E! Online updates Force of Hobbit

by Michael Martinez, Sunday, April 1, 2001

The April, 2001 Force of Hobbit update focuses on the miniatures being used for Peter Jackson's "The Lord of the Rings" movies. The most significant aspect of the monthly report appears to be that this is the first time since John Forde started writing the feature well over a year ago that he hasn't offered a major gaffe. The miniatures article does reveal some more spoilers for the movies. In particular, readers are treated to a glimpse of Silvan Elf culture in Lorien. Also, the mirror of Galadriel appears to have grown into a pool.

Alanis and Axl doing LoTR credits song?

by Michael Martinez, Friday, March 30, 2001

TheOneRing.Net has been digging into rumors that Alanis Morisette and Axl Rose may be doing a song for "The Fellowship of the Ring". If the rumor is true, the song will most likely accompany the end-credits and will be released as a single.

Ian McKellen roundup on LoTR

by Michael Martinez, Friday, March 30, 2001

Gandalf praises NZ magic (Stuff, New Zealand) 22 March 2001 Lord of the Rings actor Sir Ian McKellen has given New Zealand top billing in his British homeland. Sir Ian lived in Eastbourne - a Wellington harbourside suburb he described in The Independent on Sunday newspaper as a "hamlet" across the "estuary" from Wellington city - for a year, filming New Zealand director Peter Jackson's fantasy trilogy. Initially apprehensive about whether he would like it, Sir Ian said the charms of New Zealand caused him to dread his return to high-stress London. Read the full article here Also, Sir Ian answered many fan questions in his latest (March 27) e-Post on the Lord of the Rings.

Of thegns and kings and rangers and things

by Michael Martinez, Friday, March 30, 2001

Maybe only once have I ever seen anyone ask how many Rangers would have been guarding Sarn Ford the day the Nazgul showed up. And then no one was able to provide a satisfactory answer. It's a tough question because, so far as we know, J.R.R. Tolkien himself never tried to answer it. And in trying to answer that question for ourselves, we quickly get drawn into digressions and tangents. Any attempt to figure out how many Rangers were stationed there inevitably gets bound up in an effort to calculate how many Rangers there must have been altogether. An interesting question which also occasionally gets asked is, where did they all go during the War of the Ring? And were the thirty Rangers whom Halbarad led to Rohan the last of their kind? Halbarad's words to Aragorn, "I have thirty with me; that is all of our kindred that could be gathered in haste," seem to imply there were more Rangers who stayed home. But if Halbarad couldn't gather them all in his haste, where were the other Rangers? They certainly weren't guarding the Shire any more because Saruman's ruffians were in the process of taking over. They weren't guarding Bree because Bree was having to take care of its own problems with Saruman's ruffians. The Rangers are a curious group Tolkien never gives us an explicit history of the organization. Nor does he tell us how they managed to survive as a people. It seems most likely that the Rangers were merely a special group supported by the larger Dunadan tribe or nation. When Aranarth decided not to re-establish the Kingdom of Arnor, he took the title of Chieftain of the Dunedain, but he also retained the title of Lord of the Dunedain. Read the full article here.

Oh, Arwen! Ooo, yeah!

by Michael Martinez, Thursday, March 29, 2001

Promotion for Liv Tyler's new movie, 'One Night at McCool's', is kicking into high gear. If you suddenly see Liv Tyler oozing across your Web browser as she washes a car, don't blink twice, it's really her. The promotional campaign for "One Night at McCool's" is providing content to selected Web sites to include in their content. Xenite.Org was selected to participate in the campaign and, since we love Liv Tyler, we had no problem agreeing to help the suits make millions of dollars. The car wash scene appears to be an homage to the famous scene in "Cool Hand Luke", where Paul Newman and other inmates are tortured by a shapely young blond exhibitionist as she uses her body to wash her car. Read the full article here

Tolkien and Middle-earth track update

by Michael Martinez, Tuesday, March 27, 2001

The first guests have been announced for the Tolkien and Middle-earth fan programming track at Dragoncon 2001. Glass Hammer will be performing at the convention this year, which will be held over the Labor Day Weekend, August 31 - September 3. Representatives from Decipher, Inc. will also be in attendance. And William Kenyon, a writer who worked for Iron Crown Enterprises, will also be there. More guests are being sought at this time. The track will also be showing the rarely seen (in America) video, "J.R.R.T.: A Film Portrait of J.R.R. Tolkien", and will also feature lessons in Elvish from Tolkien linguists. For complete information on Dragoncon, be sure to visit http://www.dragoncon.org/.

