Legenda 60: Stuff worth reading

[Legenda offers a brief, non-inclusive index of stuff I noticed and enjoyed since the last episode. It doesn’t usually include materials presented on the major fansites, which I love dearly, but which are linked in the sidebar. Because I always forget or just miss stuff, please add additional pieces of interest via link in the comments.]

Some more Richard Armitage silliness:

Morrighan’s Muse followed up her earlier silliness with this, pointing out that Mr. Armitage now seems to be flirting with the chicken in the lower right hand corner. Look how jealous the chicken in the lower left is getting.

To which Guylty then added this. I think they have similarly large sclera. And there’s a real resemblance around the tip of the nose. Too bad Gonzo isn’t taller. Then again, we saw Armitage play a dwarf — so perhaps Gonzo could play Armitage …

Everybody has an opinion!

• RAFrenzy threatened she was going to see it again, but I don’t know what happened.
• [Spoilers] Zan’s third review! Also worth reading because frequent commentator Teuchter gives it a review in the comments.
• [Spoilers] Finally, mulubinba’s full review. Somewhat of an apologia for Jackson’s editing, but very detailed and well considered.
• [Spoilers] Charlotte Hawkins (author of one of my favorite booklength fanfics) is already jonesing for the next one.
• [No spoilers] AgzyM went to London. And reviewed HFR. Everyone has a right to an opinion, no matter what their physiology does or doesn’t do!
• [No spoilers] Jonia responds to HFR.

Richard Armitage Archive:

• Fabi and Ana Cris share the results of their Hobbit quiz for charity.
• The Hobbit helps mulubinba out with some young fans at work.
• Ania comments on Polish media on Richard Armitage (English at end of post).
• At ItsJSforMe: The Lils ring in the New Year!
• thefrencharmitagearmy is back!
• Frenz and TheQueen comment on their trip to New York, during which they saw the arrivals for the premiere of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. TheQueen in particular has a lot to say about autograph hunters.
• How many times have you seen that movie? Agzy asks in “How Much Hobbiting is Too Much?” I’m copping to five times, and it would have been more had the weather been a bit nicer.
• “Team Thorin“: A new FB page for Thorin lovers.
• And for the bereft beard lovers: RAFrenzy interviews @RichardsBeard.
• Phylly3’s collection of music to honor Tolkien and Thorin.
• Faboamanto casts Lords of the North as a TV series.
• Xenia comments on the information that Armitage was eating steak tartare.
• Harry Kennedy or the curtains? Hilarious.
• Jonia’s got the lowdown on that Louis Vuitton cardigan Mr. Armitage was wearing in the Nylon Guys interview.
• FedoraLady makes it to 500,000 hits. And Guy muses on the occasion.
• Zan decides to go in for Guyday Friday in a big way in 2013.
• Grati evaluates her year of blogging Armitage and writing fanfic.
• FedoraLady presents Armitage-aided New Years’ resolutions in three pieces: 1 and 2 and 3.
• And she also gives us a very emotional review of Plush Thorin.
• The Matthew Clairmont proponents now have a website.
• Heidi says goodbye.

Fanvids, ausnahmsweise:

• In a vid by Faboamanto, one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen — Armitage at sword practice.

• I also loved this, for reason that are probably obvious to readers by now.

Best New Year’s gift, ever:

• Trudy updates “In Consequence.” Ch. 17 is seventeen pages of pure delight as the Thorntons set out on their wedding journey and learn the pleasures of the marital estate. Will have more to say about this eventually.

Still collecting fan fic links — don’t give up on me, fic authors. (I feel like I spent the week driving.)

Tumblr:

It remains exciting to see people discovering Armitage in realtime — check out the Richard Armitage tag on tumblr for the latest. Keep in mind that the tumblr atmosphere is friendlier to everything rough-and-tumble, point-blank, explicit, profane, etc., and don’t go there if you’re easily offended by such things.

• Really gratified to read this!
• An animated GIFset of Armitage at sword practice.
• What to do to people who say they hate The Hobbit.
• Reasons why mezz loves Mr. Armitage.
• Mashup of moments from the Glamour UK  interview in a GIFset. This looks like it was hard to make.
• Most hilarious thing ever: Liveblogging “The Great Sperm Race.”
• Check out “RA: Check us maybe?” — I loved the original song in a guilty way — am a total sucker for those thundering Valkyric disco strings — and I love this.

OT, collateral attractions, and things I think about:

• Didion’s reaction to 2012 as a year for women in film.
• Mike Hopkins, award-winning sound director who worked on the LOTR films, dies in rafting accident.
• Jas’ Tolkien Day graphic mishap. Not so mishappy, IMO.
• I love how Michelle Obama dresses. Here an overview of her 2012 gown highlights and her 2012 more casual looks. (No politics.)
• The best New Years’ reflection I’ve read anywhere in a long time. This blogger comes from a much more conservative religious upbringing than mine, but in the themes of her blogging I feel a kinship. Mutatis mutandis in the Servetus case: How I can listen to my heart, if I believe in principle that what comes from my heart is shameful?
• One of the most widely read bloggers in the U.S. decides to take the plunge and go independent, it seems. An interesting look into the sustainability of blogging as something to keep one alive. (Don’t worry — I’m not even thinking about quitting my day job, or not to blog, anyway.)
• Tolkien’s unexploited South African connections.
• I had one of those mixed feeling weeks regarding TORn. I don’t know how to put it, exactly. Every time I think, ok, I am getting to like them, I get thrown a curve. Now and then they’re thoughtful, as in this discussion of the value of spoilers (I would say it has a lot to do with what the viewer wants or expects — I like a few, but I resent it when the whole film is betrayed by the time I see it, as threatened to happen with The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey) and my defenses go down. Maybe the problem lies in my objection to the apparent need to debunk everything anyone who’s not an insider has to say. Sometimes they are right — as in this discussion of faulty headlines and conclusions regarding the box office for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey — and sometimes they are just cultivating chips on people’s (I won’t say “their,” because I don’t know them) shoulders, as in their pickup and reblog of someone who’s annoyed that literary critics didn’t automatically fall in love with The Hobbit. The site continues to be a frustrating read for me.

~ by Servetus on January 5, 2013.