Ooh, look possibly good Hobbit movie news.

Encore is still playing the heck out of FotR -- I caught the end the other day and the beginning up through the Council of Elrond and the very end (from when Merry and Pippin lure the orcs away from Frodo) tonight.

You know what still bugs me? That scene where Legolas wants to cross the river right away and Strider wants to wait 'til dark to avoid orc patrols. I mean -- Hello!! Orcs are much more likely to be patrolling at night -- and they haven't come across the Uruk-Hai yet.

I'm just now watching RotK for the 2nd time, and I have one observation and a related question:

The lighting of the beacons REALLY belongs on the big screen, because on my TV, it looked like lightning bugs.

Question: are the beacons in a sort of circle, with Minas Tirith in the middle, so that each beacon that was lit was a response TO Gondor? Or was it a more linear series of beacons, more or less, where they were relaying a message from Gondor to Rohan?

(Legolas? Still the prettiest.)

(Aragorn? As of where I paused the DVD, still not king.)

(Elrond is unhappy about Arwen choosing Aragorn, so he's overseeing the re-forging of the Mighty Sword of Whoop-Ass, because he DAMN well isn't giving them a *new* sword for a wedding gift. It's re-gifting or naught.)

Question: are the beacons in a sort of circle, with Minas Tirith in the middle, so that each beacon that was lit was a response TO Gondor? Or was it a more linear series of beacons, more or less, where they were relaying a message from Gondor to Rohan?

I'm almost positive it's the latter.

I think in the books there were beacons to the north of Minas Tirith to Rohan and to the south towards (I think) Belfalas.

There's a Figwit documentary!

I want to see it.

When you look at a map of Middle-earth, you can see that Minas Tirith is on the eastern edge of a mountain range, and Rohan is way westward, on the north side of that range. (Helm's Deep is nestled into that range.) So the beacons are one-to-the-next, from east to west, in a relay from Minas Tirith to the borders of Rohan.

(The same thing happens in the Agammemnon, when the Trojan War is over. Clytaemnestra sets up a fire-sign relay so that she will have advance warning when her husband is coming back to port. I mean, because she is planning to kill him rather than come to his aid or anything, but same technique for long-distance signallign when there is no AT&T.)

Woohoo!

The RotKEE comes with a model of Minas Tirith and you can get Minas Morgul with the gift set.

Okay, I think I misinterpreted: you get Minas Tirith with the gift set and if you buy the gift set you can buy Minas Morgul too. (Not a gift with purchase.)

TORN also says that you can pre-order now at Amazon and I am not finding that.

Yay! I like those gift set goodies. I wasn't that keen on the Gollum statue that came with TTT. I would have much rather had something Rohirric, like my own personal Eomer or something.