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The One Ring Forums: Tolkien Topics: Movie Discussion: The Hobbit:
A late but positive review of DOS on internet (link, please...)
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mae govannen
Tol Eressea


Oct 17 2016, 11:44am

Post #1 of 56 (2107 views)
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A late but positive review of DOS on internet (link, please...) Can't Post

http://www.theartsguild.com/...solation-smaug-2013/

Can someone convert this address into a link, please, so that the article is easily accessed? Thank you... (I've been away quite long, don't remember how to do it Blush )
I found it refreshing to see someone daring quietly to differ from the raging critics who have echoed each other bashing up the new Trilogy by Peter Jackson.
Any comment by other TORNsibs about this article?

Mod note: Link is now clicky.

'Is everything sad going to come untrue?'
(Sam, 'The Field of Cormallen', in 'The Return of the King'.)

(This post was edited by Silverlode on Oct 18 2016, 12:17am)


Noria
Gondor

Oct 17 2016, 12:22pm

Post #2 of 56 (2022 views)
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Agree with the reviewer [In reply to] Can't Post

I love DOS so of course I agree.


Otaku-sempai
Immortal


Oct 17 2016, 1:13pm

Post #3 of 56 (2014 views)
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URL [In reply to] Can't Post


In Reply To
http://www.theartsguild.com/2016/10/15/page-screen-hobbit-desolation-smaug-2013/

Can someone convert this address into a link, please, so that the article is easily accessed? Thank you... (I've been away quite long, don't remember how to do it Blush )

Any comment by other TORNsibs about this article?


You use the URL button, mae. I broadly agree with most of the sentiments in the review, but I could certain argue over some of the specifics. I'm not happy about how Jackson handled his inclusion of the Ringwraiths--mostly involving his invented story of their defeat and entombment. I liked the general idea of Tauriel, but not so much many aspects of her relationship with Kili.

http://www.theartsguild.com/...solation-smaug-2013/

"He who lies artistically, treads closer to the truth than ever he knows." -- Favorite proverb of the wizard Ningauble of the Seven Eyes

(This post was edited by Otaku-sempai on Oct 17 2016, 1:20pm)


MyWeeLadGimli
Lorien

Oct 17 2016, 3:25pm

Post #4 of 56 (1983 views)
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Higher stakes [In reply to] Can't Post

I'd have to disagree with the author's sentiment here: "Heightening the stakes of the story results in a darker and weightier tale, which true Tolkien fans should be able to appreciate instead of lament as they are returned to the familiar world of Middle Earth not one but three more times."

It feels unnecessary to me to try to make every story a fate-of-the-world affair. The original was about some Dwarves who wanted their home back, and the Hobbit who was helping them, and I don't know why that's not enough.

Also, one of the themes of the book is the utter pointlessness of the conflict towards the end. Having the world on the line kind of diminishes that sense of futility, imo.


mae govannen
Tol Eressea


Oct 18 2016, 5:59am

Post #5 of 56 (1911 views)
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Thank you for taking [In reply to] Can't Post

the trouble of answering anyway, even if only to state your love for DOS... which I happen to share entirely!...

'Is everything sad going to come untrue?'
(Sam, 'The Field of Cormallen', in 'The Return of the King'.)


mae govannen
Tol Eressea


Oct 18 2016, 6:12am

Post #6 of 56 (1909 views)
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Aw. URL button? Your other comments [In reply to] Can't Post

make more sense to me, for I can't remember any URL button at all, shame on me. Will have to look for that next time I start a new thread... Thanks for the hint anyway!

As for the Ringwraiths, is your objection to them because it looks like they have been actually killed, and then brought back from the Dead by this "Necromancer"? Do you see a major discrepancy with Tolkien there? Or on some other point perhaps?

'Is everything sad going to come untrue?'
(Sam, 'The Field of Cormallen', in 'The Return of the King'.)


