The mearas are stronger and faster than normal horses, as wise as men, and live as long as men. They’re descended from wild horses, specifically a particular horse which was tamed by Eorl, the first king of Rohan. The mearas only allow themselves to be ridden by the king and his sons.
After the eagle helped Gandalf escape from Isengard, Gandalf went to Edoras, and asked Theoden (who was still under Grima’s influence) for a horse. Theoden told Gandalf to pick any horse, and begone. Gandalf chose Shadowfax, the greatest of the mearas, and whom, IIRC, no one had ever been able to ride before (I doubt that Theoden realized that a mearas would allow Gandalf to ride it).
Kind of. They are much more in tune with nature than their Gondorian neighbors. They’re in the RotK book, but not the movie (I don’t think that really counts as a spoiler).
Actually, I was thinking of the quick series of shots where the various Rings of Power are given to the groups – nine kings taking the nine rings for men, seven dwarves taking the seven dwarven rings, and the three elves take the three elven rings. I’m remembering that it’s Elrond, Galadriel, and Cirdan, but maybe I’m mistaken.
Ah, but reading between the lines of a conversation between Gimli and Legolas shortly after departing from Lothlorien, it seems as though Celeborn could revisit that great occasion in his mind any time he liked, and it was just like being there all over again.
Hoo boy. You people need to stop having these discussions when I’m not at the keyboard, all the catching up is serious work. I’ll just go through stuff in order:
I recall Grima’s physical description as not being terribly flattering. Pale, heavy lidded eyes, etc. Don’t have the book handy though.
The White Council has been adequately covered already - Galadriel was the one who created it, and she and a bunch of other important elves were members. It waas not a “council of White Wizards” but a “Council of the white” by which we mean “those who oppose the forces of darkness.”
Rohan. Well, I think you’ll get to see something of how important Rohan is in RotK, so I’ll mostly leave that aside too. Suffice it to say that Rohan is -big-, and we don’t see the more densely populated parts, overall. They are farmers and herdsman, and they absolutely do not fill their whole country end to end. But the country is big, so might be surprised at how many Rohirrim there are. In terms of how the only place in Middle Earth that looks “prosperous” is The Shire, well, I think it’s been mentioned here already that The Shire is more of an… what was it? Edwardian England sort of place, vs the rest of Middle Earth which has a more medieval feel. This will explain the differences in “prosperity” a little, perhaps. Also, The Shire, while a green and happy place, is pretty tiny. For reference, here is a pretty decent Map of Middle Earth that Google turned up for me. You can see the Shire in the middle of Eriador in the upper left. It runs from roughly the label for Michel Delving, past the big blot of Hobbiton, about as far as the label for “Buckland” in the East, and probably about half that far north south, with Hobbiton more or less in the center again. Now compare Rohan. It extends from the Gap of Rohan in the West, to roughly the “A” in Anorien in the East, Fangorn Forest in the North, and the White Mountains in the south. The West Emnet is the more thickly peopled part, which you will note, is not the part that Aragorn and co, running from Sarn Gebir towards Fangorn Forest, crossed.
Your questions about the various groups of Men are already mostly answered, but to re-summarize: The Dunlendings (Now of Dunland, to the Northwest of Rohan) were the original inhabitants of Rohan, before the men of Gondor, who nominally claimed the land, gave to the Rohirrim to be in thanks for bailing them out in a battle against the forces of Mordor. The Dunlendings have been bitter since. As for the other Men you’ve seen, they are in service of Sauron, not Saruman, and hail from that big area in the southeast labelled “Haradwaith”
The wild men aren’t really druidic at all. In fact, if I had to draw any sort of paralell, they remind me more of a sort of African Tribesman sort of arrangement.
The Mearas are super-horses. Stronger, smarter, faster, better and more picky than ordinary horses.
You’ve actually already seen a bit of Gondor - remember in Fellowship when Gandalf rides off to do some research about Frodo’s ring? He goes to a city with a nice view of the Mountains of Shadow and rummages through some tomes and scrolls? That’s in Gondor.
As for Extended RotK: YMMV, but for me the added content contained way too much “Oh. Yeah. PJ used to direct low budget horror films.” and not nearly enough stuff that advanced the story. PJ let too much of the wrong kind of dorkiness bleed through into several sequences that were rightly cut from the theatrical but were, for some reason, re-inserted in the extended cut. The first ten minutes of the extended version is the only portion that I felt added significantly, and that was too divergent from the book to really sit right with me.
