[00:00:00] My brother or somebody who was reading it for the first time in my childhood or memories or whatever. This is where they stopped. Really? Because it was so fun. They powered through, you know, the Hobbit stuff at the beginning and then all of book one is pretty exciting. Yeah. And then book three, I should say book one and two, then book three, I feel like also a lot of excitement, a lot of stuff happening. So the change of pace to Frodo and Sam with just the first two chapters of book three, it was so fun.
[00:00:30] four i think that's what got somebody something about the dead marshes and whatever because we were watching the movie and someone's like oh i could never get through this in the book this is what got me well i didn't mind it let's yeah let's talk about that did you guys what did you guys think because i have heard the same sentiment that the first the book four is more not as action packed as book three but when you were reading it did you actually enjoy it i definitely thought
[00:00:54] it was slower and just it all felt like it was in the same spot where like everybody's been traveling so far i was like all right same scene and it just felt like one really long detailed hike so i was not super into it like that but i was more into it and like you're about to go backpacking this is gonna be like your bread and butter i know this is gonna be me but i liked it because the characters like
[00:01:21] we hadn't been with sam and frodo for a long time and then just like smeagol is so fascinating to me oh my god so like even if it was slow and kind of felt the same i was like i don't really mind because i think the characters are interesting at this point i don't know they're just different from the movies and maybe if i hadn't seen the movies and didn't have all that comparison then i maybe yeah it would be even less but i don't know that's good i found myself really yeah i found
[00:01:48] myself really missing frodo and sam in book three like i when i know it was action-packed and there was like a ton of stuff going on but i really missed both of them it felt like a really long time yeah it really did yeah and so it's so bizarre well like i was going through the timeline of things in my head and it's bizarre that all of book three happens within like a week and then all of a sudden you just rewind that week and frodo and sam and like two chapters get to the same place where
[00:02:13] they are yeah i was just gonna say right in like a week so are we past helms deep now yeah wow we're past the plan to your vision because the the nazgul comes racing i was just gonna say okay that's what that is from yeah that makes sense so okay that kind of blew my mind of like just the timeline of things but it was fun to just go back a week and like get frodo and sam in mmu wheel i just i don't know why i just really miss them so i was really happy to be back with them
[00:02:40] yeah it felt like buddies like i haven't seen in a long time would you say what would you say like so your brother quit that do you think he'd pick it up now and would actually well he actually did pick it up now and now he read it and really enjoyed it um so i think that would be true for a lot of people maybe it's expectations or age or something else but i feel like there are just certain chapters
[00:03:07] you have to really love the characters to enjoy them and these were character driven chapters that i loved yeah yeah but how could you not like these i know yeah i mean you're right like there there was a bunch of things going on in all like all three of these chapters like the taming of smiegel chapter was really interesting i think maybe people would say out of these three chapters maybe the black gate is closed is the most boring but that was still so scintillating to me because it's such good character development like i felt like we got good character development in book three and
[00:03:34] like you know we know who knew who these characters were but all of these chapters move so well that you understand frodo and sam so like they're what how why they act the way they act frodo is so much better in the books and the movies he's like so much stronger sam is like amazed at frodo and his responses to things yep like there was a line i think in the black gate is closed that it says like sam thought he had mistake or he like knew that frodo was the kindest person ever and that kind of made
[00:04:02] him naive and he thought he thought it made him blind to things and he realized that it didn't because frodo's like seeing right through golem's right little plots it was just i just loved it he called frodo the wisest person he ever met or something except for maybe gandalf and bilbo yeah it was just so good um so let's get started on chapter one the taming of smiegel
[00:04:28] you guys got a summary of this chapter i thought you were gonna do like welcome oh shoot oh god good reminder dang it well welcome to the podcast i'm john danny and lizzie and this is the fellowship of the first time readers ah there you go jen is hopefully gonna uh yeah just joined west bark i thought maybe she's here i know and i'm curious because she was reading like today mostly so i was like curious how she liked the fresh in her mind
[00:04:56] she was like oh i don't know we'll see yeah uh yeah i think she's gonna join us a little bit later she's uh has a late shift at work today so all right taming of smiegel taming of smiegel yeah we got a chat summary sam and frodo climb down out of the emmon mule and catch golem along the way because he was following them frodo makes smiegel promise on the ring and then they trust him to lead them yes perfect emmon mule what do you guys think of emmon mule
[00:05:24] is that how you say it how do you say it i don't know i don't say it yeah lizzie you can't make fun of me you don't have a genuine question is that is that how you say it yes the emmon mule i mispronounced so many different things in this this book well it was weird because by the time we got to later chapters like in the next or the next two all of a sudden looking back it's just like it
[00:05:54] said in those chapters in hindsight it felt like it would be paradise they were dreaming of the emmon mule as a vacation land almost and then they were being maybe sarcastic in that thought but that's kind of how i almost felt as i was reading it it just i think it said something about a waterfall or something and i'm just like oh is this a little nicer than i'm picturing yeah because in the movies it looks so bleak and maybe it felt bleak to them um but it also just didn't feel that bad i guess it
[00:06:22] didn't feel as much of a labyrinth as i imagined it yeah i don't know why um but i guess it must have been and then the heights thing climbing a mountain you know i guess that's scary yeah chance of death honestly i pictured like a pretty normal place just super rocky and like pretty open compared to like they've been in the woods in the snow yeah yeah i want the south and the heat like it yeah now they
[00:06:49] have it but i think it's just like endless wandering like trying to find the right path it really is funny too because like every place they go and they look to get out of that place and they're like looking for a better spot or like a new territory or terrain and then all of a sudden they hit the new terrain and then they're like no i want the old stuff again or like they're on these rocks and they're like oh i'd rather go anywhere and then they're in the marshes and they're like oh i'd rather go anywhere yeah they want to be in the shire spots exactly i know that's why
[00:07:15] yeah even in rivendell they're like oh the shire my own that one section about beds yeah it's like oh not not in la florian i want to go to rivendell for my own bed um yeah this place is really creepy though because there's a description that it says that there's no birds that make any noises there i just felt like it was a really interesting description or uh it says no this was actually the marshes it says beyond its tumbled skirts lay livid festering
[00:07:43] marshes where nothing moved and not even a bird was to be seen like that's a really creepy place like i feel like marshes should be filled with birds am i right sure yeah and these not being filled with birds is a little creepy but we'll talk about that in the next chapter i was surprised how quickly they knew that it was golem because even on the like second page of the
[00:08:06] chapter they're like did you see them again talking about his eyes um those eyes did give me a turn and i guess it makes sense but it's been so long since we've heard golems for all of book um three that it just felt like oh whoa they really they're very aware like yeah he's still behind us we've been keeping an eye on him we look at his creepy little eyes in the dark um and it doesn't
[00:08:32] scare them like the way i feel like it should i'm like which is mind-blowing yeah they're so calm how i don't get it and they keep being like he's so much more dangerous than you think too like he'll eat you he'll kill you and then they're just they'll just jump on him like it's nothing yep that actually blew my mind that was like a kind of insane part of the whole narrative when all of a sudden sam's like oh let me go get a better view of him like let me creep up on him like right
[00:08:59] he's he like eats children don't do that i feel like that must be one of these soft magic uh hobbit powers because it's like this weird bravery where they're just not worried i don't know why it just feels like um they're so casual wait and i'm just trying to think have they seen really dark stuff yet did they see anything with boromir or is it all just still part of the adventure have they seen anyone
[00:09:25] die other than gandalf no you can't see a balrog like i mean by now they must know there's some some evil in the world and but they're just so confident yeah it is actually mind-blowing the ring rodo especially is just so much more confident in uh in the book in the movie uh we'll talk about that later but um another question that i had for this this chapter was it just got me thinking about
[00:09:49] um their original plan and this is like maybe a dumb question but you were we were talking about smiegel and like how he was following the group and all of a sudden frodo is not like you know afraid of him but what do you think gandalf's original plan for getting into mordor was like i was thinking about that the other day just like you know on a walk and i was like what did he what did he hope to do because i came up with like a random theory about this that he just kind of was guided by providence
[00:10:17] and like there were i i can't really back this up but it seems strange that he allowed golem to follow them like he knew that god was following them because he died in moria so like maybe he was planning to deal with golem after moria because mo golem would like you know make a ruckus in moria but it seems strange so maybe like gandalf knew that smiegel needed to be like added to this because he knew another way into moria and gandalf didn't know that way into moria that's like my head really
[00:10:46] do you remember that like oh yeah i said yeah from the movie before reading the book yeah i was like i think gandalf in moria like waited at those three doorways till they could see that's right so that's he could explain it to them so you literally like that's the same kind of train of thought i like it but i don't know it had to be sneaky like he could not have wanted to walk up to the gate he definitely had to have either he already found some pathway or he knew what smiegel knew
[00:11:16] or he was just gonna get there and like have to figure it out yeah but it's like random thoughts that i have of like how did they how did what was gandalf's original plan but i love that i don't know he's guided by fate yeah exactly i kind of imagine gandalf's original plan was to go to minas tarith yeah just the fact that he had aragorn with him and it feels like from there you could come up with some kind of plan i don't know what it would be but maybe eventually he was hoping to muster a bit