Silverlode
Forum Admin / Moderator


Oct 18 2016, 6:48am

Post #7 of 56 (1907 views)
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If you use Advanced Editor [In reply to] Can't Post

You can embed a link by:

1. Highlighting the text you want to use as the link.
2. Clicking on the "link" (chain) icon in the message box header (far right, next to the picture icon)
3. Delete the http:// that is already in the popup box and paste in the URL you want to link to.
4. Click submit.

And voila!

If you're using Basic Editor, you have to use either Markup or HTML to make a link clicky. Feel free to PM me or ask on Feedback for instructions on how to do that. Smile

Silverlode

Roads go ever ever on
Under cloud and under star
Yet feet that wandering have gone
Turn at last to home afar.
Eyes that fire and sword have seen
And horror in the halls of stone
Look at last on meadows green
And trees and hills they long have known.




mae govannen
Tol Eressea


Oct 18 2016, 8:13am

Post #8 of 56 (1899 views)
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An important other character... [In reply to] Can't Post


In Reply To

It feels unnecessary to me to try to make every story a fate-of-the-world affair. The original was about some Dwarves who wanted their home back, and the Hobbit who was helping them, and I don't know why that's not enough.

Quote


Well, you seem to forget, in the original party, the wizard Gandalf, with later his rather conspicuous but mysterious comings and goings, although he always came back to help the others!...
Why is he at all involved, and from the very beginning?
What are his real concerns and intentions in not only joining, but recruiting the Hobbit Bilbo, if it is merely such a trivial and unimportant adventure as you make it to be???
And why would he be telling Bilbo in the end those famous last words:
"You don't really suppose, do you, that all your adventures and escapes were managed by mere luck, just for your sole benefit?" Etc...
Moreover, why would JRRT himself have later written 'The Quest of Erebor', if he didn't feel important to reveal in that extra piece of writing some of the 'fate-of-the-world' reasons that Gandalf had to participate, and sometimes to be absent for a long while?...
It seems to me that PJ actually found a great way of doing justice to both the original little novel and its later complement, by joining them in his own rendering of the tale, giving it thus openly the vaster significance it did have for M-e as a whole, although the main protagonists that you mention didn't know it at the time... but Gandalf did! Wink

As for your disagreement with the author of the article regarding the extra joy fans should have felt in having 3 more M-e films provided to them through that one opportunity, you have of course every right as an individual not to feel that way, but I must say that I for one felt just like Gimli receiving 3 strands of hair from Galadriel; I could gleefully paraphrase his ecstatic words by mine, full of gratitude too:
"I asked Peter Jackson for one Hobbit movie... He gave me three!... Heart "

'Is everything sad going to come untrue?'
(Sam, 'The Field of Cormallen', in 'The Return of the King'.)

(This post was edited by mae govannen on Oct 18 2016, 8:19am)


Silmaril
Rohan


Oct 18 2016, 8:27am

Post #9 of 56 (1892 views)
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I was very disappointed by DOS when I left the cinema. [In reply to] Can't Post

The barrel scene, toilet climbing, gold dwarf and smaug chase ruined that movie for me. As did the bunny sled chase and goblin king in AUJ, and Bard, Alfrid, Ironfoot etc in BOTFA. I really tried hard to love these films but after watching LOTR after a very long time I think that The Hobbit movies did go wrong in too many aspects for me. Unfortunately.


mae govannen
Tol Eressea


Oct 18 2016, 8:27am

Post #10 of 56 (1890 views)
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All my thanks, dear Silverlode! [In reply to] Can't Post

... Also for compassionately giving me the way out of my technical troubles by inviting me to ask you for help!!! So kind of you, really... Heart

'Is everything sad going to come untrue?'
(Sam, 'The Field of Cormallen', in 'The Return of the King'.)


dormouse
Half-elven


Oct 18 2016, 8:54am

Post #11 of 56 (1896 views)
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I love DOS too, so agreeing with the reviewer poses few problems... [In reply to] Can't Post

... though I did wonder a little how well he or she knew 'The Quest for Erebor.' I could be wrong, but I don't remember Dol Guldur being described there in any detail. It's mentioned, as it is in 'The Hobbit', but not in any detail. But on the broader point, of bringing out the 'Dol Guldur/Sauron' aspect of the story and raising the stakes, tying the outcome of Thorin's quest to the long struggle for the fate of Middle Earth, I've never had a problem with that in the film because Tolkien got there a long time before Peter Jackson did.

