#i also love how because the movies cut out saruman’s connection with the shire

[defendglobe]

fucking obsessed with the scene where saruman steals merry’s bag of weed

[paradoxcase]

Moria thoughts (I’m up to just before the discovery of Balin’s tomb):

In the movie, after establishing that Saruman is purposefully forcing them to abandon the idea of going over Caradhras and thus having to go through Moria as Gimli suggests, Saruman gives this like, evil villain speech about Gandalf is super afraid to go through Moria because of the Balrog, which I think is supposed to foreshadow Gandalf not making it out of Moria.  But in the books, Gimli doesn’t mention Moria at first, and actually it was Gandalf’s idea to go that way, even without trying Caradhras at all.  They only try Caradhras because Gandalf and Aragorn had been arguing about this and Gandalf finally agreed with Aragorn that they would try Caradhras first before going through Moria, and then when Caradhras doesn’t work out, Gandalf is like, look guys, I’ve been through Moria before, it’s really not that bad, trust me, also there are a whole bunch of evil werewolves/wargs around here and we probably don’t want to continue going overland with them chasing us (they do actually have to fight off some werewolves the night before they go into Moria, which honestly I can’t imagine why Peter Jackson would have cut that scene because it’s exactly the sort of stuff he loves).  Anyway, I feel like inserting Gimli into this conversation and making Gandalf actually averse to going through Moria removes the last tiny little bit of Gandalf and Aragorn’s relationship that we might have seen in the movie, which is just a shame.  We also miss the actual foreshadowing that Tolkien does, where Aragorn keeps making dark predictions about how Gandalf won’t survive Moria and how he, personally, is going to wind up regretting going this way and etc., which is IMO much better than just having Saruman say “muhahaha my evil plan to make them go through Moria has worked!” which was honestly kind of dumb.  There is a note about Tolkien calling Moria a “trap” but it’s not really clear if he actually meant that someone was really forcing them to go through it and face that danger.  There’s even a note in the companion that it’s not clear if Gandalf actually knew what Durin’s Bane even was before meeting the Balrog.  There’s a nice little moment after they get locked into Moria by the Watcher where the hobbits are scared and Aragorn is like, don’t worry, Gandalf will definitely be able to lead us out of here, I’ve known him a long time and he’s very good at this, in spite of all of his dire predictions earlier.  Another little bit of their relationship that wasn’t included in the movie.

For the Pippin-is-stupid record: It was Boromir and not Pippin who threw a rock into the Watcher’s pool, and he did it because he was frustrated, not because ooh, I’m bored, it’s fun to throw rocks.  But Pippin did throw the rock down the well in Moria, and it was more or less because he wanted to see what would happen.  Pippin admittedly isn’t smart all the time.  However, he did not actually send an entire skeleton connected to a big clanking chain down there, it was just a rock.

Gimli has a very nice poem/song about Durin in Moria which obviously didn’t make it into the movie.  I realize they can’t put all the songs in the movie, but I would have liked to see this one!  I remember they did put in, IIRC one of Bilbo’s songs when Pippin sang it to Denethor, and they included the dwarves’ song in the Hobbit.

If you’re like me and always wondered how Gollum could possibly have followed them into Moria when they entered the way they did, it turns out that Gollum actually entered from the east quite a long time before the Fellowship entered from the west and had only just found his way to the west exit when the Fellowship entered there (and then the west exit was blocked by the Watcher).  After Gollum escaped from Thranduil, he was being chased by both angry Elves and and angry Orcs, so he actually entered Moria in order to hide from them, with the sort of vague plan of trying to get to the Shire when he came out, since he knew it was west of the Misty Mountains.  Then he got lost, and, I suppose, was following the Fellowship just in order to find the way out again.  He may or may not have actually known that the ring-bearer was part of the Fellowship at this point.

[chaos-in-the-making]

Alright, I'm about to tell you guys what I told @thoresque in private.

