Relevant to the Hobbity atmosphere of late

[blackruzsa]

Oglaf!




(actually for me, the reason the eagles didn't fly them to Mordor/the Lonely Mountain was because the eagles aren't dumb enough to try flying into Mordor while Sauron is still in power and definitely not when a dragon could idk turn them into crispy fry. As for why the eagles didn't at least fly them halfway over, well, see above. Not the eating bit, the first bit. But probably also the eating bit)

Oglaf here.

Comments

[akodo_rokku]

I am gonna use "It's fucking walk o'clock!" in the future.

[bewareofgeek]

There's also these new inventions called "Arrows".

Given that one shot did it for Smaug...

[icon_uk]

Eagles would be flying well above arrow range, Smaug was very close to ground level when he met his end.

[droolfangrrl]

And if I remember right, Bilbo spotted a missing scale on smaugs chest. Then he told the best dale archer about, thus the end of smaug.

For me its that it was too far for them to fly from where they live.

[chieflewal]

Weak. But then, Tolkien was a devout Christian, he would be prone to making weak fictional connections.

[q99]

Not too weak. The ring corrupts everyone. The eagles are just as sentient as everyone else. And you're having them- a king, no less- carry the ring to mount doom.

[blackruzsa]

Oh true, if it could corrupt Gandalf and all those people, they'd have been well within range.

[lilacsigil]

Eagles holding the Ring and flying into Mordor might as well be marching up to Sauron and handing him the Ring, so I can see why they wouldn't do that. And I don't think they really give a shit as to who rules the Lonely Mountain but they will do the occasional favour for Gandalf.

[sinisterlink]

Oh, the eagles. I am so sick of hearing about the freaking eagles. I check in at the imdb message boards to look in on discussions about movies I like and I swear to God, for weeks after the movie came out everyday there were like ten new topics about, "But why didn't the eagles just take them to blah, blah, blah?". While I enjoy the above strip and some of the jokes about the eagles are pretty fun, I honestly don't see why it is so hard for people to get WHY the eagles wouldn't want to help all the time.

1. The eagles are sentient creatures. They aren't a taxi service that just shows up whenever someone needs a ride. Imagine if you swooped in and saved someone's life and then they were just like, "Hey bro, can you fly me like a few hundred miles over that way and risk getting shot at with arrows and killed by a dragon so I can reclaim my kingdom?" You'd be like, "Uh, no".

2. The eagles have absolutely nothing to gain from helping the dwarfs take back Erebor. At all.

3. Honestly, this is one of the moments where they needed to put in a line or two from the book, because the book explicitly states why the eagles wouldn't take them all the way:

"The wizard and the eagle-lord appeared to know one another slightly, and even to be on friendly terms. As a matter of fact Gandalf, who had often been in the mountains, had once rendered a service to the eagles and healed their lord from an arrow-wound. So you see 'prisoners' had meant 'prisoners rescued from the goblins' only, and not captives of the eagles. As Bilbo listened to the talk of Gandalf he realized that at last they were going to escape really and truly from the dreadful mountains. He was discussing plans with the Great Eagle for carrying the dwarves and himself and Bilbo far away and setting them down well on their journey across the plains below.

The Lord of the Eagles would not take them anywhere near where men lived. "They would shoot at us with their great bows of yew," he said, "for they would think we were after their sheep. And at other times they would be right. No! we are glad to cheat the goblins of their sport, and glad to repay our thanks to you, but we will not risk ourselves for dwarves in the southward plains."

So there you have it. The eagles really only helped out because a) they really hate goblins, and b) Gandalf is bros with the head eagle. And they don't seem that fond of dwarves, anyways.

4. As for the whole, "Why didn't they just fly the ring to Mordor?" thing, I always found this one pretty easy. It's pretty obvious that just marching into Mordor isn't an easy thing to do, what with how Sam and Frodo were sneaking all over the place trying to find a way in without getting noticed, and how at the end Aragorn and all of them are fighting just to cause a massive distraction so nobody notices them. I can only imagine that trying to fly into Mordor would be nothing more than a suicide mission considering everyone and their mother would be able to see you. The eagles would have been dead before they even got close to the mountain what with all the archers around along with those things that the Ringwraiths were flying around on.

