A Geek History of Time - Episode 57 - Drunk Tolkien

Episode Date: May 30, 2020

BELLS Blow in her face and she'll follow you anywhere. You are destroying the Constitution of the United States may God have mercy on your souls. Good day. Yes. It's a sad... ... ...toy. We could be saying that we just elected the right white man to power.

That's creepy, but that's in a different category of creepy. Zizuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz There's a point of what fucking truth that matters, try and get it. Like with most episodes I can bring him back to wrestling. Right, well he's got other people who work for him who also do things. And they can use mutate, hide, human size into smaller worlds after all. Fuck you. I still don't give a shit about getting fake property in a fantasy game. This is a Geekmas tree of time. Where we connect in Nurgere to the real world. I'm Ed Blalock. I'm a distance learning world history

teacher with one class of English students here in Northern California. And true to my history teacher roots in order to cope with the current quarantine circumstances when I needed to get a haircut rather than trying to storm my local state house. I handed a set of clippers to my wife who then gave me a Viking haircut.

I am now turning my head sideways for Damien to get a look at the awesomeness of this bjoc. It looks good. Oh, I didn't see it. I didn't know it went that eye up. See, see, I got it freshened up today because our son, my little boy who is two years old, needed to have his buzz cut freshened up.

So my wife went over him with the trimmers and a lower setting than she'd done last time. The first time this all happened, he was starting to get shaggy So my wife went over him with the trimmers and although we're setting then she'd done last time. Uh-huh. Uh, the first time this all happened, he was starting to get shaggy and I was starting to get really shaggy too. So, uh, we took my, my beard slash hair, hair trimmer and, uh, set the guard at the absolute longest setting in a rand of my son's head. Okay.

That was the very, very first thing that happened. And it looked pretty good. My wife did a really good job for, you know, first time amateur. Sure. And then just last weekend, about a week ago, on Saturday night, my wife took the clippers to my head because I figured it's the rag and the rock,

why the hell not? I'm gonna to get a Björn iron sides haircut from Vikings and we did the sides up like like his and then my wife decided she wanted to leave everything long on the top here. So for anybody who watches the show my haircut actually went up looking like something between a Burene season two and Burene season three. It's a reverse mallet. So there's two and it really is business in the back. Party in the front. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, business business in the back rating in the front. Yeah. Really. Yeah. What it is. You know, but but to the Vikings, that's a party. Sure. And that's and that's me rambling a Great Lakes because I'm a little drunk and we'll explain that in a moment.

But who are you, sir? I'm Damien Harmony. I am a distance teacher as well. I can't wait all Latin distance teacher for most of my day, although I did get a couple of outlines for essays for my world history kids. I am a father of two. I am a pun comedian. I am a poet, a popper, all the things. Actually, I came on to, so right before this show, I did my live Twitch stream show, which is twitch.tv-capetal-punz and I did a I came on and I started singing Frank Sinatra just call me pun reliable call me pun deny was it didn't it didn't land well see that's that's that's worth the price of admission right there. Fuck you. All right, people need to donate. I want more price of admission. I want to not

live up to it. So I think I might have just found the problem. No. Okay. So sorry, my my levels just went way up for a second. But yeah, I don't know. You may have bumps again. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. But anyway, so we don't have producer George here. No, we don't. And we miss him.

That's one of the reasons that's drinking. But so just one one of many an important one. It's near the top of the list. There is a list. I am enjoying the fact out of this quarantine because Everybody's cutting their hair and freaking out. I have had the same haircut since I was 27 Where I just take this the the hair trimmers to myself and set it at two all the way around my head and call it good That's it. It's just a quarter inch all the way around. Beard, top of the head, sagittal, Chris.

Well, I do the same thing for my son. And he's fine with it too. And so, and my daughter's got long hair, so you can let long hair grow. So I'm like, everybody else is like, oh God, I gotta, you know, I mean, you have style. I don't. I'm just like, I'm gonna get the shit done here, done, done. Like, the only time I

change a setting is when I take the hair trimmer down to the nether regions. Like, that's the only time. Other than that, it's all just a two. Well, is, gentlemen, I just learned more than I needed to know how that you all. I'm joking. I use feet, but Actually wrote a joke about that. It was pretty funny, but you know what we need to do We need to get like one of those trim your ball hair commercials on our show like see if like man-scaping wool sponsors You know honest honest to God. Yeah after that joke I think we have we we have, we have a 50-50 chance there. I'd say we're in the ballpark. Oh, nice. Sack it to you. Oh, God. And it's a testament, ladies and gentlemen, to the fact that I am infected

and he created that I'm not telling him good day. This is true. This is true. Well, you come at me with puns. You literally are like throwing rocks at a man with a machine gun here. So it's. This is a good point. Yeah.

So, all right. So, um, God, there's something else I was going to say about this, but fuck it. Let's just jump right into it. Um, all right. You're drunk. I am. something else I was going to say about this, but fuck it, let's just jump right into it. Um, all right, you're drunk. I am. Why? Okay, let's, let's, let's, why? Have you, have you like watched the news lately? No, there was a well regulated militia in Michigan. Okay, I'm gonna before you go any fucking further and stop you right goddamn there. Okay, it's no longer time.

Who's been a listener? No, no, no, totally. One, two, anybody who's been listening to our blog for any length of time knows that that of the two of us. It's a podcast at air quotes, conservative. Yeah.. Air quotes conserved. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm the token air quotes conservative. And I am the second amendment guy. And I'm going to call that bullshit right now.

There is nothing well regulated about that group of meal team six mother fuckers who stormed the Michigan state house. No, no, I'm sorry. No, those are terrorists who are cosplaying soldiers. That's bullshit. Period. Those are inadequate personalities who are using AR-15s as substitutes for personality. Well, we said in a previous episode that a gun is a force multiplier though. So, you know, they're just using the tools that Jesus gave them. Yes.

And as the token Catholic in the room, now Jesus didn't give them those. And anybody who has the money to be, to be spending it on a couple of thousand dollar toy fucking rifle is not in a position to need to go back to work right now as badly as any number of other people who really actually don't want to go back to work right now because they're scared for their health. So no. Well, okay, let me just push back a little bit here. Let me push back a little bit here. After the four gospels, what's the next book of the Bible? Act. Okay, and after that, it's Romans, isn't it? I'm drunk. Yeah, Romans.