The reviewer is right in singling out the enlargement of the original novel as the thing that separates this adaptation from others. It's the addition of new material that I think annoys most of the people who really dislike these films. I can see their point (some of the time) but will still disagree that Bilbo has been sidelined or the original story lost in the additions. Seems to me that it's still the central narrative, and Bilbo still the central character.

I don't have a favourite of the three films but I do love DOS (did I mention that before... Wink ), and think it contains some of the most beautiful scenes, both straight out of the book and newly-minted.

Hooray for positive reviews! (Actually, most of the published ones I saw at the time were pretty positive.)

For still there are so many things
that I have never seen:
in every wood and every spring
there is a different green. . .


mae govannen
Tol Eressea


Oct 18 2016, 11:47am

Post #12 of 56 (1881 views)
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Even Bard disppointed you? How amazingly [In reply to] Can't Post

different various persons' perceptions of the same thing can be, really!!! Shocked
At the end of DOS, I for one was all thrilled, had LOVED the Dwarves (+1 Hobbit) attempts to finish off Smaug, and I was eagerly looking forward to the next and last film!...
Didn't you appreciate at least the dialogue between Bilbo and Smaug, for example, just as great in my eyes as the dialogue between Bilbo and Gollum in AUJ, straight from the book as well?
At the time of LOTR, did you like everything in the films immediately, or did you have strong reservations and dislikes, at first?

'Is everything sad going to come untrue?'
(Sam, 'The Field of Cormallen', in 'The Return of the King'.)


mae govannen
Tol Eressea


Oct 18 2016, 12:15pm

Post #13 of 56 (1870 views)
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What a correct and nice way to put it, [In reply to] Can't Post

"But on the broader point, of bringing out the 'Dol Guldur/Sauron' aspect of the story and raising the stakes, tying the outcome of Thorin's quest to the long struggle for the fate of Middle Earth, I've never had a problem with that in the film because Tolkien got there a long time before Peter Jackson did."(bold italics mine).
All your other points I second as well, and like again the way you have formulated them (ah, the incredible beauty of gold-coated Smaug rising up into the sky and shaking himself in this kind of furious dance!...)
As for positive reviews, I'm glad for you that you mostly read positive ones; well, quite to the opposite - perhaps because of the daily feed from my Google Alert - I have been exposed for months to a daily dose of total and revolting absurdities on the part of a number of reviewers, many of them merely repeating ad nauseam what others had written, although in some cases they themselves obviously hadn't even seen the movie in question, so I got a bit of an overdose of that and tend nowadays to automatically shrink away from any more reviews... hence my particular relief and pleased surprise in reading this one, and my joy in sharing it with everyone here...! Cool


'Is everything sad going to come untrue?'
(Sam, 'The Field of Cormallen', in 'The Return of the King'.)


Otaku-sempai
Immortal


Oct 18 2016, 12:37pm

Post #14 of 56 (1868 views)
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The Nine [In reply to] Can't Post


In Reply To
make more sense to me, for I can't remember any URL button at all, shame on me. Will have to look for that next time I start a new thread... Thanks for the hint anyway!


My Post Style is set at Markup. Below my Post window are the 'buttons': code; reply; quote; b; u; i; email; url. Your screen may be different, but if you enclose url and /url within brackets ([ ]) on either side of your link address, that should do what you want.


In Reply To
As for the Ringwraiths, is your objection to them because it looks like they have been actually killed, and then brought back from the Dead by this "Necromancer"? Do you see a major discrepancy with Tolkien there? Or on some other point perhaps?


