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SirPhoebos posted:I reached the chapter with Tom Bombadil in my re-read and I had totally forgoten about Goldberry. I know that Tom has a They meet in one of the poems in this collection..
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Jan 24, 2015 23:22
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status in the lore, but what about Goldberry? Is her background ever illuminated?
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SirPhoebos posted:I reached the chapter with Tom Bombadil in my re-read and I had totally forgoten about Goldberry. I know that Tom has a I think Goldberry's meant to be a fairy spirit that appeared in Middle-Earth without being a Maia necessarily. Back in the early editions before Tolkien thought up the Maiar, there were magical nature-related "fairies" walking around who were separate from Men and Elves. Melian was originally one of them, but the idea faded over time and it's not mentioned in the published Silmarillion or LOTR. Tom and Goldberry are probably remnants of it; they don't really care enough to be spirits that serve the Valar.
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Jan 26, 2015 01:01
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When did Gandalf and company first come to Middle Earth? (particularly in relation to the events in the Hobbit and LotR?)
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Jan 31, 2015 00:07
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SirPhoebos posted:When did Gandalf and company first come to Middle Earth? (particularly in relation to the events in the Hobbit and LotR?) The arrival of the Wizards was one of the events that marked the start of the Third Age. I believe they were sent to help the Numenorians not turn evil, and keep Sauron from returning.
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Jan 31, 2015 00:43
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SirPhoebos posted:When did Gandalf and company first come to Middle Earth? (particularly in relation to the events in the Hobbit and LotR?) The arrival of the Wizards was one of the events that marked the start of the Third Age. I believe they were sent to help the Numenorians not turn evil, and keep Sauron from returning.
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Jan 31, 2015 00:44
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So, if the Wizards were present throughout the Third Age...why didn't Saruman just dredge the river to find the Ring?
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Jan 31, 2015 00:59
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He tried at one point, if I recall; but also he was worried that if he made a big show of looking for the Ring in the Gladden Fields, the others on the White Council would know what he was up to. This after he had gone to some lengths to convince them that he thought the Ring had been washed out to sea long before.
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Jan 31, 2015 01:05
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VanSandman posted:The arrival of the Wizards was one of the events that marked the start of the Third Age. No they came 1000 years into the 3rd age.
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Jan 31, 2015 02:19
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Data Graham posted:He tried at one point, if I recall; but also he was worried that if he made a big show of looking for the Ring in the Gladden Fields, the others on the White Council would know what he was up to. This after he had gone to some lengths to convince them that he thought the Ring had been washed out to sea long before. Yeah, but surely 1000+ years is long enough to slowly and covertly look for it. Saruman was just lazy.
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Feb 1, 2015 02:08
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Octy posted:Yeah, but surely 1000+ years is long enough to slowly and covertly look for it. Saruman was just lazy.
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Feb 1, 2015 03:51
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Can I just say that Treebeard is one of the best chapters of LOTR? It has a great variety of moods, captures the central theme of the small influencing the great, it's an excellent character study of Treebeard and the Ents, and it's placed as a perfect counterpoint to the Uruk-hai chapter. When you pair it with The White Rider I feel like it's the most openly hopeful part of the trilogy. The laws of nature itself are changing to fight evil: trees are coming to life and dead friends return from the grave. Contrasted with the stagnancy of The Old Forest and Galadriel's Lothlorien and it's like the world is moving again.
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Feb 1, 2015 20:07
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It's funny, the thing that bugs me the most about Tolkein's biases is how wolves are basically four-legged orcs in the books. I wasn't bugged by the wargs in the movie, but that was because those were clearly CGI monsters. Wolves are actual animals, and they were nearly driven to extinction in North America because of the mindset that they're innately evil. Sorry for the  . On another note I find it kinda funny how way less of a jerk Boromir is in the book. I guess it goes to show 'If you miss one Will Save, no one ever lets you forget it.'
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Feb 4, 2015 16:34
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SirPhoebos posted:It's funny, the thing that bugs me the most about Tolkein's biases is how wolves are basically four-legged orcs in the books. I wasn't bugged by the wargs in the movie, but that was because those were clearly CGI monsters. Wolves are actual animals, and they were nearly driven to extinction in North America because of the mindset that they're innately evil. Most people in the films are just caricatures of what they were in the books. Especially Boromir and Denethor. And Gimli  , my favourite character. He's just a comic sidekick.
