The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

It's sometimes hard to complain about one of your favorite books, but here I go, comparing it to the damn movie and making my complaints. :)

... the movie has much better pacing. I mean, damn, I love how it improved on the book by switching between PoV's like that! No sticking with Aragorn and company and THEN sticking with Merry and Pippin, etc. And then the battles were all pretty much superior in the movies, but we're spoiled. Super spoiled.

BUT I really really HATE how the movie adds freaking Elves to the battle of Helm's Deep. Seriously.
In the book, it really is pretty awful and hopeless, but it was awful and hopeless for the Rohirrim. Adding elves might be flashy and blah blah oh good for you, focus groups, but DAMN. There was no lasting agreement between elves and the horse lords. Why should there be? I mean, MAYBE I would have bought the big lie if it was brokered between Gondor and the Elves, but history tore a huge rift between the Elvenkind and Men that ended with the elves destroying Numenor, the island of Men, after Men's treachery. Only the line of Isildur and the Rangers, having never broken faith, remain on friendly terms.

So WHERE THE HELL IS THE REASON for the elves giving up their immortality (and not coming back because they don't have souls like men), dying in a stupidly senseless fashion? I mean, JUST because Galadriel took a fancy to a couple of blokes passing through on an admittedly dire quest? Then why not send a ton with Frodo to storm Mordor? Yeah, yeah, I know, secrecy... but elves can be stealthy.

Just not that weirdo who likes to surf shields and oliphant trunks.

Again, the movie was great for all those battles and I loved being in the thick of the Ents like that. The Shelob scene was brilliant.

The book does the history so much better. Especially the Ents. And in most ways, the book's version is so much more meaningful. The Ents went across Arda in search for their Ent Wives at the end of the First Age and freaked EVERYONE the hell out. They never found them. Tho, I do wonder. Did any of those hasty Ents ever catch up with Tom? Ask him about his bubbling brook of a wife? I wonder how she fits into all of this. Did Goldberry REMARRY? *gasp*

Otherwise, I love the book's quiet times, the introspective times, the thinking-things-out times. And of course, Sam's brilliant meta-speech.

I love them both. :) They're near-perfect companions.

Except, of course, for the uninvited dinner guests at that damn battle. *grumble* *grumble* *baaharrooooooom* Who was that hasty never-d0-well that decided to invite them, anyway???



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