Now I am cultured I guess

Date: 26 january 2025 

I've seen all three Lord of the Rings movies now. My conclusion is:

I like the first one best cs I liked exploring the Lotr world and it's mystique, and there was a lot of suspense built up during it, I'm not sure how I feel about the pay-off. I especially like Smeagol's character, he's fascinating thru all three movies though I found him the most intriguing during the first. I liked Boromir's character a lot as well and he's only in the first movie. The other two movies are entertaining as well and I do think they're worth a watch. I also have not read the books so my review is purely based on the movies (I have not watched the Hobbit movies either).

The only characters I didn't care for as much was honestly Sam, and later Frodo but I'll get to that. Sam is the only character that I didn't sense any uncertainty surrounding his character, his character development, or his motives. I never doubted how Sam would react to something, or what he would do in a situation. I guess this doesn't necessarily make him a bad character, that he is consistent and predictable. However, I don't think it holds up because he's not very nuanced, in fact I think his character is slightly flat. I want to clarify that it is not because Sam, and Frodo, are a "boring race" or anything, it's not cs they are unskilled in combat or because they don't have supernatural powers. Pippin and Mary for example are also characters lacking in these areas, but I still really like their characters. Bilbo is another character I really like, probably making me more biased to like the first movie (again), and I'm glad we get to see him in the last movie as well. But going back to Sam I would say the lack of background, character development, variety of motives, emotions and more, is what piles together and makes him a boring character.

Frodo I really liked in the first movie, he expresses a lot of emotion and has complex relationships to characters like Bilbo and Gandalf that I really enjoyed. He helps the viewer get familiar with other characters and, get us introduced to the ring from an outsiders perspective. The viewer doesn't know much about the ring (assuming u haven't read the books), and therefore doesn't know what exactly having the ring entails. So seeing Bilbo have the ring already from the beginning of the movie and acting the way he does, we don't know exactly what is him (Bilbo) acting, and what is the ring making him act that way. This makes it the more interesting to see Frodo get the ring because we don't know exactly how it will affect him. This is one of the things I liked seeing in Frodo's character, seeing the way the ring is changing him. It ultimately turns him paranoid and easily manipulated by Smeagol that convinces him that Sam is after the ring. Frodo turning his back on Sam made me think maybe we'd get some interesting character development from them as they would have to be on their own for the first time thru all the movies. Or maybe that their relationship dynamic would be altered in some way. But they were separated for an incredibly short time and when they got back to each other nothing had changed. It was pretty anti climatic if u ask me.

I could go on yapping about interesting characters like Aragon, Gandalf, Smeagol, Boromir, Bilbo, Pippin, Mary and more, but then I would go on forever. This post is more of a shit on Sam I guess, and a minor critique on Frodo's character. I could go more in depth on this but I can't write this post all day, I've already sat here for an hour and I've got plans I gotta get ready for. Anyway these thoughts I have aren't set in stone and can be altered. 

- Elliot