Categories > Books > Harry Potter > Lost In Middle Earth
Director's Commentary
0 reviewsThis is a virtual director's commenty, which you can read or ignore, as it won't affect the story.
1Original
Disclaimer :
The characters and situations all belong to other people. Harry, Hermione and co belong to JK Rowling (and possibly others?), The Pirate Kings belong to whoever owns the rights on POTC (I, II and III), Lucy and (the somewhat squashed corpse of) Mr Tumnus belong to whoever owns Narnia now, and Scarlett, Brent and Stuart belong to whoever owns the rights to Gone With The Wind. Also, if I have missed anyone out, they belong to their original owners as well. This especially applies to any time I have quoted directly from a book, or show (the only instances that spring to mind are Luna's "Daughter of The Fifth House" speech, and Aragorn's coronation, but there might be more).
All lyrics (that are not original) remain the property of their original creators, as do the tunes they were put to.
And the reason that a full disclaimer was not put up front was to avoid spoiling the story.
This is all being done for fun and frolics, and not for profit. You can reproduce this story, as long as the author credit (that would be me), you don't change it, and the two disclaimers are left in tact (that is the first chapter, and this chapter), because we wouldn't want anyone thinking I was trying to pull a fast one, would we?
PLEASE NOTE : This is a virtual "director's commentary" for the story. So you are free not to read it, as it will not make any difference to the story itself.
PLEASE ALSO NOTE : This will contain spoilers for all of "Lost In Middle Earth", so if you haven't read the story, then don't read this.
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
Origin
I pretty much made this story up as I went along. After the first line ("Hermione awoke with a jerk"), the rest of it was pretty much improvisation, and I would change my mind about things from one chapter to the next.
Very little of this was planned, and quite a lot changed as I was writing it (which is one reason that I normally complete a story before posting it, so that I can go back and alter things in the past if I have to). Most were little changes (who gets what line, what events happen in what order and so on), but there were some major ones.
Eowyn/Faramir : They were never going to end up together. I could not bring myself to make Charlie marry Ginny, especially when so many of the other cast (Luna, Hermione, Harry, Cedric, Fred, George, Draco and Neville) all knew what was going on. However the idea of getting Draco and Ginny together pretty much popped up as I was writing the "Aragorn heals Eowyn" scene, because it seemed funny.
Ron's Death : This was not my original plan. My original plan varied between a) having Ron try to catch the ring, miss and then trip and fall, b) Ron stealing the ring, then gloating about it so much that Hermione just loses it and pushes him in or c) Ron stealing the ring, then going to kick the crap out of Sauron. It wasn't until I was writing the "1001 Ways" list that I hit upon the idea of Ron taking the ring, but siding with the good guys after he found out what was going on.
The events in Cirith Regulas : Up until I wrote this, I had no idea how to get Hermione out of being captured. Indeed - until one of the reviewers (merlyn2) mentioned it, I had totally forgotten that Frodo gets all nekkid (but even if I had remembered, I still would have cast Hermione as Frodo. I just would have planned it better!). There were several ideas, including having Sam get captured, but in the end, the idea of setting loose a sixty foot snake in a room full of orcs was just too funny to pass up. However, as mentioned in the story, it did mean Sam didn't get to sing his song, and since I had already written it, I decided to include it anyway (As one of the only "serious" pieces of music in the whole story)
The Pirate Kings : This was kind of made up on the spot, because I wanted to show The Dementor Attack from the point of view of the pirates, rather than The Grey Company. It didn't occur to me until writing it that Will Turner and Legolas were played (in the film at least) by the same actor, so it necessitated re-assigning the lines, so that Will and Jack ended up being the two at the end (originally it was Jack and Lizzie).
Hermione's Diary : I had no idea how to do the first part of Frodo and Sam's journey to Mordor. None what so ever. I had all sorts of ideas, but in the end, they all fizzled out. And even the diary idea went through a couple of generations. Originally it was going to be just Hermione writing, then Hermione writing one diary, while Harry writes another. But, halfway through that version, the idea of twin diaries and a transcription quill bounded in to my mind like a puppy, and that was that.
Scarlett O'Hara : I went through several different endings, knowing that I would never have to write the story for any of them. They included The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe (with Hermione having to stop the mountain falling on Tumnus), Tron, Annie, The Wizards Of Oz (I kind of warmed to the idea of dropping a house on Bella), Star Wars (with Luke and Leia's roles being reversed) and a few others, but eventually, with the help of Fred and George, I decided to turn Hermione in to a Southern Heroine. And if anyone wants to continue this story - feel free (the only characters I have are Hermione, Fred and George, so you can do what you want with it!)