Yeah, okay. And if you look at the 15th chapter of Romans, okay, you will find that it actually mentions the ability to arm yourself. That's why it's AR-15. Thank you. Checkmate atheists. Aren't you the atheist here? Thank you. Checkmate atheists. Aren't you here the A.C.A.S.T.R.? Yeah, I didn't work as well.

Yeah, you got it. Come on, AR-15, X-ROM-15. Yeah, I know. I get that. I see what you did there. I see what you did. I see what you did there. And you know, that doesn't sound too far off from some from what some of the ones might actually try to argue. There's also that. Uh, see somebody is actually speaking to somebody who, you know, actually petitioned in my catacas and before joining the Catholic Church. Bullshit.

because before joining the Catholic Church, bowl of shit. No, like, okay, I cannot manage, I cannot effectively, especially after one beer, I'm not in a position to find the vocabulary, to effectively, my scorn for anybody who wants to try to try to take that point of argument. Okay. So yeah.

Okay. So anyway, you're drunk. I am. Why? A little bit. Well, as I said a minute ago, have you watched the news recently? But really, our episode, the sea evening, is an excuse for me to use this particular maladaptive coping mechanism, because for a long time now, like ever since the first time we did an episode on Tolkien,

we've talked about how entertaining it would be to do our own version of a drunk history, which will be drunk token, which is to say put several pints of beer in Ed and then ask him questions about the Lord of the Rings. I like this plan. I'm excited to be a part of it. I'm ready. Yeah, let's do it. All right. Well, I've got a bunch of questions that aren't really in any order, because I've only read Lord of the Rings or had it read to me once.

So a lot of this is based on what I know of the movies. So it's gonna be real fun. We're already off to a rollercoaster. Okay, cool. Are you ready? Oh, he's taking another sip of what are you drinking? By the way, in case we want to sponsor. Okay.

Well, what am I drinking right now? What I am drinking is a sin tax imperial peanut butter stout from Mother Earth Brewing Company. Okay. It is really, really good. And it is 8% out of volume. It should be noted that before the episode started, I drank appropriately for a token podcast. I drank two golden drugs, which of course is the Germanic Belgian for golden dragon. I drank two of them, and that's, and actually when I drank, we're the golden drug 9000 quads, which is a 10.7% beer for those of you who aren't beer

snobs listening at home. Average macro brew is about 5% alcohol by volume. This is more than double what I'm drinking tonight is the, yeah, this is the beer with like rocket fuel. I mean, it's not like I'm, it's not like a drink hard liquor. Well, wait, wait, but I have because right after I put my son down to bed, I had more than one shot of bourbon because I knew that I needed to get started on a buzz in order to do this. And so yeah, you free-drain Tolkien. I'm, I'm to host it.

All right. Yeah, I'm toasted right now. So any errors that you make in speech are just going to be considered syntax errors. Precisely. All right. So question number one, the ants. Go.

Those are the big tall tree things, right? All right. All right. You're, you the big tall tree things, right? All right. All right. He wore it. He wore it his brethren, yes. Okay. Fangorn for us.

All right. Why didn't they do anything about the orcs for so long since they were clearly being burned for fuel for the orc factories? Well, okay. first thing first. The, the end themselves, of course, were not ones being burned at first. The trees of Fangorn were the ones being burned, who were their larvae, for lack of a better word. In order to become an end, there, there had to be a tree for a very, very, very, very, very, very, I got to add a whole lot more of our varies to that statement, long time before the tree would again to gain

consciousness. And then after it had begun to gain consciousness, that is time went on, it would become more and more sentient until it would actually gain the ability to pick up its roots and walk. So, which then of course turns into the question of, well, if it was killing their babies, why didn't they act faster? And what you need to remember about the ants, of course. I want you to imagine the most truly conservative, not like right wing conservative, but like, well, you know, let's not pre-hasty conservative. Sure, yeah, yeah.

Kind of kind of person that you know. Okay. Okay. You know, genuine conservative, not reactionary, but genuine like, okay, no, I understand when we need to do something, but do we need to do it right now? Okay. And I think to the extent that anything in the Lord of the Rings could be looked at as any kind of level of satire, I think, I think maybe the ends qualify. Because they are, they are kind of like anybody who's ever been involved in, I'm going to bring my own professional life into this.

Anybody who's ever been involved in any of that decision making. I was just gonna say parliamentary politics. Yeah, yeah, as any level of parliamentary politics is, well, you know, we need to talk about it. And before we talk about it, we need to talk about what the rules are gonna be for talking about it. Right. Before we talk about the rules that we're gonna discuss, we need to talk about, you know, how we're going to be for talking about it. Before we talk about the rules that we're going to discuss,

we need to talk about how we're going to discuss the rules for what we're going to discuss. And it's the meeting before a meeting before a meeting before a meeting to have the meeting to then schedule the other meeting kind of thing taken to its, to its, and the degree, extreme. Yeah, nice. Nice. That's well done. Thank you. You know what? I ain't even mad.

You can you can you can credit the stout for that. I'm not even mad. Okay. So, yeah, the ends are as close as an establishment figure like Tolkien could get to real satire. Okay. This is going to be my take. Okay. And also, and also by the way, it should be noted the way it should be noted that the the tree beard, the the leader of the aunt was a caricature of CS Lewis. Like like that that character was Tolkien giving his best friend shit. best friend shit. Okay. All right. Because the home home that that tree beer does was was apparently the exaggeration of a verbal tick of CS Lewis's in conversation. All right. Ready for the next one? Go for it. Tell me about the Eagles Ed. All right. Okay. I immediately leaned away from the screen. Just instinctively. Yeah. I was afraid you were going to get hit by hit by beer transmitted

by internet. So yeah, so okay, so here's the deal. There are any number of edge lords and I just want to point out the folks at how it should have ended, hishe.com. Great animators, funny guys, great satirists, but they take the easy way out sometimes in satire. And one of the things that they've done is an episode how the Lord of the Rings should have ended, which was, well, we've got fucking heels. Let's get on the heels and drop the fucking ring in, like bombing rate over Dresden.

Let's do that. Right. Okay. Here's the thing. Yes. On the surface, this looks like an awesome idea. Okay, look. So instead of walking,

which like who the fuck is gonna walk that far? Right. Let's utilize the air power we have as a resource here. And get on the backs of the Eagles Let's utilize the air power we have as a resource here. And get on the back of the eagles and drop the ring into the mountain because we know what we gotta do. And what that old look. Time out.

Time out. At some point, they had animals. And Gandalf himself had a wagon. They didn't have to walk even when they were walking. They could have taken carts. They could have taken draft animals. They could have taken riding animals. They could have gone faster than short people walking.

