The Lord of the Rings Trilogy - Part 1 with Anna Salinas

start again. If I'm sounding fatigued, it's because we had to watch nine hundred hours of movies for this episode today and and this is also the third episode we are recording today. Yeah, so it's gonna it's gonna be a buck episode. There, the hinges are off and we are ready to have discourse. I feel like I feel like I got my second wind. I'm feeling very excited about this episode and feeling excited about these movies. This

is your We're we are firmly in Caitlin's wheelos. Yes, I mean you have the pictures to back it up. I'm okay, so that we should say with the podcast this week, so we talked about the role of women in some of your favorite movies. We use the Betel test as a jumping off point for our discussion. Hey, what is the Betel test? Well, it's just this test that you apply to movies. For example, it requires that the movie has at least two women in it, so

already most movies fail. Those two women have to have names, they have to speak to each other, and even more movies fail that, and that conversation between those two women cannot be about men. Let's demo it really quick. Sure, Hey, Caitlin, Jamie, did you know that movie can be nine and a half hours long and still not pass the Factel test. That sounds alarming and crazy, but I would believe it because it's a mainstream Hollywood film. Unbelievable, and that it

is still very cherished. Yeah, transition the movie series we're talking about today. Hey, it's Lord of the Rings movie. Caitlyn has dressed up as proto for Halloween. Sorry I waked it wrong. Not Halloween, it was the midnight screening of Return of the King. Actually, that's so much worse. Have you I are you for other people dressed up? Or was it just you? Some? Oh my god, not a lot of people. Wait, sorry. That was one of

the times I dressed up as Proto. A second time was in a movie that I made in my senior year of high school called Car Wars Return of the Jedda. I'm having a panic, so I had I dressed up as I did a cameo as Frodo where I like get out of a car and someone off screen says, Froto, this is Return of the JEDDI not Return of the King, and I say whoops, and then I put on the ring and disappear. It's a hilarious visual joke. So I

dressed as Fronto for that. And then a third time I dressed up as Froto to school as a senior in high school. It was spirit week and you had to dress up as your favorite character. So I dressed up as Frodo a third time for that. Okay, I guess in times like this you just have to say okay, and that is good and we love it. In conclusion, oh, I found the picture I had. It's on my Instagram, right,

I found it on your Facebook. It's uh, I forgot you're also playing Proto because it's um we will post it on the Becto cast Instagram I mean, we simply must. But yeah, scared. I feel like you're all acting as though I should be powerful, acting as I should be embarrassed of me dressing up as photos of my nose. I am extremely proud of this. It's good. Anyway, Let's introduce our guest. I'm yeah, I'm sorry that we just a really long spiral. Okay, okay, So our guest today.

She's wonderful. She is a writer, a comedian, and creator of bad comics by Anna Anna Selena's. Hi, guys, thanks for being here, Thanks for having me, Thank you so much. Um. Yeah, so let's talk about your relationship to Lord's Sure. Well, let me say this, you shouldn't be ashamed of dressing up rod, thank you. I am uh Lord of the Rings fan. Certainly. I like anything fantasy. I was really

into fantasy in middle school. But I am a diehard Harry Potter fan, so I can relate because I used to go to the midnight screenings and dress up and the book releases and dress up, but I never really did for Lord of the Rings. I think part of it was like the fandom of Lord of the Rings feels like it spans ages a bit more like in my life. There were a lot of older men who like The Lord of the Rings. I was like, that's

that's not for me as much. Because the books were first published in like they a lot of parents were really into it, but my mom was not. And so we would watch the movies together. We like started from the beginning and watched all the movies and theaters together. Yeah, which is weird for a movie that is not about women at all, Right, mother daughter, Yeah, bonding thing. But I love Elijah would um, I've done an entire comedy

show about him. Well yeah really yeah, yeah. We did a pickle hour maybe a year and a half ago, maybe more about Elijah would like a PowerPoint presentation that was like the backbone of the show. And I think what you learn is his career has kept going strong. You know, he was, he's been doing things. Yeah, he's he's around. Sometimes I confuse him with Toby McGuire. It's just a fact. I mean, that'll happen. I would say he has a better career than Toby McGuire. Yeah, he listened.

He paid in Spider Man two. Yes, we all know that was his best roal. I never saw Seveis kits so I can't say anything about it, but Spider Man two with good Spider Man three when he had the emo air cut hair. But the dance scene in Spider Man three, yeah, is iconic. Is iconic name a community, that scene is iconic within it. That scene connects with everyone. It is a great equal. It was a meme before me, Jamie, what's your history with Lord of the Rings? Um? I read?

