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I've just finished reading LOTR which I must admit I'd forgotten just how good it is (I last read it about 15 years ago)!

Anyway a collegue in his wisdom diced with death when he said it was nothing but a load of long drawn out boll*cks.
He had the audacity to suggest that the whole deal would have been much better if Gwaihir had just carried the ring, or Frodo with the ring, and just dropped them off at the mountain so that it could be destroyed instead of all the unnecessary pussyfooting around the Middle Earth!

Some people just have no appreciation of good story!

He is right about the eagle thing mind

yeah the eagle thing would be the best idea but wouldn't make much of a book lol

or a film.

i think the eagles werent up for it--too scared of saurons power.


*looks at discos and thor*

i hate people that diss something like lotr

haha imagine.. the film starts, Gandalf rides to get the eagles and they carry Frodo, thats like stuff for 10 minutes

nice quote

well why did they interfere later on then
silly bugger


im tempted to say Birdbreains ;p

Quote? Where?

They did interfere later because they owed Gandalf something
He had healed Gwaihir from a poisoned wound plus Gwaihir was a friend of Radagast

I thought about that, when I read the book I was thinking of Tom Bombadil carrying the ring to Mount Doom and then the eagles- that would have been easier and faster-
But there would not have been a book or story, It would have been awfully boring

It's funny, whenever I read LOTR again, all that normally strikes me is "Geez, long stretches of this are really badly written..."

The Short Version of LotR:

Bilbo: Have this ring Frodo
Frodo: Cool
Gandalf: We must destroy the ring. Gwaihir, take Frodo to Mt. Doom, so he can destroy it.
Gwaihir: K. Come Frodo. To Mt. Doooom!
Sauron: Shit, I'm dead
The end

wow, that's dull

Nice stuff Agent Elrond.

This thread/Eagle topic is tempting yours truly to post yet another long message/explanation.

But nevermind.

post a semi-long message. Give us your 2 cents, actually, for u, it's like 16 cents

LOL!

OK.

The Eagles are entities in their own rights, not taxis.

The Eagles are Manwe's subjects, and as such cannot undertake the problems of Middle Earth directly. Like the Istari, they can help out when necessary, but they are not allowed to do all the work.

The Eagles, similar to Gandalf, are not people (or in this case birds) who intervene all the time. They are not legal citizens who would ally with Men.

First, the only reason the Eagles came to Morannon in the first place was because Gwaihir, Chief Eagle, owed Gandalf a favor. They were not planning to help win the war and tried to stay as neutral as possible, even though they did hope the side of light would be victorious. The Eagles wouldn't have been willing to play such a crucial role, since this was a war of Man, not a war of Middle-Earth vs. Mordor. They had rights as sentient citizens of Arda and would not just take Frodo all the way.

Secondly, that wouldn't help all that much. Even though the journey would be easier, the job wouldn't be. If the Eagles carried Frodo, the Men would not unite under Elessar. What about the great Uruk-hai hosts? What about the evil Men of the South and East? What about Sauron? If Frodo got to Mount Doom without affecting the rest of the world in any way, who cares if he gets the Ring in or not? Sauron might be destroyed, but his armies would destroy everything with nothing to stand in their way. Plus, no last stand of Men outside the Black Gate to distract Sauron while Frodo made his final decision. But, most importantly, NO SAM AND GOLLUM! If Frodo could just fly, no one would need to come with him except other Eagles (even good warriors can't fight very well on birds' backs). Sam was Frodo's voice of reason, without which he would succumb before he reached Mordor, and Gollum was the device to destroy the Ring, since his giddy dancing ended up doing the job just fine.

As Agent Elrond said, 16 cents.

yup

lol

you know how people are. They cant do anything on their own but can perfectly offer suggestions to work that has already been done. As if they know better.

in an age of instant gratification and a throw away society, your friend is in league with quite a many people: why read it when you can rent the movie...

and some people have no imagination nor patience to appreciate great literall works for their minds do not work that way...in a society filled with MTV, reality shows, heavily filled action-sex laden movies, it's no wonder your friend did not appreciate the book...

getting angry about it is just playing into his world...

Quick people-gather round...
im going to do something rare-

Prove
Shadowy
Wrong!



Weeellll.

With sauron destroyed the orcs would not destroy anything-except maybe his old strongholds.
The orcs hated sauron as much as anybody did, and melkor before that.

It is mentioned in the silmarillion how melkor created the orc in mockery of the elves, the orc secretly hated the master they served through fear.
in fact i think somewhere in lotr orcs actually talk about hating sauron and wanting to live peacefully---The orcs that take frodo i think.

Well, the Orcs hated Sauron and Melkor, but they hate the Free People of Middle-earth more, and that's why they're gonna try to destroy everything that they have, it's in their nature already.

Would you really expect the leftover Orcs and the evil Men of the South and East to just sit there prettily in Mordor and Harad and Rhun and Jesus know where else without doing anything just because Sauron was destroyed already? Sure, they hate Sauron too, but it doesn't matter now. They hate EVERYONE else too. They are savage, bastard evils. They are jealous of the free people, and they'll do everything to dominate, to kill, and to destroy.