So even before we get to why not the eagles, I mean, was it because they didn't like the way that it sounded being on a cart, like was the sound of their own wheels making them crazy? I mean, why not just take it easy? Okay. I mean, they started on a corner in Winslow, Arizona, right? And they had a bunch of different. No, no, no, no, no.

Dwarves on their mind. They didn't know. And and and. Gimli wants to hold me. And so there was not a girl. There was not a girl, my lord, because Tolkien only and didn't write women characters that insistence of his daughter.

So yeah, no, no. Number one, number one, good day, sir. Number two, now you're shifting the goalposts, because you started by asking me about the goddamn Eagles. Now you're bringing in this whole other, I'll get to the other one later. This was just to service the Eagles. Okay. equals pi. Okay. And service it. You did. I did. I did. So I took it to the limit. So, so, so to get back to the corrects of your question here. You know, everybody wants to, or everybody who's not familiar with the legendarium and came to it from the movies, wants to just say, well, why didn't they just get on the eagles and drop the ring, you know, from the air? Right.

And the thing is, and I will say that this is a point from a strictly utilitarian standpoint. It doesn't make a lot of sense. But from the point of view of understanding the mindset of who's involved in the decision making and when you understand the world building that went into everything beforehand. You know, the the Eagles are the the servants slash favorite creatures of Monway, the Lord of the Heirs, of the Vailar, who are essentially like the gods of the Middle-earth to simplify things a very great deal. And they generally are pretty aloof and they don't get involved until they feel like they have to.

And this would be a pretty good point at which to argue, well, you know, maybe you need to. Yeah. Except, you need to remember the Tolkien as a Catholic. And his headspace is one in which no matter how hard he tries, everything still has to serve a monotheistic Christian worldview. And the eagles, as I have stated in a quote that's been used in our bumper, represent the grace of God, you edgelord mother fuckers. And so the thing is, you don't count on the grace of God. You do everything in your power to make sure that you are worthy of the grace of God. And then you have faith that it either will happen or it won't happen. And that's what your job as a Christian is to do. And so the eagles show up to rescue them after

they have gone through the trial literally by fire of getting the ring to Mount Doom and having smegel bite it off of Frodo's finger and then fall into the cauldron because we have a whole lot of other Christian allegory that Tolkien would insist to his grave. He didn't mean to write into it, but he did. Anyway, so, so yeah, the eagles don't do it because, I mean, the short form is the eagles don't do it because you, as anybody who has studied Christian theology knows is you believe that miracles happen, but you don't go looking for them in any particular case.

That's kind of the most sad. That helps those who helps themselves. That's the most Zen approach to miracles that I've ever heard. Like, you do you, and if they happen, cool. And if they don't, oh well. That's just that level of acceptance. There's an argument to me made for the universality of belief then, yeah, yeah, kind of kind of gonna say that's that's a thing

Kind of like it because there's like this peaceful easy feeling and you know that God won't let you down And you're already standing On the ground You ready to go on Lauren help me, okay, yeah, all right move it on all right,, you can't just wish I would come to my senses. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, is, well, okay, the in-universe explanation for the eagles, of course, is that very shortly after they begin the quest, we find out that Sauron has been working on developing flying beasts for the nine riders. And so if they rode the eagles, they'd still wind up running into counter-aircraft, basically. So that doesn't work.

Number two, the moment you take off from the ground and begin flying, you're a gigantic big fucking target. Right. And, you know, Sauron is going to figure out how to, you know, because stealth is a critical important part of the whole mission. Sure. In order to get close enough to drop the fucking thing into Mountain Doom. If you just announce, oh, hey, look, we're on the back of the Eagles. Hey, it's not like Sauron isn't a malevolent wizard himself. Right, he's gonna get you one of these nights.

It's kind of a... Yeah. And as soon as he sees you with his lie and I, you're already gone. Wow. And as soon as he sees you with his lie and I he's you're you're already gone Wow Like like how much time have you spent looking at you with lyrics in order to prepare for this very conversation Not much I wrote an email a year ago. I feel So I feel like you've cheated. So, oh my God. I feel like such small fry in comparison.

Oh, nice. So nice. All right, you know, I had to find something. Especially in a place where there's a bunch of ants because then you've got a Glenn fry. Yeah. Oh. So does Sarron have the ability to block out the sun? Can it does he know how tequila sunrise? Actually, I'm going to move past terrible terrible fucked up eagles. And it is explicitly stated that utilizing the power of

Mountain to himself is able to generate clouds to clouds and clouds of oil and volcanic smoke to turn more door, essentially into a constant twilight to allow his create his not really creations, but his minions to move about unbothered by the noon day sun. Okay. So next question. So yes. Okay.

Next question for you. Okay. Did the ring mess up Bilbo? though. And the reason I asked this is because he was already secretive and suspicious from the Hobbit forward. Well, okay, you got to remember that by the time the Hobbit is written, of course, he's already been into the influence of it because he picks the ring up. The whole. Okay. So, so this is one of those places where we have, we have to wonder whether Tolkien was intentionally being genius or if he kind of fell backwards into

really being really clever. Um, and you know, it's why I'm going to go with that. No, as shell backwards. Oh, God, yeah. Everybody falls backwards and being clever. Yeah. So, so the thing is, it's, it's a, it's a, it's a, a fan and argument. And it has been for a very long time. It is as long as anybody anybody, as fans have been discussing

the hop-it and the rest of the LOTR, that obviously Bill Boe is an unreliable narrator. And everything we read in the hop-it has to be understood from that point of view. And the thing is, he doesn't write down the story of there and back again, until after he's home with the ring in his possession sitting on the mantle in, in back end.

And so yeah, the ring did fuck him up. Okay. And I think, I think, you know, like we talked about an episode about, you know, Tolkien's experiences in World War I, I think this is one of those things where he couldn't help but kind of carry the idea of an experience like that traumatizing somebody, and leaving somebody different than they were before they left. It's one of one of the themes of the story,

is that Billbo is a different person when he comes home. And the extent to which he's a different person, because, you know, he left the shire and came home and had this adventure and did all these things, and they extent to which he's a different person, because, you know, the ring has been, you know, busy doing its mojo on him, is something, you know, that's really hard to parse. Like, we can't tell for sure.