However, in all of this, there were three things I knew for absolute certain that I would do.
The first was the ending :- As I said, I didn't know it would be GWTW, but I knew it would be something.
The second was Dumbledore being behind it :- Rather than make it all a dream, or try to explain why Voldemort was playing by the rules (instead of committing mass murder in every chapter), this was all a training mission from Dumbledore, to see if Harry's friends (and potential friends - Dumbledore always held out hope for Draco, remember?) were up to the job of helping him fight the war.
The third thing was making Luna play Gandalf, because, more than anything, I wanted to include the line "So when they say Saruman is abroad they really mean it?"
Film vs Books vs Play
As I mentioned, this story was mostly based on the 1981 Radio version of LOTR, staring Ian Holm, Bill Nighy and Michael Hordern. This is because it is the version I am most familiar with, and the version that was easiest to adapt. And of course, the fact I don't like the films one little bit.
Not because they miss bits out, or because they give Arwen a sword, but because the writers took it upon themselves to mess around with the basic traits of the characters, and make them different people. The Ents were always going to attack Isengard - they didn't need to be tricked. Faramir was not a complete twat, he was a nice guy. And, although I understand why they wanted more women to take active roles, Arwen's entire plot was just such a travesty it annoyed the crap out of me.
Also, they skipped out on Frodo's return home to The Shire. Which is pretty much unforgivable. And don't give me "It's in the special edition", because something that important shouldn't be missed out of the film in the first place!
And since (as one review put it) "You are god in this universe" (Ellisguy), I decided to try to set the record straight, and get Hagrid and Charlie back where they belong (being nice guys), and make Cho what she should be (the woman who appears only three times in the book).
Of course, that's not to say I didn't take little bits from the flims. The book contains no descriptions of the battle with the pirates (from what I remember of it, anyway), and there was also no description of Saruman's confrontation with Gandalf (although this does appear in the Radio Play). And, of course, all the parts where I mock them (of which there were quite a few, since there was just so much to mock!).
Story Telling
The reason for the three different story telling methods (Fellowship was one long story, albeit with some flashbacks, Two Towers was four distinct stories told in order, and Return was all of the stories told at once) was because of Frodo and Sam's journey.
The Fellowship was easy - the group is altogether, and so it is a single story.
The Two Towers was less easy, but still fairly straight forward - the four factions are all working on their own, so it was four stories. As I said, this gave me problems with the Frodo/Sam part, but I eventually got round them.
However, the latter part of Frodo and Sam's journey - after the events in Cirith Ungol (Cirith Regulas) - gave me even more problems. I didn't want to go on with the diary format, because I thought I had used it all up (plus it really didn't feature Ron a lot), but if I told their story all in one go, I thought it would get very boring and dull. So I hoped that mixing it in with the action/adventure plot lines might make it less so.
And the final part - after the ring is destroyed - goes back to the single story line, because the eight of them are back together as a group.
Characters
Frodo/Sam (Hermione/Harry) : This, along with Gandalf (Luna) was the foundation of the story. And although it would seem that Harry would be better as Frodo, I think that Sam is the one with the hardest job (even given "The Burden"), and most definitely the hero of the story. Plus, of course, Hermione knows the book a lot better than Harry does, so making her the lead makes various parts of it easier. Finally, despite what the film shows, Sam would NEVER abandon Frodo, and between Hermione and Ron, only one of those has been completely faithful through all seven books ;)
Gandalf (Luna) : I realise this was possibly one of the most surprising (along with Gollum!Ron), but to me it always seemed obvious, for three reasons.
First - if Voldemort wanted to win, he would not make Dumbledore the most powerful wizard in Middle Earth. Instead, he would pick someone who appears to be an insane, but harmless, nutcase.
Secondly - if Dumbledore was truly testing his students, he wouldn't put himself in such a powerful position to help them.
Thirdly - Luna totally rocks. Making her the most powerful character in the story just opened up so many avenues of entertainment and fun that it was too hard to resist. Avenues which would not be there if Dumbledore was in charge (and now that you have read through the story, can you imagine Dumbledore doing as well as Luna?)
