Today I was thinking about The Lord Of The Rings and it struck me that, no matter how good the movies were, they simply sucked a lot of the badass out of the books. Let me cite one example from The Fellowship Of The Ring:
Movie
After Frodo is stabbed by the Morgul blade, Aragorn desperately tries to get him to Rivendell before the blade shard can do its work. The day is saved by Arwen, Aragorn's warrior-girlfriend with really sensitive tear glands and a disco party shining out of her ass. She mounts Frodo upon her horse and rushes him to the Ford of Bruinen, where the Ringwraiths hesitate to enter elven territory. She essentially flushes them away with some kind of water spell after uttering the relatively badass "If you want him, come and claim him".
Book
Frodo gets stabbed by the Morgul blade as above, but instead of being rescued by Arwen, an male elf named Glorfindel shows up. Glorfindel has history, culminating in him essentially slaying a Balrog single-handedly. He's a massive badass.
He takes Frodo to the Ford of Bruinen, and this is where shit really changes up. At first the Ringwraiths don't want to cross because they know that Glorfindel is such a massive badass. He dares them to cross.
Then, Frodo dares them to cross. This is a massive difference. Let's get this straight - Frodo, a hobbit from one of the most rural areas of Middle Earth, invites the nine greatest emissaries of the Dark Lord Sauron, Lord Of The Rings, to come and take him. He's essentially saying, "One foot over that line, motherfuckers. One foot".
To top it off, we find out that it's Gandalf who summoned that waters of the ford, which makes a massive difference since it reveals that Gandalf was taking measures to keep Frodo safe as best he could with the time and resources he had after he inexplicably left the book when the hobbits most needed him.
Other moments of unnecessary change and badass-decay include but are not limited to:
- The elves appearing at Helm's Deep. This sucked the meaning right out, as it was supposed to be the reforging of the Last Alliance. It meant so much more at Minas Tirith in the books, when the entire force of the enemy was arrayed against Gondor, and you essentially had all the dark beasts of Mordor against the defenders of Gondor, the Rohirrim, the elves, and Aragorn's fucking army of the undead.
- Aragorn's warrior-relationship with Eomer. This shit was awesome in the books. They fought side-by-side on multiple occasions, culminating in them cutting a swathe through Orcs and meeting during the Battle Of Pelennor Field.
- Elrond is an asshole. It took his daughter giving up her, what, Elfdom? to reforge Narsil and give it to Aragorn - despite the fact that it's rightfully his in the first place, costs Elrond nothing and could be used both as proof of heritage and to strike fear into the enemy.
So, forum, what are moments in movie adaptions of books that make you simply ask "why? Why would do you that? It was perfect. Perfect. Weep"?