In this part of the review Gandalf gets to play hero and brings Theoden back to himself, that's a good thing. On the other side of Middle-earth things aren't going so well for Frodo and Sam; Gollum's causing tension between them and it's not long before they find themselves in the middle of a battle.
123. Oh, one of my favourite bits of music is coming up. We've arrived at Edoras.
124. Inside the Golden Hall, Éowyn is trying to tell
125. Ugh, Wormtongue is really creepy. You just know exactly what he wants to do with Éowyn.
126. Here it is. Best bit of music ever.
127. The way Éowyn's hair is here is why I don't have long hair anymore. I live in Scotland. With long hair you look like Éowyn does pretty much 24/7!
128. I want to live in Edoras!
129. I am also a secret Aragorn/Éowyn shipper (well, obviously not so secret now). This may come up again in the future.
130. Hehe, unloading all the weapons. It's like the Dwarves in Mirkwood in The Hobbit.
131. Gandalf is really playing up the feeble old man thing as he leans on Legolas's arm when they head into the hall.
132. This bit kind of reminds me of West Side Story. I keep on expecting Aragorn and the gang to start breaking out some moves as they fight off the guards.
133. Gandalf obviously had to die so he could come back as Gandalf the White and have enough power to drive out Saruman's poison from Théoden. It's all very complicated but smacks of 'everything happens for a reason'.
134. Théoden looks like he really needs to exfoliate.
135. Well that got rid of Saruman.
136. I love the backward aging thing. So clever. You don't really notice it at first and then suddenly he's younger again.
137. Théoden's sword is so cool, with the horse heads on the hilt. I love all the attention to details.
138. And now it's time to get rid of Gríma Wormtongue. Now it's Aragorn's turn to teach the meaning of pity. Though not killing him means that bad things will happen later on... though it does give them the Palantír, so I suppose it was for the good over all.
139. Oh dear. Now they have to tell him that Théodred is dead. And presumably he knows nothing of having banished Éomer either. This will be awkward.
140. I like Éowyn's headbandy thing.
141. I wonder if those are actual flowers or if they're fake ones made for the film.
142. Gandalf offers platitudes for the death of Théodred. He's basically saying to Théoden that he has to get over it and go do battle against Saruman's army.
143. And then a couple of refugees show up to let everyone know what's happening out in the kingdom.
144. Gandalf uses this as another little dig at why Théoden needs to go join the war. He's not so keen though.
145. When Théoden points out that he's king of Rohan, not Aragorn, I always think Aragorn should say 'yeah, but I'm going to be king of Gondor, so neh neh neh neh neh!'
146. All the same, Aragorn is quite defensive of Théoden's decision to run to Helm's Deep. I suppose he's feeling the whole kingly solidarity thing or something.
147. Meanwhile, Gandalf's got other places to go and people to see. He promises he'll be back. He's keeping tight lipped about what he's actually off to do though.
148. Now Aragorn's off to do a bit of horse whispering (in Elvish of course). Taming a wild horse because he's just that awesome.
149. After a little moment between Aragon and Éowyn, it's back to Isengard where Wormtongue's joined Saruman. The former is filling in the latter on who Gandalf's travel companions are. Looks like Saruman knows that the King has returned.
150. Edoras is evacuating. There's a lot of people living there. It doesn't look like there's that many houses there.
151. I love this little bit with Éowyn practicing with her sword. She's so badass.
152. And yeah, I love it for the Aragorn and Éowyn bit as well. He should seriously give up on the Elf chick and go for Éowyn instead. He does kind of lead her on a bit.
153. Okay, from this angle Edoras looks a lot bigger.
154. By letting Wormtongue go, they've basically allowed him to given Saruman lots of insider knowledge to make it easier to attack them. Might have been better to just kill him or at least chain him up and keep him with them.
155. Back to Frodo, Sam and Gollum. I'd kind of forgotten about them. This happens when I read the book as well!
156. Sam does not understand the special understanding of each other that Frodo and Gollum share. They're practically the same person and all that jazz.
157. The Ring is clearly getting to Frodo more and more. Poor Sam. He's all worried about his friend.
158. Frodo: 'It's my task! Mine! My Own!' My precious!
159. Oh I love the Gollum/Sméagol conversation. It's so clever. They really hit on a winner with doing this because it's been reused at least twice since then.
160. I feel sorry for Sméagol right now. I think everyone has that little mean, doubting voice at the back of their head, but Sméagol's actually has control over him. I always really want Sméagol to win and he does a pretty good job of it here.
161. Aww and he's trying so hard as well, bringing Frodo rabbits. Perhaps if Sam could be a little bit nicer and more accepting of him, Sméagol might have been able to keep Gollum at bay.
162. I've just realised that Word doesn't seem to mind 'Sméagol' but it takes issue with Rohan's royalty. Why is that?
163. 'Po-tay-toes': this is a common response in our house when you ask whether you want chips or potatoes with your meal.
164. Another little glimpse of war for Frodo and Sam. I always want to know a little more about where these people are coming from.
165. Yay! Mumakil! I imagine you'd get really motion sick riding on one of those.
166. I feel sorry for the Mumakil, I mean, they didn't ask to get involved with any of this.
167. Hello Faramir!
168. They're really rather rough with the little Hobbits. Especially as they're clearly not Orcs and look way more like children than anything else.
169. When Faramir wonders who the dead man is, I always wonder whether anyone has written fanfiction about who he actually is. I would read that story.
170. Faramir is not a cheerful person. I mean, I understand why, but he's very doom and gloom.
171. And that's the end of Disc One. Seems like as good a place as any to stop.
Stop by next week as we start the second half of The Two Towers.
Wow that's a detailed account! I'm stopping by on the A-Z Road Trip and I've browsed some of your posts. I think it was brave of you to be so open about a topic that some people shy away from discussing but I guess it must help you to be able to put thoughts into words. Particularly when you are going through difficult times. I hope you're successful next time around.
ReplyDeleteThank you. It definitely helped to write about the IVF treatment. We're hoping to use one of our frozen embryos soon. Fingers crossed next A to Z I can do the A to Z of being pregnant.
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