You know, there's all kinds of discussion in Tolkien fan groups about, you know, the whole story of the riddle contest in the Hobbit and riddles in the dark that chapter in the book. How much of that version of the story is really reliable? You know, is telling us the full story of exactly how that happened or did things go differently and he's telling us the version that makes him look better. Right. Is he fulfilling a fantasy for himself? And we and can't know. Okay. Yeah. That seems a little hand wavy, but I'll accept it because I believe that Star Wars is R2D2

telling a story about how he was a hero. Like the entirety of it. So I'll accept that. Yeah. Well, the pre-purchase. Okay. Yeah. It's like, oh, yeah. And by the way, I had jets. I mean, the answer is, yeah. Yeah. No, the the the the short answer to that is the, yeah, the ring, the ring did. Fuck him up. The ring did mess with him.

And it was only by the shoe of him deciding, you know what, I got to, I got to get out here. I'm gonna go, you know, to, to, to Rivendell and settle down. And, and, you know, the sack of baggains is can fucking hang like I don't care. Um, you know, his, his whole decision to do that. And his, I have to give Bill O'Credit his, his, um, on log to Frodo at the beginning of the fellowship of the ring where he talks like I feel really stretched out.

I feel I don't feel like myself anymore. I feel worn out. I'm just so tired. I mean, one of the things that I think is is good in our day and age about the Lord of rings is that we actually have protagonists who are certainly not emotional intelligence. Like Bilbo recognizes at the beginning of the book that like, no man, I need to get out of here. I'm done. I'm tired.

I need to take care of me. And on a certain level, it's kind of ridiculous. And that's a little bit, you know, hobbitish, you know, when I want to go have an echo party, something else. But by the same token, it takes a level of self-awareness to make a change like that, to leave his favorite nephew behind and leave the shire where he's lived all of his life, basically, except'm out of here. I gotta do something else. I gotta find a better place for me. And I think that's there. There is something valuable in and then Frodo is a hero who says, you know what, look, I don't know the way to, I don't know the way to

Mordor and I'm scared out of my mind, but you know what, I'm gonna do it. Like somebody has to and I wish this hadn't fallen to me, but it has. And then Sam actually, Sam is my next question. No, you know, okay, go for it. So did the ring mess up Sam? Because he seems on a festive. Sam a lot. I'm going to mess him up and off a lot less than Bilbo and Frodo.

And I think part of that has to do with Tolkins idealization of different classes being different which I can explain in a second. And then I think, and to immediately answer the question, I think part of it has to do with, I think he was affected by it, but I think the way he was affected by it looks a lot more like the way, and where nary soldier is affected going off to war. Okay. Which is, I just want to get home. I want to have my life and I want to do the best I can being me. And I have this big, big scary dramatic thing that happened to me. And I'm not the same person as I was when I started, but I may or may not really want to talk about what it is. It made me

different from when I left. Very British. If that makes sense. Yeah, very British, but I think also just, you know, and so, you know, and I thing about, you know, class differences. You know, like we talked about in the episode about Tolkien in World War I, Tolkien was from a kind of upper middle class kind of background, at least as far as his birth reference as he didn't have a lot of money, but he was from a family that had upper class connection or upper middle class kind of connections. from a family that had upper class connection, or upper middle class kind of connections. And he was, the standard of wisdom,

he was a gen, and so when he went into the army, he was an officer. And he had to send a great many young men who were not from his social class out into the battlefield and had to watch a whole bunch of them die. And his view, and who was responsible for, I genuinely think he really did look at it as he was responsible for those men. His view of his role as an officer and his view of their role as soldiers, I think, had a very profound impact on the differences between the way the ring affects Frodo and the way the ring affects Sam. Frodo fails.

Right. It's really important to point out at the very end of the day, standing over the crack of doom, Frodo says, you know what, no, I'm not going to give it up and winds up having have a column bite his finger off. Right. It's the greed of someone else because it saves the world. Yeah. and the greed of someone else that saves the world. Yeah, and he carries this burden, carries this burden, carries this burden, carries it stoically, and you know, trust you all this,

and then ultimately wants it breaking. And I think that speaks to Tolkien's experience as an officer, I think that speaks to his experience of having to be the one responsible for all of these other people dying. And I think his view of if he had faced the ultimate moral test in those circumstances, I think he honestly probably believed he probably wouldn't have passed. You know, and I think maybe he felt he didn't pass because he did give the order for his men to go up over the top. And maybe he felt like, and this is all speculation on my part after, you know,

two and a half years, a couple of shots, But my speculation is I think about it right now that he might have felt like he had taken a passing for him would have mad saying, you know what, no, I'm not going to send you a die up there. I'm not going to do that. But he gave the order because it was what had to be done. the order because it was what had to be done. And meanwhile, his view of the men that he had been commanding is the way Sam is depicted, which is I am loyal. I'm going to do what you tell me to do. And I love my career, my whole mind, and I love, you know, and I just, and I don't have any I'm like, real, the moment I love, you know, and I just, and I don't have any grand ambition. I just want to get this done and go home. Mm-hmm.

Okay. Now, and I think that's an idealized you. I don't think it's necessarily a false one. Right. It's not worth so. And so I think, yeah, yeah, no, it's, it's, you know, Vaseline on the camera lens, but it's, but it's not,

you know, Photoshopped. Right, right. That makes sense. Yeah. Okay. Next question. Oh, by the way, if anybody's interested, the Tolkien episodes are episodes 11 and 12

of a geek history of time. So go back into the archives there. So where did the dwarves go after Gimli joined the fellowship? Because there were a plenty of dwarves and elves there and only one of each race joined up. Like we see elves later, I'm trying to think of the next time we see dwarves at all. And I can't think of it. Now they figured in pretty heavy into the hobbit, but where the rest of the dwarves go if this is an important thing. What they do about things. Well, depending on which draft of legendarium it is you're looking at. It's just Christ told and spent, you you know the balance of his dull life.

Go over his father's notes and trying to find an answer to questions like this one. There are a couple of things you need to know about the dwarves. Really there's one thing you need to know about the dwarves and that is they're like infamously insular. And the rationale for Gandalf spending all the time he did in the Hobbit training, which for the smog that kicked out of the mountain basically has to do with Gandalf was at that time playing a long game. Like he knew that you know it was it was going to be beneficial to get the dwarves back into the mountain. And the dragon was a potential asset. Should anybody other than Sauron show up and decide they wanted to be the next Dark Lord? And then of course, in the middle of the Hobbit, he realizes that Sauron is still around and is in the process of becoming Sauron again, basically.

