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It's official: The Lord of the Rings is the world's favourite movie trilogy


Quintus

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The older I get, the sillier I find these comparisons. I'm perfectly happy enjoying The Lord of the Rings for what it is, and Star Wars for what it is. While they have many similarities (the influence of the story of The Lord of the Rings on Star Wars runs very deep indeed) they also have many distinctions.

 

Star Wars has the space setting, it has familial ties across both sides of the conflict (an element that admittedly gets soapy if played too often, see Sequel Trilogy, The) and it introduces us to a world under one centralized rule: a good one, in the prequel trilogy; an evil one, in the first trilogy.

 

Personally, I like The Lord of the Rings series much more. It has a greater sense of heft to it. There's not a single moment in Star Wars that touched my heart in a way that's anywhere near that of Sam picking Frodo up. Its just more profound that way. Even moments like the opening of the Hidden Door I find immensly moving to this day. Star Wars very rarely aims to move its audience, and its generally aiming at a younger demographic, anyway.

 

I also find the fact that all six movies were made by the same producer/writer/director and the same core creative team, and that each trilogy was essentially produced as one big movie in three parts, to be more conducive to a sense of an overall arc than the Star Wars approach. The way the films change styles (in terms of direction) between entries like Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back or between The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi is quite jarring, and you also get rather egregious continuity issues like Leia being Luke's sister all of a sudden, which is bollocks.

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20 minutes ago, Marian Schedenig said:

LEGO isn't a noun. The correct plural is "LEGO bricks".

And plus, I don't play LEGO. I create. I sculpt. I construct. I do not play. I'd like to see a child try and pull off some of the projects I'm working on!

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2 hours ago, Chen G. said:

The older I get, the sillier I find these comparisons. I'm perfectly happy enjoying The Lord of the Rings for what it is, and Star Wars for what it is.

 

Yes! Thank you! 

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5 minutes ago, Modest Expectations said:

Why is this topic not on the Tolkien sub-forum?

 

Because the poll includes Star Wars, and the Tolkien subforum is not to be spoiled with that crap. 

 

Edit: better include ;-)  so the touchy touchies don't get offended.

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Graphics isn't the first thing that comes to mind personally when it's time to criticize LoTR... you'd think it's because its graphics are highly-acclaimed and visionary, but it's moreso that graphics aren't too significant a factor compared to the dynamic of story and directing.

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I can’t really see it, it just says ”Star Wars”. Even so, the SW-brand is tainted by association and oversaturation, probably making people enjoy the OT less, or less willing to return to it.

 

The Hobbit trilogy was equally bad, but I think the general movie going market has forgotten about those movies, - they’re not top of mind - and they’re not as readily associated with the original LOTR trilogy anymore.

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The pole is specifically about trilogies. Not hexalogies and not ennealogies.

 

The irony is that, while the various trilogies and spinoffs of Star Wars don't feed into the original as directly and as easily as The Hobbit does into The Lord of the Rings, they do all carry the same title: "Star Wars".

 

So people are quicker to bind all the Star Wars properties together than they do The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

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The only thing this poll is proving is how ridiculous Netflix's behaviour on social media has gotten. Oh, and the irony that both film series won't stream anymore on their service at least for many years to come!

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14 hours ago, Holko said:

If only 3 was better!

It's brilliant. Not sure what people seem to have problems with; it's a perfect ending to that series and one DreamWorks' finest animated series they'll have for a while. Not only is Hidden World a great film, but it features one of the best scores of last year.

 

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Huh. I thought the villain was very weak and a lot of beats, including the final decision and through its proxy, the ending, felt completely unearned and not well-motivated. Fluff moments went on way too long. More subjective, but I hate that orange-ish brownish dusk light the final "battle" was staged in, it doesn't look pleasing at all and mutes out everything else. Just overall I like the first 2 visually a lot more, don't give a rat's ass about hair or water simulation being more accurate even if it is, they were more colorful and interesting-looking. I love the first 2 complete scores, listened to 3 maybe... 3 times since I've seen the film? I just don't find myself wanting to go back to it and get into it, it didn't draw me in the way the first 2 did.

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I’ll never understand the dragon movies.  Saw the first one which was fine I guess, but forgettable.  Saw the second one basically on the merits of people proclaiming the series’ quality, and won’t see the third because for whatever reason those movies just aren’t for me.

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11 minutes ago, Arpy said:

The Hidden World is Powell's greatest work!

On those first impressions it seemed much more of a mush with less immediately standout cues or bits, less of a structure and less noticeable and memorable themes than the previous ones.

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That's funny, it was the complete opposite for me, and I hadn't heard the score outside of the film then!

The themes are crystal clear, each developing over the course of the film and reaching a satisfying conclusion.

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I love that each movie has the exact same climax (Hiccup and Toothless get separated, Hiccup needs a pep talk). I’m assuming it’s not an intentional parallel or anything. But beyond that, the dragon and panda movies are way more fun and artistically of interest than anything Disney’s churned out in the past decade or so.

 

Also, Astrid > Leia or Rey. Thank you and good day. 

 

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1 hour ago, Arpy said:

It's An Unexpected Journey, too. The best of the three!

 

I’m on two minds of An Unexpected Journey. It’s lighter sensibility is a breath of fresh air for this series and the photography is fantastic. The Extended edition - which is meant for television - is wonderfully leisurely in its pacing. Theatrically, though, it was quite badly paced, and even when it really gets going (when they leave Rivendell) the action ain’t that great: there’s some real issues of geography during the Goblin-town chase.

 

Most importantly, An Unexpected Journey relies most heavily on Lord of the Rings nostalgia in revisiting familiar locations, familiar faces, familiar music and a familiar narrative. The other two films, set in the Wilderland, have a fresh sense of setting, as well as delving into a different narrative and themes.

 

Its the least of the three, methinks, but I still like it.

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8 hours ago, Chen G. said:

The pole is specifically about trilogies. Not hexalogies and not ennealogies.

 

My experience is, that if something isn’t super clear, people will interpret it in different ways. Just saying. But the two of us seem to agree overall.

 

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