OneRing.Net gets major spoiler info

by Michael Martinez, Monday, March 26, 2001

A spy has reported in to TheOneRing.Net with new revelations about promotional footage being shown to gaming store owners. The promotional footage includes scenes which may not make the final cut, as well as interviews, and some rehashed trailer shots. Most notable are the facts that Eowyn will fight at Helm's Deep and Arwen's Glorfindellian ride with Frodo is confirmed in new and exciting detail. Treebeard's face also appears in the promotional footage. There are no pictures (at this time) available. Just a text report.

Houghton Mifflin says book is not a novelization

by Michael Martinez, Friday, March 23, 2001

Tolkien Online has been investigating the report from Diamond Previews concerning an upcoming edition of The Lord of the Rings. Houghton Mifflin cryptically says that the book is a movie tie-in with pictures and information on the characters but is not a novelization.

Liv Tyler talks LoTR, Elvish

by Michael Martinez, Friday, March 23, 2001

Tolkien Online and several other Web sites picked up a story with Liv Tyler. She speaks a little Elvish (not transcribed by the reporter) and offers a translation. There is a little spoilage in the article, possibly even for the end of the third movie.

Decipher gets the role-playing game license, too

by Michael Martinez, Friday, March 23, 2001

Decipher, which was awarded the LoTR collectible card game license last year, has announced that they now have a license to produce role-playing games based on the "Lord of the Rings" movies.

The manly men of myth and Middle-earth

by Michael Martinez, Friday, March 23, 2001

I was first introduced to the Beowulf legend in the fourth grade. My classmates and I were assembled along with a few hundred other lucky kids in an experimental school, the like of which I have never seen again. We were given the usual lessons and textbooks, but there was a particular emphasis on sparking the children's imaginations. We were literally inundated with audio-visual aids and tools. We watched movies, played our own film strips, interrupted classes to follow the space missions, and made things in our cone's art room. I remember vividly reading stories about Thor with his goat-drawn chariot, how he killed the goats each night and ate them, and brought them back to life the next day. I followed the Mighty One on his dangerous adventures against the giants. And there came Beowulf, with his ship-full of brave Geats, to rescue King Hrothgar from the deadly menace of Grendel and his mother. I didn't know then, however, that the interest in Beowulf had been rekindled by a man in England named Tolkien. In fact, at the time, I knew nothing of Tolkien and Hobbits and Elves and Dragons. For some reason, he wasn't included in our unusual curriculum. It was a different world from today. My friends and I all wanted Richard Nixon to be President because our families believed he would get us out of the Vietnam war. I suppose the country had other things than Hobbits to think about at the time. "Beowulf" the poem is an appropriate symbol for the generation of Americans who had to live through the war. We grew weary of it. Hrothgar's people were weary of the terror which Grendel wreaked upon their lives. His warriors were brave men but they had reached a point where they refused to go up against the monster. "Sore is my soul to say to any of the race of man what ruth for me in Heorot Grendel with hate hath wrought, what sudden harryings," Hrothgar tells Beowulf when the Geats first arrive in Heorot. "Hall-folk fail me, my warriors wane; for Wyrd hath swept them into Grendel's grasp." Read the full article here

Games Workshop announces LoTR products

by Michael Martinez, Tuesday, March 20, 2001

The much anticipated product list from Games Workshop is now available on their Web site. http://www.games-workshop.com/lotr/ says the table top gaming products should be available by Christmas 2001, in time for co-release with "The Fellowship of the Ring", Peter Jackson's first LoTR movie. Seven box sets are planned, with dozens of blisters divided between the Forces of Good, the Forces of Evil, and Scenery. Weathertop, Orthanc, Khazad-dum, and Amon Hen all figure prominently. More products will probably be announced in conjunction with "The Two Towers", due for release in December 2002, and "The Return of the King", due for release in December 2003. Peter Jackson's "The Lord of the Rings" movies are expected to generate a marketing bonanza for many companies, although Games Workshop has indicated they don't expect to sell much LoTR-related material. They are hoping their "Lord of the Rings" product line will increase their visibility and help boost sales for their Warhammer products.

