Theories on 1 - Part Two

> This Article Contains SPOILERS. <

1 Wears a Nazi Flag and a Death Mask

Clothes make the man, and in 1's case, this is probably a bad thing. Because of his lofty status at the start of the film, he wears a very king-like hat and cape in his first few scenes. He's presumably worn this outfit for most of his time as the group's leader, so it's fitting that he loses this attire piece by piece as his leadership fails over the course of the plot. There's symbolism to be found in his garments, and since 1 is quite the poetic type, he may have subconsciously chosen to wear them because of that symbolism.

Let's start with 1's cape. Its tattered edges imply that it was scavenged from the ruins rather than made for him, and it has a very distinct red color. The only other pieces of cloth that color in the film are the red flags with black and white symbols that we see strewn across the city where it takes place. These flags are later shown to have been the banners of a fascist dictator called the Chancellor, the man who first ordered the Scientist to create the Fabrication Machine and then corrupted it. In short, 1 might just be wearing what amounts to a Nazi flag.

It's been suggested in foreign dubs of the film that the Scientist modeled each stitchpunk after someone that he knew in life—with 1 being modeled after the Chancellor. Why he would model one of his creations after the man who caused the machines to turn against humanity is unclear, but since bringing the stitchpunks to life involved transferring a piece of his own soul into their bodies, the Scientist may have inadvertently given his memories of the Chancellor to 1. It's possible that 1 then "recalled" these memories, liked some of the Chancellor's ideas, and decided to govern his own people in a similar fashion.

Wearing a piece of the Chancellor's flag, a symbol of power, could be 1's way of embracing his newfound ideology and giving himself the confidence that he needs to rule his group singlehandedly. It's easy to imagine how this could corrupt his noble intentions over the years. This could also explain why he's so reluctant to remove his cape when one of the machines tries to snare him by it. He isn't just letting go of an accessory or a status symbol, he's letting go of the assurance that his way of managing things still works.

Next, there's 1 hat. This garment's most notable feature is the copper one-cent coin that he has fastened to it. The first thought is that 1 wears this coin on his head because it happens to have his name embossed on one side of it. This may be true, but later in the film, that same coin is used to cover the face of a dead stitchpunk during a funeral. This suggests that the stitchpunks have some sort of belief about the afterlife and that they associate coins with death. Whether or not 1 shares these views, he could be wearing one of those death symbols as a way to intimidate the other characters into following his rule. He's reminding them without words that death is always nearby and that he alone has control over it.

Much like his cape though, this decoration seems to delude the leader in a very unfortunate way. By wearing a symbol of death on his hat, 1 literally has death hanging over his head all the time. That's not a good position for someone as insecure as 1 to be in. It may have fed his fear of the machines to the point that he became paranoid, which then pushed him to more drastic methods of keeping the stitchpunks in line. Other factors played larger roles in this of course, such as three of the stitchpunks deserting the cathedral and another one becoming more and more curious about the outside world, but that lingering dread in the back of 1's mind from his coin could have sent him on a subtle but steady decline over the years.

The fact that he doesn't start to find his courage until after the coin falls from his hat further supports that the copper piece represents death. By losing that symbol, his fear of death probably becomes more abstract and somewhat easier to live with. Again, other factors play larger roles in 1's transformation after this point, but the loss of his morbid token and its false sense of power could have forced him to finally stand tall on his own.

I think what makes 1 so interesting to 9 fans is that we know he's one of the good guys. No matter how objectionable his behavior is, he's still acting in what he believes to be the group's best interest. The challenge then is to figure out his logic from the clues around us, which is very fitting in a movie about searching for the truth. We want to understand and like 1 because at the end of the day, we all know that the calloused cermudgeon has a soul inside.

Theories on 1 - Part One

> This Article Contains SPOILERS. <

Directed by Shane Acker, the movie 9 is an animated film about nine rag dolls trying to live in a post-apocalyptic world overrun by machines that have wiped out humanity. These rag dolls, known as stitchpunks, come to learn that they and the machines were both created by a man called the Scientist, and that their purpose is to defeat the machines and restore the Earth. The film has developed a cult following since its release in 2009, largely because it lends itself to a lot of discussion and fan theories. Today, in honor of 9's recent seventh birthday, I want to offer two fan theories about the character named "1."

