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small correction: the factions in the war dont include the eagles as they come at the very end, its humans, dwarfes, elves, orcs and wargs that are counted as the factions.
Nitpick: in the book, Bard's black arrow wasn't particularly deadly nor otherwise special except that it was his favourite, "lucky" arrow that he'd always saved for last and made sure to recover after each use.
My most favorite baffling thing about this book... Spoilers! Spoilers! Spoilers! ...Is how the great, big battle just... gets skipped over. Because the view-point character gets knocked out five minutes into it. And has to hear a second hand account on how awesome it was! That one took some GUTS as a writer, even back then.
As one who has read "The Hobbit" recently, I love the amount of references that made it into this one. From the colors of the Dwarves caps, to the Trolls from "Hilda," to Smaug looking like the version from the 1977 animated "The Hobbit." Huge props on this episode! Great work!
3:23 So, the whole thing about Bilbo initially lying about how exactly he got the ring and only revealing the true story later was actually an in-universe reflection of Tolkien's later ret-con to make LoTR work? I've been a huge fan of those books for ages, and I never knew that.
Tolkien was big into the meta game - the Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit are meant to be the book of Westmarch written by Bilbo and Frodo that Tolkien has translated for us.
Or when Tauriel and Kili spent what felt like forever taking turns making last-minute saves from certain doom for each other until one of them finally rolled a natural 1...
nah man the part with dain ironfoot and his anti arrow balistas and the goats....(ok i dont know if thats not a part of the book but i still liked that part it was funny)
My college, strangely enough, has an incredible collection of J. R. R. Tolkien documents including the very first reference to the Hobbit written on a student’s exam.
if i recall correctly he was writing a 0 on a student's exam and he was inspired to write : in a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. And as they say, the rest is history
One of my all time favorite books but you got some errors in the video. Gandalf was with them most of the time till Mirkwood before leaving for a side-quest. The eagles did not take them to Lake-town but instead an area to West of Mirkwood, where they meet Beorn. At least in interviews Tolkien said he hated allegories. The taking of a cup angering the dragon comes from Beowulf.
A few others: the elven languages came first, a toy for the amusement of a developing linguist. Then thoughts of what kind of people would speak that language led to the first drafts of the Silmarillion. The Hobbit, which started as bedtime stories for Tolkien's children, was at first not connected to "Middle Earth". When The Hobbit was a success, Allen & Unwin wanted a sequel. Tolkien countered by asking if they could try publishing the Silmarillion. After looking at it, Allen & Unwin declared it unpublishable; it would never sell. So Tolkien wrote the Lord of the Rings, a sequel to The Hobbit--and to the Silmarillion, tying the two previously unrelated works together. Matt mentions The Hobbit's starting point as "The Shire". The Shire is never mentioned in The Hobbit. Not once. Bilbo's home is simply described being located in "The Hill". The Shire as the greater region that contained The Hill was not presented until The Lord of The Rings. Addendum the maps mention Hobbiton--but not the Shire.
3 for the elven Kings under the sky 7 for the dwarf Lords in their Halls of stone 9 for the mortal men doomed to die 1 for the dark lord on his dark throne One ring to rule them all One ring to find them One ring to bring them all And in the darkness bind them In the land of Mordor where the shadows lie.
The influence of this book could never be overstated. This, combined with war games, was responsible for D&D, which led to the creation of Ultima and Wizardry, which led to the creation of Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, etc. The concept of an RPG.
Where would modern fantasy be without Tolkien? At the very least elves would probably still be short toymakers instead of tall forest hermits. Pretty sure that was Tolkien's decision, and fantasy writers have been borrowing that image, and many others, ever since.
@@gunjfur8633 Older then the Hobbit and of similar folk lore origin to what became fantasy elves, but didn't fully have an identity as anything but fay tricksters, nor had association with christmas till about mid 1800's
Also, the order of events described is a little jumbled. The goblin/Gollum encounters and the eagle rescued happened before the giant spiders, as the party also had to venture through a confusing forest before reaching Lake Town. Also, Gandalf was around some of the time, not leaving the party completely until they reached the woods.
The Hobbit and Lord of The Rings books are definitely a different style of writing to modern books. Its hard to explain what I mean, but Tolkien and his contemporaries wrote differently compared to the writers of today. Its more.... dense.
I still can't get over that Gandalf hijacks Bilbo's house for a dwarven rave, then bamboozles Bilbo into tagging along when he had no interest in going...AND THEN has the temerity to abandon the party halfway through, right when things get seriously dangerous. There's RUDE, and then there's what Gandalf pulled! XD Also, wow, youtube's auto-captions recognize the word "burninate". I would not have expected that.
