The Lord of the Rings

The Lord of the Rings is a trilogy written by professor J.R.R. Tolkien, who in 1897 stole the manuscripts from the dungeons of a castle in Transylvania. Scrolls of the same accounts of a Dark Lord with a One Ring were also said to be stored away at Vatican City where they kept their antique torture devices. Tolkien wearing a disguise of a heretic got himself thrown into the lower levels of the main serpent church alter and proceeded to take microfilm of the stash of knowledge there. He also managed to steal MicroJesus. Tolkien was long gone before they realized the MicroJesus was missing. Tolkien was listed as a suspect but they couldn't do anything outside of rebooting the original program and saving it to a zip folder. Making MicroJesus even smaller and buried under pages of code that took forever to scroll through the syntax that presented his holy image. In the end they opted to create a more sufficient Jesus. They named it Jesus 2.0, which did unseemly miracles like turning leather into duct tape.

Having survived World War II after almost being killed in World War I, Tolkien was more prepared and knew his way around. He dedicated his life to writing about wars in far off lands, wars that could not easily be rewritten by the George W. Bush Nazi regime. But there were those who were nervous that Tolkien was writing about things they had no control over since the locations were governed by other powers-that-be. He was brought in to the Grand Inquisitor for questioning. They knew he did something but not sure what exactly. They grilled him over the character of the Dark Lord having a similar name as Satan. But Tolkien assured them he was just making it all up as he went along. He drove the point further by explaining that somewhere in the story a crazy guy had magic rings for breakfast. That the One Ring never had any influence over said crazy guy and that another crazy fish guy also had it for breakfast along with a human finger and merrily dove into a volcano. So how could he be doing anything but writing a friendly children's book?

The only thing that stood in Tolkien's way, was finding a suitable publisher. A respectable publisher that would print his books with the best illustrations and materials. He wanted a map of Middle Earth included without having to get permission from some pompous map printing company. Thankfully he secured all the rights and Atlas Shrugged. Once the professor found the proper publishing company to send all his manuscripts to, he found that the publisher he would be working with also published such works as Alice in Wonderland, The Chronic of Narnia, and Darth Maul's Diary. At first he was a little unnerved by the usual fare of the book company, but he wasn't going to be too picky as the other choices would have put him in the same company of book sellers who published such works as I Am Going To Kill Your Brother and Your Brother is Dead. Tolkien wisely opted to stay with the aforementioned publisher.

Plot[edit | edit source ]

The foundation of The Lord of the Rings is the peaceful countryside inhabited by small folk known as Hobbits. They loved to grow flowers. Pick flowers. Grow pipeweed. Smoke that pipeweed. Pick pipeweed by the bushels, and smoke even more pipeweed. They loved to eat. They farmed like nobody's business. They raised corn. Grew all kinds of Fruits and Vegetables. They would make tons of butter. Butter was essential for all those taters they harvested. They were a highly advanced culture of smoking food fanciers that every so often, they would travel across great distances to visit the great ovens of Mount Doom.

It wasn't always like that, however. For many centuries hobbits didn't even know about such places. It wasn't until Gandalf, who loved pipeweed showed up and basically guilt-tripped Bilbo Baggins into coming with him and some lonely dwarves to confront a Dragon. This was the piping into the trilogy that comprised three parts; The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King.

The plot's characters centered around mainly the hobbits who loved to smoke and eat. A lot. And their adventures through many dangers and many exotic cuisines throughout Middle Earth. It also emphasized a man who would become king who would live in a city that looked like a wedding cake. The other main feature of the plot is a magic ring. But not just a magic ring, but in fact, the One Ring. It was the main device that overshadowed the lives of some of the hobbits, as well as the elves, the dwarves, the wizards, the men, the women, the horses, the orcs, well just everybody.

