#Gandalf for President

[greyistari]

( hair tuck )

#thinking abt this blog #for the first time in a long time #˚ ⋅ ⟩ i. ooc : gandalf fanclub president . #what a comfort muse #ugh. i should watch all the lotr movies.

[turkwriter]

if you think biden is the best available candidate and the choice that most reduces harm, great. All we can realistically ask of each other is to make what we think is the best tactical move to reduce harm.

please vote for biden if you truly think he is the best choice. Thank you for seeking a better world.

But please don’t make fun of or dismiss the blood on Biden’s hands. He was the prominent voice for the Democrats guiding the country into an invasion that killed hundreds of thousands of humans. It was not a guaranteed thing. Many in the military correctly believed this was a bad long-term solution, and non-British international partners were split to say the least.

Biden very quickly set the tone of helpful/submissive opposition where an unprompted invasion of a sovereign nation was absolutely on the table, it was just about negotiating specifics. The American people needed to be better convinced for this to happen, he said. He provided cover for and instruction to the second Bush administrative on how to sell the war. He campaigned for the invasion process to last “at least 4-5 years” for “stability”.

He both set the goal posts and knocked the ball in. He said that the American people would have to be 100 percent convinced that Hussein had nukes and would use them, on us. And then he backed the lie, the great WMD lie that was always a lie and resulted in the death of one very bad man, yes, but also hundreds of thousands of innocents. Without that proof the American people would “need” ever surfacing.

he was not hoodwinked, he was a ranking foreign affairs senator, he had access to the best most convincing data, which as we all know was a big fat goose egg. he backed the lie anyway.

if you still think, despite being the candidate with the most blood on his hands, Biden is the best choice for harm reduction, maybe he learned his lesson and won’t do it again, then fair enough. Thank you again for wanting to reduce harm. Wanting that is enough for me even if we disagree on tactics.

Just please don’t throw the truly countless victims of Biden’s active complicity under the bus and belittle bringing up his bloody record. People call him Genocide Joe and Bloody Biden for a reason. A deeply sad reason involving hundreds of thousands of dead people. Please don’t make light of that. Thank you.

Literally no one but you is calling him Genocide Joe over the Iraq War Senate votes from decades ago. They're calling him Genocide Joe because the same people who tried to push the Tara Reade hoax and Dementia Joe bullshit last election cycle are trying to find something that sticks this time.

#Joe Biden #I'm not voting for him in November for ~harm reduction~ #I'm voting for him in November because I think he's been a great president #i assure you i was both alive and cognizant during the lead-up to the Iraq War #and i know that Joe Biden was not the leading voice in getting us into it #wasn't even in the top 5 voices #i'm not a Zoomer who thinks of 2003 as ancient history from before i was born #i was there gandalf

[audhd-nightwing]

batfam as new girl quotes

steph: where are you, tim? this place is fancy and i don’t know which fork to kill myself with.

***

dick (16 y/o): i’ll take you through the whole thing. i’ll be like your guide.

jason (13 y/o): like gandalf through middle-earth?

dick: ok, first of all, let’s take the Lord of the Rings references and put them in a deep, dark cave where no one will ever find them.

jason: except smeagol. he lives in a cave.

***

tim: you text me “happy monday.” what am i supposed to do with that?

damian: oh, i don’t know. maybe have a happy monday?

(he’s trying to be nice)

***

jason: would you consider us adorable?

dick: no! we’re adult men.

dick: we’re cute.

***

cass: you always see the worst in people.

damian: yeah, because people are the worst!

***

steph: i mean, bruce, we love you, but…

steph: but you’re not a man of the people.

bruce: of course i’m not a man of the people. i’m above the people.

***

cass: we’re a family. families talk about things.

jason: no, families ignore things until they go away.

***

new parent bruce: dick, do you want to go to sleep?

9 y/o dick: no way.

bruce: if you do, i’ll write you a check for $6,000.

***

duke: what are you doing in here?

tim: eating cookies and avoiding confrontation.

(in the bathroom at a gala)

***

steph: jason, come on, that’s like the president and the vice president not being best friends.

jason: they’re not best friends.

steph: come on. everybody knows they’re best friends.

***

dick: i’m in love!

damian: titus, clear my schedule. i need a word with our brother.

***

steph: duke, those shoes are not brown! they’re green!

duke: you guys are idiots! they’re as brown as money.

cass: what color is kermit the frog?

duke: brown! he’s a brown frog.

tim: duke! you’re color blind, dude.

***

bruce: darn it! has anyone seen my croquet cleats?

***

tim: hey guys, do you think i’m a good person?

steph: you’re a terrible person. it’s hilarious.

***

dick: i’m very quick on my… uh…

jason: did you just forget the word ‘feet’?

dick: feet, yeah.

(he’s been awake for 72 hours without sleep)

***

duke: i can’t believe i didn’t notice this before but damian, you are legitimately crazy.

damian: i think we’re all a little bit crazy, don’t you, thomas?

duke: no, i mean, you’re like aging ballerina, child chess prodigy, professional magician crazy.

damian: it’s my grandfather’s fault.

duke: yeah okay fair enough

***

tim: if i was doing something stupid, you definitely would be involved.

dick: yeah, you’re damn right i would be. and i would probably be there to make it even stupider.

***

bruce: has anyone seen my good pea coat?

***

steph: i brake for birds. i rock a lot of polka dots. i have touched glitter in the last 24 hours!

steph: and that doesn’t mean i’m not smart and tough and strong.

***

jason: are you insane, bruce? we’re not ready.

jason: that’s like taking a musical from rehearsals straight to broadway. you got to workshop it first.

(pushing the theatre kid jason agenda)

***

dick: you realize i say goodnight to you every night and you never say goodnight back?

dick: what is the problem, jason? do you not want me to have a good night?

jason: oh my god you’re so overdramatic

***

tim: please don’t mistake my measured blank tone for calmness, as i am filled with waters of rage.

(he’s at a gala)

***

bruce: damn it! i can’t find my driving moccasins anywhere!

***

duke: what a dumb idea.

duke: do it.