Okay, so that was a little long, but seriously, I am so sick of hearing about the eagles. I did enjoy the comic strip, though. :p

[sinisterlink]

As an add-on, aside from the eagle thing, my main wondering of the Hobbit/Lord of the Rings stuff is why doesn't Gandalf do more magic? You'll see him do some awesome powerful magic and then he'll run off and just start whacking people with his staff instead of doing more spells. But then I just figured that he's waiting for his magic gauge to recharge, so that's why it takes him awhile between spells. *nods*

[blackruzsa]

Same :)) I am not so much sick of hearing people ask about the eagles but I AM sick of people not thinking of the answer themselves, or not THINKING in general. It's not some magical explanation, it could either be "maybe they couldn't" or more accurately, "maybe they didn't want to." My personal favorite is "maybe fuck you".

[thezmage]

Do you really want to be hundreds of feet up and completely at your mercy when the ring corrupts your ride? Sure, it's not like it's an instantaneous or certain thing, but it's too much of a risk to take.

[janegray]

#2 I don't know if that's true...

I mean, after Sauron is done conquering and/or destroying the other races, won't he come for the eagles too? He is not just some greedy dude who wants to get a kingdom, he is an Eldritch Abomination who gets his jollies from mass torturing and murdering.

They did something like that in Harry Potter. The giants and other races asked why they should help Dumbledore in his fight against Voldemort, and he pointed out that Voldemort would turn his attention to them after he is done with wizards.

It's pretty damn myopic of the eagles to go all "well Sauron isn't threatening us now, so we'll wait until all his other enemies are dead and we'll be leaft alone against him." Even if they didn't want to risk their lives by carrying Bilbo all the way to Mondor, at the very least they should have carried them for some of the way.

The eagles would have been dead before they even got close to the mountain what with all the archers around along with those things that the Ringwraiths were flying around on.


Don't eagles fly too high for arrows to reach them?

And, as far as I know, those dragons weren't ready yet when Bilbo started his journey, back then the Ringwraiths were still riding on horses. I thought the implication was that the dragons were created later, along with Saruman's new army.

[ogrebear]

Personally I always figured if they did the distraction battle at the gates of Mordor then the Eagles could have flown in... though I guess that battle only worked cos the Nazgul where dead by then...

[wizardru]

As others have mentioned, the Eagles were not at the Fellowship's beck and call, so it's a false assumption that they could just demand and command them. Gwahir and the eagles were all survivors of the First and Second Ages of Middle Earth.

During the battle of the Black Gate, the eight surviving Nazgul WERE there...but then Sauron realized it was a distraction and sent them to stop Frodo at Mount Doom, but it was too late. He sent them ON THEIR FLYING FELL BEASTS. Had the fellowship managed to send the Eagles, the Nazgul would have intercepted them. In the movies, we even see them flying patrols over Mordor.

There are scads of reasons why the Eagles would have been a bad idea, really.

[mola_ram]

Nowadays I simply c/p my imput on the whole Eagles debate that's rolling.

To avoid a wall of text, I'll try to keep this as brief as possible.

First of all; If Gandalf had used the eagles to drop the ring into Mount Doom to destroy Sauron, and succeded, there would have been several unfinished issues and loose ends in Middle Earth;.

Saruman would still be in power.
Rohan would still be in shambles due to his influence.
Denethor, the steward of Gondor would never bow down to Aragorn, which could have led to a civil war in Gondor.
The Darklings from the eastern kingdoms would most likely try to invade the western kingdoms due to the large military power they build up during their manipulation by Sauron.
The witchking of Angmarr would still be around.
So in a time where the elves and all things magical are leaving the shores of Middle Earth, the world of men would essentially be poised on the brink of a new age filled with chaos, infighting and total war.
Gandalfs' long winded plan is essentially about setting the world of men up with strong noble leadership for ages to come, without the threat from all the highly magical entities and beasts when the elves and dwarves are gone, and man is left on his own.
Gandalfs master plan is essentially leaving a cleaner, simpler Middle Earth for Man, before he travels into the west, thus making the plan to use the eagles to drop the ring into Mount Doom a short term solution at best.
Note that you can piece this together from just watching the movie, and not neccesarily have read the book.

