LOTR trilogy is terribly overrated

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The discussion critiques the Lord of the Rings (LOTR) trilogy, with one participant expressing that the films are overrated and boring, particularly criticizing the excessive CGI and long overhead shots. Others suggest that the viewer's experience might have been improved by reading the books first, as they offer a richer narrative. Some participants note that while they enjoyed the movies, they found certain aspects, like the pacing and character portrayals, lacking compared to Tolkien's original work. The conversation also touches on the challenges of watching all three films in one weekend, with many agreeing that it can be overwhelming. Overall, the thread reflects a mix of disappointment and appreciation for the LOTR films, highlighting differing opinions on their value and execution.
gravenewworld
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Roommate made me watch all 3 this past weekend. :zzz: :zzz: :zzz:


The first movie was extremely boring. The next two were just awful as well. I wanted to throw the remote at the TV after the 103948302948023984234 overhead flying shot.

LOTR trilogy has got to be some of the most overrated set of films ever. CGI sucks.
 
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Oh, geez. You're not already into LOTR and someone made you watch all three of them in one weekend? I'm a fan, actually, but I feel for you.
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I, Elf Lord Moridin, banish you to the deep dungeons of to-tried-to-make-up-a-name.
 
You've gone through this in the wrong sequence. First you READ the Hobbit, then you READ the Trilogy. Last you watch the movies and wonder how the writers, cinematographers, special-effects crews, set designers, etc managed to capture at least a portion of Tolkien's work.
 
Hey, my dear friend made those movies and he visits here.

A pox upon you!
 
I second CQ's comment. I enjoyed the films, but can't imagine being forced to sit and watch the entire trilogy in a weekend!
 
turbo-1 said:
You've gone through this in the wrong sequence. First you READ the Hobbit, then you READ the Trilogy. Last you watch the movies and wonder how the writers, cinematographers, special-effects crews, set designers, etc managed to capture at least a portion of Tolkien's work.
The books had a better story. But they weren't as fun to read as the movies were to watch.
 
50% of the movies could have been edited out from all of the running through fields in the hobbits' home to all of the useless overhead flying shots. Half the time there was simply a homosexual overtone running rampant (not saying it is bad).
 
Moonbear said:
I second CQ's comment. I enjoyed the films, but can't imagine being forced to sit and watch the entire trilogy in a weekend!
Unless I have accumulated a massive personal debt with a person, I cannot imagine submitting to many hours of movie-watching to placate them. Methinks GNW dost protest too much.
 
  • #10
turbo-1 said:
Unless I have accumulated a massive personal debt with a person, I cannot imagine submitting to many hours of movie-watching to placate them. Methinks GNW dost protest too much.

I watched all the Star Wars from 1-6 back to back straight. I kind of am a movie buff.
 
  • #12
Hurkyl said:
The books had a better story. But they weren't as fun to read as the movies were to watch.
Hey, Hurk. In college, I borrowed the Hobbit from a dorm-mate. I read it in a day and immediately went out and bought a boxed set of the paperback version of the trilogy and burned the whole next weekend reading that. I've always regarded reading as a collaboration between the author and the reader, and have found it tremendously enjoyable. From age 10, when my parents bought a house with a large library of really cheaply-produced "classic" books, I started reading Verne, Dickens, Twain, Hawthorn, etc, etc.

For a parallel, read Dune, then watch the movie. Read the Exorcist, then watch the movie. the books were by far superior.
 
  • #13
Argh someone watched Star Wars 1-3. :eek:
 
  • #14
Kurdt said:
Argh someone watched Star Wars 1-3. :eek:

Yah. 1&2 were atrocious. 3 was OK. Then you have 4-6.
 
  • #15
I have to admit the Elven songs and poetry in the books were too painful for me to read (bored my socks off) and I had to skip over them.
 
  • #17
turbo-1 said:
For a parallel, read Dune,

Ugh, no, don't. Dune was SO BORING I wanted to gouge my eyes out.

The end had the battle scene, but I was SO disappointed when it was over in like a page and a half.
 
  • #18
I heard that the exorcist book is too scary to read.
 
  • #19
gravenewworld said:
I heard that the exorcist book is too scary to read.
If you're alone in an unfamiliar house (I was) and try to read it overnight, you might not get much sleep. That is a really horrifying novel.
 
  • #20
gravenewworld said:
I heard that the exorcist book is too scary to read.