[00:11:45] of an army and then actually march on the black gates and then have frodo be going in some secret way distraction whatever i think that's how i imagined it but he also might have just been flying in the seat of his pants yeah um because i don't know i don't know if he ever got that far yeah i i'd like that plan too because i feel like he knows aragorn is going to go to gondor and like you know regain his throne so maybe he's hoping that aragorn will muster all the troops and they'll
[00:12:13] maybe then then they'll do the distraction thing where they'll try to draw all the forces out of the black gate and all of a sudden you know frodo can sneak by but still it is actually mind-blowing too in in the movies it's like they get into mordor and it's like a few hour journey to mount doom i think it's going to be like multiple days in mordor it seems like it's going to be a longer time where they're in mordor going to mount doom than than we think so i'm curious about that too
[00:12:40] to be honest um but yeah what else you guys got in this chapter i got a lot of other stuff but oh let me just keep flipping here i know i'm looking at all my notes here um smeagol what do you guys think about smeagol because like i feel like partly the movie did a perfect job with smeagol like i could totally see
[00:13:06] how that's perfect and then the other side of me is like it's completely different completely wrong so i don't know what to think i'm kind of with you i think they nailed them and they butchered him at the same time i've been trying to see him as smeagol and gollum or what does sam call him stinker and slinker stinker and slinker and i've been trying to read his lines distinctly with the different
[00:13:32] personalities in mind i like that but sometimes it's hard to tell um so i think it's adding more depth in the movies i've never watched with that in mind except for the obvious scenes where they're going back and forth and showing his like conversations but he does seem deeper and i am wondering there are like a few key moments and i'll look at my notes if it was this chapter
[00:13:59] um i think in the next chapter where i'm actually kind of wondering if he would have been could have been good like it always felt like gandalf thought he had potential to be good um we don't want to decide his fate who are we to like kill and then it feels like frodo kind of believes that and has me believing it like if i didn't know the ending if i hadn't seen the movies i'd be like i see a redemption
[00:14:25] arc here yeah same so i'm like it's so weird so i'm trying to understand it and then i'm curious how things will end potentially a little different in the books from the smiegel perspective um yeah he's deeper than i thought he is much deeper than i thought and i'm like i'm trying to analyze him not necessarily through like you know 21st century lens here but i think it's different from the movies
[00:14:50] in that in the movies when they capture him i feel like smiegel is in the driver's seat after that um until he gets abandoned and by like you know abandoned in the forbidden pool in the in the books it seems like golem is still completely in control and smiegel only pops up every once in a while yeah the thing that we'll talk about that shocked me was at the black gate when he rescues them
[00:15:15] he's like don't take the ring to him he's like you could go away and give smiegel the ring and go like back to the shire and enjoy life and let smiegel have the ring and i'm like that's out of the movies in the movies that's a great moment for him because he's like don't take it to him and he's like he mustn't have it and it's like you're like oh this is actual change in smiegel yeah and in the books it's like he has not changed yet in the books they capture him which might be more realistic
[00:15:43] for like an addiction kind of idea of who smiegel is he doesn't just change immediately it's like a slow journey maybe to his change and i'm curious if we'll ever get this like big definitive moment for smiegel where he like redeems himself to some extent or not necessarily redeems himself but like you know helps the ring out in some way or helps destroy the ring in some way but it's very different but i also think they do a great job with them i think the movies did a great job with them yeah so difficult to capture yeah
[00:16:13] what do you think lizzie just thinking about it no i i agree like he's much more like i have really like no pity for him when i watch the movie like he is just golem he's kind of gross i don't trust him but then in the book they have to treat him much more human so then i feel
[00:16:38] like okay they kind of trust him and they fell asleep and he didn't eat them and then he's actually like guiding them correctly and then the other thing i noticed that frodo is like so great at talking with him immediately and i was like where did you get that from frodo because like he didn't really have that personality i feel like and then it's kind of like when somebody's really good with kids and they can just like talk to kids super easily like that was kind of how frodo was to me i was
[00:17:08] like how did you know how to just handle that situation so well and then it said they're like they were kind of akin to each other they just had an understanding of one another i was like that's so weird and i was like is that the ring yeah i kind of think so right the same ring personality trait is just connecting you i think this is kind of like harry finding a uh like a commonality with voldemort and a lot of things like they both have this commonality of the ring and that was an
[00:17:35] interesting thing because one of the things that i was like he's still such a creepy character um i thought the dialogue that he had when they were like taking a nap in that little pit um sam wakes up and like he's eyes open and he's reaching out every time golem takes over to try to grab the ring and he refrains every time smeagol takes over so it's like you definitely see this guy wants the ring more than anything else it's like kind of terrifying but i'm curious too because i know
[00:18:04] i like read some papers on this because i was really curious about this and i like you know wrote a little essay about this but how people diagnosed him or like what people thought he potentially could have um and there's a lot of different theories out there but nothing really matches perfectly which is why a lot of people go on the addiction route um and so there's like a few different theories that people have for what smeagol is really going through and the most common one is really addiction like he
[00:18:29] has some kind of addiction to the ring and he's been abused by the ring and abused by numerous other people so they kind of like think that that's the main thing that he's dealing with he's like an addict going through withdrawal then a lot of people think that he has some kind of personality disorder but that one's a little less popular i think and a lot of people go with uh tolkien's like religion and his faith and thinking that this is like someone battling you know sin and trying to deal with like
[00:18:57] sin and the evil in their own life and trying to like like take it off the throne or whatever it is so there's a lot of interesting dynamics but i don't know if any of them perfectly matches i think this is like a really interesting character i haven't seen like like many other characters like smeagol in any book i've ever read yeah like he is very unique but he's still in it for himself right like he's he's been sent out by that's a great question i don't know or are we assuming that
[00:19:26] he's on these like evil errands and he's like like sneaking around i think a bit of both like i think sauron sent him out almost like letting smeagol think that he escaped or something like that hmm like it seems like it's mixed but i feel like if sauron just keeps eyes on smeagol smeagol's good enough to just get the ring and then sauron can just grab smeagol that's kind of like
[00:19:51] yeah simplistically my mind was thinking that yeah but i don't yeah i don't really think that's what's happening well i i actually did question that when we kept seeing the wraiths fly over and then the first time we see them it felt like it flew to them yeah and then flew low and then turned around so when we get to it i'll read it again but i was like did it just find them and now it's going back to yeah explain this why would it go to the marshes and turn around unless it just happened to get
[00:20:20] called right then yeah you know but what are the chances it'd be over their head and turn around but um yeah i again just another element or reason not to trust gollum where i'm like hmm he's shady yeah does he think he escaped and then yeah and there's a weird thing too that he has that he got me thinking this because we don't necessarily know for sure what is going on here
[00:20:45] but when the race are flying overhead in the dead marshes and he keeps like going oh he sees he knows right i'm like does he see does he know that they're here right i'm like paranoid with them so gollum's fears are completely i think paranoid and they're not based in reality but at the same time they are because the ring is abusing him and using him and saran has these plantier and there was this there was something that i completely glanced over that i just wrote an essay about this
[00:21:12] because someone made like a comment about it on youtube there's a line in the black gate is closed that talks about how saron actually has form he's like corporeal he's not just this eye on the top of baradur because he actually tortured gollum because gollum talks about it and he's like oh he has he has four fingers on his hand oh yeah they cut off one from the ring and it wasn't like the movies where they slice off all i thought that too i was like yeah one finger they just cut off one
[00:21:39] finger and then gollum says oh but he can do a lot with those four fingers like or something like that he says something along those lines where the implication is that he tortured gollum with those four fingers like just his presence alone and then after that he like sent gollum to go look for the ring knowing that this creature would would be so drawn to the ring that he'd like find it i don't again we're first time readers so we don't know what the heck we're talking about yeah but that
[00:22:04] that is the impression yeah it's a fair thought yeah oh man we just got a two buck donation from philip thank you thanks philip thanks for the thanks for the two bucks really appreciate it philip makes a ton of comments on uh all of all the essays too so oh good one of the uh dedicated viewers it sounds like he probably knows more than us and yeah yeah he's one of the lore
[00:22:29] masters all right good yeah he's like laughing like they're so wrong yes i think it's fun for these people though like the they're like lore masters and they're like oh these guys are idiots versus they're you know maybe they get some things right but it's kind of fun they're like seeing it through fresh eyes again i feel like after three reads i'll be like okay yeah i got whoa three reads you're already planning i'm saying just i need that's like base level and then i can be a lore
[00:22:56] master yeah i believe that i think i'm gonna have these on audiobook all the time just like listening to them they just seem like i could definitely see that and i'm i think i can't wait till i get to the summer really into i think that's gonna be fun um there was a point in here uh one little thing the elven rope awesome love that it was around does it have magic bar why could frodo not see
[00:23:21] in this thing when he fell down i was like that this is more than just darkness this is something else yeah what's i think after he got stabbed by the knife it said that he had like really good night vision and i was like where does night vision go that like he was he was like best at that and now and now it's fading and sam's like what do you mean it's not that far yeah like it's cool dude what's up
[00:23:46] so i have no idea from the lightning or something else worse i could see nothing nothing at all until the gray rope came down seemed to be shimmering somehow so to me this darkness was caused by some kind of evil or a black rider flying overhead or whatever and then the elven rope he could see because that's the good magic to counter whatever this bad magic is but then we never got any