All nine stitchpunks are named after the numerical order of their creation. The newcomer and protagonist is named 9 while the oldest stitchpunk who leads the group is named 1. 1 is by far the most complex character in the story, being both an arrogant coward and a tragic, failing protector. You can spend days analyzing him and come up with dozens of theories about his backstory and motivations. With that said, let's explore the first of today's two.

1 Has a Soft Spot for 6

1's main goal throughout the movie is to keep the stitchpunks safely hidden away from the machines that roam the outside world. The character 6's main goal is to direct the stitchpunks out into that world to find "the Source," their place of origin that holds the secrets of their creation. Because of this, it stands to reason that 1 would see 6 as a nuisance and resent him. However, there's actually evidence to suggest that deep beneath his cold, crabby exterior, 1 may have a hint of compassion for the eccentric little visionary.

For starters, 1 never seems to get angry at 6 for telling the others to go find the Source. He only ever gets angry at the others for taking 6's advice. This is likely because the others usually don't know what 6 is talking about when he refers to "the Source," which makes his urgings a less direct threat to their safety. It's also likely that 1 knows better than to blame the striped stitchpunk, as 6 is very childlike and detached from his surroundings. Still, scaring him into "better" behavior wouldn't be impossible. We see 6 recoil in fear from 1's brutish bodyguard 8 on one occasion, and he knows to run away from all of the machines that attack the group. He's clearly aware enough of others to be reprimanded, yet 1 doesn't resort to that. The film hints that 1 knows the Scientist used alchemy to create the machines and that he's trying to keep it a secret from the other stitchpunks so they don't dabble in "dark science" as well. Maybe he understands what a burden it is to know something that the rest of the group doesn't and sympathizes with 6's reclusiveness.

We also see that 6's room is right next to 1's throne room in the cathedral where the stitchpunks live. This is odd since 1 appears to prefer living apart from the rest of the group and is much tidier than 6. It could be that the leader is keeping him away from the others so 6 can't give them ideas to go exploring outside, but if that's the case, it appears to be all that 1's doing. 6 spends most of his time in his room drawing pictures of the Source to show to people; 1 knows this and knows how problematic it could be, but he never does anything to prevent it. Why not take away all of 6's ink and paper so he can't draw anymore? Perhaps 1 realizes that drawing is 6's favorite pastime and he doesn't want to deprive the artist of that. He almost even seems to encourage it, as we see that he has a large drawing of 6's displayed on the wall of his throne room. It's also possible that he keeps 6 close to him so the impressionable youngster doesn't get any bad ideas in turn from the other stitchpunks.

Most telling of all, it's right after 6's death that 1 finally takes charge in destroying the movie's main villain, the Fabrication Machine. Up until this point, we either saw 1 running and hiding or following someone else's lead in fighting the machines—and often being a detriment because of his cowardice. When the Fabrication Machine kills 6 though, the elder decides for himself that action must be taken against the metal monster.

Granted, he's dismissing the artist's dying plea not to destroy the Fabrication Machine even though 6 claims that the souls of the dead stitchpunks are inside of it and need to be released. It can also be argued that 1 wants to destroy the machine more to save himself than to avenge 6, but compare his reaction to the youngster's death with his reaction to the character 5's death right before it. The Fabrication Machine kills 5 at a time when 1 is reeling with shame over his failure as a leader, and when he's given a chance to help the others destroy the villain afterwards by making a bridge collapse under it, he does nothing. 6 is then lost while intervening, and 1 responds by forming his own plan to destroy the machine. 5's death didn't push him to become braver, but 6's did.

As for ignoring 6's plea to spare the Fabrication Machine and release the souls from it, 1 might think that 6 is just following instructions left by the Scientist. 1 despises the Scientist for using dark science to create the machines, and he probably blames the man for 6's obsession with the Source. When that obsession leads 6 to his death, it's possible that 1 rejects this plan involving the Scientist's agenda as a way to get revenge on his creator as well as on the Fabrication Machine.

