That's Ent-ertainment

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

I'll just give you a moment to let that brilliant thread title sink in.

Ok?

Apologies for the delay (see post #10 in Boromir88's 'Meat driven' thread for details — sorry I can't link); but I completely forgot about the idea until that thread was brought back.

This thread is for my favourite character and for all of that glorious race: Treebeard and the Ents. Their portrayal in the films didn't satisfy me, and I'm not at all sure that there were good reasons for choosing this portrayal.

In my opinion, the Ents did not come across as likeable. The best example of this is when Treebeard says his highly amusing line "It takes a long time to say anything in Old Entish; and we never say anything unless it's worth taking a long time to say." Merry and Pippin just roll their eyes and look stroppy as if encouraging the audience to think that Ents are frustrating and annoying.

Then they decide not to go to war. What on Middle-earth? Why would they do the total opposite of what they did in the book? As it happened, it appears that this decision was made so that Pippin could trick the Ents into going to war. Now, this makes Pippin look clever. Pippin needed being made to look clever because he was shown to be a bit of an idiot in The Fellowship of the Ring. However, this doesn't so much elevate Pippin as diminish Treebeard. Pippin demonstrates to Treebeard that Treebeard's own forest is being destroyed by Saruman. We must presume that Treebeard did not know this. What an awful guardian he is. Add to this that every other Ent just storms out of the Forest after one call by Treebeard, despite the fact that their long debate just hours beforehand suggested that they, as a group, had reasoned and accepted that they were not going to war. Oh dear.

I don't really want to talk about the CGI or whatnot. I really liked the look of the Ents, and I could never really get a clear picture of them when reading the book. But this thread is really about how they came across to the audience. In conversation with other people, I find that nobody loves the Ents (a bit like Faramir actually; only with Faramir, even though I really didn't like the character in the films, I can understand why he was portrayed that way).

Treebeard and the Ents I don't understand.