603

That's such a Tom thing to do (fedia.io)

submitted 9 months ago by ickplant@lemmy.world to c/lotrmemes@midwest.social

58 comments fedilink hide all child comments

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[-] jodanlime@midwest.social 90 points 9 months ago

I read the books as a youngin' I was so pissed that they left my favorite character out of the movies. So I kinda had the opposite experience from you.

[-] Jax@sh.itjust.works 39 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

I watched the movies first then read the books and was subsequently pissed when I realized what they left out lol.

[-] ahornsirup@sopuli.xyz 39 points 9 months ago

I read the books first, and while there are plenty of omissions and outright changes from the source material that I disagree with, cutting Tom Bombadil is not one of them.

[-] skulblaka@startrek.website 50 points 9 months ago

Bombadil was one of the most important pieces of world building in LOTR, and that's not a joke. He's clearly a being of great power. He holds absolute sovereignty over his domain, such that even the trees and the undead bend to his will. And there is absolutely no cogent information or backstory on him, whatsoever. At all. Bombadil is printed proof that Middle Earth has a lot more going on than is touched on in the story. If Bombadil is an unexplained Great Being then it stands to reason that there would be more, beyond Sauron and Sauruman and the characters we meet directly. Bombadil is a signpost pointing off-screen and saying "Hey, there's more stuff over this way".

He may be crazy, and silly, and poorly explained, but that's all for a reason. Tom represents the "etc." at the end of the list of beings in Middle Earth. He is an open end implying the existence of more like him.

[-] CitizenKong@lemmy.world 48 points 9 months ago

Nice interpretation but he really was just a character from unrelated stories by Tolkien he liked so much he reused him in LOTR. He's just a remnant of the initial version of the book which had a lot of elements later editions revised like Strider being a hobbit.

[-] Sylver@lemmy.world 19 points 9 months ago

I think that’s what makes Tolkien such a talented writer. Sure, he just wanted a nice character reference, but he managed to make it fit in such a way that truly did expand the horizons of Mordor to near infinity.