PART TWO coming soon

What Made "Ice Age" Good?

With a current score of 11% on Rotten Tomatoes and a current domestic gross of only $58.7 million, it's pretty safe to say that Ice Age: Collision Course has been a disappointment. I would've said "a huge disappointment," or maybe even "a mammoth disappointment" to be witty, but I don't think anyone who's been following the Ice Age series from the beginning had high enough expectations for this film that it could be that much of a letdown. It's a shame, because the first movie actually was a solid and heartfelt piece of entertainment that deserved to have better sequels. Ever since the second movie though, the series has been trying to create a very different identity for itself, and it seems to have forgotten a lot of the key elements that made the original film good.

What are those elements? There's a lot to say in answering that, but I can narrow it down to three major points:

1. "Dramedy," Not Comedy

It's hard to believe, but Ice Age was originally pitched to 20th Century Fox as an adult drama and the studio suggested changing it to a children's comedy. The end result was a hybrid of the two that the filmmakers have always referred to as a "dramedy." You can piece together the original plot from various sources, and while I think it was smart of the filmmakers to tone down or scrap a lot of those ideas, it was even smarter of them to keep the story's more tragic elements intact. The reveal of Manny the mammoth's backstory catches just about everyone off guard the first time they see Ice Age, and dramatic surprises like that make the film challenging as well as entertaining. Because of that, we get more emotionally invested in the characters and feel a much stronger sense of reward when they succeed in the end.

The sequels, on the other hand, are pretty much straight-up children's comedies. They have very few serious moments in them, most of the new characters have quirks and gimmicks in place of personalities, and the heroes usually joke their way through perilous situations instead of reacting with fear. What's more, since the tone is lighter, the characters' personal problems are a lot smaller and less engaging.

It's said that this change was because of Scrat, the sabre-toothed squirrel who's always chasing after his acorn in wacky, Looney Toons-style fashion. He was the most popular character from the first Ice Age, so the sequels decided to make everything in them more zany like his scenes. The problem with this is that Scrat works best as comic relief, and if there isn't enough drama for him to relieve us from, then he serves no purpose. Filling an entire movie with cartoony antics makes him less unique, and now his scenes interrupt the story in the sequels more than they offset it. Drifting away from "dramedy" was just a cheap idea with a weak outcome, and it hurt the comedic elements that were already in place.

2. A Touch of Humanity

The first Ice Age film is the only one in the series to feature humans--Neanderthals, to be exact. They're one of the more interesting elements in the film, not just because they give the story its emotional core, but because they never talk. This creates more of a contrast between them and the animal characters while also allowing scenes where everything is conveyed through actions and expressions rather than dialogue. Scenes like that can add a lot of depth and subtlety to a film, and they're especially nice to see in children's movies because of that.

I've read that the filmmakers did consider bringing humans back for the second film, but they decided to drop them and explore other aspects of the Ice Age universe instead. It's kind of ironic, because all that the sequels really do is introduce new animals who are more anthropomorphic than the ones in the first film. They'e basically humans, except they have more exotic character designs and they're allowed to talk. There's nothing wrong with featuring new prehistoric creatures in each movie, but when all of the characters are animals who can speak to each other, there's no sense of wonder or suspense in any of the encounters. We know exactly where the heroes stand with everyone because everyone's motivation is said outright, and the intrigue of connecting with other species is mostly forgotten.

The closest the sequels ever come to recreating that dynamic with the humans is with the non-talking dinosaurs in the third film. Even then though, the emotion is somewhat lacking because the dinosaurs are too out of place in that time period. If the filmmakers wanted to explore other aspects of the series's universe, humans could have still offered a lot of different ideas. There were other species of cavemen living at the same time as Neanderthals, and cavemen did cause a lot of problems such as overhunting and competition for food and territory as their populations grew. However, more talking animals in the sequels meant more opportunities to cast big-name celebrities, so spectacle won out over heart once again.