(he is an enabler)

#dc comics #dcu #batfam #batfamily #the batfamily #incorrect quotes #new girl quotes #dick grayson #bruce wayne #jason todd #tim drake #damian wayne #stephanie brown #cassandra cain #duke thomas #batkids #the bats #batman comics #dc #batman

[morningnoodles]

things bagginshield fic writers put in their fics that never fail to have me giggling, kicking my feet in absolute giddy and delight:

"confusticate" and "confound"

Dwarves. (in bilbo's POV)

bed snuggles (especially them tangling their legs together - i am a simple woman)

balin being the president of the bagginshield club

food being an integral part of either the story or their relationship or both

consort!bilbo

BAMF!bilbo

horny!thorin

them being ridiculous

gandalf in a corner with a pipe doing absolutely nothing but reacting to them being ridiculous

either of them logicking their way out of admitting they're in love. or jealous.

"speak plainly"

#bagginshield #the hobbit #bilbo baggins #thorin oakenshield #the hobbit fanfic #keet rambles

[youlittlepufferfish]

Me seeing the lesbian Gandalf, wizard president and BDSM Forsaken together in their over-40s Mexican standoff.

#wot show #moiraine damodred #wot spoilers #wheel of time #wot #moiraine sedai #lanfear #siuan sanche

[medlilove]

Please click for full resolution, k?

Finally managing to upload this after failing yesterday! Here, have some alt outfits for our favourite freak and geek, Eddie Munson. The fact that we only got one in canon is a crime.

Some notes on the details because who’s going to stop me?

These are all post season 4 au everyone lives, thanks for asking.

All the graphic tees are taken from real heavy metal shirts.

The After the Gig one, feel free to make up your own backstory...

Why yes House Party Eddie is looking at Steve, while wearing an Ozzy tee and a (real! I found it online!) Bat belt buckle. I spent way to long on this one. I wanted a full confidence Munson.

Eddie got dragged into going for a walk up the hill with the gang by primarily, Steve, Dustin and (a very convincing, dare you to say no) Nancy. They want to have a bonfire for the Vecna-versary. It was a hike, Eddie did not sign up for a damn hike. At least he wasn’t the last one up the hill (Robin).

The record in Eddie’s bag is the toilet Metallica album from ‘82 (Metal Up Your Ass). It always sold out before Eddie can get down to the city. So when Garath showed up outside Steve’s place 7:38am (after being sent over by a groggy Wayne in the trailer park) who had heard from a friend who had heard from a sister who had heard from her boyfriend that their go to shop in Indianapolis had got 15 new crates of inventory the night before, he grabbed the nearest clothes he could find and jumped in the van. Leaving a bewildered Steve still half asleep in bed. He was in such a good mood that day, he was completely oblivious to how jarring his appearance was.

The logo on his hat is Harley Davidson. It’s a straight copy of an old beanie. I head-canon that he works in a garage that his uncle is familiar with after high school. He seems like he’s good with his hands.

Eddie hates deep winter, how can he perfect his metal head look when it’s all hidden under coats and scarves? The first time Max saw him across the lot, in a giant coat taking out the trash, cigarette in hand, she thoroughly made fun of him. It pissed him off like mad, but deep down he was glad he could put a smile on her face…he supposed.

The badge on his coat is a (real) retro Tolkien one that says: ‘Gandalf for President’.

#stranger things #eddie munson #steddie #stranger things 4 #my art #steve x eddie #eddie the banished #stranger things au #eddie stranger things #medlilove art #steve harrington #Fashion #outfits #etc

[physalian]

Color in Fiction! (Once You See it, You Cannot Unsee it)

White versus black, red versus blue, Gatsby’s green light, Dorothy’s ruby red slippers, Belle’s blue dress.

Color is perhaps the most ubiquitous motif used across both fiction and reality to thread people or objects through a common theme, or to pit two ideologies against each other beyond their verbal spats. Color is also perhaps the simplest motif, but that doesn’t make it any lesser in its potency.

In fiction, color is an easy way for the audience to learn as fast as possible who’s on whose side, and who their opponents are, and today, we’re going to look at a few.

But first: Crash course into color theory:

Warmer colors evoke passion or uncertainty, movement and excitement, happiness and warmth, but also rage, aggression, love, and lust. The cooler colors evoke sadness and serenity, but also youth and spring and winter and death.

Most of the time when a creator wants to juxtapose color in a narrative or other work, they’re going to use inverses, just google one of the hundreds of teal and orange movie posters. Inverses are whatever colors lie at opposite sides of the wheel. Blue and Orange, Red and Green, Purple and Yellow. These pairs show up either in opposition, or as an ensemble of one character or a group or team.

Part 1: Black and White

Yes it has grounds in racism, but black and white are also accepted to mean chaos and order, good and evil, death and life.

In a show like Lost, themes of black and white are constant. The black and white backgammon pieces, the colors of the Dharma station logos, the show’s main title card, God stand-in Jacob (Lucifer from Supernatural), and his unnamed brother, the Man in Black.

Black and white show up *everywhere,* in some places subtler than others. In fiction with a male and female lead, if they are coded in black and white, the man is almost always the one in black. Black means strength and mystery and this deep, almost corrupted darkness. White is purity, femininity, youth, and nurturing, when a woman wears it, unless she's the villain.

Villains in white are very often surprise villains:

The White Witch (Chronicles of Narnia)

Saruman (Lord of the Rings)

President Coin (Hunger Games)

Hans (Frozen), Mayor Bellweather (Zootopia), Auto (Wall-E)

Elizabeth from Pirates of the Caribbean is an interesting case. She begins the first movie wearing light colors and being trapped in the pure and lawful life of the governor’s daughter. She ends her arc in the third movie in solid black (through several costumes) a badass Pirate King and wife of the new Captain of the Flying Dutchman.

Men in black are chivalrous, dark knights, or morally grey vigilantes, silent badasses, or edgy badboys. Black is also of course reserved for villains a la Darth Vader, or Severus Snape and Voldemort and a million others. The "Black Knight" is his own trope, whether he's in a fantasy setting or not.

Women in black are temptresses, or seductive badasses. Black is the color of corruption, sin, and angst in western media 9 times out of 10 unless a narrative wants to subvert it.

I could do an entire essay on black and white in Lord of the Rings alone but here's a few other contrasts: The white Tower of Ecthelion, Minas Tirith, the "White City", the White Tree, Gandalf the White. The Black Riders, Black Speech, Black Land of Mordor, Orthanc (Saruman's Tower).

But you don’t have to make your character’s entire costumes black and white, no, you can just make their hair light and dark.