Apparently Tolkien used his experience from the trenches a lot more when telling the story of Sam and Frodo scaling the mountain, that whole section is apparently an allegory about the specific forms of hell that trench warfare put you through, even down to them forgetting the tastes of some foods.
@@vexaris1890No allegory, but he heavily leans on his experience in the war. And while he despises allegories there are clear themes visible in his story, like the devastation industrial military economies bring onto the world, the dangers of greed and power and that the ideal society is the humble but pleasurable hobbit society.
I would really like a link to the source of Tolkien specifically calling out the allegory regarding Smaug.. considering Tolkien being famous for stating that he hates allegory and any allegory you see in his writing is your own perspective
"The sort of rage that is seen only when rich folk that have more than they can enjoy suddenly lose something that they have long had but have never before used or wanted."
Allegory, for the record, is not the same thing as allusion or relevance. He very much intended The Hobbit to be conparative to the small village dwelling, everyday people of England and their capacity for resiliance, strength, and goodness, for example.
He hated the concept of allegory as in "allegorical stories" that have a fixed meaning to decode. He prefered for his works the term "applicability" (iirc) because in any narration of fantasy you will find elements and experiences (and similes) that relate to our own world.
@@kittydreamz86 one quote does not make something an alegpry. Dragons are known for being greedy, even the beowolf dragon, witch smaug was heavily based on was greedy. Allegory is not a baseline comparison between one thing and another. Sure it is a big part, but it is a bit more complicated.
A correction to the video. The "battle of the five armies", the "five armies" do not count the eagles as one of the armies, and not Beorn, neither the bats or the ravens. The five armies are Goblins, Wolves, Elves, Men, Dwarves and the fifth army... Wargs! Source is The Annotated Hobbit, ed. Douglas A. Anderson, p. 339
I was introduced to "The Hobbit" in school when we were made to read a few chapters out of a textbook. I HAD to go find the actual book. After I did find a copy ( at a thrift store), my Great Uncle gave me the "Lord of the Rings" books as well.
Not just skipping, but completely erasing. The journey through Mirkwood is pretty key for explaining the elves' motivation for the war. Surely you can do better EC.
Kind of a correction about Gandalf's relationship to Bilbo - he was more of a family friend than BFF, at least at the start of the story. He shows up, and Bilbo has no idea who he is until he gives his name. That said, they do have a strong friendship by the end.
Gollum was called so because of the gulping sound he makes at the end of his sentences, the book explicitly states that he calls himself “My precious (though LOTR complicates this somewhat)
Imagine talking about JRRT's work without mentioning how much his passionate Christianity, his linguistic scholarship, & his children shaped his world/stories.
Honestly, the journeying, genealogy and a lot of the narrative etc are pretty much inspired from scripture. You can definitely see his bible nerding in his creation of middle earth etc.
And how is childhood trauma from a South African tarantula bite, has cause spiders to be cemented as default "evil creature" in fantasy settings. From D&D to Minecraft.
@@Read_Scripture absolutely! And, as the Hobbit was primarily written to be a uniquely Anglo-Saxon series of fairy tales, it's no accident that its evil is all tied to Christian ethics. Greedy dragons, gluttonous trolls, wrathful goblins, worshippers of dark false powers.
The thing I love most about The Hobbit, is that it's not just the precursor to the standard epic fantasy, it's also the precursor to Pratchett-style snarky fantasy.
So, I might have misread that as "necrodancer" for a second.. I've been playing a lot of crypt of the necrodancer lately. Neuromancer makes more sense though lol
''The dragon is an allegory for the rich hoarding wealth'' Meanwhile Tolkien denied his whole life that any of his work is allegorical. Way to distort the truth to push a narrative.
Didn't he just say his books weren't an allegory for christianity? Also, I'm pretty sure he wasn't against allegory in general, he was just against authors claiming that their authorial intent is the only way to see their story and saying that readers aren't allowed to interpret them for themselves
Doesn’t this series always start with “literature can be read multiple ways”. Even if Tolkien didn’t intend for that to be the reading when he wrote the book, Smaug can easily be seen as a “hoarder” type.
Bilbo and Gandalf weren't originally bffs. Gandalf and Bilbo's grandfather (on his mother side) were bffs. Gandalf and Bilbo's friendship develops throughout the events of the "Hobbit''. Loved the video❤️
Bilbo: Stuff to do? Gandalf: I assure you, I would not abandon this venture were it not a matter of the most grave importance. And right now the fate of Middle Earth balances on getting Cheap Trick back together…..
Tolkien laid the foundation of fantasy. Without him, we wouldn’t have had other iconics like Harry Potter and A Song of Ice and Fire. Without him, not only would literature be different as a whole, but also film and television. It was the massive success of the Jackson films that helped kick off a revolution in Hollywood.