I read The Hobbit in sixth grade. My whole class did because my teacher, I think, was really into Lord of the Rings, but we were like not old enough to read the actual books. And then the same as you and I would go and see it with my mom, specifically every year. I don't think my dad saw these movies or had any interest in seeing them, but my mom and I did, And I think maybe it's because they were coming out once a year at the same

time Harry Potter movies were starting to come out. Someone was like, oh, and I remember my mom making a big deal of it because those were the first PG thirteen movies I saw in theaters, and my mom was like, you're not old enough. You're actually like this is kind of like Forbidden Fruit, but we're going to go see a three hour movie and you're not gonna like it,

and so but we did. I remember not really retaining any information, but just like watching them very passively and being like, wow, that was a lot, like just being very ug and be like that was a lot of images in a row. I don't know, but but I I have never been big on fantasy, and so so it is a bit of a slog for me. Sure I understand it's deep fantasy too. So like Harry Potter, it's like, oh, it's about a boy and its crushes at school. Lord of the Rings there's you just get

dropped in this complicated world. There's so there's so much lore, and it's like, I'm not going to do the homework. So just to give you a brief history of Caitlin's experience with the Lord of the Rings trilogy, I did not see Fellowship of the Ring in theaters because I did, like I watched the trailer. That was around the time that Harry Potter was like the Harry Potter movies were starting to be released, and I was like, I started

in one, right, I think, so that seems right. I had never heard of Lord of the Rings before because I grew up under a rock and I was like, what is this cheap Harry Potter knock off? That's what I thought Lord of the Rings was. But then I saw a few months after it came out on DVD, and I was like, wait a minute, this is really good. I like this a lot. And then I watched that movie a bunch of times. My mom got like the extended edition that we got, the whole box set. I

saw Two Towers in Theaters five times. I saw A Return of the King and Theaters six times. My sister has a cat named Precious, after what Gollum calls the ring. It runs deep for me. Um and I have not revisited these movies, probably in ten years or so. But when we were all rewatching them together, I was reminded that I can recite all of the dialogue to all of the movies. Confirmed. We watched them all. We watched

them all with super producer Sophie. We we watched every minute. Yeah, it was a long day, all nine hours and twenty minutes roughly. Yeah, boy was it nine hours and two heads? So yeah, shall I do the recap the very brief freaking yeah, And the interest of this not being also nine hours long. Basically, the story takes place in Middle Earth. It's like a very like Middle Ages, Anglo sex and fantasy world where there's men, there's dwarves, there's elves, there's hobbits,

there's orcs. All of them are men, all of them are male identifying. There are somehow no women in this world, except except for some elves. Yeah. So there is a dark lord named Sauron. He has he made a secret ring because the power and control is is held within rings. He used to be good, but now he's bad. I think he was always bad. He was bad, but he used to be Gandel's friend. But now he's bad and he's not Gandles. That's Saramon. I'm talking about Soron. I

fantasy is an annoying genre. Okay, so Saron, do we see him? Do we know he looks like? Is he just an idea he has? He's like, he's a figure, he's tall, he has a mask. We don't really know what his face looks like in the beginning, Yeah, well they don't specify. Oh yeah, I when she said it, I was like, oh, the same, sor he becomes the eye because okay, so he has a ring. He's poured all of his evil and life forced into it. The ring gets chopped off of his hand. Was him? That

was him? So then he so he effectively dies. But because his life, the ring is basically his hor crux, so he attaches his thank you for in terms of planters. So because the ring survived three thousand years later, the spirit of Saron endures. So so he becomes the fireball the eyeball. Yeah, right, got it? Okay, because that's what I when I think when I think Saron, Apparently I think Saramon. But what I meant was I think of the flaming eyeball. Right, Sarmon stands next to right, just

renames Saramon. Why why do that? Very poor? Seems unfair name choices. Yes, it's just like all the women in this movie are the same, like four vowels, just in different orders. Here's my girlfriend al just like who is this? Sorry? Okay? So, then so the ring ends up in the hands of first Gollum and then Bilbo Baggins. Bilbo gives his ring, which they do not know is the Ring of Power, this like evil ring yet h he gives it to

his nephew Frodo who is our here, cutie? And this is after Bilbo has gone off on an adventure with it. He yeah, that was already been in three boring movies. Yeah, confusingly because at this point we didn't know that, right, And the less is older right and bend at a cumber badges there. Yeah, and it's so long also, So Gandolf Frodo and Bilbo's friend is like, wait a minute, I think this is the Ring of Power, which he confirms. Then he's like, we gotta do something with this ring.

So they meet up in Rivendell at the Council of El Rondo, which is a boring scene and is that El elf elf Land? Yeah? Yeah. The representatives are like, what shall we do? Yeah, So we've got a dwarf there, We've got an elf there, we've got another man from Gone Door. We've got aragorn Is there who helps out.

There also a few other hobbits, so and it basically they have to They're like, oh, yeah, we should take the ring to more Door to destroy because that's the one place that it can be destroyed because if it falls back into Saron's hands or I, then he'll regain power and cover Middle Earth and darkness. So they're like, great, let's have a fellowship. We'll all take this ring together

to more door. Frodo being the main ring bearer, they go full power of myth at this point Hero's journey to a t uh and then they get split up at the end of the first movie. The second movie is basically I mean the second movie. I don't know how much. It's very important. Um Ergorn, Aerogorn, Gamble and Leglists have to save Mary and Pippen, who are too other hobbits that get um captured by the Urakai. Then

we are those trees. No, those are Goblin orc hybrid yelling. Yeah, there's a lot of names of things that I don't know. I'm here to be your Lord of the Rings dictionary and like fan and in fantasy too, like JRR Tolkien probably has a great reason for naming everything a very specific thing, and that somehow makes it worse for me. Yeah, he invented a whole language for this book. He invented Elvish a door to get a life of frick get Like, inventing a new language is for door. But you know

