Writing Better Men: A Look at Masculinity in The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit Films
Mom and Dad weren’t officially divorced yet, but Dad was in Orlando and Mom just out of New York. I was in hell. Depression and dysphoria were rapidly approached as my world felt like it was reduced to rubble. I scavenged for any scrap of escapism. What I found was The Lord of the Rings film trilogy.
Compared to the blockbusters of its time, Peter Jackson’s epics focused on men who, in times of great pain, found emotional support and love in each other. They also cry, and hug, and even kiss(!) foreheads so much. Above all they felt earnest, like their compassion was unconditional and without a lick of irony. When I was a kid, I took solace in Frodo and Sam’s strength in the face of overwhelming peril. I still feel lucky to have absorbed these positive examples of masculinity during a time when my emotions where at their most turbulent. It was a shock that The Hobbit films failed to recapture the emotional core of their predecessors.
The difference in production quality between Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy and his Hobbit films is well known. Poor color grading, frame rate issues, inconsistent special effects plague the prequel trilogy. Yet these issues have no real bearing on the quality screenwriting or direction, which can still achieve an emotional impact. Here I want to examine why The Hobbit films haven’t emotionally resonated with me as much as their predecessors, regardless their dubious technical aspects.
Both trilogies are about white men, written by a white man in the 20th century, predominantly represented by white men on screen. The fiction has obvious, glaring limitations including xenophobic themes and a lack of racial and gender diversity. Yet I’ve been invested in the story both as a kid and even now. I love these characters, their capacity to hope beyond hope amidst the darkest times. They express affection for one another and openly lend support when another man falls into despair.
Rings never felt ashamed of their expressive male protagonists because the cinematography and acting communicate the necessity of these acts. There is a sequence in The Return of the King where Sam and Frodo cast the Ring into the fires of Mount Doom causing the volcano to erupt in a dying gasp of hellfire. Each and every one of their companions is shown individually mourning their assumed deaths — it’s a moment of singular catharsis that quickly transforms into abject heartache. Focusing on Sam, Merry, or Frodo as tears stream down their faces, whether in anguish or joy, is a powerful indicator of what the film values.
Despite the original trilogy’s bombastic action, the pacing still allows for its heroes to breath, to sit down and talk about how they’re feeling. Take when Frodo and Sam muse about their would-be lives in The Shire, how Frodo can finally feel the touch of grass after braving the scorched plains of Gorgoroth. Or how about when Gandalf comforts Pippin in the face of certain death, the wizard’s account of a peaceful afterlife that heartens Pippin despite their desperation. Perhaps it’s nothing more than poignant storytelling, but men who embody their love for each other is important in the hands of an audience. The message was especially clear for my turbulent childhood, were depictions of compassion during and after trauma was what I longed for — even if it didn’t feel socially acceptable.
Conversely, The Hobbit films are more conservative in their representation of men expressing love and friendship. Similar to Frodo and Sam in the original trilogy, Bilbo and Thorin’s friendship acts as the prequels’ emotional bedrock. Yet unlike the in Rings, the two men hardly speak directly to each other throughout the second and third outside of a few key scenes. When Bilbo talks about wanting to plant an acorn from Beorn’s garden to “remember all the good and the bad”, it’s easy to envision a film where their relationship was more earnest and better developed. Despite these moments’ instant gratification, the overall result feels far more stilted, like their relationship is less authentic.
Even in the first film, Bilbo and Thorin’s relationship only improves due to the material things that Bilbo does, rather than any kind of genuine emotional bonding. It’s uncomfortable that the dwarves only warm to Bilbo when he vows to help them materially. It’s true that there’s plenty of spectacle to get caught up in when Bilbo returns from the Goblin Tunnels and pledges to “help retake the dwarven homeland”; he’s finally shown true courage and even has even saved Thorin’s life! Surely the dwarves will warm up to him. Yet in context, the dramatic effect is stunted because it’s their only bonding moment in An Unexpected Journey. As a culmination of tension between the two men throughout the first film, it’s a disappointing resolution. As the baseline for their sudden friendship in films two and three, it’s mighty dubious footing.
