Indistinguishable from Jesse

Like Fellowship, Return of the King came out during Mudd's finals week. Despite the timing, 300 of Mudd's 700 students went to Ontario Mills AMC on Tuesday night. Tickets only cost $3 thanks to a subsidy from DOS and APC.

FNMG showed extended editions of Fellowship and Two Towers in a lecture hall on Tuesday, creating a private version of Trilogy Tuesday. I had a International Economics final Tuesday afternoon and a Microeconomics final on Wednesday to study for, so I only watched the first half of Two Towers. I liked the added rope scene at the beginning.

Theater 16 was almost entirely Mudd students and students from the other Claremont Colleges who bought their tickets through Mudd. I brought Set and started a game on the floor in the front of the theater. We quickly had 12 players. I still have all of my cards, and I was the only person to step on the case.

I liked RotK, but there were a few things I didn't like:

• The ring had an immediate effect on Smeagol's grammar. It's easier for me to believe its effect on emotions than its effect on grammar... I blame the linguist in me. (Hmm, wasn't Tolkien a linguist?)
• The battles were too predictable. During the battle for Minas Tirith, I was waiting for the army from Rohan and the army of the Dead to show up rather than wondering how well the good guys would hold the city/castle.
• The steward of Minas Tirith seemed to be doing everything in his power to screw up his side. His actions didn't seem to be random, but he didn't seem to be under Sauron's control either.
• There's no way an army of ents can keep Saruman locked in his tower without a strong leader like Aragorn or Gandalf around. I'm told they don't succeed in the books.
• Aragorn ends up with Arwen rather than Eowyn. I'm told that the relationship between Arwen and Aragorn makes more sense in the books. (I only read Fellowship.)

The part of Two Towers where Theoden (King of Rohan) discovers his son's death is still the only part of the trilogy that makes me cry.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 22nd, 2003 at 1:31 am and is filed under Mudd. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.