Ad Terras Per Aspera

I just spent eleven and a half hours watching the extended (true) editions The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King. My brain is pretty much fried now. Today also marks the first day I’ve seen ROTK in either form as well.

I never realized how well these movies fit together. I watched FOTR when it was originally released, and then TTT when it was originally released, and then all three right in a row today. It just fits together so well, its like I just watched a 11 and a half hour movie instead of three movies in a trilogy.

I am not even forming coherent thoughts here, this is how amazing LOTR is; or how scary it is. Tolkien wrote LOTR in response to many things, including his experiences in war. Is war this brain numbing? At the end, I don’t think I even felt sad for Gandalf and Frodo leaving; it wasn’t the destination that mattered, but the journey itself.

This journey brought four friends, plus others acquired along the way, to the brink of destruction and back. Isn’t this what war almost is? A journey in to destruction that many don’t return from? Tolkien was there and back again, and he survived so he could write this story.

In my opinion, Peter Jackson’s version of the story is also wonderfully designed and told. I am not comparing Jackson’s and Tolkien’s versions; to do so would be like comparing a certain red fruit to a certain slightly more rounder fruit.

And I am still not going anywhere with this. I’ll write something later when my mind has had enough time to digest this all. In short, LOTR is fucking awesome.