3. Less is More

The first Ice Age movie was about three animals returning a lost human baby to its family while bonding with each other and trying to survive a pack of predators. That's it. There were no major global disasters, no discoveries of lost civilizations, and no magical, outer space excursions. The story was small and simple, and that gave it enough time to properly flesh out its most important elements.

There's too much of everything in the sequels. Too many characters, too many subplots, too many twists and turns, and too much at stake. It's overwhelming, and with so much crammed into each installment, none of the story elements has enough time devoted to it. There are interesting elements in the sequels, such as the character Buck in the third and fifth films and the relationship between Diego and Shira in the fourth film, but they only get superficial development. Imagine getting a flashback of what happened to Buck's family and how he came to live underground with the dinosaurs instead of just seeing a goofy story about how he lost his eye. Imagine getting a flashback of why Shira left her old pack of sabre-tooths and being reminded of what Diego's pack from the first film was like. These subplots could have been really compelling if they didn't have to share their hour-and-a-half run times with a dozen other stories.

Another issue with putting too much into the sequels is that it strains their plausibility. Ice Age: Collision Course is about averting an asteroid by launching magnetic rocks into space from a volcano while a squirrel in a spaceship plays billiards with the solar system. Not only is it nearly impossible to take that main premise seriously, it's also difficult to take the characters' personal story arcs seriously because of how ludicrous the threat to them is. I know that the first movie had a few implausible moments too, like the ice cave full of dinosaurs and spaceships and the river of lava that erupts out of nowhere, but at least those scenes were short and barely referenced again. Heck, the latter example actually sets up one of that movie's most earnest character moments, and since the lava eruption was likely caused by underground volcanoes which were common in prehistoric times, the character moment is able to overshadow the disaster. Again, less is more.

I will say this much about the Ice Age sequels: they did make a lot of money. The original film made roughly $363 million at the box office, and except for Collision Course, each of the sequels earned more than that. There is an audience for those kinds of films, but it's a different audience than the one that the series first drew in, and as we can see, the series is starting to lose that newer audience.

We're already hearing rumors that a sixth Ice Age movie will be in the works soon. If that's true, then I definitely think it should be the final installment in the series and that it should bring things full circle by reintroducing the above three points. I think it should be the film that finally brings back the baby from the original as an adult, and just as the characters speculated in the first film, he should now be a hunter who doesn't remember being rescued by animals when he was little. Have the character who first brought Manny out of his depression over his first family now pose a threat to his new family. That would be an interesting, dramatic conflict with a lot of tension and uncertainty, and the main premise could involve the humans and animals clashing with each other after a disaster at the start of the film forces them together. That way, we could still get some of the larger scale antics of the sequels while also having the drama of the original.

More likely than not though, this won't be the premise of any future movie. We'll probably get another sequel or two much like the last four until the franchise bottoms out, and then Ice Age will go on the same shelf as The Land Before Time and Home Alone as a good movie that spawned a baffling series. In the end though, that one good movie is all that matters. Hollywood could hurl a million sequels down on us that crash and burn, but however big their craters are, we can always find the original with all of its simple, "dramedic" humanity perfectly preserved in the ice below.

The Appeal of Tom Bombadil

How you feel about certain elements in a popular series often depends on how you were introduced to the series as a whole. When it comes to a series like the Lord of the Rings trilogy that's been adapted across more than one medium, the fans who were introduced to it through the books tend to be more devoted to Tolkien's universe than the fans who were introduced to it through the movies. I'll admit upfront that I belong to the second group, and I think it's because of this that I've never quite seen the appeal of one of the books' more beloved elements: the character Tom Bombadil.

Appearing in only three chapters of the first Rings book, Tom Bombadil is a mystical, carefree fellow of unknown origins who wears yellow boots and a blue coat and spends his days wandering the Old Forrest while singing. He saves the hobbits a few times on the first leg of their journey, shows no interest at all in the One Ring, and then bows out of the story entirely with only a brief mention afterwards at the Council of Elrond. Like a lot of minor characters from the books, Bombadil gets left out of most adaptations, but he always seems to be the one whose absence people object to.

