# New “Lord of the Rings “ movies coming! (2023 announcement) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [February 24, 2023, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272 "2023-02-24T02:35:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/121 "2025-12-21T00:20:00Z")
> [@What\_Exit](#): > > The Professor had more thoughts on that failure bit later on. Radagast did not fail, he did other. Remember, first and foremost he was a Maia of Yavanna and he sought to protect nature from Sauron. So while Saruman completely failed and Gandalf succeeded, Radagast more or less did a different thing. Sure, Tolkien did modify his early statements. But still, Radagast wasnt the big success. > [@Kimstu](#): > > Yeah, I’m not going to quarrel with anyone for hating on the Jackson Radagast, but for me the portrayal worked. It got across his perceived “lightweightness” in terms of being able to understand or cope with problems of Peoples and big Serious Stuff like rings of power. Right, I actually like the way Radagast was shown, not all powerful and mighty, just a guy who loved nature- and did help out vs The Enemy . ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/122 "2025-12-21T05:30:29Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Right, I actually like the way Radagast was shown, not all powerful and mighty, just a guy who loved nature- and did help out vs The Enemy I think that’s more or less how they portrayed all the benevolent super powerful characters like Gandalf, Galadriel, etc). Like they helped out and could do the occasional magic trick when needed. But you don’t see Gandalf blasting a 1000 yard hole in the battle lines of Morder with his staff. Which I think is more or less even trying to use great power to do good would have unintended and corrupting consequences. ---
**Author:** ![curious\_ape](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b19c9b/32.png) [@curious\_ape](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curious_ape)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/123 "2025-12-21T06:03:53Z")
Please do away with the hyper-feminized, ever-crying hobbits. And Peter Jackson’s complete ignorance of basic physics. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/124 "2025-12-21T12:13:43Z")
What are you talking about? Rosie Cotton only got like ten seconds of screen time. And speaking as a physicist, that’s exactly how a giant monster of flame and shadow would work. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/125 "2025-12-21T14:01:10Z")
Yeah, I don’t see what’s wrong with the emotional culture of hobbits as per canon. Tolkien deliberately wrote hobbits as more “down to earth” (in more ways than one) than other Middle-earth peoples, and emotional candor is part of that. Men of the high lineages have this warrior/leader culture that valorizes stoicism. Elves, being immortal, have a long perspective that gives them an “adults in the room” vibe: they don’t get upset. Dwarves kind of fetishize toughness in all respects. But Hobbits are written as simpler, more mercurial people, with moods more easily stirred but more superficial. They have a buried core of staunch courage, but they don’t access it much in ordinary life. They’re content to focus on their small enjoyments and small quarrels, deeply connected with nature but not thinking deeply about it, or about other big-picture stuff. Which is why other Peoples tend to consider hobbits not so much “feminized” as “childish” (a stereotype reinforced by their small stature). It takes a lot of hard scary Big World experience to make hobbits into tough adventurers and warriors. Which is why the four hobbits in the Fellowship screw up a lot and get upset a lot. So would any of us, for that matter: Nazgul and goblins and trolls, oh my. A wish-fulfillment retcon of Hobbits as pre-toughened video-game-style Marvel heroes would be boring. ---
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/126 "2025-12-21T14:32:44Z")
Really good summary. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/127 "2025-12-21T16:02:18Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Honestly, I would kind of like it if someday somebody adds to the Middle-earth story universe an account of how Radagast actually coordinated animal/bird/insect resistance during the Wars of the Ring. There are lots of elements of Tolkien’s world that would be great to see more of (e.g. what about the blue wizards?)—_if_ someone could do them justice. The best-case scenario for this “Hunt for Gollum” movie is that it would fall into that category. But my expectations are not that high. ---
**Author:** ![curious\_ape](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b19c9b/32.png) [@curious\_ape](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curious_ape)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/128 "2025-12-21T17:59:42Z")
The hobbits are crying all the time in the movies. They essentially behave more like women than men, which can be explained by the female writers. They aren’t so emotionally incontinent in the books. And Peter Jackson’s physics challenges are legendary in all his movies. They aren’t as bad in LOTR as The Hobbit, but still pretty bad. The Rohirrim charges are just one example. The Helm’s Deep battle is full of absurdities. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/129 "2025-12-21T18:57:04Z")
They’re crying a lot because they’re going through incredibly stressful situations. In what ways do they behave more like women than men? ---
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/130 "2025-12-21T18:59:14Z")
Same question, plus: they _do_ weep quite a bit in the books. ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/131 "2025-12-21T19:25:28Z")
