Amazon, Warner Bros in Talks for LOTR Series Adaptation: Variety

Whoa, I hadn't heard there was a new Dune movie coming out. Starting a new thread in Arts and Entertainment.

I hope I'm not off about the Dune rumours.

When I said "being made" I was searching for words, as all I've heard so far is who might be directing, and some seemingly confirmed casting choices.


And Maynard of Tool might push the new music further into the future, but there are bits of evidence that has me hoping for 2019.

Oh, it's being made. I started the thread already. I have misgivings about casting Jason Momoa as Duncan, but the other casting choices seem spot on. I just hope the director, Villanueve, "gets" Dune. Lynch got the look, but didn't understand half the other themes.

Well... map at least should confirm this is post second age since Beleriand isn't in there.

The caption "Three Rings for the Elven-kings under sky," suggests either second age or some focus on the Elves. Perhaps this going to tell of the events leading up to the Last Alliance? That could be interesting to see... the old lands of the Elves, maybe when Moria was populated etc.

It's pretty well established it will be the young Aragorn chronicles for the first season at least. I'm hoping they would explore beyond that in the other 4 seasons. I'd like to see the Rings of Power being made and distributed, with all the carnage that followed. That would get us into Moria.

I would like to see the Rangers, and above ALL!

TOM BOMBADILL!!!

They'd have to construct a whole ranger culture. Tolkien gave very little to go on.

Come to think of it, why would Aragorn take on the job of getting the ring to Rivendell all on his own? This seems like something worth 2 rangers at least. If they can get 20 rangers all the way down to the muster of Rohan, you think they could scare up one at least to give Aragorn a hand. Doesn't quite hold water, does it?

Mrs Figg wrote:
TOM BOMBADILL!!!  

I'd accept Tom as an occasional interlude.  But we have no hints he and Aragorn ever met.  He expressed no opinion when the topic of Tom was brought up at the council of Elrond.  I don't think Tom will show up in the first season at least and I can't imagine how it would work if he did.

Either he will end up being made serious or I will be made to feel as awkward as I did during the dishwashing scene in the hobbit.

The dishwashing scene in the Hobbit was one of things they got most right. But I can't imagine how to handle full-on Tom style silliness. Would have to give up on most of the singing.

halfwise wrote:
Come to think of it, why would Aragorn take on the job of getting the ring to Rivendell all on his own?  This seems like something worth 2 rangers at least.  If they can get 20 rangers all the way down to the muster of Rohan, you think they could scare up one at least to give Aragorn a hand.  Doesn't quite hold water, does it?

The rangers have a lot of responsibilities, presumably Aragorn thought that keeping an eye out for the Hobbits on the East Road outside of Bree was not something that required more than one of them. After he caught sight of Tom and and some hobbits rejoining the road, overheard some interesting bits of their conversation, and then followed them to Bree... well I'm not sure why he did not get help before leaving for Rivendell. It's been too long since my last read-through, but I recall that the attack on the Prancing Pony happens their first night there. Perhaps Aragorn deemed that they could wait no longer before leaving: that they had to act before all the Black Riders converged on Bree. Pretty risky business, overall, but who knows if more of his kin would have saved them, when the Riders eventually caught up with them at Weathertop? Ultimately it was Glorfindel's help that saved them, or else I think Frodo would have been taken.

Yeah, I had similar thoughts, but for something this important I call it pretty poor planning.  The rangers would have heard about what happened at Bree, you'd think they's have pre-arranged to link up at Weathertop as soon as things go down. Or after the ruckus at Crickhollow you'd think they'd string themselves out along the road out of the Shire. They weren't too busy to head south later on, surely they could rearrange their forces close to home.

This heading south later is quite a different operation of course: coming to the aid of their king as he works to come into his own. And we see some of what happened because of their leaving with the destruction of the Shire under Sharkey and Co.

Here's the map itself. Might have to open the image in a new tab to see the whole thing.



It extends further south and east than the maps you'll find in most editions of LOTR, though the southern portion can be found in other official maps, including the one by Pauline Baynes, which Tolkien was involved in the creation of. This is far from the first map to depict mountains to the east of the Sea of Rhûn, but I don't think those ever appeared on a map Tolkien himself was involved in the creation of. Most (all?) didn't extend that far east, nor does the Baynes map show rivers flowing into the Sea of Rhûn from the east. Hopefully someone will correct me if I'm mistaken.

halfwise wrote:Come to think of it, why would Aragorn take on the job of getting the ring to Rivendell all on his own?  This seems like something worth 2 rangers at least.  If they can get 20 rangers all the way down to the muster of Rohan, you think they could scare up one at least to give Aragorn a hand.  Doesn't quite hold water, does it?

Why does Aragorn not carry a functional sword?

Letter 210 wrote:Strider does not 'Whip out a sword' in the book. Naturally not: his sword was broken.

Now that's a good question. He really should have left the thing with Elrond and trotted around with a functional troll sticker.

That map is a non event. The only reason I can think for putting out an unlabelled map is that they plan to cover so much time that place names may change?

hmm what if its Aragorn who fell in a barrow and Tom tells him to run around naked for a wee bit with his crown jools a dingle dangle hey ho fol-de-rol a ninny hoo!

Somebody knows how to get audience numbers up.

halfwise wrote:The dishwashing scene in the Hobbit was one of things they got most right.  But I can't imagine how to handle full-on Tom style silliness.  Would have to give up on most of the singing.

They may well have got it in the spirit of the book but it made for quite uncomfortable viewing in the world PJ had built it in to. Wasn't my cup of tea.

the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings have a very different feeling to them, almost seem to be different authors. It's true that PJ took it too far in the Troll fight and goblin cave, so that you don't feel there is any threat to these cartoon characters. It's a subtle balance and he whiffed it.

{{{  So much I wish I had time to comment on here!!   But only time for a question.

Has it been actually officially confirmed the series is young Aragorn. Because whenever I see something about it on Facebook or similar and read the comments below- an awful lot of folk seem to be expecting either LotR's or bits of the Silmarillion (which I dont even know if they have the rights to use or not!) and there is never a response from the 'official series' to any comments to say otherwise. So do we actually know what they are making? }}

Nothing new but always good to hear someone else's views.

"dune-nigh-DEEN"??

A few miles from aber-deen.