ORC report
At the very last possible moment I decided to go to ORC (The One Ring Celebration) even though going at the very last possible moment meant that I didn't get to spend a whole lot of time there, but that's okay because I didn't really have time to spare anyway, but anyway, and I'll try not to babble too much, but here's the tale of yesterday...
Illwynd reporting to be debriefed on the events and happenings of ORC. *salutes* !!!
Getting there
I woke up late but decided to go anyway, got quickly into costume and finally got out of town at a little after 2-ish, and hurried my sorry procrastinating butt the 150 or so miles up to Pasadena, remembering along the way that Caltech is in Pasadena also (I have an absurd fondness for that school, what with their version of Ditch Day... and I only wish that my strengths lay in areas that would allow me, possibly, someday, to go there.) I like long drives like that, the feeling of going somewhere... although I hate LA with a passion, and I consider LA to be everything north of San Diego county up to San Fernando and extending out east almost to Palm Springs... it's just too big and unfriendly for me. Although their mountains are nice, they're so different from my mountains down here...
Arrival and vendors and stuff
So I got there at around 4:30 and figured out where to park... I had never been to Pasadena before, and I found it to be quite a nice area, at least downtown like that, and there were apparently many other interesting things going on in the area... I saw people in old-timey garb while I was walking from the parking garage to the convention center, and upstairs in the center there was an opera of some sort going on... Us ringers were relegated to the basement, ha! ... When I got there I wandered around looking at the vendor stuff for a while, bought some knick-knacky little cheap things (several bookmarks, a One Ring on a chain in a lovely little box with the inscription on it, for only 10 bucks and not bad quality for the money ^__^ and a little leather belt-pouch thing, and the book "Celebrating Middle-earth: The Lord of the Rings as a Defense of Western Civilization," a collection of essays edited by John West. Considered buying a sword or a couple of wasters, or some of the lovely leather clothes stuff, but didn't... I hate spending money...)
Panel Discussion
Then I wandered into one of the last remaining panel discussions, about the influence and purpose of the Valar in Middle-earth, quite interesting actually, I only caught about half of it, but here's the notes I took...
"Melkor's evil/fall originated in being self-centered, not cooperating with the other Ainur (in the first music) and working only for his own glory <-- his motivation- supports the notion that Tolkien viewed one's intent as more important than means or outcome- compare to Aule's motivation in creating the Dwarves.
"Was Melkor's disharmonious music "worse" in essence than the first theme? Can it be viewed as just two themes that were each good, but just disharmonious together? -The music was perfect to begin with, so Melkor's desire to deviate from perfection makes his theme imperfect, less good by default.
"But the third theme might not have come into being if Melkor had not done as he did- was Melkor's rebellion planned/expected by Eru? As the greatest of the Ainur, was the desire to deviate part of his nature --> subcreation- greater ability= greater ambition? Was Melkor "set up" to rebel? -relation to question of free will of the Ainur
"Desire/ability to create as a positive quality- in the image of the maker- the desire to create would be a trait passed on to the created thing. Melkor/Morgoth's later inability to create new things shows that inability as a bad trait.
"Creation cont.- Feanor's ability to create things celebrated, only became bad when became possessive.
"The Arkenstone- was it a Silmaril? Difference in appearance/ light emitted. If it was, was the curse still active, would we have known about it? Would it have expired?"
Wandering, in line for bloopers, meeting fen, and a groundscore
Then I wandered around a bit again, and happened to wander past the door where Lij was inside meeting people and doing photos, so I actually have seen one cast member, from 10 meters away... was weird, kinda, seeing him in the flesh, it's always a bit weird meeting celebrities, and only the second time I have seen any, even from afar... And ooh, let's see... I saw a bunch of people in costume, a LOT of elves, several hobbits, and a few Gondorians. It's weird, I swear... I never get along very well with Elvish-type folks, but Hobbit-type people and Mannish folks like me. I wonder why that is? So anyway, of the people I talked to... I met a few gals who, although they couldn't guess what I was, they were very amused when I told them that I was a Mary Sue. Heheh. Then I saw the Hobbit Sisters again (they really do look like hobbits! I always feel so tall when I stand next to them... gotta be weird for people who actually are tall (I'm 5'6"/167cm... pretty average) I met them at ComicCon, apparently they live around here...), and then I got into the line for the bloopers. Was chatting with other folks in line, yay new friends! And then there were a couple other girls who had no idea what I was talking about when I said I was a Sue. They said "Gosh, now I feel like I'm not as much of a fan as I thought I was." Haha. *devilish grin* And while standing in line I groundscored a nice silver bracelet. Couldn't find anyone missing it, and I didn't see a lost-and-found anywhere, so it's mine now. ^_^ (Although I might consider that keeping found jewelry at an LotR Con to be a bad move... OME, heheh, what if it's the One Bracelet?! If I start calling it Preciousss, somebody slap me!)
