captivated by the trees. I had the sense that Jackson wouldn’t have included it if weren’t quite important, so it seemed like an obligation to enjoy it. Though yes, Chronos, I do remember getting a kick out of the Ents admitting that they’re decidedly slow of speech! Still: that is rarely interesting to watch. Reading is a whole 'nother story.
Wow to the news of Dourif’s accent. It really was very different from his regular voice–as much as I know of it, which admittedly isn’t that much since he does use different voices quite a lot. But he usually has a rather flat affect when he’s playing his stable of psychos and killers and psychokillers. I do love it, though… there’s something silvery about his voice.
Clearly I spaced out in listening to Faramir’s dialogue regarding how he knew of Boromir’s death. I was probably distracted by the pretty. Funnily enough, he and Sean Bean are the only men I find remotely attractive in this film, so it’s amusing that they play brothers.
Holy cow. I will definitely watch the bonus disc. I was reluctant to do so because I don’t really want the magic spoiled before seeing ROTK, but I think I will anyway. This sounds so utterly amazing that I doubt I’ll find it “old hat” when I get to film #3. The way you all describe it, this is even more amazing. Serkis is incredible and the effects wizards are geniuses to be able to take so much of a human performance and pack it into a computer-generated creation.
Kinda surprised I didn’t mention this in my earlier diatribe, but: I found it almost painful to watch the scene where Sam is pulling the rope attached to Gollum/Smeagol (does it matter which one I call him? He seems to prefer Smeagol, so that’s what I’ve been calling him, mentally, although the Gollum name is certainly more famous). Sam just seemed horribly cruel. Also when he was being dragged around by Faramir and screamed at while Smeagol seemed to be in utter agony, both mental and physical, throughout most of the film. And it was actually hard to get through. Now that’s good acting/FX/directing.
OH. If “Wormtongue” is an epithet from his detractors, he gets a pass. It’s hard to tell sometimes with fantasy genre names! Looks like my boy Remus remains the most silly, obviously-named character.
Ah, that makes total sense too. Okay, nit solved.
Is the fact of dad being willing to kill his own son external knowledge (to the films) or did I miss yet another bit of backstory while I was Ogling The Pretty? Because for a guy who’s just lost one son to be willing to kill another just for letting go a prisoner on his own discretion seems … quite astonishingly low.
“I wouldn’t like to be around when one of these suckers is making a speech.” – The Cat, Red Dwarf.
Oh my. I didn’t catch at all that Saruman’s not in Mordor itself!!! I am quite staggeringly dumb. All this time I thought he was hanging out in Mordor, and the Orcs were just coming from Isengard. So this makes Frodo/Sam’s journey make a little more sense, in that they’re not trooping out to meet Saruman. I suppose we have no idea – until ROTK – what’s waiting for our fair hobbits in Mordor, then? Or did I miss that too?
So the tension between Faramir/Frodo/Smeagol was all invented for the movie? Okay, Jackson and the screenwriter gain some major points, because the story has been missing the “generally good guy with darkish tendencies” until he showed up to replace Boromir.
:eek: That is … harsh. (I take it that particular combo is an unusual one and Elrond didn’t/doesn’t expect him to gain access to both.) I don’t understand, though. Wouldn’t Elrond prefer that Aragorn find someone else rather than keep mooning around Arwen? Or is Elrond just determined to keep Aragorn from having sex with Arwen? Because that seems rather short-sighted.
It’d have to. I did NOT envy DM and EW having to emote their way through those mawkish lines. Still, if Jackson was inventing whole minor subplots (Faramir’s interest in the Ring), he sure as heck could’ve nipped that lovefest in the bud.
They usually don’t. Still seems silly to be willing to kill all men in order to rule over a planet of orcs.
OH here’s another question. It’s called Middle Earth. Is this supposed to be in another solar system or universe? Are there other Earths in this story? Or does “Middle Earth” refer to time period?
Extraordinary. I saw lots of gorgeousness in Xena and Hercules, which were both shot there, but I really had no idea. Like another world.
Whew, I was worried I was trodding on toes by dissing Aragorn’s Ideal Woman.
This I can see, although the earlier responses seem to indicate it could be up for debate?
By the way, does Grima have any powers of his own? Do we get more backstory to him? Is he even human? Again: no need to answer if it’s revealed in the later book/film.