I love the LotR and especially The Hobbit but I don't like what Peter Jackson did with either. He left out the most important chapter of LotR "The Scouring of the Shire" and The Hobbit was just abysmal - totally changing the story and making it too doomy. Yes the original has the death of a major character which is sad (no spoiler) but it's a good death. The tone of the film is wrong and I can't help wondering what Guillomo del Torro would have made of it; we will never know.
I loved reading the Hobbit as a kid - and still do! I really like the edition I have because it's really big and has these beautiful illustrations by Michael Hague - some of them, like the Battle of Five Armies and the dwarves at Bilbo's home, are two-page spreads and truly a sight to behold, capturing the wondrous feel of the story perfectly.
Fingers crossed that one or more of the following is covered: 1) War and Peace 2) Les Miserables 3) Dante's Divine Comedy 4) Canterbury Tales 5) The Hunchback of Notre Dame 6) The Da Vinci Code
LOL. Except for Dracula, every book you have covered thus far was required reading for me in high school. What is next "So You Haven't Read - Crabbe" or "So You Haven't Read - The Chrysalids" I should start a bingo card.
"Gandal rolls a natural 20 on his persuasion check." Wrong. The DM cannot override player choice with rolls. If Bilbo went, then it's because his player really wanted to go and he just needed something to justify his character's motives.
Wrong. The DM can override any rule they wish. It's just that it's usually a bad idea to force PCs into doing things without the player's approval if you want to keep your players. Also, the Dwarves are clearly NPCs, and they still needed to be persuaded. And furthermore, there are plenty of examples where the dice are used to override player choice: Player: I choose to jump across the chasm DM: Make an Athletics check Player: DM: That's a failed check, but I cannot override your choice, so you jump across the chasm and land safely on the other side.
Smaug isn't the only person in that movie who references greed. Movie Thorin concentrates on the needs of his entire party, but book Thorin is all about "My" this and "My" that. His greed at the end is totally foreshadowed in the Unexpected Party. Very nice, by the way.
Andy Circus gave a great performance in LotR, but your interpretation of Gollum's physical appearance is much closer to what I had imagined. also, big fan of that "Cheap Trick" joke! this series has been great, and I can't wait for the next one!
I dad was a huge fan of The Hobbit and gave me his copy of The Hobbit which I still have today and has a really cool sleeve and has riding all over it. It was awesome.
“As Tolkien pointed out, Smaug being an allegory for the rich and wealthy upper class..” Except that Tolkien never stated that anywhere and, if I recall, he actually said that he “cordially dislikes allegory and all of its manifestations”! So yeah, you’re outright lying Extra Credits!
I hope you guys are planning to review "A Christmas Carol" for the holiday season. That timeless classic has been reimagined more times than I can count.
4:34 the eagles don’t fly them to lake town, they only fly them to the Carock where the meet Beorn and make their way through Mirkwood. At that point they get captured by the wood elves and escape down the river to lake town. You cut out like a quarter of the book.
1) the great eagles don't fly the group to Lake Town. 2) don't use the term allegory when dealing with Tolkien's literature 3) the great eagles were not the fifth army. The wargs/wolves were.
The irony of this framing device is that in D&D, they're called Halflings, not Hobbits. This is because the Tolkien estate sued TSR over the use of the name back in the day.
In the book, Bilbo wasn't friends with Gandalf until AFTEr finishing the adventure. In the book, Gandalf was searching for a descendent of th eTuk family (one of the few Hobbit families who like adventures) and he found Bilbo for the run. Bilbo REJECTS the request and Gandalf THEN decides to put the marker on Bilbo's door (without Bilbo knowing) to get Bilbo on the adventure anyway. Also, to justify the retcon, Tolkien wrote that the OG Hbbit book is the version that Bilbo published while the newest version is the official one "that nobody but Frodo and Gandalf" knows about.
This book was one of my absolute favorites. Still read it every once in a while too! Oh! I also read it after a test along with the entire “Lord of the Rings” series in less than 4 hours.
In an alternate timeline Bilbo fails and is consumed by Smaug's Dragon-fire along with the one ring. For centuries afterward scholars would debate the cause of the sudden self-destruction of Mordor and Sauron while Conspiracy Theorists would insist the one ring still exists somewhere.
Do you have a citation for that bit about Tolkein saying that Smaug was an allegory for the rich hoarding wealth? I've been doing some searching and haven't turned up anything.
I feel so called out, with an early 90's edition hard cover and the audio book, waiting on me to do more then skim the drawings and finding he misty mountain poem..
My friends and I will flip between saying "I've been Bagginsed" if we're feeling railroaded by the DM, and saying "I'm Bagginsed" if we're feeling like too little butter scraped over too little bread.
