LOTR shippiness

[timepiececlock]

Ok, so. Apparently, and I had this all backwards before-- Aragorn marries Arwen at the end of Return of the King. For some strange reason I'd remembered him marrying the Rohan princess. Anyway, looking at the tTT movie, I've become conscious of two things:

1.) they REALLY sent Arwen away. They spent a long amount of screen time devoted to it, so I don't see how they'll explain her coming back except a really corny last-minute popping up form the New Zealand scenery with a declaration of love and a "Sorry I left you when your people were being slaughtered by the greatest force of dark the world has ever known; let's get married now that you're king."

2.) as you can probably guess from my semi-rant above, I don't think I WANT them together in the movie. The way it was in the movies, Arwen and Aragorn let me bored. They were pretty, but cold. Contrast to that, I thought Aragorn and the Rohan lady (banging forehead for the name...E-something) had great, sexy chemistry. And he seemed to be actively interested when he was around her, instead of reserved and serious like he was with Arwen. Eowyn (that's her name! Isn't it?) seemed more like someone who could be Aragorn's equal, a partner at his side instead of a goddess on a pedastal above him.

Now, this can all be attributed to directing and casting, as some actors just have different chemistry. And normally, a change like this would infuriate me as a fan. But oddly, I've found I would like the movie more if Arwen didn't come back and marry Aragorn, and if he chose the Rohan pricness instead.

Comments

[queenofthorns.livejournal.com]

Hee! It's Eowyn, by the way. And I REALLY don't want her to end up with Aragorn because, as you know, the reason she does her magnificent act of great heroism which basically changes the course of a battle is because she is in despair - she loves Aragorn and he doesn't love her back. I like that he was a little attracted to her in the movie, but I thought they were trying to make it very clear that he has this deep bond with Arwen ... Also, Eowyn ends up with my absolute favorite character in the books, although he's been changed rather a lot in the movies.

And finally, I don't think Arwen's gone ALL that far - they didn't actually SHOW her getting on a ship to leave Middle Earth ;)

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

And I REALLY don't want her to end up with Aragorn because, as you know, the reason she does her magnificent act of great heroism which basically changes the course of a battle is because she is in despair - she loves Aragorn and he doesn't love her back.

Good point, good point. But still...

... Also, Eowyn ends up with my absolute favorite character in the books, although he's been changed rather a lot in the movies.

I was disappointed that we weren't introduced to her first in battle armor like a man, as she was in the book. In the movie she seemed much more helpless-princess-y, leading the villagers into hiding and obeying her father and all... I would have liked her to be more involved in the battle. But still, I loved her.

And you know, I thought about it while I was doing the dishes, and I wondered if I'm not somehow projecting my BtVS shipperdom onto the LotR situation. I mean, I do think about B/S all the time, and if you look at it, this question (as it is in the movie, anyway) is just like Buffy/Spike vs. Buffy/Angel.
The hero has two potential loves: the new love, who is blond and funny and a warrior and a little wild and deeply in love; and you have the First Love-- who is dark and mysterious and tragically forbidden and WAY older than the hero.

Then again, Angel's in love with someone else now and has moved on from Buffy, so maybe this is a bad analogy. Anyway, it seems to be my nature to root for the cute blond who suffers from somewhat unrequited hero-love.

Or it all could boil down to my very tiny negative predisposition to Liv Tyler.

[queenofthorns.livejournal.com]

Anyway, it seems to be my nature to root for the cute blond who suffers from somewhat unrequited hero-love.

Heh! Well, I totally get that. The thing is that in the books, I just find Aragorn quite, quite boring as soon as we find out that he's more than Strider - all that looking majestic blah dee blah stuff annoys me (although Viggo as Aragorn is a total hottie and I love how've they've made him much less sure of himself.) And Book Faramir? Was my first fictional boyfriend - so I love how Eowyn realizes that her "love" for Aragorn is really a crush on this incredibly romantic-seeming guy and Faramir is the Real Deal: there's your B/A, B/S analogy for you, if you like, except that Book Faramir was never Evil - but Movie Faramir is much more ambiguous. OTOH, he's also not nearly as fabulous and good-looking - though hopefully he'll improve in RotK.

And if *I* were to get all 'shippy, I'd want Eowyn and Movie Boromir together. But he's dead ... sigh! ;) (And am currently re-reading the books - midway through TTT - and have realized that yes, my first impressions of Book Boromir were ENTIRELY correct. What a jerk! Bleah!)

Re:

[rashaka.livejournal.com]

so I love how Eowyn realizes that her "love" for Aragorn is really a crush on this incredibly romantic-seeming guy and Faramir is the Real Deal: there's your B/A, B/S analogy for you, if you like

heeee. :D

OTOH?

I know, I didn't quite like how Faramir was more tempted in the movie--- I like in thebook how he wasn't portrayed as being as fallible as his brother--it added to the fact that while some men are weak, some men are also strong and can resist temptation.

But he's dead ... sigh!

Ah... that's one character change I liked in the movie-- Boromir having the slightly more noble idea of stealing the ring for the sake of Gondor rather than just himself. And I love Sean Bean, and I totally cried when he died. I thought he actually deserved "Best Supporting Actor" more than Gandalf's actor (Ian M.), because I thought his performance was better. ::siiiigh:: I have to go see TTT again.... and soon. I have to see it four times in the theater, and so far I've only seen it once!

Re:

[queenofthorns.livejournal.com]

I know, I didn't quite like how Faramir was more tempted in the movie--- I like in thebook how he wasn't portrayed as being as fallible as his brother--it added to the fact that while some men are weak, some men are also strong and can resist temptation.

I think this is all of a piece with Jackson's vision - we are constantly told that Isildur FAILED, and by extension that ALL men are Isildur's heirs and therefore subject to the same potential weakness that he is. In the books, really, Boromir is the ONLY person who falls prey to the Ring, and that's because he starts off as an insecure jerk and never really progresses beyond that point until the very, very end - given that they made such a point of saying that the Movie Boromir WAS a good man corrupted, I think it would have been impossible to have Faramir not even consider using the Ring for Gondor.

And he DOES resist temptation in the end - he lets Frodo go. The end result is the same with more dramatic conflict. I hope that we'll see more of Faramir in the extended version of the DVD because I want to get inside his head more ...