[00:24:12] conclusion i don't know if we ever will but there could be something in the future that then the movies never touched that the books talk about but i thought that was weird because he has that and moria too because he's actually able to hear golem and like no one else in the party is yeah even like aragorn can't track him and and he hears i mean he's like able to see things in the dark that are a little different that little moment where he's like blind he can't see was so bizarre where is it
[00:24:39] in the book again what page um i mean yeah 595 to me but it's like four pages into the chapter oh he goes it's good to be able to see again said frodo breathing deep do you know i thought for a bit that i had lost my sight from the lightning or something else worse i can see nothing nothing at all until the gray rope came down it seemed to shimmer somehow it does look sort of silver in the
[00:25:07] dark said sam never noticed it before though i can't remember it as uh i as i've ever had it out since i first stowed it but if you're so set on climbing mr frodo and he goes on and he just talks about climbing and i'm like sam i was like maybe he had his head right yeah you might go through concussion protocol right here or ask him questions that i want to know well like sam said two paragraphs or three paragraphs earlier rain's nearly given over already um but don't you go
[00:25:35] doing anything risky mr frodo i haven't gotten over that shriek on the wind yet if you have like a black rider it sounded so he the fact that he said that and then says but one up in the air if they can fly he literally is saying it sounded like a black rider in the air but can they fly well he nailed it as we find out later so kelleborn gave him this rope right yeah well i was wait was this
[00:26:01] the official gift or was this just the rope maker who gave it to him yeah no no i think he was talking to the rope maker and was like yeah i love ropes what in the world and then maybe it was the official gift though i then the then they said we heard you like ropes yeah this wasn't his official gift i don't think oh this was a bonus one and then but he didn't got dirt as his yeah you're right you're right it was the best wow lizzie nice you are a lore master um so yeah this might have just been a
[00:26:29] bonus one like oh no big deal you want some fancy magic rope um i also love is it made out of elfer because in the movie it is his gift maybe that's why it's glowing and maybe yeah it's interesting too because like it seems like that other moment that happened uh that was bizarre that i keep thinking about is um when he is about when he crosses over into rivendell and he's about to like faint
[00:27:00] um glorfendell is like glowing so i'm like elves seem to be able to like glow in the dark for some but that's the whole light of the even star yeah i think so i think you're kind of right but maybe this rope is made with some like they dipped it in that or something like that i mean it's got some magic to it because uh golem smiegel did not like this rope which i thought was interesting because in the movies that never really felt like the vibe it felt like he didn't like
[00:27:27] being captured yeah but here it was like no the rope itself is torturing him i also loved uh when they look down this cliff and sam's like oh mr frodo i'll go first and he starts to go down the head first and frodo's like you're an idiot you're gonna die can we think about this logically like sam is great in this sam it's interesting too because sam is such a different character
[00:27:52] in the book than movie he's kind of more of like an idiot in the book he just like is a bit more brash i think he's incredible in the book i love him with everything in me in the book but he's not as like he's more moody he's more grumpy he's more like fine i'll just do it kind of attitude and then he is in the movie which i think is great but i love him just like going head first over this cliff and frodo being the one that stops him he's so sassy too yeah seriously
[00:28:19] yeah like he he's never nice to him yeah i'm not that like i would really be either but i was like man frodo is so chill so true after everything yeah and then i like it that like this is a line that i like that they're in eminuel and they're like miserable then all of a sudden it says it certainly came said frodo and that's the chief thing but now we've got to think of our next
[00:28:44] move night will be on us soon and he goes how beautiful the stars are and the moon i love that i'm like they're in the middle of this miserable place and all of a sudden he's like oh look at the stars though that's great and i still i was trying to dig deeper into this moon thing only because smiegel was talking about it later with white face and then yellow face and yeah so then i'm like he specifically mentions it's not quite a full moon so i was trying to figure out what the deal was
[00:29:13] with moon and it it seems like it could be an elf power kind of thing oh yeah but then it feels like maybe smiegel i forget if he's not that scared of the moon but he's very scared of either he doesn't like either okay but the white face is better than the yellow face i think so okay so i've just thought there's like a little more going on with the moon but i haven't figured it out yet yeah definitely seems like he only likes traveling with like a new moon or like you know a very small sliver of a
[00:29:43] moon or something like that um he almost talked about this like with a deity kind of sense too the yellow face and the white face but i loved uh tolkien's writing when he comes down this like precipice it says down the face of a precipice sheer and almost smooth it seemed in the pale moonlight a small black shape was moving with its thin limbs splayed out maybe its soft clinging hands
[00:30:09] and toes were finding crevices and holes that no hobbit could have ever used or seen but it looked as if it was just creeping down on sticky pads like some large prowling thing of an insect kind and it was coming down head first as it was as if it was smelling its way now and again it lifted its head slowly turning it right back on its long skinny neck and the hobbits cut a glimpse of two small pale gleaming lights its eyes that blinked at the moon for a moment and then were quickly lit it again
[00:30:36] like i was reading that i was like shivering i was like this is terrifying so creepy it's such good writing um and then when they actually like get him or they're like talking and uh frodo goes he's getting near now near enough to hear a whisper indeed golem had suddenly paused again and his large head on its scrawny neck was lolling from side to side as if he was listening his pale eyes were half unlitted sam restrained himself though his fingers were twitching his eyes filled with anger
[00:31:03] and disgust were fixed on the wretched creature as he now began to move again still whispering and hissing to himself it's like a terrifying description like this is such an interesting entrance that he has and it's funny too because like we have never seen him really before until this moment like we know the movies but like we have never seen him until this moment and it's a terrifying entrance as i read i try to picture him like dark like the orcs blending into the rocks and then has like really tiny eyes
[00:31:32] because that's like the most opposite of the movie yeah because i feel like smeagol's eyes are so big on his head that he looks like goofy like not really right or hobbit is he hobbit what is he i don't know something similar to aha there yeah something similar to that but i think okay so yeah i try to imagine it like differently than that because i don't know i feel like it'd be fun if he was really like dark and you couldn't really see him anyway like he was just like he looked like a rock
[00:32:03] you guys ever see the hunger games yeah no when uh peter like disguises himself as a rock this guy like he's good at this camouflage and all of a sudden he like opens his eyes and he's in a rock i'm like that's gone he's just like oh you see the eyes you just see the eyes i feel like his skin kind of is like rock like i don't know he's blending in everywhere he goes in the shadows i feel like he can't be this like white i don't know he looks too clean in the movie i know he does
[00:32:33] look too clean in the movie there's actually a big debate that i was discovering whether his skin is blackish or whitish like different different images depict him as having different color skin which is interesting right i think there's like a big debate debate on that in the lord of the rings community yeah i guess that makes sense we we haven't gotten a lot of description out of him yeah or what we have could easily be a little exaggerated i was picturing him a little more um
[00:32:59] human or a little more hobbit here to make him less threatening because it felt like the way they were treating him was not like a threat so then i'm like well if frodo's treating him so easily like trustworthy maybe it's just ring power bonding but it also feels like he's maybe less creepy looking yeah but he's going down like i know but then this is it's hard like and the movies did a great job
[00:33:24] with that like that's pretty creepy yeah and it's not human to be able to like crawl this way as if your hands are sticky and you could just i feel like maybe they're just used to other creatures in middle earth and oh that's a good point not knowing what's going on because they've been so like sheltered in the shire and they've had exposure to him for so long that they're like all right the time has come right let's go get him and then he just jumps on him like maybe it's kind of freeing to at least
[00:33:54] know where he is rather than like he could be anywhere out here we don't know or even like didn't they know that gandalf had already spoken to him and like met him yeah yeah they did know that's also like another familiarity thing i don't know i would be scared same running i would be terrified absolutely terrified of that i'd be like i would need a bow and arrow like long distance kill
[00:34:19] like i don't even want a sniper rifle yes exactly yeah and then he pulls out his sting and he's like you've met it before haven't you i was like okay frodo's responses in this are on it unbelievable like i mean i've dealt with people who have kind of like you know issues like gollum and all people say to act like frodo in this situation be very firm like it's the first thing that you're supposed to do when you meet like a person like that be firm don't like give them any leeway or like any
[00:34:48] any like you know little wiggle room and frodo does that he's very firm in his descriptions and his what he says and i love that the moment um uh with um gandalf just comes out here like frodo is thinking about this thing and he goes no if we kill him we must kill him outright but we can't do that not as not as things are poor wretch he has done us no harm which is a bit of an overstatement that i
[00:35:16] think he has done them significantly yeah like stalking them the entire time oh hasn't he said sam rubbing his shoulder anyway he meant to and he means to i'll warrant throttle us in our sleep that's his plan and i love that these are two completely extreme positions i dare say said frodo but what he means to do is another matter he paused for a while and thought gollum lay still but stumped stopped whimpering sam stood glowering over him it seemed frodo then had heard quite plainly but far off voices out of the past what a pity bilbo did not stab the vile creature when he had the
[00:35:45] chance pity it was pity that stayed his hand pity and mercy not to strike without need i do not feel any pity for gollum he deserves death deserves death i dare say he does many that live deserve death and some that die deserve life can you give that to them then be not too eager to deal out death in the name of justice fearing for your own safety even the wise cannot see all ends they like misquoted that though yeah yeah i think so bothered me i think they didn't get it perfect but
[00:36:10] who's they you mean here or in the movies in the movies no this if there's not a direct quote from the first book whoa i didn't even notice slightly off huh well that's frodo's memory i wouldn't be able to remember that perfectly word for or is it gandalf's memory yeah there you go quite plainly but far off there's a rainbow right there voice out of the past like super faint
