Addressing the Elephant in the Room

Addressing the Elephant in the Room

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Hello again, all.

It's been a very long time since I've been on Blogger as is no mystery to a lot of the old Author and Writing crowd. While I did decide to pop back in and considered just posting things whenever, I felt like I should respectfully let people know what's going on.

The short and simple of it is: life happened. While I don't want to dive too deeply into it, a large amount of medical and personal circumstances struck very hard, not to mention being followed by the beginning of the pandemic and the disaster that has been the last few years. As it stands, I had very little inspiration to do anything short of hide from existence and haven't done much in the way of writing.

My intent for moving forward is quite simply to get back into it. I'm a great deal more focused on writing both small and large projects. I'm working on several things on the back end that I intent to publish and therefore don't want to actually post on the blog. I can promise more to come on that one. I intend to also put out stuff on the block that wouldn't otherwise find its way into a publication. These might be a bit more random then previous, though I hope that's more because I've expanded as a writer than gotten worse as one.

I'll let you be the judge of that.

Finally, I'm thinking about changing things up to make this less of a purely fiction related blog and expand out more. I've had thoughts about doing reviews, informationals, and things like that, but I really haven't delved too hard into that quite yet and am not sure if I want to quite yet.

At the end of the day, my intent is simply to get back into the groove and really start writing and living again. I hope everyone has been doing well and it's nice already seeing some familiar names and blogs that I haven't seen in quite a few years.

The best I can offer is: expect more to come. I'm not sure about scheduling or anything like that, just know that the willingness is there, so keep your ear to the ground.

Remakes Blogfest - The Lord of the Rings

Hello Lovelies,

Today I wanted to take a moment to step outside of my normal format and join in on a little fun. If you're not aware, Alex J. Cavanaugh and Heather M. Gardner are hosting a little thing they're calling the 'Remakes Blogfest' today. And yes, I AM releasing this a day early, but only because of my normal blog format of leaving a day or two between posts. Either way.

The idea behind this blogfest is to identify those books/movies/tv/etc. that you feel actually improved when they were remade. Now, while most people think about remakes across the same medium (example provided The Thing from Another World (1951) versus The Thing (1982)), remakes also count with regards to adaptations from the original source material. And, while most would probably expect me to delve into the horror scene with something like The Thing, Dawn of the Dead, or some other title, I decided to go a different route.

Lord of the Rings.

To those that don't know, I'm a huge Lord of the Rings fan. I've actually read the entire series three times now, quite literally have the One Ring as my wedding ring, and have drawn massive inspiration from the concepts, styles, designs, characterizations, and more in a number of ways. A lot of the time, the inspirations are only more obvious personally due to their involvement in my game design for Dungeons and Dragons. Once in a grand while they're noticeable in any fantasy series that I work on, but that is what it is.

Now, while both the books and movies are enjoyable, I feel that the movies are actually a large improvement upon the original source material. Before anyone screams 'Blasphemy!', allow me to explain. There are a few areas, particularly in the range of tone and characters (both entire characters and character design), that the movies really improve upon in comparison to the books and really make it the high-epic fantasy story that we all know and love.

First and foremost, let us talk about the tone.

To those of you that have never read the books before, allow me to clarify that the books are much slower and longer than the movies. Now, I'm sure those of you who have tried to marathon the extended movies like I have are shouting "THOSE THINGS ARE ALREADY OVER 11 HOURS LONG! HOW CAN THEY BE ANY SLOWER?!"

The answer? The original books were only half-fantasy-epic.

The original intent behind the books had less to do with high-adventure and had more to do with world creation. To those unfamiliar with Tolkien's history, the books were partially written in the trenches of war. They were an escape. Tolkien devised and created this massive, incredible world with all of these creatures and beings and cities and customs and the books themselves ended up being an exploration of that world. Literally. The books are essentially a mashup of a geographic travel guide that talks at length about the world and people that are being met and experienced with just a hint of 'Oh yea, war and evil.' There are certain sections of the books that are as much of a slog as actually going on a trek across the world. While there are plenty of amazing visuals and a hell of an adventure story, there's also plenty of areas that feel like 'a review of middle-earth's foliage in a million words or more'.

The movies, in turn, decided to largely cut this element out. While there's plenty of huge, sweeping shots to show off the landscape and the travel, it's nothing compared to the books. The movies, instead, focus on the adventure of this fantasy epic.

Now, while many will likely agree with me that the movies improved in this element, I feel the next section needs clarification because of the focus. There were a number of characters in the books that were either glazed over or entirely removed. The one that I'm going to focus on has actually gotten a lot of heat for NOT being in the movies. I'm outing myself as a horrible person (supposedly) for supporting that the character in question is not present, so fire away if you hate me for it.

Without further ado, let's talk about Tom Bombadil. 

As previously mentioned, the original books are an exploration of the world of Middle Earth. There are plenty of characters that make little to no impact and simply don't need to be explored within a cinematic version of the film. However, there is also ONE character that makes WAY too much impact while doing LITERALLY nothing. Insert Tom Bombadil.