Part 2: Hair

**Possibly also because racism but we don’t have time to unpack all that right now**

When you have your male protagonist and his male foil, love interest, competition, companion, lancer, or villain, most of the time (in western media where blonds are in abundance) the more noble or “good” character of the two will be blond, the other brunet, especially in a love triangle. If two male characters have opposing ideologies on any level, they will often have opposing hair. A male and female lead duo will also tend to have opposing hair, but it’s most obvious what they’re doing when it’s two dudes and not just coincidence.

Here’s a nonexhaustive list, with the brunet first (ignoring if the adaptation was faithful):

Frodo Baggins and Samwise Gamnee (LoTR)

Aragorn and Boromir (LoTR)

Aragorn and Theoden (LoTR)

Denethor and Faramir (LoTR)

Thorin and Bilbo (Hobbit)

Jack Shephard and James “Sawyer” Ford (Lost)

Jack Twist and Ennis Del Mar (Brokeback Mountain) *Also have opposing hats*

Bruce Wayne and Harvey Dent (The Dark Knight)

Tony Stark and Steve Rogers (Marvel)

Bucky Barnes and Steve Rogers (Marvel)

Loki and Thor (Marvel)

Nico di Angelo and Will Solace (Percy Jackson)

Percy Jackson and Jason Grace (Percy Jackson)

Sherlock Holmes and John Watson (the Cumberbatch one)

Sam Winchester and Dean Winchester (Supernatural)

Edmund Pevensie and Peter Pevensie (Chronicles of Narnia)

Gale Hawthorne and Peeta Mellark (Hunger Games)

Damon Salvatore and Stefan Salvatore (Vampire Diaries)

Tom Buchanan and Jay Gatsby (2013 Gatsby)

Caledon Hockley and Jack Dawson (Titanic)

Notable nonexhaustive exceptions:

Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy (Harry Potter)

Percy Jackson and Luke Castellan (Percy Jackson)

Jacob Black and Edward Cullen (Twilight)

Batman and Superman (DC Comics)

Luke Skywalker and Han Solo (Star Wars)

Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi (Star Wars) *wardrobe makes up for it*

*Feel free to tag the ones I missed

Not every brunet on the list is a “bad” guy, nor is every blond the “good” guy, but compared to each other, the brunet tends to be the more morally grey, the more corrupted, the one who’s ideologies end up getting them hurt or killed or proving them wrong. Or, the brunet faces more demons, has a darker personality, or tends to have a “shoot first ask questions later” philosophy.

This of course goes out the window if the media is set in a region or with a cast of characters who are meant to share similar features, like how there’s no blondes at all in Last Airbender (otherwise Aang would absolutely fit the pattern).

Whether that’s Frodo getting corrupted by the Ring and Sam being his rock, Jack Twist getting murdered while Ennis lives on, or the beloved Dark Knight and his bat-black demons while Harvey’s White legacy saves Gotham, next time you write a brunet and his blond competition, ask yourself just why you’re doing it.

*Side note, I’m pretty sure Harvey Dent, when he’s animated, is usually a brunet, but he’s also usually Two-Face by then and no longer a hero*

I don’t even have time for black and white in anime or the trope of the white-haired anime boy and since natural hair colors are kind of moot, I don’t think the same rules apply. But outside of the westernized “black knight vs white knight” I do want to dig deeper into color motifs in anime at some point.

Here's some notable dark and light dichotomies nonetheless in wardrobe and/or hair:

Kirito and Asuna (Sword Art Online)

Lelouch and Suzaku (Code Geass)

Midoriya and Bakugo (My Hero Academia)

L and Light (Death Note)

Medusa and Stein (Soul Eater)

Sasuke and Naruto (Naruto)

Roy Mustang and Riza Hawkeye (Fullmetal Alchemist)

Eiji and Ash (Banana Fish)

Kyoya and Tamaki (OHSHC)

Yuri and Viktor (Yuri!!! On Ice)

Dracula and Alucard (Castlevania)

Part 3: Red v. Blue and everything in between

The megalith that is the color motif extends past the white/black dichotomy.

It’s also red and blue.

If red is pitted against blue in any story, red is always the team the audience is supposed to root against, unless this is sports. Red is the color of the Sith, the Fire Nation, red eyes are seen as evil, red is blood and rage and wrath and fire. Red is the color of evil empires. Blue is the color of heroes. It’s water and healing and camaraderie, serenity. Blue is the color of rebels and underdogs.

Red versus blue is in everything from the color of lightsabers in Star Wars to the color of cybertronian eyes in Transformers, to the color of the Water Tribes and Fire Nations (with some exceptions a la Azula’s blue fire) to the colors of the pills in the Matrix. Red is the ‘dangerous’ choice, blue is the ‘safe’ choice. Unless your character is patriotically sporting the red, white and blue of the UK, USA, or France.

Villains usually only wear blue if they're ice-coded, or belong to a faction wearing navy blue uniforms.

Red versus blue also shows up between leaders and their lancers. The first one I can think up off the top of my head is Robin and Raven from Teen Titans.

Purple is also usually lumped in with the bad guys and green with the good guys, but purple and green also show up a ton as contrasting colors of the same character like the Hulk or the Joker. But both can swing either way. The Decepticons in the early cartoons for Transformers had purple everywhere and reclaimed it in Transformers: Prime. Megatron, Soundwave, Shockwave, the Vehicons, Airachnid, and the Dark Star Saber, and some G1s]. Prime also has three sets of red-blue dichotomies within their factions: [Arcee/Cliffjumper, Optimus/Ratchet, and Knockout/Breakdown].

Green is the color of more Jedi, and the Green Lanterns, but green also represents sickness or disease or generic evil energy a la Loki, Dr. Facilier (Princess and the Frog) or the Hyenas and Scar in the Lion King.

Pink is really up in the air, as is orange and yellow, especially when it comes to female characters, especially female anime characters.

But enough about color dichotomy.

Part 4: Color Singularity

Color singularly is either meant to evoke a specific emotion, like using blue everywhere to represent sadness, or it’s meant to be a bold statement in an otherwise grayscale world.

I mentioned a few at the top of the post and I’ll elaborate on them here:

In Great Gatsby, green and yellow are very important colors. The “green light” is this real object at the end of the titular character’s love interest’s dock. This light and this color are motifs that represent Gatsby’s longing for Daisy and to return to a glorious past he can never have again (it’s also the color of American money). Yellow is also everywhere in this book. It’s the color of his chekov’s car and several dresses at his extravagant party. Yellow is the color of his current life of glitz and glam and riches (and is also the color of gold). If you listen to one of the accompanying songs to the 2013 film, Florence and the Machine’s “Over the Love” recognizes the importance of yellow in the narrative.