I … have no idea what you’re implying, but I suspect my comments about “her” not being an Earth Mother were a bit of an understatement. Coolio.
That’s Arsene Lupin, smartypants!
Um, just to make a minor nitpick (and maybe the movie is different from the book in this and I don’t remember it), but Gandalf doesn’t ride off to find Eomer. He’s off to gather up the forces of Erkenbrand of the Westfold, who is leading the Western force that got defeated at the Fords of Isen (when Theodred was slain). In the book, he also heads to Isengard to get Treebeard to loan him the huorns, those walking trees (not the Ents, but the dense forest that moves).
As for Grima, son of Galmod, he’s nothing special. He just is one of those sly bastards who slowly drips poison into the ears of a ruler, changing their outlook. I always found it funny that Wormtongue manages this for Saruman given certain aspects of The Return of the King, about which I will say nothing at this point.
A shouting match in Cafe Society? Inconceivable! Anyhoo…
One peculiarity about the peoples of Middle-earth (at least the ones we see) is that while Hobbits are a lot like Edwardian Englishmen, most others are more medieval. Thus, the Hobbits have surnames like Baggins that are passed down from father to son, but members of other races do not. “Wormtongue” is an appelation given to Grima by those who perceive his worminess. He was not born to a Mr. and Mrs. Wormtongue. Arwen is referred to (at least in the books) as Arwen Evenstar, but her father is Elrond Half-elven, not Elrond Evenstar.
Jackson really pushed the grotesqueness in places, although he took some cues from Tolkien. But Saruman just looks like Christopher Lee with long hair. As for the one-dimensionality of the evil characters, I think that may be deliberate. People read “Paradise Lost” and come away with the idea that Satan is the hero. Tolkien didn’t want his readers identifying with his demons. But you can’t help but like Gollum a little even as you’re repulsed by him, can you?
Well, you note the notable exception of Boromir. For lesser flaws I would say that, at the beginning at least, Gandalf is grumpier than he should be and Pippin is rash. Theoden is not merely a victim of possession in the book. As for looks, the movie kept Frodo and Aragorn’s exchange - “I think a servant of the Enemy would look fairer and feel fouler. // ''Meaning that I look foul and feel fair?”, which would make sense if he looked more like John Hurt and less like Viggo Mortensen."
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The place of Arwen is a bit problematic. She barely appears at all in the main portion of the book, but her story is told in the appendices as a continuous narrative, which is a lot more effective in my opinion but obviously wouldn’t work for the movies.
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I found myself a little disappointed that the battle royale ended so very quickly after the backup army arrived.That was an appetizer.
Yes, you’re a bad person. It’s very moving to see how selfless Sam is that he doesn’t even realize how heroic he has been.
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That’s the point. No one knows how Frodo can possibly succeed. They just know he has to try.
Yeah, that’s Jackson’s fault. The bad guys in the book weren’t planning to kill everyone.
Warg is just the Old English word for “wolf,” but it is also related to a Germanic word meaning “evildoer.” In Norse mythology, wolves occasionally show up as mounts for supernatural beings. Wargs are described by Tolkien as demonic wolves (not giant hyenas).
Who knows what Denethor would do? But by the laws of the land, his life would be forfeit for disobeying the Steward of Gondor. And his dad might feel bound enough by his oath to uphold the law to the extent that he’d have to put his son to death. It wasn’t a major plot point or anything in the book. It just showed how seriously Faramir believed in Frodo that he would go that far.
They’ll be crossing swamps, deserts, and wastelands and moutains ridden with troops of orcs to get to Mt. Doom. That’s all in their job description from FOTR.
Elrond said he’d be bound to no woman until/unless he managed to be king of a reunited realm. He said nothing about quickies with other humans.
But Arwen (at that point anyway) was of elven kind. And they only have sex in order to get pregnant, and only within the confines of marriage. And every episode of intercourse results in a pregnancy. (Which means Fëanor the mighty got nookie exactly 6 times in his lifetime, which lasted a few thousand years (7 kids, but 1 pair of twins) and he was one of the most prolific elves in history).
Oh, and rape an elf maiden, and she dies.
It’s earth. Middle-Earth is derived from “Midgard”, from Norse legends, which translates into, wait for it, “Middle-earth”. It got called that because it was in the middle of the realm of Arda, about midway between the Gates of the Morning in the east, and the Undying lands in the West.