that's 12 to 13 hours out of the day

Why? Look, I really like Glorfindel. He's a very cool character. In fact, for years I've had this idea that in the far recesses of his mind, during the Council of Elrond, when Gandalf is saying "even if you were to give us an Elf Lord of your house, he could not open the road by the power that is in him", Frodo was over there thinking "shut up Gandalf -- I love Merry and Pippin, but I'll take Glorfindel thanksallthesame."

But the plot is already complicated enough to squeeze it into the timeframe he had, letting Arwen do it reduces the number of characters in the series and also introduces a strong female character to help connect with the women in the audience. Let's face it, women do NOTHING in Lord of the Rings. Nothing on-stage anyway.

What Arwen does is also consistent with Tolkien's other works, so it's not absurd in the context of his world either. Luthien faced off Sauron (with Huan doing the grunt work) and then Morgoth himself in the Lay of Lethian. Frankly, all she really does is help partially heal Frodo (very consistent with Luthian and Arwen's own father (Elrond) and grandmother (Galadriel)'s abilities, and then steal a bit of Gandalf's thunder with the horses.

Would I personally have preferred to just stay true to the books? Yes. But I get why he made the changes and frankly, they're just not that big a deal to me.

I have a friend that absolutely loathes the LOTR trilogy simply because they cut out the Tom Bombadil section of FOTR. I love the books too but I'm not that big of a purist.

I really liked Bombadil in the book. But it would have been really hard to project that character into film. He was impossibly confusing and mysterious even in the book. It would have taken 30 minutes of explanation for viewers unfamiliar with the book to understand Tom in the film...

It didn't bother too much that they left him out of the movies. At the same time, I would've really liked to have seen come out, bouncing around in yellow boots singing "Hey dol! merry dol! ring a dong dillo!" -- mostly for comedic purposes.

Ditto, though my friend doesn't "loathe" the trilogy, he's just really upset about leaving out Tom Bombadil.

As if he's integral to the story or would be worth the extra half-hour they'd need (at least) to cover all that stuff. Seriously, what was Jackson supposed to do? Be completely faithful and make three five hour movies??

I saw the movies before reading the book, and I could completely understand why they cut him. That whole section just seemed like the hobbits fell into an acid trip that didn't belong with the rest of the story other than to show that there was more powerful things out there.

I have heard alot of people say that. That is most people's only gripe with the movies.

I am excited about the Hobbit. However, I really hope Jackson gets Smog right. If Smog looks like shit, it's going to suck.

Smaug


/fanboy.

I hope your being sarcastic here. Did you NOT see who killed the Witch-King of Angmar during the Battle of Pelennor Fields? Um, Eowyn...Shieldmaiden of Rohan. The movie-adaptation did not use the books dialogue, but the spirit of the scene is the same: no MAN can kill the Witch King, but a WOMAN did (with help from a Hobbit).

Ha ha... exactly..

The whole "Kinda omnipotent tree hugger Cheshire cat lumberjack with a penchant for silly poetry" really doesn't fit with the rest of the story...

Meh, they sort of left the part out about the special abilities of the "hobbit's" sword. But whatevs. (I still see your point, though.)

/fanboi

I am pretty damn excited for this. What an awesome book it is. I am going to just hope and trust that the 3 movie deal works out. I will probably go out of my way to enjoy it either way. Being that I am a pussy when it comes to spiders I am not sure how I will handle that part. The scene in the trilogy was really rough for my bitch-ass.

Lol did you get edited by mods in this or did you really type the last two sentences?

Arachnophobia?

I ****ing hate spiders too. It's not uncommon.