what do you speak it? Oh? No? But people speak Yes, that's next level. That's next level. I'm not quite there. We had to learn how to write our names in Elvin in sixth grade. I remember Corey Spiby being all this is dumb. He's like, isn't this for nerds? And my teacher was like, no, it's not, which has just proved my teacher was a nerd. Yeah, shout out Corey's Biby. So so the rest of the second movie, Frodo in Sam his best friend Slash Gardener go off together. They're

heading towards more door. The power dynamics of their relationship is question refusing because like Frodo is Sam's boss, but also their friends. Are we beating around the bush on this? Well, we'll get to the context of their friendship later, because there's a I'm curious. I mean, if listen, if we have listeners who, first of all, sorry I called you dorks. Only time I call our listeners dorks, they get very upset with me. But sometimes I gotta tell you I

have to do it to you. Sometimes you're you guys are dorks. But but if we do have anyone who has read the books, I'd be interested in examining, like some of the subtexts of the relationships in the movies as opposed to the books, because I my guests would be that the subtext in the books are not as lissit and homo erotic as they are in the movies.

But we'll get to of that too. Sure. So Sam and Frodo are heading towards more to Or they kind of like split off from the group and head there alone, and then they meet up with Gollum, who's being troublesome. And then the third movie is like everyone's trying to get closer to more Door. There's some battles, all kinds

of ship happens. It's I'm not doing a good job with this recap, but because I'm skipping over, you know, nine hours worth of content, but right wild because it sometimes takes longer for us to recap an hour and a half movie, and it's almost like not a lot. Actually, well, that whole battle at the end is like thirty minutes. It's very long, at the end of which they do fulfill their mission. Frodo finally tosses the ring into Mountain Doom after a little scuffle with Gollum, and then everything

is fixed. And then there's about thirteen conclusions to the story, which makes sense. I mean, it's a very long story. It is funny how many are You're just like, because it keeps the endings. I think it's because the endings keep fading to black. Yeah, and then especially after you've been watching for nine and a half hours, it's good. It's like, we know it's good. Now do we really have to see everything wrap up? But the last ending

does suck me up a little bit. When you see Sam and the girl from the first movie and their kids and the feet are huge, just like, it's that sucks you up a little. I cried, Yeah, you know what, I don't like it because I'm like, do you really love that woman? That's true? I don't know. I just I felt noting for seven hours. I hadn't felt the thing in seven hours, and then I was just like, oh,

their lives can go on. So I skipped over a lot, including all of the female all three of the female characters, and it's made because they're hardly consequential to the story. But there are a few of them, and they do some stuff here and there, but kind of not really which we'll talk about um. But yeah, that's effectively the story. Good people set out to destroy evil and then they destroy evil. So let's take a quick break and then we will return to Middle Earth for the discussion. Do okay,

we'll be right back, and we're back. Okay, so we have oh wait, you know what Gollum. That's who we left out of well, I mentioned him, but I really doubt it. Everyone's favorite part is cute about on the daily I guess last week when we were on it together is cute. The cutest boy in the movie is the cutest Orlando Bloom. Okay, I my crush is from this movie because even if I don't like a movie, I've got a crush on someone. Gollum was a crush,

Orlando Bloom was a cry and who else? Oh, in like Elijah would was like, Frodo is such a cutie pie and he has great hair and beautiful eyes. Yeah, yeah, his eyes are beautiful, but also I found him to be I just think Frodo and Sam feel a little gender fluid in the movie gender fluid. Yeah, I don't. Okay, that's giving it a lot of credit, a lot more credit than it deserves. But um, Frodo in particular, in my mind watching I was like, yeah, I could see

myself in that. Well, I would argue, well, I think Hobbits of all of the races that we see, which are all white people except for the bad guys that have dark skin, um of those hobbits are like the least agro you know. They're like that's like just farm and like, you know, live off the land. We're gonna have little hobbit holes and we're going to be nice.

They love to dance, Yeah, they love to dang out. Yeah, that's their purpose, right, So at least they're displaying the least amount of toxic masculinity of all of the characters we see in the movies. Well, yeah, so let's get into that really quickly. So it has been said by many that there are gay undertones to Frodo and Sam's friendship. I think that the movie does at sometimes go out of its way a little bit to hit that point

kind of hard, you think the movie, I think the movie. Yeah, I think that the movie is implying it a little bit without implying it in the way that movies sometimes do, where male friendships are portrayed on screen as being kind of homo erotic. And I and Caitlin and I were talking about this a little bit before we started recording,

and and it's weird. I think that you can even draw a line from scenes that we see between Sam and Frodo, which are nice scenes, like I have no issue with the actual scene itself or the friendship or anything like that, but you can almost draw a line from there to like a jet Apatow buddy comedy of like, Okay, what are other examples of male friendships we see in cinema?

And like where you have let me see, I'm trying to other big example correctly, Yeah, where it's like there's a lot of like, oh, we're friends, let me care about each other, no homo where this isn't the type of movie that would say that, but there's I don't know, I see what you're saying. I think there's an element of a we care about each other more than anything else, which can carry a bit of a like homorotic undertone.