Dorothy’s red slippers in the Wizard of Oz are hyperbolically bold, especially since the movie starts out in black and white. Color is a huge piece of this film- the Emerald City, the Yellow Brick Road, the horse of many colors. Red scientifically is the color humans tend to notice first, those shoes were made to be remembered. Color in Wizard of Oz is the symbol of the fantastical, which was really helped by the time the film was made and simply seeing so much color on screen dazzled audiences.

Red catches your eye faster than any other color, and red in a world of black and white sticks in your mind, just look at Schindler’s List.

Belle from Beauty and the Beast, along with a lot of fictional women wear blue. Blue is biblically Mary’s color, and at one time was the color marketed to women before the shift to “blue for boys”. In the original Beauty and the Beast, Belle was the only character who wore blue, because she was an outsider, and outlier, a free-thinker. Or at least, Belle is the only one who wears blue until she dances with the Beast. The live-action remake didn’t maintain this extra level of the narrative and that’s a shame.

I didn't mention eye color much above (also maybe because racism) but blue eyes, especially animated blue and green eyes, go to characters who are more hopeful, heroic, nurturing, morally just, honest, or brave than their brown-eyed counterparts, unless he's a blue-eyed Tall, Dark, and Handsome. Blue-eyed people tend to be blond, so the traits go hand in hand for the "good" character.

Weirdly enough, this also applies to blue-eyed animal characters -- your animated anthropomorphised villain is rarely going to be drawn with eyes that aren't brown, black, green, red, orange, or yellow.

Because color is also a subliminal or overt way of foreshadowing in both written and visual media as much as any other motif and recurring symbol. You can foreshadow death, or impending doom, or an eventual identity reveal, whatever you want.

You can also subvert the usual associations with specific colors. Black doesn’t have to mean evil in your world. Black can be life, too. White doesn’t have to be pure, white can be clinical and sterile and lifeless (but please no more lady villains in white pantsuits, that's its own cliche at this point). Shake it up a bit every once in a while.

So whether it’s dueling ideologies or the very forces of good and evil, a harbinger of doom or a secret tell, or community and camaraderie, or an enduring hope, you can represent it all with a careful dose of color.

#writing advice #writing tips #writing resources #color theory #literary analysis

[mask131]

About the "Tolkienesque renaissance"

The term "Tolkienesque renaissance" is of my own invention and creation, but it is a name I use to designate a very specific wave of fantasy fiction, or rather a specific phenomenon in the evolution of fantasy in the English-speaking literature.

As we all know, Tolkien's shadow cannot be escaped when doing fantasy. Tolkien's works being published began the modern fantasy genre as we know it today. D&D, the other big "influencer" of fantasy, would not have existed without Tolkien. The Peter Jackson trilogy began the fantasy renewal of the 21st century. Epic fantasy is a sub-genre explicitely designed after Tolkien's work.

And the massive influence of Tolkien over fantasy is the most felt in the second half of the 20th century, in English-speaking literature, through something I would call the "Tolkien cold-war". When you take a look at the fantasy books of the second half of the 20th century, you notice a fundamental clash and divide splitting it all in some sort of silent feud or discreet conflict. On one side, you have the "Tolkien followers" - as in, the authors who walk in Tolkien's footsteps ; on the other side, you have the "counter-Tolkien" offering what is essentially a counter-culture in a Tolkien-dominated fantasy.

We all know that Tolkien's success was huge in the early second half of the 20th century. The success of "The Lord of the Rings" and the "Hobbit" and the "Silmarillion" was especially important during the 60s and 70s - Gandalf for president and all that... People loved Tolkien's fantasy, people WANTED Tolkien's fantasy, and so publishers and others were happy to oblige. This began the "Tolkien followers" movement - but this beginning was a very unfortunate one, because it was one that relied on not just homage, imitation or pastiche... But in pure copy-cat and sometimes complete rip-off. Since people wanted some Tolkien, people were given LITERAL Tolkienesque fantasy. The most famous (or unfamous example of this would be the 1977 's "The Sword of Shannara" novel. This novel was designed to literaly be a simplified "The Lord of the Rings" with only a few details changed here and there. In fact, this is most of what people recall about this book - how blatant of a Tolkien rip-off it is. And yet, this book was a BEST-SELLER of the 70s fantasy, and it was a huge success, and everybody loved it, precisely because it did the same thing Tolkien did, and so you got to enjoy your favorite series all other again. Afterward, Terry Brooks, the author of the novel, expanded it into a complete series moving into much more original and personal directions, as he admitted himself that doing a Tolkien copy-paste was more of a publishing and editorial decision to make sure he would sell and settle himself in the literary landscape rather than an actual artistic project or personal desire. "The Sword of Shannara" got its own sequels, and became its own thing (though VERY reflective of what the 80s American fantasy was in terms of style, tone and content), but nowadays everybody remembers it for being the "Tolkien rip-off" in its first novel.

And yet being a Tolkien rip-off can sell well, and if the "Shannara" series hadn't proved it, "Dungeons and Dragons" did, since its first edition in the late 70s went as far as to just take Tolkien's inventions such as orcs, Balrogs and hobbits, and include it in its game. The same way the Shannara series then found its own tone and content, through the successive editions Dungeons and Dragons then began to build a world of its own... But it confirms what I said: it was the era of the Tolkien rip-offs.

In front of these "Tolkien followers", which were back then "Tolkien imitators", there was another movement that drove fantasy forward - and it was the "counter-Tolkien movement" so to speak. Works of fantasy that willingly chose to depart from Tolkien's formulas and archetypes and tropes, to do their own thing. Sometimes they did it out of an actual dislike of Tolkien's books: for example the "Elric Saga" was created because Moorcock hated the paternalist, moralist tone of The Lord of the Rings, and so he countered Tolkien's world with a protagonist serving the Lords of Chaos, using a soul-sucking evil sword, last remnant of an empire of cruel, decadent and demonic elves, in a tragic world doomed to endless falls and oblivions... (Though, ironically, Moorcock would end up initiating a genre of dark fantasy that Tolkien himself had explored in his unpublished texts...). Others did it not because they disliked Tolkien but wanted to prove you could do something else: for example Ursula Le Guin admired and appreciated Tolkien's works, but she was fed up with all the imitators and pastiches, and so she created her "Earthsea" world. No European setting dominated by white people, but an archepilago of islands with dark-skinned characters. No big war or political manipulations, the stories being about about the life, journeys and evolution of individual people. No sword-wielding hero or horse-riding paladin, but wizards and priestesses as the protagonists. No big prophecy about the end of the world, flashy magical sword or evil overlord ready to destroy the universe (well... almost), but rather philosophical and existential battles doubling as a fight against oneself and one's very existence...

