FanGirl Fridays!

Welcome back to another edition of the namesake feature of this blog. In it, I just geek out over some topic on thing that I am currently obsess about. Lately I have been covering all of the things that I have loved since my childhood. Next up I will be talking about my love for the The Hobbit/ the Lord of the Rings

 

When I younger my dad introduced me to The Hobbit after I finished reading the Chronicles of Narnia . The movie had been announced and he wanted me to get into the series so I could understand the movie. I fell in love with The Hobbit since it was a perfect read for my age range and it had a really great story. I loved Bilbo and all of the 13 dwarves (Fili, Kili, Ori, Dori, Nori, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, Oin, Gloin, Balin, Dwalin and Thorin...and yes I did this from memory). My favorite part of reading this and LOTR was going back to look at the maps to get a feel for where the characters are and how far they have travelled on their journeys. Since GRRM was inspired by Tolkien, it probably explains why I like ASOIAF/GOT so much.

 

So right before the first movie came out, I decided to read The Fellowship of the Ring. As an 11 year old, the books were tough to get through with all of the excess descriptions and all of the songs. It may have been a little advanced for my brain as I couldn't understand that the Hornburg was Helm's Deep and only really cared about Frodo and Sam's story (which means I may have skipped some stuff in the final book). Despite this, I still find things that I like every time I read the series now that I older, which makes me really enjoy it. Some of the best parts of the book are looking at the appendices and the timeline of events after the end of the book. The very last entry always chokes me up (its about Gimli and Legolas and takes place 120 after the destruction of the ring) since it harkens back to the Fellowship.

 

The movies are another thing that I love about the series. I may have problems with the new Hobbit movies, but I absolutely love the LOTR movies and watch them everytime they are on. Everything from the costumes and locations to the character portrayals, I love it all. Even with all of the changes (no Tom Bombadil, etc), I still can find myself getting lost in the story, but it doesn't affect how I feel about the book (hopefully that can happen with GOT one day. haha).

 

This was the story that influenced so many others and solidified the trope of the (orphaned) savior on a quest (Luke Skywalker, anyone?) and will always remain relevant with its looks at war, the environment, friendship and love.