Why is that? He doesn't contribute all that much to the plot, and even by the books' own admission, he's so disconnected from everything having to do with the Ring that it's pointless to include him in the quest. What's more, having someone that lighthearted and silly pop up so early in the story almost harms the dark tone that it's trying to set. Again though, I'm someone who already saw the story play out fine without him on film before I read the book, so maybe I need to look at merry old Tom from a different angle to see his charm.

For starters, fans of Tom Bombadil probably like him more from a worldbuilding standpoint than from a storytelling one. Having the hobbits cross paths with someone who seems to come from a separate story makes Middle-earth feel like a much bigger place, and keeping Bombadil's origins a mystery opens up all kinds of fan theories about who or what he might actually be. As I've said in past essays, fan theories provide a more interactive way of enjoying a work of fiction, and since Tolkien mapped out so much of Middle-earth's history and mythos in his other writings, it makes sense that a rare enigma like Bombadil would intrigue so many readers.

Another explanation could be that his jolly, quirky demeanor makes him more unique and memorable. In a story full of brooding, angry, and depressed people, it does turn a few heads to see someone who's more upbeat among the cast. There's also something about an ageless, magical figure who's eccentric rather than stoic that people often find interesting. We've seen that type of character everywhere from Merlin the wizard in the King Arthur legend to the Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland — even Mew from Pokemon, to be topical — and a lot of character complexity can be found in that contrast of age and youthfulness.

I think that the best explanation for Bombadil's appeal may lie in the story behind his creation. The character was said to be inspired by a doll with boots and a hat that belonged to one of Tolkien's children. After an incident where the doll survived getting stuffed down a lavatory (the Forbidden Pool, if you will), Tolkien was so impressed that he would often make up bedtime stories for his children about the doll's other adventures. The Hobbit also started out as a bedtime story, so when Tolkien came up with an idea for a sequel to the book, he decided to incorporate the doll-inspired Tom Bombadil into that followup.

Given their similar origins, it's only natural that Tom's scenes in The Lord of the Rings would have the same lighthearted tone as The Hobbit instead of the dark and serious tone of the sequel. It's also possible that the character is meant to ease that transition in tone, acting as one last callback to the more innocent times of Bilbo's adventure before the Nazgul come along and ruin everything. If this is the case, then his final mention at the Council of Elrond where the heroes decide not to involve him in the One Ring's destruction can be seen as an official goodbye to that innocence. That does kind of make it sad to see him go.

At the end of the day, I still think that the Lord of the Rings movies were smart to leave out Tom Bombadil. Film is a different medium that requires a tighter narrative than literature, so minor storylines such as his have to go. The fact that some of his lines are said by Treebeard in the Extended Edition of The Two Towers at least shows that Peter Jackson's team appreciated his character and wanted to have some nod to him in their version. I may not have the same attatchment to Bombadil as fans who discovered Middle-earth through the source material, but after looking at him through a wider scope and getting to know him better, I can appreciate him too.

Of Blank Slates and Second Bananas

I saw the movie Watership Down for the first time a few months ago (right before Easter, which made all those cards with bunnies on them suddenly look very morbid). For anyone not familiar with the story, it's about a group of rabbits led by the brothers Hazel and Fiver who leave their old warren to start a new one and encounter several predators and enemies along the way. It's one of the darkest and most highly acclaimed children's movies ever made, and while I did love it, there's one nitpick about it that bugs me every time I watch it.

The rabbit Hazel is treated as the main protagonist in the story. Everyone hails his leadership skills throughout the film, he orchestrates the plan to defeat the villains during the climax, and he gets the big heroic sendoff in the final scene. What bugs me is that I don't quite understand why he's the main protagonist. He's not a particularly interesting character, and while he does have the main conflict to deal with, he doesn't really have a personal story arc. His brother Fiver, on the other hand, is a runt who gets pushed around by the rabbits in the old warren and whose connections to the spirit world help him to see the future and point the group of deserters towards their new home. Fiver is the underdog with a unique ability who incites and drives the story. He's a much more compelling and pivotal character, so why is it Hazel who gets the ultimate spotlight?

