Poking my head (after I haven't been to this thread in forever and never really got to catchup on it, though I want to), to share some roommates-reactions to RotK. As some of you may or may not know, the wonderful Lee has decided that the EE of RotK is exactly the present I need, for no reason at all, and last week the package landed in my greedy little hands. As some others of you may or may not know, it's the end of the semester here, which pretty much means crazy-busy-time. However, I had to play with the shining new CDs, for just a little, maybe a few new scenes, a few favorite scenes, you know? Two of my roommates were in the livingroom while I did. The conversation sounded something like:

Roommate1: Why is he crying?
Me: He thinks his sister is dead.
Roommate2: That's the blond?
Me: Yes. but she's not dead. Her uncle and her cousin are dead, though.
Roommate1: No, she's dead. Look.
Me: No, she's not.
Roommate1: How do you know? She looks dead.
Me: I've read the book. Oh, look, now she's breathing, see?
Roommate2: Is he in love with her?
Me: No, but she's in love with him. He's in love with another woman.
Roommate1: Is *she* dead?
Me: No, just not there.
Roommate1: Is *he* in love with her?
Me: Not yet. They'll marry int he end, though.
Roommate2: Why is he so sad?
Me: His brother died, and his father died and nearly killed him in the process.
Roommate2: Lots of dying in this movie.
Me: (Not mentioning the Fandalf-is-dead-now-he's-not part) Actually, less than you may think. All the other main characters are still alive
Roommate1: They don't look in love.
Me: (Holding myself from starting a whole long speech about the emotions of the characters) Not yet. They're still busy being sad. But they will.
Roommate1: Is the woman he sees in the ball the one he loves?
Me: Yes.
Roommate2: She looks much younger than him.
Me: Actually, she's thousands of years old.
Roommate1: Oh, beating and monsters, yuck!
Roommate2: Oh, beating and monsters, yuck!
Me: (Jumping ahead over any scene with fighting, monsters, beating or messy, so pretty much to the end)
Roommate2: He looks different.
Me: That's because he washed his hair.
Roommate2: No, really different.
Me: Yeah, really, that's because he washed his hair.
Roommate1: He still doesn't look very happy.
Me: (Stopping myself from starting a whole speech about the emotions of the characters).
Roommate2: Maybe it's because that woman he's in-love with is not there.
Me: No, she's going to be there in a minute.
Roommate1: Wow, he was really happy to see her!
Roommate2: Who's the guy standing behind her?
Me: Her father. He's also thousands of years old.
Roommate1: He has little silly tied things in his hair. He doesn't look that old.
Me: They're immortal. She's giving up her immortality in order to marry him.
Roommate2: Why should she give it up for marriage? Can't she just stay alive and still be married to him?
Me: Don't know. This is how it works.
Roommate1: They're smiling. That's it. Are you sure they'll be together in the end?
Me: Yeah, I've read the book.
Roommate2: Oh, this looks like such a lovely place.
Roommate1: He looks really fat when compared to the others, that's how I can tell them apart. Otherwise, they look all the same to me, all 4 of them.
Me: Oh, I probably like him the most.
Roommate2: The fat guy that looks confused?
Me: (Not holding myself anymore. Starting a whole speech about friendship and choices and trying to do the right thing despite everything and attempting to better and being there for a friend and how compassion may change everything and loyalty and trying and the internal fights and the taking of a burden you don't know if you can carry and - well, look at the "Firefly" thread for how I can forget myself when I start babbling about something I love andmeans a lot to me).
Roommates: Are you sure that's what it's about? All I saw was a bunch of monsters hitting each other and being ugly. Are you sure we're talking about the same thing?

[Edited to put the couple of words that ended up here back in the former post. The "continues" feature is great, but those few words looked lonely in a post of their own, so I put them back with all their other friends.

One roommate fell in love with "Firefly", the other two really aren't into anything that has anything unrealistic (in the lack of a better word) in it. A friend is introducing me to "Gilmore Girls" and whenever I watch it's like "Look! Something with no monsters or beating people up! I can watch these things too! The News are worse than lots of the stuff I watch!"]

Roommate1: He has little silly tied things in his hair.

Nilly (Hi, Nilly!!), show her the footage from I think it's disc four, with the original version of the coronation that they shot during the principal photography in 2000. Elrond looks even goofier, with his hair done up in a ridiculously elaborate geisha-like style.

V. funny, John. My roommate loved it.

Roommate2: Lots of dying in this movie.

Somehow I don't think Helm's Deep would make a good impression these folks.

Look! Something with no monsters or beating people up!

Pfft! How can people be prepared for life without monsters or up beating? I worry for the Gilmore Girls generation. Thank goodness PJ came along to bring them misery and oliphaunts.

I finished watching RoTK EE the other day. I was in a weird mood so Denethor bugged the hell out of me and I got to the "shut up already and torch yourself!" point well before Denethor was at the torching point.

However, I was much more sympathetic to the oliphaunts and thought it wasn't fair that they were being killed -- they aren't evil! just mistreated!

And I read some of the appendix A and I didn't realize how old the characters were in relation to each other. Aragorn is older than Theoden who's older then Denathor, I forget where Frodo falls in this, but Sam and Faramir are the same age.

I really need to finsh reading the book and go through the Appendices more carefully.

Finally watched the EEs back to back. Now THAT's how the films should be seen.

Where's the .cx URL from?

Good question. My totally uneducated guess is the Czech Republic.

Me: (Not holding myself anymore. Starting a whole speech about friendship and choices and trying to do the right thing despite everything and attempting to better and being there for a friend and how compassion may change everything and loyalty and trying and the internal fights and the taking of a burden you don't know if you can carry and - well, look at the "Firefly" thread for how I can forget myself when I start babbling about something I love andmeans a lot to me).

t loving Nilly lots

Strangely enough, I just dropped by to post this: [link] which makes an excellent first installment to the trilogy of goofy animation.