This counter-Tolkien genre definitively peaked with the other big name of "dark fantasy" and what would annonce the "grimdark fantasy" a la Game of Thrones: Glen Cook's The Black Company.

But what about the titular "Tolkienesque renaissance" I speak of?

Well, if the "Tolkien followers" had only done bad rip-offs, it would have never lasted, ad the "counter-Tolkien" movement would have won. In fact in the 80s, it almost did! Tolkienesque fantasy was thought of as cliched and stereotyped and overdone and dead. People had enough of these blatant-rip offs, as the hype of the 60s and 70s had died out, and the 80s folks turned to other forms of fantasy - such as The Black Company (Dark Fantasy), or Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser (Sword and Sorcery), or various parodies and humoristic fantasies, but all far from the "epic fantasy". And yet, something happened... The "Tolkien imitators" became "Tolkien followers" or rather "Tolkien reinventors", and began the "Tolkienesque renaissance".

The Tolkienesque renaissance is this group of fantasy authors, most predominant in the 90s though they began their work by the late 80s, that decided they would make the Tolkienesque fantasy live on. Not just by copying it as their predecessors did, a la Shannara, no. But by reinventing it, freshening up the old ways for a modern audience and new times. They took back all the key ingredients, and the famed archetypes and the usual tropes of the epic fantasy a la Tolkien, and they reused them without shame... But in new ways, with twists and turns, playing on the codes of the genre, while carefully avoiding the cliches and stereotypes of the time. Giving what people liked about epic fantasy, while also producing new works that felt fresh and went into opposite directions - taking lessons from the counter-Tolkien movement.

It is commonly agreed that the series that began this renaissance was David Eddings' The Belgariad, published between 1982 and 1984. Just a look at the Wikipedia article mentions this best-selling, very influential fantasy series was the "last gasp of traditional fantasy, and the founding megasaga of modern fantasy"... Now, I actually have to disagree with Wikipedia's words. I do not consider it a "last gasp of traditional fantasy" since it already began the Tolkienesque renaissance and thus a new generation of fantasy ; and the other qualificative is ridiculous since modern fantasy already began with Tolkien, and the Belgariad is not a mega-saga, but just five average-sized books. But the idea of it being a link between an older and a newer generation of fantasy books is very true.

While The Belgariad has to be put first, second comes Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time, which probably is the most famous of the Tolkienesque renaissance works of the 90s and became this behemoth of fantasy literature. And to make a trilogy of iconic works, I will add another 90s success: Tad Williams' "Memory, Sorrow and Thorn". Another iconic work of the Tolkienesque renaissance, though lesser known today than the Belgariad or The Wheel of Time - which is a shame, because Williams' work as a huge and heavy influence on a famous fantasy story of today... "A Song of Ice and Fire", which takes a LOT from "Memory, Sorrow and Thorn" (I even call this trilogy the "missing link" between LotR and ASoIaF).

The thing with these Tolkienesque renaissance series is that today, to an audience that was nourished by Tolkien and D&D and Pratchett and other things of the sort, a superficial glance might make them seem like "yet other rip-offs, yet other stereotyped, yet other clichéed" fantasy series. You just have to see the reception of the first season of "The Wheel of Time" tv series - here there was a clash between two generatons of fantasy.

And what these people who take a superficial glance will miss is how inventive and fresh and interesting these series felt back then because they played with or subverted the tropes and the codes of the traditional fantasy. They all played by the usual archetypes - you have an everyman young chosen one, a magical mentor who must "die" at one point, an evil overlord in an ominous half-disembodied state, evil black-clad horsemen going after the hero, elves and dwarves and trolls... And yet, these series twisted these same ingredients they used to bring new flavors.

Let us take the Belgariad briefly, to see how the whole Tolkienesque formula was subverted. Like in Tolkien you've got an order of wizards appeared as elderly, bearded men - but here, they are definitively human beings unlike the otherwordly Istari, and their appearance is explained by them being the disciples of a god that likes to take the appearance of a bearded old man, and who by divine influence made them look like him. You've got a dangerous, all-powerful item the big bad is seeking to destroy the world - but here it is no evil, or corrupting thing. It is rather an item dangerous because of the sheer scope and range of its power, and the temptation isn't becaue it is "evil" power, but just because it is a power so massive it can break the world. You've got a missing king with a stewart/regent holding the throne for him until the lost heir returns - but when said heir returns, the stewart/regent is no evil vizir or scheming usurper, and gladly offers back the throne to its legitimate owner. Belgarath, your Gandalf-stand-in, is far from being the dignified guide and noble mentor of Tolkien, as he is a half-werewolf drunkard that hates any kind of official ceremony or garb and prefers running through the woods or rolling under a table in taverns. And while everything is designed as a Tolkienesque setting, you've got no elves or dwarves or orcs - but humans. And that's a big change compared to more traditional 80s fantasy (like D&D or the Krondor series or Shannara). You have your Nazgûl stand-ins, but they're humans. You've got your Istari, but they're humans. You've got your dwarves equivalent, but they're humans. You've got your orcs equivalents, but human too. And it is shown that it is all a human vs human combat, despite being a world of magic and gods, placing some relativism into it all. (Though the fact they decided to subvert the Tolkienesque good vs evil wordlbuilding by having humans on both sides did cause other aspects of the series to age badly but that's another topic).

I can go on and on but I think you see my point - and this same subversion can be found in the other two series I talked about.

