Tolkien/Peter Jackson LotR take
Slow work day.
I feel like PJ’s Middle Earth movies decreased quality over time, so Fellowship did new and very cool stuff with material I’ve read and reread; I was so burned out by Desolation of Smaug I’ve never seen Battle of Five Armies in its entirety and tbh it sounds so unappealing.
One of the cool things PJ did in Fellowship was give Arwen something to do. LotR women are usually really remote - I think that’s JRRT’s war experience speaking. So in the book
Tolkien/Peter Jackson LotR take
Arwen’s this remote if beautiful figure and Glorfindel, who’s an incredible badass and who never shows up again, defeats the Ringwraiths at the river. Two powerful but remote characters fit Tolkien’s world which is more expansive and less connected, but PJ gives you more interaction with one character - and yay, a woman too!
And then Arwen really does nothing for the rest of the movies.
Right before Aragorn travels the paths of the dead in Return of the King,
Tolkien/Peter Jackson LotR take
Elrond shows up; in the book he brings a banner Arwen made and his two sons, Aragorn’s old army buddies Jake and Elwood, or whatever (and they too are badasses you never get to see again).
Aha, I thought. This’d be the perfect time for a more active Arwen to show up instead of two characters in whom we have no investment, and lend her significant skills to the last big fights! I really wish PJ had done that instead of Elrond nagging and Arwen wasting away Gothily.
Tolkien/Peter Jackson LotR take
Btw; I think one strength of LotR *as books* is this giant world. Goldberry is powerful but she’s a genus loci; are there other places like her? Are there entities as powerful as Tom who just don’t care about the war? What sort of battles did Aragorn and Elrond’s children fight in the 14 years Frodo was blissfully taking hot baths, studying Quenya, and not thinking too hard about the ring? Etc etc. Tolkien basically hands you opportunities to write your own story.