And I think I don't give Peter Jackson in particular any credit for setting that up in any kind of progressive way, but I think because the performances are so heartfelt and the characters themselves are so emotional and sweet and earnest, The result is this on adult traded love for each other free from toxic masculinity, which is like in real life. If Sam and Frodo lived, I think they would experiment because I don't think they would have

hang ups. Maybe Sam more, I don't know. I mean that in let me be clear, if these two Hobbits lived in our real world, if we saw them at the frolic Room Tonight Room, that's just the bar around here that I like the best. It's a fun little guy. Yeah exactly, Yeah, I mean. And then something I thought was really great with Hobbits in particular is and you were touching on this a little earlier, Gutland. It's like they are so openly emotional in a way that we

don't see Eric Gorn. We definitely don't see Leglis a k A hacker computer boy. But I think that if we bring Leglis into the real world, he's straight up Mr Robot because he's always every time people are having feelings like us, is standing to the side like we need to go. He's not mean about it. But we do not see him cry. We don't. But the Hobbits are are very emotionally expressive. We see them cry a lot.

I mean, Froto is just sobbing for quite a bit of yeah yeah, like they're there, and and Mary and

Pippen as well to a lesser extent. But I think it's just because they're like more humorous characters, but we see them cry multiple times, and so I guess I can't say exactly what it is, but it's something about the tone of the scenes between Froto and Sam that are a little bit different than Mary and Yeah, the scenes we see between, even if they are emotionally charged scenes, it's laid on a little bit thicker for those two characters,

probably because they're more main characters. I don't know that. And it is Frotos. His burden is being the ring bearer, so like he carries the most steaks, you could say,

and the stakes in this story are super high. I mean, it's like a world so because he and Sam is with him every step of the way, I would say that the stakes are so high and there's so much emotion attached to whether or not they accomplish this quest that I think it makes sense for them to have such like emotionally impactful scenes because they're carrying the weight

of the world on their shoulders. I think so. In terms of Freda and Sam's relationship, I don't want to erase or deny the existence of a same sex relationship if that is in fact what it is. But I think there's a tendency to see a close male platonic friendship and label it as gay, which I would argue. I think that can be harmful because it kind of implies that men are not allowed to or that it's not normal to have a close platon friendship between two straight men, or between like a gay man and a

straight man. Because men feeling like they can't have closeness and emotional intimacy with other men in a non sexual way, I think contributes to toxic masculinity, because I mean, toxic masculinity stems from a lot of different things. One of them is men suppressing their feelings and thinking they can't be emotionally vulnerable with people, especially other men, because that's a sign of weakness. I totally agree with you, and I think I love you man is a response to that.

I mean, I don't want to over credit jet Apatow because he's super problematic, but I think he's horrible. But I think I love you man was an attempt to be like, whoa, No, men can be emotionally bound as best friends and it's and it's not weird. Guys. Look, he's also married. That is what I was attempting to say earlier. And I feel like I need I needed it set up in a way and had not been

set up, and I felt very secure about it. But yeah, I think that that is true where it's like, because those movies did come out later, it's like, oh, let's normalize male friendship, but the asterisks in those movies like, but it's not gay like the way Appata does it is homophobic because he's like, yeah, straight dudes can be

friends in a way that's not gay coded. Yea. And that does seem in a way a response to scenes like the way and I can't like, I literally can't describe exactly what it is, but the tone of those scenes to me is different and in a way that I always liked, Like I I love, I'm fully here for Sam and Frodo in the real world. I think what you both are saying is true in exists sort of parallel because you Jamie, you see it, you feel it, and I'm sure no part of you was like, men

can't be friends and if they're friends, it's gay. But there is the I understand Kalen you too. There is that danger when at is the narrative we're pushing that people will read it and say, well, I guess guys can't be friends because if we try and put it in things, it'll just be seen as homo erotic um. But I think they're both true. But I do want to add what's interesting. I know this is not supposed to be about I love you man, but there is a gay character. There are a few gay characters and

I love you man. And even that, to me was super problematic because Andy Sandberg plays like, okay, you'd put he's broy. What it's like great. The movie is trying to be like, look how innovative we are by having a broy queer character. Yeah, has never done a good thing in his life. I think we can agree. I haven't seen Freaks and Gigs because I can't look at Seth Rogum without wanting to pull my own head off. And yeah, the time to watch it may have passed.

Is it done? Should I not bother? I like Martin Starr. Mart He's a good one. He seems great. It was good when I saw it when I was like fifteen. Yeah, I haven't revisited it in a long time, but um yeah. So just to finish this thought, I just like to see like a close male friendship on screen and automatically, like automatically assume that it's like a gay sexual relationship.

I just think can doesn't necessarily have to, but it can further perpetuate the idea that it's like weird or abnormal to have straight men have emotional closeness with other straight men, and I think that helps keep toxic masculinity alive. And well, have I been guilty of doing this myself where I've seen two men on screen who are friends and like the other gay. Yes, I have done that. I'm guilty of that. But then there's the separate analog of like fan culture, which I think is divorced from

what we were just talking about. There's so many different ways to look at this one relationship. Erotic fan fiction in particular, which is hot in rules. It's oh, it's super hot and rules, but it it took Frodo Sam and it built world, a whole world, whole new world, whole horny new for all um, and then I ran this this whole, you know, train of thought that I

have about their relationship. I ran it past my friend j T, friend of the cast Twilight episode, and he said, yeah, that's all well and good, but keep in mind that queer people seeing media like this that has a close male friendship will like ship those two characters together because there's such a lack of visibility of queer characters in mainstream media that they'll say, yeah, those two men are gay, and I see myself represented in their relationship, because that's

pretty much all I have to choose from, right, So I think if the queer community is seeing relationships like that and saying like, yeah, I see gay undertones in that, like they know better than straight people, so I think it's maybe more appropriate it when that happens. Yeah, this Lord of the Rings in particular, and I guess, like I guess I would extend this to a lot of

fantasy and and possibly sci fi as well. Is there's like so many different ways to watch it, Like I feel like almost more so than other genres when you're looking at hyper fictional characters, like it almost depends on who you are and what your life experiences based on

how you're going to view it. Because if you're you know, like a queer person wanting to see yourself represented in a movie like this, and aren't seeing yourself explicitly represented, then it makes sense that you would see that scene and be like, oh cool, I feel at least a little bit scene because of how I'm viewing this scene.