Tom Bombadil, to those unfamiliar with the books, is a character that shows up in the middle of 'The Fellowship of the Ring'. He is a 'merry fellow' the lives in a small valley with Goldberry. Frodo and Sam meet him on their travels and, if there's one thing Tom is good for, its bringing the story to a grinding halt. While the entire scope of the story is about the travels across Middle Earth and the overwhelming threat that is the One Ring along with Sauron and his armies, Tom is introduced as a character that not only doesn't care about this, but genuinely isn't effected and can even SOLVE the issue. In essence, this character is basically a God and we spend a significant period of time with him just fucking around. This character not only isn't influenced by the One Ring, but literally has power over it like no one else short of Sauron does.

So what comes of this character that surpassed all others in power? LITERALLY NOTHING. He just...is there. They meet him, they dick around, and they leave. He serves absolutely no purpose within the story other to introduce himself as existing. I genuinely have no idea what Tolkien was thinking with Tom's introduction, but if there is one character that is not only worthless but annoyingly worthless within the scope of everything, it is Tom Bombadil and I'm very happy the movies ignored him.

Finally, I want to talk about characterization.

Briefly speaking, the movies did a better job of providing more memorable characters for most of the individuals in the story. I clarify most because there were a few missteps. As stated, the books were largely exploration focused rather than epic focused. This caused one character in particular, Aragorn, to somehow be examined and subsequently ignored when he shouldn't have been. The books touch on Aragorn's lineage, his age, and the fact that he has a pretty amazing history as both the one true king and a hardened ranger, and yet make Aragorn into this incredibly placid character that doesn't act as much as is acted upon. He doesn't push forward in the same ways as he does in the movies and is largely just pushed along by the plot. It's an incredible miss.

HOWEVER, if there is one thing that the movies do make a mistake with, it's in the characterization of a specific few. Merry and Pippin, characters that seem almost interchangeable within the films, are actually explored in a more in-depth manner and really make a name of themselves singularly. They deserve special mention. The character that doesn't deserve as much love but goddamn does he get it is Legolas.

Oh fuck me Legolas.

While there's nothing really wrong with Legolas in the books or even with the initial characterization in the first movie, something happened somehwere in Hollywood that turned Legolas into this God. I don't know if it had something to do with the actor or the actor's agent or Peter Jackson or what, but Legolas becomes this Mary Sue character that can do no wrong, essentially has super powers, and is so 'critical'(?) that is literally shoehorned into a story HE'S NOT EVEN INVOLVED WITH, i.e. the Hobbit movies. While it's one thing to note that Tolkien was not focused on specifics of any given battle outside of the fight itself, it's another thing to have Legolas shield-surfing down stairs or murdering an entire team of Oliphaunt riders ALONG with the Oliphaunt. 

In short, much like Tom Bombadil, it just feels so out of place in comparison to everything else. Honestly, the wizard is more believable.

And so, ignoring God-King Legolas, I feel that the Lord of the Rings movies are overall superior to the books. While, again, the books are by no means bad, the necessary trimming and cleaning up of the story really helps to make it the fantasy epic that we know and love today. It does a tremendous job of filling in areas that need it, cutting off areas that aren't needed, and just giving us a wonderful tale of adventure, fun, magic, and heroism.

I hope you all enjoyed. What was your favorite parts from the books and movies? Was their one you liked better? Share in the comments below.

- RB

(Additionally, I have no idea what happened with the copy paste of the links to the other authors, but I hope you'll forgive its odd appearance and join these authors as they explore their favorite remakes.)
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1. Ninja Captain Alex J. Cavanaugh
2. Heather M. Gardner
3. Diane Burton - Adventure & Romance
4. Christine Rains
5. Tamara Narayan
6. Juneta @ Writer's Gambit
7. CineMarvellous!
8. Tossing It Out
9. Stories I Found in the Closet
10. Spunk On A Stick - Diane
11. Pat Hatt
12. The Write Game
13. PepperWords
14. XmasDolly aka Marie Moody
15. Writing Off the Edge
16. Sharon M. Himsl - Shells, Tales and Sails
17. The Warrior Muse
18. Michelle Gregory at Dust Kittens in the Corners
19. Elizabeth Seckman. Author
20. Birgit
21. The ToiBox of Words
22. Shah Wharton
23. Spacerguy
24. Michael Abayomi
25. Stephen Tremp Breakthrough Blogs
26. Madly-in-Verse

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Planning for the Tour

Hello Lovelies,

With the end of the public chapter releases for Xenophobia, I want to start thinking towards the future. Whether it be six months or a year down the line, my thought process is now on a) finishing Xenophobia and its respective editing and rewrite; and b) planning how to release and sell the story.

I've done a number of other smaller short stories that have been released simply through the Kindle online store. However, I realize that this one definitely deserves more love than a few random tales (call it maturing as an author from scribbler to writer).

What I'd like instead is to go through the appropriate channels to garner viewership and readers. I've obviously already been getting feedback here and there from readers, but now I want eyes in a different way. Obviously I can do things like paid-for marketing, but I feel there's a much better opportunity through being able to speak to people who care about books and their content. Things like interviews and blog tours in the blogspot writer's community immediately come to mind.

With that said, I wanted to know if any of you have ever done something along that line. Have any of you ever done a blog tour? Or an interview? Or maybe something else that I'm not thinking of? For those that have, did you find them particularly useful or rewarding?

Right now I'm just trying to build a gameplan and I would love to hear your opinion and experiences, particularly from established writers (that's not to say I don't want to hear from our lovely serial readers as well!) Thank you, Lovelies~

- RB