[Child of the 7th Age]

Lord of Angmar, <P>I happen to feel that Elvish Archer has a valid point. <P>You raise the following question: <I> Elvish Archer, have you read the books? </I> While I can not speak for Elvish Archer, I can speak for myself, and I am probably one of the older posters on this site. I was part of the "Frodo Lives" generation that went to college in the late sixties, and have re-read the books so many times that I can not even remember as well as Silm, HoMe, etc.<P>Let me first say this....I have obviously not seen PJ's RotK so I can not say in advance how I will respond to that. And overall I have enjoyed the movies and am very grateful that they were made.<P>But one of my frustrations has been this: throughout TTT and even Fellowship, Frodo was too often reduced to a one-dimensional victim, with other elements of his personality ironed out. This has been covered in many other threads. In Fellowship, the scene with the Barrow-wight is missing where Frodo rejects the impulse to disappear with the Ring and instead stays to rescue his friends as is the scene in the Pony where he gets up on the tabletop and shows some spunk by singing. His depiction at Weathertop against the Nazgul is much weaker than that portrayed in the book, to say nothing of the fact that he is carted off by Arwen like a piece of luggage. I could cite other examples in TTT -- the elimination of Frodo's serious conversations with Faramir and, worst of all, the zombielike scenes at the end of the movie where he saunters up to the Nazgul in a trance. <P>Were there times when Frodo was exhausted and tired in the book, with head bowed low? Absolutely. But there were also times when the light of an Elf-friend showed through his eyes. The intriguing thing about this character in the book is that at the same time as the power of evil is growing in one side of his fea, the capacity to show mercy and his increasing resolve are blossoming in the other side. I don't see these things in PJ's Frodo. I see a very frightened young hobbit lad who is in over his head. <P>I'm not saying it would have been easy to show such complexity in the limited time available in the movie. And there are commercial reasons why PJ's Frodo looks like a sixteen-year old lad, which also adds to his air of vulnerability. But I do think it is valid to question if PJ has done justice to this character and shown him in a one-sided mode. <P>sharon