Sebastian handles his defeat in a mature and dignified manner
So the battle drums continue to beat, and sixteen weary victors continue on into Round 3 of Middle-earth March Madness 2017! Only YOU (and as many of your friends as you can round up to join in the voting) can decide who will make it on to the Quarter Finals. Let’s see who’s still with us:
First up, the Movies Only category, where characters created by PJ and his gang fight it out in search of eternal (until next year, at least) glory: Aragorn’s loyal Brego had no trouble seeing off Mumak Mahud – clearly the rider is no match for the horse. Figwit defeated Mrs Proudfoot without disturbing a hair on his immaculate head; and it will come as a big disappointment (but perhaps no surprise) to some that Sebastian’s dreams of conquest are over. Yes, despite a brave fight from the spiny mammal, pointy-eared warrior Tauriel came out ahead, and progresses to Round 3.
On to Books Only, where Goldberry and Tom Bombadil continue on without any real problems. They may not have made it into the movies, but they have made it to Round 3 – where, awkwardly, they now have to face each other. Glorfindel joins them, but sadly Quickbeam was too slow to get going in this round, and was defeated by Prince Imrahil.
In Movie and Books, Bilbo is holding the torch for all hobbits; with Merry defeated by Aragorn, Mr Baggins is the only halfling still in the contest, having narrowly beaten Faramir. (With Aragorn and Brego both continuing on, we find ourselves wondering – what if they were to meet in the final? Would Brego be half-mad enough to vanquish his kingly friend, or would he have seen enough of war by then, and concede to the man he saved?)
Finally, in the Wider Mythos set, Luthien and Beren progress together, having seen off Glaurung and Feanor. In The Silmarillion, we learn that of all the Valar, Morgoth feared Varda the most; and well he might, as after a close run battle between them, Varda emerged victorious. But it is in this category that we find the biggest upset of this round – Earendil is sailing on, after a shock victory over Eru! Who would have expected a Mariner to beat Middle-earth’s supreme being? They don’t call it March Madness for nothing, you know…
Here are the full results from the second round:
Round 3 voting is open until March 28th 10pm EST. Will Goldberry final show Tom exactly what she thinks of his yellow boots and his ‘Ring a dong dillos’? In a showdown worthy of the end of the Second Age, will Elrond conquer the dark lord Sauron? It’s up to you – vote now! Continue reading “Middle-earth March Madness Round 2 results – and vote now for Round 3!”
If you haven’t yet voted in Round 2 of TheOneRing.net’s March Madness competition, now is the time to do so! This round is producing some VERY interesting results among the 32 remaining contestants. Neck-and-neck battles currently include:
In the Movies Only division, the lovely Tauriel has a narrow lead over Sebastian the Hedgehog. Can elvish archery prowess win out over sheet unadulterated cuteness?
In the Movies and Books division there are currently two contests that are too close to call: Smaug vs. Sauron and Bilbo vs. Faramir. Fire is sure to be involved in the battle between the two Middle-earth arch-villains: the wily dragon Smaug and the Dark Lord Sauron. Could the fact that today is March 25, the day of Sauron’s defeat in The Return of the King give Smaug a slight edge, or might Sauron’s victory be guaranteed by knowledge of the bare spot on Smaug’s breast? How does one chose between two of Middle-earth’s most virtuous heroes: Bilbo and Faramir? Can Faramir’s Gondorian armour withstand a blow from Sting?
Fingolfin Challenges Morgoth – John Howe
The Wider Mythos division has another close contest in the works between evil incarnate, Morgoth, and the mighty Varda, queen of the Valar. In The Silmarillion, it took all of the might of the Valar to defeat Morgoth. Can Varda do it on her own? Can the light defeat the darkness one more time? It’s up to you to decide! Round 2 voting is open until 10:00 p.m. EST tonight. Go here to vote, and join us in deciding these, and other great battles going on right now.
The battles are underway and the clash of arms echoes around TheOneRing.net – we’re into the thick of it with Middle-earth March Madness! As you know (click here for details), our categories this year are Movies Only, Books Only, Movies and Books, and Wider Mythos – so we’ve got some unusual contestants mixing in with familiar fighters. And that means some unexpected results…
In the Movies Only group, Sebastian the Hedgehog was clearly sufficiently recovered from his brush with dark magic, to see off the Goblin Scribe. Alfrid Lickspittle may have been a sneaky survivor (up to a point) in the films, but he’s already out of this contest, resoundingly conquered by the ever lovely Figwit.
Books Only – we’re glad to see that happy couple Goldberry and Tom Bombadil are both through to Round 2, having seen off Fatty Lumpkin and Celebrian, respectively.
Some of the most epic battles thus far have surely been in the Movies and Books category, where after a mighty struggle, the Balrog was able to see off Beorn (did he have wings to help him?). It will come as no surprise that Sauron and Smaug have both made it through; but who would have expected Merry to manage a narrow defeat over Boromir? His pal Pippin will not be joining him in Round 2, having been vanquished by Aragorn; and I’m afraid hot dwarf Thorin is already down and out, with Faramir showing his quality in a fairly convincing win.
Wider Mythos sees Luthien and Beren both progressing; they are joined in the second round by Earendil, who ‘sailed’ through in an easy victory over Finrod. And in the most fiery of battles, Glaurung overcame Ancalagon; could he go on to face Smaug in the Semi-final?
Here are the full results of the first round match-ups. [Click here]
And so on to Round 2! Voting is open until March 25th 10pm EST; show your support for your favourites, and make sure they survive to Round 3! What lies in store – could there be an all tree battle in Round 4, with Quickbeam facing Old Man Willow? Might we see a final showdown between Goldberry and Luthien? Could Sebastian the Hedgehog go all the way to be crowned champion? YOU decide – vote now!