Bilbo (Molly) : This was a last minute thing. I wanted to try to get all nine Weasleys in, and since we had a female Frodo, I thought a female Bilbo wouldn't be that hard to accept, and I couldn't find anywhere else to put her (DH not withstanding, she is not the Eowyn type, Galadriel was already taken by Lily, and Cedric and Molly? Can you say ewwwww?)
Merry/Pippn (George/Fred) : This was the easiest one to cast, once I decided to start doing this properly. And it turned out to be by far and away the most annoying, as I kept getting the twins mixed up. I had written four whole scenes of Gandalf, Pippin and Denethor before I noticed that I had written "George" instead of "Fred".
Aragorn/Arwen (Cedric/Cho) : There were originally three choices for Aragorn - Cedric, Ron and Sirius. I ended up going with Cedric because I knew he had a ready-made army of rangers, in the form of the rest of The Hufflepuffs. And, after Aragorn was cast, Arwen quickly followed (who else would it be but Cho?). Of course, the fact that this site has apparently not even HEARD of Cedric made it a tad annoying, but what can you do?
Ring Wraiths (Death Eaters) : Why not dementors? Two reasons. First was that they were nine mortals under the command of Sauron, and we already have characters who fit that description. Second was that the dementors were already busy as The Army of The Dead.
Elrond (Dumbledore) : Next to Gandalf, Elrond is the person with the most control and power in the story, so I figured DD could fit there.
Legolas/Gimli (Draco/Neville) : Elves and Dwarves do not get on. Draco and Neville do not get on. Plus Legolas is tall and fair, and Gimli... isn't. There were a few other choices for this (including Ginny playing Gimli, still with Draco as Legolas), but this one seemed the best.
Theoden (Arthur) : I mostly did this because I knew I could distract him with muggle stuff (a washing machine, if anyone hadn't realised yet). Plus with Bill and Ginny already taking the parts of his children (nephew/neice), he seemed the best choice.
Saruman/Grima (Peter/Snape) : This was one of the hardest choices to make. It was blindingly obvious that Peter would be the best choice for Grima, because they were both traitors, both slimy, and both more than a tad creepy. But then I put James and Lily in, and realised that with Elrond, Galadriel and Celeborn forming the start of The White Council, and with Saruman betraying them, Peter would be better put to that role. So the role of Grima fell to someone else who is creepy, slimy and generally not nice - Snape. The fact that Luna, Ginny and Hermione got to kick him in the balls several times was just an unexpected bonus.
Eomer/Eowyn (Bill/Ginny) : Once I had decided that Ginny wasn't going to be Gimli, Arwen or Gollum (long story), there was only really one place she could go. So, she took the role of Eowyn away from Lavender and Cho (who was in the running until Cedric was cast). Bill followed because I was running out of Weasley kids, and Charlie was a much better choice for Faramir (being a bit of a free spirit, and not bound to his father Fudge).
Celeborn/Galadriel (James/Lily) : These two were cast just because I wanted to have the shot of them leaning over Harry, looking in to the Mirror.
Glorfindel/Haldir (Sirius/Remus) : Two bit parts (in this story, if not the books) that needed filling, and two characters to fill them.
Denethor/Boromir (Fudge/Percy) : These two kind of got cast together. Boromir was originally down to Cedric, Percy, Charlie and Bill, and Denethor was down to Fudge or Arthur. In the end, the total suck-up nature of the Denethor/Boromir relationship lent itself more to Fudge/Percy than to any of the others.
Faramir (Charlie) : Despite the fact it meant Eowyn wasn't going to get hitched, this was another fairly obvious choice. Frodo and Sam needed someone they felt they could trust, and I needed someone who was pretty much the antithesis of Percy (and Fred and George were already taken).
Lord Of The Nazgul (Lucius) : Another fairly obvious choice.
Mouth of Sauron (Rita) : This was a toss-up between Rita and Bella, but in the end it came down to Rita being slightly less of a crazy lunatic.
Gwaihir/Friends (Hedwig/Norbert/Buckbeak/Errol/Pig) : Making Hedwig play Gwaihir was a fairly easy choice - she is pretty much the only owl we know by name, and easily the most famous of the owls. And due to the lack of other flying creatures, Norbert and Buckbeak were obvious choices for the other two "rescue" eagles. The appearance of Errol and Pig was, obviously, just done for comedy value.
