NEW VERSION. :)

It has long been clear that Sam (usually) wins (almost) any poll he's in - unless Bill the Pony is an option. In fact, Bill the Pony is so popular that he was previously voted the "real" hero of Lord of the Rings!

So alright, fine. Let's see how they do head to head. Sam dispatched both Elrond and Pippin with ease, but will he find a more difficult opponent in the Battle of Bywater's most notable participant? Or will Bill "turn tail and dash away" as he did at the entrance to Moria, fleeing from the Watcher's tentacles? Only time (and the results of this poll) will tell!

The Lord of the Rings

More work on Nyx and MC (I wanted to name him Samwise Gamgee, but I mistaken switched first and last name, so I present Gamgee Samwise xD) and Junpei~

Thought I could have some fun redrawing a lotr screenshot with my hobbit designs and this was a delight, will definetly be doing this again.

Only issue is that they aren’t quite the heights I imagined for these characters, but I can live with that. Pippin’s not holding his sword because I couldn’t get the posing right, but he’d definetly be the last to draw his anyways lol.

((Also well aware that they look different to the canon of the books/wouldn’t have tails, but what’s the point if I don’t have fun with these?))

"Nice characters are boring" to YOU. I love characters who no matter what, will always have genuine love for humanity in their heart. Characters who dance and laugh and sing with sincerity. Characters who believe in others, and are willing to extend a helping hand to people when no one gave them the same luxury. Characters who have gone through so much but believe, no matter what, that humanity and life is something beautiful and worth protecting

Every time I rewatch The Lord of the Rings I oscillate violently between “it’s important to show men having close, supportive friendships and I’m so glad Peter Jackson chose to show all the male characters being loving and physically affectionate with one another in a healthy, platonic way” and “damn, these bitches gay. good for them, good for them”

One difference between the Lord of the Rings books and the Peter Jackson films that I find really interesting is what the hobbits find when they return to the Shire.

In the books, they return from the War, only to see that the war has not left their home untouched. Not only has it not left their home unscathed, battle and conflict is still actively ravaging the Shire. They return, weary and battle-scarred, to find a home actively wounded and in need of rescue and healing. All four launch themselves into defending their home and rousting those harming it, and eventually succeed. But their idyllic home has been damaged, and even once healed, is never quite again the Shire they set out to save.

In contrast, in the Jackson films, they return to a Shire shockingly untouched by the horrors of war. The hobbits of the Shire talk, in the Green Dragon in Fellowship of the Ring, about not getting involved with issues "beyond our borders," and it seems those issues have not invaded their sanctuary. After having been bowed to by kings, dwarves, elves, and men alike at the coronation in Gondor, their only acknowledgment upon returning home is a skeptical head shake from an older hobbit.

One of the most poignant scenes to me in Return of the King (and there are a considerable amount) is the scene where Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin are sitting in the Green Dragon. The pub patrons bustle around them, talking loudly, clapping excitedly, drinking cheerfully, just as they had in the beginning of the story. But the four hobbits sit silently, watching almost curiously at what was once familiar but is now foreign to them. Their home has not changed. But they have.

Which is the deeper hurt? To come to your home to find it irrevocably changed, despite all you did to keep it untouched and the same? Or to return home but no longer feeling at home, because it is only you that is irrevocably changed?

"Don't go where I can't follow!"

Oh, Sam…

One of my personal nitpicks for historical fantasy is a lack of servants, staff, subordinates, and... idk... subjects? Like, their absence is not... a total dealbreaker for me, depending on the situations the characters are in and whether or not I can just assume that other people are there in the background... but so many of the protagonists in historical fantasy stuff are higher-ranking (very often royalty), and/or have busy jobs, and/or have enormous houses that would necessitate having at least part-time staff.

Like, girl, you should have a maid! WHERE is your chaperone?! WHO is driving this carriage?! Where are your footmen? Are you trying to imply that a WEALTHY DUCHESS is taking a CAB?! You know that you probably have tenants, right? Where is your steward?! Where is your lawyer? Your accountant?! (Like, yeah, you're not going to have your lawyer living in your house, but you HAVE one, right???)

Or, man, you're supposed to be a military commander and you don't even have a single secretary?! Where is your SQUIRE?! (In the spirit of historical fiction, I am jumping wildly across time periods with every sentence here.) Man, I know you aren't looking after your own boots. Where are your GUARDS?! Who set up this tent for you?! Who is looking after your horse?! Who is making and carrying the incredibly valuable maps people are recklessly stabbing daggers into?!

SOMEONE has to be scrubbing these floors and delivering the mail and cooking the meals and doing laundry, and they're probably all DIFFERENT people! My dentist has at least three different receptionists and we can't even get ONE for our court wizard here? A sorcerer's apprentice to take notes? Someone like Sherlock Holmes could get away with just having a housekeeper and taking taxis, sure, but your character is supposed to be a KING?! Why is he answering his own front door? He's going to get assassinated. His SERVANTS should have SERVANTS.

Like, yes, I understand that a lot of servants in certain places at certain times were supposed to make their labor invisible, but there have always been servants who still had to interact directly with the masters of the house?! Yeah, there are potentially really messy ethics here, class divisions are bullshit, but I don't think that completely ignoring the reality that humans have ALWAYS been doing work for other humans is better than just including some well-paid and well-treated servants and employees? Because a complete absence of them, especially where logically for the worldbuilding there MUST be servants (and probably exploited servants, or worse, for some particular worldbuilds to work), often makes me think that your main characters just don't care enough to notice the "lower class" people or know their names.

Also, even Frodo Baggins had a gardener and Samwise Gamgee might be the best damn character in the story?! Sam saved the world?! Servants are PEOPLE. Servants are often the funniest and most interesting characters, tbh, with the most to say about a society and its workings (yes, Discworld is a very good book series, highly recommend), and also the joke of some romantic scene being carefully orchestrated by a stage crew of servants frantically diving into bushes to stay out of sight never gets old to me. Teamwork makes the dream work!

I don't want to gatekeep historical fiction, especially not historical fantasy, because the worlds don't necessarily have to conform to our own and may have magic and characters are often in very unique circumstances, but... sometimes I pick up a story and it's like... "Author, please tell me that you know there is a difference between a butler and a valet?!"

kisses u on the forehead in an unmistakably samfrodo 2003 way

Frodo and Sam + physical touch

THE LORD OF THE RINGS TRILOGY 2001-2003 | dir. Peter Jackson