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The Lord of the Rings
Jan. 23rd, 2026 03:58 pmI've been "rereading" by way of the audiobook narrated by Andy Serkis. He's a brilliant narrator, with two caveats:
As of writing this post I'm about an hour off the end of The Fellowship of the Ring, with the sundering of the fellowship poised to come crashing down on my head. Legolas has been my favourite character since before the movies made him hot, but this time I'm finding myself caught up in the story of Frodo like never before. His yearning for the Shire and desperately reluctant acceptance of his calling have really touched me this time through. I've been especially caught on the moment, small as it is, when having been incapacitated by the Nazgûl blade he endures his agony in silence as his friends carry him to safety, so mindful he is already of the burden and danger he's causing them. When I first read The Lord of the Rings I was too young to know what war was, and I've been reading it my whole life the way I first read it then, as first and foremost a fantasy adventure, full of elves and magic and great quests. For some reason this time it is finally coming home to me how much this is a story of the Great War, and how much Frodo embodies the ordinary conscript: terrified, untrained, barely able to comprehend the grand events unfolding around him but determined to do his duty and empowered through unthinkable ordeals by the deep love and loyalty he has for his friends.
LotR was my second foray into transformative fandom, after getting hooked on fic via Harry Potter and Mugglenet. I haven't been active in the fandom since I was fifteen or so, and fortunately my "contributions" were all published on dead or forgotten sites under a different username - I remember writing one or two "tenth fellowship member" self-inserts, and something godawful about Legolas having a doomed romance with a mortal OC, and something even more godawful about Haldir (for some reason???) battling anorexia nervosa. (Edit after a pause and some googling: Oh god, the whole site that hosted all my teenage dreck has been re-archived on AO3. It's all still out there! Some of it still getting kudos and comments! The internet truly is forever.) Most of the fic I was reading back then is probably of a kind and thus better forgotten, but I'd like to link a couple of old favourites that have stuck with me over the years.
While the Ring Went South... by Thundera Tiger is a scrupulously canonverse fic slotted into the two week journey between Rivendell and Caradhras. It's genfic, full of adventures and largely centred on the rivalry/developing friendship between Legolas and Gimli. I reread some of it not that far back and it lived up to all my fond memories. The sequel, During a Journey in the Dark, doesn't seem to have made it to AO3 but is still available on Stories of Arda.
Celebdil-Galad and Tinlaure wrote a large volume of intensely smarmy, whumpy Legolas & Aragorn torturefic. I have not reread any of these since my teens, and I don't intend to, since I doubt my adult self will be able to reconnect with the emotions they once provoked even if they turn out to have been brilliantly written masterpieces. More likely, they were written by kids a couple of years older than me at the time and with commensurate skill. But I still remember them fondly.
- His singing is juuust bearable when he's doing a very low voice (like for Aragorn) but excruciating otherwise. I've had to skip past some of the poetry on these grounds.
- Or really 1a: his singsong Tom Bombadil voice captured the character in his purest essence, which is to say, it's so smug and jolly that the first sound of it made me want to punch something. I'm not a habitual Bombadil skipper (though admittedly that's more due to stubborn pride than any real appreciation for Tolkien's vision in those chapters) but Serkis' Bombadil defeated me utterly.
As of writing this post I'm about an hour off the end of The Fellowship of the Ring, with the sundering of the fellowship poised to come crashing down on my head. Legolas has been my favourite character since before the movies made him hot, but this time I'm finding myself caught up in the story of Frodo like never before. His yearning for the Shire and desperately reluctant acceptance of his calling have really touched me this time through. I've been especially caught on the moment, small as it is, when having been incapacitated by the Nazgûl blade he endures his agony in silence as his friends carry him to safety, so mindful he is already of the burden and danger he's causing them. When I first read The Lord of the Rings I was too young to know what war was, and I've been reading it my whole life the way I first read it then, as first and foremost a fantasy adventure, full of elves and magic and great quests. For some reason this time it is finally coming home to me how much this is a story of the Great War, and how much Frodo embodies the ordinary conscript: terrified, untrained, barely able to comprehend the grand events unfolding around him but determined to do his duty and empowered through unthinkable ordeals by the deep love and loyalty he has for his friends.
LotR was my second foray into transformative fandom, after getting hooked on fic via Harry Potter and Mugglenet. I haven't been active in the fandom since I was fifteen or so, and fortunately my "contributions" were all published on dead or forgotten sites under a different username - I remember writing one or two "tenth fellowship member" self-inserts, and something godawful about Legolas having a doomed romance with a mortal OC, and something even more godawful about Haldir (for some reason???) battling anorexia nervosa. (Edit after a pause and some googling: Oh god, the whole site that hosted all my teenage dreck has been re-archived on AO3. It's all still out there! Some of it still getting kudos and comments! The internet truly is forever.) Most of the fic I was reading back then is probably of a kind and thus better forgotten, but I'd like to link a couple of old favourites that have stuck with me over the years.
While the Ring Went South... by Thundera Tiger is a scrupulously canonverse fic slotted into the two week journey between Rivendell and Caradhras. It's genfic, full of adventures and largely centred on the rivalry/developing friendship between Legolas and Gimli. I reread some of it not that far back and it lived up to all my fond memories. The sequel, During a Journey in the Dark, doesn't seem to have made it to AO3 but is still available on Stories of Arda.
Celebdil-Galad and Tinlaure wrote a large volume of intensely smarmy, whumpy Legolas & Aragorn torturefic. I have not reread any of these since my teens, and I don't intend to, since I doubt my adult self will be able to reconnect with the emotions they once provoked even if they turn out to have been brilliantly written masterpieces. More likely, they were written by kids a couple of years older than me at the time and with commensurate skill. But I still remember them fondly.
