Hold the presses! The Sweet Sixteen has been set, but not without a bit of controversy. For the first time in the storied history of Middle-earth March Madness, we’ve had a tie – yes, a TIE!
In the Beauties bracket, the Cinderella story (16) Feanor tied with (9) Varda when voting ended at 10pm ET today. To solve this tie-breaker, we decided to randomly pick one to win…no no, we wouldn’t do that. Instead, we did something a bit more logical. We took the total votes from round 1 and 2 and combined them for each contestant. The general idea being, if one contestant got more overall votes in those first two rounds, they should win. After the tally, (9) Varda made it through to face (5) Melian. Should be an interesting match-up!
However, one could argue that is not the most interesting match-up of the Beauty Bracket…we have (3) Galadriel facing a fan favorite (10) Legolas!
In the Brains bracket (8) Elrond managed to slip by the number one seed Tom Bombadil and will face (4) Luthien. Two of the top seeds, (3) Faramir and (2) Gandalf will face off in the other match-up.
Both the Brawn and Baddies brackets are advancing all the top seeds into the Sweet Sixteen.
In the Brawn bracket we have (1) Beorn facing (4) Eomer, while (3) Boromir will face (2) Eowyn. Will we have a sibling battle in the Elite Eight??
The Baddies contestants read like a who’s who of bad-arse Middle-earth antagonists. We’ve got (1) Morgoth facing (4) Sauron, and (3) Smaug facing (2) The Balrog of Moria. I only wish we had a couple hundred million dollars and the special effects wizards at WETA to visualize these match-ups for us!
Voting is now open and will remain open until March 30th at 10pm ET. We will calculate the winners at that point and post the next round on March 31st. Follow after the break for a complete bracket image (download it), and to vote on all of our Round 3 match-ups! [Sweet Sixteen Bracket] [Round 2 Bracket] [Round 1 Bracket]
Continue reading “A TIE! The Sweet Sixteen is Set – Middle-earth March Madness – Vote!”
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We have some incredibly close contests as we choose our Middle-earth Sweet Sixteen. In the Brains bracket, can (5)Treebeard overcome (4)Luthien, or does (7)Aragorn have a strategy to come from behind and win over (2)Gandalf? (10)Gimli and (2)Eowyn are locked in a tight battle – who will prevail in the Brawn bracket? What about the Beauties (10)Legolas and (2)Arwen? Can anyone defeat (1)Morgoth in Baddies?
Voting ends March 26 at 10 PM ET, so pick your winners now! Here’s a link to the poll: Round 2 voting.
A note on how the bracket combatants were determined. TheOneRing.net created a document containing all combatants, sub divided into divisions. We asked staff to cast sixteen votes per division, with the votes having a weight of 1-4. Each staffer cast four 4 votes, four 3 votes, four 2 votes and four 1 votes in each division. We then totaled all the votes from each division to determine their rank, and ultimately placed those into our bracket for seeding.
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Last year, The Forge Studios released the pilot for their epic action adventure fantasy, “The Rangers”.
Now, the independent film studio is releasing a new, 40-minute cut of their pilot on Youtube — and they’re giving TORn readers the chance to have a look first before officially announcing it to the world on Thursday.
The Rangers film project is about a special force of soldiers, known as Rangers, who were founded long ago by King Alirion to guard and watch the borders of the Kingdom of Olaran. The series invites you to follow the adventures of the unit of Rangers led by Brander Noke, also known as Wolf, and their new rookie Soren Fell. Continue reading “Get first look at The Rangers: A Shadow Rising’s new 40-minute cut”
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Middle-earth March Madness Round 2 is here! With 1000+ votes for each match-up, some of our first round match-ups came down to just 5 votes!
In the Beauty Bracket, and with the biggest upset of the tournament so far, (1) Goldberry was beaten by the (16) Feanor! In the Brains Bracket, (6) Gwaihir managed to hold off (11) Turgon. In the Brawn Bracket, the battle of the dwarves was won by (11) Gimli when he took down (7) Dwalin. And in the Baddies Bracket, (3) Smaug decimated (14) Lurtz.
Round 2 has its share of interesting match-ups – what are your favorites?
Voting in Round 2 will remain open until March 26th at 10pm ET. At that point, we’ll calculate the winners and post the next round on March 27th. Follow after the break for a complete bracket image (download it), and to vote on all of our Round 2 match-ups! [Round 2 Bracket] [Round 1 Bracket]
Continue reading “Middle-earth March Madness – Round 2 Bracket – Vote Vote Vote!”
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Welcome to The Great Hall of Poets, our regular monthly feature showcasing the talent of Middle-earth fans. Each month we will feature a small selection of the poems submitted, but we hope you will read all of the poems that we have received here in our Great Hall of Poets.
So come and join us by the hearth and enjoy!
If you have a Tolkien/Middle-earth inspired poem you’d like to share, then send it to poetry@theonering.net One poem per person may be submitted each month. Please make sure to proofread your work before sending it in. TheOneRing.net is not responsible for poems posting with spelling or grammatical errors.
Continue reading “The Great Hall of Poets”
If you have a Tolkien/Middle-earth inspired poem you’d like to share, then send it to poetry@theonering.net. One poem per person may be submitted each month. Please make sure to proofread your work before sending it in. TheOneRing.net is not responsible for poems posting with spelling or grammatical errors.
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Wellington’s Tolkien Society, Welly-moot, have been in touch to let us know that they are hosting the ULTIMATE Middle-earth Marathon at the Roxy in ‘Wellywood’ over 24 hours, Thursday 24th to Friday 25th March. That’s all SIX of Peter Jackson’s Middle-earth movies, Extended Editions, over one day!
Continue reading “The Ultimate Middle-earth Marathon – Roxy Cinema, Wellington”
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Hold the presses! The Sweet Sixteen has been set, but not without a bit of controversy. For the first time in the storied history of Middle-earth March Madness, we’ve had a tie – yes, a TIE! 