….Question. When did Tolkien, a man who has gone on record saying his dislike of allegory, ever say that Smaug was an allegory for the wealthy upperclass? I want to know when and where he said that. I can’t believe he would be that contradictory.
Direct quote from The Hobbit "His rage passes description - the sort of rage that is only seen when rich folk that have more than they can enjoy suddenly lose something that they have long had but have never before used or wanted"
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Im doing the hobbit rn in school thank you guys ( i read it 21 times )
small correction: the factions in the war dont include the eagles as they come at the very end, its humans, dwarfes, elves, orcs and wargs that are counted as the factions.
Plz do The Lord of the Rings!
Do the Lord of the rings
Please consider not doing any more sponsorships with them! Hello Fresh mistreats their workers and suppresses unionisation efforts!
Nitpick: in the book, Bard's black arrow wasn't particularly deadly nor otherwise special except that it was his favourite, "lucky" arrow that he'd always saved for last and made sure to recover after each use.
As long as it's not depicted as a ballista
I was going to nitpick that Gandalf and Bilbo weren't friends before the gathering with the dwarfs. Thus, the "good morning" conversation 😅.
As long as we're nitpicking, the eagles didn't fly the hobbit and friends to laketown.
@@monkeybabble correct me if i am wrong, but gandalf kenw Bilbo in his youth, when he was visiting Bilbos's mother. grandmother.
@@federicoapl They were...friends is a strong word. It's like saying you're friends with your parents friends.
My most favorite baffling thing about this book...
Spoilers!
Spoilers!
Spoilers!
...Is how the great, big battle just... gets skipped over. Because the view-point character gets knocked out five minutes into it. And has to hear a second hand account on how awesome it was!
That one took some GUTS as a writer, even back then.
The kinda bad Hobbit movies would have been improved by that.
@@poilboiler Honestly, I mostly liked & enjoyed the Hobbit Movie trilogy... but yeah, they're deeply flawed. Won't even pretend otherwise.
Kind of what happened to Tolkien himself in real life, during WW1.
The book originates with a story he told his kids when they were small, he did not want to into gory details.
when they turned 2 pages into a 2 and half hour moive... I wish they didn't.
As one who has read "The Hobbit" recently, I love the amount of references that made it into this one. From the colors of the Dwarves caps, to the Trolls from "Hilda," to Smaug looking like the version from the 1977 animated "The Hobbit." Huge props on this episode! Great work!
Thank you!
@@extrahistory Most welcome!
I also want to congratulate them on Bilbo's beard. That etching pattern is near and dear to my heart.
I loved the trolls too :)
Also, a reference to Fantasy from 'The Pagemaster' at 4:20 ... I might be the only one who remembers that movie.
3:23 So, the whole thing about Bilbo initially lying about how exactly he got the ring and only revealing the true story later was actually an in-universe reflection of Tolkien's later ret-con to make LoTR work? I've been a huge fan of those books for ages, and I never knew that.
Tolkien was big into the meta game - the Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit are meant to be the book of Westmarch written by Bilbo and Frodo that Tolkien has translated for us.
Hobbits have the highest base stealth score, and some of the highest magic resistance scores in the setting.
And they can reroll natural 1s
I was raised on Tolkein literature, and this is always a good story.
Agreed!
This is always a GREAT story.
Yeah Jolkien Rolkien Rolkien Tolkien was an outstanding writer!
You forgot the part where Legolas jumped defied physics but running across a bridge of falling debris. The most important part of the book.
My most hated moment
Or when Tauriel and Kili spent what felt like forever taking turns making last-minute saves from certain doom for each other until one of them finally rolled a natural 1...
nah man the part with dain ironfoot and his anti arrow balistas and the goats....(ok i dont know if thats not a part of the book but i still liked that part it was funny)
@@rmsgrey "I could have something down my trousers"
Because it's perfectly normal to walk on fresh snow and not sink...
My college, strangely enough, has an incredible collection of J. R. R. Tolkien documents including the very first reference to the Hobbit written on a student’s exam.
if i recall correctly he was writing a 0 on a student's exam and he was inspired to write : in a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.
And as they say, the rest is history
Marquette University?
They bought his archive back in the mid-50s for just $5000!
@@spangelicious837 Correct.
Looking forward to "So You Haven't Read The Silmarillian."
Heck, just an episode on The Children of Hurin would make my year.
💯💯💯💯💯💯💯💯
noooo... not Narn i Chin Hurin... please no 😢
The Silmarillion....now THAT'S the stuff!
Controversial opinion….the Chikdren of Húrin is THE best work of Tolkien.
Yes, the Silmarillion!
One of my all time favorite books but you got some errors in the video. Gandalf was with them most of the time till Mirkwood before leaving for a side-quest. The eagles did not take them to Lake-town but instead an area to West of Mirkwood, where they meet Beorn. At least in interviews Tolkien said he hated allegories. The taking of a cup angering the dragon comes from Beowulf.
