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The best example for me, is Radagast. I don't have him have birds nest in his hat, nor the chariot
But I do have him look like he just came back from a 6 month survival trip in a deep forest (dirty, twigs stuck in his cloth etc...)

His personality is close to Gandalf (patiently waiting for characters to tell their story, nodding, thinking only interrupt to elaborate details), but while Gandalf seems to care for the characters struggle (and other people), Radagast cares only for the nature.
Gandalf would ask about survivors, ask about their wounds, inquire about the state of settlements they passed.
Radagast would ignore wounds (unless they directly comment it), and ask about the state of trees, color of animals, etc...


I think the dwarves gets rough treatment in the Hobbit movies and to some extend the books.
A culture/race that can make halls like Khazad-Dûm, craft weapons/armor of legends, etc... is not the "vibe" I get from that portrayal.
Have a hard time putting words to it, but it seems such a culture/race must be very serious, and plan everything in details. And also after so many catastrophes happening to them, it should take something quite severe to dampen their spirits.

There is one major plot hole in The Hobbit that JRRT never adequately addressed: the Dwarves of Erebor cannot determine the date of their own New Year. Forget about Durin's Day, the Dwarves cannot keep simple track of the phases of the moon.

"The first day of the dwarves' New Year," said Thorin, "is as all should know the first day of the last moon of Autumn on the threshold of Winter. We still call it Durin's Day when the last moon of Autumn and the sun are in the sky together. But this will not help us much, I fear, for it passes our skill in these days to guess when such a time will come again."

Presumably, the Dwarves at least know when Winter begins (I have assumed it is at the beginning of November, as the Hobbits' Winterfilth--October--is supposed to have originally represented the last month of the old year). And it should be a simple enough matter to determine when the last new moon of Autumn will occur. That at least narrows down the probable dates for Durin's Day if one is to occur in a given year. Even if the Dwarves have lost the knowledge of calculating the sunset and moonrise times, there are others in Middle-earth who could help them out if they were only asked: the Elves, Mannish astronomers/astrologers, and the Wizards--perhaps even some Hobbits. If nothing else, when the Dwarves realized that they had reached the first day of the last week of Autumn, they should have known just from the new moon that it was the first day of their New Year.

All day Bilbo sat gloomily in the grassy bay gazing at the stone, or out west through the narrow opening. He had a queer feeling that he was waiting for something. "Perhaps the wizard will suddenly come back today," he thought.

If he lifted his head he could see a glimpse of the distant forest. As the sun turned west there was a gleam of yellow upon its far roof, as if the light caught the last pale leaves. Soon he saw the orange ball of the sun sinking towards the level of his eyes. He went to the opening and there pale and faint wa a thin new moon above the rim of Earth.

The film crew for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug even addressed this issue in the lunar calendar that the Dwarves can be seen consulting in Bard's home. It actually gives an (improbable) date of September 30 for Durin's Day, placing the company's arrival in Esgaroth in the movie on September 28.

Otaku-sempai wrote:The film crew for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug even addressed this issue in the lunar calendar that the Dwarves can be seen consulting in Bard's home. It actually gives an (improbable) date of September 30 for Durin's Day, placing the company's arrival in Esgaroth in the movie on September 28.

Interesting because I believe Bilbo arrives at Esgaroth on his birthday (22nd September) in the book.

All important to me because my birthday is September 28th and my daughter's birthday is (the far more prestigious) 22nd September!

bluejay wrote:Interesting because I believe Bilbo arrives at Esgaroth on his birthday (22nd September) in the book.

All important to me because my birthday is September 28th and my daughter's birthday is (the far more prestigious) 22nd September!

You are correct, although we do not learn the date until we find it in The Lord of the Rings during the Council of Elrond (if I remember correctly). In addition, in the book the company remains in Lake-town until the second week of October and it takes weeks to find the hidden bay and more days on the doorstep waiting for Durin's Day--probably around October 22--although other dates have also been proposed.

spivo wrote:The best example for me, is Radagast. I don't have him have birds nest in his hat, nor the chariot
But I do have him look like he just came back from a 6 month survival trip in a deep forest (dirty, twigs stuck in his cloth etc...)