And so it becomes that much more urgent to make sure that smog is dealt with and gotten out of that position of defensibility. And so that's Gandalf's long game as the eagle sent by Monway to and oromade to figure out how to about a sort to sound deal with this problem in bit of earth. As for, you know, they actually answer your question about what happened to the dwarves. There is there are different drafts of the legendarium in which is stated that they were busy dealing with, you know, essentially, orcs coming up out of the depths under their homes in the iron mountains.

And, you know, the, you know, Sauron's assault on the free peoples was multi-frontal. So he's distracting a lot of folks there. Right, so they can't band up. Yeah. Okay. Speaking of which, what happened to the population of Moria? Moria? Moria? Moria.

Moria. Moria. Moria. Okay, what happened to them? You mean before the Hobbit? Yeah, like we see the minds of Moria, don't we? Yeah, we do. And it's overrun by God. They, yeah, they many of those Godlins marched to aid.

I'm going to say it's Gothmog at the Battle of Five Armies. They came out of that mountain range to assist the other Orcs and Godlins at the Battle of Five Armies. And now I'm trying to remember, hold on. So yeah, no, there was, yeah, Moria being what it was at the time of the end of the Lord of the Rings, the time of the Return of the King. It was still overrun by goblins. And they went to aid, I'm sorry, not the Battle of Fire Armies, they went to aid the rest

of Sauron's forces at the Pellanore Fields. Sorry, I'm drunk, forgive me. So yeah, they were part of that at force. All right, this is a softball for you. Why is Gimli so attracted to elves if he's so prejudiced against them? Cause he has a huge crush on Gladriel. Is that her name?

Yeah, because he asks for her hair. That is her name, right? Yeah, he does. And the thing is there's a couple of different things going on there. The first thing I'm going to say is that if you check categories, the hit rate for different categories on, let's say, adult, entertain websites, you're going to find that tags like interracial happen to coincide.

Very heavily trafficked to those kind of tags happen to coincide very heavily with places that have repetitions for being immensely racist. It's a good point. So I'm just going to say there's something there, but the other to get closer to what Tolkien was actually going for is Gimli has a Has an ingrained taught from his childhood and typathy For the elves because of the way his father was treated by legless as dad on the way to the mountain to fight the dragon. And because of course elves and dwarves have just kind of had they they you know the dwarves. I mean you know honestly

I can't really disagree with them. The dwarves look at elves and they think what a bunch of fucking hippies like you know they live in the woods and like we never we never really hear anything about any of them doing an honest you know an honest day's work for an honest day's pay you know dwarves dwarves are a kind of an embodiment of the pronestant work ethic which is really funny coming from a Catholic author but there you go and you know elves are kind of literally a fairy and, you know, immortal and they don't really have to work for reasons we never really get explained to us. But you know, they're in there just naturally good at everything they do because, you know, elves.

Right. And so there's some resentment there. And then Gimli shows up and he's got all of these prejudices and then he encounters Galadriel who I need to take a moment to point out Galadriel if you read the legendarium if you read all all the other all the other stuff outside of the novels themselves you come to find out that Caladriel is actually a stone badass. Like it's not just that she's a very powerful, essentially sorceress, as we see in the movies portrayed so incredibly well by Kate Blanchett. It's not just that she's this wizard dress of the wood.

It is she was one of the very first generation of the Noldor, which is a particular subfamily of the elves who came from the far west into Middle-Earth. And in order to do that, they essentially kind of threw the finger to the veilar and she has essentially spent the last several thousand years kind of an egg incredibly old, like Legolas is literally a child compared to her. You know, it's like the comparison of, you know, Legolas would be a teenager and she would be a, you know, centenarian. I mean, you know, in human terms, it's an incredible difference in their age experience. And so there is an awful lot of backstory in the scene where she talks to Frodo and is confronted by the ring. Her, her, you know, talking about, I would be a queen, you know, and then everyone would love me and fear

is and then her saying, okay, no, I'm going to be diminished and I'm going to go into the west. Is her essentially saying, okay, look, I'm going to swallow my pride, I'm going to go back to where I came from. Okay. And there is, and she was, she was a particularly proud rebel in the first age, or the second age, coming to Middle-Earth in the first place. And so she is this figure of immense power and immense feminine power. And I think, you know, Gimli, Gimli is for all of his inbred, meaning bread into him, not the reason why he's not that he's a shaggy discuss. But for all of the, yeah, no, for all of the, for all of the antipathy that he's been taught to hold for elves, he is essentially an honest, he's, he's one of the most honest,

plain spoken straight up characters in the fellowship. Yeah. And, and, and that's kind of what he embodies. And he cannot help but be struck by her power and her charisma and her beauty. There's a wonderful scene between him and the legless. This has been dissected on Tumblr, but I'm going to go through it here anyway, because it's worth talking about. There's this wonderful scene in the book, and Steve Jackson did a great job of translating

into the film where everybody's talking about, you know, what did a gladriel give you. And Gimli says I asked her for, for, but one single strand of her golden hair. Right. And she gave me three. Yeah. And Legolas is listening to this and he smiles. And you're like, okay, well, you know, that's really sweet. Okay, now here's the deal.

Legolas is like, you know, a cousin to multiple people who are involved in the backstory in this. And so he knows all of the drama. And the drama is that back in the first age of Middle-Earth, back like literally thousands of years before this happened. And I'm trying to figure out how to simplify this. The the high elf who is responsible for crafting absolutely the most beautiful gemstones ever cut by any craftsman ever in the history of Middle-earth. Went to Galadriel and said, I need a strand of your hair because your beauty is so, is

so surpassing that it will allow me to create some thing. And she looked at him and said, no, you're at dick. Fuck off. But she gave it to Loli Gimli. But she gave not no, no, no, she gave three of them to Gimli. And so the legalist, that's like, okay, you know what? She thinks you're all right, man. Yeah, no kidding. She, she, she, she measured you and did not find you wanting because Feynwear was the greatest, most cunning, most skilled, most powerful craftsman of all of the elves. And she told him to pound sand because he was an agatist and a narcissist and a fuck with. And so you asked for one strand, she said, no, here you go, have three.

So there is a message in that story that, unfortunately, because of the density of the universe that it created 99.9% of readers and viewers never get. but if you if you spend the time to learn to read the silver really to learn that you're like await Hold on Wow Gimli's Gimli's Gimli's Gimli rocks, dude. Yeah, okay. All right, you know, clearly clearly go at real things he does so there you go Okay All right back to the humans. Why did the King trust a guy named Wormtong?