[00:36:39] i see it hey we get a rainbow it is still so warm in here um yeah i know sorry guys it's okay but i do love frodo's response here he's just so firm with them we'll talk about that as the chapters go on but so good um you guys have anything else in this chapter i also oh another thing that i love sorry
[00:37:05] i asked you that and then i show it in at last frodo was convinced that he really was in pain so first of all one of my questions is is golem actually in pain from this rope why is this rope causing him pain is it something in the rope because frodo could see it shimmering so is there something like golem can't touch about this rope because it's elvish maybe evil creatures can't touch this thing without feeling pain because sam touches it and he doesn't feel pain he didn't tie himself but
[00:37:34] was that like the same kind of rope that they would have had him in like maybe the wood elf yeah maybe i'm gonna say it must be a light thing like the fact that it's visible it has actual light in it the same kind of light that he doesn't like from the sun or even the moon um and sam is saying even the moon could be some kind of elf magic yeah for whatever reason this rope feels more like moon magic
[00:38:00] you know like something about that like soft subtle light um or even just the idea that the moon doesn't create light it's just reflecting it so the rope too is just kind of some kind of elf light that's being reflected through this rope um just like frodo's thing that he's got even though it's not been used yet because it says here too he examined it and found that it was not too tight indeed hardly tight enough and i love this line sam was gentler than his words i love that sam is harsh but then really he's just
[00:38:30] a big softy you know doesn't tie it too tight and then this section was nuts too when he goes no not on it said frodo looking down at him with stern pity all you wish is to see it and touch it if you can though you know what would drive you mad not on it swear by it if you will for you know where it is
[00:38:55] yes you know smiegel it is before you i'm like frodo no don't say that like you're tempting him you're just like openly tempting him here to snatch the ring and the next chapter you kind of see that moment where he's like reaching out and having this back and forth in his own mind about like stay stealing the ring it's that was a bold choice by frodo i don't know if i agree with that one but it was the first thing to me that
[00:39:20] it feels maybe different from the movies but it happened again later where there's this confidence from frodo where it almost feels like power like he hasn't had a lot of that as a hobbit but he he said it again in the other chapter where he says something about if you try to take it i'll use the power of the ring and throw you in the fire which i'm like foreshadowing cool and then it even made me rethink the
[00:39:47] ending but then it also felt out of character for frodo somehow this kind of boldness threatening i was like is that is that frodo is it the ring talking um or frodo is getting a little more arrogant than he usually would be because the one of the more interesting lines comes next after that because it says for a moment it appeared to sam that his master had grown and golem had shrunk the tall stern shadow a mighty lord who hid his brightness in gray cloud at his feet a little whining dog
[00:40:15] yet the two were in some way kin and not alien they could reach one another's minds golem raised himself and began pawing at frodo fawning at his knees like that was a cool section sam is really uh he knows people i think he's like really perceptive and how he can like understand people but i love this section of frodo like almost surprising him
[00:40:41] um and him sam being able to see the vast difference between frodo and golem but also they're like almost the same creature which is concerning i think part of it is just frodo's on his own now yeah and so like he has to be in charge he has to take charge and then he kind of did that already
[00:41:05] with boromir before he died because he was like no you're just making me more sure of what i have to do like the way you're acting i have to go i have to destroy it or whatever he decided to do and then like he just ran off by himself like he was prepared to just do the journey alone yeah so i don't know i feel like it's his second like i don't know his second act of like being the one in charge and then sam i
[00:41:33] feel like he's just watching it all happen change and he's like okay you know like i'm your little servant which is weird i don't really like that because it's it's kind of like that in the movie yeah but it's not they're like yeah it's yeah i know exactly what you mean but it's very different there was a paragraph where he was like he just saw that frodo was different like it wasn't up for discussion like this is just how it's gonna be but yeah it's a difference yeah it's really interesting
[00:42:03] um you guys have anything else in chapter one before you go to chapter two i'm just wondering about um frodo reading what the ring said i'm curious if there was any power in reading it it felt like cool and all and it even made me wonder did golem even know what it said has he ever seen it did he ever throw it in fire um i assume he kind of did but i just wasn't sure and
[00:42:31] then i thought it was a weird distinction to say don't what do you say not on it don't swear on the ring or by the ring what is that what is the difference is that an old english thing that i don't fully get um strange that is one of the questions i think we we've had maybe the most in this is like really what does the ring do what are the effects of the ring what is the power of the ring and then this whole thing of like swearing on the ring versus by the ring and what hold it really
[00:42:57] has on golem is really interesting to me i don't fully understand that i don't know what this swearing on the ring is really going to do because you know golem could just have his like you know fingers crossed behind his back is this thing how binding is this thing going to be because frodo doesn't all of a sudden he's like okay we're good now you can let him go sam he won't run away like no this is absurd yeah watch out for this dude because in the next chapter that starts it says
[00:43:24] frodo and sam were hard put to keep up with them but he seemed no longer to have any thought of escaping i'm like okay so this definitely seems to be binding golem in some way but yeah like why did it actually change him and it's not like he's he's not really fighting himself anymore to obey them he's just like okay i promise and then he's actually changed which is crazy maybe it's just because like he's so obsessed with the ring that any mention of it like he wants to please it and
[00:43:50] wants it so like but does he already have his plan made all the way in his mind because like or does that happen when they get to the gate that kind of happens when they get to the gate maybe maybe right before the gate i would say i was trying to play with um the idea of this being um like a true binding promise and i was wondering if frodo made any promises and it almost feels like the ring is the mediator in this promise yeah keeping where then
[00:44:19] smiegel actually feels like he can't because if he breaks this and he swore by the ring the ring won't like him as much or something like the ring will feel betrayed so he's like no no i did swear by the ring but then it also says from that moment a change which lasted for some time came over him so sometime what caused it to change i guess we'll see um was it a real change did frodo do something to make the
[00:44:47] change go the other way i don't know yeah there's a lot of questions that i have i don't know if you know just the whole idea of the ring the soft magic system of this thing is kind of confusing it's interesting we're getting little glimpses yeah all right taming of smiegel unless we have anything else in the or yeah unless we have anything else in taming of smiegel let's go to the passage of the marshes that's it for me beautiful um we already touched on some of the things in this chapter but uh
[00:45:18] i one of the first things that i really liked about this chapter and i think tolkien is doing a good job of this is like having the frodo and sam almost be like foil characters for each other for smiegel himself like one is very trusting not and later we learn he's not like not like fully trusting but like he he's in control of the situation and sam is just so distrusting of this person and i'm definitely on sam's side of this i'm like no this he's done nothing to deserve
[00:45:44] your trust you've just sworn on the ring and you're assuming that this creature is going to be okay with that after and i'm like no there needs to be a lot of proof i like slit his throat like don't mess with this creature anymore but another part of that that i love about this is that they don't and i'm and we know from the movies obviously like smiegel plays a huge part in the destruction of the ring so it's like fate is still guiding this right here fate seems to be very much guiding frodo and like there's all
[00:46:11] sorts of like little angels and demons on his shoulder like trying to guide him in different directions but like frodo is feels like he's saying true to what he thinks and he knows so i'm like everything that frodo says i'm like bowing down and worshiping because he seems like he's guided by providence and fate here like more than other people to be honest i don't know though chapter summary golem leads them through the dead marshes softer magic than in the movies questioning the oh they're questioning if
[00:46:40] they can really trust golem as they go and smiegel doesn't really know his way through the marshes not as much as i thought it feels like he's just really good at figuring it out as he goes yeah i also love that there was a little bit of a riddle here um because it to me feels like in the movies the hobbit and the riddles never really jived with what we see in lord of the rings yeah so
[00:47:06] i like seeing a little bit of a riddle come out it's like oh this is that golem um yeah that we've seen before he's like obsessed with riddles still telling riddles in the hobbit yeah i like that he they do this for his song in the movies when he has the fish to catch a fish so juicy sweet i love like the little again the movies i mean for everyone everyone that complains about the movies i think they really do capture a lot of the spirit of this oh yeah it's crazy how when you
[00:47:33] read the books you realize they put so many of the songs in the movies but just in small little lines oh yeah where fans real fans can be like oh my gosh that's like the line and uh i was talking about this with two other things like i think they missed certain things like you know sauron's corporeal form like i think him as the eye it was an interesting representation of him but i think they could have done that maybe a little bit better and then one thing that i think they really nailed in the whole series which we'll talk about even at the end of the black chat black gate chapter was just
[00:48:01] like the sacrificial nature of these characters and everything that frodo and sam were talking about like there's a moment where um in this chapter where frodo is like oh sam my dear my dearest have it my habit of habit my best friend i don't think we're gonna have a return journey i don't think we need to worry about the food that comes after this and he's essentially preparing him to die and
[00:48:23] yeah like kneels his tears fall on frodo's hand and then in the very next chapter sam kind of has a remembrance of this and he's like processing through it and so he goes oh man what if my old gaffer would see me now but he's like i won't be able to see him again he's like what i would do to see that guy's face again i'm like saying they're going no because sam is like processing his own death coming to grips with the fact that he is going to die in this journey and that is tragic