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Feb 4, 2015 16:42
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SirPhoebos posted:It's funny, the thing that bugs me the most about Tolkein's biases is how wolves are basically four-legged orcs in the books. I wasn't bugged by the wargs in the movie, but that was because those were clearly CGI monsters. Wolves are actual animals, and they were nearly driven to extinction in North America because of the mindset that they're innately evil. It was a fairy tale trope as old as Beowulf, and Tolkien was in no position to try to be Farley Mowat on top of everything else. He did at least have a pretty naked dogs-over-cats bias though 
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Feb 4, 2015 19:46
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SHISHKABOB posted:People used to call things "blue" when it's like dude that's not blue that's really dark grey or something. The vikings, for example, called Africans for "blue men".
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Feb 4, 2015 20:23
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Data Graham posted:It was a fairy tale trope as old as Beowulf, and Tolkien was in no position to try to be Farley Mowat on top of everything else. I guess it's just a consequence of the
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Feb 4, 2015 22:09
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Hogge Wild posted:Most people in the films are just caricatures of what they were in the books. Especially Boromir and Denethor. And Gimli The movies contain a lot of things, but subtlety is not one of them.
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Feb 4, 2015 23:01
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Alhazred posted:The vikings, for example, called Africans for "blue men".
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Feb 4, 2015 23:08
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This article mentions it. It's pretty interesting. There's a lot of speculation that phrases like "wine dark sea" from Homer etc are relics of a time when blue wasn't thought of as a color at all - just some variety of "dark." I've seen experiments where African people living in the grasslands can easily distinguish a slightly different shade of yellow-green that to my eyes looked almost impossibly close to the others. At the same time, they couldn't see that a cyan square was different from an aqua one (or something like that, shades of bluish green). I could easily see which one stood out, they had a really hard time. Color perception depends a lot on language and culture. Here's an article based on specific experiments. Prolonged Panorama fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Feb 5, 2015 |
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Feb 5, 2015 01:05
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Prolonged Priapism posted:This article mentions it. It's pretty interesting. There's a lot of speculation that phrases like "wine dark sea" from Homer etc are relics of a time when blue wasn't thought of as a color at all - just some variety of "dark." Interestingly enough, this particular cliche was so omnipresent in ancient Greece that they often decorated the rims of their wine amphorae with ships, so that when they were filled up, the ships painted on would appear to "sail on wine dark seas"  Homer is filled with cliches and fixed epithets like this; they presumably helped the poet remember the lines, and would help keep the meter. Athena is always Grey Eyed Goddess Athena. All swords are Sharp Swords. A famous example of this failing to work as intended is "The loud barking dogs did not bark".
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Feb 5, 2015 06:42
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Rosy-fingered dawn. Always with the rosy-fingered dawn
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Feb 5, 2015 16:59
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Gollum first picks up the Fellowship's trail in Moria, right? So how does he follow them after Gandalf destroys the Bridge?
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Feb 5, 2015 17:08
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Hogge Wild posted:Most people in the films are just caricatures of what they were in the books. Especially Boromir and Denethor. And Gimli What they did with Denethor was just so ham fisted, and they even had a good actor playing him so they could have played up the nuances with him a lot better. Instead of a noble man tormented by visions of overwhelming forces arrayed against him leading to despair, he's just a giant self righteous shithead who hates his second son for no reason (I know he favored Boramir and was more critical of Faramir in the book as well but the movies took it into ridiculousness) SirPhoebos posted:Gollum first picks up the Fellowship's trail in Moria, right? So how does he follow them after Gandalf destroys the Bridge? I think it's assumed he knows more secret ways out of Moria. I mean, the orcs also followed the Fellowship out as well so there obviously some other exits.
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Feb 5, 2015 17:36
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Levitate posted:What they did with Denethor was just so ham fisted, and they even had a good actor playing him so they could have played up the nuances with him a lot better. Instead of a noble man tormented by visions of overwhelming forces arrayed against him leading to despair, he's just a giant self righteous shithead who hates his second son for no reason (I know he favored Boramir and was more critical of Faramir in the book as well but the movies took it into ridiculousness) A bunch of angry people on the internet have posts about how PJ and Co. don't really believe in the idea of nobility as a character trait. It's kind of passé, I guess. Through that lens the character changes to all the Numenorean-descended characters make more sense to me.