A few others: the elven languages came first, a toy for the amusement of a developing linguist. Then thoughts of what kind of people would speak that language led to the first drafts of the Silmarillion. The Hobbit, which started as bedtime stories for Tolkien's children, was at first not connected to "Middle Earth". When The Hobbit was a success, Allen & Unwin wanted a sequel. Tolkien countered by asking if they could try publishing the Silmarillion. After looking at it, Allen & Unwin declared it unpublishable; it would never sell. So Tolkien wrote the Lord of the Rings, a sequel to The Hobbit--and to the Silmarillion, tying the two previously unrelated works together.
Matt mentions The Hobbit's starting point as "The Shire". The Shire is never mentioned in The Hobbit. Not once. Bilbo's home is simply described being located in "The Hill". The Shire as the greater region that contained The Hill was not presented until The Lord of The Rings.
Addendum the maps mention Hobbiton--but not the Shire.
3 for the elven Kings under the sky
7 for the dwarf Lords in their Halls of stone
9 for the mortal men doomed to die
1 for the dark lord on his dark throne
One ring to rule them all
One ring to find them
One ring to bring them all
And in the darkness bind them
In the land of Mordor where the shadows lie.
The influence of this book could never be overstated. This, combined with war games, was responsible for D&D, which led to the creation of Ultima and Wizardry, which led to the creation of Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, etc. The concept of an RPG.
and Renaiissance Fairs
Where would modern fantasy be without Tolkien? At the very least elves would probably still be short toymakers instead of tall forest hermits. Pretty sure that was Tolkien's decision, and fantasy writers have been borrowing that image, and many others, ever since.
Others would have found inspiration in Nordic stories, perhaps not explode like he ended up, but he also didn't get famous over night.
reminds me of a translation of hobbit I have read in elementary school...
where sting was apparently made by "gnomes of gondolin" xD
Arent Christmas Elves also a modern invention?
@@gunjfur8633 Older then the Hobbit and of similar folk lore origin to what became fantasy elves, but didn't fully have an identity as anything but fay tricksters, nor had association with christmas till about mid 1800's
@@insaincaldo
Remimds me of how the only named Elf from Norse Myth was a Smith, even though thats more of a Dwarf trait
I'm sure one of these days you'll come across a book I actually haven't read. There's so many that odds are good one of them is on your list.
Challenge Accepted!
Also, the order of events described is a little jumbled. The goblin/Gollum encounters and the eagle rescued happened before the giant spiders, as the party also had to venture through a confusing forest before reaching Lake Town. Also, Gandalf was around some of the time, not leaving the party completely until they reached the woods.
The Hobbit and Lord of The Rings books are definitely a different style of writing to modern books. Its hard to explain what I mean, but Tolkien and his contemporaries wrote differently compared to the writers of today. Its more.... dense.
All those trees
Tolkien had a famous hatred of allegory. He said repeatedly that nothing in his books was an allegory of anything.
I still can't get over that Gandalf hijacks Bilbo's house for a dwarven rave, then bamboozles Bilbo into tagging along when he had no interest in going...AND THEN has the temerity to abandon the party halfway through, right when things get seriously dangerous.
There's RUDE, and then there's what Gandalf pulled! XD
Also, wow, youtube's auto-captions recognize the word "burninate". I would not have expected that.
Homestar Runner's reach is far.
@@maddie9602 "WAH! That is not a small [reach]! That is a BIG [reach]! What are we gonna do?!"
I see this as a setup so that when he returns he can say "If you're referring to the incident with the dragon, I was barely involved."
Apparently Tolkien used his experience from the trenches a lot more when telling the story of Sam and Frodo scaling the mountain, that whole section is apparently an allegory about the specific forms of hell that trench warfare put you through, even down to them forgetting the tastes of some foods.
Oh yeah. The Dead Marshes were the no-mans-land in the rain.
No, no allegory. Tolkien hated allegories.
@@vexaris1890No allegory, but he heavily leans on his experience in the war. And while he despises allegories there are clear themes visible in his story, like the devastation industrial military economies bring onto the world, the dangers of greed and power and that the ideal society is the humble but pleasurable hobbit society.
I would really like a link to the source of Tolkien specifically calling out the allegory regarding Smaug.. considering Tolkien being famous for stating that he hates allegory and any allegory you see in his writing is your own perspective
"The sort of rage that is seen only when rich folk that have more than they can enjoy suddenly lose something that they have long had but have never before used or wanted."
Allegory, for the record, is not the same thing as allusion or relevance. He very much intended The Hobbit to be conparative to the small village dwelling, everyday people of England and their capacity for resiliance, strength, and goodness, for example.