[00:48:50] because sam is like still an optimist in this and that was a tragic section for me when i came across that and for it to happen so early yeah oh my god for them to know this early on like oh yeah we're we're probably not coming back yes oh it's just such good writing um oh he goes yeah this is the whole line i don't know how long we shall take to to finish said frodo we were miserably delayed in
[00:49:19] the hills but samwise games you my dear hobbit indeed sam my dearest hobbit friend of friends i do not think that we need to give thought to what comes after that to do the job as you put it what hope is there that we ever shall and if we do who knows what we will come of that if the one goes and we are at hand i ask you sam are we ever likely to need bread again i think not if we can nurse our limbs to bring us to mount doom that is all we can do more than i can i begin to
[00:49:46] feel sam nodded silently it took his master's hand and bent over he did not kiss it those tears fell on it then he turned away drew a sleeve over his nose and got up and stamped about trying to whistle and saying between the efforts where's that dreaded creature i love that it's so sad though just such good writing um but yeah i i do love sam i love his distrust in smeagol he's kind of
[00:50:12] keeping frodo in check keeping him in balance but yeah they keep and again back to this old thing they keep talking about the promise because like frodo is very sure in this some of these lines it says perhaps you're right sam said frodo speaking openly there is a change in them but just what kind and how deep i'm not yet sure seriously though i don't think there is any need for fear at present still
[00:50:37] watch if you wish give me about two hours no more and then call me and later it says don't worry said frodo there is no help for a bill he'll come back you'll see the promise will hold yet a while and he won't leave his precious anyway which i'm like how does frodo know this he just is in control of the situation yep like if i'm i am sam in this story right now going like oh he's gone he's out of here like i clearly i'd be out but frodo's like no he'll be back i'd just be like as long as it
[00:51:04] looks like we're going in the right direction yeah right i'm okay with it yeah as long as like i have a sword on me i could kill him if i need to looks like we're going in the right way let's just go i'm more like i think yeah it's impressive i am not at all i am very distrustful of this dude i don't know because frodo just knows the power of the ring i think
[00:51:28] and he almost i think frodo's almost trusting the ring that it's always going to bring golem back to them yeah more than anything about golem yeah i kind of think so yeah it seems like frodo just understands like has like a almost like a camaraderie kind of like a kindred spirit with him because he just knows the power of the ring and and frodo and golem knows that too so i think they have this like weird
[00:51:55] like balanced together kind of and it feels like smiegel or golem has been following them for however long they've been journeying so far yeah this must be better than having to hide way back behind them so even if he did lose them and then they kept going through the marshes found their own way he would still be following them probably so he might as well follow with them frodo's got good instincts
[00:52:23] yeah yeah he really does a lot better than uh than the movies and the movies it's weird too like when you watch the movies at this point frodo is like almost incapacitated like he can't do anything he just like sits around and like doesn't have that many good moments and i'm curious how the books are going to keep going if maybe he will like start to cave to the power of the ring a little bit um but he's still so strong and so still so in control and like a master of his fate at this
[00:52:51] moment so different but yeah there was only the again the just the light thing where he's looking at these candles of corpses frodo was standing lost in thought looking at the pale lights and then sam i felt like kind of had to snap him out of it not in some extreme way but just like hey don't look at them gollum says we shouldn't although also like now he trusts gollum yeah he's like all right
[00:53:18] i agree with this one let's not look at those creepy things wait but he goes i tried once but you cannot reach them we tried once yes only shapes to see perhaps not to touch and then sam looked darkly at him and shut it again thinking that he guessed why smiegel had tried to touch them i was like why did he try to touch them i don't know why yeah a great great question i think uh how do you get out of it eat them a little food that's probably my guess yeah i was
[00:53:48] thinking that but i don't know that's too creepy i think he's starving he's going off he's eating worms around he's talking about birds i think smiegel is so hungry right now at this moment that he's like looking in like before he was when he was going before he's probably so hungry that he was like might as well flesh yeah hmm let me dig in that's my guess though i don't know
[00:54:13] um one of uh i did another essay about this but this is like a cool thing that i found in this one section that smiegel talks about um saran all the pronouns that he uses are all capitalized and his saran's pronouns are capitalized by no other real character in the books maybe by a few here and there and it was just interesting it was like smiegel has so much like fear and reverence
[00:54:40] of this character that like tolkien felt it appropriate to i guess capitalize in this moment that's a good catch so i was like that's kind of a cool little thing i was like doing some research there's a moment on amanhen when he uh not uh frodo is like seeing the great eye but he doesn't capitalize the pronoun there so it's a fun little tidbit hmm um yeah these little what what what's in
[00:55:09] your guys like image of these little candles and these little wisps people were talking about this one in some comments talking about these things are willow wisps i don't really know what willow wisps are because i i'm not like deep deep into fantasy lore i guess oh that's a fantasy thing willow wisps yeah it's like things that live in bogs that are like have they look like mist they look like fog and they're not like real or form but this is like the exact description of them they're like they have like these lights in them and they're like it's almost like the light at the end of the tunnel if you
[00:55:37] focus on it long enough it'll like lead you into the water and like lead you to your death you'll join the lights are you looking them up yeah there there's a uh ted naysmith did a depiction of them but they it's like just looks like fog and like lights and lighted light lit up fog you want the willow whisper you want like lord of the rings willow list lord of the rings willow list let's look that up maybe i'm saying that wrong too i don't know this is disney
[00:56:06] disney did that hey oh yeah yeah that was a cute little thing cute little guy i don't know i fear that i've just lost my imagination to the movie at this point yeah it's kind of true it was pretty much the exact same as the movie yeah i i was picturing like fireflies or something but it felt too cheerful i'm like this is a creepy place so then whatever light i was imagining didn't fit this so then i was like dismissing it i mean that can't be that no it can't be that and then i think i just pictured a
[00:56:36] normal bog and i imagined anything that was light was just in their heads yeah um and then i was like are they getting high on these bog juices that in the air and they're just like probably not seeing clearly and they're kind of like in a weird mental state and then frodo staring out at the water made me think yeah he's getting a little delirious so i don't know if they're real or not it felt um
[00:57:03] like there's i don't know i've seen like movies where and maybe like for uh um what's the uh why can't i think of him charles dickens i feel like there's been like things that i've read from charles dickens where like someone will be like sneaking around uh doing like something bad in a grave or in a bog and all of a sudden they'll see like a light and that's like terrifying to see in a bog i'm like i could see how eerie it could be like if you're just in the middle of this
[00:57:31] bog and it's like a night or even day and all of a sudden you see these like lights floating around that would be terrifying but i don't know i kind of imagined fireflies but like scary fireflies i also kind of pictured it um i don't know if you can imagine like when you're stargazing sometimes the thing you're staring directly at you can't see but you can see more stars in your peripheral vision something about like where your retina is in your eye so it was just the idea of like
[00:57:59] they're uneasy lights because you can't see them when you're looking at them but then they're always in the side but then when you look they're like kind of not there um so that's what makes you like stare harder you're like i just saw it where is this and you kind of i don't know something about being disoriented too in it yeah um because these can't be pleasant lights yeah most lights are
[00:58:19] pleasant yeah that's really interesting actually um there is it the his we've talked about this a little bit before but smegol's fear of the wraiths is nuts in the book because it talks about he says wraiths he will he race on wings the precious is their master they see everything
[00:58:49] everything nothing can hide from them curse the white face and they tell him everything he sees he knows ah golem golem golem it was not until the moon had sunk westering far away beyond toll brand deer that he would get up or make a move which had to have been hours right i'm like he's so paranoid by this that he doesn't want to move and then there's another section of the books where it says uh fredo actually had to draw his sword on him to like make him get up and move and i'm like yeah he's that paralyzed by these things that he doesn't want to move like what did they do to him
[00:59:19] it's like kind of tragic actually um i also didn't like this dynamic that the next line is from that time on sam thought he seemed saw a change in golem again yeah um he was more fawning and would be friendly but there were strange looks in his eyes so right there i thought did that wraith actually
[00:59:49] send some kind of signal to him did actually make him change or did it just remind him of his mission like oh wait they actually can find me and if they do i want to make sure i'm doing what i'm supposed to be doing yeah is he still on the mission hmm interesting actually and how does he know that they talk and tell everything too like he had to have seen that in action yeah true nobody else really
[01:00:14] knows what they do yeah absolutely maybe yeah he was in mordor yeah i think so maybe he like saw the plant here in action or like saw them communicating with that somehow grabbed him that's a really interesting point actually i didn't think of it that way i thought this was more like paranoia but maybe he actually does think he sees everything because of the plant here maybe he got a vision through this or like maybe no one i feel like no one talks about what they do they just hunt the ring and
[01:00:43] he's like no they say everything they tell you they see like uh i don't know that's so fascinating i actually never really put that together um interesting they were wow that's gonna change my like perception of that now um because there's other things people were making a note of this too like so there people are kind of questioning what saren is doing right now and they're like he's like
[01:01:09] navigating with the palantir so maybe he went to like saren's own chambers where saren could like torture him and like get this information out of him because a lot of people say too that saren wouldn't trust anybody else with this he's like almost like voldemort in that sense with his horcruxes oh yeah anybody knowing about this he doesn't want anybody knowing information about the ring because i'm interested too with the ring wraiths like they live to serve the ring and they're they
