{"id":71147,"date":"2013-04-26T13:18:04","date_gmt":"2013-04-26T18:18:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/?p=71147"},"modified":"2013-04-26T14:34:26","modified_gmt":"2013-04-26T19:34:26","slug":"j-w-reviews-the-hobbit-chronicles-ii-book","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/2013\/04\/26\/71147-j-w-reviews-the-hobbit-chronicles-ii-book\/","title":{"rendered":"J.W. Reviews The Hobbit Chronicles II Book"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"intro\">This month on J.W. Braun&#8217;s Bookshelf, J.W. takes a look at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/The-Hobbit-Unexpected-Chronicles-Characters\/dp\/0062265687\/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&#038;camp=1789&#038;creative=390957&#038;creativeASIN=054789872X&#038;linkCode=as2&#038;tag=theoneringnet\" title=\"The Hobbit Chronicles II\" target=\"_blank\">The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey Chronicles II: Creatures and Characters<\/a> by Daniel Falconer and Weta Workshop. Meanwhile, he announces a new contest and answers your questions in the mailbag section below.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><center><iframe width=\"510\" height=\"287\" data-src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/-euEK5Zc_h4\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" class=\"lazyload\" data-load-mode=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/center><\/p>\n<p>(To see photos of <em>The Hobbit Chronicles II<\/em>, visit <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/lordofthefilms\" title=\"Lord of the Films Facebook page\" target=\"_blank\">The Lord of the Films facebook page<\/a>. To see the details of J.W.&#8217;s Big Spring Giveaway, where you can win Tolkien merchandise, <a href=\"http:\/\/jwbraun.com\/blog\/?p=3778\" title=\"J.W. Braun's Blog\" target=\"_blank\">visit his blog<\/a>.)<\/p>\n<p><strong>JW&#8217;s Riddle of the Month: <\/strong>(The answer appears below)<\/p>\n<p>I never was, but am always to be<br \/>\nYet some will look forward to seeing me<br \/>\nTo some I give hope, to some I give fear<br \/>\nBut for today, I&#8217;m never here <\/p>\n<p>What am I?<\/p>\n<p><strong>JW&#8217;s Mailbag Questions<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>Why do the Orcs in The Hobbit movie look different than the Orcs in LOTR? &#8211; Jay<\/em><\/p>\n<p>To quote Sir Richard Taylor, &#8220;It would be a mistake to think of the Orcs of Middle-earth as one species without regional variation, characterized by a single look and culture.&#8221; &#8211; JW<\/p>\n<p><em>I read that Arwen was the last elf born in Middle Earth. Is this true? &#8211; Traci<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The notion is not borne out anywhere in Tolkien&#8217;s writing but is part of Arwen&#8217;s original character description for the Peter Jackson films. In the books it is true that she carries the name of &#8220;Undomiel&#8221;, which means &#8216;the even-star of her people&#8217;, but this is probably more symbolic than literal, signifying the waning of the Eldar in general. -JW<\/p>\n<p><em>How many times does Frodo almost die in The Lord of the Rings movies? &#8211; Primula<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Take <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sporcle.com\/games\/Sitsaln\/times-frodo-would-have-almost-died\" target=\"_blank\">this sporcle quiz<\/a> and find out yourself! In all seriousness, it&#8217;s a fun quiz and interesting to see which various characters save Frodo, including one you probably wouldn&#8217;t think of offhand. (No surprise who saves him the most!) &#8211; JW<\/p>\n<p><em>[In reference to the article <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/2013\/04\/18\/70887-nine-absurd-ideas-for-the-hobbit-and-the-lord-of-the-rings-that-were-actually-considered\/\" title=\"Nine Absurd Ideas \"target=\"_blank\">Nine Absurd Ideas for The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings That Were Actually Considered:<\/a>]<\/em> <em>You forgot one: Last year, TORn reported that Jackson thought of having Gollum kill Frodo&#8217;s parents in The Hobbit. I remember because I attended a discussion hosted by Quickbeam on the idea. &#8211; Christine<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The idea has some merit! When Frodo&#8217;s parents are boating, Gollum is on the loose and looking for a Baggins from the Shire. (In &#8220;The Shadow of the Past&#8221; Gandalf even mentions that Gollum pursues the Ring to Dale and back West again, all the way to a river.) And Tolkien even hints that the drowning of Frodo&#8217;s parents has some suspicious circumstances, possibly including a struggle. Then again, the river Gandalf is referring to is the Anduin, so it shoots down the whole theory, doesn&#8217;t it? As the Gaffer says, boats are tricky enough for those that sit still. &#8211; JW<\/p>\n<p><em>What tobacco did J.R.R. Tolkien smoke? &#8211; Dan<\/em><\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s no record of what he preferred, but his children have said he used to keep nuts and washers in Navy Cut tins, so that&#8217;s as likely as any. &#8211; JW<\/p>\n<p><strong>The answer to the riddle above?<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=_274z9AO6Q8\" title=\"tomorrow\" target=\"_blank\">Tomorrow<\/a> (Or &#8220;the future&#8221;, but that doesn&#8217;t come with a cool hobbit video.)<\/p>\n<p><em>J.W. Braun is a Tolkien scholar and author of <a href=\"http:\/\/jwbraun.com\">The Lord of the Films<\/a>, published by ECW Press in 2009. If you have a question for him, simply drop him a line at <a href=\"mailto:lordofthefilms@gmail.com\">lordofthefilms@gmail.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>You can find out more about J.W. at <a title=\"J.W. Braun's Website\" href=\"http:\/\/jwbraun.com\">jwbraun.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This month on J.W. Braun&#8217;s Bookshelf, J.W. takes a look at The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey Chronicles II:&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":87,"featured_media":68763,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[163,4,18,148,104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-merchandise-books","category-hobbit-movie","category-merchandise","category-hobbit","category-production-weta-workshop"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/hobbitbookchronicles2creaturesalrg4.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1tLoH-ivx","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/87"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71147"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71147\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71182,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71147\/revisions\/71182"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68763"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}