Ser Drewy

Sometimes I genuinely wonder what JRRT would think of what's become of his art. (I still have no idea why anyone would think Shelob Waifu was a good idea).

Rings of Power Season 2 may feature.... young Shelob? What in the hell?

Extended preview of the Gollum game:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/may/06/head-of-uks-leading-anti-monarchy-group-arrested-at-coronation-protest Head of Anti-Monarchy group arrested at coronation protest.

https://variety.com/2023/tv/news/rings-of-power-season-2-writers-strike-1235603767/ ‘Rings of Power’ to Finish Filming Season 2 Amid Writers Strike Without Showrunners on Set

Tone is the issue rather than plausibility. Legolas walking atop snow has an ethereal quality to it. Legolas mind controlling trolls to smash stuff or surfing mumaks have a Fast and Furious thing about them. (I'm pretty 'eh' on OTT CGI stunts in general these days). I'm not really sure what they have planned for Celeborn. Or how they'll address his long absence with Galadriel's lack of interest in finding him. From memory, he didn't really feature into any of her motivations particularly. It's almost like they never thought about him until the scene with Theo oddly enough. I'm not sure they'd do a love triangle thing, or make Arwen a child of Galadriel. It's possible he'll randomly show up at some point in a dungeon or something possibly where Meteor Man is heading. Or Sauron will come across him and use him to try to manipulate Galadriel in some way,

Quite possible. Jackson had Legolas mind-control a troll by sticking a dagger in its brain, and cut-off hundreds of Orc heads whilst hanging upside down on a giant evil bat. The bar for baffling nonsense has been set highly, tbh.

I think that's just baked-in to Middle-Earth adaptations at this point. Like it won't surprise me if Helm Hammerhand backflips off a wall shooting arrows at Corsairs or runs up a Mumakil's trunk and punches one of the riders tbh.

War of the Rohirrim anime will debut at Annecy Film Festival.

Dianne Abbott suspended after antisemitic remarks: https://news.sky.com/story/diane-abbott-accused-of-hateful-antisemitism-after-suggesting-jews-do-not-face-racism-12864141

Much like Stanek it leaves you wondering why they put all this effort and time into this nonsense rather than just attempting to write something half-decent.

Polychron has now added himself as an author to Fellowship of the Ring on Amazon...

My sides x2: Dear Eru above:

My sides: Apparently this is a list of everything he claims the show ripped off.

Saw someone posting this old interview the Telegraph did with JRRT which I've not seen before: https://archive.is/BYqh5#selection-1231.1-1231.62

Finally caught up with this. I liked it. I think it's a good adaptation from what I remember of the game. It's faithful, slavishly so at times, though some parts are a bit unsubtle. I think both leads did a good job. I'm baffled by complaints that they weren't given enough time to develop, to be honest; I think that part of the show was well-done. I think they did a good job with the ending. It plays out better in dramatic form than video game form, I think. It's easy to lose the emotion in the gameplay IMO. Would've been nice to have a bit more not-zombies in the second half of the season, although I don't remember them really being that relevant in the second half of the game either, if I'm honest.

Sounds like a chance for Peter Jackson to do that Strider + Legolas buddy movie he teased in BOTFA....

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/lord-of-the-rings-amazon-vs-warner-bros-1235337625/ Middle-Earth rights are now split between Amazon and Warner Brothers who want to make independent movies. WB has allegedly expressed interest in bringing Peter Jackson, Phillipa Boyens & Fran Walsh back in some capacity. Boyens has been advising on the War of the Rohirrim anime. Amazon will continue on with their Second Age adaptation, now currently shooting its second season. WB etc will probably stick to the Third Age. One insider in the article suggests WB have plans to Star Warsify the property.

Tolkien commemorated on the new £2 coin: https://www.royalmint.com/annual-sets/2023/celebrating-the-life-and-work-of-jrr-tolkien/ Plus a new book coming in March. His translation of the Battle of Maldon.

Honestly, the burning of Winterfell in ACOK kinda feels like its serving that purpose already: the 'haven' has been attacked and taken over, and though our heroes will likely get it back, it'll never be the place it once was. King's Landing can't really be a Scouring-like place because it's been attacked multiple times in the setting and is deliberately set up as an unsafe place. Nowhere else has that resonance either.

GRRM estimates he's got "about 500 pages" to go. https://www.polygon.com/game-of-thrones/23499159/george-rr-martin-winds-of-winter-finish-release-date-pages

Gandalf seems to suggest so:

6/10 I don't think it's any better or worse than the previous episode. It's not really grabbing me much. The drama feels stilted and while it aims for book resonance more than Benioff & Weiss ever did (which is appreciated), the episode just feels like it plods along. A lot of scenes feel lacking in dramatic weight, like it's just characters explaining things to one another.

I thought it was okay. The C-section scene was powerful. However, none of the characters were immediately interesting like the Starks or Tyrion, or Dany. I thought some of the violence was a bit tryhard - how many faces did we see mashed in? - and I don't understand why the tourney got murderous, or why it was allowed to continue. The dragons looked good. Truthfully I kinda left it feeling like not a lot happened in the hour. I lol'd at the Long Night prophecy. The bad aroma of GOT is still there and all I can think is: yep, the dark winter is coming... for one day.