The reason for not including Fawkes was that it would be too easy. They travel too fast, and can carry several people at once. If Fawkes had been playing Gwaihir, the entire story would be different, and the rescue of Frodo and Sam wouldn't have been so interesting :)
Treebeard (Hagrid) : I really, really, really had the urge to cast Flitwick as the giant tree-like character, but I thought that might be taking it just a tad too far. Plus the odds of Flitwick being able to carry Fred and George on his shoulders was pretty small.
Shelob (Basilisk) : Originally it was going to be Aragog. But that was when Ginny, Neville, Peter, Draco, Dudley and "Dark Harry" were in the running for Gollum. Once I settled on Ron, Aragog was sent home without a second thought. And the only other monster in the series was, of course, the basilisk.was the obvious choice (and it did, for a moment, lead me back to Ginny as Gollum, since she already had experience of controlling the basilisk).
Balrog (Cecil The Snorkack) : Mostly this was done for a joke at Hermione's expense. Plus having someone yell "A SNORKACK HAS COME" at the top of their voice makes any story better!
Orcs in Cirith Regulas (Goyle/Crabbe) : Done whilst writing the chapter, just because they needed names. Plus if you look at Crabbe and Goyle, can you really tell me that you don't think "Orc"?
Gollum (Ron) : Quite possibly the single hardest casting choice of the lot. As indicated previously, I went through several different versions, with Ginny and Draco being the two lead choices for a long time. Ginny because she would be jealous of Hermione (getting to spend time with Harry) and Draco because he REALLY doesn't like Harry or Hermione, and would not have to work hard to fake the dislike Gollum has for them. But, of course, they were both put to other uses (Eowyn and Legolas). And in the end, I picked Ron. Not because he was the only one left, but because of the Dumbledore sub-plot.
If Dumbledore was truly testing Harry and his friends, then he had to ensure that The Golden Trio would spend a lot of time together. And Gollum and Frodo are the two people that Sam spends the most time with. In addition, Dumbledore wanted to know whether Harry's friends were willing to give the war their all, so seeing if Hermione and Harry were willing to sacrifice Ron to complete the quest was a good way of testing this.
And, of course, Ron has shown himself to be jealous and a tad greedy, so he does fit Gollum's character quite well :)
References
As you might have noticed, there were a lot of references to other shows, books, films and the like. Some were fairly obvious ("We're called the Knights of Rohan"), and some might have been less so (only one person got the "The Five Doctors" reference).
But, to save you wondering, this is a (hopefully) complete list :-
Xena, The Muppets, Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps, Alice In Wonderland, The Lone Ranger, Snow White, Bugs Bunny, Monty Python, Bonanza, Robin Hood, Star Trek Voyager, The Chronicles Of Narnia, Dr Who : "The Five Doctors", The West Wing, Blackadder, "Voodoo Child" by Rogue Traders, Star Trek The Next Generation, Buffy, Frasier, Star Wars Saga, Undead And Unwed, Whizbit, Once More With Hobbits, W.C.Fields, Shakespeare, a reference to the Postal Strike in the UK, The Italian Job, a reference to the Recording Industry Association of America, Pirates of The Caribbean, HMS Pinafore, Blue Dragon, Titanic, 8 Simple Rules, Firefly and Potter Puppet Pals.
If I have missed any out, feel free to tell me!
Random Crap
Time Taken (Original writing, not reposting) : 70 Days (August 15th to October 23rd)
Favourite Characters : Draco, Hedwig and (of course) Luna
Favourite Part (to write) : The trip through Moria.
Favourite Moment : Cirith Regulas (it came out exactly as I wanted it)
Least Favourite Part (to write) : The first part of Frodo and Sam's trip to Mordor. It took me forever to get it right (nearly 8 days for one chapter)
And, Finally...
Thank you to everyone who has left reviews, especially those who have reviewed nearly every chapter. I have enjoyed reading them (even the less than flattering ones - constructive criticism is always good), as much as you have hopefully enjoyed reading the story, and it has made writing "LIME" (which is, apparently, my longest story to date) a lot more fun! So - thank you.
(Although I would question the person who rated the disclaimers as "boring" - it's a standard disclaimer. How am I supposed to make it exciting?)
(And I would prefer people who leave ratings to leave reviews as well. It's nice to know why you like it, and even more helpful to know why you think it is a "trainwreck" or "boring". It's called constructive critisim, and is apparently quite popular on other sites)
Despite various references, there is not going to be "Lost In Middle Earth : The Special Edition", nor will there be a "Gone With The Hobbits" story (I am not even thinking about it, because otherwise I will start to plot it, and before you know, the Death Eaters are setting fire to Atlanta)
And that, as they say, is that.