It's the one thing that is present all through Tolkien's narrative. A Ring so powerful that it made everyone into its slave. But there were characters that did not succumb to the Ring's power. They were Tom Bombadil, Galadriel, to some extent, Bilbo. And to varying degrees of defiance, Frodo. It had no real power over Faramir. Or any of his fellow warrior pals. It didn't do much for the Balrog. Or Shelob. Or even the giant eagles. It also never really had any power over any of the horses. Or Shadowfax, lord of the horses. It had some small influence on Sam, but then, it really didn't. It had zero power over Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli. It also sucked at trying to win over Meriadoc Brandybuck and the fool of a Took, Pippin. Elrond was hellbent on having it destroyed. In short, the mighty Ring of Power really sucked at being an all-powerful piece of bling. But that is the plot of the overall story. Eventually the Ring would suck so bad that it ended up being accidentally melted down to nothing because it made the mistake years ago to hook up with Gollum who was then known as Smeagol.

One Ring, the Nine random more, then Seven, and the fancy Three[edit | edit source ]

The Dark Lord Sauron, who was cosplaying as just one of the guys, made some rings. He made a lot. He crafted nine rings. He knew exactly who to give them to, and they gladly accepted them with no questions asked. Then the Dark Lord Sauron crafted seven rings. He knew exactly which dwarf lords to give them to, and they grabbed them and thought it was pretty nice of Sauron to be handing out rings like that. What a swell guy, they thought. Then the Dark Lord Sauron crafted three rings. Three magic rings. He put much care into the detail and workmanship of those rings. He knew who he wanted to bestow those three magic rings to, and came to them all pretty, hair combed, a dab of Abercrombie & Fitch cologne, and the three rings he placed in pretty little boxes. He offered them to the three elf lords who would surely detect something suspicious in his offering. And they did. But they took them anyway and then hid them from him because they knew he would probably try to come back and steal them. He did.

As the story goes, Sauron made all these rings, nineteen in total, and passed them around. Choosing who would get them, and wield them. His plan was all set. He began forging a Master Ring. A ring that would detect all the other rings. Like a radar or smart device that pinged the location of all the other rings he'd made. His first few attempts were pathetic. They didn't really do much and he had to throw them away. Then he crafted some more ring prototypes to be his one true lovely ring. It wasn't until he figured it out, that making a ring so powerful, he would need to get into a vat of lava and use the searing pain of sitting inside a blast furnace to get top notch results. He was so charred and disfigured by the making of his one ring that he cursed it to embody anything and everything that would either turn one into a toad or at the very least possess, levitate and make vanish, anyone who just happened to be in his way. He was super pissed off about having to endure horrific injuries but no pain, no gain, right?

Once he got the spell to working and the one ring to connect to all the other rings he'd made, he began corrupting all of them. One by one. The first couple of them was just basic dumb spells. Five of the nine men were turned into Liberals. Then they started getting tattoos and having their rings pierced through their noses. Sure enough, Sauron came and ripped their faces off and took their rings. The other four men, seeing this drew their swords, and Sauron zapped them with his One Ring and then went to retrieve their rings from the piles of ashes they had left behind.

Then Sauron went to wrangle the seven rings from the dwarves. He got back only a few of them, but that was on account of the dwarves not being able to return them for different rings. The others simply had a borrowing system going on, so Sauron was shit out of luck. Then the dark conniving toast face went to try to steal the three rings he gave to the elves. They weren't having any of it. Sauron was banned from all their lands and kingdoms. He was placed on the Most Wanted list, dead or mostly dead, and he was forced to retreat to Mordor where he made his One Ring, making him look at the very place that traumatized him. And to add insult to injury, he had to get used to eating from the only crop grown in those harsh lands, the Mordor Jalapeños.

