Tag: tolkien

Irritation

It has been one of those days. Everything that has happened today has rubbed me the wrong way. Well… maybe not everything, but most things. Why? Is it because the Bruins were shut out last night? It could be. Is it because the fucking Yankees are in the World Series? It might be.

Here’s hoping the drive home will be a turning point. Granted I will have to stop for gas before I get home, but I am finally going to finish my JRR Tolkien deep dive/audio book re-read. Well… I listened to the Silmarilian (boy, was that rough) and about 15 minutes into tonight’s commute I will complete The Lord of the rings (much better, except for all the singing… ouch). Up next in my Audible queue is Stephen King’s new short story collection. That should be a nice palette cleanser after all the Middle Earth fantasy. I guess I should read The Hobbit too, for completeness, and anything else that Tolkien may have published that I have never read. Naw, let’s get into some King for a while.

Once I get home the plan is to make a quick dinner for me and the love of my life. Burgers (fried on the stove) and fries (fried in the air fryer). Then we’ll sit down in the living room and enjoy a quiet night together making fun of our clinically insane cats. As per usual.

Here’s hoping for a fun, quiet night tonight and a less stressful work day tomorrow.

Movies vs Books

Why am I in such a Tolkien phase right now? It’s probably due to the second season of Rings of Power, but I read The Silmarillion and I am rereading Lord of the Rings and I am watching Rings of Power and I am (finally) watching the Peter Jackson Hobbit movies. I’m about 15 minutes away from finishing the second movie. It is requiring more suspending of disbelief than I am really willing to give. I’m in a weirdly completist mode now and have to get through all three movies (even though it is laughable that Jackson took a 400 page book and adapted it into a nine hour movie).

What’s the point of this post though? The point of this post is a spoiler free comment on Rings of Power season two episode four. I saw the first two Lord of the Rings movies before I read the books. When I was done with everything I was able to look back and consider if the books were better or worse than the movies. I think they are pretty even. There are a couple of things about the movies that I prefer to the books though. First, there is a whole lot less singing in the movies. In Fellowship, especially, people are singing all over the place and it just gets tedious.

The other thing that I like better about the movies eventually became my absolute favorite thing about the movies. Literally the thing I like best. Simply, they left Tom Bombadil out. I mean… The Hobbit was a kids book. Lord of the Rings was not. Somehow it seems that Tolkien must have tried to make Fellowship a little more kid-friendly by throwing this insufferably boring, painful character named Tom Bombadil into the story. In my current re-read of the books I am in the middle of the Tom Bombadil arc right now and I cannot get out of it fast enough. It’s just awful. Jackson left him out of the movies and it makes me love the movies that much more.

I just finished this week’s new episode of Rings of Power. Season two, episode four. Without giving out any spoilers, mostly because the news has been out since we saw a trailer months ago, Tom Bombadil is in the episode.

Why? Why, Amazon Prime Video? Why are you torturing me like this? I will say that he’s nowhere near as awful in the episode as he was in the books, but all the same… why would you do this to me?