He hated the concept of allegory as in "allegorical stories" that have a fixed meaning to decode. He prefered for his works the term "applicability" (iirc) because in any narration of fantasy you will find elements and experiences (and similes) that relate to our own world.
@@kittydreamz86 thank you!
@@kittydreamz86 one quote does not make something an alegpry. Dragons are known for being greedy, even the beowolf dragon, witch smaug was heavily based on was greedy. Allegory is not a baseline comparison between one thing and another. Sure it is a big part, but it is a bit more complicated.
A correction to the video. The "battle of the five armies", the "five armies" do not count the eagles as one of the armies, and not Beorn, neither the bats or the ravens. The five armies are Goblins, Wolves, Elves, Men, Dwarves and the fifth army... Wargs!
Source is The Annotated Hobbit, ed. Douglas A. Anderson, p. 339
There were two armies of dwarves. Those in the mountain and those coming to rescue them.
@@mikesands4681 the ones in the mountain don't get to be their own army, since there's only 12 of them.
@@twistedtachyon5877 13
For anyone curious, the Tengwar (Elvish script) at 7:36 is in English and says “like Elvish”
I'm actually reading this right now! What hilarious timing!
Totally planned that! :)
Finally, Gandalf takes his rightful place as a conjurer of Cheap Trick!
I was introduced to "The Hobbit" in school when we were made to read a few chapters out of a textbook. I HAD to go find the actual book. After I did find a copy ( at a thrift store), my Great Uncle gave me the "Lord of the Rings" books as well.
Gandalf: Do not take me for some conjurer of cheap tricks!
Also Gandalf: 2:25
Love this reference.
Skipping Beorn and Mirkwood is unforgivable! Roll a charisma check for forgiveness!
Not just skipping, but completely erasing. The journey through Mirkwood is pretty key for explaining the elves' motivation for the war. Surely you can do better EC.
Kind of a correction about Gandalf's relationship to Bilbo - he was more of a family friend than BFF, at least at the start of the story. He shows up, and Bilbo has no idea who he is until he gives his name. That said, they do have a strong friendship by the end.
I’m pretty sure bilbo just forgot about him
Gollum was called so because of the gulping sound he makes at the end of his sentences, the book explicitly states that he calls himself “My precious (though LOTR complicates this somewhat)
Cat dragon Smaug from the animated movie is my favorite version. His monologue about how hardcore awesome he is gives me freaking chills
Love the Pagemaster reference! One of my favorite movies as a child and totally an inspiration for me studying library science
You know, the hobbit is one of my favorite stories. So I cannot thank you enough for this episode.
Imagine talking about JRRT's work without mentioning how much his passionate Christianity, his linguistic scholarship, & his children shaped his world/stories.
They have and did.
Honestly, the journeying, genealogy and a lot of the narrative etc are pretty much inspired from scripture. You can definitely see his bible nerding in his creation of middle earth etc.
And how is childhood trauma from a South African tarantula bite, has cause spiders to be cemented as default "evil creature" in fantasy settings. From D&D to Minecraft.
@@Read_Scripture absolutely! And, as the Hobbit was primarily written to be a uniquely Anglo-Saxon series of fairy tales, it's no accident that its evil is all tied to Christian ethics. Greedy dragons, gluttonous trolls, wrathful goblins, worshippers of dark false powers.
Not to mention his travels, including Lauterbrunnen.
"One ring to rule them all,
One ring to find them.
One ring to bring them all,
and in the darkness, bind them."
Ash nazg durbatuluk,
Ash nazg gimbatul,
Ash nazg thrakatuluk,
Agh burzum-ishi krimpatul.
The thing I love most about The Hobbit, is that it's not just the precursor to the standard epic fantasy, it's also the precursor to Pratchett-style snarky fantasy.
GNU Sir Terry ❤
Uh...the giant eagles flew Bilbo to Lake Town? No '14 little birds bonfire' escape? No Beorn? No Mirkwood spiders? No Wood Elves? No barrel ride?
I love how Gandalf's level is [REDACTED].
If you read the Silmarillion, you would know why.
He's a Notorious Monster!
I love the burninating reference, and all the Ballad of Bilbo Baggins references. Perfection!
2:32 "you get captured by trolls"
Correction those are Hilda trolls
I await the day this covers Neuromancer, so we can finally, finally, have the extra sci-fi series about William Gibson we deserve
This. Or maybe even the Expanse, the last book has just released, complete series is a good time for an overview.
So, I might have misread that as "necrodancer" for a second.. I've been playing a lot of crypt of the necrodancer lately.
Neuromancer makes more sense though lol
Oh god yes
''The dragon is an allegory for the rich hoarding wealth'' Meanwhile Tolkien denied his whole life that any of his work is allegorical. Way to distort the truth to push a narrative.
