Hi, So, Just A Question, Hadn't The OG Bench Already Been Replaced Before? The One In The Tv Show Is

Some of y’all are not appreciating Bilbo Baggins enough. I am here to remedy that. This guy has:

• somehow managed to establish himself as a respectable, staid hobbit by the time he was fifty, despite being both a grandson of Bullroarer Took and the Shire champion of pretty much every aiming-game known to hobbitkind

• had an in-depth debate on pleasantries with a random guy passing by in the street, who turned out to be GANDALF

• collapsed in front of his own fire shaking and muttering “struck by lightning” over and over again in response to hearing about dragons and danger

• mind you, this was after he screamed loud enough to startle a roomful of Dwarves

• signed up for a dangerous quest completely outside of his league out of spite

• when told to scout out a mysterious light, saw some trolls, and instead of reporting back with the information, decided to PICK THE TROLLS POCKET

• arrived in Rivendell for the first time and said it “smelled like elves”

• upon meeting a strange creature that visibly wanted to eat him, he decided to play a riddle game with him- and guessed pretty much every one, and made up his own riddles, afraid and alone, that not only were good and full of linguistic puns, but actually stumped the other guy- AND THEN CHEATED AND WON WITH A QUESTION

• showed mercy to said strange creature who wanted to kill him, and was now standing between him and freedom

• eavesdropped on the dwarves arguing over whether to try to save him, then popped up casually smack in the middle of them just as they were debating

• somehow managed to sleep like a log at the really really high eyrie full of wild predators

• found himself in a bad situation, said eff it, and turned around and antagonized and fought off an insane amount of man eating spiders, like enough of them that fifty was a small portion, by singing at them with incredibly complex and punny insulting songs composed on the spot, while simultaneously slaying them in multitudes despite having zero combat training. Seriously, we don’t discuss enough how epic the spider scene is.

• broke a company of dwarves out of the very secure prison of the Elvenking by inventing white water rafting with barrels

• charmed his way out of being eaten by a dragon

• stole the frickin Arkenstone from the guys who employed him, one of whom was a king

• took part in an epic battle, only to be knocked out in the first ten minutes and miss the entire thing

• was named elf-friend by the guy who’s prisoners he sprung

• wrote his own autobiography, complete with all the narrative recognition of his own heroics

• spent 60 years writing said autobiography

• taught his lower class neighbor’s kid how to read

• taught his nephew Elvish- not only Sindarin, but Quenya too

• spent decades telling his cousins his own story as fairy tales, complete with character impressions accurate enough that one of them was able to fool a servant of the Enemy with a second hand impression

• used the One Ring of Power to hide from his neighbors

• planned an elaborate feast with multiple social faux pas to mess with his neighbors, complete with a purposefully bewildering speech and culminating in him vanishing into thin air in front of everyone

• left his cousins and neighbors very unsubtle passive aggressive gifts in his will

• settled into Rivendell, randomly befriended the heir to the throne of like half of Middle Earth, and apparently spent his time writing very personal poems about his hosts and reciting them to crowds of elves

• after being invited to a Council of basically every major kingdom in the continent, spent a quarter of the time reciting vague poems about his friends, a quarter of the time telling anyone who would listen about his heroic past, and half the time interrupting to ask when lunch would be

• volunteered to bring the ring to Mordor

• became one of only four or five mortals in history to live in Valinor

Seriously, Bilbo Baggins may well be the most chaotic, insane person in the entire legendarium, and that includes the likes of people like Finrod “bit a werewolf to death to save the life of guy who he just met and gave up his kingdom for” Felagund.

"And I'm trying my best to stand up for you in every way I can." 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️

I like the idea of Viktor being one of those aces that make nsfw jokes/remarks when least expected.

I know some people were salty about Bilbo in the Hobbit movies not wearing the same thing that Ian Holm Bilbo is wearing in the prologue scene of Fellowship, and I hear you. That kind of attention to detail is always wonderful. And I know some people think the explanation that since the voice over is done by Galadriel, she probably just didn't know what he was wearing is a copout.

However...I do enjoy picturing everyone sitting around listening to Galadriel tell the story, and Bilbo starts tugging on Elrond's sleeve and whispering to him like

"Elrond...Elrond...that's not what I was wearing that day."

(being patient with the elderly) "It's okay, Bilbo."

"I didn't even own that waistcoat yet."

(getting exasperated) "It really doesn't matter, it's fine."

"It's not fine. It's wrong. Tell her she got it wrong, Elrond."

(questioning his life choices) "I'm not going to do that, Bilbo."

"Why not?"

"BECAUSE SHE'S MY MOTHER-IN-LAW."

The hill I will die on.

fun thing about herding and/or generally neurotic breeds: they are really good at following rules you have instituted, but they will also make their own Dog Rules they will follow stringently whether or not you like it

eragon does break his right wrist in canon (1st book)

Fun little parallels I realize now I have done.

In canon, and in MIC, Blagden’s right wing is the one that is broken by Barst.

Islanzadí loses her right arm, a specific parallel I put in place to connect her to Blagden.

If the dragonfire burns work out as I’ve somewhat settled on, Arya’s right arm will have the flame scars.

Look at this whack little family sharing single battle war wounds! I’m so proud of their bonding so well.

I couldn’t reboot it for some reason

It took the Ring two seconds to make both Isildur and Gollum claim it as their own.

It didn’t take much longer for it to make Bilbo do the same, as he kept it as the key “trick up his sleeve” during the Quest for Erebor and never considered harming it.

But in 17 full years and 6 months, it couldn’t make Frodo claim it. It took being inside Mt. Doom, the place where its power was absolute and drowned out all othere, to get Frodo to claim it.

Inside Mt. Doom, no bearer can resist the Ring. They will inevitably claim it there. But literally ALL of the other Ring-bearers who ever claimed it did so outside of Mt. Doom.

The Ring never needed to apply its utmost, Cracks-of-Doom-level pressure to make any previous Ring-bearer claim it. Frodo was the only one who resisted it so long and so well that it had to force itself upon him and break him just to get him to regard it as his own.

Frodo Baggins is the strongest mortal in the Third Age of Middle-Earth and no, I am not accepting questions at this time.

(Remember our beloved Samwise Gamgee never claimed the Ring, and didn’t have it long enough for it to really sink its teeth into him as deeply as it did into everyone else. I’m talking about those who actually claimed the Ring at some point in their lives.)