The Wheel of Time begins with the chosen one going on a quest... But which chosen one? That's the problem - there are multiple candidates, and so we begin with a guessing game. And the Aes Sedai are clearly an answer to Tolkien's Istari - but all women instead of all men, and much more numerous and pro-active. As for "Memory, Sorrow and Thorn" we have benevolent trolls that are actually more akin to Tolkien's dwarves and have some Inuit-influence, while the Tolkienesque-elves turn out to either be the big bads of the series and the evil guys ; or to be sheltered, useless side-characters that are not helping anyone and cause more problems than anything (I'm exaggerating a bit here, but you get the subversion). Spoilers - but the Galadriel equivalent literaly gets murdered during her second actual appearance, to make it very clear what kind of subversion we are into.

Because this was the game of these books - and the reason they were such huge successes. It wasn't about avoiding or setting themselves free from the tropes and code and archetypes of the genre. Rather it was about reappropiating them, reusing them, twisting them and modernizing them in order to get rid of the stale cliches and frozen stereotypes. It was all a game of imitation yes, but also of derailing - a subtle, discreet, derailing so that everybody got on board of the same type of train, but said train took different tracks to another landscape and worked on a different fuel. (If it makes sense?). It is a game of subtle twists - but unfortunately it is often this subtlety that makes these series overlooked, as people just focus too much on what is identical/similar and not much on what is different... Despite the differences being key here in this effort of renewing what was a dying style. Placing back these books in their context highlights even more how "fresh" they felt back then.

I have one specific point that illustrates this, but I'll need to write a whole post for it...

#fantasy books #fantasy literature #tolkienesque renaissance #tolkien #the belgariad #the wheel of time #memory sorrow and thorn #fantasy series #the elric saga #earthsea #the black company #lord of the rings #lotr #tolkienesque fantasy #dark fantasy #epic fantasy #fantasy cliches #fantasy tropes #the evoluton of fantasy

[evilspitefulviledisgustingmalice]

#cbat #none pizza with left beef #randy your sticks #OSHA #gandalf big naturals #yes they smoke weed #ken ashcorp #dashcon #poll #tumblr polls #funny #meme

[adorkastock]

Maybe standing confidently with a tall staff like a priest or mage. Presiding over a ceremony or mediating a meeting, or maybe the end of the "You shall not pass!" Gandalf gesture

tysm for these ideas! the tall staff one would be a really cool turn around from a low angle

#AdorkaStock Suggestions

[velvet4510]

I think this should be talked about more:

the fact that at the Grey Havens, Frodo accurately predicts that Sam will be mayor and foresees the names of five of Sam & Rosie’s children after Elanor. He directly tells Sam that he will have Frodo-lad, Rose-lass, Merry, Goldilocks, and Pippin (although Pippin was actually born before Goldilocks.)

Like, this is INCREDIBLE to me. Some say that Frodo is just guessing that Sam might become mayor and guessing what the names might be, but how could he be sure that humble Sam would ever want to be mayor? How could he just assume the number of children that Sam & Rosie would have? And how do you guess a name like Goldilocks??

I seriously think he had a premonition of Sam as mayor with six children by those names. I’m not quite enough of an expert on the lore (yet) to know if his Wraith wound and/or the Ring might’ve made this possible, or if this is just a strange gift that he was born with. He does have premonitions of Gandalf in battle and of his journey to Valinor elsewhere in the book. (His description of his vision of Valinor is clearly what Sam used when writing the last pages, since he describes Frodo’s actual arrival the same way.)

I heard a clever theory (I can’t and won’t take credit for it; it was in a great fanfic I read) that he foresaw Aragorn’s visit to the Brandywine in 1436 Shire-reckoning, in which case he must’ve seen Sam as mayor - since he WAS mayor at that point - and might’ve heard Sam introducing each of his children to the King, and that could be how he knows their names. If so, Goldilocks might’ve been standing between her brothers Pippin and Merry, and Frodo could’ve mistakenly assumed she was older than Pippin and thus listed her name before Pippin’s when talking to Sam. Hamfast, Daisy & Primrose would also have been born by then, but since they were extremely young (4, 3, and 1) at the time, perhaps they were off to the side with Rosie, and Frodo couldn’t see them next to their father and siblings, so was unaware of them.

It makes me wonder if Tolkien meant to imply this. He took the time to write that Frodo somehow knew Sam would be mayor and have children with those exact names, and then wrote in the appendices that not only were those predictions true, but there was a specific event (Aragorn’s visit) over which Sam presided as mayor and would’ve had to introduce his children by name. He put so much thought and detail into everything, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he actually intended Frodo to have had a vision of Sam and his children meeting Aragorn at the bridge.

Thoughts, anyone??

#lotr #jrr tolkien #frodo baggins #lotr books #lord of the rings #samwise gamgee #the grey havens #lotr theories

[stachebracket]

Round One 'Stache Match-ups

Peppino Spaghetti (Pizza Tower) vs Professor Rowan (Pokémon) Geppetto (Pinocchio 1940) vs Tim Lockwood (Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs)The Lorax (The Lorax) vs William Riker (Star Trek: Next Generation) The President (Pikmin) vs King Dice (Cuphead) Nigel Thornberry (The Wild Thornberrys) vs Kratos (God of War) Filbrick Pines (Gravity Falls) vs Mouse Kaboom (Happy Tree Friends) Tarzan's Dad (Tarzan 1999) vs Drayden (Pokémon) Morshu (Legend of Zelda) vs Magikarp (Pokémon) Luigi (Super Mario) vs Snidely Whiplash (Rocky and Bullwinkle) Dracula (Castlevania) vs Gaepora (Legend of Zelda) Hades (Hades) vs Geralt (The Witcher) Jules Winnfield (Pulp Fiction) vs Walrus Captain (A Hat in Time) Dr. Wily (Megaman) vs Charlie Swan (Twilight) King of All Cosmos (Katamari) vs Hizashi "Present Mic" Yamada (My Hero Academia) Drake (Pokémon) vs Craigor Smiff (Red Stitch Report) Blaine (Pokémon) vs Gimli (The Lord of the Rings)