In the theater, jumping, and luck
And then we got into the theater and I happened to see a gal I know who I had been planning on going to the Con with if I had gone for all 3 days, so we sat together and the folks showing the blooper reel were waiting for everyone to get into the theater and they did some LotR trivia questions... and for the easiest possible question, I won something! It was hilarious, they asked what Frodo's birthday was, some other girl got it wrong O_O and I raised my hand, actually got called on, got it right (of course!) and leaped up on the stage (somebody else tripped while trying to emulate my jump... and I was in a long cloak! But hey, I practice! Sorry if that sounds odd or mean, but it was rather amusing...) stuck my hand in the prize bag and came out of it with a nice piccy of Theoden, Eowyn and Eomer. Heheh, I had thought about buying that one (seeing as there was a terrible lack of Gondorian stuff in the vendor's area, and I am fond of the Rohirrim...) so yay I felt so lucky! Perhaps this bodes well for my luck this year!
And ahhh, the bloopers! Stop reading here until bold text below if you don't want to read SPOILERS!
It was great, it was excellent, it rocked, it was grooviness of all grooviness, it was immensely, fantastically funny, and I hope hope hope they release them someday (and I know there has to be more... it was only 7 minutes long!) All the cast apparently have filthy mouths, particularly when they screw up their lines... heheheh, I don't think I had heard quite that many repetitions of "f--- it!" in quite some time... and John Rhys-Davies being perhaps the worst of them all, filming the "what about side by side with a friend" bit, he says his line, but Legolas' bow is in the shot, and he ends saying "If you don't get that stick out of my shot I'll f---ing kill you." Deadpan! rotfl! And Ringwraiths unable to get on their horses, Frodo unable to put on his jacket, everybody in the small Bag End set standing up and bashing their heads on the ceiling and falling over as one, Aragorn nearly chopping off Elrond's nose by accident (really! Was bloody! Eek!) Faramir half-grinning at the camera and looking very smug (I wish I had a still of that moment! The expression was absolutely priceless!) and Faramir in the Henneth Annun scene, with a fake PJ head, doing a ventriloquism bit where the head says to Frodo and Sam "You must come with us" or something like that... hilarious! And Sam in the "have you been eavesdropping?!" scene babbling "I just wanted to get a bit of a closeup... you've had one and Frodo's had one, and all I've been in is group shots..." and Gandalf playing around at getting into the shot OME! And a bunch of Gondorian soldiers starting out doing a drill-like thing and winding up dancing, complete with groin-grabbing and hip-swiveling *sporfle* It was great! And then Gandalf criticizing the job of barring the door in Moria- "What is this? Typical elf-work!" and Elrond doing Mr. Smith, with shades and everything! There was quite a bit more that I can't remember, and hmm, well, a while back I found a bootleg copy which had some of what I saw yesterday, and some stuff that wasn't on the one I saw, and is missing a bunch of it, I can't recall where I found it and the video quality is horrendous, but here it is if you want to have a look-see... still quite funny. Oh, and the people running the thing had no idea if the bloopers would ever be released, so meh. *shrugs* Hope they do.
Second-hand reports on something I missed- John Noble on Denethor
I was very sad that I didn't get to meet him, but here's what my friend told me... apparently she got a chance to hear him talking about his opinions on Denethor. And this is paraphrased and second-hand... but here's what I remember of what she said... Somebody asked him if he was sorry that the palantir wasn't included, if he thought that would have made it more understandable to the audience why Denny went batty, and he said he thought Denethor had quite enough reasons to go batty even without the palantir- his wife was dead, his sons, he thought, were both dead, his line had ended, and he had lost all hope of his land surviving, which would be quite enough to make somebody go mad. He apparently also said something about what he thought would have happened if he had survived the whole thing- he said he thought that Denethor would have accepted Aragorn as king. He may not have liked it, but he was an honorable man, and would have done what was best for Gondor.
Later, and heading home
So after I chatted with my friend for a while, it was getting late, and I didn't have a ticket for the dessert party- I very much wish that I had, and that I would have had time to stay for it, because it sounds like it would have been a lot of fun, but unfortunately I didn't, and if I had stayed I certainly would have drank, and then not been able to go home, and would have had to find a place to stay overnight (my friend offered to let me share her hotel room, but I had promised hubby to be home before midnight, so I couldn't...) so that, as they say, was that. I headed back out onto the roads, spent the whole drive singing and grinning from ear to ear and being very happy that I had gone, even though I missed a lot of cool stuff and only got to be there for less than 5 hours... next year, I swear I'm going for the whole time, and nothin' is gonna stop me! Wah-ha!