Second of all; What part of ; "There is evil there that does not sleep, and the great eye is ever watchful." don't you understand ;o)

[arilou_skiff]

Just one thing: The Witch King would go poof if the Ring was destroyed, he's one of the Nine, and as such his power is tied to the One Ring

[icon_uk]

That would be the great eye which is ever watchful but which managed to completely miss the two and a half Hobbits carrying the all powerful Ring into it's own country? That great eye which is ever watchful? ;)

[blackruzsa]

:D Pretty much all that XD

[pallas_athena]

I agree with all your points. However, I don't think Tolkien called the humans who fought for Mordor "Darklings;" I think he refers to them pretty constantly as "Easterlings" and "Haradrim" or "Men of Harad." The humans who fight against Rohan at Helm's Deep are "Dunlendings" from Dunland.

The Haradrim are dark-skinned and described (briefly) in a way that conveys the fearful impression their "otherness" makes on the people of Gondor. Which is an annoying bit of racial insensitivity on Tolkien's part, but I don't think he went so far as to call them "Darklings."

[halloweenjack]

OK, nerds, listen up. Here's the deal.

The reason why the giant eagles wouldn't fly them to the Lonely Mountain, or Mordor, or wherever, is that giant eagles couldn't possibly fucking fly, because of the square-cube law. The closest thing to a giant eagle in terms of wingspan is a condor, which gets by mostly by coasting on thermals, and in any rate couldn't carry dwarves and halflings and fucking wizards.

But giant eagles can fly there, for the same reason that dragons can fly, and rings can turn you invisible (and evil), and so forth. They can do that because of magic. And yes, magic has rules, just like science, but here's the thing: you can make those rules up from the beginning. So, let's make up a magical rule, OK? OK! The rule is that giant eagles, with their giant eagle eyes, can see God. And God, as it so happens, looks very much like an elderly, avuncular human who lives in an imaginary town called "Oxford" in an imaginary land called "England." And even though they can't hear God, they can read his lips. (Lips fascinate them, because they have none of their own.) Of course, God--one of whose many names is Reuel--can see and hear everything the giant eagles do and say.

"So, Reuel," they say, "why don't we just drop these little critters off wherever they want to go? It's not that far to us, really."

"Well," Reuel said as he puffed on his pipe, "wouldn't make for a very interesting story, would it? Or at least not a very long one, and I get paid by the word."

"But it's so cruel not to help them out when it would be so easy to! Not to mention risky for them, and why risk a potential food supply?"

"Well, now," Reuel murmured around the stem of his meerschaum, "could be, just could be that you've forgotten who makes up the rules. Could be that old Smaug has a bit of a keen eye himself. Could be that he prefers roast fowl to flesh."

The birds paused and looked at each other. "Really," the eldest said, "they were made for walking. Probably closet acrophobes, the lot. Crueler by far not to let them trod."

There you have it! Now, if you can explain why Gollum didn't just put the fucking ring on a chain or string around his neck...

[blackruzsa]

You are delightful.

[deleonjh]

Was he actually paid by the word, though? The wordiness and bloviation seems to me to come from the fact that he's an academic and thus couldn't be concise if you put a gun to his head.

As for Gollum, I believe Christopher Walken's character in Pulp Fiction made a cogent argument for where the safest spot to hide small valuables on one's person would be. Let's see Bilbo steal the ring out of that hidey hole.

[cainofdreaming]

There have been bigger birds of prey, though. In, was it, New Guinea. Somewhere in that area anyway. There were birds that preyed on other, flightless, ostrich-like birds that weighted about a ton. They weren't nearly that heavy themselves, of course, but still quite large in comparison to modern birds.

And then, of course, there's Pteranodons.

This all is kinda missing the point, though. And the funny. :)