Eggman (Sonic) vs Lando Calrissian (Star Wars) Archibald Dandy (The Adventures of Captain Wrongel) vs Walter White (Breaking Bad) Mung Daal (Chowder) vs Linebeck III (Legend of Zelda) Kingambit (Pokémon) vs Doc Louis (Punch-Out!!) Major Alex Louis Armstrong (Fullmetal Alchemist) vs Doctor Neo Cortex (Crash Bandicoot) Soichiro Yagami (Death Note) vs Murro Morton (Identity V) Baron Zeppeli (JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 1: Phantom Blood) vs J. Jonah Jameson (Marvel) Wulfric (Pokémon) vs Henry Henderson (Spy x Family) Gashu Satou (Your Turn to Die) vs Stanley Hudson (The Office) Alolan Golem (Pokémon) vs Landorus (Pokémon) King Harkinian (Legend of Zelda) vs Thundurus (Pokémon) Gustavo (Pizza Tower) vs Tornadus (Pokémon) Broque Monsieur (Mario & Luigi) vs Cadmus Ebcott (Red Stitch Report) Rhys Strongfork (Borderlands) vs Agustín Madrigal (Encanto) Bob Belcher (Bob's Burgers) vs Soseki Natsume (The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles) Oscar (Duolingo) vs Professor Turo (Pokémon)

Soda Popinski (Punch-Out!!) vs Mario (Super Mario) Cliff Clavin (Cheers) vs King River Butterfly (Star vs the Forces of Evil) Stoutland (Pokémon) vs Grandpa Harley (Homestuck) Von Kaiser (Punch-Out!!) vs The Captain (BBC Ghosts) Mustache Girl (A Hat in Time) vs Tobias Fünke (Arrested Development) Chat Noir (Miraculous Ladybug) vs Randy Marsh (South Park) Wario (Super Mario) vs Gandalf (The Lord of the Rings) Kevin Ayuso (Identity V) vs Mr Pickels (Happy Tree Friends) Inigo Montoya (The Princess Bride) vs Minimus Ambus (Transformers: More Than Meets The Eye) Kricketune (Pokémon) vs Eldstar (Paper Mario) Jane Crocker (clever disguise) (Homestuck) vs Advisor Mung (Hypnagogia 無限の夢 Boundless Dreams) Saguaro (Pokémon) vs Revolver Ocelot (Metal Gear Solid) GOING TO REMATCH Waluigi (Super Mario) vs Vincenzo Santorini (Atlantis: The Lost Empire) Mr. Rime (Pokémon) vs Raikou (Pokémon) Sportacus (Lazy Town) vs Ron Swanson (Parks and Recreation) Steven Magnet (My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic) vs Sir Humphrey Bone (BBC Ghosts) Sea Hawk (She-Ra and the Princesses of Power) vs Duster (Mother 3) Varrick (The Legend of Korra) vs King Bradley (Fullmetal Alchemist) Omni-Man (Invincible) vs Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart (Doctor Who) William Murderface Murderface Murderface (Metalocalypse) vs Lolorito Nanarito (Final Fantasy XIV) Mumbo Jumbo (Hermitcraft) vs Probopass (Pokémon) The Toy Soldier (The Mechanisms) vs Chancellor Cole (Legend of Zelda) Alakazam (Pokémon) vs Entei (Pokémon) Thom Merrilin (The Wheel of Time) vs James Gordon (DC Comics) Gomez Addams (The Addams Family) vs Solid Snake (Metal Gear Solid) GOING TO REMATCH Asgore Dreemurr (Undertale) vs Taryon Gary Darrington (Critical Role) Julius Pringle (Pringles) vs Netero (Hunter x Hunter) Dudley (Street Fighter) vs Barret Wallace (Final Fantasy VII) BJ Hunnicutt (M*A*S*H) vs Daruk (Legend of Zelda) Mabosstiff (Pokémon) vs Vito Corleone (The Godfather) Cervantes (Fire Emblem) vs Don Paolo (Professor Layton) Gordan Freeman (Half-Life) vs Zangief (Street Fighter)

#stachebracket #stacheupdates

[ilhoonftw]

I think one reason why intl fans are completely against mhj is because of that info leaking allegation cuz now all stans of all groups are speculating about how any bad press or scandal in the past few years was her doing and this allows them to completely shift the blame from the artists like I’ve seen people allege how those bad lee serafim performance critiques were clearly paid for and started by her. On the other hand hybe has some were prominent company stans. I also think sometimes people have a general hard time just accepting that somebody shitty is partly right and partly wrong as well.

It’s so weird and interesting to see how much practically everybody is leaning into a ‘good guy’ and ‘bad guy’ narrative. Like the cherrypicking of info. I saw somebody say that mhj was saying weird things about Lee serafim and their debut but when you zoom out the truth is that yeah she was saying some super weird stuff about them but also she was standing up for the nj girls cuz their debut was getting pushed back and when hybe was questioned about it they basically shrugged the concerns away. Like dude all of them are creepy but this also shows how little hybe cares about those girls as well.

on the newjeans note I also found it so creepy but concerning how much those young girls are going through turmoil cuz mhj isn’t settling firm boundaries between them like I admit I know that within this industry the line between the managerial staff and artist gets very blurred cuz that’s who you spend the most time with so they’re almost family but still those girls should not have to call you crying worrying about your mental health mhj. I genuinely wonder what’s going on with those girls cuz right now yeah since they’re profitable hybe will want to keep them but clearly there’s a certain callousness with which they’re dealing with them but on the other side mhj is just such a concerning case as well. I hope things work out for them they’re all so young. I know I’m making assumptions but I get so so pissed off at the parents for even putting such young girls in these positions to begin with. I’m sorry this was so long it’s just everybody is extremely favouring one side and I just wanted to vent to somebody who sees that they’re all absolute asses

death to company stans tbh

i doubt mhj really has this much of hold on the industry to be the mastermind behind everything bad that went on in 2k23 💀 bigshit on the other hand was always slimey i was there gandalf. eye for eye tbh, everyone in entertainment keeps tabs on each other, it's business...

ls bad singing controversy were p organic, like every year there's a group that gets in hot waters for being bad singers and their encore ridiculed... twice, jimin, kang daniel, hell even kara used to be called the 'group that can't sing' 💀 i mean that's why idols don't sing live and companies have them prerecord pretend live versions that have even heavy breaths included... to avoid bad live singing controversy. i mean stans will defend everything, say 'oh they were tired' but it's kinda crazy how singing lessons aren't a priority

i feel like 'mhj is a creep' and 'mhj cares for nj in her own way' and 'mhj was screwed over by the bigshit machine' can coeexist

it's also wild how everyone glosses over the absolute lack of concerns towards idols as human beings shown by hitman bang 💀 if he doesn't care for nj and toyed with their fates by messing with debut date then he doesn't give a shit about your faves either...