Movies Only – Round 2 March 23rd – March 25th 2016
Books Only – Round 2 March 23rd – March 25th 2016
Movie & Book – Round 2 March 23rd – March 25th 2016
Wider Mythos – Round 2 March 23rd – March 25th 2016
The schedule for Wondercon went public yesterday, so we are finally able to confirm that we are indeed hosting a panel on Sunday at 10:30am. Below you will find the posting from the Wondercon schedule website, but since the panel was presented, we have added one more panelist.
Mike Urban, also known as Ostadan, will be joining us. He is one of the author’s of TORn’s book “The People’s guide to J.R.R. Tolkien” and will help flesh out the discussion on the upcoming release of a standalone “Beren and Luthien” book. Continue reading “TORn goes to Wondercon in Anaheim, April 2”
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.
Spring is in the air, and it’s finally that time of year when fans get to vote on their favorite Tolkien characters. Yes, Middle-earth March Madness is back for 2017! If you are new to TheOneRing.net, Middle-earth March Madness is our adaptation on the popular NCAA Basketball tournament that takes place every March/April in the United States. It’s our chance to have some fun matching up middle-earth power players against each other. Past winners include Samwise Gamgee, Gandalf, who won in both 2013 and 2015, Thranduil, and last year’s winner Galadriel, who defeated the mighty Morgoth in the final round.
To mix things up a bit and give some other, very deserving characters a chance, the past winners mentioned above will sit this year out in the esteemed ‘Champion’s Hall of Fame.’ As for this year’s brackets, the four divisions will pit characters against each other based on the following criteria:
Movies Only – characters who appeared only in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings and/or The Hobbit movies
Books Only – characters who didn’t make the final cut for the movies
Movies and Books – characters who graced both the written page and the silver screen
Wider Mythos – Middle-earth characters not in the movies from Tolkien’s works outside of The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.
Our staff are sorting out the field of 64 initial combatants now, and we’ll be posting the first bracket and polls this Monday, March 20. Stay tuned to the front-page of TORn for the announcement to start voting, and follow along on Twitter and FB with #middleearthmarchmadness @theoneringnet
From the moment movie goers first experienced Peter Jackson’s The Fellowship of the Ring, they couldn’t stop talking about every little detail no matter how small or obscure. In December 2001, one of TORn’s very brave Discussion Board members began collecting these observations on the LotR Movie Discussion Boardand put them into a list. Very soon after, our brave collector disappeared leaving all of these wonderful observations floating loose in Wilderland!
Early in 2002, and being a chronic hoarder, I adopted the abandoned list and put out the word to the Movie Discussion Board that the collection was on again and to bring forth whatever they saw or heard that they took special note of and it would be added to the list. Here are some examples of observations:
-At the beginning of the Battle of the Last Alliance, Elendil is carrying Narsil upright before him (a theme repeated throughout the film).
-Gil-galad is wearing armour with the insignia of the House of Gil-galad on his chest!
-Merry tosses his apple to Aragorn when ready to swordplay with Boromir.
The floodgates opened and the list quickly grew to over 700 observations that stood out to us as poignant, book-related, or so incredibly trivial it will make your eyes roll in disbelief. Well, we’re geeks… what’d you expect? Every few weeks during the film’s run, I put out a call for more or collect observations from Members’ posts! The challenging part was sorting out duplications (or similar observation), putting everything in chronological order and in filmic chapters. I also did a little editing when needed 😉 Then… with the release of the extended dvd…I added those observations and marked each one with double asterisks to highlight them. Believe it or not, we’re always finding more!! Here’s an example of the results:
THE PROPHECY
1. When the New Line logo appears, you can hear the same ringing sound the One Ring makes throughout the film!
2. In the film and soundtrack there are chapter titles from The Fellowship of the Ring and The Hobbit are worked into story – From the soundtrack: “The Shadow of the Past”; “The Treason of Isengard”; “The Black Rider”; “A Knife in the Dark”; “Flight to the Ford”; “Many Meetings”; “The Council of Elrond”; “The Ring Goes South”; “A Journey in the Dark”; “The Great River”; “Amon Hen”; “The Breaking of the Fellowship”–From the film: “A Long-Expected Party”; “Shortcut to Mushrooms”; “The Bridge of Khazad-dûm”; “Lothlórien”; “Mount Doom”; “Strider”; shows the “Sign of the Prancing Pony”–and From The Hobbit; “Riddles in the Dark”; “Not at Home”; “Concerning Hobbits.”
3. The three Ring-bearers at the beginning of the film are the ORIGINAL three (i.e. Galadriel, Gil-galad and Cirdan)
4. When Galadriel holds up her hand wearing Nenya in the prologue, the faint wrinkles on her hands disappear, and they become younger.
5. Only the Elves wear their Rings, and these Rings are not taken by Sauron [ref: The Silmarillion]; all the Elves wear their rings on the middle finger while Sauron wears his Ring on the Finger of Ego, the Index Finger; The Dwarves inspect their rings then hold their Rings away from them; the Men keep their rings close to them. They are the only group which stares straight ahead like Zombies.
One of the changes I made to the original list was that nothing of a nit-picky or negative sort would be added. Thinking of everything Peter Jackson and the hundreds of people who made these films had gone through to create three movies at one time, I just didn’t think it was right. Those observations were for others’ lists.
Because these lists are still active and growing all the time, feel free to share your own observations. Find me on the Boards where you can also find all of these links and more in the footer of my posts on The One Ring Forums Message Boards.
