Tom Bombadill

  I've been a huge Tolkien fan, for about as long as I've been able to read...
  But, and other fans may hate me for this, I've never been a fan of Tom Bombadill...

Perhaps it's the nonsensical abundance of music that he flows with, perhaps it's the way that his whole contribution to the Fellowship of the Rings reads as a complete Non Sequitur in a book that is otherwise nicely layered and complex in it's depiction of the characters and their motivations, their worth as individuals when compared to the influence of malice and temptation upon them, and the way that Tolkien can immerse us into a world of wonder and we can dream a little, loose ourselves in a place written so real, that it must have once been real...

  Ahem...   So, I'm thinking the other day that if, in fact, Tom Bombadill had been in very well done, and amazing Lord of the Rings trilogy, perhaps on an extended, extended, directors cut...

  Who would have played him...

  I know, your all thinking the same thing....
  Obviously, it simply has to be Cantus the Minstrel from Fraggle Rock...  Right?

  Really?    

  I thought it would have been pretty easy to see that pairing, but I get your point, although technically Gollum wasn't played by a "live action" person, and lest we forget, Yoda had Frank Oz crouched underneath him, one hand up his butt, and yet we all felt the wisdom and power of the little green hand puppet, didn't we?

  Okay, okay, so we have to limit this to an actual human actor....

  I've decided that, my vote to who would have been the perfect choice to play a non sequitur in such a role, something that literally is both shallow in appearance in a "what the hell was Tolkien going for here?" kind of way, but on second thought, you constantly go back and look again, nagged by the constant idea that you have missed something, something...   well, important...

  You even decide, that if it has nothing to offer the story, then maybe he was put there to offer, you, the reader, some kind of understanding of...  Well, I'm not quite totally sure, but it feels as if there's something there.

  Yeah I know, the films done and they've moved on to the Hobbit, and your wondering if the singing is going to be in that one.

  By the way, to those who thought the singing was misplaced in the films, or those who think there wasn't enough, relax....

  This post won't answer that question, now or ever....

  Because like Tom Bombadill, this post isn't really about the film versus the book, or even about the strange songs about clothing and color that Tom is fond of...

  In fact the post is really about nothing of the kind...

  Because, perhaps Tom was a character unto himself, and defies interpretive representation thru an actor.

  Maybe, just maybe, it was never meant to be...

  What actor could read these lines, and make them work....

"Hey dol! merry dol! ring a dong dillo! Ring a dong! hop along! fal lal the willow! Tom Bom, jolly Tom, Tom Bombadillo!"

I mean, what the hell is that supposed to convey?

 Is it just filler?   Is it the ultimate non sequitur in something that simply defines the identity of Fantasy in the 20th century and beyond...
  Perhaps,
  But this post isn't really about that, or even what the hell that is supposed to mean..

  It's about who could take such an iconic and impossible to understand character and make it his own?

  Of course, there is only one actor who could do that...

    Yep.....   So next time your reading Lord of the Rings; Fellowship of the Rings, and you start thinking about skipping past old Tom Bombadill's chapter, do yourself a favor, and stop, go back, and read it again...   With Christopher Walken's voice in your head as you read Bombadills lines out loud...

  Profound and intense are two words that I wrote down just now to make it seem that somehow this would all make sense...
  That the idea of posting about who would play Tom Bombadill would make some kind of sense either on this Blog or in life in general...

  And Like Tom Bombadill, you can enjoy it or not...   You can try and make sense of it or not.

  Or you can just read and enjoy...

  Because it doesn't have to make sense....

  Like our lives at times...

  Does that mean that life is like.... JUST STOP THAT....  
  I wasn't trying to make a parallel...





  Or was I?