Movie spoilers get a bad rap.

Even the word itself, spoiler, comes with connotations of bad. Reminders of food that’s gone off. Anything that spoils entails less enjoyment, not the same amount. And certainly not more. Or so it’s traditionally held.

To which I say, to use a quaint British phrase, “pish and tosh”.

Not because I don’t think it’s impossible for there to be spoilers with an adaptation of a novel that was first published in 1937. There are. Continue reading “In defence of spoilers”

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.

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
The Hobbit would be better subtitled ‘Great Expectations’ rather than ‘An Unexpected Journey’, given the spectacular triple-act it follows, and the accumulated anticipation in the near decade since the Oscar-sweeping The Return of the King. This presents a problem for judging the film, for we are none of us objective. Comparisons with the original trilogy are inevitable, and thus before we even look at the intrinsic merits of the latest addition to Jackson’s Middle-earth adaptations, we need to be aware of how much we take for granted in coming to this new trilogy, and thus how our critical faculties are skewed. Continue reading “Thomas Monteath critiques An Unexpected Journey”

Readers who are skeptical after seeing the title of this piece have a right to be. English professors have been known to find all sorts of things in books which the authors never put there. In addition, at first glance Middle-earth seems a particularly non-religious place. We find no mention of God in The Hobbit, no prayers, Bibles, churches, priests, or ministers — none of the things typically associated with the Christian faith.

Fans also know Tolkien was a Professor of Anglo-Saxon and that his writings were influenced by the myths of Northern Europe which he and his friend, C. S. Lewis, loved to read aloud with the circle of friends that later grew into their famous writing group, the Inklings.

So how might it be claimed that The Hobbit is a Christian story? Continue reading “The Hobbit: an essentially Christian story?”

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.

I haven’t yet seen The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, but what I’ve seen and read of the White Council sequence has intrigued me. Continue reading “Galadriel, political animal of Middle-earth”

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.

New Zealand Post's hobbit coins Back in October, New Zealand Post announced that they would mint special-issue gold coins as a tie-in with Jackson’s The Hobbit. The press release stated:

The rim of each coin is inscribed in both English and Dwarvish with the words “Middle-earth — New Zealand.” Continue reading “Say it right: Middle-earth language usage”

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.

In Imagining Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit, guest writer Eric M. Van draws together the threads of known facts, and add a dash of logic to speculate on how Peter Jackson and his crew may have imagined their version of JRR Tolkien’s The Hobbit.

This second part of the series examines the unique adaptation challenges for Jackson and his fellow screenwriters that come from a sequel that’s a prequel — and whether they’ve had a six-movie Ultimate Edition in mind from the very start. Continue reading “Imagining Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit: Part Two”

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.