The Hobbit

Do whole suits of Mithril armor exist, though?

No, just a shirt underneath the armor would be enough.

For those of you who can't watch the video, basically when Thurin gives Bilbo the Mithril shirt, the latter tells the former to give the shirt...after the battle, since he would need it more.

edited 25th Mar '15 5:01:19 PM by dRoy

Wearing a whole suit of mithril would be overkill. It'd be the fantasy equivalent of a very lightweight Iron Man suit.

On the worms, I assume the Wereworms were simply not aggressive creatures. They could dig tunnels because burrowing through Earth is what they do, the Orcs just set them on a favorable path. Battling a Dwarf-Elf-Man hybrid army may not be in their nature.

Speaking of which, Legolas in this trilogy was like Hawkeye, Captain America, Black Widow all rolled into one with slight sprinkle of Thor.

They don't even need to fight, just put some holes below.

edited 25th Mar '15 5:06:31 PM by dRoy

Does that make Gandalf Nick Fury?

Alternatively, if Bilbo had worn the mithril and The Ring, he could have sneak attacked the orcish leaders. For a hobbit with an invisibility ring he has a strange habit of failing to wear it when it would be useful. Such as scouting dragon hoards, major battles, fighting spiders, attempting to sneak out of an Elven dungeon...

You know...Gandalf IS based on Odin...who is also missing an eye.

Huh, that would have worked as well.

I think Thorin's logic in giving Bilbo Mithril was "You're fucking incompetent, but you're important to me, so I don't want you to die. Take this indestructible chainmail shirt."

edited 25th Mar '15 5:10:18 PM by SonOfSharknado

I think the main reason Bilbo doesn't use the Ring as much as he logically should is because the movies have that special screen thing for when we look at someone wearing the Ring, along with background whispering, and too much of that could get annoying. The alternative would be filming the scenes of invisible Bilbo, which just isn't as entertaining in a visual medium as it is in text because...y'know...visibility.

The worms might get scared by the sight and sound of an entire army roaring with rage. My take on is that the worms dug the holes but didn't advance further because as peaceful animals, they recognized the threat of those three combined armies and fled the fuck off.

Was there really anything that says that the worms were pacifists? I mean, for all we know it could be a bloodthirsty race of creatures.

Of course. There's no indication either way, but that's what I assumed given they were only used for transportation and not battle, so I deduced they were adverse to battle.

That's a fair reasoning, I guess.

I just assumed it was a massive plot hole, but I do love the idea that the giant toothy worm monsters don't like fighting.

Still doesn't explain why the orcs didn't use them to tunnel directly into Erebor, though.

...Maybe the worms were too busy digging into the plot.

My reasoning was the worms, assuming they're pacific creatures, would just panic if they dug too close to the Elvish and Dwarven armies. "OH SHIT OH SHIT THOSE GUYS ARE ARMED TO THE TEETH OH SHIT"

Also, I think Azog notes once that they can dig through Earth but not through the stone that makes Erebor. It's too thick.

edited 25th Mar '15 5:36:24 PM by Gaon

...Okay, Pacifist Wereworms is officially my new favorite headcanon. That's adorable.

I'd say.

Dune Sandworms > Tolkien Wereworms

They're like the eagles only they don't help out during the climaxes.

As for Thorin giving mithril shirt to Bilbo, either they didn't have time or skill to reform it to fit Thorin's bulk (maybe not enough mithril too), or he was proposing to Bilbo.

I reread the book last month. There's so much Ho Yay in the last movie, I can't blame the Bagginshield shippers.

Hobbit and LOTR are almost all dudes; what do you expect?

The book was all dudes, too.

I got the impression that digging through the ground with the wereworms took quite a while, so siccing them on the armies would have involved knowing exactly where everyone was going to be and how things were going to unfold long before they actually had reason to believe they would unfold that way (he might have predicted Dain, but he had no way of knowing the elves or the humans would be there at all).

So digging to an area close to where you know your enemies are going, then holding off on finishing the tunnel until an opportune moment (like after you know what the situation is) makes more sense.

edited 25th Mar '15 11:15:46 PM by KnownUnknown

The book was even more all dudes. Say what you will about the movies, but at least they tried a little bit for some female representation, which is more than Tolkien can say.

He can't say anything, in fact, on account of being dead and all.

"Tolkien Wereworms"

They aren't Tolkien Wereworms. They are Peter Jackson Wereworms.

In the books they are only mentioned in passing and never play a role in the story. It is unclear if they actually exist in Middle Earth or if they are merely a Hobbit legend.