Good night.
The characters and situations all belong to other people. Harry, Hermione and co belong to JK Rowling (and possibly others?), The Pirate Kings belong to whoever owns the rights on POTC (I, II and III), Lucy and (the somewhat squashed corpse of) Mr Tumnus belong to whoever owns Narnia now, and Scarlett, Brent and Stuart belong to whoever owns the rights to Gone With The Wind. Also, if I have missed anyone out, they belong to their original owners as well. This especially applies to any time I have quoted directly from a book, or show (the only instances that spring to mind are Luna's "Daughter of The Fifth House" speech, and Aragorn's coronation, but there might be more).
All lyrics (that are not original) remain the property of their original creators, as do the tunes they were put to.
And the reason that a full disclaimer was not put up front was to avoid spoiling the story.
This is all being done for fun and frolics, and not for profit. You can reproduce this story, as long as the author credit (that would be me), you don't change it, and the two disclaimers are left in tact (that is the first chapter, and this chapter), because we wouldn't want anyone thinking I was trying to pull a fast one, would we?
PLEASE NOTE : This is a virtual "director's commentary" for the story. So you are free not to read it, as it will not make any difference to the story itself.
PLEASE ALSO NOTE : This will contain spoilers for all of "Lost In Middle Earth", so if you haven't read the story, then don't read this.
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
Origin
I pretty much made this story up as I went along. After the first line ("Hermione awoke with a jerk"), the rest of it was pretty much improvisation, and I would change my mind about things from one chapter to the next.
Very little of this was planned, and quite a lot changed as I was writing it (which is one reason that I normally complete a story before posting it, so that I can go back and alter things in the past if I have to). Most were little changes (who gets what line, what events happen in what order and so on), but there were some major ones.
Eowyn/Faramir : They were never going to end up together. I could not bring myself to make Charlie marry Ginny, especially when so many of the other cast (Luna, Hermione, Harry, Cedric, Fred, George, Draco and Neville) all knew what was going on. However the idea of getting Draco and Ginny together pretty much popped up as I was writing the "Aragorn heals Eowyn" scene, because it seemed funny.
Ron's Death : This was not my original plan. My original plan varied between a) having Ron try to catch the ring, miss and then trip and fall, b) Ron stealing the ring, then gloating about it so much that Hermione just loses it and pushes him in or c) Ron stealing the ring, then going to kick the crap out of Sauron. It wasn't until I was writing the "1001 Ways" list that I hit upon the idea of Ron taking the ring, but siding with the good guys after he found out what was going on.
The events in Cirith Regulas : Up until I wrote this, I had no idea how to get Hermione out of being captured. Indeed - until one of the reviewers (merlyn2) mentioned it, I had totally forgotten that Frodo gets all nekkid (but even if I had remembered, I still would have cast Hermione as Frodo. I just would have planned it better!). There were several ideas, including having Sam get captured, but in the end, the idea of setting loose a sixty foot snake in a room full of orcs was just too funny to pass up. However, as mentioned in the story, it did mean Sam didn't get to sing his song, and since I had already written it, I decided to include it anyway (As one of the only "serious" pieces of music in the whole story)
The Pirate Kings : This was kind of made up on the spot, because I wanted to show The Dementor Attack from the point of view of the pirates, rather than The Grey Company. It didn't occur to me until writing it that Will Turner and Legolas were played (in the film at least) by the same actor, so it necessitated re-assigning the lines, so that Will and Jack ended up being the two at the end (originally it was Jack and Lizzie).
Hermione's Diary : I had no idea how to do the first part of Frodo and Sam's journey to Mordor. None what so ever. I had all sorts of ideas, but in the end, they all fizzled out. And even the diary idea went through a couple of generations. Originally it was going to be just Hermione writing, then Hermione writing one diary, while Harry writes another. But, halfway through that version, the idea of twin diaries and a transcription quill bounded in to my mind like a puppy, and that was that.
Scarlett O'Hara : I went through several different endings, knowing that I would never have to write the story for any of them. They included The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe (with Hermione having to stop the mountain falling on Tumnus), Tron, Annie, The Wizards Of Oz (I kind of warmed to the idea of dropping a house on Bella), Star Wars (with Luke and Leia's roles being reversed) and a few others, but eventually, with the help of Fred and George, I decided to turn Hermione in to a Southern Heroine. And if anyone wants to continue this story - feel free (the only characters I have are Hermione, Fred and George, so you can do what you want with it!)
