What's Up Jayvik Nation

nothing, just tolkien originally writing down the hobbit because his son christopher kept complaining that he'd change the details from night to night and then christopher later being so crucial in taking tolkien's notes and turning them into fully written novels of worldbuilding. loving someone to the point of creation and then having them help you finish the job.

1930 "Black Panthers" by Major Felten. From Art Deco & Art Nouveau, FB.

I want you to remember:

The fascists hate you too and they just will pretend otherwise until after they've killed the rest of us, before they turn on you.

i was going to do a rant about this before seeing this tweet but imma just leave this here

some jayvik sillies

Swordtember 2021 by Marina Lunina

The Fellowship movie did Bilbo so dirty ☠️ I know they didn’t make the hobbit movies yet so they were trying to keep the focus on Frodo but:

Bilbo is friends with Aragorn and comes to his defense over Boromir rather than Legolas

Bilbo volunteers to take the ring to Mordor first so nonchalantly like an old queer professor on sabbatical volunteering to cover a 101 course and everyone at the council is honored by his offer

Literally not even scared or sad about it or anything — just straight up “yeah okay I see what you’re getting at, Lord Elrond, I’ll do it 💅 guess I’ll have to rewrite the ending of my book”

Bilbo doesn’t ask to see the ring again or make a go at Frodo but instead sings a sad little song out the window after giving him Sting and his mithril shirt

“it is my dwarf-mail that Thorin gave me” AAAH

Bilbo’s there when they leave Rivendell in the winter and tells them good luck like a worried little peepaw

Also the movie makes it sound like he never got to Erebor but HE DID and was traveling with some of the original company including Gloin who’s the only one who smiles when Bilbo volunteers to take the ring to Mordor

Read a Bagginshield fic with the premise "while Thorins passed out after the battle of Five Armies, Dain and Balin trick Bilbo into learning dwarfish politics and he accidentally becomes an important mediator between Dane and Erebor," and that concept is funny as fuck. You wake up after nearly dying in a war against your generation's long enemy, just to find out that your ex boyfriend, who you tried to murder in a greed induced rage, is now helping run your newly reclaimed homeland.

ok but why can imagine a dragon embryo who *knows* they are "misshapen" (has underdeveloped/absent wings) and chooses a dwarf. And when they hatch the dwarf leads them through the mountain tunnels and teaches them about recognising different gems and stones, shows them balconies where the strong winds at high elevation almost feel like flying. And the dragon helps in the mine, when smaller by scouting ahead and through crevices and when larger by holding up mine shafts that are about to collapse or lounging on a mountainside to keep watch.

A lot of post-Empire Inheritance fics have the new Riders be an even distribution between the four races as if the dragons have a diversity quota, but I sorta think they would tend to prefer elves first, then Urgals and humans, with dwarven riders being the most uncommon because their natural dospositions just. don't. match. The evolvement of their race is very territory-specific; namely to the mountains and stones and the world within them - what we get of dwarven culture shows them as a very clan-oriented, closed off group of people. And while that's changing a bit under Orik's rule, it doesn't change the fact that they naturally prefer stones and caves and a set settlement surrounded by clan and kin instead of flying on a dragon all over with multi-raced companions. Orik is as progressive and open-minded as you can get but even he hates flying! So I'd think that amongst dwarves it would take a really unique, adventurous individual to attract - and in turn be happy with - the companionship of a dragon and life as its rider. Such dwarves would be anomalies (in a good way, but still unusal), not the norm for their people.

There'd be more elves b/c canonically I think it's said somewhere that most Riders were elves. Granted the humans were only added in later but the elves' shared history with the dragons and the initial legacy that ties their races together runs too deep; their magic and culture - and even state of being - is wholly intertwined with each other (dragons gave elves immortality, elves gave dragons speech, they literally made each other into what they are) so I'd like to think there's always going to be this natural affinity between them, like a sense of innate kinship. Or a more symbiotic evolvement relationship like that of clownfish and sea anemones.

Urgals are the most similar to dragons in nature - they're straightforward, value strength and hunting prowess, in tune with the land and nature and celebrate all of nature's harsher laws in their constant desire to fight, hunt, and win, but upon achieving that they're content with their lot in life. No intricate politics or bottomless ambitions. All nice and simple and visceral. Aligns with the dragons perfectly. They can be the perfect hunting partners and no dragon bonded with an Urgal would need to deal with the vegetarian crisis.

Also the dragon's going to have the best playmate growing up, they can wrestle together and butt horns

Humans are the most unpredictable. And varied. Scanning human minds is prolly a lot like browsing ao3 tags, whatever niche trait the dragon embryo's looking for in a partner, there's bound to be a human who has it lol.