Illwynd reporting to be debriefed on the events and happenings of ORC. *salutes* !!!
Getting there
I woke up late but decided to go anyway, got quickly into costume and finally got out of town at a little after 2-ish, and hurried my sorry procrastinating butt the 150 or so miles up to Pasadena, remembering along the way that Caltech is in Pasadena also (I have an absurd fondness for that school, what with their version of Ditch Day... and I only wish that my strengths lay in areas that would allow me, possibly, someday, to go there.) I like long drives like that, the feeling of going somewhere... although I hate LA with a passion, and I consider LA to be everything north of San Diego county up to San Fernando and extending out east almost to Palm Springs... it's just too big and unfriendly for me. Although their mountains are nice, they're so different from my mountains down here...
Arrival and vendors and stuff
So I got there at around 4:30 and figured out where to park... I had never been to Pasadena before, and I found it to be quite a nice area, at least downtown like that, and there were apparently many other interesting things going on in the area... I saw people in old-timey garb while I was walking from the parking garage to the convention center, and upstairs in the center there was an opera of some sort going on... Us ringers were relegated to the basement, ha! ... When I got there I wandered around looking at the vendor stuff for a while, bought some knick-knacky little cheap things (several bookmarks, a One Ring on a chain in a lovely little box with the inscription on it, for only 10 bucks and not bad quality for the money ^__^ and a little leather belt-pouch thing, and the book "Celebrating Middle-earth: The Lord of the Rings as a Defense of Western Civilization," a collection of essays edited by John West. Considered buying a sword or a couple of wasters, or some of the lovely leather clothes stuff, but didn't... I hate spending money...)
Panel Discussion
Then I wandered into one of the last remaining panel discussions, about the influence and purpose of the Valar in Middle-earth, quite interesting actually, I only caught about half of it, but here's the notes I took...
"Melkor's evil/fall originated in being self-centered, not cooperating with the other Ainur (in the first music) and working only for his own glory <-- his motivation- supports the notion that Tolkien viewed one's intent as more important than means or outcome- compare to Aule's motivation in creating the Dwarves.
"Was Melkor's disharmonious music "worse" in essence than the first theme? Can it be viewed as just two themes that were each good, but just disharmonious together? -The music was perfect to begin with, so Melkor's desire to deviate from perfection makes his theme imperfect, less good by default.
"But the third theme might not have come into being if Melkor had not done as he did- was Melkor's rebellion planned/expected by Eru? As the greatest of the Ainur, was the desire to deviate part of his nature --> subcreation- greater ability= greater ambition? Was Melkor "set up" to rebel? -relation to question of free will of the Ainur
"Desire/ability to create as a positive quality- in the image of the maker- the desire to create would be a trait passed on to the created thing. Melkor/Morgoth's later inability to create new things shows that inability as a bad trait.
"Creation cont.- Feanor's ability to create things celebrated, only became bad when became possessive.
"The Arkenstone- was it a Silmaril? Difference in appearance/ light emitted. If it was, was the curse still active, would we have known about it? Would it have expired?"
Wandering, in line for bloopers, meeting fen, and a groundscore
Then I wandered around a bit again, and happened to wander past the door where Lij was inside meeting people and doing photos, so I actually have seen one cast member, from 10 meters away... was weird, kinda, seeing him in the flesh, it's always a bit weird meeting celebrities, and only the second time I have seen any, even from afar... And ooh, let's see... I saw a bunch of people in costume, a LOT of elves, several hobbits, and a few Gondorians. It's weird, I swear... I never get along very well with Elvish-type folks, but Hobbit-type people and Mannish folks like me. I wonder why that is? So anyway, of the people I talked to... I met a few gals who, although they couldn't guess what I was, they were very amused when I told them that I was a Mary Sue. Heheh. Then I saw the Hobbit Sisters again (they really do look like hobbits! I always feel so tall when I stand next to them... gotta be weird for people who actually are tall (I'm 5'6"/167cm... pretty average) I met them at ComicCon, apparently they live around here...), and then I got into the line for the bloopers. Was chatting with other folks in line, yay new friends! And then there were a couple other girls who had no idea what I was talking about when I said I was a Sue. They said "Gosh, now I feel like I'm not as much of a fan as I thought I was." Haha. *devilish grin* And while standing in line I groundscored a nice silver bracelet. Couldn't find anyone missing it, and I didn't see a lost-and-found anywhere, so it's mine now. ^_^ (Although I might consider that keeping found jewelry at an LotR Con to be a bad move... OME, heheh, what if it's the One Bracelet?! If I start calling it Preciousss, somebody slap me!)