Didn't he just say his books weren't an allegory for christianity?
Also, I'm pretty sure he wasn't against allegory in general, he was just against authors claiming that their authorial intent is the only way to see their story and saying that readers aren't allowed to interpret them for themselves
Doesn’t this series always start with “literature can be read multiple ways”. Even if Tolkien didn’t intend for that to be the reading when he wrote the book, Smaug can easily be seen as a “hoarder” type.
Finally one I've read, and I've listened to that song on repeat more than once 🤣
It's a dang good one!
Bilbo and Gandalf weren't originally bffs.
Gandalf and Bilbo's grandfather (on his mother side) were bffs.
Gandalf and Bilbo's friendship develops throughout the events of the "Hobbit''.
Loved the video❤️
The plural of index is indices, and the plural of medium is media.
Bilbo: Stuff to do?
Gandalf: I assure you, I would not abandon this venture were it not a matter of the most grave importance.
And right now the fate of Middle Earth balances on getting Cheap Trick back together…..
How'd you fit this book into 1 episode? I thought it'd take at least 3! 😉
Tolkien laid the foundation of fantasy. Without him, we wouldn’t have had other iconics like Harry Potter and A Song of Ice and Fire. Without him, not only would literature be different as a whole, but also film and television. It was the massive success of the Jackson films that helped kick off a revolution in Hollywood.
I love the LotR and especially The Hobbit but I don't like what Peter Jackson did with either. He left out the most important chapter of LotR "The Scouring of the Shire" and The Hobbit was just abysmal - totally changing the story and making it too doomy. Yes the original has the death of a major character which is sad (no spoiler) but it's a good death. The tone of the film is wrong and I can't help wondering what Guillomo del Torro would have made of it; we will never know.
I loved reading the Hobbit as a kid - and still do!
I really like the edition I have because it's really big and has these beautiful illustrations by Michael Hague - some of them, like the Battle of Five Armies and the dwarves at Bilbo's home, are two-page spreads and truly a sight to behold, capturing the wondrous feel of the story perfectly.
I love this but thanks for the unexpected cry. RIP Mr Nimoy, you amazing person
2:31 - I LOVE that you used the Hilda trolls, it's such a subtle and awesome nod to such a great series!
Fun fact J. R. R. Tolkien was inspired by Finnish mythology for his stories
Partly yes
More Anglo-Saxon mythology than Finnish... Finnish + Welsh were the prime influences for his languages though.
I have re-read The Hobbit so many times I can recite the first page. Y'all did a great job
Fingers crossed that one or more of the following is covered:
1) War and Peace
2) Les Miserables
3) Dante's Divine Comedy
4) Canterbury Tales
5) The Hunchback of Notre Dame
6) The Da Vinci Code
The Hobbit was my very first "proper" book. I still have my parents' old version
LOL. Except for Dracula, every book you have covered thus far was required reading for me in high school. What is next "So You Haven't Read - Crabbe" or "So You Haven't Read - The Chrysalids" I should start a bingo card.
I've never even heard of those two. What's a chrysalid?
I actually have read this because I had a 6th grade English teacher obsessed with Tolkien
You completely forgot Beorn! You know, the giant shape-changing bear who personally wins the Battle of the 5 Armies for the heroes? C'mon man.
"Gandal rolls a natural 20 on his persuasion check."
Wrong. The DM cannot override player choice with rolls. If Bilbo went, then it's because his player really wanted to go and he just needed something to justify his character's motives.
Wrong. The DM can override any rule they wish. It's just that it's usually a bad idea to force PCs into doing things without the player's approval if you want to keep your players.
Also, the Dwarves are clearly NPCs, and they still needed to be persuaded.
And furthermore, there are plenty of examples where the dice are used to override player choice:
Player: I choose to jump across the chasm
DM: Make an Athletics check
Player:
DM: That's a failed check, but I cannot override your choice, so you jump across the chasm and land safely on the other side.
Love the way you drew professor Tolkien, writing happily under a tree. Awesome!
“C’mon, boys, we’re going to an adventure!”
Love the Hilda trolls and the Trogdor reference. Keep up the good work!
Smaug isn't the only person in that movie who references greed. Movie Thorin concentrates on the needs of his entire party, but book Thorin is all about "My" this and "My" that. His greed at the end is totally foreshadowed in the Unexpected Party.
Very nice, by the way.
Andy Circus gave a great performance in LotR, but your interpretation of Gollum's physical appearance is much closer to what I had imagined. also, big fan of that "Cheap Trick" joke! this series has been great, and I can't wait for the next one!
I remember both reading and listening to it as a book on CD back in high school, it’s always one of my favorite books! Thanks for the video!