[01:01:33] don't live to serve saren so if a ring wraith ever were to come across the ring would he bring it back to saren or would he take it for his own and they're wraiths so i don't know if they could take it for their own but it's like they're ever drawn to the power of the ring they're not necessarily drawn to saren himself yeah so saren is using these things and these creatures but none of these creatures seem completely loyal to him they just seem like they fear him right like even they were talking about this interesting and uh the beginning of this book when they were
[01:02:02] there was the differences between all the orcs um like there were people from mordor and they were like making fun of each other and they're like oh we at least we don't eat flesh and they're like oh interesting like there's works that you know maybe are vegetarians or something like that you know what's going on here um and there was like a a fear i remember that the mordor orcs had of saren himself they almost didn't want to be in a service they were like fearful and like
[01:02:30] doing this out of like oh i can't believe we have to be here and do this so weird yeah it actually kind of is fascinating to uh see this whole thing um i'm curious if they can if they could wear the ring if they found it and what it means in the darkness bind them like if that ring controls them and if sauron put his malice and everything into the ring but galadriel was tempted on some level to take the
[01:02:56] ring yeah i think gandalf was tempted on some level although he doesn't have a ring but galadriel does have one of the other rings and she theoretically would be able to take it yeah so i don't know if ringwraiths could but interesting wait who are the ringwraiths again because those are the nine the nine rings that saren so saren made i i don't know if saren made these actually what nine rings are made though huh what type of like men okay they're human they're men they were given to the
[01:03:25] i guess nine of the most powerful kings in middle earth at the time okay because i don't feel like they could keep the one ring though because they're already gone they're already in the already wraith form in the unknown oh interesting i don't know unless they might not be able to even wear a ring bound into like maybe there is an escape if you true because they're kind of not like
[01:03:50] living so they might not be able to even put the ring on yeah their original rings put them into don't they have the rings on a movie yeah i think they would but could they put on another ring well they can wear clothes yeah they can wear armor so i guess they can ride horses yeah you just be a cloak a floating ring and a horse there's another description here that said um even the mirror of dead faces some haggard phantom
[01:04:19] of green spring would come but here in either spring nor summer would ever come again i was like oh the chronicles of narnia it's gonna be forever winter there or something uh but this place is just creepy i don't love it yeah it says for a while they stood there like men on the edge of sleep where nightmares lurk holding it off though they uh though they know what they can
[01:04:44] only though they know they can only come to mourning through the shadows the light broadened and hardened the gasping pits and poisonous mounds grew hideously clear the sun was up walking on the clouds and the long flags of smoke but even the sunlight was defiled the hobbits had no welcome for that light unfriendly it seemed revealing them and their helplessness little squeaking ghosts that wandered among the ash heaps of the dark lord like that is terrifying why does he have ash heaps first of all
[01:05:11] is he burning bodies what's going on there yeah that is so weird but this whole thing is just like i thought i just love the writing there because it's like the light comes up and from this point we've only seen golem hate the light and all of a sudden sam and frodo are now like oh we feel exposed in the light they're almost becoming like golem to some extent longing for like
[01:05:35] the the darkness and the the shadow suddenly sam woke up thinking that he heard his master calling it was evening frodo could not have called for he had fallen asleep so that is really weird because at first i thought they're high on these swamp gases but then i thought it's gandalf or some kind of fate
[01:06:02] speaking to sam in his mind because what are the chances he would wake up for this exchange yeah just to solidify his lack of trust yeah in golem good timing really good good good fate timing yeah that is actually really interesting but i chose to think of it as a positive thing nudging him in the right direction rather than um going crazy or being high on gases yeah but this whole conversation was
[01:06:27] terrifying though like especially i've talked about this before but each time that the second thought spoke golem's long hand crept out slowly pawing toward frodo and then was drawn back with a jerk of smiegel smoking and finally both arms with long fingers flexed and twitching clawed toward his neck like terrifying stuff so i i took that to mean the one arm was going out and that was golem one arm one arm and then both arms men golem and smiegel both are like yeah you're right let's kill him
[01:06:56] yeah which is crazy how is sam so okay with i know also he played it really cool i was like way to go sam that was nice like opening one eye pretending like he's asleep that whole time that was and then just like stirring like oh i'm waking up right now what yeah but it still felt like i'm wondering what sam is thinking his plan is now now that he knows if he didn't stir was he gonna try and kill frodo
[01:07:20] right then yeah it also feels weird because what if sam didn't stir and just waited a second longer and let's say he legit was trying to strangle frodo and sam jumps up right away would that be enough to convince frodo like oh yeah we can't trust him you're right yeah because it almost feels like maybe it would have been better to let him go another second longer maybe that's dangerous
[01:07:45] yeah i'm like while while golem's hands are around his neck sam can get up and go like right now what do you think yeah what do you think about this situation going on should we still trust him huh all right do you guys have anything else in this chapter before we go to last um oh just another little divine mention uh a great heaviness was in all his limbs but he roused
[01:08:10] himself with effort and sat up something warned him to be careful and not reveal that he had overheard the debate so again that's in sam's mind like something warned him yeah okay yeah and then another wreath fly by terrible speed into the west it's also interesting to read this in light of the fact that this is essentially frodo's retelling of the thing so everything that he's getting from other people are eyewitness accounts of these things so like sam is telling him and telling frodo in this
[01:08:37] moment while frodo's writing this down he's like i had a dislike in a weird pit in my stomach that i knew that you know i needed to do x and y and he just kind of files and again it feels like fate is really guiding him at this moment that is interesting it's a lot easier to assign um good intuition in hindsight sometimes so i don't know but he at least feels that way yeah for sure yeah sounds like oh no no i knew all along you know
[01:09:10] um all right black gate is closed chapter three we'll wrap it up with these this chapter deliberation at the black gate pretty much the whole chapter is at the black gate yeah um the black riders were seen than men from the south and by the end of the chapter frodo decides to listen to smiegel and go to kirith ungold yes kirith ungold um this is the other line that i thought was
[01:09:35] devastating that i've mentioned before but well we are here said sam here's the gate and looks to me as if that's about as far as wherever i'm going to get my word but the gaffer would have a thing or to say if he saw me now often said i'd come to a bad end if i didn't watch my step he did but now i don't suppose i'll ever see the old fellow again he'll miss his chances i told you so sam where's the pity he can go on telling me as long as he got breath if only he could see his old face again but i have to get a wash first or he wouldn't know me like i love that little comedic levity moment
[01:10:04] there but so sad so sad that sam was like grieving his own death here he almost knows and he's like oh he's like thinking about all the things that he wishes he would have done which is like one of the biggest things i think in his life right now is that he wishes he would have you know hugged the old gaffer before he left on his journey or did something um so ah just tragic and then you have in
[01:10:33] the next section smiegel saying uh he'll eat us all if he gets it all the world yeah what no he does very strange mean he goes keep it nice master or be kind to smiegel don't let him have it or go into a nice place and give it back to little smiegel yes yes master give it back hey smiegel will keep it safe he will do lots of good especially the nice hobbits hobbits go home
[01:10:59] don't go to the gate like he's trying to sneak that in there real quick um oh man um two lines that i liked here if there is only one way then i must take it frodo just like so definitive um and then sam saying uh being a cheerful hobbit he had not needed hope as long as despair could be postponed that line was so good i was like oh whoa yeah like he's like i don't even need hope
[01:11:29] yet i'm just happy to you know like not despair and that's my goal right now it seems like the hobbit mantra like that's what they do yeah they just delay hope so they delay despair as long as they can um another weird question uh or just like random at the beginning of the chapter um before them stood the oh upon them stood the teeth of mordor two towers strong and tall in days past they were built by
[01:11:53] men of gondor in their pride and power blah blah blah sauron takes over gondor failed are those the two towers and then it made me think what are the two towers i thought great question the two towers like and jen's here um we hope i thought the two towers were or thank and the tower the eye is on
[01:12:20] is that baradour right yes i thought those were the two towers but then when it said this i'm like for it to actually say the two towers in writing in the book two towers strong and tall i was like maybe are these also are one of these towers like are these towers just way in the background yeah because then i thought maybe one is baradour and the other one is whichever one is near osgileath yeah what's
[01:12:48] the one called where the wraiths live or near where they take the stairs um yeah yeah that's kirith on goal kirith on goal is that one yeah that's where the pass is i forgot what the place is called it's like the tower of the moon and the tower of the sun which weirdly on our books it has that or oh it has this this tower has the moon this tower has the sun and they've mentioned the moon and the sun a bunch of times as the white and yellow face recently the hand yeah yeah yeah the little creepy that's the white hand of sauron i guess oh but then it's something it said the black
[01:13:16] hand of sauron somewhere yeah it did say that yeah his black hand his black four-fingered hand um so i think this is actually that sounds like a good two towers i actually think that uh this is debatable because i know i the more i've been doing these like every once in a while i'll say oh you know i'm on the second book i'm reading the two towers and lord of the rings and people are like no no no tolkien wrote this in one version and his
[01:13:42] publishers made him break it up into three books um because so so he wrote them all just straight yeah boom he and he wanted them published that way too he wanted that one complete copy published but his publisher made him break it up and so when they were coming up with the title for the second book i think they just threw two towers out there or something like that because there was a lot of two towers in the book and one was hey what's up one was one idea was i think or think and minute
[01:14:09] or think and baradur and the other is like these two at the the entrance of uh the moron or the black gate and then the other two towers that we have are ministeria and yeah uh kirith an ghul or whatever that uh minis morgal so i'm like the tower of the the i think the tower of the rising sun and the tower of the setting sun or i forgot exactly what it was called i don't think it was the tower of the moon in the sun i think it was the tower of the rising sun and the setting sun i know he's like protecting you it's like what do you got in there