Of Hobbits and other small folk[edit | edit source ]

The mystery of how the Hobbits came to exist was one that's better left alone as some scholars might say. There never was any real deep diving into where hobbits came from, and it was just accepted that some dwarves got together with some elves and perhaps a bartender or two. Again, nobody was really asking. There was the fact they were a type of Munchkin with extreme foot fur, like the paws of a falkor and incredibly good at growing crops of pipeweed and food. All these factors seem a bit odd. But in a good way. In Middle Earth, there were dwarves, men, and elves all living in harmony for the most part in what would be The Shire. There were some strange ships going on. Hobbits were experts at all things that mattered in life. They were easy to talk to. Easy to convince of things. Gandalf had a history of having all kinds of fun bringing them to far off lands where they traveled with quirky characters, some being known to try to kill them. Confronting beasts, creatures, demons of the ancient world, gargantuan spiders and forces of nature that ultimately was designed to bring about the end of the world. Yet hobbits would roam the world, if they wanted to.

In all these situations and typical fare, hobbits were a peaceful race with comfortable and exaggerated lifestyles hinging on lots of smoking, eating, and whatever else could be imagined of folks with nothing but time on their hands. The Shire was a lush, green land of meadows, fields, trees, dug out holes fashioned like indoor-outdoor cottages that were underground. Under the roots of trees, or hills, or under other holes. These living conditions were elaborate as well as cozy. They had some serious power tools. Everything was circular and centered. They were mini-mansions in what would be a giant terrarium that eventually branched out into the wider world. A world that included Mordor. Not everything was built into the ground. They had a pub. A regular old love shack where they could all get together, and get wasted. There were several of these scattered throughout the Shire. There was The Green Dragon, The Green Bucket, and The Green Toadstool.

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The Morians[edit | edit source ]

As the lands of Middle Earth were being shaped with zigzagging mountain ranges, the dwarves began moving into mountains for several reasons. One, they gave impenetrable shelter and defense against the elements, and other bothersome situations. Like a warlord from East Hell who never agreed to Middle Earth even existing with any kind of features. He was a minimalist. Two, the mountains could be dug out while still maintaining structural integrity making mining for precious metals and gems a wise location for their craft. And three, before anyone knew there was a Balrog living far beneath the cavern's mantle, slumbering in the earth's crust, things were quite peaceful.

But things didn't stay that way. For there was a fierce demon of the ancient world coming out to feast on anything that moved. It must be stated that the dwarves were probably the best prepared for such events, having axes, blunt tools, heavy hammers, and chainsaws that they wore on their belts. It was the striking of a pickaxe against a slab of rock that penetrated the rock and through to the other side into a Balrog's face. Naturally this woke it up and the next thing anyone knew, there was a giant fire-breathing demonic gorilla–butterfly emerging out of the mountain's pit where they were mining. It wasn't a good situation – many dwarves were singed and suffered third-degree burns while trying to flee.

The once-glorious mountain dwelling of Moria and the Halls of Dwarrowdelf were darkened after the carnage done by the Balrog. But relations and friends of the Morians were still alive outside of Moria. Many years after the Balrog had done its foul deeds and finally went back to sleep, some of those relatives showed up. Namely Gimli. The first thing they did was open the secret doors and pass through. Once seeing the tomblike condition of the place, it wasn't that much of a shock that there was a water beast in the form of a soggy Shelob who destroyed the secret entrance by slamming the stone doors shut and collapsed the entire passageway. Sure it could still be cleared away and rebuilt, but nobody was going to stay and deal with it. It was on its own. Gimli along with all his friends, though no planning on their part, managed to cause the main bridge to the exit to be smashed and impassable. It was Pippin who woke the Balrog up this time. And it was Gandalf who stayed behind to deal with it. Gimli would be telling the dwarves all about this. There was going to be some shit. When Gimli learned that the Balrog was finally conquered and roasted on a stick by Gandalf, Gimli didn't feel too much in a hurry to avenge Morians. There was still the quest he was currently on, with certain death, small chance of success, and there was no waiting for that.

The Tree Elves of Lothario[edit | edit source ]

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The Horselords and some White Lady[edit | edit source ]

A country that features wide open fields and hills, where wild horses run free. The horses that have been taken in, and well cared for, are companions to the men of Rohan who would have wrangled giant eagles and dragons had they been as numerous as the horses. But the giant eagles were in their own exclusive club and dragons were more unpredictable than the horses. Rohan would be the scene where many turning points of the story occurred. It may seem, on first reading that the horses were just there, but if one reads between the lines, it was the horses that made the big decisions and they called the shots.