Apparently some people have expressed the opinion that the Endgame movie was hastily written and produced, which resulted in plot holes and mistreatment of overarching character arcs and stories. That certain things happened because those involved did not use the proper respect and care with the material, and didnt have a solid outline of what would be good for the STORY and the CHARACTERS, instead of what was good for their pocketbooks. Because of this opinion, there has been pushback from others who enjoyed the movie without the same gripping disappointments, saying that we should be GRATEFUL for what was given, because a movie this big and this complicated is practically impossible, was never meant to be perfect, and you cant please everyone.

The problem that I have with this is, that the directors did exactly the opposite. They didnt try to please ANYONE. They wrote their own story that has little to no connection to the previous stories. It's like they hadnt watched the previous 10 films and picked up the characters halfway. I feel the same way about Ragnarok, and how it mutilated my favorite characters. And I LIKED Endgame. Despite liking it, I have some serious problems.

To make my point more clearly, let me shift focus. I am a die hard Lord of the Rings fan. I read The Hobbit in 5th grade, and never looked back. I've read all the books, I could give you all the meta. I know as much about Tolkien as I can, because I adore and respect him as a person and his works are a gift to my life. Fast forward to 2001 when the movies came out. Peter Jackson was told making the movies was an impossible task. Yes, impossible. That it couldn't be done in three movies, there was too much content in the book, and it would fall flat. Yet what happened, you ask? They made three incredible, timeless movies that snatched up no less than 11 awards, sweeping everything else into the dust. It was written and produced with respect and care to the original material, even though they cut a lot of it out. Is the Lord of the Rings trilogy perfect? No. Do some of us fans have some problems with the choices made? Yes. Leaving out Tom Bombadil hurt, but it made directing sense. So we came to terms with it. Giving lines from one character to another irritated me, but overall I can accept it. The characters were real, the story was gripping, and they didnt sacrifice quality for special affects. Every character, and there was a lot, was treated with respect and given closure by the end. High fantasy, impossible to produce, plenty of problems, but God i love those movies so much. Tolkien would be proud.

What Marvel did in this movie sucked ass. The ending they gave Steve would be the equivalent to Aragorn saying at the end of Return of the King, "Nevermind, I dont want to marry Arwen, whom I have loved all my life and is my elf princess and stood by me and helped me through the most difficult journey to overthrow an evil overlord. I'm going to wank off back to Numenor (which is gone and he cant go back to bc it was destroyed) and spend my days with that one chick I kissed that one time. Boromir? Who is Boromir?" This is no disrespect to Peggy Carter, i love her, but it made no gd sense. It also broke the few rules of time travel that the movie set in place. So you make your own rules, and then you break them.

And Thor just... leaving with the Guardians?? Wtf?? After all the talk in Ragnarok about Asgard being a PEOPLE, and how much his people have LOST, and are kind of hopeless? They need stability and leadership, and Thor just... doesnt care??? Not my Thor. If he had told Valkyrie, "hey, I have to go on a quest to find my brother who is very likely no longer dead because of choices made in the past" then I would have accepted it. Even a "I'm going to find a better place for our people now that Earth has all its citizens back" would make sense. Not this "I care more about myself than about the people I was raised to guard, protect, and lead." Wow. Who is this guy? Call it his depression, call it being low, call it self discovery, whatever. To me it rang very false and shallow. When Valkyrie asked when he would be back, he could have said "I will return when I am ready to be the king they deserve". THAT would have been acceptable.

Thors ending would be like Sam completely abandoning Frodo after the ring had been destroyed, deciding not to go back to the Shire to help rebuild (in the book the Shire was destroyed by Saruman), and not caring that his friends and family needed his help. Because he needed to work on himself and eat a salad. Yes, I went there.

So while I enjoyed Endgame, and the shock, and the plot, and the ending, I take serious issue with the way some of the characters were sidelined and completely reduced to something that they werent. I got into Marvel for the relationships. For the heartache and joy that the actors and actresses brought onscreen. Dont tell people to get over it. We were emotionally invested in these movies and this blatant disrespect feels like a betrayal.