For the... Ha ha ha. To understand that, you need to know something about Viking Kennings. Okay. And the best, the best introduction I can give to that is to understand that one of the biggest bad asses in all of Viking history was known as the Ragnar Lothbrock. And Lothbrock literally means, well, depending on which way you translate it, it either means goat bridges or fuzzy bridges.

And this was a man who killed thousands, I'm just saying. And so a, a worm with a Y should be noted with a Y. And I don't know. That's a kind of dragon. I have to look it up. No, actually, just, yeah, well, actually, no, I'm wrong. It is, it is no. Oh, okay.

But, but it should, it should be pointed out that to the Vikings, calling somebody worm tongue, would mean they are very cunning with their words, and it might mean, okay, no, look, you need to keep an eye on this guy, but it also just might mean that this guy is a very, a very cunning wordsmith. This is a guy who can be very, very crafty with what he says. And so it doesn't necessarily mean you as the king need to be wary of him. It might just mean this is a guy who is very very capable of of of of turning words around, of of putting, putting phrase together real well, who might be who's just very convincing. And so yeah, I mean, to a modern reader, you're like, well, the guy's name is fucking worm tongue.

Like worms are gross, dude, like come on. You know, if you understand that, you know, the writers of Rohan are and a fantasy idealized version of, you know, the Anglo-Saxons of Dark Ages England, it kind of becomes clear that Wemtung still doesn't sound grey, but it's not necessarily as pejorative to somebody from that culture as it is to a modern year. I guess it's just like, so. So my last name is Harmony. And if I played music and never stopped, I just was always strumming it, something or

always blowing on something or whatever, you would be right in blaming the person who had me along if they're complaining that God he never stopped playing music It's like fuckers last name's harmony. What'd you expect? So it still comes down to like his name means like cunning tongue'd one like You know if anybody's going to sweet sweeten the ears of the king for his own designs, but okay so Here's a question about more about the King. Okay. If Farahmeer and Boramir's dad, the King, is such an obvious prick. Stuart, Stuart,

Stuart, not a King. He's not okay. Stuart, he doesn't come from the Royal Line of Arnor. Okay. So if he's not not a king Steward if he's such an obvious prick Why do the other humans allow Boromir to join the fellowship in the first place instead of just grooming him and going? No, no, no, your dad's a dick never mind Well, okay, number one his dad is a dick and We we are a lot more privy to what a dick he is than anybody in universe

is. I'm going to argue this is this is a point where he has readers are privileged. Everybody in universe just knows he is the steward of gondor and his two sons are the champions of gondor. And you know, faramir is the captain of the ror and you know Farmer is the captain of the Rangers and is doing all this stuff you know out in Ethylian and Boramir is you know Captain General you know of the army you know badass and the extent to which their father is a dick is something that we see because we wind up being sitting right there in the throne room with Pippin and we hear from Pharamere about it. Right. And Pharamere is of course the unfaithored son, Boram here is the favored son, and the extent to which the steward has been turned and filled full of despair and convinced that there is no resisting.

You know, they're all going to die and there's there's nothing can do about it isn't something that becomes clear to anybody but Pippin essentially and Gandalf because he's a wizard. That hasn't become visible to anybody until until like the point at which he actually tries to set himself in his younger son on fire. We're we're privy to stuff that he says that he doesn't say in front of anybody else. And we wind up being privy to understanding that no, he has a palantir and he's been using it, which is dangerous, because he's not one of the chosen people who's powerful enough to do that without being corrupted by Sauron, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And so when he says, all right, well, there's this council thing going on in L. Ron's place. I'm going to send my son, everybody's like, well, yeah, of course you're going to send your son. Your son's a stone

killer. Yeah, your son's a bass. Boramir is the man, dude. And so, you know, I think that's a case of us, like I say, it's the case of us as a reader being privileged information or becoming privileged information that people in universe don't really have. Okay. That's fair. If that makes it. It does because we're able to knit together all the parts of the narrative, whereas anybody around him was only seeing a sliver. So that's fair. Yeah. And and and then you know the other thing is I think one of the things that Steve Jackson did remarkably well in the film and Sean Bean deserves

like all the credit in the world for for portraying this really well is it's really easy really easy for Somebody has the reader to look at Boram here and go like well this guy's just a dick like from day one. He's a prick Screw him And the thing is no bore mayor is Was intended by Tolkien and I think and I think really is, and I think Jackson does a great job of portraying him as truly a tragic figure.

He really does, honest to God, want to do the right thing. He really does, in the end, he wants to save Minas Tirith. He wants to save his city. He wants to make his father proud of him. He wants to save his brother who, you know, we come to find out he and his brother have a really great relationship even though their father has a shitty relationship

with the younger one and doats on the older one, you know, the two of them, Boramir, you know, is portrayed as being the guy you'd want to have as your older brother in that kind of situation. He really is a lawful good character who falls. You know, and Sean Bean, I think, gives a really great performance showing that, that he winds up making a horrible horrible mistake for the for I think as close to the right reasons as you can think of and anyone's a paying for it. And in the movie he has that wonderful moment where he looks at Erragorn and has that wonderful wonderful speech about, you

know, my city with the banners on the white walls and, you know, my captain, my king and all of that. Right. Which doesn't happen in the book. And I think it's one of the things that Jackson added to the movie that I think actually improves on the book because in the book, Boremir doesn't have that moment of redemption. Borimier doesn't have that moment of, you know, having, having, having that recognition of, look, I, I really made a mistake. And I really wish I could fix it, but I can't. Right. You know, and, and I think Tolkien

kind of tried to do that, but it doesn't, it doesn't, it doesn't, because of the nature of the medium. It doesn't come across the same ways it does with Sean being having that wonderful, wonderful death speech in the film. And, and so I think, I think Boremir kind of gets a raw deal. Um, his father just get a raw deal as father is a dick. But, but I think, I think Boremir suffers because his father is a dick. But I think I think Borimier suffers because his father is a dick and so I feel like I kind of need to say that. Okay. Let's see we've got five or six more so I'll hit you rapid fire. Give me your best two paragraph answer to each. Why are the elves all about leaving and therefore not fighting against Soron? If they don't do it until years later when Frodo is finally ready to go as well.

Like I would get it if they were going to do it mid-sentence while he's still going to toss the ring. But he tosses the ring and then years and years later that's when they all leave. So why aren't they jumping in on it? They're not jumping in on it because, wow, there's a whole lot of backstory involved there. The simple version of it is they do everything on an extremely extended time scale to begin with number one because they're immortal. And so to them, Frodo throwing the ring in and then leaving are almost concurrent, even though it's to us ring in and then leaving are almost concurrent, even though it's, you know, to us, you know, decades later, right to them.

