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Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

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Re: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

#191

Post by PeterCorless »

lisper wrote: post #169
slaymaker1907 wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's extremely mysterious and in a good way. He is one of the only characters able to just casually put on the one ring with seemingly no effect and then give it back immediately afterwards. I think he gives off eldritch horror vibes, but in a mostly benevolent way. If everyone else were ants, he would be an etymologist intrigued by our behavior or something.

> He is one of the only characters able to just casually put on the one ring with seemingly no effect and then give it back immediately afterwards. OK, that's fair enough. But to my mind, this is just a setup that cries out for an explanation that never comes. It's a major flaw in the dramatic structure of the narrative, a bug not a feature. But I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree about that.

See, that's the best part. It's what makes people "fall into" Middle Earth. That there was whole parts of the backstory that don't get explained. That there are periods of history you get a glimpse into to believe there is a huge depth to it. That the way we see the continent now is not how it always was. Who were the barrow wights? Why were they cursed?

As a kid first reading it, I feared the barrow wights as much if not more than the Nazgul.

The whole aside was to show that the hobbits had truly "left the Shire" and that perils lay along the road in any direction they might turn. But, again, there were allies or, at least, guides all along that road as well.

Bombadil and Old Man Willow are a foreshadowing of the Ents to come.

Re: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

#192

Post by TheMagicHorsey »

This is a strange, and Lovecraftian take on Bombadil. I always thought he really was just a jolly fat guy out in the woods. Kind of like a Middle Earth version of one of those potbellied rednecks you see laughing on a small fishing boat, surrounded by a pile of empty beer cans, who waves at you and asks you if you want a cold one, before turning back to the Skynnard blaring from the ancient boombox on their ice cooler.

Re: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

#193

Post by qorrect »

Trasmatta wrote: post #29

> Possibly the least liked character in The Lord of the Rings. A childish figure so disliked by fans of the book that few object to his absence from all adaptations of the story. I've been a fan of Tolkien for decades, and this doesn't match up with my experience at all...Tolkien fans seem to generally love Tom, and many were deeply disappointed that he wasn't in the movies (even though his exclusion makes perfect se…

Well I'm glad you said that, I was very disappointed he wasn't in the movies. My other friends seemed not to care, or they thought he would be too difficult to portray on camera.

Re: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

#194

Post by ineedasername »

SkyMarshal wrote: post #125
ineedasername wrote: post #94

I always thought of Tom Bombidil as Eru, the creator, or at the very least was taking cues from Eru. Two pieces of evidence: 1) The song he gives, which seemed a positive one, and is not remarked upon as discordant or unpleasant. Eru created through song, and in that choir it was the introduction of disharmony that signified evil. 2) The passage where it's asked "who is he?" The answer is "He is." And then "he is as…

Encyclopedia of Arda has an analysis of that, and concludes he’s not Eru: https://www.glyphweb.com/arda/t/tombombadil.html

Very interesting! But I wonder if it might be a bit of misdirection by Tolkein to say "there is no embodiment of the One.." After all he is good Catholic who believed in the Trinity.

Still it is strong evidence against == Eru unless Tolkein was playing semantic games.

Re: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

#195

Post by adamc »

lisper wrote: post #166
forgotmypw17 wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tom represents the Great Mystery, the great unknown of the beyond that is all seeing and all knowing and all powerful. Omitting him is like omitting the whole premise of the book. It's like making a movie based on the Bible but omitting the Resurrection of Jesus.

Sorry, but that just doesn't compute for me at all. Tom is a silly character with no gravitas. He puns his own name just to make it rhyme with "yellow" -- over and over again. And there is nothing in Tom's story that is even remotely comparable to the Resurrection. The Resurrection is a key event in the Bible story. It is something that happens to change the dramatic arc of all mankind . In Tom's story, nothing happe…

He's more the curious incident of the dog in the nighttime. Who is he? Why does no one know of him?

Incongruent facts are always interesting. IMO.

