Well, it has been nearly a decade but in the last year I’ve gotten through with reading all the books and the extended versions of the Lord of the Rings movies, so I have been skimming this thread for any interesting discussion/insights from the hardcore fans. Amidst the debates on what counts as a spoiler and lots of pre-release Hobbit talk, there were some interesting tidbits. A few things that stuck out to me (and slightly tie in to my recent experience with the movie), so thought I would weigh in years later. Here are some scattered thoughts on the series and some responses to age old discussion in this thread.
Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings
I think NP made the point that movies are like trailers for books and I generally have the same approach with film adaptations. You get to see some of the most action packed/exciting scenes, but you’re not going to get the full context.
With that in mind, I thought Peter Jackson’s LOTR movies were OK. I watched the extended versions. The visualizations were amazing and by far the best aspect, although the CGI hasn’t aged well in many cases. The set designs and costumes are excellently done though.
I’m not going to fuss over what was or wasn’t included. Something has to be cut to make a movie and everyone is going to have a different opinion on what should get cut. And as much as I would have liked to see the Scouring or even Tom Bombadil, I also completely understand why they left those out. So any gripe over the movie for me is just based on what’s in the movie.
I'm not sure if I would ever watch these again. They were very well done and an impressive feat overall, not to mention that they pretty much wrote the book on 21st century blockbusters, but I felt the story and characterizations lacked the vitality found in the books. Things like the way Gimli and Legolas develop their relationship throughout the books, the nature vs industry allegory of The Two Towers, and even Frodo's departure to Valinor. These things were all in the movie, but just not conveyed with the same amount of depth as in the books. IDK, if I had come into these films without reading the books prior, I'm not sure I would have cared that much about what was going on. I also felt that some of the movies got a little too bogged down in giant action sequences. Again, I get that for their time these were impressive and unique, but it's just hard to get excited about video game fight sequences anymore. The Two Towers was the most egregious in this regard - and this was my least favorite of the three for that reason. Conversely, my favorite movie (and my favorite of the books) was Fellowship because the lack of action sequences allowed for a more faithful recreation of the books that focused more on characters and landscapes. Even despite skipping over a huge chunk of the first half of the book and bringing in extraneous plot points (Arwen mainly), Fellowship felt more complete than the following two. Return of the King was somewhere in the middle. Again, not big on the action sequences and I hated the way Aragorn's Army of the Dead sequences were handled, but Jackson sticks the landing on the ending sequences as well as everything involving Frodo and the ring.
Overall I didn't hate them and I am really glad I got to see them, but I wasn't enamored with them. If you see movies as trailers for the books, there are some great realizations (the council of Elron, everything at The Shire, Mount Doom, etc). For the sum of its parts though? I'm not sure. Based on how these movies landed with me and some of the discussion in this thread, I can't say I have any interest in seeing The Hobbit movies. I don't have a moral quarrel with them (although they seem like blatant cash grabs to me). But I have next to 0 interest in seeing the quaint and lighthearted book turned into a 3 part epic blockbuster. I also just didn't feel that compelled by the positive reviews that were posted here from the time of release.
Merits of adaptation
A lot of this thread consists of a back and forth between Cried and Forostar about the merits of adapting Tolkien - whether Jackson did a good job and even whether it was worth adapting to screen in the first place. There's some interesting stuff in there. LC made an interesting point about how our ways of telling stories evolve and as a consequence the content of the stories we tell also evolve. Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings is much more action-oriented, there's more moments of romance, and less English allegory. It's a much more 21st-century telling of Lord of the Rings.