> [@curious\_ape](#): > > The hobbits are crying all the time in the movies. They essentially behave more like women than men, which can be explained by the female writers. They aren’t so emotionally incontinent in the books. Pretty certain the hobbits cry less in the films than they do in the books. I don’t think there’s a single instance of them crying in the films that isn’t taken straight from the books, and a lot of it is cut out. A lot of holding hands, embracing, laughing and especially singing for joy is also cut out- not just from the hobbits either. Methinks Prof. Tolkien had a different view of what is ‘feminized’ behaviour than you believe. > Gandalf: > I will not say do not weep, for not all tears are an evil. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/132 "2025-12-21T19:27:32Z")
Never mind. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/133 "2025-12-21T19:30:15Z")
Right there with you. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/134 "2025-12-21T20:10:52Z")
> [@curious\_ape](#): > > The hobbits are crying all the time in the movies. They essentially behave more like women than men, which can be explained by the female writers. Uh-huh. Tell me you’ve never read any Homeric epic, without telling me you’ve never read any Homeric epic. 🤣 > [@](#): > > Then in tears > Achilles, from his friends withdrawing, sat > Beside the hoary ocean-marge, and gazed > On the black deep beyond […] > > The Trojans met, > But found it hard to know their dead again. > They washed away the clotted blood, and laid⁠— > Shedding hot tears⁠—the bodies on the cars. […] > > Agamemnon in the midst > Rose, shedding tears⁠—as down a lofty rock, > Darkening its face, a fountain’s waters flow⁠— > And, deeply sighing, thus addressed the Greeks: […] > > At last > Phoenix, the aged knight, with many tears > And sighs, took up the word […] > > illustrious Nestor’s son > Drew near Achilles, and with eyes that shed > Warm tears he gave his sorrowful message thus:⁠ […] > > With them swift Achilles came, > The hot tears on his cheeks […] > > When Ulysses saw him so worn, so old and full of sorrow, he stood > still under a tall pear tree and began to weep. […] > > he said, weeping bitterly, "My friend, this man has done the Achaeans > great wrong. […] > > Telemachus wept, and so did Menelaus, nor could Pisistratus keep his > eyes from filling, when he remembered his dear brother Antilochus […] Etc., etc., etc., ad infinitum. (And it’s not like Hellenic culture was noticeably feminist or gender-egalitarian, either.) See, you’re coming at this from a naively post-Victorian Anglophone culture perspective which conventionally views weeping as “female-coded”, and forbidden to mature males. Tolkien, being far more knowledgeable about ancient cultures and their epic literatures, wrote his neo-saga much more realistically in terms of emotional expression. (Tolkien’s tone is still somewhat constrained by the conventional prudishness of his era—-an actual saga author would probably have been a lot more explicit about hobbits’ sexual fecundity, for example! 🤣—-but much less constrained than how the naively sexist retconners of today would write it.) **TL;DR:** In actual epic literature, brave men cry a LOT. Hobbit emotional levels as written by Tolkien and portrayed in the movies are totally within normal parameters for male emotional expression. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2025, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/135 "2025-12-21T23:55:30Z")
> [@curious\_ape](#): > > The hobbits are crying all the time in the movies. They essentially behave more like women than men, which can be explained by the female writers. They aren’t so emotionally incontinent in the books. I know, right? All fighting all the time, that’s my idea of a manly saga. Feelings, pfui! ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/136 "2025-12-22T00:20:42Z")
Heh, as my above Homer quotes illustrate, in the quintessential manly sagas of western culture, it’s all fighting AND crying all the time. 🤣 But yeah, I don’t think we need new emotionally repressed versions of hobbits just because it makes some male viewers feel a bit insecure to see them cry onscreen. Tolkien wasn’t afraid to write hobbits crying, and I think he knew what he was doing. ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/137 "2025-12-22T03:34:47Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > I am truly now Bored of the Rings (copywrite a couple of guys in 1969). Now THAT I’d watch! > **[Bored of the Rings](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bored_of_the_Rings)** > > Bored of the Rings is a 1969 parody of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. This short novel was written by Henry Beard and Douglas Kenney, who later founded National Lampoon. It was published in 1969 by Signet for The Harvard Lampoon, and, unusually for a parody, has remained in print for over 50 years. It has been translated into at least twelve languages. > The parody steps through The Lord of the Rings, in turn mocking the prologue, the map, and the main text. The text combines slapst... ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/138 "2025-12-22T05:44:16Z")
> “Oh the leaves are falling, the flowers are wilting, and the rivers are all going Republican. O Ramar, Ramar, ride quickly on your golden unicycle and warn the nymphs and drag queens! Ah, now who shall gather lichee nuts and make hoopla under the topiaries? Who will trim my unicorns? See, even now the cows laugh, Alas, alas.” Chorus: “We are the chorus and we agree. We agree, we agree, we agree.” I was reciting this to myself the other day. I think msybe RAMAR could be spelled in the NYT Spelling Bee. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272/139 "2025-12-22T19:18:48Z")
Shantih Billerica! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-coming-2023-announcement/980272.md?page=6)