Many people seem familiar with Lord of the Rings via the Jackson movies, but there’s a much longer tradition of artists depicting scenes from the books. Plus of course, two TV / movie series that bring some great voicework & songs (Rankin-Bass’ version) and fascinating animation (Ralph Bakshi’s), despite their overall flaws.

But in terms of alternate illustrators, check out the Brothers Hildebrandt, for example.

Personally, I’m enjoying this Argentinian master’s version because the characters are no longer as wholesome-looking as in other depictions, giving the scene slight horror overtones. The ammonite is a nice bonus, too!

Some more Chichoni art here:
https://lemm.ee/post/27712402

  • NacktmullMEnglish
    3·
    1 month ago

    Never cared much for the Jackson movies, to me they are completely void of the fairytale-like magic the books have. Then there is my second biggest complaint, that his orks look like fucking zombies. That is not surprising, considering where Jackson is coming from (Braindead, lol) but still, orks and goblins are called greenskins for a reason damn it!

    • luciole (he/him)@beehaw.orgEnglish
      3·
      1 month ago

      Agreed. What he did with The Hobbit in particular was utter nonsense. He made a whimsy fairy tale into Lord of The Rings “Reloaded” or something.

    • JohnnyEnzymeOPMEnglish
      2·
      1 month ago

      his orks look like fucking zombies

      LOL, I never thought of that, but I guess its true.

      to me they are completely void of the fairytale-like magic the books have.

      I tend to agree with that. So many of these Hollywood movies are utterly caught up with visuals & sound, building tension and manipulating audience reaction. Me, I’d love to see a BBC-made series adaptation if a budget could be found. One that could pay a little more attention to details and cover more of the text, such as including the Bombadil section, a proper return to Hobbiton, and the true coverage of Saruman’s demise.

      Another annoying thing for me is that some critical sections of the movie were shot but not included in the regular film, so you could only see these in the extended versions. For example, somewhere in the search below you can find:

      • the FULL council of Elrond scene, in which Gandalf speaks the ring’s inscription, the sky turns black, and even the elves quake in fear
      • Saruman and Wormtongue meet their doom, even if it’s not accurate to the books
      • the amazing/hilarious appearance of the “Mouth of Sauron” before the final battle
      • hmm, am I missing anything…?

      https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=lotr+extra+scenes

      That said, I’m still kind of impressed by the movies given that Jackson and his little team were seemingly writing the adaptation on the fly, often finishing pages literally hours before they were shot. Really poor move by the studio IMO, which later wound up turning The Hobbit in to a total mess. Not that they likely cared due to money being their bottom line.

      Btw, I do consider the extended ‘making of LotR’ movies to be significantly better films than LotR itself.