There is so little meaningful communication between The Hobbits characters. Dialogue, for one, is heavy on exposition, which leaves little room for emotional expression, bonding, or flavor. Exacerbating the problem is how The Hobbit giddily plunges into action set-pieces any time there’s a moment’s respite. This of course leaves with Bilbo little else to do than save Thorin from a stray ax blow. In the absence of emotional bonding, Thorin’s impression of Bilbo will flip solely according to how competent and useful he is. Where the film aims for wholesome camaraderie, its central relationship feels exploitative and toxic.
The worst offender is The Battle of the Five Armies, the trilogy’s finale, which forgoes thematic and emotional resolution in favor of climactic action. There is an excessive amount of carnage in the film’s tail end, whole scenes shot for the purpose of giddy, orc-slaughtering celebration. The film’s violent focus is not only antithetical to Tolkien’s own somber ruminations on war but also comes at the expense of the previous trilogy’s poignant representation of male friendship.
After the battle settles, the film does give the characters a few scenes to express themselves. But pay attention to the camera again. See how the audience is only shown Bilbo weep from afar over the Thorin’s body for precious few seconds, then a quick cut to a prolonged scene where Tauriel mourns her lover Kili. Tauriel gets extended close-ups. Fili is held and kissed. Tears stream down the lovers’ faces. The lingering, sympathetic camerawork communicates how this scene is more comfortable framing Tauriel’s affection for Fili than any of the films’ male leads. The film’s focus on the this romance takes away from Thorin and Bilbo’s relationship, both thematically and in terms of sheer screen time.
While this moment itself isn’t effective given that the subplot detracts from the narrative’s central thrust, i.e. Thorin and Bilbo, it displays an attention to an emotional expression that The Hobbit trilogy ultimately lacks. Even when moments of grief are cut short in Rings, like when Gandalf falls from the Bridge of Khazad-dûm and Aragorn urges the company forward lest they’re overrun, the camera still gives ample screen time to each member of the Fellowship as they process this trauma.
The contrast between trilogies is especially striking during their respective denouements. On one hand, Bilbo plans to leave Erebor without saying a word to his year-long companions, bottling his grief as men in media are shown to do. He manages a final statement, and returns home to ultimately consider the late Thorin Oakenshield a friend. On the other hand, Frodo and Sam are shown processing their trauma together over long periods of time. Their journey visibly affected them and, more importantly, they comfort each other long afterwards until Frodo comes to terms with his decision to leave Middle-Earth. The films ends with the Rings lads kissing, hugging, and openly weeping at the departure of Frodo and Gandalf.
It’s not entirely fair to say that The Hobbit films display no emotion from their male leads. Thorin, for example, is often frustrated, angry, and fiercely prideful of his friends and family. It’s not that these characters are emotional husks, it’s that their counterparts in The Lord of the Rings express a broader spectrum of emotions not typically associated with masculinity and heteronormativity.
The prequels feel almost ashamed of the Rings films’ homoerotic undertones, going out of their way to divorce its men from anything emotionally passionate. Again, Kili and Tauriel end up very much in love, but it plays out as a standard, heterosexual love triangle that’s so trite it loses any kind of resonance or warmth. Where the previous films subverted masculinity, this tacked-on romance is conventional in a patriarchal, heteronormative society.
The men in Rings display compassion and love that was particularly formative in my childhood, especially considering that Middle-Earth is a world seemingly without women. Yet even when I found role models in these films, I would bury the trauma of my parents divorce beneath layers of toxic masculinity and emotional distance. Wider society, after all, encourages people who have been assigned male at birth to never let their emotional armor slip publicly. We’re told to take any pain in stride, to prove our strength over others. Never show weakness. Media too perpetuates these self-destructive behaviors by representing men whose rugged sense of individualism stunts their emotional honesty.
What society values in masculinity is not static, and it’s imperative that creators react to toxic cultural values with positive representations. It’s telling how Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings drew inspiration from classics like Homer’s epics The Iliad and The Odyssey. These ancient poems feature men expressing a broad range of emotion that don’t conform to modern “Western” ideas of masculinity. The Hobbit novel, in comparison, gives screenwriters less expressive men to work with, being only a fraction the length of Rings and far less detailed. But despite these challenges, it is the screenwriter’s duty to craft compelling drama — source material be damned. And at the end of the day, recreating yesterday’s toxic masculinity is neither entertaining nor important.