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The Gondorloans and some suicidal tomato man[edit | edit source ]

The lands of Gondor were vast and ancient in Tolkien's recount and there stood the glorious city of Minas Tirith, where a lot of strange events went down. Depending on where you were from. In Mordor, they referred to Minas Tirith as a place to start world domination. The city itself was build to resemble a giant multi-tiered wedding cake. A lot of its citizens were famous bakers. Gondor once had a king, but when their king got possessed by a ring made in Mordor and eventually became murdered because of it, the people had to replace him with something. The best they could come up with was a guy who was already a member of the king's staff and served as a temporary ruler until the king got back from smashing orc in Mordor, and then until something could be done about the perpetrators of the king's demise.

It was a very long time and no matter how many investigations were carried out, nobody got any closer to who the killers were. Many spoke of it being an army of orcs, but the official story was that a few orcs shot arrows into his back, killing him instantly. Another rumor to be milled over was that a balrog shot an arrow killing him while he gathered Mirkwood sticks for a fire and he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. But there was no mention of the ring he was carrying with him and so, nobody could have known that it was this object that got him killed. The Gondorloans were very imaginative, coming up with theory after theory, and the steward of the place was in it for the long haul.

Long years passed and Minas Tirith was declared the capital city of Gondor, after Osgiliath was deemed far too dangerous and too close to Mordor considering that Minas Morgul and a few other border settlements had unofficially turned into throughways for orcs, trolls, giant trolls, oliphaunts, and Grond. The steward was a temporary position to rule Gondor in the king's absence. It wasn't thought out too well by the populace but very well thought out by the steward. From the beginning everyone knew the king was found dead and he wasn't coming back. But as the steward began a long line of temporary rulers, it became clear that the steward was more or less the de facto king and nobody seemed to question it and shrugged it off. Believing all kinds of weird stories about the resurrection of a king who died walking the plank, or the plank walking him. Another story was that the king would return but it would be someone else, or Zombies. Whoever returned as a king, it was assumed, of course, to be a former steward who took off for a while and would come back to regale them with his story about being in a battle of five armies. While other folk just accepted that their ruler was going to be a steward who would want to be thought of as Royalty. Without the title and bowing and the kissing of rings. Eventually the steward was okay with the bowing and the kissing of rings.

When Denethor came along, he got busy and had two sons to which to pass on the royal title of substitute king. Having two sons allowed Denethor to set his favorite son Boromir up as his replacement and his second born Faramir as his favorite decoy-gofer-pincushion-target-practice boy. He had a crazy crystal ball that drove him mad and made him super paranoid. Mordor's ruler, the ever-chronic Lord Sauron would taunt Denethor by showing him all the neat gifts he had. Meanwhile the people went on with their usual servitude, baking cakes resembling Minas Tirith. Cleaning the walls and applying stucco like frosting. Sweeping all the dust away, leaving clouds so thick, it really was like flour. Denethor enjoyed gardens of olive freshness and loved cherry tomatoes. He loved the Humongous Giant Tomato.

When Mordor started gathering armies to park outside the borders of Gondor, Denethor sent Boromir to talk to Elrond about what to do. It was an odd request. Denethor seeking the help of a little elf compound far in the west but in truth it was Denethor's twisted way to punk Faramir. It was Faramir who had several dreams about visiting Elrond in the first place, and the citizens did come up with theory after theory about why Faramir would dream of Elrond in the first place but there's nothing wrong with that. When Boromir had the same dream just once, Denethor immediately sent him to Elrond to attend the council. Incidentally it was about the same ring what got their king killed. Although at the time it was just referred to as a weapon of the enemy obtained by the good guys. Gandalf knew what it was. Elrond knew what it was. But Denethor and his sons did not know. It was also ironic that Denethor sent away his favorite son to carry back a weapon that got him killed. This time it wasn't a balrog with an arrow. It was a bunch of orcs that repeated history. Boromir had met his end on the way to Mordor, but was actually heading back to Gondor. He would have succeeded to, but unlike Isildur he didn't quite get as far as he would have. Isildur didn't really get too far either.