Good guess, mae; right on both counts! The nineteen Rings of Power were forged in the Second Age between 1500 and 1590. And Sauron made the Master Ring about ten years later. Sauron presumably distributed the Rings before the forging of the One Ring, giving nine of them to Men and seven to the Dwarf-lords (the Three Rings of the Elves, were not made by Sauron and were distributed by Celebrimbor). The Nine first appeared in the forms of the Nazgūl around 650 years later, about the year 2250 and when Sauron was defeated they were overthrown or went into hiding. The Ringwraiths reemerged in the Third Age around the year 1300 when the Lord of the Nazgūl became the Witch-king of Angmar, the other eight remaining in the East until about 1640 when they began the rebuilding of Mordor. The Nine remained active throughout the rest of the Third Age. The Nine had been undead Wraiths for at least 2500 years before the rise of Angmar. And the defeat and entombment of the Nine is a complete invention of Peter Jackson, as is the High Fells of Rhudaur.

So, yeah, you could say that there is a major discrepancy between the Ringwraiths of these films and Tolkien's canon.

"He who lies artistically, treads closer to the truth than ever he knows." -- Favorite proverb of the wizard Ningauble of the Seven Eyes

(This post was edited by Otaku-sempai on Oct 18 2016, 12:47pm)


Silmaril
Rohan


Oct 18 2016, 1:32pm

Post #15 of 56 (1837 views)
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Bard [In reply to] Can't Post

It's not the character of Bard, that's ok, but some action with him. The hilarious repair of his broken bow and the shooting of Smaug on the shoulder of his son. The prison escape which is in my opinion totally unrealistic and silly. The killing of the troll on his vehicle. The toilet climbing...

Yes, there are great (book) scenes. The beginning of AUJ until Radagast is great, the scene with Gollum, Bilbo in Rivendell, things like that. Therefore I bought the discs and movie books in hope that the scenes I disliked would get better, but this wasn't the case. And I don't like to skip scenes in a movie, that's not the way I watch films.

And yes, there are some minor scenes in LOTR I don't appreciate like the Legolas stunts, the warg attack on the way to Helms Deep or the jumping off the pirate ship by the 3 heroes. But these are just some small details that really don't influence the overall impression. These 3 films are the best I've ever seen.


Otaku-sempai
Immortal


Oct 18 2016, 1:47pm

Post #16 of 56 (1834 views)
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The History of the Nazgūl in the Films [In reply to] Can't Post

Hi again! I didn't want to make my previous post too long, but there was a bit more that I wished to address.

As I stated above, the Nine should have been undead Wraiths throughout the Third Age and well before the end of the Second. Treating them as though they were still mortal in the films and entombing them may be the hardest contradiction with Tolkien's legendarium to overcome. However, there may be workarounds that we can devise for that and other objections to how Peter Jackson portrayed them.

Establishing Angmar and achieving the fall of the North Kingdom of Arthedain were the Witch-king's projects and the rest of the Nine were not involved. In the films, it seems that the other eight Nazgūl were summoned to the defense of the Witch-king. Other servants of Sauron, some maybe even being lesser Wraiths transformed by Morgul-weapons, might have ruled the other regions controlled by the Nazgūl in their absence.

Because of the intervention of the rest of the Ringwraiths, Angmar might have fallen much later than in Tolkien's cannon--perhaps sometime after the capture of Minas Ithil. The Nazgūl gathered again to confront a combined army of Dśnedain, High Elves and Mirkwood Elves that was prepared to march on Gundabad. This could tie in to the death of Thranduil's Queen and mark the beginning of Elrond's 400 years of 'watchful peace' placing the fall of Angmar in the films around the year 2340 more-or-less.

The Nine might have been not so much slain as immobilized by spells, defeated by the arms and combined magic of the Dśnedain, the Elves, the skin-changers(?) and at least some members of the White Council (Elrond? Galadriel? I notice that she recognized the Witch-king's blade whereas Saruman did not).