Sorry, I don’t see anything to support the statement “Elves only have sex to conceive, and conceive every time they have sex” on that page (or anywhere else I have looked). In fact, the first phrase at least seems at odds with “The union of love is indeed to them great delight and joy.”
It does say that Elves eventually lose the urge: “With the exercise of the power (of generation), the desire soon ceases,” but since at least one pair of elves is known to have “generated” six times, we can assume it takes a while to fade.
EDIT: And we can assume they boink like bunnies during that while, although Tolkien was too much the gentleman to say so.
M’kay, I’ll have to revisit “People of Middle Earth” and see where I can locate that cite. Unfortunately, given my schedule lately, I may not get to that until retirement.
I’ve never been a fan of fantasy or a long movies, but Lord of the Rings is my favorite movie of all time. I read the books after I saw it, and have watched the movie several times since.
As before, I jotted down my thoughts along the way, and will thus have plenty of my usual dumbass questions and uninformed opinions to share that will surely make everyone shake your heads in dismay and, mayhap, a bit of rueful affection for my ignorance. But they’ll have to wait until tomorrow, 'cause I’m tired.
For now, I just wanted to say: Guys, I am so grateful to everyone who answered my original question with a “heck yes” lo those many weeks ago, because now I can answer my past self: Yes, you will like the movies, O slightly-younger choie. You’ll like 'em a helluva lot.
Ooh here’s one thing I’ll mention now to open up discussion. I was surprised that I found this film, at least the beginning through the middle, a bit harder to follow than I would have expected considering I’ve already seen two of these suckers. Seemed as if the editing was a bit … off. Not just that scenes were cut out that maybe might’ve filled things in better, but that within the scenes, actors were sometimes not “placed” in the same way they were in previous camera angles. I’m probably not making any sense… I’m very curious to see if anyone else found it this way? (It’s possible this has been discussed already in the topic; my apologies if I’ve forgotten.)
Anyway, though there are no spoilers in this post, there will certainly be some following, and thus I allow the floodgates to open. So here’s my official standard announcement:
Warning! Below this point, spoilers for ALL three LOTR movies, including Return of the King (the third film), may be discussed without spoiler boxes! Newbies and Spoilerphobes beware!
Yay! I’ve been waiting for this post. (I actually have it emailed to me). Not because I’m an expert, but because I love learning all this extra stuff about these movies I loved.
I did feel like the third movie was a bit rushed, until it got to that incredibly long denouement. I wonder if they originally planned to leave out the scouring?
Anyways, can’t wait until you actually ask some questions.
Scouring had to go for the same reason Bombadil had to go: too much to show, not enough movie time to show it all. Which is why Saruman bites the dust at Isengard instead of later on.
As we alluded to when you watched TTT, Saruman’s end in the movie is very different from what happens in the book.
I’ll spoiler-block the description of what happens in the book here, in case you’re planning on reading the book at some future date:
[spoiler]In the book, Gandalf appoints the ents to keep watch over Saruman and Grima in Isengard. After the heroes depart Isengard, Saruman talks his way out (he still has some power in his voice), bringing Grima with him, and vowing revenge on the hobbits.
When the hobbits return to the Shire, they see that things are not all happiness and light. There are shirrifs everywhere, as well as “Big Men”, and everyone is very suspicious. Industry has come to the pastoral Shire, and a lot of hobbits are upset. (Remember the vision that Frodo had, while looking in the Mirror of Galadriel, about bad things happening in the Shire? It’s kind of like that).
Frodo & Co. learn that a guy named “Sharkey” has taken up rule of the Shire, basing himself out of Bag End. They quickly put together an armed rebellion, and defeat Sharkey’s Men, before heading to Bag End to face Sharkey himself. There, they discover that Sharkey is Saruman, with Grima still in tow. Saruman attempts to, once again, use his voice to enspell the hobbits, but it doesn’t work. As Frodo orders Saruman to leave the Shire, Grima stabs Saruman to death, and then attempts to flee; hobbits pump Grima full of arrows, and he dies, too.[/spoiler]
I’ll just go through stuff in order:
The professor would be rolling in his grave.