[01:14:44] um but a lot of people yeah a lot of people don't say it's obviously uh minis ethel i don't know actually what what is that this is a new one is the old name for minis morgal oh well oh yeah yeah i could be wrong by the gate minis morgal's by the gate i mean by the stairs by the stairs yeah okay yeah
[01:15:10] minis morgal and barador are both like this map's too small but yeah where's our online super map oh yeah i'm really curious about the two towers the background on my computer is the map now so yeah i definitely this chapter i feel like i fell off a little bit i was like all right
[01:15:36] long hike oh yeah i got the point it was a short chapter so i like appreciated that i actually still really love this chapter but like after the first two pages of like this dialogue and they stop then there's just like smeagol is going crazy yeah it's interesting um but yeah the two towers kind of interesting because um
[01:16:04] i don't know what they are yet hmm but that is good perspective that he wrote them all and the chapters were kind of after i mean the breaking up of the books so the names don't have as grand of meaning maybe as um you might think from jr i'm not really reading chat all that much because you know i'll read it maybe later but someone is actually saying i don't know if this is a joke or not helms deep in
[01:16:28] orthink because helms deep did have a tower tower of helm hammerhand or the horn of helm hammerhand and that is like a little bit of a tower center of the book yeah sure but that's the two towers it doesn't resonate with me just because it didn't mention the tower as being so grand like it may be mentioned it was there but did it even say tower or just tall part of the wall or something you know like so that feels like a stretch yeah or think feels like a real tower and it's been mentioned
[01:16:56] for multiple books and the eye feels like it's on a real tower it's been mentioned for a while we've known it's existed but all the other towers feel like they're less important but or think feels like it's fading in importance yeah but i guess that was only the end of the i don't know and what did you think oh you don't even have a mic jen we gotta adjust yeah i figured you guys could share
[01:17:27] as it should be so what do you think i don't know what you guys are exactly um all the chapters you read today yeah what did you think about them did you like them or actually jen answered this did you like them or were you kind of bored by them a little bit towards the end they were kind of boring i feel like yeah but well also i'm listening to it and it's very confusing i don't know why they have
[01:17:54] the chapters laid out so differently than the book um what do you mean the movie um no the audio book it just says 1920 but like 19 and 20 are actually chapter one and then it so i was kind of confused if you're asking me the chapters i don't really know but just what do you feel about the story um
[01:18:21] no wrong answer i can't think right now um why'd you put me on the spot give me like a second yeah yeah take it all right it's ready whenever you're ready um there was another really good moment in this chapter that i liked with i mean we've been talking a little bit about just like the um the power that frodo has in these chapters like the command that he has and this is one of my
[01:18:50] favorite uh paragraphs that he has because he like catches them like sam thinks in this moment that frodo is naive and he's like not really seeing through golem and then all of a sudden this moment happens and i love this second paragraph that follows this is what it says i did not mean the danger that we all share said frodo i mean a danger to yourself alone you swore a promise by what you call the precious remember that it will hold you to it but it will seek a way to twist it to your
[01:19:16] own undoing already you are being twisted you revealed yourself to me just now foolishly give it back to smiegel you said do not say that again do not let that thought grow in you you will never get it back but the desire of it may betray you to a bitter end you will never get it back in the last need smiegel i should put on the precious was what you're mentioning before it any and the precious master you long ago if i wearing it were to command you you would obey even if it were to leap from the
[01:19:41] a precipice or to cast yourself into the fire and such would be my command so have a care smiegel and then i love the next sentence goes sam looked at his master with approval he's like finally he's on my side there we go but he goes but also a surprise there was a look in his face and a tone in his voice that he had not known before it had always been a notion of his that the kindness of dear mr frodo was of such a high degree that it must imply a fair measure of blindness
[01:20:10] of course he also firmly held the incompatible belief that mr frodo was the wisest person in the world with the possible exception of old mr bilbo and of gandalf golem in his own way and with much more excuse as his acquaintance was much briefer and may have made a similar mistake confusing kindness and blindness at any rate this speech abashed and terrified him he groveled on the ground and could hear and could speak no clear words but nice master this is frodo waited patiently for a while and he spoke
[01:20:35] again less sternly come now golem or smiegel if you wish tell me um of this other way and show me if you can what hope is there in it enough to justify me and turning aside from my plain path i'm in haste just a great section of writing right there yeah i love frodo's firmness right there i love sam looking at his master with approval he's like happy about that it's just so good but also just the fact that he's like if i put this thing on and i command you go into the fire you would and that
[01:21:03] would be my command like excuse me for hold on what what is going on there that was uh that was harsh it just made me wonder if things in the third at the end were orchestrated more intentionally than the movie led on yeah really i was like if that would be his command and was the ring in there at all
[01:21:33] with that because to me that just felt a little harsh um the threat the whole thing it felt more than necessary so i i felt like there was maybe a little sprinkling of ring power influencing that yeah agreed for sure um one question that i have in this chapter is who are the silent watchers
[01:21:59] there's a section that smiegel is talking about they're going to like minis ethel or minis morgal or bear or whatever the 20 names for this place nothing moves on the road that they don't know that they don't know about the things inside now the silent watchers i feel like it's many things yeah trees yeah animals people i don't know i felt like it's just like the whole world is watching you
[01:22:28] so is this is this then like smiegel's paranoia that everyone is watching him or is this like something actually real that's watching well i think he probably has reason to think that something is watching him or it has been especially if he knows the nazgul are already like reporting what they see it just feels like that has already happened to him like he's already been watched so now he's
[01:22:54] like paranoid but he's warning them but i think he's like justified yeah i feel like he gets called to mordor and then gets like tortured and let out and then he probably encounters all these orcs like i think all of his mordor knowledge is real and like all his fears justified but i don't really think he's like a servant of the dark lord but he seems like an independent mercenary contractor yeah yeah he's like a ranger in his own way
[01:23:26] yeah i wonder if this is just paranoia it's even capitalized too like it's an official thing a real title the silent watchers he thinks they're always watching now i keep thinking of the comparison you made in the one video about the game of thrones guy yeah yeah theon grayjoy yeah um and that would kind of track as a torture thing where he was so crazy by this torture
[01:23:57] that they may have actually played weird tricks or let him think he's escaping but then he actually gets taken back um or they let him get almost out of mordor and then they bring him back and tell him that spies were watching you know give him the idea that no matter where you go or what you do we always know what you're doing so if they built that into his head through torture methods he would be
[01:24:20] paranoid forever um and someone is saying and i kind of read this before too uh because i don't fully i think it's going to be different in the movie in the book but there they do have the depiction of the silent watchers in the movie um you know those like two goat things that are sticking their tongue out really long yeah those are the silent watchers yeah so they those are like statues like little
[01:24:46] gargoyle kind of things yeah so those are like the silent watchers maybe smeagol saw them and is like terrified of them i have to google it yeah there it's a creepy section of the movie i'm like oh that was weird yeah so i'm curious what that if there's going to be a difference in the book where they're maybe they're going to be like more like brooding i mean they're pretty brooding in the movie too but
[01:25:07] oh the giant things the silent watchers but i guess that yeah that's an interesting thought but i i guess the other weird part that i was trying to figure out nothing moves on the road that they don't know about but it says the road climbs right under the shadow of the walls and then passes the gate nothing moves that they don't know about and then sam's kind of like so that's your advice
[01:25:32] so we're going to be stuck in the same spot so i'm just i'm also a little confused that then it says he can't see everything at once and it feels like the path like kirith ongle feels like wouldn't they see that too is that what he's saying yeah he's saying if they take that path they're not going to be on the road they're going to be near the road or they're going to get off the road before they
[01:25:59] reach the silent watchers but then again i was picturing in the movies like how close they actually get um so i guess we'll see how it's portrayed hmm yeah i'm really curious about that does smiegel definitively know or not know about the palantir he doesn't know right or your theory has me thinking that he does he saw it okay i feel like he almost does now because he's so paranoid about like sara and
[01:26:25] all these other people seeing and watching him that i'm like maybe he really doesn't know why would someone let him see that because maybe i don't know he saw it in his travels to the other ones yeah maybe like maybe like one of my thoughts was was there one near like the city of dale which is up where the lonely mountain is where smiegel was like like laying where he was in the
[01:26:52] mountain where was the one that the song was about and it said there's like a moon in the tower where was that one i think that was orthink before it was orthink i think that was like i think where that might have been uh i was thinking whatever that town was from rings of power yeah oh maybe yeah but i also i couldn't remember how many palantirs there were
[01:27:18] oh it's like that crystal ball um that saruman had and then we find out sauron has um i saw an article this week about how many companies use lord of the rings names for their companies and this was the first one i thought i like palantir people went feral over there because this guy like touts himself as like a uh big you know uh lord of the rings fan but i'm like
[01:27:46] everyone who's the lord of the rings fan is like no this guy's a fraud because he uh he like used this he does surveillance on people and it's like how he how dare he name something palantir and take something from tolkien who would have hated this besmirched name that's so funny yeah um what else you guys uh anything else that you guys see in this chapter any last little tidbits