"He who lies artistically, treads closer to the truth than ever he knows." -- Favorite proverb of the wizard Ningauble of the Seven Eyes

(This post was edited by Otaku-sempai on Oct 18 2016, 1:47pm)


Ingwion
Lorien


Oct 18 2016, 5:01pm

Post #17 of 56 (1801 views)
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Ring-wraiths [In reply to] Can't Post

Is it at all possible that in the books the Nazgul were still mortal, but their lives have been hugely lengthened (infinitely?) and had become wraiths through being "stretched" so much?


It was a foggy day in London, and the fog was heavy and dark. Animate London, with smarting eyes and irritated lungs, was blinking, wheezing, and choking; inanimate London was a sooty spectre, divided in purpose between being visible and invisible, and so being wholly neither. - Our Mutual Friend, Charles Dickens.

It is said by the Eldar that in water there lives yet the echo of the Music of the Ainur more than in any substance that is in this Earth; and many of the Children of Ilśvatar hearken still unsated to the voices of the Sea, and yet know not for what they listen. - The Silmarillion, J. R. R. Tolkien


Otaku-sempai
Immortal


Oct 18 2016, 5:44pm

Post #18 of 56 (1788 views)
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I don't think so. [In reply to] Can't Post


In Reply To
Is it at all possible that in the books the Nazgul were still mortal, but their lives have been hugely lengthened (infinitely?) and had become wraiths through being "stretched" so much?


No, not according to what is stated by Tolkien. And even if they had not fully transformed after 650 years, they surely had by the end of the Second Age almost 1200 years later, to say nothing of the the rise of Angmar over 3,100 years after the forging of the One Ring.

"He who lies artistically, treads closer to the truth than ever he knows." -- Favorite proverb of the wizard Ningauble of the Seven Eyes


Ingwion
Lorien


Oct 18 2016, 8:46pm

Post #19 of 56 (1756 views)
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Nazgul [In reply to] Can't Post


Quote
No, not according to what is stated by Tolkien.


Where are these sources found? I can't remember any explicit information on the mechanics of the Nine, so I would appreciate it if you could tell me if there is.

(Sorry for going off topic)


It was a foggy day in London, and the fog was heavy and dark. Animate London, with smarting eyes and irritated lungs, was blinking, wheezing, and choking; inanimate London was a sooty spectre, divided in purpose between being visible and invisible, and so being wholly neither. - Our Mutual Friend, Charles Dickens.

It is said by the Eldar that in water there lives yet the echo of the Music of the Ainur more than in any substance that is in this Earth; and many of the Children of Ilśvatar hearken still unsated to the voices of the Sea, and yet know not for what they listen. - The Silmarillion, J. R. R. Tolkien


Otaku-sempai
Immortal


Oct 18 2016, 9:15pm

Post #20 of 56 (1743 views)
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Well... [In reply to] Can't Post

Going back to what you posted earlier, you are at least half right:


In Reply To
Is it at all possible that in the books the Nazgul were still mortal, but their lives have been hugely lengthened (infinitely?) and had become wraiths through being "stretched" so much?


The Nine did not die and then return as undead; they eased into it over a great length of time.


Quote
'A mortal...who keeps one of the Great Rings, does not die, but he does not grow or obtain more life, he merely continues, until at last every minute is a weariness. And if he often uses the Ring to make himself invisible, he fades: he becomes in the end invisible permanently, and walks in the twilight under the eye of the dark power that rules the Rings.'


This, of course, is what happened to the Ringwraiths--what made them into the Nazgūl. The process may have taken centuries, but in the end they were no longer quite human. This transformation was complete by SA 2251 when the Nine first appeared as the Nazgūl. Tolkien touches on it in Appendix B, "The Tale of Years".