Re: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

#196

Post by AnimalMuppet »

aposm wrote: post #53
Trasmatta wrote: post #29

> Possibly the least liked character in The Lord of the Rings. A childish figure so disliked by fans of the book that few object to his absence from all adaptations of the story. I've been a fan of Tolkien for decades, and this doesn't match up with my experience at all...Tolkien fans seem to generally love Tom, and many were deeply disappointed that he wasn't in the movies (even though his exclusion makes perfect se…

I was so baffled by reading this opening paragraph that I assumed the entire post was meant to be read as a tongue-in-cheek or "edgy" theory, not a serious discourse on the books. Was I wrong??

No, not wrong. I'm not sure whether the post is serious, or just trying too hard for an edgelord take.

Re: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

#197

Post by TheRealPomax »

MattConfluence wrote: post #118

It's a fun read in a fan-fiction sense, but when you look at the out-of-universe story of the events of Tolkien's life and his writing process it becomes clear that Tom is not meant to be any kind of evil. Tolkien wrote a silly whimsical poem about one of his children's toys that they had named Tom Bombadil. In this tale he lives in a dangerous environment, but he is able to overcome the dangers and get his happy end…

It's interesting that this description is apparently "evil", even if in this framing Tom predates all, and everyone lives on his unceded land. You'd become "particular" about your role after living through several ages of that, too.

Rather than evil, it's more "biding their time until that injustice can finally be rectified". In this post's framing, literally every humanoid race is by definition an (unwitting) invader.

Re: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

#198

Post by PeterCorless »

teddyh wrote: post #107
Trasmatta wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And his absence from the films was remarked upon, negatively in my circles. Yeah, same. On Tolkien forums in the early to mid 2000's, I think these were the most commented on complaints about the movies: * No Tom Bombadil * No Scouring of the Shire * Movie Faramir vs book Faramir * The Ents deciding to not help Merry and Pippin at first (tbh, this is the one that still gets me the most. It sort of ruined a key attr…

Don’t forget the how the entire character of Gimli the dwarf was replaced with some sort of clown.

They lost me at dwarf tossing.

Re: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

#199

Post by JKCalhoun »

lucideer wrote: post #50
Trasmatta wrote: post #29

> Possibly the least liked character in The Lord of the Rings. A childish figure so disliked by fans of the book that few object to his absence from all adaptations of the story. I've been a fan of Tolkien for decades, and this doesn't match up with my experience at all...Tolkien fans seem to generally love Tom, and many were deeply disappointed that he wasn't in the movies (even though his exclusion makes perfect se…

Absolutely thought "I must be living in a bubble" when I read this: I don't think I've spoken to a single book-reader who wasn't vocally disappointed by the omission of Tom from the films. He was certainly one of mine & my sibling's favourite characters.

Agree. Tom represented a couple of things for me when reading the books.

First, he represented all the small pockets of unknown magic that could exist in Middle Earth. I would stare at the map of Middle Earth in the front of the book and wonder about the parts not covered in either The Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit. What strange things might be there? Tom heightened my sense of wonder about the world.

But second, Tom showed up just as the hobbits seemed to have met their darkest hour. You can dismiss this as deus ex machina on the part of the author, but it was a needed break from the stress and anxiety that had been building to a crescendo at that point. And I thought perhaps Tolkien was suggesting that sometimes you have to trust in the benevolence of strangers — or that some higher power is watching over the most vulnerable.

Re: Oldest and Fatherless: The Terrible Secret of Tom Bombadil (2011)

#200

Post by ncmncm »

avidphantasm wrote: post #156
eric_cc wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100% agree with you. Tom was my favorite character and an essential one in my opinion. I was one of those people that was deeply disappointed by his absence. Tom is entirely beyond caring about "good" or "evil". His peace is such a vital contrast to every other character and has stuck with me over time.

A good point. He is an indifferent character, much as nature is indifferent to humanity. However, to “humans” experiencing peril, indifference can feel like evil.

Global Climate Disruption is (1) a looming catastrophe for human civilization, (2) potentially a major setback for us as a species with a population crash from billions to millions, but (3) barely a hiccup to the biosphere, just one among many pulses of extinctions.
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