[01:28:13] um the green gleam in golem's eyes the green is for golem right and then the pale is smeagol and smiegel is good golem is bad is that i think so yeah it's like yeah um yellow in his eyes or just in general it was green and yellow oh oh like the yellow or the pale um you know it could be i just i'm thinking of the one line where it said pale but most of the time
[01:28:41] i was hearing it like mention the green that's what stood out a little bit because it's like odd um i that would actually be really interesting to portray that in a movie to see how they would actually do that flipping someone's eye shades between two different colors curious if they actually did do that i know and next time i watch them yeah i know i want to watch some things um i did love uh the moment where when they're talking about oliphants and sam says stood up
[01:29:07] putting his hands behind his back as he always did when speaking poetry and began and he says this poem that's like a children's rhyme it's like the most basic song that we have in the book so far but uh it makes frodo laugh because like there's this whole moment where frodo stood up he laughed in the midst of all his cares when sam trotted out of the old the old fireside rhyme of oliphant and the laugh had released him from hesitation i thought that's so good so like just how a quick
[01:29:32] laugh can just make him like like have a clear mind i think that's such a good little bit of writing there that's good medicine mm-hmm um we saw another mention of black riders where the same warning fear was on him as he felt in the presence of the black riders helpless horror they huddled together the wing shape wheeled and stooped down swiftly speeding back to mordor so again it feels like it saw them
[01:30:00] and is going back to tell a message yeah right that seems strange um my my reading of that actually was that could have potentially been the moment and i don't know this for sure i actually want like a timeline of dates i think this might have happened even over the marshes but that might have been the moment when uh pippin touches the plant here and they're all kind of called back like sara almost
[01:30:24] calls them all back to like send them off to their spots okay yeah um uh but i i don't know for sure about that one that one seemed a bit strange it seemed to kind of come out of nowhere but it is weird that they're getting so close to mordor that they're right here so anytime a black rider is leaving or going they're going to kind of see it i guess yeah um yeah good old sam just uh finding humor
[01:30:55] um the only part of that little rhyme that i thought was funny and i never lie it's an all it was just the last like line i was like what do you mean yeah like all fonts don't lie um so anyway trying to read into that like we can understand all fonts but also it made it sad because then i'm like i don't want any of them to die but yeah never lie on the ground not even to die like lie down and i never lie
[01:31:26] um true never lie on the ground not even to die and then it ends with and i never lie okay yeah true it could just be a reminder again that they're always on their feet why say it twice i don't know interesting is that also true two elements yeah that's actually like i want to dissect this now and you know what else felt weird to me um
[01:31:53] that smeagol had not heard of them i guess in my mind i thought of smeagol as like he's been everywhere yeah right he's old and he has traveled the entire middle earth looking for the rain yeah i pictured that he knew every blade of grass in middle earth so it was weird that okay fine he didn't make it all the way to the south but he's never even heard of them yeah and hobbits who are way hidden in a nook have heard of them i don't know yeah that seemed to come out of nowhere to be
[01:32:22] honest i'm with you on that yeah really bizarre section all right i think that was it that's all i got in here it's a good section even though it's like a maybe not one of the most scintillating chapters there's still a lot of good stuff in there a lot of character development yeah it's really good stuff um all right let's go over some of our favorites we'll wrap it up so give me uh your favorite character your favorite moment and who wins a hot
[01:32:51] tamale wow not a lot of characters i know there's pretty much three so bracket of three so all three chapters i thought could have been shortened and if i didn't watch the movies i think it would have been a little lost yeah yeah that's a good point
[01:33:15] they yeah and then i liked the recall like the rope the elf rope that's great saving frodo um but yeah i was and listening to it golem is like weeping a lot so it's like very annoying did you feel bad for him at all um moments but mostly enough yeah yeah which is like weird because that's almost how you feel with people like that who in like real life like none of us know like
[01:33:44] someone who's exactly like smeagol but you all know like those you know some people who are disturbed and you have like a weird pity with those people mixed with like a little bit of like disgust like no you stay stay away from me i like how frodo handles it though because sam doesn't trust him at all yeah but frodo wants to give him a chance and treat him like kindly for the most part yeah you're right
[01:34:07] versus sam yeah it's like it's weird like frodo is kinder and then he has to be even harsher at moments but that allows him to continue to be kind yeah but then he starts to trust him i think right um um smeagol just trusts frodo a little bit more yeah i think he does and then he keeps saying he's gonna show the master i loved how he's like oh master just said to go to the gate he never said like to get in
[01:34:37] yeah that was fun and we also didn't talk about it specifically but in that last chapter i think he's lying like when he says oh i didn't know what you were doing because before that point he had already talked about her when he was having that little debate he's like oh we can bring him to her and in the movies he says that a little later i think but my thought is that she lob
[01:35:06] well we'll find out soon um so to me it's the spider in the little passageway um and so i feel like if he already knew so how smart is smeagol that this is the the thing smeagol's like oh all right well they're gonna get to mordor we're obviously not gonna go this way so i can just come up with a way to bring them around but then plays it off so well that you really
[01:35:35] you believe that he's coming up with it on the spot and frodo believes him and frodo can read him pretty well i think and sam but they both are like hmm all right yeah i guess this sounds good sure let's change our plans and go to this other creepy place what other choice do they have well they don't have much but then smeagol convinces them by by yeah but he does it by basically saying no you're gonna give it to him don't do that don't go there you know and kind of makes it seem like oh you never told me what we were doing but obviously he
[01:36:05] already knew yeah because he came up with another plan of like how where else they might want to go so this was all just his ploy to then present them with the other option well sam believes yeah sam doesn't fully believe him and but smeagol even warns them and kind of says hey you're not gonna like the look of this thing when you get there this stair is kind of steep and it's next to a really creepy place and silent watchers and blah
[01:36:30] blah lots of these creepy silent but again that's a good strategy to get up ahead of it and be like you're really not gonna like this yeah but it's probably better than death yeah at the black gate yeah so he's conniving he's very conniving all right let's go over some of our uh some of the last little bits favorite character favorite moment hot tamale or are we what are we even calling this
[01:36:58] now we always change it it was basket of mushrooms i still like the hot smile i just go hot hot tamale i respect hot tamale it just rolls off the tongue you know um sam is the favorite character for me um yeah same me just great you know um i think my favorite moment is when they're waiting to
[01:37:22] catch smeagol when he's creeping down nice moment of creepy but you're like oh yeah they're banding together oh man but also when they're talking about death like when i after i'm done with this book i think i will remember that conversation about death the most from these chapters yeah of frodo accepting and then talking to sam about like we probably aren't going to live through this yeah like that was
[01:37:49] powerful so maybe that'll be my favorite moment hot tamale come back to me because i think it's smeagol not yeah the smeagol side of it not the side of thing i think my uh my hot tamale is i think is frodo in this because of all those just the moments that he stood up like standing up for himself very firm is in command of a situation control that's like hot tamale energy yeah it's so true okay my favorite moment though is the which is a sad moment sam regretting that he
[01:38:18] will see his dad's face again that just crushed me that that line right i was like no wait wait the old gaffer is his dad yeah oh i was distancing it accidentally like a friend and uncle so the old gaffer is his dad and then there was other so much different character that they mentioned who was his uncle i forgot what his like title was but he was the person who kept the baggins garden
[01:38:44] before the old gaffer did so he was like he was bilbo's original and then it was the old gaffer and then it was sam hmm so it like went down the family line wow but he was like oh that makes it great grand uncle or something like that so much worse yeah i know you'll never get to see his face again even to be told i told you so yeah and there well this is like a stupid thing um sorry i'm going all
[01:39:09] sorts of side notes but there's a moment in um the third movie in the extended i think where sam is fighting those three orcs while he's trying to get back up to frodo and that little other tower another tower yeah and then he goes that one's for uh frodo mr frodo he goes that one's for the shire and then he says a line that i never understood he goes and that one's i thought he used to say that one's for my own temper i always thought that was a line that he said but he said and that
[01:39:37] one's for my old gaffer that's what he's saying oh so he's saying this one's for my dad so it's a great moment much sense i know i always thought he said that's for my own temper because he's like mad and he just wants to get out right it just makes sense too right yep but nope that's for my old gaffer cool okay my favorite character is smeagol whoa whoa okay smeagol not golem
[01:40:07] the best um and then i would say hot tamale frodo same reason he's just standing on business yeah and my favorite moment i like the rope but particularly when sam is like contemplating how the knot fell apart yeah he's like i know how to tie a knot better than anyone in the shower and then he's like
[01:40:33] he's like i think i it i called to it and it came down and like i just like that he like yeah trusted himself but then also didn't really fight with frodo he was like all right i see how it is and like he's like i know some some magical just happened yeah yep i really like that yeah i hope they use it again i can't remember if they ever do at least in the movies yeah they need to have like one more epic rope thing like i want to see this like be full circle where sam knows the rope is a little
[01:41:02] more powerful now and yeah can prove to frodo that he ties a good knot yeah that'd be great all right well i don't think i'm just just too fresh well thanks for joining us on our journey of the fellowship of the first time readers until next time
[01:41:27] always good to lose i'm really curious when we're gonna meet faramir i can't wait to meet
[01:41:52] faramir i keep hearing he's so different in the book and i people are say if you're like excited for us to meet faramir and uh it also makes a lot more sense now that i'm like looking at the map as i'm reading like just like it's funny to look back every time i'm watching the movies the map doesn't exist to me and i'm just like everything makes sense sure that's yeah go here whatever but it likes it's just becoming so much more real yeah agreed looking at these paths