This isn't the only case of a sidekick being more interesting than the designated protagonist in a story. Eli Wallach's character Tuco Ramirez in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly is much more colorful and engaging than Clint Eastwood's character Blondie, yet it's Blondie who always gets the last laugh as the hero with a plan up his sleeve. There's also Dennis Dun's Wang Chi in Big Trouble in Little China, who follows the lead of Kurt Russell's Jack Burton despite having more at stake. Heck, even James Bond is pretty one-dimensional compared to most of the assistants, contacts, and love interests that he's had over the years. It's odd from a writer's viewpoint to see so many dynamic figures forced to be second bananas to stiffer and blander ones, so why do so many authors and screenwriters do it?

The most likely reason is because characters like Hazel, Blondie, Jack Burton, and James Bond are more serviceable to audiences than their sidekicks are. They have less distinct personalities, so it's easier for us to project ourselves onto them and pretend that we're the ones living their lives. This type of character is often referred to as a Blank Slate, and while they're still commonly used in storytelling for the above mentioned reason, we do see a shift in their role as the protagonist every now and then.

Just look at the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. At first they seem to present another case of a Blank Slate protagonist who's going to have a dynamic sidekick, but Will Turner quickly gets demoted to a helper after he meets Captain Jack Sparrow. The two spend the rest of the original Pirates trilogy pretty much competing with each other to be the main protagonist, then Will drops out of the series altogether in the fourth film and Jack has the stage to himself. It's almost like the screenwriters were afraid to make Jack the hero at first and gave him a more standard counterpart to be safe, then when they saw how popular he was with audiences, they took off his Will Turner training wheels and edged him into the leading role. Sources say that Will is supposed to return in the fifth Pirates film, though it's unclear whether or not Jack will have the same relationship with him as before.

Another supporting character who famously became the protagonist in his film series is Peter Sellers's Inspector Clouseau, who first appeared in the 1963 crime comedy The Pink Panther. In that film, the protagonist is a jewel thief named Sir Charles Lytton who attempts to steal a famous diamond while Clouseau is simply a detective who investigates its disappearance. Clouseau was technically an antagonist in that movie, but his bumbling persona was so memorable that he took over as the hero in the next five installments of the series, though not always played by the same actor. That's not even counting the two reboot films from 2006 and 2009 that featured Clouseau in the lead with no mention of Lytton. Once again though, this more engaging character had to be broken in with training wheels before he was allowed to be the protagonist.

Judging from these examples, audiences seem to like having more memorable main characters. The recent criticism of Twilight's Bella Swan and poor performance of Hardcore Henry, an action film shot entirely in the first-person point-of-view, also seem to suggest that a lot of readers and filmgoers want more than a Blank Slate to project themselves onto. So again, why are so many three-dimensional characters relegated to sidekicks and supports for one-dimensional ones?

I was wracking my brain over this when a crazy idea finally came to me: maybe a lot of writers do this not because they want audiences to imagine being the protagonist, but because they want audiences to imagine being with the sidekick. Maybe characters like Blondie and Will Turner exist so we can experience what it's like to spend time with people like Tuco Ramirez and Jack Sparrow. Maybe Hazel the rabbit really just exists so we can observe and try to understand a character as mysterious as Fiver.

Whatever the case, it's still nice to see a second banana grow ripe and get picked every once in a while -- or a second carrot, if Watership Down ever gets any sequels.

The Point of the Spiders

Perhaps the most important rule in storytelling is that every person, place, thing, or event in the story needs to serve a purpose. If an element doesn't have some unique effect on the characters or the plot, then it should probably be removed. This rule is a lot more strict in film than in literature, but even books can only get away with spinning their narrative wheels for so long. Considering this, let's examine one of the more famous scenes from The Hobbit where Bilbo saves his dwarf companions from the spiders in the forest of Mirkwood.