I saw The Exorcist for the first time just after I'd seen http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repossessed" with Leslie Nielsen, a parody of it, so I couldn't stop laughing.

I thought http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0404032/" was great and super-creepy, though.
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  • #21
Yes, read the books. But I can summarize much of them into this: ride for many days, eat mutton, ride for many more days, get attacked, lick your wounds, eat mutton, ride for many days. I swear to god that all they eat is mutton in those books! I tried reading the Silmarilllion when I was about a 5th grader...Jesus I made it about an 1/8th in and gave up. Still haven't gone back and finished it. Tolkien was a great author, and really made this a real world. Thats basically what the Silmarillion is, the bible of LOTR. Theres actually a lot of other books explaining different time periods and such.
 
  • #22
Seriously, has anyone here even eaten mutton? OH...MY...DOG...horrible, horrible aftertaste that has lasted 30 YEARS!

...URP...ugh. 'Scuse me.
 
  • #23
lisab said:
Seriously, has anyone here even eaten mutton? OH...MY...DOG...horrible, horrible aftertaste that has lasted 30 YEARS!

...URP...ugh. 'Scuse me.

Really? How did you have it, lisab? I usually find that Greek restaurants and Persian restaurants do it up pretty nice.

But maybe you got unlucky and had a black sheep of a chef cooking. (Sorry, that didn't really work. Maybe you just had some baa baaad mutton? I give up.)
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  • #24
I read "The Hobbit" and found it tolerable, but not more. I abandoned LOTR after about 100 pages into the first volume. My opinion of Tolkien is that he is better at philology than he is at characterization and plot line. My wife loves the movies. They are among the few tapes we own and there was a time when she watched them over and over again. In my opinion the fans of Tolkien should be in up in arms over the lousy acting in that film, especially the roles of Frodo and Sam Gamgee. Anyone who saw the interview of Elija Wood (Frodo) on late night TV (Jay Leno I think it was), the "p*ss and sh*t" episode, will realize that there is something missing in the man.
 
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  • #25
gravenewworld said:
Half the time there was simply a homosexual overtone running rampant (not saying it is bad).

The ratio is much higher in the books. Not that there's anything wrong with it! Actually, it is a particularly unique English male bond-in-wartime theme. That's how it was described to me, anyway.

I enjoyed the movies for the most part. I was nearly screaming at the end of the third film "GET ON THE F****** SHIP!" They scratched the best part of the books (Scouring of the Shire) in favor of the dull denouement of the Grey Havens.

Also the battle scenes were too long, and the physics of the Humans with trebuchets and a height advantage losing agains orcs in a valley with catapults... that just annoyed me.

But hellyeah, watching 9+ hours of a movie in one weekend, that's too much unless you are in a body cast.
 
  • #26
The movies are better than the books imo, as the book has all these extra things- long lineages, longer histories, songs , funny languages etc.
 
  • #27
CaptainQuasar said:
Really? How did you have it, lisab? I usually find that Greek restaurants and Persian restaurants do it up pretty nice.

But maybe you got unlucky and had a black sheep of a chef cooking. (Sorry, that didn't really work. Maybe you just had some baa baaad mutton? I give up.)
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CQ, I don't think I've ever had it cooked up right.

My mom would make it into a stew. She was very old-school about nutrition when we were kids; a meal without meat was unthinkable. After my folks divorced we didn't have much money, so she would cook cheap meats -- organ meats, chipped beef from a can, venison, and...mutton. Maybe it was just bad meat...I remember clearly how rancid it tasted.

Shiver!
 
  • #28
My grandpa was a sheep herder when he was younger, so had mutton about once a week when I knew him. I don't remember it being anything special, however, I have had some amazing leg of lamb dinners since then.
 
  • #29
lisab said:
CQ, I don't think I've ever had it cooked up right.

My mom would make it into a stew. She was very old-school about nutrition when we were kids; a meal without meat was unthinkable. After my folks divorced we didn't have much money, so she would cook cheap meats -- organ meats, chipped beef from a can, venison, and...mutton. Maybe it was just bad meat...I remember clearly how rancid it tasted.

Shiver!

Was it from an old ewe or an old ram? The rams have a stronger taste (even with lamb, if it's a ewe lamb, it'll be milder and better tasting than if it was a ram lamb...unfortunately, most of what gets sold as lamb here is ram lamb because they keep the ewes as replacement breeders). Even some lamb has a distinctively sour aftertaste that I cannot stand, though have recently had some that doesn't have that taste (then again, when it doesn't have that aftertaste, it has almost no taste at all...might as well use cheap chicken).