That's like whatever decade is a blink of the eye. So there's that, which is kind of the easy pad kind of hand-waving answer. Yeah, that's very handy. The other, yeah, the other answer is, again, one of the things that I think Jackson did right with the movies is, at the very beginning of the very first movie we hear Kate Blanchett as glad real saying the world has changed. I feel it in the air. I feel it in the earth.

I smell it in the air. Whatever it is, she said the next part, but the world is fundamentally different. One of the things that I think is profoundly important about the message of the Lord of the Rings is that by throwing the ring into Mountain Doom or failing to throw the ring and having gone to it for him, but you get what I'm saying, the destruction of the ring literally winds up destroying magic in Middle Earth. When the ring goes, everything else that is supernatural has to go, whether immediately or over time. And so the ring goes, and at that point, it's like, okay, well, the elves have been planning on leaving

anyway for a while, so now we really need to do it. And because the extended time scale, it takes for a while. So now we really need to do it. And because the extended time scale it takes in a while. But you know beforehand they were like okay no look this place is going to be lost to San Juan. We got to get out of here. And they were in the process of departing already. But you know it's the thing is when when Frodo and Bilbo leave at the end, they are leaving with, I mean, the subtext is that them and Gandalf are kind of, if not the very last ship, then they're one of the last ones going. Right. And so it's not so much that the elves don't leave until 20 years later, it's that it takes

20 years for that migration's that it takes 20 years for that migration to finally come to an end. Gotcha. Okay. And that migration and then migration becomes inevitable because the ring has been destroyed. And now all of the elves who are the first born of the of the speaking races are now going to go back to heaven essentially we're gonna go back to heaven, essentially with the Vailar, and they're heading back to the far west. All right. Okay, a couple more questions.

Why can Tom Bombadil see a Frodo with his ring on? Tom, fucking Bombadil. Here's the deal. Depending on where you stand at the fandom. Tom Bombadill is either the most important Lynch pin in all of the mythology of Middle-earth or he's a singularly or he's a singularly annoying self-insert by Tolkien And I kind of think he's both okay and I kind of think he's both. Okay. And so the thing is Tom Bombadil, so okay, Sauron is essentially a fallen angel of the highest order.

Okay. Gandalf is a fallen angel of a slightly lower order. The Balrog is a fallen angel. There's all these kind of kind of angelic kind of figures, you know, Mon win or Oro May and Yavanna and all of the Vailar in the very far west are like the gods, but they're subservient to A.I. Arun, the one Lou Vatar who is, you know, God, because Tolkien was a Catholic and at the end of the day it has to be monotheistic, but anyway. So, Tom Bambadill to use a really weak analogy, Tom Bambadill is like one of the Titans. Okay, so the Vailar, the Vailar are the Gods and the Mayar are the Demigods or the lesser gods. And then Tom Bombadil is this elemental figure

who kind of arose out of creation spontaneously on his own. He's kind of like the avatar of the earth itself. Mm-hmm. And so because he is that, because he is not, he is immortal, he is immortable. He might very well be unkillable by anything. We don't know. And he's so intrinsically tied to the earth itself

that the ring doesn't hold any kind of interest or promise because the ring is all based on Sauron being an ambitious sociopath motherfucker who's like, okay, look, I want to control the world. I'm going to impose order on the world if I have to choke every motherfucker in it to death. A la Darth Vader. And to Tom Pombadill, that's like, who cares? Like the world is the world. Nature is nature. Like I'm fine with just like the world being the way it is. And I have no interest in any of this dominion. I have no interest in any of this kind of rulership kind of crap.

So like who cares? And so because he is, depending on who you talk to, it's either because he's so completely divorced from reality, or it's because he is so incredibly powerful himself that like it just has no interest for him. Okay. And the reason he is that character is either because Tolkien was trying to say something about nature versus technology, which is possible, or I think more likely. Whatever he's saying about nature versus technology is entirely unintentional, and that was him

creating this character as his self-insertinsert and then goldberry the wife of Tom Bombadill is Tolkien's wife who as we've spoken of before Tolkien was absolutely besotted with. Right. Like, you know, in one of the most like, oh my god, that is so sweet, I'm going to die kind of kind of, you know, love stories. Um, that like he just, he had to find a way to put her in there as this, you know, most beautiful, you know, river's daughter kind of figure. And, and himself as this goofy, you know, sing songy poet, weird nature god kind of figure. And you know, that's really sweet. And if you want to draw symbolism out of that from his subconscious then that's awesome but there you go. Okay. So let's see

in the time that we've got left I'm gonna ask you yes two questions about tactics. First off and again limited to two paragraphs here. Why didn't the beacon lighting also alert Sauron? And why not stop that first? Okay, so the beacon lighting almost undoubtedly did alert Sauron. Okay. Number one. There's no getting around that.

Lighting lighting a beacon alerts everybody. Like everybody who can see the beacon's nose, oh hey, you know the jig is up. Well, right. Okay. And as far as why not stop that first, the thing is beacon lighting, I mean, you know from classical history, from teaching Latin,

you know that the Romans used the systems of beacons, you know, as part of their military tactics and strategy. And of course, in the Sangokuji die in Japan, there are some very elaborate systems of beacons that were put in place by a number of different Dimeo. The one that immediately comes to mind is a system put in place by a Takeda Shingen that involves watch towers that were 30 or 40 feet high and big, huge levers, these huge fires at the top of them. Well, the thing is, I mean, obviously, that's an unambiguous signal that can be made out by everybody everywhere. So that did, I mean, yeah, that total did alert Sauron.

And so Sauron and all these generals knew that, eventually the writers of Rohan were going to show up. eventually the writers of the writers of Rohan were going to show up. You know, they may not have accounted for Theodin, son of Thangil, being quite the incredible motherfucking badass that he was, and giving quite such a stirring speech to his men before they charged at the Pelellar fields. You know, I'm gonna say, Erigorn is a really great leader of people if I had to work for anybody,

and especially if I had to follow anybody on the battlefield, I could do a lot worse than Erigorn, son of Errathorn, but I will tell you right now, if I wanna give anybody the job of giving me a motivational speech before I go off to kill some other fucking orcs, say I would in son, think of the one I want to do that, because speaking as a student of medieval Saxon English to the extent that I am one, and a student of the Middle Ages, the speech he gives to the Rohirin before the Battle of the Pelinar Fields is one that knocks it

out of the park, a sore day or red day. Right. And then, and then ending it by writing, by writing down the line, you know, banging his sword on the, on the spears of all of the answers in the front rank, just getting everybody to shout, death, death, and, and, and, and like, Pretty metal. Every time I watch, oh my God,

it's not only metal, it brings a tear to my god damn high. I like it like oh my mmm So so the thing is You have to keep in mind that okay Sarah knows these guys are coming, but there's only so much you can do okay You know it's based on the rules of the universe He knows they're coming and he thinks, well, you know, I just have a bigger fucking army and I have the witch king who no man can kill. Right. You know, only to find out, fucker, I am no man.