Here's how the journey through Mirkwood unfolds in both the book and its film adaptations:

1.  Bilbo and the dwarves get lost.

2.  Bilbo gets separated from the dwarves.

3.  The dwarves get captured by spiders.

4.  Bilbo saves the dwarves from the spiders.

5.  The dwarves get captured by elves.

6.  Bilbo saves the dwarves from the elves.


Looking at this list, the chain of events seems a little redundant. Why not just have the elves capture the dwarves right after Bilbo gets separated from them and leave out the spiders altogether? The elves are more important in the long run, and since rescuing the dwarves from them is the bigger challenge of the two anyway, it seems like more efficient storytelling to only have one rescue in Mirkwood. So what's the point of including the spiders in the plot?

Well, the first argument is an easy one: J.R.R. Tolkien wrote The Hobbit as an adventure tale for children, so it's okay for it to have a lot of action scenes with a loose narrative structure. That may be true, but there's a bit more to the spiders than just being one more obstacle. There's a lot of fear surrounding Mirkwood in the story, enough to earn several warnings, and having the characters actually get captured by monsters inside that forest justifies that fear. Without the spiders, Mirkwood would just seem like a really dark place with deer, butterflies, grouchy elves, and rivers that you need to stay out of -- hazardous, but not menacing. Including the spiders also helps to drive home the story's lesson of listening to your elders; having the dwarves almost get eaten by monsters because they ignored Gandalf and wandered off the path leaves a much stronger impression than just having them get arrested by elves.

It can also be argued that the spiders serve to offset the elves. The Mirkwood elves are the beings that Bilbo's company gets the biggest warning about. They're the main obstacle in the forest, not the spiders. Prior to this though, the story presents elves more or less as allies, so they don't feel like much of a threat to the readers, the viewers, or the heroes. All of the trouble before Mirkwood comes from monsters, and having Bilbo fight off one more round of monsters in the forest only to have the elves capture his friends shows a transition in the story. Instead of vicious, evil creatures, Bilbo now has good but uncooperative people standing in his way. That means that instead of cutting and stabbing his way out of trouble, he has to harness his wits that he discovered during the Riddle Game with Gollum and be strategic from this point on.

Another thing to consider is that the fight with the spiders is the peak of Bilbo learning to embrace his adventurous side. He comes to the dwarves' rescue single-handedly for the first time, he names his sword and uses it for combat, and in the book, he makes up songs to taunt the spiders with as he fends them off. He's finally mastering the abilities that the quest has forced him to learn so far, and he's having fun doing it. The fact that he's going up against a nest of evil monsters with very little moral dilemmas about hurting them makes the scene fun for the readers and viewers as well. This creates an especially nice contrast with his refusal to fight in the Battle of the Five Armies after he grows wiser from his experiences.


And that's the most important purpose of the spiders in The Hobbit. They show that the main character is capable of growing and changing. Bilbo's greatest internal conflict is that he wants to lead the quiet, predictable lifestyle of a hobbit despite being from a family that prefers the unexpected. He resists change in the first part of the story, and while it's helpful that he's good at fighting giant spiders in Mirkwood, it's more important that he decides to fight them at all. Thematically, the spiders are a test of whether or not Bilbo is adaptable and confident enough for the second half of his journey, and as soon as he passes that test, the Mirkwood elves step in to take things to the next level things for him.

"The Jungle Book" Review

Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book is a curious case when it comes to movie adaptations. Several different versions of it have been put to film over the years, but they never seem to want to follow the plot of the source material. They'll often pick one portion of the story to tell (usually the first part where the tiger Shere Kahn is the main villain) or simply borrow elements from Kipling's work while telling a different story altogether. I don't know why Hollywood steers away from faithfully adapting this tale, but nowadays The Jungle Book seems to be more iconic for its characters and their motivations than for what those characters do.