I love how they used the troll design from Hilda. It’s nice to know Extra Credits watches quality shows.
I dad was a huge fan of The Hobbit and gave me his copy of The Hobbit which I still have today and has a really cool sleeve and has riding all over it. It was awesome.
I like how the order of information is 'leonard nimoy song' and THEN 'Tolkien character'.
In the Middle of the Earth
In the land of the Shire
Lives a brave little Hobbit
Whom we all admire...
“As Tolkien pointed out, Smaug being an allegory for the rich and wealthy upper class..”
Except that Tolkien never stated that anywhere and, if I recall, he actually said that he “cordially dislikes allegory and all of its manifestations”! So yeah, you’re outright lying Extra Credits!
2:31 neat reference to Hilda, with the rock trolls. one of my favorite series' of all time.
I hope you guys are planning to review "A Christmas Carol" for the holiday season. That timeless classic has been reimagined more times than I can count.
4:34 the eagles don’t fly them to lake town, they only fly them to the Carock where the meet Beorn and make their way through Mirkwood. At that point they get captured by the wood elves and escape down the river to lake town. You cut out like a quarter of the book.
My favorite book! Yayayayayayay this makes me so happy! Don't forget, it's a Christmas story, it has elves!
Been getting more into middle earth again. Glad to see The Hobbit get some love!
I swear to god i just rewatched the series over the past 6 days and now this drops. I am starting to question if life does revolve around me.
I loved the subtle strongbad Tragdore the burninator reference.
Coming full circle between Extra Sci-Fi and Extra Literature, are we?
We couldn't help ourselves!
Gandalf, literally conjuring up Cheap Trick, I love that pun.
Far over, the misty mountains cold…
Suggestion for a book to explain.
PLEASE do The Outsiders. It's one of my favorite High school reads, and more people should know of it.
1) the great eagles don't fly the group to Lake Town.
2) don't use the term allegory when dealing with Tolkien's literature
3) the great eagles were not the fifth army. The wargs/wolves were.
The irony of this framing device is that in D&D, they're called Halflings, not Hobbits. This is because the Tolkien estate sued TSR over the use of the name back in the day.
6:20 "Burninate" the whole village; nice TROGDOR reference right there! 🤘
I love the name of the coffee shop, "Smaug Roast" LOL!!!!!!!
Oh, and thank you so much for not bringing in the talking chair!
In the book, Bilbo wasn't friends with Gandalf until AFTEr finishing the adventure. In the book, Gandalf was searching for a descendent of th eTuk family (one of the few Hobbit families who like adventures) and he found Bilbo for the run. Bilbo REJECTS the request and Gandalf THEN decides to put the marker on Bilbo's door (without Bilbo knowing) to get Bilbo on the adventure anyway.
Also, to justify the retcon, Tolkien wrote that the OG Hbbit book is the version that Bilbo published while the newest version is the official one "that nobody but Frodo and Gandalf" knows about.
Haven't seen this series! Book reviews! A whole new reason to check out this channel.
This book was one of my absolute favorites. Still read it every once in a while too!
Oh! I also read it after a test along with the entire “Lord of the Rings” series in less than 4 hours.
We power read through most of this series too!
I’m so glad this series is happening
I really like your presentation of this story. D&D style!
I think i founded my favourite episode of extra credits ever. I love hobbits and Lotr so much
In an alternate timeline Bilbo fails and is consumed by Smaug's Dragon-fire along with the one ring. For centuries afterward scholars would debate the cause of the sudden self-destruction of Mordor and Sauron while Conspiracy Theorists would insist the one ring still exists somewhere.
Do you have a citation for that bit about Tolkein saying that Smaug was an allegory for the rich hoarding wealth? I've been doing some searching and haven't turned up anything.
I feel so called out, with an early 90's edition hard cover and the audio book, waiting on me to do more then skim the drawings and finding he misty mountain poem..
My friends and I will flip between saying "I've been Bagginsed" if we're feeling railroaded by the DM, and saying "I'm Bagginsed" if we're feeling like too little butter scraped over too little bread.
as a person who has read this book I love this video
The best part about the Leonard Nimoy song is that he’s the only one in the video without pointed ears.
The Eagles didn't fly them to Laketown, but dropped them on that rock before Mirkwood...
….Question. When did Tolkien, a man who has gone on record saying his dislike of allegory, ever say that Smaug was an allegory for the wealthy upperclass? I want to know when and where he said that. I can’t believe he would be that contradictory.
Direct quote from The Hobbit
"His rage passes description - the sort of rage that is only seen when rich folk that have more than they can enjoy suddenly lose something that they have long had but have never before used or wanted"
I had three weeks to read this for school and now it's due tomorrow and I read 3 pages so now I'm here