UNUSED AUDIO COMMENTARY BY HOWARD ZINN AND NOAM CHOMSKY, RECORDED FOR THE RETURN OF THE KING (PLATINUM SERIES EXTENDED EDITION)
This is amazing, and something that should actually exist. It’s split into four parts (2,3,4 here). Some excerpts:
ZINN: As has been proven, time and time again, cut off a Hobbit’s steady access to pipe-weed and ale, and it is only a few short, hairy-footed steps to intellectual barbarity. To wit: In this scene Pippin can’t keep his thieving hands off the newly acquired Palantir, and is nearly driven mad by it.
…
ZINN: Orcs are Middle Earth’s last nationalists, creatures standing up to a colonial power coming in to enforce some “better” ruling order. But guess what: There won’t be any Orcs left by the time that order is established. Their very Orcanity is at stake.
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ZINN: Gandalf also mentions the Witch King of Angmar.
CHOMSKY: The Witch King is not just a name; it’s a question every colonial administrator must ask himself: Which king? Which king do you want, Gandalf?
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CHOMSKY: You’ve called Denethor a rational actor, but how do you explain his passivity when he’s standing here doing nothing while an Orcish horde has, by its own admission, come to slaughter him and his people?
ZINN: I think Denethor is convinced he can still work something out when the Orcs arrive. Again, the suggestion that all Orcs have the same motivation goes against what we have learned from all insurgencies throughout history. Yes, there are hard-line Orc factions, but there are more moderate Orc factions with no interest in needlessly prolonging the war. It’s in no culture’s interest to destroy itself, after all.
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ZINN: Minis Tirith: a city literally hiding from Middle Earth behind large stone walls. Do you see farming in Minas Tirith? No. Crops are imported. Do you see manufacturing? Outsourced, I imagine, to Dwarves. Where do they get their horses? From Rohan. Armor? Most likely armor manufacture is outsourced to Haradrim children down south. No wonder it can’t stop an arrow!
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CHOMSKY: The real question is whether Gandalf ever even wanted this mission to succeed. If so, why didn’t he entrust the ring to the Eagles? They saved him and Bilbo from peril at least twice in The Hobbit and helped him escape Saruman’s tower in The Fellowship of the Ring. Why not just have them fly over and drop the ring in the fires of Orodruin?
