Well, I tried to watch LOTR.

I am a Tolkien fanatic and have been since I was twelve years old. I can quote passages not only from The Lord of the Rings, but also from The Silmarillion.Yes, the movies got farther away from the books as they went. I refer to them as movies using many characters and place names from Tolkien.The one that pissed me off the most was Galadriel's speech denying the ring. It is one of my favorite moments in the books. If you know the characters and their histories, you probably agree it should have been done first with pride and anger and then with quiet lamentation. They had an actress who might have been able to pull it off, but they didn't even try. In the movie, it was a big special effect with a booming voice and Galadriel taking on this semi-ghostly look.

Editorial changes in the interest of length or those sorts of things are fine. For instance, the substitution of Glorfindel with Arwen is fine. There were others that were also fine.The problem for me and others is when the themes of the story are tampered with. For instance, a recurring theme in the movies is one of a reluctance to fight. Aragorn was, in the films, a reluctant hero who had to come around to the idea of becoming ruler of Gondor. As we know, that was Aragorn's goal from the beggining in the books. A reluctance to do what needed doing. Treebeard and the Ents had to be goaded into fighting after the Entmoot by seeing a field of felled trees. Not so in the book. Again, a reluctance to fight.
The Rohirrim and Theodan were another example. In the book, once Theodan was cured of Saruman's influence, he pretty much set out to stomp a mudhole in some wizards ass. The Rohirrim did not withdraw to Helm's Deep as a last act a desperation in hopes of outlasting the enemy and no more. They pulled back there as a last act of desperation in hopes of holding out until the men under Eomer that had followed him in exile could return and the men of the westfold could be rallied. Then, when the summons came from Gondor there was no reluctance to go to their aid. There are other examples I could cite. Why add a recurring idea or theme to the story when it does not provide brevity or story sense and in fact detracts from the ideas of the original?Not to be too picky, but was the arrival of the Elves at Helm's Deep the way you envisioned it? How about the army of the dead at Minas Tirith? Or the dramatic confrontation between Saruman and Gandalf, or between Gandalf and the lord of the Nazgul at the gates of Minas Tirith?Those movies were good whiz-bang summer entertainments. They failed simply in that they did not communicate the central theme of Tolkien, which is that desire for power over others is the root of all evil and that all people of good will must be prepared to stand against such evil.

Is what I'm about to engage in. Aragorn was never reluctant to claim the throne of Gondor, in the books. In the "Tale of Arwen and ARagorn" (an appendix in most editions of TLOTR), Aragorn and Arwen fell in love and Elrond said he would join his daughter to no one less then the King of the Dunedain, so Aragorn set out on his decades long quest to become the king and get the girl.There are two cartoon versions of TLOTR, one the Rankin & Bass animated "Return of The King" (not nearly as succesful as their "The Hobbit") and Ralph Bakshi's late seventies rotoscope (a method recently updated and used in that Christmas Train movie) feature. Bakshi's version ended before the battle of Helm's Deep and the intended second part was never made. You're right, it did suck, but it didn't follow the book much closer then the new films did.Also, as a hardcore Tolkien guy, I feel the need to point out that the genre advancement you refer to has been due to TLOTR, where most aspects of the modern fantasy were codified. If you want to get real technical, "The Worm Ouroborous(sp?" and the short stories of Lord Dunsany predate Tolkien and had many of what are now fantasy conventions, but all that those two bodies of work had done was brought together and popularized by Tolkien. Of course, the transformation of modern fantasy must be attributed to the great writers of the sixties, your Moorcock, Zelazney, Le Guin and the like, but the dean of modern fantasy is and sahll always be that Oxford linguist.So, Crash, you're a good poster, I like what I read from you, and we agree on just about everything (I think), but say Tolkien ain't great again and I'm a-getting out my whuppin' stick.

I'm a-getting out my whuppin' stick!

You fail to show proper respect for the whuppin' stick, and the strong and sinewy hand weilding it.

I never threatened your hindquarters. The whuppin' stick is plied about the head, shoulders, adbomen and groin.Fear the whuppin' stick.

You row, I will fight.

Holmes, the book was completed beforeit was submitted to a publisher. It was the publisher's choice to sp

There's that word again. "Fanboys"; how nice...You risk the next step up from the whuppin' stick...The shakin' cane.Fear it.

I thought you were implying that Fellowship had been written, submitted and published before Two Towers was written, etc. I was just putting my geeky point of fact that is was completed before it was submitted and it was an editorial choice to split it into three volumes. That's all.

You're next in line for the whuppin' stick after Crash.

Well, the answer to that could turn out to be long. I am more then happy to give such an answer, but I would first have to ask if you have read The Silmarillion and how famaliar you are with the history of the character Galadriel?