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Feb 5, 2015 19:47
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Levitate posted:What they did with Denethor was just so ham fisted, and they even had a good actor playing him so they could have played up the nuances with him a lot better. Instead of a noble man tormented by visions of overwhelming forces arrayed against him leading to despair, he's just a giant self righteous shithead who hates his second son for no reason (I know he favored Boramir and was more critical of Faramir in the book as well but the movies took it into ridiculousness) The scene where he ate some food made me hella hungry tho
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Feb 5, 2015 22:07
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I felt the same way about Galadriel's rejection of the Ring in the movie. If you strip out the special effects, Cate Blanchet delivered a fantastic piece of acting, with very challenging dialogue. Instead we get a bunch of garbled effects that overpower the acting entirely. It was a real shame, as it could have been one of the finest moments in the first movie. Contrast with the later scene with Aragorn and Boromir on the slopes of Amon Hen, which had no effects and focused on the actors. I thought that scene was particularly well done. Spoilered because I know we have at least one first-reader in the thread at the moment.
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Feb 6, 2015 15:27
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Ynglaur posted:I felt the same way about Galadriel's rejection of the Ring in the movie. If you strip out the special effects, Cate Blanchet delivered a fantastic piece of acting, with very challenging dialogue. Instead we get a bunch of garbled effects that overpower the acting entirely. It was a real shame, as it could have been one of the finest moments in the first movie. Yeah, like holy wow I've seen a clip of it somewhere of just her acting the scene out and I got serious goose bumps. Ynglaur posted:Spoilered because I know we have at least one first-reader in the thread at the moment. Thanks! But if you were talking about me I've seen the movies so I'm fairly familiar with most of the things.  My reading's also been going along really slowly because of school, work, and doing so many things to get into the Navy. I'm still on chapter three.  I did, however, settle the hundreds of pages of paperwork and joined Wednesday so I may find some free time now.
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Feb 6, 2015 17:49
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Ynglaur posted:I felt the same way about Galadriel's rejection of the Ring in the movie. If you strip out the special effects, Cate Blanchet delivered a fantastic piece of acting, with very challenging dialogue. Instead we get a bunch of garbled effects that overpower the acting entirely. It was a real shame, as it could have been one of the finest moments in the first movie. I think that's a tough scene to do either way. It is described in the book somewhat similarly as what they do in the movie but I think it's one of those effects that's hard to do...I always felt like it was describing how it looked to Frodo so it's kind of a mental trick rather than an actual visual effect, but that's easier to envision in your head than to put on the screen. That said, they could have probably done a bit better job with it
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Feb 6, 2015 20:18
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I got another question about the Bridge of Khazad-Dun. The movie depicts it as a narrow arch that can only be traversed by one person at a time and had no guard rails on either side. A lot of pre-movie art pieces of the Gandalf/Balrog face-off show a similar depiction of the bridge. Was this supposed to be the main East entrance into Moria during it's heyday? Compared to the relatively practical architecture we see, the bridge looks more like something you'd find in Star Wars.
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Feb 6, 2015 21:13
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SirPhoebos posted:I got another question about the Bridge of Khazad-Dun. The movie depicts it as a narrow arch that can only be traversed by one person at a time and had no guard rails on either side. A lot of pre-movie art pieces of the Gandalf/Balrog face-off show a similar depiction of the bridge. Was this supposed to be the main East entrance into Moria during it's heyday? Compared to the relatively practical architecture we see, the bridge looks more like something you'd find in Star Wars. It's described in the books as an internal defensive bridge of the dwarves, a deliberate choke point vs. orc incursions.
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Feb 6, 2015 21:25
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I think the LotR movies did a good job. They weren't very subtle but that was necessary/a good idea for a big movie. All the cut parts were good decision from a movie pacing perspective. (The opposite from the Hobbit films..)