"He who lies artistically, treads closer to the truth than ever he knows." -- Favorite proverb of the wizard Ningauble of the Seven Eyes


Ingwion
Lorien


Oct 18 2016, 9:17pm

Post #21 of 56 (1735 views)
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Ok [In reply to] Can't Post

Thank you very much Smile


It was a foggy day in London, and the fog was heavy and dark. Animate London, with smarting eyes and irritated lungs, was blinking, wheezing, and choking; inanimate London was a sooty spectre, divided in purpose between being visible and invisible, and so being wholly neither. - Our Mutual Friend, Charles Dickens.

It is said by the Eldar that in water there lives yet the echo of the Music of the Ainur more than in any substance that is in this Earth; and many of the Children of Ilśvatar hearken still unsated to the voices of the Sea, and yet know not for what they listen. - The Silmarillion, J. R. R. Tolkien


mae govannen
Tol Eressea


Oct 19 2016, 6:17am

Post #22 of 56 (1686 views)
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Yet, the Witch-King could still be killed, [In reply to] Can't Post

under certain circumstances, as obviously shown through the very scene in ROTK when Eowyn, with the help of Merry, does kill him finally.
Or what exactly happens to him then? He seems to disintegrate! Shocked
And what happens to the other eight Ringwraiths, by the way??? I realize suddenly that I don't have the slightest idea about that!... Do they also vanish later, when the Ring is destroyed and its Master, Sauron, himself vanishes?
Is all that mentioned somewhere by JRRT? Or do we have to guess?...

'Is everything sad going to come untrue?'
(Sam, 'The Field of Cormallen', in 'The Return of the King'.)


mae govannen
Tol Eressea


Oct 19 2016, 6:54am

Post #23 of 56 (1681 views)
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Don't you think that [In reply to] Can't Post

from the excellent bowman that he is, such deeds as you mention are not only believable, but highly admirable feats? That's what I felt.
And what other way did he have to let all the rather conspicuous Dwarves + Hobbit enter his house and hide there, but through that toilet hole, when all other entrances to his house were being closely and constantly watched?...
By the way, it is not so terrible a treatment as it seems to our modern and urban, Western minds, as this kind of toilet was simply in this case a hole opening straight down into the water surrounding all the houses in this properly named Lake-town, and so, wasn't especially dirty in fact. The situation evoked was repulsive and their faces all the funnier, of course, as probably intended by the script, and a mischievous director, but the situation in its actuality was nothing really to make such faces about... Sly
I really hope those scenes you dislike will become more and more bearable for you as time passes, and you will not have to indefinitely deprive yourself of all the scenes you did like in this second Trilogy!
If you disliked Legolas' stunts in LOTR, for example, were not his stunts already in his own realm as a young adult make it a real trait of character in him that helped explain and make more likable the ones he did, historically later, in LOTR?
Personally, with the long versions of all six films watched in the proper historical order, I enjoy the whole story thoroughly for its own internal coherence, even if some twists to the book stories do make me cringe sometimes: as a whole, such a treat, those six M-e films, that I wouldn't miss any of them, really. Smile

'Is everything sad going to come untrue?'
(Sam, 'The Field of Cormallen', in 'The Return of the King'.)


MyWeeLadGimli
Lorien

Oct 19 2016, 7:07am

Post #24 of 56 (1681 views)
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They are destroyed in the book [In reply to] Can't Post

In ROTK the Nazgul perish on the way to Mount Doom when Sauron falls, his thrall sustaining them being broken at that point. This isn't indicated in the film though.


mae govannen
Tol Eressea


Oct 19 2016, 7:41am

Post #25 of 56 (1676 views)
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Well, I seem to remember, [In reply to] Can't Post

now that you say how it is in the book, seeing indeed in the film some of them at least kind of crackle away into non-existence, precisely on their way to Mount Doom with their terrible winged mounts, after the Ring has melted in the lava, just before or after the black tower of Barad-Dūr collapses upon itself!
Perhaps we both should check and report here if that faint memory of mine is right or not? This scene of their destruction is but a passing moment, but I don't think I am imagining it...

'Is everything sad going to come untrue?'
(Sam, 'The Field of Cormallen', in 'The Return of the King'.)

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