The newest film, produced by Disney and directed by Jon Favreau, also takes liberties with its story. It's a remake of the 1967 animated film first and foremost, so it focuses on the boy Mowgli traveling to the man village to escape from Shere Kahn and only gives a few glimpses of the other humans throughout. Unlike the animated film though, this one actually has quite a few nods to the source material. Not only do the wolves who raised Mowgli play a much bigger role in this version, but we also see some of the book's darker aspects like Shere Kahn trying to corrupt the younger wolves and Mowgli realizing that man is too destructive to be compatible with nature. There's also a scene involving Mowgli, Shere Kahn, and a valley full of water buffalo that feels like an ironic wink at the tiger's comeuppance in the book.

Most notable are this movie's frequent mentions of the Law of the Jungle, the strict rules of nature that the animals teach Mowgli to live by. This concept is what really gave Kipling's tale its identity, and this new movie is one of the few versions I've seen that centers around it so strongly. The story might not be very close, but in terms of tone and feel, Jon Favreau's film is one of the better adaptations of the book.

That's not to say that the tone always redeems its story, however. The beginning is probably its weakest part, and that hurts this film a lot. We don't learn how Mowgli came to live in the jungle until about the story's halfway point, which makes it difficult to form an emotional connection to him and most of the other characters. It's like the film decides to skim over its setup because it assumes that audiences already know its characters and conflict, and that doesn't work. There's also a major plot point that more than one character somehow learns about offscreen, which makes for a lot of confusion when they break the news of it to Mowgli. The film's final scene might also make a few people scratch their heads, especially if they are familiar with The Jungle Book's story, but it's harmless.

Another element that can make or break a film's story is how well the actors perform it. I wouldn't say that the cast of Favreau's film is as strong as the 1967 lineup, but it helps that some of the characters in this version have very different personalities than their cartoon counterparts. Bill Murray as Baloo the bear, for instance, is a much better casting choice than you might think after you see what kind of character he is in this movie. Instead of the big-hearted and fun-loving Baloo from 1967, we get a disinterested con artist who frowns on following the rules and develops a conscience by the end of the story. Murray plays that quite well, and since the believability of the character relationships is an issue with this movie, making Baloo's relationship with Mowgli insincere at first helps a lot.

Most of the other actors do a fine job, particularly Neel Sethi as Mowgli. The only performance that falls flat for me is Scarlett Johansson as Kaa the snake. Kaa has an odd history with adaptations to begin with, since he was a hero in the book but is almost always a villain in the movies. I don't mind that they made the character female in this version, but this incarnation of Kaa is supposed to be a crafty temptress, and Johansson's voice doesn't quite reach the necessary level of that. Someone like Angelina Jolie or maybe Michelle Pfeiffer would've been a better choice, in my opinion.

And then there's Christopher Walken as King Louie the orangutan.

I think a lot of people had the same gut feeling when they learned that Christopher Walken would be playing a giant, singing ape in this movie: that his performance was either going to be incredibly awesome, a complete train wreck, or both. And it was both, which of course is the best kind of Christopher Walken performance. I suspect that the filmmakers are also aware of the actor's bizarre, comedic appeal, because in this version, Louie makes his first appearance when Mowgli rings a cowbell.

Having said that, I can't really say if Walken's performance makes this movie entertaining for the right reasons. King Louie is a hard character to pin down in film because he was never actually in the book; he was created for the animated film as a means to include another song and was named after the swing musician who voiced him. He was tailor-made for that specific movie, and because he has no place in the source material, none of the Jungle Book movies that he's appeared in since then has quite known what to do with him. Having him sing in this newest film is especially strange because this version isn't even really a musical. I give Favreau's team credit for trying to make Louie more important to the story in this film, as he reveals that big plot point to Mowgli, but the scene leading up to that is just so odd that it overshadows any emotional impact of the reveal.

Overall though, the newest version of The Jungle Book is an enjoyable film. It's obviously meant for children, but it's heavy enough for adults to appreciate it too, and while it can be underwhelming and awkward at times, it has just as many strong and solid moments. If it looks like something you think you'll like, then you probably will like it. It's worth at least one viewing on the big screen.

And for anyone who wishes that it followed the book more closely, don't give up hope. There's already another Jungle Book movie in the works that's aiming to come out two years from now.