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Feb 6, 2015 22:31
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I don't think there was anything wrong with Movie Boromir. Fellowship was easily the best adaptation.SirPhoebos posted:So, if the Wizards were present throughout the Third Age...why didn't Saruman just dredge the river to find the Ring? Saruman didn't just come to Middle-earth, cackle and say "I gotta find that ring and enslave everyone!" Saruman is the best Tolkien villain in my view because his corruptiona nd "fall" is the most detailed and believable of any bad guy in LOTR or The Silmarillion. From Tolkien Letter 181: His [Gandalf’s – but also all of the wizards] function as a ‘wizard’ is an angelos or messenger from the Valar or Rulers: to assist the rational creatures of Middle-earth to resist Sauron, a power too great for them unaided. But since, in the view of the tale & mythology, Power – when it dominates or seeks to dominate other wills and minds (except by the assent of their reason) – is evil, these ‘wizards’ were incarnated in the life-forms of Middle-earth, and so suffered the pains both of mind and body.” “They were also, for the same reason, thus involved in the peril of the incarnate: the possibility of ‘fall’, of sin, if you will. The chief form this would take with them would be impatience, leading to the desire to force others to their own good ends, and so inevitably at last to mere desire to make their own wills effective by any means.” From Unfinished Tales, The Istari: For it is said indeed that being embodied the Istari had needs to learn much anew by slow experience, and though they knew whence they came the memory of the Blessed Realm was to them a vision from afar off, for which (so long as they remained true to their mission) they yearned exceedingly. Thus by enduring of free will the pangs of exile and the deceits of Sauron they might redress the evils of that time. Saruman's corruption was not an overnight process. It was a slow, creeping and insidious thing just like how evil is in real life. A multitude of factors came together to slowly drive Saruman closer and closer to the edge . There was Saruman's jealousy of Gandalf, his increasing belief nothing but the Ring could stop Sauron, the weakness of being Incarnate... Mostly I was just quoting this to show that Saruman when he arrived, didn't really know much of anything. He had to spent several of those centuries just regaining what had been lost. Sorry, I just really like his character and reading Tolkien supplementary material is just as fascinating as reading the books themselves.
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Feb 6, 2015 23:20
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The Belgian posted:I think the LotR movies did a good job. They weren't very subtle but that was necessary/a good idea for a big movie. All the cut parts were good decision from a movie pacing perspective. (The opposite from the Hobbit films..) In theaters I loved all of them (LOTR that is, first Hobbit was alright, the rest meh). They did a fantastic job of what is pretty much an impossible task, translating these books to film as critically and financially successful movies without any reasonable book-fan hating it. For whatever reason they haven't really held up that well when I watch them now. They frequently seem corny. I can't explain why.
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Feb 8, 2015 02:14
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I'm almost done with my reread of Fellowship-they're on the Great River. A few of my thoughts on their stay in Lothlorien and their journey south. -Haldir is less of a dick in the book, and Celeborn is more of one ("Boy do I regret lifting the prohibition on dwarves!" said right in front of Gimli). -I'm sure this wasn't the intent, but Gimli's crush for Galadriel always came off as creepy in the book. -There's a lot of talking about how little hope there is in succeeding, to the point that I feel it goes into breaking the Show-not-Tell guideline. I know that this opinion benefits from the hindsight of knowing the quest succeeds, so I'm curious to know if that comment has been made by others. -The description of the land around the River Anduin as they go south is a lot different than what was filmed. -Legolas buries the Fel Beast harder than HHH.
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Feb 12, 2015 21:45
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I always thought the film depiction of Anduin was really unsuitable. In my mind it was supposed to be Mississippi-wide, meandering through lowlands and fields. The film made it out to be more like a mountain stream. Part and parcel with taking whatever New Zealand gives you, I guess, and the Shire and Mt. Doom were great and all, but if there's one thing I would change about the movies it would be to use more appropriate landscapes for Anduin and Rohan and the Misty Mountains foothills.
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Feb 13, 2015 01:18
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You can put me down as someone who wishes we had book-Pelennor in the movies. I totally get why it didn't happen, but it would have made for a much more apocalyptic feeling.
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Feb 14, 2015 01:05
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What is Adamant in Middle Earth? In my reread I've seen it twice: first in describing Galadriel's ring as "The Ring of Adamant" and then as a building material when Frodo sees Barad-Dur from Amon Hen. Is it a metal like mithril?
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Feb 14, 2015 20:05
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SirPhoebos posted:What is Adamant in Middle Earth? In my reread I've seen it twice: first in describing Galadriel's ring as "The Ring of Adamant" and then as a building material when Frodo sees Barad-Dur from Amon Hen. Is it a metal like mithril?
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Feb 14, 2015 20:37
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UoI posted:Yeah, like holy wow I've seen a clip of it somewhere of just her acting the scene out and I got serious goose bumps. I realise this is from a while back, but have you got a link to this? I'm coming up with nothing
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Feb 17, 2015 01:43
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webmeister posted:I realise this is from a while back, but have you got a link to this? I'm coming up with nothing I did a Google and Youtube search when I made that post so I could throw it in there but I couldn't at the time and still can't as of now. 
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Feb 17, 2015 05:32
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