Wired's LOTR III Tech Breakdown

rjjm writes "Interesting little logistics piece in Wired about the technology WETA used for for The Return of the King." Ya know, now that the Matrix hype vanished into nowhere, I'm glad the LotR hype is gearing up. I think this one will earn it.

Comments

Re: earning it's hype

[thenextpresident]

As a LOTR reader of many, many times, I keep hearing the same problems people have with "what they removed" and "what they changed." And frankly, it's getting old.

From the standpoint of the movies, the Saruman plot is finished, over, and done with. The seven minute scene you refer to is NOT important to the overall plot of the move: getting the ring to Mordor. You can argue all you want, but I remember hearing the same things when people complained about the removal of Tom from the Fellowship. But that hardly ruined the film.

While I agree that the extended editions are much, much better than the theatrical release, ROTK will still be a really damn good movie.

As Fran says in the TT extended edition DVD, this is one group of fants interpretation of the LotR. I never expected a blow by blow account of the retelling. Indeed, one of the scenes I missed (the one with Radagast) was never even brought up!

Put another way, if the books had never been written, and LotR had been simply a movie without a book, would that make a difference. Yes, it would. So rather than judge the movie for what they had to leave out, but rather, for what they put into the movie.

Re:The Mystery of Tom Bombadil Solved!

[doubleyewdee]

Tom Bombadil and the Witch-king of Angmar are the same person.

Actually, well, no. No they're not.

I suspect this is a clever troll, but I'll bite anyways. IHBT, IHL, IWHAND.

1. There's a lot of stuff you don't "hear" about in the First Age. Big deal.
2. You never see Galadriel and the Nazgul together either. So what?
3. The 'there' in Tom's comment was in reference to the pond from whence he retrieved the water lilies for Goldberry. In furtherance of this, according to the timeline, the Nazgul were not yet aware that Frodo had left the Shire at the time he met Bombadil.
4. Just because they knew who the real ring owner was intended to be does not mean they would not have been effected by it.
5. All the Nazgul could see him. Glorfindel could see him. Big deal. Does that make Glorfindel the Witch-King, or Tom Bombadil?
6. Now this is just getting silly. Any number of denizens of Arda could probably have done the same thing.

None of your points prove much of anything, except that the Nazgul and Bombadil were not in the same place at the same tim in LOTR.

A stronger case could be made, I think, that Bombadil was actually a subdued manifestation of Iluvitar (or one of the Valar). In Tolkien's world good and evil are rigidly defined (as they are in all mythologies) and I find it hard to believe that he would intend something this preposterous, when in no other case do you see a being that is both extremely evil and extremely benevolent in LOTR.

Anyhow.. IHBT. :)