Funnily enough I don't really agree with the way TOR have depicted Radagast. I'd always considered him much more impractical and less concerned with local politics than he is seen to be in DoM.

Other changes...
- Gandalf doesn't witter on to Galadriel how Bilbo gives him strength
- Elrond is more kindly than he was portrayed by Hugo Weaving
- Faramir is gentler and kinder
- Aragorn is sterner and less conflicted.

spivo wrote:The best example for me, is Radagast. I don't have him have birds nest in his hat, nor the chariot

If it makes you feel any better, Radagast rides a horse in the book.

But I do have him look like he just came back from a 6 month survival trip in a deep forest (dirty, twigs stuck in his cloth etc...)

His personality is close to Gandalf (patiently waiting for characters to tell their story, nodding, thinking only interrupt to elaborate details), but while Gandalf seems to care for the characters struggle (and other people), Radagast cares only for the nature.
Gandalf would ask about survivors, ask about their wounds, inquire about the state of settlements they passed.
Radagast would ignore wounds (unless they directly comment it), and ask about the state of trees, color of animals, etc...

I've always believed the idea of Radagast being a tree-hugging hermit was a little overstated. In the story Gandalf relates to the Council of Elrond, Radagast was riding a horse. He was looking for Gandalf in "a wild region with the uncouth name of Shire," and calls the borders of the Shire "distant [from civilization] and desolate [no settlements] parts." He seems to be reflecting a Wilderland culture that knows little of Eriador, and Gandalf says he "at one time dwelt at Rhosgobel, near the borders of Mirkwood." (Despite the One Ring's interpretation of Rhosgobel being a woodmen town, its name meaning "brown/russet walled house/village" makes it more likely to be simply the residence of the wizard only.) He also seemed anxious to get back to Wilderland once his message was delivered; perhaps he was concerned about what the Enemy might be doing back home.

Then he does as Gandalf bids and asks "all the beasts and birds that are your friends" to bring news to Orthanc.

Clearly, Radagast is quite interested in and concerned about what the Enemy is doing, and in coordinating with the Wise to do something about it. Whether he is most interested in protecting his home area or in the greater good is debatable; even Tolkien suggested that Radagast may have failed in his mission, but that might just be because he became insular in his part of Wilderland, considering it "normal" while other lands were "uncouth." He would, therefore, focus his attention on the lands of the woodmen. Indeed, when he left Gandalf he "rode away towards Mirkwood where he had many friends of old." He went back to his local base of operations where all his resources lay, including the Eagles of the Mountains, who are never said to enter Eriador but who certainly do fly far over Wilderland.

That he is friends with beasts and birds, and may even love them more than men and elves, does not mean that he is uninterested in the latter or that he would ignore people in need.

So I think the most authentic Radagast would be one who still fights the Shadow, but has forgotten that other lands than the Vales of Anduin and the borders of Mirkwood are anything other than backward hinterlands. He is a "master of shapes and changes of hue" (he probably effects magical transformations) and "has much lore of herbs and beasts, and birds especially are his friends." He probably considers the birds and beasts as worthy of consideration as men and elves, and thinks of them all as equals. He may even prefer the company of birds over any others. But he still thinks of himself as a good wizard, performing the task for which he was sent to Middle-earth. He has simply forgotten that that mission applies to all of Middle-earth, not just his little corner of it.

I think the dwarves gets rough treatment in the Hobbit movies.

I think the portrayal of dwarves in the movies is abominable. They are mostly presented as crass, bumbling, uncouth Scottish highlanders, good mostly for comic relief. Tolkien's dwarves are funny in The Hobbit, because it's meant to be an amusing children's tale, but in his general work dwarves are secretive, industrious, grasping, and fiercely proud. Jackson was mostly just slapping D&D-inspired caricatures onto the screen.

