Leofric

My first concert was Carlos Santana when I was in High School back in the early 80's, one of the Concerts on the Common in Boston.

Lots of books of interest, including Scalzi, Wells, McDevitt, Tchaikovsky, Cronin, Keyes, Elliot, Ryan, etc. Also looking forward to book 3 of Sooty Feathers. Good to hear the next in the Bronze age series by Miles Cameron is coming, but any word on the next book in his SF series, the sequel to Artifact Space? Would also love another Penric and Desdemona novella or full blown novel.

I started the Tyrant series in November and just finished Funeral Games, the third book, with Ptolemy's defeat of Demetrius in the defense of Egypt. It does a good job of laying out many of the contenders who arose following Alexander's death and as you mentioned how they were all once fought side-by-side and are now turning on each other in hopes of claiming power. The earlier books focused on Greeks and Scythians horsemen of the Steppe along the north coast of the Black Sea, and gave some scope to the extent of Alexander's reach. This book focused on the new city of Alexandria and the politics of the eastern Mediterranean with some great naval battles and just life at sea during this period. On to the next one, King of the Bosporus.

Luthen's whole talk with Lonnie and his line "I burn my life to make a sunrise that I know I'll never see", made me think of him in comparison to Chiwetel Ejiofor as the Operative in Serenity and his talk with Mal. The Operative: "I believe in something greater than myself. A better world. A world without sin." Mal: "So me and mine gotta lay down and die... so you can live in your better world?" The Operative: "I'm not going to live there. There's no place for me there... any more than there is for you. Malcolm... I'm a monster.What I do is evil. I have no illusions about it, but it must be done." One is basically supporting an evil Empire while the other is fighting against one, but they are both willing to do whatever they need to in order to achieve their goal, their belief they are making a better world, but not for themselves.

Luthen's speech at the end talking of sacrifice, then we switch to Mon Mothma having to decide if she is willing to sacrifice her daughter in service tot he rebellion.

I think it's not so much about Vel's background as it is Luthen's. If Vel is Luthen's daughter, then Luthen is tied into a role, he is some rich guy trying to do good, a friend of Mon Mothma's playing at rebellion. But now that Vel is part of Mon Mothma's circle rather than Luthen's, then Luthen is once again a complete enigma. His antique dealer is already shown to be a persona, a cover, he inhabits to allow him to meet with Mon Mothma and explain his travels off world as trips to restock his shop, but who he really is and where he comes from is completely unknown.

After watching the Falcon Heavy lift off and the double booster landing, I'm reminded that I don't care what Musk does to Twitter just as long as it doesn't negatively impact what he is doing at SpaceX and to a lesser extent what he is doing with Tesla and with storage battery development.

I didn't remember the title, but about 10 minutes in when Flynne takes takes over the the game for Burton it suddenly hit me, "I know this story and this is going to be awesome".

I think i got one of the those honorary badges when I was six, but its been quite a few years since I flashed it and tried to get anyone to "Respect my authoritey!".

I always took Halbarand asking Adar if he remembered him was that Halbarand was once asked by Adar to make the same choice the old villager did, he killed one of his own in order to survive being captured by the Orcs and worked with them for awhile before he fled to the sea. That is why he felt ashamed and wanted to make a new life in Numenor rather than go back to the Southlands.

This was obvious when she jumped into the middle of the sea rather than continue into the West where the deceit would have immediately been exposed.

I liked the Bombadil stuff. The only part I always found dragging was Sam and Frodo's trips across Mordor after they escaped Cirith Ungol. It felt like Tolkien was killing time by stretching out their trek, so the rest of the scattered Fellowship's adventures could be told in the same time frame. I liked episode 3, the introduction of Numenor and Elendil and his family. Not sure about Halbarand being an uncrowned King, it's a little cliche. Don't who the Meteor Man is supposed to be, but still hoping he will be a Blue Wizard, which will be confirmed when they follow the star chart to where the second meteor landed and his twin pops up. Then the Blue wizards will save the proto-hobbits from being corrupted by Sauron and get them out of the Southlands before it becomes Mordor, where the shadows lie.

As Ran mentioned this was a parody, not real commentary, but if you want to follow the logic presented, then Rohan's claim to economic power is that they controlled the main supply of horses to Middle Earth, the primary means of transporting people and goods. Plus it is stated that they refused to sell horses to the agents of Mordor, forcing Mordor to steal mounts from Rohan for their Black Riders.

That might be more from Mann as he needs the spatial awareness as a director to understand how the pieces of the action will move across the screen.

I watched the first two episodes and enjoyed them. I've read the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings half a dozen times, but only read the Slimarillion once, some 20 or 30 years ago, and never read all the other Middle Earth books built on Tolkien's notes and early drafts. (Though I have also read Farmer Giles of Ham a number of times as well, love that book). So basically I am familiar with the names and the basic details of creation of the world and Elves and Men and the war with Morgoth and later Sauron, but am very hazy on the details. So, I can enjoy this by recognizing names and scenes when they pop up without worry too much about where they fall in the timeline. As to the finding of mithril, I assume it would take centuries or more from first finding mithril to it becoming the favored metal of elves and the main trade good of Moria and dwarves striving to dig deeper and deeper into their mountain to mine every last bit and finally release the Balrog, unless they plan for this Prince Durin to be the Durin of Durin's Bane.