Where if you're a young toxic man who sees that and is off put by it, and it is like that you know, sees that same friendship and thinks I'm less likely to want to be like close friends with another man because I don't want to be seen in this way. So it's it depends on who you are, what your life experiences. Let me ask you this true

right that lack of visibility. Is it possible to make a feminist argument for Lord of the Rings using sort of that same logic of like, well, there aren't a lot of, um, you know, obvious opportunities here for feminist visibility, But are there ways in which toxic masculinity is subverted that makes this in some way a feminist movie? I think that in the way the Hobbits in particular subvert masculinity worked for me, but just because it subverts masculinity

doesn't mean it's feminist. But then there's the I am no man argument with and I'm going to try to say this name, but it is all soft voweli there owen a owen, which is what you're saying is how you pronounced you and McGregor's name is Oh yeah. I'd like to issue a formal apology to all of our Scottish fans who slam my mention saying it's allan McGregor or you and McGregor, which I had. I also just made mouth thoses that time I swarke. I was not

trying to say his name, it's you and McGregor. I had said it correctly a year previously, and then in the year between recording that and the time I funked it up nine times I met him and parked with his girlfriend for six months, and then I learned how to say his name the total wrong way, and everyone got mad at But how wasn't she saying his name all the time. She was saying his name, and she was saying it correctly, obviously, But I was like, you

know what I should say? Well, you know, what's your name? Scorci Ronan, who was in Brooklyn Ronan another movie. There we go h o O N is that it win not to be confused with Arwin the other that's annoying. You don't do that, and you're, hey, if you're writing something, don't make everyone's name the same name, writing one oh one different first let that should be left behind you in the second grade where you've got like Stephanie Oh

and Stephanie t um. Anyways, you can make the I have the thing because I tried to research, like, okay, are there feminist arguments for this series and they seem to mostly fall to a Owen because she is a woman we see in combat and she also says and I feel like with these arguments they tend to boil down to like one or two things the character says in the space of nine hours. But she says the line I am no man, and that seems to be the core. They're like, well, someone said they weren't a

man and that was true. Also, she rode a horse, so it's a feminist text. Well, yeah, riding a horse, driving a car, right, women can do it all. Yeah, I like that character the same, and she don't want to text in love with her and he's like sorry, which fine, yeah, oh wait what I don't I mean, it's your your take on Vigo. I have a skewed view of Vigo because he made my mom so horny that she almost died like that. That's why we saught

with our moms. Something you want to do? Yeah, because it's like Orlando for the young girls, Vigo for the mom and Frodo you know, Elijah for an evening in between. Frodo is like basically I was like, yeah, if you had a crush on Harry Potter, Elijah, what's gonna give you that vibe as well? Because he's the size of a ten year olds according to this movie. Yeah, um, so you're like, you know, I see it and they

have piercing blue eyes. Thank you for bringing that up. Sorry, I have to interrupt for a moment because is okay. When I was listing all the characters, all the main named characters in this movie, I ended up color coding their names in my notes based on the color of their eyes, because nearly every single character in this movie

has blue eyes. Go back and watch it. I did not notice this until my viewing of this trilogy, but Frodo, Sam Wise, Gandolf, Mary Pippin, Arragorn, Leglis, Boromir, Gollum, Grima, worm Tongue, the Steward of Gondora, I forget his name, l Round farremre King, Theoden bilbo Is steel Door, how dear, he's one of the elves. Arwin, Gladriel and a Owen, plus a bunch of other like secondary characters all have blue eyes. Well, I don't know if you know this,

but Middle Earth is an area should be there. I personally aspire to be a blue eyed hobbit, hobbit or any I'd take blue eyed elf, blue eyed anything. We'll get to the racism in this movie Elf, but well, because everything there's a lot of Yeah, there's weird anyways. So yeah, pretty much all the good guys and some of the bad guys in this movie have blue eyes. The only good guys in this movie who do not have blue eyes are Gimli Amer. If anyone knows how

to say it, it's me and and Treebeard. Name it. It's cheating. Oh that's that's too funny of a name. But I've got notes on that name, which is that it's so funny. Another fun fact about eye color in this movie, So Orlando Bloom has brown eyes. He was given blue context so that legal Us would have blue eyes in this movie because you know, this is an

area nation and whatever. But Orlando Bloom hated his blue contexts and sometimes they would forget to put them in, so whenever they did, he would just not tell anyone and then the movie would get shot with him in his brown eyes. So there are some scenes where he has brown eyes and they didn't fix it in post or anything like that. So that's really funny. What a