Where I tend to come down a little closer to Cried on this debate is that while, yes, the LOTR books will always be there, there's something to be said for how much the Peter Jackson movies have influenced the popular understanding of the story. Especially with reading becoming more unfashionable, there's a pretty good chance that Peter Jackson's vision will eventually become the dominant version of LOTR that most people identify with. Maybe that is just the nature of story telling, maybe it's an unfortunate consequence. Whatever it is, the movies are so iconic that they can't be avoided and it's next to impossible to go into the books as a new reader without being influenced by Jackson's universe in some way. But that’s just the reality I suppose and when these books eventually become public domain we’re going to see all kinds of weird Middle Earth content anyway. Which brings me to…
Future works/public domain
I am on the fence about additional Middle Earth material. On the one hand, Tolkien created a rich universe that could be endlessly explored. Certainly more depth than a lot of other blockbuster franchises (namely Star Wars). At the same time, I kinda like that so much of it has gone unexplored until now. I like that things are alluded to in the books to suggest a bigger world beyond the scope of LOTR without every piece of minutiae being explained in some supplemental material. I know The Silmarillion and History of Middle Earth covers some of this ground, but my understanding is that the universe of Middle Earth is greater than what Tolkien put on the page.
So I go back in forth. I think ultimately I would like to see some good Middle Earth content, but I’ve also seen so many IPs beaten into the ground by corporations trying to commercialize to the max and it would be nice for at least one fictional universe to avoid that, but I know it’s futile.
One thing I will say is that my immediate reaction to finishing the books was less of a desire to watch a movie version (it did take me a couple years after to finally watch the films), but more of a desire to play a video game in middle earth. It seems like an rpg style game that is disconnected from the main LOTR story but still set in that universe would be the most satisfying way to enjoy Middle Earth outside of books. Are any of those LOTR games actually good?
Tolkien inspired Metal
Did Iron Maiden ever actually consider touching Lord of the Rings? On paper it doesn’t really seem in their realm, way too much on the fantasy side of things. Even Dune is more sci fi than fantasy. Maybe Seventh Son, but Maiden only deals with the supernatural when it’s a religious or occult kind of thing. So it’s an odd pairing. I love Blind Guardian though and I think Nightfall In Middle Earth is about as good of a metal adaptation of literature as you can get. What makes it work for me is that they went with a Silmarillion story - trying to retell LOTR as a metal concept album just seems like a disaster. Going for a lesser known and smaller scale tale is a much safer bet and gives the band more room to play around with the narrative. It’s cheesy for sure but IDK, for whatever reason BG has more credibility with me than many of their power metal peers like Helloween, Strato, etc.
I've completely forgotten this thread exists, otherwise I might have written here again much earlier, especially with the project I'm undertaking (or, well, maybe not; see below).
In the past year and a half I have been working on my reading project that would take me through everything Tolkien has written - including the drafts and posthumously edited and released stuff as well as every substantial (and quite a few of those less so) work written about him. As of now, my immediate must-read list includes over 130 books (and the entire 12-volume History of Middle-earth is "one book" in this count) and it is still expanding - although more slowly now, but there are at least three books I have added in the last month and a half or so.
Since it is only one of my "lines of reading inquiry" (just at this very moment I'm knee-deep in about 5 other books by other authors concurrently), my progress is rather slow, but I don't particularly mind.
1. Beowulf - A Translation and Commentary
2. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and Sir Orfeo
3. The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays
4. Finn and Hengest The Fragment and the Episode
5. The Tolkien Reader - for Leaf by Niggle, Farmer Giles of Ham and The Adventures of Tom Bombadil
6. The Lay of Aotrou and Itroun & The Corrigan Poems
7. The Silmarillion
8. The Children of Húrin
9. Beren and Lúthien
10. The Fall of Gondolin
11. The Fall of Númenor - and Other Tales from the Second Age of Middle-earth
12. The Annotated Hobbit (The Hobbit with absolutely invaluable annotations done by Douglas A. Anderson)
Currently reading:
13. The Lord of the Rings +
14. The Lord of the Rings A Readers Companion - pretty much the same as the Annotated Hobbit, with notes made by Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull, but published in a separate volume, because of its length - it's almost a thousand pages by itself)
The thing is, my concern - while decidedly not academic - goes beyond that of a casual reader anyway; having Tolkien as my Patron Saint and having a degree in theology myself, combined with my particular interest in Medieval history and literature (and partially in languages as well) makes me interested primarily in 1. the undeniable Catholicism of Tolkien and his work (funnily enough, even in the secular lectures he often finds a way how to put it in), 2. the comparison with actual Medieval literature (including legends and such), but more as a commentary on Medieval virtues or on the narrative approach or structure etc. than any shallow surface-level "X is Grail" type of pop criticism + 3. the strange place Tolkien's work is in, as far as literature is concerned, what with being an anti-Modern post-modernist that laid the groundwork for a (development of a) separate genre of modern fantasy that usually does not remind the reader of him at all.