Mutton also just means it comes from an adult sheep, so you'd very likely get a different taste/toughness from a young adult than an old one.

Funny, though, I don't remember them eating mutton in the books or movies. I remember lots of Elven bread or something like that.
 
  • #30
I really enjoyed the books and the movies. I think the technology at the time of the movies were breakthroughs. Heck I rarely see CGI as good even today.
 
  • #31
Moonbear said:
Was it from an old ewe or an old ram? The rams have a stronger taste (even with lamb, if it's a ewe lamb, it'll be milder and better tasting than if it was a ram lamb...unfortunately, most of what gets sold as lamb here is ram lamb because they keep the ewes as replacement breeders). Even some lamb has a distinctively sour aftertaste that I cannot stand, though have recently had some that doesn't have that taste (then again, when it doesn't have that aftertaste, it has almost no taste at all...might as well use cheap chicken).

Mutton also just means it comes from an adult sheep, so you'd very likely get a different taste/toughness from a young adult than an old one.

Funny, though, I don't remember them eating mutton in the books or movies. I remember lots of Elven bread or something like that.

For some reason, when I read the books when I was young I thought that "Elven bread" was chocolate. I don't remember a mutton reference, either...and since I always get a strong "AAAGGHH" reaction when I come across it I think I would have remembered.

You're probably right, it probably was the worst-tasting variety of sheep available - it had to be. Eating it made me regret that I was born with a mouth.
 
  • #32
I couldn't watch all of the LOTR at one sitting, but I loved the movies. And I loved the books, too.

But when I read the books and "saw" the story in my head, there was a lot less focus on their furry little feet.
 
  • #33
lisab said:
But when I read the books and "saw" the story in my head, there was a lot less focus on their furry little feet.

:smile:

The biggest problem I had reading the books was that the names all sounded so similar to me, I kept confusing who was who and lost track of the story. At least in a movie, I can see who is who without worrying what their names are.
 
  • #34
gravenewworld said:
Roommate made me watch all 3 this past weekend. :zzz: :zzz: :zzz:
He made a mistake. You should have seen the Extended Editions instead, with 2 hours more material. :smile:
 
  • #35
I'm not a big fan of reading fiction. I prefer my textbooks. I did try The Hobbit and got to chapter 2 then gave up as it bored me. I don't know what it is but I've never been a fan of story books. I must have no imagination. :frown:
 
  • #36
Chi Meson said:
The ratio is much higher in the books. Not that there's anything wrong with it! Actually, it is a particularly unique English male bond-in-wartime theme. That's how it was described to me, anyway.

I didn't see it as being homosexual. It was guys that were out miles away from home, for long periods of time, who ended up depending on each other to survive. Maybe they were in love, but it seemed like more of a platonic love than romantic.

Funny thing, the Spartans were similar in that regard. But they also had homosexual partners in their group or unit or whatever, since face it, normal people need the lovin'.
 
  • #37
Kurdt said:
I'm not a big fan of reading fiction. I prefer my textbooks. I did try The Hobbit and got to chapter 2 then gave up as it bored me. I don't know what it is but I've never been a fan of story books. I must have no imagination. :frown:
That's sad Kurdt. Science fiction and fantasy books are my happiest memories.
 
  • #38
Kurdt said:
I'm not a big fan of reading fiction. I prefer my textbooks. I did try The Hobbit and got to chapter 2 then gave up as it bored me. I don't know what it is but I've never been a fan of story books. I must have no imagination. :frown:

Don't worry, I'm like that, too. Never really cared about fiction. Would read non-fiction biology books and astronomy books in grade school (scaled down to my level, of course), since it was just so much more interesting. I don't think I've read more than maybe 10 or so fiction books throughout my life. Probably 9 of those are Star Wars books. 5 or 6 I was forced to read in school.
 
  • #39
Poop-Loops said:
I didn't see it as being homosexual. It was guys that were out miles away from home, for long periods of time, who ended up depending on each other to survive. Maybe they were in love, but it seemed like more of a platonic love than romantic.

Funny thing, the Spartans were similar in that regard. But they also had homosexual partners in their group or unit or whatever, since face it, normal people need the lovin'.

I'm not even sure what you guys are referring to. I hadn't noticed anything like that at all. You all really MUST have been bored to be analyzing the story at that level.
 