a lot of what is painted in the media as bad is just regular idol system bullshit. 'oh they were scouted by different company and spent x years there' well apink was trained in cube but president hong decided to let them go and have debut them in different company called 'a cube' and apink members parents were rightfully upset about it yeeears later. trainee transfers are a normal thing? how many boy trainees went through cube after 2016? how many debuted elsewhere... how many times a smaller/broke company gets taken over by bigger company and all trainees are sacked... it just doesn't make the news

it pisses me off how every damn time some bullshit goes on, there's always a % of audience that treats it like a tennis match. pick their guy and their guy is the goodest good guy. 0 nunace. good people do bad things, hello??? also terrible people can do good things. b&w thinking truly rots brains

it's been obvious mhj is treating nj members like they are her friends and not employees... it's strange. the sns posts too. boundaries are beautiful she should try it. i feel so bad for the girls became clearly they are on the losing end irregardless of the outcome. isn't everyone but oldest member a school drop out too? the concepts they had always had me 😬😬😬 bc clearly mhj has some weird obsession with youth. i don't like her one bit

i feel like right now mhj is painted as paranoid woman who tried to screw hybe over 💀 ton of ableism too, assuming she's mentally ill. i studied glass ceiling and other barriers for women in the workplace my sociology graduation thesis and a lot of what's going on is ringing bells for me. like you have a male boos who will say you're emotional and useless all while he's having mood swings everyday at work 💀 in sk it's even worse. a lot of workplace harassement towards women seems mild so it goes unreported but it makes showing up to work x10 harder and p much nerfs workplace mobility. it's systemic. mhj straight up was put on a glass cliff

to sum it up i'm on side of human rights

fucked up idols are overworked and hardly paid, the money they earn goes into new company building and then their group disbands and they leave the company... the building still standing and being used by everyone but them

[dutchdread]

Rebirth Update 9

Well, 75 hours played and Cosmo Canyon is behind me. Have to say, I soured on Gongaga a bit, it's still gorgeous but the hell of figuring out how to navigate it ruined that for me. Costa del Sol was marginally better in that regard. While the world design of the game is impressive I do have to critique them for making the challenge in traversing the world map not "getting there", but "how to get there". If I thought it was clear which routes to take and they just happened to be difficult, then I would be fine with that, but it should not take me this much trouble to figure out how to go a few meters to the right on a map. Seeing Cid being young and handsome is still weird, even though I've known about his canonical age for ages now I still see him as a 60 year old white haired smoker. Being wrong about I can handle, but I don't like seeing him without a cigarette and with barely an insult in sight. Better were the flashbacks to AVALANCHE in the Cosmo Canyon Protorelic quest, those hurt in the best way. I have to say, getting 100% in each area as I play is getting more and more tedious, and I don't advise anyone doing it for their first playthrough, but the story parts are being handled pretty well for the most part so far. The expanded story of the Gi is very interesting and if they came here from another dying planet then the connection with the Black Materia, and presumably Jenova, makes sense and is a nice bit of worldbuilding. Bugenhagen was not as sweet and tiny as I had expected, I think he could have been done better. I think he could have Yoda or Gandalf levels of "wise old playful sage" but I don't think they manages that and it's quite unfortunate. Also not a huge fan of Nanakis real voice, although it is getting better as I hear it more often. What is not getting better is Chadley, who somehow has more lines than any other character in the story, despite being barely tolerable at best. Zack and Biggs' flashbacks were interesting as well, and I wonder what it means that they've lost their sense of time, it's almost as if they're experiencing the world as in a dream or something. Really intrigued where this is going and I really have barely any guesses so far. Speaking of time, apparently Dio made the Golden Saucer AFTER the Coral incident, that means that in just a span of 4 years, Dio made the golden saucer, it became wildly successful, it aged to the point where the cable car to the gold saucer became run-down, the land was sucked dry of mako to such an extent that it became a desert, they started cycling the reactors to save the soil, cactuars took over the reactors and turned them into weird cactuar sanctums. That is a lot for 4 years. They probably should have just specified that Coral was always a desert, especially since the cactuars supposedly have been protecting the relic there for thousands of years. Another thing that I noticed that happened exceptionally quickly was the updating of the shinra trooper testing facilities in Gongaga to having Rufus as the person giving the tests. Could have been a cool opportunity to have president shinra return for a bit. Anyway, these aren't complaints, just something I noticed. I enjoyed Tifa going against the grain in Cosmo Canyon, and was surprised at how closed off the people there seemed to be towards what she was saying. Really not that much to mention in this part concerning the story now that I think about it. It was just a solid chapter and it's time to sleep. More importantly, tomorrow it's finally time to return to Nibelheim. I can't wait.

#ffvii rebirth

[peanut-tyrug]

I showed a friend Maxwell’s skins bc this man absolutely ROASTS Maxwell and it’s the funniest shit ever to me

I’ve decided to share a few with y’all :)

“THIS MAN LOOKS LIKE HE’D TELL YOU ABOUT THE PYTHAGOREAN THEOREM!!”

“MY MAN HASN’T SEEN CHAPSTICK IN DAYS!!”

“This man looks like a PRESIDENT! Put his face on a coin.”

“I want to suck your BALLS- I mean BLOOD!”

“He’s practicing his death metal scream.”

“Did he put his clothes or his dignity in that bag?”

“He really said ‘HOW B-B-BAD CAN I BE!?’”

“He shrinkified his nose? WHY DOES HE LOOK LIKE THANOS? He looks like a Mortal Combat character.”

“IS THAT GANDALF? WHY DOES GANDALF HAVE THE WEED!?”

“HE STROKES HIS MANLY STUBBLE-“

#don’t starve #dst maxwell

[pointyearedelvishprinceling]

Babes who is the Stranger? Gandalf? Saruman? Earendil after falling out of his boat?

I have studied jolkien rolkien tolkien for 84 years, I have spent countless hours bent over the scriptures with nothing but the light of a single candle, watching the sun rise as I unraveled the mysteries of ages past

I believe my theory is correct. The Stranger is Manwe. They all got sick and tired of the Valar rule and started a rebellion for democracy. Currently, Finarfin is the first elected president of Valinor and to mark a new era, they banished and yeeted Manwe to Middle-earth

#idk love it's probably gandalf #but then him being gandalf would be too obvious wouldn't it #they're playing us so hard #but maybe it's a reverse psychology into making us think him being gandalf would be too obvious #and yet it is gandalf #anyway yes #ellie #ellrond