weird choice that seems easy to fix. I know I was gonna say earlier before we got into the blue eyes theory that because of Airgorn, Airgorn was I think there for the moms. Casting wise, Vigo was there to make your mom for Roth, and I think he was successful in a lot in the case of many moms. But I think that two thousand and three was probably one of my mom's horny or cinematic years, because that's

also the year where Captain Jack Sparrow debuted. Um that made a lot of moms right, something for the mom, something for the And then again in that same movie Orlandos for the younger set. Yeah, there's a clear formula operating in Hollywood at this time. Absolutely, yeah, whiz. Anyways, well, uh, I just want everyone to know that we do fully acknowledge the irony of having only talked about men so

far on a podcast about women. Tried to talk about a Yeah, so let's take so let's just take a quick break and when we come back, we'll talk about the freaking women. The women A k Okay, So we'll take a quick break and we'll be right back and we're back. So let's talk about the female characters in Lord of the Rings. There are exactly three four if you count Rosie who Sam Mary's at the end, but I don't. I would say you could so easily cut her out of the story with very little impact besides

me crying at the end. It's fine. So I feel like I don't know if this is true or not, but I feel like this movie cares less about women being in the story than maybe any movie we've come across so far. But in a way that is like it's confusing. I'm trying. I feel like we've maybe covered one movie where I also got this vibe where the movie is not outwardly hateful of women really at any point,

but it's just a world war. Women don't exist until you get to elve and the Right, and then that even still there's very few two Elves, and then glad Reel only gets a couple of minutes of screen time. Glad Reel is Kate Blanchett. She's mainly used for exposition more important, and this is I don't know if there's a question you can answer if like you probably can't. Is she more important though, in the world of Lord

of the Rings than we get in the movies. I don't super know that, having not read the books, I tapped out and I don't even know. She's not even she's in the Hobbit movies, but not in the Hobbit book. I don't think um because she's presented yeah by I mean she's an exposition. Yeah, that pure and simple. But I felt watching it that she was somehow super powerful.

She's well, she's powerful, but in the context of the story, she's given so little focus that I think you could easily remove her or replace her like function with like l Rondo. Because so her thing is she's the first voice you hear in the movie, because she does provide all the voice over narration in the very beginning, where she's like doing all the world building and like, here's what Middle Earth is and there's some fucking rings and ship. We do meet her on screen in Fellowship of the Ring.

She's one of the like leader is at Las Lorean. But I mean, talk about presenting a character as virginal where she is dressed in all white and she's literally glowing with having never fucked like that, do you think she's never fucked? I think that there. I think that it could be there could be a very easy argument made of like she could have fucked. But I'm just like, strictly presentation rise it's like the classically virginal, like it

almost fair maiden for sure, right. So and then so the first time we meet her on screen in Las Lorean, where she's like the she's described as being like an elf witch and a sorceress, which sounds like a sandwich of elf like some of the Keebler keel. So when we see her on screen for the first time, she's like, she's like being escorted by a male elf who I don't know if this is true or not. I think

that might be her like elf husband. I'm not sure there is a dude with her, and he seems to be like an elf king and she's sort of like the elf queen. I don't know, but she is definitely like very like fair maiden. But she's all she's spoken about as like being very powerful, highly regarded. Uh so it is weird that like, oh, but a man has to hold her hand either she doesn't she's a pacifist.

But then that just makes it a jarring movie experience where I'm like, you're not even going to comment on the fact that women have nothing to do, know, there nowhere in this whole world. It's like if we were surrounded by like if there was like the same thing was in the whole world and we just never acknowledged it. Like every we're just like, oh, we're living as if they don't exist, because they don't exist. Like well, female characters written by men wouldn't notice that, because men don't

notice when they write stories with only men in them. Um, right, because there's there are three female characters in this movie worth talking about and forty male characters who are like named and like, not all of them are fleshed out fully, but like every single person in the In the fellowship, it's nine people and they're all male. It's wild. So the last thing. I'm glad Reel. She appears again throughout the course of the movies. Usually she's talking to l Rond,

but they're never on screen together. They have this is the Elf king guy in Rivendel. Yes, so there's different like Elf realms, Brunette elf is that. Yeah, that's Rwin's dad. It does feel like the Elfish Kingdom is a patriarchy. Yes, I mean the whole the structure of every community in this movie is, which I think is made really clear through Arwin's character too. Sorry I said Arwyn, not out not that well, there's Arwin. Yeah, I know, I know.

Stupid if you only have to come up with three female names and a four D character and two names sound exactly the same. For Galadriel, the one scene that stuck out to me where it seems like she had the most to do was the scene she has with Frodo where Frodo's I don't know, tiptoe and around, just done a little stroll with his little ring has just passed away. Gandalf did that thing where he's like sea and dropped off a cliff. It was like, you're not

even gonna try and okay, but then it's he's fine. Whatever. So there's a scene between Galadriel and Frodo where basically Galadriel is tempted by the rings power but then overcomes that temptation and it's basically like I passed the test and like high fives herself. Certainly not the Bechdel test, wish the ring test. And then she also has like another Harry Pottery thing where she's like, I have a

pen sieve. Is that the Harry Potter thing where you can you're that you can look into your own memories with a pensive right? So but she but did she just show the future? She has the gift of foresight like many elves seemed to and that's a raven who might be and we don't know. It's not fully explored, but I would like to think that's a raven is an extension of the Lord of the of course Bafely,

