The TRUE ending to the Lord of the Rings — The Scouring of the Shire

📖✍️🌎🔨 All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us. And you can decide to get On Writing and Worldbuilding Volume II on December 1st! ~ Tim

The most impactful part to me about the Scouring was when the first hobbit died. Because.. Hobbits don't do that. In all the media I'd had prior, 6 movies, 3 previous books, no hobbits had been actually killed. They felt safe before.

Sam"wise" indeed. Just re-read The Lord of the Rings a few weeks ago, and the ending hit much harder this time, only a few years after the first. Reminded me of how the night sky is never visible in the city I currently live in, but the night sky over the farm/village I used to live in (and only visit now) is still almost indescribably beautiful. The colours and the stars amazing to experience (the mosquitoes less so).

Tim, thank you for talking openly about suicide. So many young men struggle silently with this - its so important that people share their own struggles to help others. I have always deeply loved the LotR films, and the end of RotK has also resonated with me personally after my own struggles. I am better, stronger than before, but those old thoughts still linger, like Frodo's wound. They have gone deep, taken hold...and Gandalf's famous line is one of the most powerful and important in all fiction. But Gandalf and Frodo were part of a Fellowship...and we too need to reach out to friends and family when we are struggling.

Man you had me crying. I think everyone can relate to what you're talking about here, and it's definitely the task which is most difficult. How do you know what to do? How do you know what decision you make is going to be the right one? How can you tell the outcome with the decisions you make? Can you ever really be certain? That uncertainty, at least to me, is paralyzing. It makes me envious of the heroes call, the moment where you are forced into the decision, because without that, the hero never would have made that decision. Frodo would never have left the Shire had Gandalf not urged him too, Bilbo never left either, had Gandalf not forced him too. And when they began their trip, they didn't know what choices were the best to make. How are we to ever know what we should do for the future, "for not even the wisest can see all ends." Just like the hardest part of writing the story is the beginning, the hardest part of starting out lives is where to start, especially when Gandalf can't give you the push you need.

I keep returning to the quote from Treebeard: “Of course, it is likely enough, my friends,' he said slowly, 'likely enough that we are going to our doom: the last march of the Ents. But if we stayed home and did nothing, doom would find us anyway, sooner or later. That thought has long been growing in our hearts; and that is why we are marching now.” This motivates me every time I resolve to try and help the earth

I just re-read the books for the first time in many years, and had forgotten that Saruman's lackeys had taken out the Party Tree, and that made me really sad. Even when Sam replaced it with the mallorn, perhaps objectively a better tree because it's a fancy pants elf tree, I can't help but think that when the hobbits look at it, their appreciation of said fancy elf tree will be tempered with the memory of the old Party Tree, probably several hundred years old when it was destroyed.

"Maybe Treebeard's right. We don't belong here, Merry. It's too big for us. What can we do in the end? We've got the Shire. Maybe we should go home." "The fires of Isengard will spread. And the woods of Tuckburough and Buckland will burn. And all that was once green and good in this world will be gone....There won't be a Shire, Pippin."

"I will not say, dont weep. For not all tears are an evil." Beautiful video, great message. Keep it up, Tim. You're still needed out here :)

That scene in the movies where the 4 hobbits look around at all their neighbors who could never understand what they've been through and just wordlessly raise their glasses (before Sam goes and talks to Rosie :3) is one of my favorite scenes in....all of film really. I'm glad we have that instead of the scouring....FOR The movies. As for the narrative of the books, well, tolkein knew what he was about :)

While I'm sad we didn't get to see a live action scouring, the movie would not have worked with it lol

The Scouring is my favorite part of the entire LotR novels. Specifically because of how it shows just how far the hobbits have grown from where they started. It shows how far Saruman has fallen from where he started. The scars of war, abuse and exploitation never truly heal or can be reversed to what they were before. It's an incredibly beautifully heart wrenching chapter that is the most real in all of Tolkien's works.

Tolkien saw what the Industrialization of Great Britain did to his country, he survived the trenches of WWI. The Scouring of the Shire is more about his life experiences than everything else he wrote. It was Tolkien at his rawest, and I think why Tolkien considered it one of the most important parts of the Lord of the Rings, at least in one interview I read.

The repetition here is so well done and so necessary.. It took me until the third repetition to actually start thinking more deeply about what you were saying

Welp, I'm older than Tim. Good to know. "All of our years are formative." Felt that more than I expected. Aaaaaaaaaaand now I'm crying a bit. I watch the extended LOTR every new year's (not The Hobbit), and as I've moved through various depths/forms of treatment-resistant depression, the movies feel different based on where the pain is every year. But it does feel worth it, to keep going. There's all of the pain, but I feel very much like Arwen thus far in 2021, I think. There will be pain, but there will also be joy. I am grateful to this community for being part of the joy. I really like the idea of treating the land as an equal not a dependent. Maybe if it's a corporation the US would be more respectful... new project to look into for sure.

After the epicness of what came before, and how definitive the final defeat of Sauron is, the Scouring in the film would just feel weak, like an out of place epilogue.

Appropriate timing for this video to come out on the back of discovering the American bumblebee is extinct in 8 states and 99% gone in mine. Very sobering.

”I'm 25 now." I realize your tone in saying this was more like "damn, I'm old" but when you said it my thought was "he's just as old as me?" Kinda of a reminder to get my act together. Because while we're the same age, you've done so much with your life while I, a 25yo who has yet to finish college in a 3rd world country where even Starbucks baristas need college degrees, feel like I'm just wasting my life. I didn't intend for this to spread negativity. Just kind of a somber reminder to myself.

Amazing video again! I'm addicted to the relaxing and deeply philosophical content you're producing. I always have time to sit down and watch these kinds of exposés!

Im 28 and I can tell you, I have found that you think you found yourself and so on, you discover later you can do it all again. Again a great video tuching on how deep and complex Tolkien's work is. This is also why it so misunderstood by modern progressives, interpretors and movie/game makers.