However, in all of this, there were three things I knew for absolute certain that I would do.
The first was the ending :- As I said, I didn't know it would be GWTW, but I knew it would be something.
The second was Dumbledore being behind it :- Rather than make it all a dream, or try to explain why Voldemort was playing by the rules (instead of committing mass murder in every chapter), this was all a training mission from Dumbledore, to see if Harry's friends (and potential friends - Dumbledore always held out hope for Draco, remember?) were up to the job of helping him fight the war.
The third thing was making Luna play Gandalf, because, more than anything, I wanted to include the line "So when they say Saruman is abroad they really mean it?"
Film vs Books vs Play
As I mentioned, this story was mostly based on the 1981 Radio version of LOTR, staring Ian Holm, Bill Nighy and Michael Hordern. This is because it is the version I am most familiar with, and the version that was easiest to adapt. And of course, the fact I don't like the films one little bit.
Not because they miss bits out, or because they give Arwen a sword, but because the writers took it upon themselves to mess around with the basic traits of the characters, and make them different people. The Ents were always going to attack Isengard - they didn't need to be tricked. Faramir was not a complete twat, he was a nice guy. And, although I understand why they wanted more women to take active roles, Arwen's entire plot was just such a travesty it annoyed the crap out of me.
Also, they skipped out on Frodo's return home to The Shire. Which is pretty much unforgivable. And don't give me "It's in the special edition", because something that important shouldn't be missed out of the film in the first place!
And since (as one review put it) "You are god in this universe" (Ellisguy), I decided to try to set the record straight, and get Hagrid and Charlie back where they belong (being nice guys), and make Cho what she should be (the woman who appears only three times in the book).
Of course, that's not to say I didn't take little bits from the flims. The book contains no descriptions of the battle with the pirates (from what I remember of it, anyway), and there was also no description of Saruman's confrontation with Gandalf (although this does appear in the Radio Play). And, of course, all the parts where I mock them (of which there were quite a few, since there was just so much to mock!).
Story Telling
The reason for the three different story telling methods (Fellowship was one long story, albeit with some flashbacks, Two Towers was four distinct stories told in order, and Return was all of the stories told at once) was because of Frodo and Sam's journey.
The Fellowship was easy - the group is altogether, and so it is a single story.
The Two Towers was less easy, but still fairly straight forward - the four factions are all working on their own, so it was four stories. As I said, this gave me problems with the Frodo/Sam part, but I eventually got round them.
However, the latter part of Frodo and Sam's journey - after the events in Cirith Ungol (Cirith Regulas) - gave me even more problems. I didn't want to go on with the diary format, because I thought I had used it all up (plus it really didn't feature Ron a lot), but if I told their story all in one go, I thought it would get very boring and dull. So I hoped that mixing it in with the action/adventure plot lines might make it less so.
And the final part - after the ring is destroyed - goes back to the single story line, because the eight of them are back together as a group.
Characters
Frodo/Sam (Hermione/Harry) : This, along with Gandalf (Luna) was the foundation of the story. And although it would seem that Harry would be better as Frodo, I think that Sam is the one with the hardest job (even given "The Burden"), and most definitely the hero of the story. Plus, of course, Hermione knows the book a lot better than Harry does, so making her the lead makes various parts of it easier. Finally, despite what the film shows, Sam would NEVER abandon Frodo, and between Hermione and Ron, only one of those has been completely faithful through all seven books ;)
Gandalf (Luna) : I realise this was possibly one of the most surprising (along with Gollum!Ron), but to me it always seemed obvious, for three reasons.
First - if Voldemort wanted to win, he would not make Dumbledore the most powerful wizard in Middle Earth. Instead, he would pick someone who appears to be an insane, but harmless, nutcase.
Secondly - if Dumbledore was truly testing his students, he wouldn't put himself in such a powerful position to help them.
Thirdly - Luna totally rocks. Making her the most powerful character in the story just opened up so many avenues of entertainment and fun that it was too hard to resist. Avenues which would not be there if Dumbledore was in charge (and now that you have read through the story, can you imagine Dumbledore doing as well as Luna?)
Bilbo (Molly) : This was a last minute thing. I wanted to try to get all nine Weasleys in, and since we had a female Frodo, I thought a female Bilbo wouldn't be that hard to accept, and I couldn't find anywhere else to put her (DH not withstanding, she is not the Eowyn type, Galadriel was already taken by Lily, and Cedric and Molly? Can you say ewwwww?)
