Warning: LOTR (That’s Lord of The Rings) spoiler ahead. Please do not read more if you do not want to know how the story ends.
The LOTR trilogy is one beautiful story. It has everything, right from the normal good versus evil to environmental awareness. Of course, many people have complained about the fact that there are too many ‘three page descriptions of a single tree’ and I wholeheartedly agree with that.
But what I simply love about the LOTR is the ending, more specifically, how the ring is destroyed. It is so arbitrary, so random, that one cannot but marvel at it. The scene is: Frodo and Sam are standing on a precipice over a river of lava in the womb of Mt.Doom. The Ring can only be destroyed if it is thrown in that lava and nothing else can destroy it (But of course.) Frodo is overpowered by the Ring and his ring-lust makes him change his mind. He refuses to throw it in the lava. (The small fact that he and Sam have overcome unbeatable odds,as read by yours truly in the 1000 odd pages before, does not stop him, such is the power of the Ring. I really felt sorry for Sam when I read that. If I were Sam, I would have pushed Frodo into the volcano, no questions asked) Sam, the patient one, tries to persuade him to do the right thing. The sub-villain, a cute, bonny looking creature (hey, don’t judge him by his appearance) gets really pissed off at this, because Frodo and Sam, those little lying runts, had taken his help as a tour guide without telling him that they intended to destroy his preciousss ring. So Gollum takes a jump at Frodo and Frodo puts on the Ring. Gollum manages to locate the invisible Frodo and jumps on his shoulders and manages to bite his finger off, the very same finger that has the Ring. A 1in 10 shot and this guy gets it right! What a winner!
So far, so Hindi Filmy. Then comes the twist. Our bonny Gollum, reunited with his ring after a few thousand years (it must be a few thousand years. LOTR operates on a geological time scale, not a human one), throws away the finger and starts dancing wildly, Ring in hand. As he dances, he loses his balance and falls into the lave along with the Ring. And the Ring is destroyed.
And that, my friends, is that.
Tell me, what sort of sadistic genius comes up with an ending like that? A thousand odd pages, all made from precious trees (each of which deserve a three page description for their futile sacrifice), all for a random ending where one guy (surprisingly!) loses his balance while dancing on the edge of a hill and falls to his death? Wow.
Conspiracy Theory Alert: I suspect there is a strong link to Darwin’s Theory of Evolution here. Just look at the connections: Weird creatures, half men, half Hobbits, biodiversity of monsters (from a Balrog to an err…Olliphaunt), operates over geological time, random path of storyline, the Race of Men becoming the dominant race- it is all there. The implications are clear: LOTR must be banned in USA or alternative explanations must be given to the way the story ends, otherwise the Intelligent Design lobby will be up in arms.