Right. You know, and by the way, I think it's worth noting here that that scene was inspired by Tolkien having read Beth ears before and thinking, well, that's really disappointing. You mean and tell me the answer is that he was born by Cisarian section? And that means that he can get around the prophecy? Well, that's bullshit. No, I don't know, that's not sufficiently metal. No, no, I'm going to have him get killed by? Well, that's bullshit. No, I don't know. That's not sufficiently metal. No, no, I'm gonna have him get killed by a woman, motherfucker. Partly partly because I think that's an unsatisfying narrative device. And partly because my daughter is now bugging me about

the fact that I've gotten, you know, two and a half books through through the series, and I don't have any compelling female characters to show for it. Sure. So, you know, fan criticism for the win there. All right. All right. You said to keep it all on the low to. Well, I've said that for the last 20 minutes. So, Helm's Deep.

Helm's Deep. Helm's Deep. The one thing that could beat Helm's Deep was a siege because it's built into a mountain. Why didn't they think of that and not build it into a mountain or make a moat? OK. First things first, we're talking about a society Okay. First things first, we're talking about a society that has a tech level, roughly comparable to the late dark ages.

And so, the concept of defense and depth is not one anybody had considered yet. Okay. And mobility warfare, the only people mobility warfare had worked for were the Mongols and in episodes 11 and 12 we talked about the rather problematic Issues of of Mongols being related to the tropes associated with with orcs Mm-hmm And actually it was in a later episode that I actually talked about orcs in depth of course. Yes And actually it was in a later episode that I actually talked about orcs in depth, of course. Yes. And Tolkien having some carrying, some unfortunate connotations there.

So the idea of mobility warfare is kind of one that as an Englishman of his generation, Tolkien would not have been up on for lack of a better word. And so within within the, the, uh, uh, mill you or the paradigm, better word, paradigm, uh, in which the writers of Rohan were operating, um, sejuor fairies, just kind of what everybody would have done in that situation. And if you get attacked by a massively superior force, uh, getting yourself to a fortress where you have defenses in a food supply and water and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, is what you just did. Okay. Now, I will, I will counter my own argument by saying that, of course, the writers of

Rohan are primarily a cavalry force, and so the idea of mobility should have been part of their go-to, but then you look at medieval history and you look at nights being cavalry and castles, still being the main mechanism of warfare in that time period and yeah, paradigms don't always make sense. Okay, that's fair. Final question. Why do the ring rates suck so badly?

Like they get distracted by mushrooms at one point I think and They're supposed to be like these great human kings who took rings and and they can they can find the ring anywhere Except if like Mary or Pippin throws food off to the side. Why are they so shitty at their jobs? Well, okay, I think you're mischaracterizing part of it for one thing. But so number one, there's narrative devices involved. Because, you know, if they were really, really inarriingly good at their job, there wouldn't be a novel. But then-

That's really shitty, anyway. Yeah, well, but you know, what are you going to do? Yeah. But I think more to the point, I think there's a fundamental assumption made by Tolkien in his world building about the nature of evil is that they're incredibly, incredibly powerful and terrifying. And oh my god, they're scary of the hell.

And if you are not sufficiently prepared or what have you, then yeah, no, they're visions of terror, but they are also fundamentally broken. And they know where the ring is or they can sense the ring in this kind of like, you know, they know where they need to go and you can't ever totally 100% shake them. But in the moment, it's important to note that in the physical world, they are largely blind. And there is a very simple, there is a very powerful symbolism involved in that, in that, you know, the moment, the moment Frodo puts the ring on, they're like, oh, no, we see you, motherfucker. Exactly where you are. They see what's invisible. But when he's dealing, they see what's invisible because they themselves are operating mostly on that plane because they have been utterly and thoroughly

Corrupted to the point that they don't they can't see literally what is True in front of their face. They have been so completely twisted by the lies of Sauron that that they are now operating on a parallel level that they are now operating on a parallel level where they're only kind of half interacting with the physical world. And you know, you point out, you know, they were supposed to be these kings of men. I think we're living through a moment where it's really clear to notice or it's really, really, really, unfortunately, unavoidably obvious, that very powerful men are capable of ignoring the real world in favor of what they think is important

to them. Okay. And these are very powerful men who accepted rings from Sauron as gifts of power, of more power, of reinforcement of their own importance. Long past their expiration date and so they they have been so thoroughly corrupted by that that in some ways they have become unimaginably powerful and in other ways they are utterly blinkered and blind to the truth of the world around them. Okay. Well that's it for my questions and it seems like that's it for your buzz. All right.

So I would ask what you're reading, but most people would want to read Lord of the Rings now. Yeah, well, yeah, at this point, at this point, what I'm going to say is, if you have already read the Lord of the Rings and you haven't read the Silmarillion, I'm going to say, yes, it's intimidating, but read it anyway. Okay. If you have seen the movies, but you haven't read the books, I'm going to say, take the time, read the books. My mother very notably picked up the Hobbit, got about three pages into it and couldn't get any farther

because Tolkien spent the amount of time he did talking about the hair on Bilbo's feet. Yes, these kinds of things are obstacles to some people. I understand that get a chance, keep reading a little farther, and once you actually get into the actual story it's a classic. I mean it's as popular as it is for a reason and so I'm gonna pitch that. Okay. The only thing I'm gonna pitch is gonna be the show that I do a wrestling streaming show every Sunday night at 8.30 twitch.tv forward slash calling it in the ring. And that's all a pitch for this week because we just gave you a whole bunch of literature. But next week we'll be back with more fun stuff and probably even worse stories from the news.

But, uh, God, I hope not. But yeah, probably not enough beer in the world for you there. But for a geek history of time, I'm Damien Harmony. And I'm Ed Blaylock and until next time, watch out for a Dwemerlack. And I made BlayLock and until next time watch out for a DwarmerLock.