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I have received your critique of ‘The Return of the King’ and would like to respond.
I agree the movie is long and the end drags on a bit (I don’t appreciate your joke about leaving in the middle of the 11th false ending and wondering the next day if the movie were still playing). You assert it’s not so well explained in the movie why Frodo leaves Middle Earth at the end, but I say it’s clear his experience with the Ring - the stabbing on Weathertop by the Lord of the Nazgul (aka The Witch-King of Angmar), the trauma of the destruction of the Ring in the fires of Mount Doom, etc. – have made it impossible for Frodo to return to normal life. Arwen Evenstar gives Frodo her place on the ship which is her privilege as one of the Eldar, since she is not sailing to the Undying Lands due to her choosing a mortal life for love of Aragorn (hard to blame her there).
As for the movie being “gayer than ‘Angels in America’” (never saw the movie), I council you not to criticize Jackson and the cast for being brave enough to show deep friendship/long companionship, born of jointly fighting - and besting! - the Dark Lord, Sauron, manifested in unashamed male-on-male expressions of affection of the hand-holding, comfort-hugging and tickle-fighting varieties. [We’ve all engaged in tickle-fighting with other men and, frankly, it just feels right sometimes, as does Rimming, Teabagging, Snowballing and Burglary. Throw in a Donkey Punch and you’ve won me over.]
Some of Samwise Gamgee’s crying bothered me too; he blubbered and no one likes that.
The Hobbit whom you think is named ‘Mary’ is actually nicknamed ‘Merry’ which is short for his real name, ‘Meriadoc Brandybuck.’ But your central claim is basically correct: it is implied in more than one scene that Merry takes Pippin’s “hairy Hobbit backside” (to use your coarse language) not to mention the implication of the oral and anal choo-choo-trains which take place at the back of the Horse and Dragon in Bywater. [Counter intuitively, Samwise is the only real man in the lot, despite the blubbering and the rampant ass-play and feces-trading he and Frodo engage in on Mount Doom, as he knocks up Rosie Cotton at least twice during the duration of the second group of four false endings (ha ha ha – asshole); in the book, they have upwards of 4 or 5 Hobbitlings.]
I’m sorry you did not take to the movie as I did but I’m glad you at least found entertainment value in some of the battle scenes and were somewhat awestruck at the technological wizardry the film puts forward.
Sincerely,
Fredrick
Date Written: February 23, 2004
Author: John Slocum
Average Vote: 4.25