Ancanar.com updates, reports on AFM, trailer

by Michael Martinez, Monday, March 19, 2001

The official Web site of the independent film inspired by Tolkien's Silmarillion is teasing fans mercilessly. The much-anticipated trailer for "Ancanar", a movie about a young man who seeks a hidden city of the Elves after his people have been defeated in a war, was shown at the Americam Film Market in early March. Curugon, the media spokesperson for Elemental Films, the company producing the movie, posted a report on the AFM and the "Ancanar" trailer. Sam Balcomb, writer/producer of the film, has posted a new letter under "Filmmaker's note". "Post Production is proceeding quite well," Balcomb writes. "Editing has commenced, which is a huge job, since our shooting ratio (what we shot compared to what we need) is so high. Stu Balcomb, our composer, is scoring themes to various characters. We are hard at work getting press materials together . SFX are being designed and rendered. It's a good time to be alive." The company promises to make its trailer available on the Web as soon as their schedule and resource permit, but in the meantime they have published two screen shots from the trailer under Balcomb's letter. Ancanar.com

A funny thing happened on the way to the canon

by Michael Martinez, Saturday, March 17, 2001

I checked in on the Barrow-downs' canon discussions recently and was glad to see that they haven't died down completely. Not that I think they should die down, but this was a project I felt from the start would have trouble keeping the steam going. Let's face it, not too many people are going to care what one small group of readers decides should comprise the "correct Silmarillion". Whatever proposal finally emerges from the discussions, I am sure to disagree with it. So are many other people. But the canon discussions represent a legitimate effort by some of Tolkien's readers to identify his intentions. This may or may not be the first such attempt, but it will undoubtedly draw some fire when something is produced. Nonetheless, every first endeavor serves an important function in the ongoing study of literature and the past. And the canon discussions are relevant to our knowledge of the literary past. Literature doesn't make the world go round. It doesn't save lives. It doesn't put food on the table. It's just there. We read it. But it moves us, provokes us to discuss it, and to understand it. In fact, we attempt to understand things about literature which the authors never intended us to understand. A friend recently asked me, after finishing, The Lord of the Rings, what the book is really about. I told her that not everyone agrees with him, but Tolkien said it was about death and the search for deathlessness. No, that's not what my friend thought the book is about. In fact, until I saw a video of Tolkien explaining the story, I didn't think about that, either. Up until that time I had always thought it was about how heroic Hobbits can be. Some people see it as a brush stroke on the canvas of the battle between Good and Evil (I always have trouble sorting the Good guys from the Bad guys myself). Some people seem to feel The Lord of the Rings is a subtle allegory about expanding personal horizons through chemical processes. I suppose the 60s weren't too good to those folks. Inevitably, any serious discussion about Tolkien leads to the question of what is acceptable. That is, what is the "canon" we must rely upon to form a common reference? There is no answer to that question. There never has been, and I don't believe there ever will be. We have a plentitude of canons to choose from. We can fire a battery of canonical postulations at each other in debate after debate and keep our heads spinning. I often jump from one canon to another when discussing Balrogs, Elven history, geography, Tolkien's intentions, and "the mythology". If ever I tried to stick to any one canon, those days are long gone, and unlike Elrond I don't remember them well at all. Read the full article here.

Houghton Mifflin makes its own LoTR movie

by Michael Martinez, Friday, March 16, 2001

It's just a sales pitch for The Lord of the Rings, but this little Quicktime movie brings the cover to life. Watch carefully as the image moves out from what appears to be Alan Lee's rendering of Minas Tirith. Fog rolls across the foreground. Probably anyone with a copy of the book and a digital camera could have done this, but it's a nice effect anyway.

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