# "Well, I'm Back" - WTF? \[Lord of the Rings ending\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 26, 2014, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596 "2014-09-26T05:03:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**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:** [September 26, 2014, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/21 "2014-09-26T20:30:09Z")
Tolkien always was weak on beginnings and endings. In all of his career, he never really wrote an ending, and the only beginning he ever wrote was The Beginning. Stories never end; they just become someone else’s story. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/22 "2014-09-26T20:38:41Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > The rightful king sits on the thrown And the steward thrown off. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/23 "2014-09-26T20:49:01Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > I seem to recall that most of his class mates in school were killed in WWI. > I think of WWII because he was mailing chapters to his son who was in the military. That makes it sound like he was snug at home while his chums went off to war. He was an officer with the Lancashire Fusilliers. Although he only spent 5 months on the front and was deemed unfit for duty after being struck with Trench Fever he did see front line duty during the Battle of the Somme. He saw more horror than most of us can imagine and did lose most of his classmates. ---
**Author:** ![standingwave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@standingwave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/standingwave)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/24 "2014-09-26T20:58:35Z")
It’s simple, plain, and humble, just like Sam and most hobbits. It’s also understatement, which is quite British. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/25 "2014-09-26T21:14:09Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > That makes it sound like he was snug at home while his chums went off to war. I certainly did not intend it that way. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/26 "2014-09-26T21:33:00Z")
> [@standingwave](#): > > It’s simple, plain, and humble, just like Sam and most hobbits. It’s also understatement, which is quite British. If it had been an American writing the story, Sam would have married Julia Roberts and moved to Hollywood. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/27 "2014-09-26T21:48:35Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > If it had been an American writing the story, Sam would have married Julia Roberts and moved to Hollywood. Right after kicking Sauron in the nuts, causing him to fall into the lake of lava in Mt Doom. Sam blows a smoke ring from his pipe, turns, and saunters away from the resulting explosion and collapse of Barad Dur without looking back, and mutters his catchphrase, “I’ll cook you some taters one of these days, I will”. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/28 "2014-09-26T22:00:19Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Right after kicking Sauron in the nuts, causing him to fall into the lake of lava in Mt Doom. Sam blows a smoke ring from his pipe, turns, and saunters away from the resulting explosion and collapse of Barad Dur without looking back, and mutters his catchphrase, “I’ll cook you some taters one of these days, I will”. All in slo-mo, of course! ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [September 26, 2014, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/29 "2014-09-26T23:11:10Z")
Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. Sancho had to go to keep the gentleman out of trouble, but was glad to be back when the nutcase finally was ready. Frodo off to asylum on Tol Erresea. ---
**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:** [September 27, 2014, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/30 "2014-09-27T14:33:29Z")
Eh, Rosie Cotton was much hotter than Julia Roberts. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [September 27, 2014, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/31 "2014-09-27T15:03:38Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Eh, Rosie Cotton was much hotter than Julia Roberts. Does Julia Roberts use Nair ™ on her feet? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/32 "2014-09-28T12:38:54Z")
> [@Tim\_R.Mortiss](#): > > Cute, but I must respectfully disagree. When Gersen said “The affair is over. I am done.” he meant it literally; his life had been all about his quest. Like many of us, he was defined by his “demons.” Now that the demons had been exorcised and the quest was over, so was he. It was his tragedy. And there he is with only Alice Wroke and ten billion SVU to console him. Plenty of scope to find a new definition there. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/33 "2014-09-28T13:03:09Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Does Julia Roberts use Nair ™ on her feet? > :dubious: No, she doesn’t. Neither does Rosie Cotton. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/34 "2014-09-28T13:17:33Z")
> [@Terminus\_Est](#): > > No, she doesn’t. Neither does Rosie Cotton. Then it’s Julia, hands down. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/35 "2014-09-28T14:37:46Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > I seem to recall that most of his class mates in school were killed in WWI. From the Foreword to LOTR, p.6: [QUOTE=J.R.R. Tolkien] as the years go by it seems now often forgotten that to be caught in youth by 1914 was no less hideous an experience than to be involved in 1939 and the following years. By 1918, all but one of my close friends were dead. [/QUOTE] > [@](#): > > I think of WWII because he was mailing chapters to his son who was in the military. Foreword, p.6: [QUOTE=J.R.R. Tolkien] It was during 1944 that, leaving the loose ends and perplexities of a war which it was my task to conduct, or at least to report, I forced myself to tackle the journey of Frodo to Mordor. These chapters, eventually to become Book IV, were written and sent out as a serial to my son, Christopher, then in South Africa with the R.A.F. [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![Hermione](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/cdc98d/32.png) [@Hermione](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermione)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/36 "2014-09-28T14:44:38Z")
I can’t begin to imagine what it was like for JRR to see his sons off to another world war, when he’d seen firsthand what the first one was like. (That’s just one of the things I’d like to see a Tolkien biopic cover. If they ever MAKE THE DAMN THING ALREADY, that is.) ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/37 "2014-09-28T14:59:17Z")
> [@Hermione](#): > > I can’t begin to imagine what it was like for JRR to see his sons off to another world war, when he’d seen firsthand what the first one was like. And sadly, for many other Fathers. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/38 "2014-09-28T15:07:29Z")
Well, and that’s kinda The Thing. You may go off and have great adventures. You may fight in a big bloody war that kills most of your generation and changes the world. But if you live through it, you’re going to go home, and you’re going to try to return to a normal life. Because that’s what there is left to do. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/39 "2014-09-28T15:56:32Z")
The line “Well, I’m back” reminds me most of is in a totally different genre. It’s the “‘Have a carrot,’ said the mother bunny” from the end of Margaret Wise Brown’s children’s book _The Runaway Bunny_. I’d have a hard time saying why, but ISTM that they do essentially the same thing in two very different books. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2014, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596/40 "2014-09-28T19:06:21Z")
John Garth’s book _Tolkien and the Great War_ would make an excellent source for a film about Tolkien’s early life. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-im-back-wtf-lord-of-the-rings-ending/699596.md?page=3)