VenomVeVenom

Thoughts? Haven't listened to it yet

Ah, I've always really liked that melody! "Molossus" is my favorite track from the trilogy and one of the reasons is because of that theme.

Yes, JNH was much better than Zimmer. It's a shame he didn’t come back for TDKR. I agree, there’s some good thematic stuff in those scores. What I mean is that it wasn’t exactly hard to come up with a solid Batman theme and score when the main theme of the previous adaptation was just two notes. …it does get boring after the tenth time Gia hammers the theme in your ear, but it’s way more flexible than Zimmer’s minor third. I don’t hate Zimmer. I actually like some statements of his theme, like in the TDKR ending. But it baffles me that he got the chance to compose a theme for arguably the most famous hero ever, and he’s totally capable of it, yet he went with just two notes, a minor third. Always brass, always crescendo and diminuendo… same thing on repeat. It’s not that different from Giacchino’s dull approach of hammering the same motif until the audience gets tired. In my opinion, both Batman themes could be much better, but especially Zimmer’s.

It's really no contest when the bar was Zimmer’s lazy two-note Batmotif and some filler electronics...

Hmmm... I think the second one is more of a callback to that mysterious style Shore used in FotR, in the scene when Gandalf visits Bag End (right after "What about very old friends..."). I don’t think the two are directly related, but the first one does feels like a Dwarven Weakness and Redemption idea.

Hey! What's going on?

I mean the ascending minor chords thing. Yeah, the SM* as chords themselves still appear in TTT, but the ascending minor chords separated by minor-major thirds don't appear much after FotR IIRC In Helm's deep it's just the same two chords (usually Em-Gm) over and over again with different inversions

Yes, that’s because "SM" is part of a technique Shore used frequently in FotR but mostly abandoned in the later scores: essentially, he’d climb through minor chords spaced by alternating minor and major thirds, something like this: He used this a lot for moments of danger in FotR.

Ah, I see. Interesting interpretation, but I think that might just be a coincidence From a writing perspective, Howard might've simply gone, "I need an evil color, but straight i–iv is too basic… secundal harmony will do the trick!"

Yeah… because it’s literally the same theme in both tracks, lol. The one Doug calls "The Journey There":

Which moments exactly?

All of these are just variations of one type of “Evil chord” in the score. The i–iv (both add2) progression is what you’re hearing in these examples, and that’s what I call the “Evil chords” (sorry @Chen G., for me the real Ring chords are the minor ones a half-step apart! ). They also represent Sauron’s minions, which is why they form the Ringwraith theme. Then there’s the i–vi progression, which Monoverantus calls the “Mount Doom chords”, probably the purest expression of evil in the entire score (and they’re everywhere!). Evil ("Ringwraith") chords: The Prophecy 1:28-2:11 The Siege of Gondor 4:11-5:23 Saruman the White 3:24-4:04 Mount Doom ("pure evil") chords: Mount Doom 1:26-1:56 - Here Shore mixes both of them! The Three Hunters 1:50-2:05 The Road to Isengard 0:05-0:20 In my view, both progressions represent different facets of evil in Middle-earth. The i–iv reflects the ancient evil powers of ME (for example, the Ringwraiths or Sauron in the prologue). The i–vi conveys the purest form of evil... Mount Doom, Sauron’s presence, etc. Either way, they’re all just tools Shore uses to convey evil!

Listen closely to the violins at 03:27. Uhhh... doesn't that sound a bit familiar, or is it just me?

Yeah man, for me the theme’s just too long and too complex for how little it shows up in TPM. It didn’t really stick with me.

Young Anakin's theme. The only way I can describe it is by paraphrasing George Lucas: Too much chromaticism. Too little memorability.