In short, just like with Dante (who is altogether different, but actually rather similar in many ways), I am interested in Tolkien's work as in the "literature of virtues"; it is not all-encompassing and there are more nuances and aspects, but the basis is there.
(BTW, as of now I am quite convinced that it is Beowulf (and Tolkien's commentary thereupon) that is really the key to the sum of his work, but I don't want to simplify it too much; let's leave this for later.)
Also, I found it useful (and not often said) that it is altogether beneficial to approach JRRT as either poetry or prose poetry, that gives the reader a rather helpful mindset or Vorverständnis to begin with.
That said, despite everything I have said above and despite having read the books before watching the Jackson movies, I am undeniably in love with the latter as well. DESPITE the usual complaints (which are indeed mostly sound), i. e. primarily:
- the characterisation (and infantilisation) of hobbits, especially Merry and Pippin
- devolving Gimli into a comic relief of sorts
- the extremely mishandled characterisation of Denethor
- the characterisation of Faramir
- the lack of two thematically significant parts (and quite important at that) - Bombadil and the Scouring of the Shire
and so on, I find the films to be quite useful and in many ways very beautiful. Probably because a lot of the aspects I love in Tolkien's work has been retained in a way I would never expect from a "Hollywood" movie.
Because the spirit is there, believe it or not.
Because of all those thousands of hours of work and love and care and passion have no precedent and no follower (really, nowadays I'm almost inclined to put on the Extended Editions special features and commentaries, just to bask in the fanboyish passion of everyone involved.
Because of Shore's incredible work with the score - the thematic density, the beauty of the melodies, the overall thought put behind that. I have been studying the score alone for several years (with pauses, of courses) and I am still finding new stuff. For beginners (who don't have Doug Adams' book on the score), since the website Magpie's Nest is now defunct (she would still send you the archived webpage, if you asked) I'd recommend the Youtube user Monoverantus and his three playlists where he analyses the score in depth - one for each Complete Score: 1. Fellowship of the Ring, 2. The Two Towers, 3. The Return of the King. Really, try it, it's great.
And now the bomb - despite everything I said above, despite being a "book first", serious, literary fan - I actually mostly like-to-love the Hobbit movies as well, this post is already long enough, so I won't elaborate, but from a certain point of view, there is actually a lot of similarity between the book and the movies that people often overlook - there are some very significant flaws (Alfrid, primarily), but as a whole, I have a lot of appreciation even for these movies; like I said, it would require a longer delving-into, maybe I might do so later on.
Anyway, after seeing enough excerpts and reading enough about it (and after seeing the absolutely wretched Amazon Wheel of Time adaptation), I still haven't found the courage to watch Rings of Power. Maybe one of these days...
Also, since people here are in general younger and the video games thread is quite active, let's just say that from what I heard, there are some good game adaptations of the Legendarium out there, but so far I have been only able to corroborate the alleged excellence in these cases: Lord of the Rings - The Return of the King (2003) - yes, the hack-and-slash tie-in for the third movie - I have spent hundreds of hours with it back in the 00s and it still stands out as a great game
Battle of Middle-earth 1, 2 and the Witch King DLC - BTW, although the multiplayer servers have been shut down some time ago, there are fan-made servers that allow you to play the game in multiplayer even nowadays - with a bit of tweaking.
LEGO Lord of the Rings (yep, I'm not kidding, it's a great game)
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