In the theater, jumping, and luck
And then we got into the theater and I happened to see a gal I know who I had been planning on going to the Con with if I had gone for all 3 days, so we sat together and the folks showing the blooper reel were waiting for everyone to get into the theater and they did some LotR trivia questions... and for the easiest possible question, I won something! It was hilarious, they asked what Frodo's birthday was, some other girl got it wrong O_O and I raised my hand, actually got called on, got it right (of course!) and leaped up on the stage (somebody else tripped while trying to emulate my jump... and I was in a long cloak! But hey, I practice! Sorry if that sounds odd or mean, but it was rather amusing...) stuck my hand in the prize bag and came out of it with a nice piccy of Theoden, Eowyn and Eomer. Heheh, I had thought about buying that one (seeing as there was a terrible lack of Gondorian stuff in the vendor's area, and I am fond of the Rohirrim...) so yay I felt so lucky! Perhaps this bodes well for my luck this year!
And ahhh, the bloopers! Stop reading here until bold text below if you don't want to read SPOILERS!
It was great, it was excellent, it rocked, it was grooviness of all grooviness, it was immensely, fantastically funny, and I hope hope hope they release them someday (and I know there has to be more... it was only 7 minutes long!) All the cast apparently have filthy mouths, particularly when they screw up their lines... heheheh, I don't think I had heard quite that many repetitions of "f--- it!" in quite some time... and John Rhys-Davies being perhaps the worst of them all, filming the "what about side by side with a friend" bit, he says his line, but Legolas' bow is in the shot, and he ends saying "If you don't get that stick out of my shot I'll f---ing kill you." Deadpan! rotfl! And Ringwraiths unable to get on their horses, Frodo unable to put on his jacket, everybody in the small Bag End set standing up and bashing their heads on the ceiling and falling over as one, Aragorn nearly chopping off Elrond's nose by accident (really! Was bloody! Eek!) Faramir half-grinning at the camera and looking very smug (I wish I had a still of that moment! The expression was absolutely priceless!) and Faramir in the Henneth Annun scene, with a fake PJ head, doing a ventriloquism bit where the head says to Frodo and Sam "You must come with us" or something like that... hilarious! And Sam in the "have you been eavesdropping?!" scene babbling "I just wanted to get a bit of a closeup... you've had one and Frodo's had one, and all I've been in is group shots..." and Gandalf playing around at getting into the shot OME! And a bunch of Gondorian soldiers starting out doing a drill-like thing and winding up dancing, complete with groin-grabbing and hip-swiveling *sporfle* It was great! And then Gandalf criticizing the job of barring the door in Moria- "What is this? Typical elf-work!" and Elrond doing Mr. Smith, with shades and everything! There was quite a bit more that I can't remember, and hmm, well, a while back I found a bootleg copy which had some of what I saw yesterday, and some stuff that wasn't on the one I saw, and is missing a bunch of it, I can't recall where I found it and the video quality is horrendous, but here it is if you want to have a look-see... still quite funny. Oh, and the people running the thing had no idea if the bloopers would ever be released, so meh. *shrugs* Hope they do.
Second-hand reports on something I missed- John Noble on Denethor
I was very sad that I didn't get to meet him, but here's what my friend told me... apparently she got a chance to hear him talking about his opinions on Denethor. And this is paraphrased and second-hand... but here's what I remember of what she said... Somebody asked him if he was sorry that the palantir wasn't included, if he thought that would have made it more understandable to the audience why Denny went batty, and he said he thought Denethor had quite enough reasons to go batty even without the palantir- his wife was dead, his sons, he thought, were both dead, his line had ended, and he had lost all hope of his land surviving, which would be quite enough to make somebody go mad. He apparently also said something about what he thought would have happened if he had survived the whole thing- he said he thought that Denethor would have accepted Aragorn as king. He may not have liked it, but he was an honorable man, and would have done what was best for Gondor.
Later, and heading home
So after I chatted with my friend for a while, it was getting late, and I didn't have a ticket for the dessert party- I very much wish that I had, and that I would have had time to stay for it, because it sounds like it would have been a lot of fun, but unfortunately I didn't, and if I had stayed I certainly would have drank, and then not been able to go home, and would have had to find a place to stay overnight (my friend offered to let me share her hotel room, but I had promised hubby to be home before midnight, so I couldn't...) so that, as they say, was that. I headed back out onto the roads, spent the whole drive singing and grinning from ear to ear and being very happy that I had gone, even though I missed a lot of cool stuff and only got to be there for less than 5 hours... next year, I swear I'm going for the whole time, and nothin' is gonna stop me! Wah-ha!