I think we can say that. So, yeah, she has that scene where she shows like weakness and being like, yes, I would be tempted if I had the ring, because Forrhoto is like I don't really like this whole ring bearer thing, why don't you take it? Glad reel like I want to be a flower girl right there, It's like,

seems like a more jobs they give it. So, not to defend the sexism of this movie, there's a reason that Hobbits are best suited to carry the ring, right, which is they're so pure of heart, right right, they're resilient to its evil. Yes, what's weird is that only hobbit men were available for that duty. But that is

my giving a little space too well on that. So you could maybe make an argument that, like, yeah, why wouldn't a woman have been considered for this, because we've seen throughout history women being less corrupted by power, But maybe that's only because women have never been given power, so we don't know how corruptible they are. But we could ship up, yeah we could, right right right, But yeah, that is that is Bilbo presumably wouldn't think of that

because he's just like my buddies. Do you know anything about well and also his nephew, anything about front of parents um or like he why he must be an orphan I'm guessing I don't know, Yeah, because Billbo is his uncle yeah, and there's no parents intervening, being like, don't give him the worst thing ever, that's true. No one cares that he's going. I think his only family is well. And Bilbo also does the rudest thing ever.

He's such a drama queen. He when he goes to his own birthday at the beginning of the Fellowship of the Ring and he's like, hey, everybody, just telling you I'm leaving forever power and then he disappears and leaves with lets say goodbye to literally anyone. It was pretty rude. Yeah, it was a weird move. But he's a little corrupted by that point. He is, I think he yeah, like he gets nervous around the Ring and he's like, I have to get the funk out of here. He feels it.

He does feels it by the end to write, right, we just got word from super producer Sophie that Froto's parents drowned. Oh go wait, in like the Hobbit, No, because we don't meet Froto or any I don't think any of the other Baggins is in the Hobbit. There's probably some backstory somewhere in the books that we learned,

or maybe like an appendacees or something. Frodo is just another example that I think you could apply to this almost this whole world, because gender is dealt with in such a passive way in this entire world where you could gender switch. Most of the characters in these movies, I think that they're with no impact. I think like characters like are Gorn to be a little bit trickier. Characters directly involved in the patriarchy at least seemed to

be making some sort of commentary. But all of the Hobbits, I would say, because they are so also emotionally open. They're all nice, not involved in overt love triangles, and they're not oppressing. They're not doing like they're Frodo could easily be a female character with really nothing about the story changing. Well, yes, about this story changing, right, If the writers of the Lord of the Rings movies had made Frodo or a girl, it would certainly have been

a different movie because and we're writing it. Oh, I don't think it would be the same. Yeah, no, it it wouldn't be treated. I don't think that a studio would invest like a jillion dollars into a female lead film franchise in two thousand and one, especially based on because the source material, like all of the like old school fans of Lord of the Rings would be like, oh, Peter Jackson, fran Walsh a woman and Philip A. Boyan's

a woman co wrote these movies. What so it's one man and two women doing most of the Oh my god, Well this just gets back to, uh, not all women are. That is mind going because the movie itself could have

made the choice to make these women more important. Well it did because from what I understand, again, haven't read the books, so I might be a little wrong on this, but like our Win's involvement in the story in the books is like hardly there at all, and they took mostly stuff from the appendices and beefed up her character much more than it had been in the books. Is Rwin liv Tyler? Yeah, but that feels like more of a movie thing because they're like, yeah, that's a she's

a tricky character. Because it's like I, I, of course I want to see women in these movies more. But the way that they amplify her character is so like there's such an agenda behind it that it's like almost like I don't know if I would prefer more general neutrality, or to see live Tyler specifically, so that she can be you know, like coveted and her father can just be like, I don't want you to do this, so don't.

And that's so many and they're all all the scenes are so quiet, and he's like, listen up, bitch, you cannot do anything. And she's like, but I would like to do something and he's like, tough ship, you can't do it, and then crying, and then you're just like this movie is very long. Well, let's get into Darwin. She is the daughter of l Rond and in some ways the daughter of Steven Tyler. You could argue that you could also argue El Rond is Steven Tyler if

you look at him. That's I think Steven Tyler was really slept on in the casting process. Well, doesn't have blue eyes, because if not, they could not count. For I remember my mom because I'm from Boston, Ak the land of Arrowsmith, where literally the year the Aerosmith roller coaster debuted at Disney World. Why does that place exist, Uh, the air Smith roller coaster, not Didney World. My mom

made us all go that year. But she I have like a very specific memory of my mom looking at liv Tyler in the movie, leaning over to me and being like Steven Tyler's Daughta is so beautiful. I was like ah. Anyway, So her story is that she has to decide if she wants to stay in Mental Earth and be with Aragorn, which means she would need to sacrifice her immortality, or if she wants to sail away with her elf people to the Undying Lands so that

she can stay immortal. Wait, a woman's storyline is a rooted in whether she's going to sacrifice something for a man or not, And that's a do or think of that. I don't see why that bumps anyone. So both l around her father and Aragorn are encouraging her not to make this sacrifice, but she decides to stay, which means I suppose she's given a little bit of agency in order to be able to make this life changing choice. But of course the choice that she makes is to

sacrifice a huge part of herself for a man. Yeah, I mean, and it's her choice she does. I I appreciate, And again we're going bear minimum argument that the story at least lets her make her choice and doesn't go the route of like, because if you go like way back in mythology, there's so many examples of like a female character who makes a choice and is killed because she made the choice she wanted to and didn't do