Merry/Pippn (George/Fred) : This was the easiest one to cast, once I decided to start doing this properly. And it turned out to be by far and away the most annoying, as I kept getting the twins mixed up. I had written four whole scenes of Gandalf, Pippin and Denethor before I noticed that I had written "George" instead of "Fred".
Aragorn/Arwen (Cedric/Cho) : There were originally three choices for Aragorn - Cedric, Ron and Sirius. I ended up going with Cedric because I knew he had a ready-made army of rangers, in the form of the rest of The Hufflepuffs. And, after Aragorn was cast, Arwen quickly followed (who else would it be but Cho?). Of course, the fact that this site has apparently not even HEARD of Cedric made it a tad annoying, but what can you do?
Ring Wraiths (Death Eaters) : Why not dementors? Two reasons. First was that they were nine mortals under the command of Sauron, and we already have characters who fit that description. Second was that the dementors were already busy as The Army of The Dead.
Elrond (Dumbledore) : Next to Gandalf, Elrond is the person with the most control and power in the story, so I figured DD could fit there.
Legolas/Gimli (Draco/Neville) : Elves and Dwarves do not get on. Draco and Neville do not get on. Plus Legolas is tall and fair, and Gimli... isn't. There were a few other choices for this (including Ginny playing Gimli, still with Draco as Legolas), but this one seemed the best.
Theoden (Arthur) : I mostly did this because I knew I could distract him with muggle stuff (a washing machine, if anyone hadn't realised yet). Plus with Bill and Ginny already taking the parts of his children (nephew/neice), he seemed the best choice.
Saruman/Grima (Peter/Snape) : This was one of the hardest choices to make. It was blindingly obvious that Peter would be the best choice for Grima, because they were both traitors, both slimy, and both more than a tad creepy. But then I put James and Lily in, and realised that with Elrond, Galadriel and Celeborn forming the start of The White Council, and with Saruman betraying them, Peter would be better put to that role. So the role of Grima fell to someone else who is creepy, slimy and generally not nice - Snape. The fact that Luna, Ginny and Hermione got to kick him in the balls several times was just an unexpected bonus.
Eomer/Eowyn (Bill/Ginny) : Once I had decided that Ginny wasn't going to be Gimli, Arwen or Gollum (long story), there was only really one place she could go. So, she took the role of Eowyn away from Lavender and Cho (who was in the running until Cedric was cast). Bill followed because I was running out of Weasley kids, and Charlie was a much better choice for Faramir (being a bit of a free spirit, and not bound to his father Fudge).
Celeborn/Galadriel (James/Lily) : These two were cast just because I wanted to have the shot of them leaning over Harry, looking in to the Mirror.
Glorfindel/Haldir (Sirius/Remus) : Two bit parts (in this story, if not the books) that needed filling, and two characters to fill them.
Denethor/Boromir (Fudge/Percy) : These two kind of got cast together. Boromir was originally down to Cedric, Percy, Charlie and Bill, and Denethor was down to Fudge or Arthur. In the end, the total suck-up nature of the Denethor/Boromir relationship lent itself more to Fudge/Percy than to any of the others.
Faramir (Charlie) : Despite the fact it meant Eowyn wasn't going to get hitched, this was another fairly obvious choice. Frodo and Sam needed someone they felt they could trust, and I needed someone who was pretty much the antithesis of Percy (and Fred and George were already taken).
Lord Of The Nazgul (Lucius) : Another fairly obvious choice.
Mouth of Sauron (Rita) : This was a toss-up between Rita and Bella, but in the end it came down to Rita being slightly less of a crazy lunatic.
Gwaihir/Friends (Hedwig/Norbert/Buckbeak/Errol/Pig) : Making Hedwig play Gwaihir was a fairly easy choice - she is pretty much the only owl we know by name, and easily the most famous of the owls. And due to the lack of other flying creatures, Norbert and Buckbeak were obvious choices for the other two "rescue" eagles. The appearance of Errol and Pig was, obviously, just done for comedy value.
The reason for not including Fawkes was that it would be too easy. They travel too fast, and can carry several people at once. If Fawkes had been playing Gwaihir, the entire story would be different, and the rescue of Frodo and Sam wouldn't have been so interesting :)
Treebeard (Hagrid) : I really, really, really had the urge to cast Flitwick as the giant tree-like character, but I thought that might be taking it just a tad too far. Plus the odds of Flitwick being able to carry Fred and George on his shoulders was pretty small.
