ROTK

[burntcopper]

:bawls like a little baby:


Oh my god. Omigod. Oh. My. God. There are no words.

Pippin just owned this movie. Billy Boyd... oh wow. His growing up, and his franticness, and the leaving of Merry, and killing the orc, and realising what a fucking stupid thing it was to swear allegiance to Denethor, and singing, and pushing Faramir off the bonfire and discovering Merry on the battlefield...

Pipeweed! Table dancing!

Eowyn. Oh I so love Eowyn and Theoden. That's it. I am so Rohirrim when I'm not being a hobbit. It's the saxon/viking/celt in me. Her joy at seeing Aragorn and Theoden giving his blessing and her utter heartbreak when he lets her down, then the battle and her fear and the death scene and oh god. And daegaer's so right about the gender issues and the men just not even seeing that she's a woman because she's in men's clothes, though I do think it's a definite position of honour for her to rule Rohan after him, as she's the one he trusts to do it. Theoden gives better battlefield speeches than Aragorn.

Siege Weapons! :See Heather fall over and die from the squee: Counting! 'We're surrounded, outnumbered, no chance of survival? What are we waiting for?' or words to that effect... Beacons!

Frodo and Sam and Gollum, dear god... and the one time you see someone struggling with the invisible in a film and it looks believable....

I no longer fancy Aragorn when he cleans up and goes Elessar with Gondorian armour. Bleh. Oh, and the one time I was able to tolerate Arwen? The kissing at the end because they're so incredibly happy and obviously in love and I was crying with joy and emotion then anyway...

Gondorians! Let the Rohan stampede your enemies while you stay indoors with your stupid armour! But lemme have one of your prototype trebuchets, pwease? Note: I also find nothing special about your precious White City. Gimme Rohan any day.

Faramir.... Oh, baby.... Lemme hug and squeeze and let you snog the hell out of Eowyn in that completely unfairly cut scene of the Houses of Healing. But your dealing with Denethor, and your utter resignation and commitment to duty and to what you know is a suicide mission... oh, sweetie...

Gandalf kicketh arse. Yea verily he doth.

Shelob... I can why she's supposed to be scary, but I suffer from complete arachnophilia. I love bugs and examining them, and Starship Troopers had me going 'Sam, Frodo? Stab her in the abdomen, long slash along there, all her guts fall out.', so I think the impact was lost on me.

The end! Seen through lots of sniffling and that bit riding into the Shire with grumpy hobbit. The Green Dragon, where Sam spots Rosie and suddenly he's off and you know? We so should've been shown the end of that scene, where he grabbed her and dipped her Clark Gable style. Or at least picked her up and spun her round. But so with the squee. And kiddies! Mini-Astin! Also, anyone else notice that the hobbit female Pippin grins at when he catches the bouquet is Diamond? Though I so vote for Merry being the object of his affections.

Oh, and Peter Jackson? There is one thing I have a bone to pick with you about. Hobbit Kissage. Where the hell was it? There should've been kissage on the lava flow, proper kissage at the harbour to the Grey Havens, and at least some kissage between Merry and Pippin, because their love is so squee!


Also, daegaer? Thou hast corrupted me with Bracy and Gedge when it comes to Sam and Frodo. you have.

Getting plot bunnies for original fic. Where the heir to the throne doesn't know about it, doesn't give a toss about it, and rejects the named magical reforged sword because 'I'm happy with this one, and the balance on that one is frankly shite.'

Comments

[daegaer.livejournal.com]

It is a position of honour, but it's one she gets despite being female. Obviously if Theodred had lived he'd have been the next king (or maybe not, I'm not that sure how Rohan handles inheritance, but he'd have the best shot), but it seems very much as if Eowyn is the least-likely heir. What the Rohirrim want is a ruler that fights, as that is what they value. Women "don't" fight (despite Eowyn being a trained swordswoman) - Eowyn makes that quite clear in her statement to Aragorn about those who do not use blades still dying upon them. In the Rohirrim cultural worldview it seems that what a man does with a sword is "fight" while what a woman does with a sword is "defend" - and "defending" is given less cultural weight.

I don't mean that Theoden and Eomer don't love Eowyn, or that Theoden didn't love and valure his wife or his sister, or even that they don't think they are in fact offering her an honourable position. However, it is made quite clear that no matter what the characters think, they do in fact value what they perceive as female activities less than they value male activities. That's perhaps brought out more strongely in the book, where Eowyn chooses socially honourable death over what she sees as a less valued life. Eowyn has no authority (she has power, as the king's niece, but does not have the authority to use that power) - she is refused permission to fight again and again, despite being skilled, and is always given the "female" task: lead the civilians to Helm's Deep, organise the seige of Edoras. In both cases Eomer would be an equally viable choice, and yet he automatically goes to fight while she automatically is kept back. The only thing that differentiates between them is their gender (again, in the book, Eowyn seems a more skilled warrior than in the movie, and her despair is greater as well). When she is told to rule it is explicitly in Theoden's name: he has told them to obey her as they would him. She is a regent, not a Queen - and Theoden in the movie actually expects his people to die anyway. He's offering her part of what he thinks she wants, a chance at an honourable death, but it is still couched in terms of the appropriate sphere of activities for a woman.

I'm not saying Theoden is a bad man, trying to oppress the women of his kingdom. Of course he's not - he doesn't even realise such a thing could exist, which makes it all the more difficult to counteract. Clearly what he wants to do is safeguard his beloved neice, and to do that he treats her in a way that is different from his equally beloved nephew and son, for no other reason than her being female. (Movie Eowyn is not a good "woman" as the annoying stew sequence in the extended TTT makes clear - she cannot cook, she doesn't stay inside or cover her head when she goes outside. She clearly sees female life as a trap).


* * *

*wide eyed innocence* Corrupted you? Why, whatever do you mean? Ain't it natural fer an honest workin' class lad to look all moony eyed at his upper class officer/employer? And to hold his hand when he needs a bit of comfort, and give him a kiss every now and again? All that cuddlin' is jest to keep warm, yer know. Yer can't get across a vast wasteland filled with orcs or irritated Afghanis without a bit of cuddlin' to keep yer spirits up!

[burntcopper.livejournal.com]

:nods at the Eowyn stuff:

I've been a Sam/Frodo shipper since I first read them when I was very small, but now when watching them I have Bracy and Gedge voices running through my head....

[jane-somebody.livejournal.com]

if Theodred had lived he'd have been the next king (or maybe not, I'm not that sure how Rohan handles inheritance

Hmm, I think if Rohan is acting analogously to Anglo-Saxon civilization, Eomer, as Theoden's sister-son, is the natural heir even before Theodred.

I like the points you've made.

[soulstar.livejournal.com]

*points upwards* Yes - what you said! On every single point. Schelob was great, but not scary to me, just very cool. Oh, and the flaming boarhead battering ram? I *want* one... d'you think it's too late to put in a Christmas request to the parents?....

[burntcopper.livejournal.com]

Naaaah. Point out that every girl needs one.