what her father told her to do. So at least that's not an example of that like ancient trope of women being punished when they do what they want. But it's not it's not good, it doesn't bode well. That's the only thing we really get to see her think about or trapple with, is like she's basically choosing between

her father and Vigo. She has an agency, but she's still just in accessory right right, And part of the reason that she makes this choice to stay with air Corn is because she also has foresight abilities, some clairvoyance if you will, and she foresees she foresees that she will have a son with Aragorn, So like, now motherhood is a daughter that that really annoying where she stares into the woods and she's like, what if I had a son? I was like, even you can't imagine women

in this world, yeah, because you've never met one. Well, there needs to be a male heir, because you know, Agorn does accept his destiny to be can't be in charge. It's the rules that is. But what's really getting me down is you know that two women co wrote this with Peter Jackson. I mean, and I also wonder to what degree were they calling the shots? Who knows? Who knows. It's a different times, it was a different it was almost twenty years ago, you know. Oh God, but this

is so within our lifetimes. It is so frustrating to think of like this nice memory that we have of like seeing a movie with our mom, and it's like, oh, we were not represented in the away and didn't even notice it. Yeah, it's just it's just unfortunately huge franchise. They tried a little harder. Again, I haven't seen Hobbit one, just Hobbit Too. There's also a third one, sad, I mean number two was smill fucking heavy. They smoke, but they do dry to make that female character more active.

Interesting that you mentioned that, because, um, well, a friend of the cast, Lindsay Ellis, I was hoping we talked about this. She made a three part video essay series about the Hobbit trilogy. She made a straight up Future Link documentary. It's amazing. It's like everything she does. It's amazing. I encourage you to refer to part two of this

video series. There's a section between around minute nineteen nineteen and where she talks about the character of Tariel, which is the Elf maiden played by Evangeline Lily in the Hobbit trilogy. So she was added in just like this character kind of like created from nothing, because I'm pretty

sure she's not in the Hobbit book. She gets she gets added into this narrative as a warrior lady because the studios thought this movie would be more marketable to a female audience if there was a lady in it.

That was that is misguided positive, but the movies are so lame right Well then, also, as Lindsay Ellis points out in the video, her being present in the story in the context that she is in the story, which is like a warrior, creates a contradiction in the Middle Earth universe because in the Lord of the Rings trilogy is established that women don't do battle, and like a Owen has to disguise herself as being a man in order to ride into battle in Return of the King.

So like there's like these very rigid gender roles that are established in the Lord of the Rings trilogy where like, you know, save the women and children. They have to be like protected and put away into the caves. They can't fight, And she's all and a win is all like, well, I'm competent with the sword. I want to fight for this causes I believe in, Like why shouldn't I be able to fight? So she so we'll get to a Owen.

But like, she's easily the most active character. But the Hobbit trilogy like really fucks up the rules that are established in this universe by putting this Tariel character into those movies. Um. But anyway, so back to our own really quick. Um. She does do a couple of small things that influenced the direction of the story, Like she saves Frodo from the Ring Raiths that are chasing him

in the Fellowship of the Ring. In the first movie, she tells her dad Elrond to have the sword reforged so that Aergorn can fulfill his destiny to become king. So she doesn't forge the sword herself, she tells a man to do it. Um, and for a man. Women can't touch swords, so except your unless you're a win. So yet if the sword is a standing for the fallace, then this is a very homerotic movie. Then you better

be jerking off that sword, Pale. But basically you discard game. Yeah, you can pretty easily remove her character from this narrative and the story would be pretty much unchanged. Like, she doesn't have that much to do. We only see we don't even see her on screen in the first movie until I think it's an hour in eight minutes into the movie, to be fair, there's a lot left after that point, that's true. But she's only in the movie, you know. But she's on screen then for about four

minutes during that like chase scene. Yeah, she is mostly absent from the movie. Meanwhile, there's eight hundred men in it. Well, hey, gang, Hey, it's us. I'm sick now you're so yeah, you suddenly got sick. In a matter of seconds, I'll break the fourth wall and be like, yeah, we recorded this months ago. Uh there. So this is a two parter because, as you know, The Lord of the Rings is extremely long,

So stay tuned. We have the second part of this episode with our wonderful gust on a coming up very soon. In the meantime, you can follow us at all the normal places. You follow us on Instagram at bechtel Cast, Twitter at bechtel Cast, Patreon ak Matrion five dollars a month to bonus episodes. Also, if you live in the Los Angeles area, come to our live show on September fift at nine pm at the Ruby. We are covering Edward Scissor Hands with guests Maggie may Fish. We're so excited,

it's gonna be great. I won't be sick anymore than yeah, you'll be in tip top shape, I promise, sah. And if you want to come to that, um tickets are going fast, so get them while you can. And to do that, go to our website becktel cast dot com and go to the live appearances tab and there's a link to buy tickets there and it's always in good to our merch store if you need any of the merch. Uh, it's what you do. Would you need it? Listen you need it And that's at t public dot com. Slash

the Bechtel Cast, the Battel Cast. I was going to get it wrong. We'll see you for part two of the Lord of the Rings episodes soon live long and get that ring. Hey, wond ring to rule them all but two parts to this episode, Love It, Bye Bye,