Tough Travels: Dragons
Laura M. Hughes
At the start of every month, Fantasy-Faction will lead you (yes, YOU!) on a tour of the fantasy genre. From high to low, from classics to new releases, from epic…
The Hobbit
Tough Travels: Beginnings
This is not an April Fools’ Day trick. Tough Travelling is back! At the start of every month, Fantasy-Faction will lead you (yes, YOU!) on a tour of the fantasy…
The Ciftci Case: Is Gollum Good or Evil?
Richard Bray
Almost 80 years after Gollum appeared in The Hobbit, and 60 years after Frodo first suggests that it may have been better if Bilbo had killed Gollum when he first…
Roads Go Ever Ever On
Leo Elijah Cristea
Something important is ending as we speak; the end of an era of not only entertainment, not just a story, but our invited cinematic access to a deep, rich and…
The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies
Zachary A. Matzo
The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies brings Peter Jackson’s filmic reimagining of J.R.R. Tolkien’s classic tales of Middle-Earth to a close in epic fashion, and with the emotional…
THE HOBBIT IN 72 SECONDS… Cause you ain’t got 9 hours.
Overlord
Not everyone has enjoyed The Hobbit movies so far and that’s a problem. Expected to sit at around 9 hours in total, when all is said and done, that’s a…
Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor – Video Game Review
Author’s Note: This review is spoiler free! Licensed video games do not have the best of reputations. E.T., for the Atari 2600, is considered one of the worst games ever…
Medical Science reveals why Gollum & Smaug lost to Hobbits…
So, this is a strange one! A paper appeared in this month’s Christmas edition of the Medical Journal of Australia with a theory as to why, in fantasy novels, the…
The Tolkien Archives at Marquette: A Glimpse At His Original Manuscripts
Nicole Singer
Through a stroke of luck and the foresight of their one-time curator, the Marquette University libraries house the original manuscripts for J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit and The Lord of the…
Jackson Facebooks new ‘Hobbit’ poster
Peter Jackson decided to get us Hobbit fans all excited yesterday by releasing a special SDCC edition of “The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies” poster on his Facebook…
Did Shakespeare invent Gollum?
Was Gollum inspired by one of Shakespeare’s villains? Martin Freeman, star of The Hobbit, thinks it’s a distinct possibility. In an Interview with The Telegraph, where he is explaining how…
Woman Sculpts Smaug the Dragon Out of ‘The Hobbit’ Pages
Within ‘The Hobbit’, J.R.R. Tolkien used words to craft one of the most memorable fantastical beasts all time; the massive, fire-breathing Dragon, Smaug. One reader wasn’t content to use just…