  • #40
I don't know, to me it was obvious. Sam and Frodo went through so much. I think I remember "I love you"'s being exchanged between them.

Then there was Merry and Pippin. They grew very close. Gimli and Legolas grew close, too, but I don't think it was nearly as close with them as with the Hobbits.

It was also weird how there was a total lack of women in the books. I'm glad Jackson decided to add in Arwen into some parts.
 
  • #41
Poop-Loops said:
I don't know, to me it was obvious. Sam and Frodo went through so much. I think I remember "I love you"'s being exchanged between them.

Then there was Merry and Pippin. They grew very close. Gimli and Legolas grew close, too, but I don't think it was nearly as close with them as with the Hobbits.

It was also weird how there was a total lack of women in the books. I'm glad Jackson decided to add in Arwen into some parts.

Weren't Merry and Pippin brothers? And Sam and Frodo also related? There was a lot of brotherly love, and male bonding, but I didn't notice anything more than that.
 
  • #42
Moonbear said:
Weren't Merry and Pippin brothers? And Sam and Frodo also related? There was a lot of brotherly love, and male bonding, but I didn't notice anything more than that.
BLASPHEMER!

Meriadoc and Peregrin were cousins, and Sam was Frodo's servant.
 
  • #43
arildno said:
BLASPHEMER!

Meriadoc and Peregrin were cousins, and Sam was Frodo's servant.

Oh, right, it was Frodo and Bilbo who were related. I TOLD you I get all their names mixed up.
 
  • #44
Poop-Loops said:
I didn't see it as being homosexual. It was guys that were out miles away from home, for long periods of time, who ended up depending on each other to survive. Maybe they were in love, but it seemed like more of a platonic love than romantic.

That's what I meant about "bond-in-wartime." Tolkein lost a few very close friends in WWI. Without this reference, many of the "men with men" scenes in the book can appear "gay." Soldiers in war know what this is about. Evidently, there was a particularly English "public school" / army officer that was even more so. So, no I'm not really saying it has homosexual undertones. It just can seem that way.
 
  • #45
arildno said:
He made a mistake. You should have seen the Extended Editions instead, with 2 hours more material. :smile:

Oh they were the special editions jam packed with all sorts of extras (the DVDs that looked sort of like books). We watched 1&2 on Sat. and 3 on Sun.
 
  • #46
gravenewworld said:
Oh they were the special editions jam packed with all sorts of extras (the DVDs that looked sort of like books). We watched 1&2 on Sat. and 3 on Sun.

You must have been crawling out of your skin when everyone was crying by the boats as Bilbo and Frodo slooooooooowly walked away.
 
  • #47
I plan on building a hobbit hole sometime in my lifetime. Can you imagine how efficient it would be?
 
  • #48
binzing said:
I plan on building a hobbit hole sometime in my lifetime. Can you imagine how efficient it would be?

binzing, you and I are of one mind on this! YES, hobbit holes are so cool!

But my dream home would be more than the hobbit hole. The hobbit hole would be the deepest part of the house, and the rooms would transition from underground to a room that's completely outdoors...and...and...

Oh, I digress yet again.
 
  • #49
I've already planned this and looked at logistics (been like this since I was about 10). I plan on using 11 foot concrete pipe, which would allow for standard 8 foot ceilings, while giving a large amount of space under the floor for pipes, electricity, etc. The hole would also probably have a few regular square or rectangular rooms, although they would be underground, even below the hobbit hole.
 
  • #50
turbo-1 said:
If you're alone in an unfamiliar house (I was) and try to read it overnight, you might not get much sleep. That is a really horrifying novel.

Try reading Legion the second book by candle light that is pretty scary. Call me legion for we are many. Hurrr, *shudders*

Evo said:
I have to admit the Elven songs and poetry in the books were too painful for me to read (bored my socks off) and I had to skip over them.

Count yourself lucky Tolkien wanted to write the whole book in Sindarin (elven) But a friend persuaded him not too, there are actually 3 fully formed languages along side the book. And about seven books full of extraneous information including maps, flora, fauna and so on. To be frank it is remarkable that the film captured anything like the world Tolkein created, and is testament to the makers already being big fans.

I am a massive Tolkien geek so I am biased but I thought the films were remarkable. Wish they would have done the scourging of the Shire at the end. And I don't see why they omitted mention of Tom Bombadil particularly in the extended versions, but ho hum, only so much you can squeeze into 3 hours I suppose.
 
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