A devastated Denethor then began trying to get Faramir killed, ate dinner, ordered the troops to stand down, and tried to torch himself. He eventually succeeded when Gandalf showed up and told him straight up that he could not stop the return of the king. Denethor was said to be taunted by Mordor's chief agitator again, showing him the face of Aragorn and a Black Fleet of ships carrying more enemies. But the ships were of Green Dead Guys. Denethor had set himself ablaze and ran full speed over the edge of the precipice of the giant cake structure, but as luck would have it it didn't really do much to distract the orc army before the Green Dead Guys showed up. Then all bets were off. Sauron was taunted back by Aragorn. This was the least he could do since Aragorn was already quite annoyed having to do things the hard way. The tradition of Gondor was that the return of the king was supposed to feature a feast of a variety of tomato recipes and not a bonfire of a charred and demented pastry dude.

The Black Gates of Mordor and some freak mouth guy[edit | edit source ]

One could call this accursed place a hellish landscape of twisted features, with no living elements except a bunch of orcs and trolls, and an obese yet mobile spider the size of a hobbit's daily menu. In fact, hobbits are a menu item for the spider, as well as the spider's size representing a hobbit's menu. But that would be an oversimplified description of Mordor. Mordor wasn't a place you could just simply describe as if you could simply walk into it, take notes and come back. You could simply walk into Mordor if you were a deformed freak of nature, but only if you simply walked into it after being outside it for a cigarette break. Then, yes, you could simply walk into it by walking back into it. By then it's just some polluted, stinking hellhole.

The real horror of Mordor is that every orc is a minion to a dark lord while they go around thinking they're somehow superior. But they're not. They're just orcs and they eat menu items with meat back on them. It's the Black Gates that reveal how unsettling Mordor really is. Because without the Black Gates, there's just nothing but a bunch of rocks, and a cool-looking volcano. This is how Mordor is, it gets all dark and there are billowy clouds of smoke due to the active volcano. This is a place that Tolkien wanted to stress, make everyone understand who was reading about it, to know that this was not a fun or inviting place. Not an ideal vacation destination. Tolkien knew this place. He really did live in such a place for a little while. Usually just hanging out in the trenches. With the exception that there were no giant glaring eyes mounted on a tower, or flying creatures bound to kill everyone in their path. There were no hobbits around. There were no massive spiders, and there was no fiery, lava-churning volcano. If there had been, it would have been welcome as the place the author was stuck at was freezing.

There is no grass, and hardly any mulch. Dry and sandy, dusty and sometimes oily from where they make weapons of minor destruction. It's hard to live in Mordor. Even if you're there against your will, but have to be there as in Frodo and Sam's case. Also Gollum was there. First time he went was on a bet that the Ring was somehow located somewhere among the rubble of a bygone era where a family of cartoon characters smashed boulders all day. Gollum figured incorrectly that they had his precious ring. Second time he ends up in Morder, he's a tour guide, but he dies there and so does his precious ring. These are the kind of things that just happen in Mordor. It was ironic how bad the place could be, and it had some dead features that were creepy and haunted. But as it was, even ghosts didn't like Mordor. There was a shit ton of ghosts hiding in another land in a mountain, but that was resolved and then, it's on good authority that some of them moved to Mordor once the dust settled.

But during Sauron's reign, and his reign of terror to go along with it, he employed a half man half maw who kept most of his face covered so that only his mouth could be seen. And nobody could miss it. This guy could be spotted from quite a distance away and he smelled really bad. He spoke for his lord Sauron. Some thought maybe he was Sauron and that this was just a trick to fool the warriors from capturing him to face justice. But the way he talked proved that he was just another large mouth. He lied about the Mithril shirt, claiming that they had captured a halfling and tortured him to death. But it was just a ploy. A dumb one that didn't pay off. He was sent packing with no more information about anything, and it was extremely lucky that Pippin didn't mention anything about the ring although he did mention that the guy had a really big mouth. And mused that he must have eaten the prizewinning pumpkin from his own land to get such a disfigured face like that. Gandalf had to stop him before he went on with quips about how long it must take him to brush and floss his teeth and how much lip balm he must be going through.