...they hated him yes, but to live in peace or peacefully???...maybe, as long as they get pillage and plunder and eat man flesh, then yeah...

they didnt
they hated sauron and melkor over everything

for giving them this twisted existense

but were powerless to do anything about...so they took it out on the other races that were prettier than they...


but...what was the topic again???

no they were scared of him and did what he said.

in TTT some orcs even talk about living peacfully--none of this 'Man flesh' cak

remember this?
Elf: *watches fight* How long do you think this will go one for?
Orc: Me dunno. Me bored. Me no like fighting. Me want to grow flowers.
Elf: I thought orcs just want to kill.
Orc: Only if some one says so.
Elf: Will you follow my orders?
Orc: I guess.
Elf: Nice, go kill that orc over there.
Orc: OK

I don't think it matters much for the Third Age Orcs anymore. The Orcs who HATE Melkor tremendously were the Orcs back in the First Age, the first generation of Orcs that were twisted from being Elves. Most of the Third Age Orcs were already born like that...Orcs. They were already born savage, they don't look back anymore, they are ragged, baleful, they don't care about their origin anymore. They just follow what "the Eye" commands.

The Orcs and the other Evil minions hate the free peoples of Middle-earth because of their freedom, their consciousness to obey the path that they knew was right, and most certainly, they hate the free people because they are their enemy, and they certainly can be a damn good meal.

cry FINE

agent elrond, someone needs to call 911, 'cuz you are on FIRE sweetie, you are FUNNY. Shadowy, you are absolutely correct about the Eagles, they have the same POV as the Ents. And as far Old Iarwain Ben-adar taking the ring to Mont Doom - he might have, "...if all the free peoples of Middle Earth would beg him to do so....but he would not have understood why".

And for the record, I LOVE a good story....

no amount of goading would have moved Iarwain to take the ring...not that he didn't care, but it was not in his interest to do so...he fully understood the implication of what the ring can and cannot do...he just didn't want the bother...

for if all things faded in the end...Iarwain would still have Goldberry and frolick about in a merry manner...

addendum...I TOO love a good story...

ouch, sauron send down in his prime

you almost did it my old boy, but leave the correcting shadowy to the big lads - and by that I certainly don't mean me....

Discos - .....yet

*pats discos on the back*

im liking you so much more all of a sudden

i like him more than you...

I don't know if I understood what this current, errh, discussion is about...

... but if it's about the question if the orcs could have conquered Middleearth after Sauron's downfall
they obviously couldn't... theyre following their own hatred but Sauron's command, and without a leader they are lost... cf Battle of Morannon, they all flee, killing their own kindred and so on...

but wait obviously I misunderstood something there as nobody really talked about that

Ignore this post

lol see-exa backs me up
It is pointless to resist--my son, you will join us, or die!



@feanor what, you like discos more than i do
or you like him more than you like me?

Errrh, What are we talking about?

i like him more than you like him but since i had to dissect that the joke is utterly ruin...

sorry but that vader quote came on

not enough appreciation,

so I guess you have taken the time to read all of the topics/threads on this forum and officially declared we dont huh

Discos - *tut*...fool

got to agree with you Ush, there are parts that were very badly written. Even still it doesnt change the fact that LOTR is an amazing piece of work.

Ush, go suck mud!

and you Baylin.....just go

Discos!

*gives another jewel*

you are a hero!

All a matter of opinion
No reason to suck mud

I personally never found any passages "really badly written", but surely there are scenes better than others and some that in my opinion don't really reach the high standards of the rest of the book
but theyre still irreplaceable and brilliant
I really need a peace-smilie here

@exa dont make me say something about mud to you

and what books do you like Ush? jean austin, stephen king?....all but just a few other names of people justas big and creative and awesome as me

Discos - now tolkien on the other hand

... he didnt say that he didnt like lotr

He said that some stretches are in his opinion badly written

Which is something completely different because that's true for each and every book, no matter how close to perfect balance the other sentences, pages, chapters are

*cough* *is watching*

I closed the lid on the mud box, so everythings ok now

There will always be a page or two that would seem to drag on; more like a pause in the action as part of a continuation to the story. A breather if you will.

if you look in the silmarillion, there is a paragraph where Tolkien describes a whole family of elves (I think) and mentioned their relation to each other ie step sisters cousins etc.....argh!

Whether there are long stretches that seem to drag on, it doesn't take away the excitement of the story, the one complaining about the book being bad is just lacking imagination to really appreciate said book.

i thought rivendell was extremly long it took me a while to read as it kept drowning .. to me any way

true but it would of been considerably shorter and not (in my opinion as good) but like i said thats just me.

it takes about >260 pages to actually reach something in reference to an actual "fellowship" of the ring

I read a little in Tolkien's Letters today, there's some comment about an other planned film made of the story, and the changes are a little rigorous there - for example, most of the way the hobbits are carried by eagles

I don't exactly remember Tolkien's reply, but he said something like he already used the eagles nearly too much, it wouldn't be really believeable with too many eagle-scenes, and imo he's right about that - eagles as they are now are ok, but more influence of them would definitely ruin the story, ignoring the fact that there would be nearly no story left

people say rivendell was the worst part of the book.

its my favourite, i couldnt put it down theough that chapter

rivendell sucked? who dare say this treachery.

I prefered Lothlorien myself, but how could people say Rivendell sucked, the part of the Old Forest tired me out a bit.....why couldnt the of just invented a compus right there on the spot

anyways its good though as they got to meet the ye merry Tom