I think Jackson also got elves very wrong. He shows them as humorless, snobbish, and cool; Tolkien depicts them as loving to laugh and delight in the world, willing to mingle with all sorts of people, and bursting into song or music for just about any reason. What Jackson was trying to hit, and missing, was their agelessness and the wisdom that comes of living for thousands upon thousands of years.

I mean, can you imagine Jackson's elves in Rivendell singing Tra-la-la-lally to the company of Thorin as it enters the valley?

Stormcrow wrote:I think Jackson also got elves very wrong. He shows them as humorless, snobbish, and cool; Tolkien depicts them as loving to laugh and delight in the world, willing to mingle with all sorts of people, and bursting into song or music for just about any reason. What Jackson was trying to hit, and missing, was their agelessness and the wisdom that comes of living for thousands upon thousands of years.

I mean, can you imagine Jackson's elves in Rivendell singing Tra-la-la-lally to the company of Thorin as it enters the valley?

Honestly? I find it a little difficult even seeing the Elves of Rivendell doing that in Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. But maybe that in part is a reflection of the seriousness of the times.

Stormcrow wrote:Clearly, Radagast is quite interested in and concerned about what the Enemy is doing, and in coordinating with the Wise to do something about it.

It also just occurred to me that Radagast seems emotionally new to the idea of the Enemy rising. He is obviously nervous and anxious when talking to Gandalf, as if he hadn't been sending adventuring parties on quests for the past sixty years.

Otaku-sempai wrote:I find it a little difficult even seeing the Elves of Rivendell doing that Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. But maybe that in part is a reflection of the seriousness of the times.

In part, but I think it's more a matter of the focus of the narrator. The narrator of The Hobbit allows us to see silly things, while the narrator of The Lord of the Rings, after the first chapter, is much more serious. Tolkien later reverse-engineers the reason for this: Bilbo wrote The Hobbit, while Frodo and Sam wrote LR.

The fates of elves and men are different. Men live for a space in the world, then they die and go to heavenly paradise forever. (This is both the Christian view and the view throughout Tolkien's legendarium.) Men are only visitors to Middle-earth, and leave it after a short while, and so do not truly belong here. Elves, on the other hand, live forever in Middle-earth. This is their paradise; they belong here. The time they spend here is to them like the time men spend in heaven: everything is a delight; everything is sustaining to life. The big difference is that the Enemy has marred Middle-earth; paradise is spoiled.

So you can understand when everything elves see or do leads to them bursting into song and laughing with pure delight. They don't need to eat and sleep as much as we do; just singing under the stars is enough for them. So singing tra-la-la-lally and making fun of dwarves and hobbits is just as much a part of their delight as creating epic works of poetry or music, or hunting, or feasting, or sleeping, just sitting and thinking. There's a reason Bilbo called the Last Homely House a perfect house for whatever you liked best: you're in the most diverse haven for elves in their earthly paradise.

So the elves who played boring music and ate salads and looked down their noses at dwarves bathing in fountains in Jackson's movies? Totally wrong. Elves delight in the world. That is their most defining characteristic.

One of the few bits of TOR I don't love is the role Radagast plays. I like to think of him as more hermitic. I agree that Rhosgobel should be a dwelling of his, not a town, and one that he might not even visit for months (years?) at a time. And he shouldn't be playing a "chieftain" role among the Woodmen. I see him being "that crazy old wizard" they sometimes visit in great need, if they can find him, and he may or may not help them.

Rabbit-sleds? Just...no.

As for the elves singing silly songs and being frivolous, my interpretation (that is, what I envision) is that it is through the lens of the Hobbit narrator, and one who has just been on a long, arduous journey with a bunch of dour dwarves. So, yes they take delight in the world and have a sense of humor, but they're not frivolous and silly.