The Matt Walsh Show - My Thoughts On The Lord Of The Rings Movies

Episode Date: March 8, 2025

Matt Walsh explains everything that was wrong about the Lord of the Rings movies.   - - -   Today’s Sponsor:   Balance of Nature - Go to https://balanceofnature.com and use promo code WALSH for 35% off your first order PLUS get a free bottle of Fiber and Spice. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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But I'll concede that no other movie has any right to be that long. A lot of comments about this, too, saying, you know, I said no movie should be three and a half hours long, like the brutalist, that awful movie was. and a few attempts to come up with exceptions to the rule, and Lord of the Rings was mentioned by several people. Sorry, not only is Lord of the Rings not an exception, but it's actually a perfect example of what I'm talking about. And you know what this dwarf says to that?

Okay, so let's just take Return of the King, which I think was the longest one of all three movies. And I like those movies, by the way. But the theatrical release of Return of the King was about three and a half hours. It was about what The Brutalist is. And then there are all these extended cuts that are four and a half hours long, which is just obscene. That's offensive.

I'm offended. If I pick up the Blu-ray, not that I watch Blu-ray anymore, and it says four and a half hours long, I'm offended by that. That's so insanely long. How would you, how do, that you would dare even sell that, that you would put that on the shelf for anyone to watch. Four and a half hours, so, but no, let's just take three and a half hours. That was way too long.

Okay? That, you could have cut, return of the king, you could have cut at least 45 minutes out of that movie, at least 45 minutes, and it would have been a better movie. And if you cut 45 minutes, it's still a movie that's two hours and 45 minutes long. It's still a long movie. Can you just cut it down from epic marathon length to very long? Can we just make that?

It would be a better movie. I hate you. Why would you be without me? Quite infamously, the movie has three endings. Let's start with that. Okay, pick one ending. I mean, the movie really ends with Frodo and Sam. They're stranded on the rock and the lava's all around,

and then the bird comes and picks them up. And as many people, so many people, of course, have pointed out, and it is true, it's a major plot hole that, well, why didn't they just ride the bird to Mordor? I get this same question. Why didn't they just fly the eagles to Mordor? You know, shut up. It could have been 30 minutes total.

If they just hopped on the bird, go drop the ring off in the volcano or whatever, and they'd be fine. But fine. So the bird picks them up and they're flying away on the bird into the sunset. You know, last shot. You've got the, they're flying away from, you get the lava and everything and mortar is collapsing. But then you see them on the bird and they're going off into the distance and you see it's green and green pastures ahead. And it's a great closing shot. And it kind of, it tells you everything you need to know. We don't need to then see, oh, now he's laying in bed. and he's meeting, and he sees his friends again, and he's happy, and he's jumping on the bed and hugging them.

God, die. We get like five scenes after the end of people congratulating Frodo, which again, we get it. And it's even more great, because Frodo didn't even do a good job in the first place. He whined like a baby the entire time, and then he tried to turn back at the last moment and not even do the job,

and it only happened because Gollum tackled him, So by accident, he actually completed the journey. And then we got to go through 45 minutes and just watching people kiss this guy's ass. It was a little bit. It's a little much. It's a little much. Being a husband, father, and host of my own show means life never slows down. Imagine trying to eat 31 different fruits and vegetables every day.

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Walsh for 35% off your first order as a preferred customer. Plus, get a free bottle of fiber and spice. That's balanceofnature.com, promo code Walsh. And you could have cut the whole subplot of the ghost soldiers. or whatever it was, where Aragorn goes and recruits these ghost soldiers, right, to go and fight the big battle at the end. And you could have cut the whole thing with the ghost soldiers, and that would have saved you 40 minutes or so, probably. And then you lose this massive plot hole,

which is that the ghost soldiers show up halfway through the battle. I don't know why they're late. And then they just go, it's pretty lame. You know, we get this great battle scene, and then the ghost soldiers show up, and they just go through, they're like swarming, army ants, and they easily kill everybody. They kill all the bad guys, and the battle's over.

And they're able to easily kill everyone because they're already dead. They're invincible, right? They're these corporeal creatures that can't be harmed, can't be killed. There's no stakes for them in the battle. They got literally nothing to lose. They're already dead. So why didn't you just get the ghost soldiers from the beginning? Release us.

Better dear. Very handy in a tight spot these lads, despite the fact they're dead. You could have had the ghost soldiers fight every battle through all three movies. They would have easily won. Again, the movie's over in an hour. And then at the end of that, Aragorn is like, oh, you've proven yourself in battle, ghost soldiers. Be free now. How do they prove themselves?

It required no courage for them to fight that battle. They were already dead, and they're hanging out in a cave somewhere for eternity. So you did them a fate. They're bored to death, literally, hanging out in a cave underground. You let them come up to the surface and fight a battle where they can't lose and somehow they've proven their medal They've proven their courage and now they get the curse lifted and now the curse is lifted They just disappear into nothing this they become dust So anyway now I have I have given I have complained about Lord of the Rings

And it has taken as long for me to complain about it as the movie is is also so I've so this is just a total waste of time But let's get to the daily cancellation Rings fan I watched all the extras on the extended version, but which is the best film franchise of these three? I'll say this one. There you have it. Starting a business can seem like a daunting task,

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