Shelob (Basilisk) : Originally it was going to be Aragog. But that was when Ginny, Neville, Peter, Draco, Dudley and "Dark Harry" were in the running for Gollum. Once I settled on Ron, Aragog was sent home without a second thought. And the only other monster in the series was, of course, the basilisk.was the obvious choice (and it did, for a moment, lead me back to Ginny as Gollum, since she already had experience of controlling the basilisk).
Balrog (Cecil The Snorkack) : Mostly this was done for a joke at Hermione's expense. Plus having someone yell "A SNORKACK HAS COME" at the top of their voice makes any story better!
Orcs in Cirith Regulas (Goyle/Crabbe) : Done whilst writing the chapter, just because they needed names. Plus if you look at Crabbe and Goyle, can you really tell me that you don't think "Orc"?
Gollum (Ron) : Quite possibly the single hardest casting choice of the lot. As indicated previously, I went through several different versions, with Ginny and Draco being the two lead choices for a long time. Ginny because she would be jealous of Hermione (getting to spend time with Harry) and Draco because he REALLY doesn't like Harry or Hermione, and would not have to work hard to fake the dislike Gollum has for them. But, of course, they were both put to other uses (Eowyn and Legolas). And in the end, I picked Ron. Not because he was the only one left, but because of the Dumbledore sub-plot.
If Dumbledore was truly testing Harry and his friends, then he had to ensure that The Golden Trio would spend a lot of time together. And Gollum and Frodo are the two people that Sam spends the most time with. In addition, Dumbledore wanted to know whether Harry's friends were willing to give the war their all, so seeing if Hermione and Harry were willing to sacrifice Ron to complete the quest was a good way of testing this.
And, of course, Ron has shown himself to be jealous and a tad greedy, so he does fit Gollum's character quite well :)
References
As you might have noticed, there were a lot of references to other shows, books, films and the like. Some were fairly obvious ("We're called the Knights of Rohan"), and some might have been less so (only one person got the "The Five Doctors" reference).
But, to save you wondering, this is a (hopefully) complete list :-
Xena, The Muppets, Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps, Alice In Wonderland, The Lone Ranger, Snow White, Bugs Bunny, Monty Python, Bonanza, Robin Hood, Star Trek Voyager, The Chronicles Of Narnia, Dr Who : "The Five Doctors", The West Wing, Blackadder, "Voodoo Child" by Rogue Traders, Star Trek The Next Generation, Buffy, Frasier, Star Wars Saga, Undead And Unwed, Whizbit, Once More With Hobbits, W.C.Fields, Shakespeare, a reference to the Postal Strike in the UK, The Italian Job, a reference to the Recording Industry Association of America, Pirates of The Caribbean, HMS Pinafore, Blue Dragon, Titanic, 8 Simple Rules, Firefly and Potter Puppet Pals.
If I have missed any out, feel free to tell me!
Random Crap
Time Taken (Original writing, not reposting) : 70 Days (August 15th to October 23rd)
Favourite Characters : Draco, Hedwig and (of course) Luna
Favourite Part (to write) : The trip through Moria.
Favourite Moment : Cirith Regulas (it came out exactly as I wanted it)
Least Favourite Part (to write) : The first part of Frodo and Sam's trip to Mordor. It took me forever to get it right (nearly 8 days for one chapter)
And, Finally...
Thank you to everyone who has left reviews, especially those who have reviewed nearly every chapter. I have enjoyed reading them (even the less than flattering ones - constructive criticism is always good), as much as you have hopefully enjoyed reading the story, and it has made writing "LIME" (which is, apparently, my longest story to date) a lot more fun! So - thank you.
(Although I would question the person who rated the disclaimers as "boring" - it's a standard disclaimer. How am I supposed to make it exciting?)
(And I would prefer people who leave ratings to leave reviews as well. It's nice to know why you like it, and even more helpful to know why you think it is a "trainwreck" or "boring". It's called constructive critisim, and is apparently quite popular on other sites)
Despite various references, there is not going to be "Lost In Middle Earth : The Special Edition", nor will there be a "Gone With The Hobbits" story (I am not even thinking about it, because otherwise I will start to plot it, and before you know, the Death Eaters are setting fire to Atlanta)
And that, as they say, is that.
Good night.
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