The mountain features of the country were the work of a dark entity that seemed hell bent on gridlocking the tectonic plates and keeping sharp angles in an unnatural way. It would take years to undo the mess, and the only ones capable of moving mountains were the dwarves, oddly enough. But after the incident in Moria, the thought of running across another large creature from the ancient world, especially one that was a spider, wasn't something the dwarves wanted any part of. They also gave a solid argument against working on any mountains in any place close where evil had been. A balrog, a watcher in the water, and a host of goblins and cave trolls in Moria was one thing, even the dragon Smaug who took over the Lonely Mountain was one thing, but a massive spider that probably hatched a million more in one of the mountain ranges in Mordor? No. Just ... no.

Critical reception[edit | edit source ]

Although published as separate, standalone tales, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings was a continuing saga that was highly successful. Tolkien was raking it in. Everyone knew the stories and entire generations were obsessed with anything Tolkien would put out. It was a clear phenomena, spawning posters, calendars, clothing lines, plays, theater, songs, entire movies were made based on The Lord of the Rings. This thing took off and hasn't relented since. If Spaceballs gave but a glimpse into what merchandising was all about, anything Tolkien was more than just a flamethrower. It was a nuclear missile.

The critics loved it. Bookworms loved it, it tasted very thick. Scholars loved it. Kids loved it. Everyone loved it. There doesn't exist a soul who doesn't have some fondness for The Lord of the Rings. That is its legacy. It conquered the world of mythology and shed new light on the past after it had been zapped by the atrocities and tragedies that Homer wrote about. It hurled and crushed the Dark Ages and reinvented the Middle Ages bringing those times back into everyday life. But without the dragons, the ringwraiths, the dark lords, or even the impossibly giant spider. But everything else is still around. The All‑seeing Eye. The short people. The tall people. The pipeweed-smoking wizards. Gollum! All still a part of this world.

Adaptations[edit | edit source ]

There are nine films. The most famous trilogy featuring Peter Dinklage and Viggo Mortensen was a massive success. Filmed and released between the years 2000 and 2003. In 1978 an animated version that was to have two parts ended up being only one part for some weird reason. But some years later, the same movie company that released the animated book adaption of The Hobbit, produced a film called The Return of the King with the same musical guests as in The Hobbit. They wanted it to be what concluded the 1978 film as it really bothered them. It bothered everyone. It was just gnawing at the fabric of society. It carried the story but something was missing. Namely the rotoscoping and the constant mispronunciation of Saruman's name. There are several foreign-language versions of the story of the Ring and of Hobbits varying in silliness, and the butchering of Tolkien's work. But they're foreign adaptions and as such, nobody cares. After the huge success of the Peter Jackson trilogy, numerous skits, bad lip reading, and documentaries flooded the internet and fast DVD sales. Then many several movies and series followed hoping to get in on the cash cow. However, after the mitigated disaster of what Tolkien wrote as a short children's novel was morphed into a fan fiction involving elements from the Silmarillion and a mini-musical that turned into a drugged-out dragon and a hypersensitive elf king, the cash cow had come and gone. And went. The only hope for Tolkien to have another suitable and epic adaption was to let enough time to pass and another director and other writers to come up with a cohesive trilogy times two, but with the same characters more like Tolkien intended and different actors like Tolkien might choose. Except for Gollum. That one was pretty much right on the money. And maybe a few Ents.

See also[edit | edit source ]

• Dungeons & Dragons
• The Chronic of Narnia
• Star Wars

• The Lord of the Rings
• Work In Progress
• British literature
• English culture
• Books
• Nerd
• Hobboeroticism