Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter

[j]

Harry Potter

[Deleted]

Star wars

[Bazzy]

Not mad on either . WHAT ! I know , tried watching the films but just couldn't get into them especially Harry Potter

[Tournament Master]

I like the LOTR movies as a whole better, although I have rewatched Harry Potter more because of the kids. For books I'll give the nod to Harry Potter as I enjoyed all those books and couldn't get through a chapter of LOTR (I did read the Hobbit though).

For the tie breaker I'll go with throwingtoasters and give the nod to Harry Potter because of the theme park attractions. The theming of Diagon Alley and Hogsmeade at Universal is better than anything Disney has done, which is impressive.

[Deleted]

I really liked the first Harry Potter book/movie. A lot. I wish they had stopped there. Beginning with the second book/movie, it was just a downward spiral of angst. Every conceivable thing gets piled on the protagonists and every good thing is stripped away from them. Bit by agonizing bit. Yet somehow, the plucky kids wade through all the pathos to barely squeak out a moral victory.

I guess that’s popular in young adult fantasy fiction? I’m honestly not sure.

The Lord of the Rings series is hard to slog through (both the books and the movies). I feel like because I don’t know that Strider’s great great grandfather fought at the Battle of Morning Coffee with Elrond’s cousin’s best friend’s uncle, I’m missing a huge part of the story. But they were consistently that way—they didn’t seem to get worse as they went along.

Bottom line: I enjoyed watching all three Lord of the Rings movies. I didn’t enjoy all of the Harry Potter movies.


EDIT: Likewise for the books.

[topdollar]

Nov 11, 2021 19:17:16 GMT -5 @kevinb said:

Star wars

Never read any of the Lord Of The Rings/Harry Potter books or saw any of the movies. It's always been Star Wars & superheroes for me.

[DK II]

For me, it's hard to compare them as I believe they they are two different aspects of the Fantasy genre.

LOTR = "high" or "epic" fantasy. "Set in a magical environment that has its own rules and physical laws, this subgenre’s plots and themes have a grand scale."

Harry Potter = "sword/sorcery" fantasy. "A subset of high fantasy, it focuses on sword-wielding heroes, as well as magic or witchcraft.

Of course, in this case, the audience is the main differing factor between the two. LOTR seems to be to be for a more mature audience while there are elves and dwarves and dragons, the story is mature. Harry Potter was definitely meant to garner a younger audience and have them grow into the more mature themes of the final books (and the last three movies).

I like them both, given the choice, I would read LOTR (but only The Hobbit & the Trilogy books, the others are way to "scholarly" feeling for me) and watch the Harry Potter movies.

[Vegas]

The reason I started this thread was because I went to Universal Studios this weekend but I have never seen or read any of the Harry Potter movies/books. However, from a really young age I have been very familiar with Lords of the Rings as when I was in Kindergarten, 1st Grade, and 2nd Grade in Tacoma- whenever it rained- and it rained alot in Tacoma- instead of going to recess the teachers would play videos instead and I saw the animated Hobbit and Lords of the Rings countless times before I even read the books years later. I know they are different things but I was still wondering how you would compare these two major fantasy book series.

Although I don't know any of the context, I was impressed with the Harry Potter area at Universal Studios (I had not been to Universal Studios in 8 1/2 years.) The ride was good. I think a theoretical Lord of the Rings ride somewhere could be cool too by starting in the Shire and then going to places such as Rivendell, the Mines of Moria, Mordor, etc.

In addition to riding the Harry Potter ride (I rode it with throwingtoasters,) yesterday at Universal Studios I also went on the new Jurassic World ride (not much different from the Jurassic Park ride other than adding some dinosaurs who debuted in the Jurassic World movie,) the Mummy ride, the Transformers ride, and the studio tour (I went on the tour with Toasterboy too.) I also went to Moe's for a glass of Duff.

Originally I was going to Chicago for my 4 day Veteran's Day holiday weekend for the NGI6 but I changed my plans because there was no other show in Chicago this weekend and I usually have to see at least two shows for me to justify the trip (unless it is to a show in a city I have not been too in which case I will go sightseeing in addition to the show.) So I decided to stay in the Southwest and go to California this weekend. I was going to go to Disneyland because I really want to see Star Wars Land but I could not get a reservation for a park entry ticket until after 1 PM so I decided to see the new things at Univeral Studios instead and go to Disneyland to see Star Wars Land in 2022 (probably the same weekend as a wrestling show I attend in California.)

Good to see Toasterboy again and I had fun at Universal Studios.

[on_the_edge]

A section of a theme park dedicated to LOTR would be sweet but HP being set in modern times fits just a bit better. Not sure how it is set up in Cali but in Orlando they have all the shops and many of the places from the books. It is two sections, one in each park, that you can travel from one to the other on the train which is like a fun, casual ride in of itself. Then they have rides at each side. One side is the school and surrounding areas and the other is Diagon Alley complete with the darker areas. Now granted the shops are set up to make Universal more money they are fun to just walk thru at the least and if getting souvenirs it is cool that it is like buying from stores in the books/movies. Plus trying some of the food in the books in places that the characters ate at is neat. It can be done for LOTR but just a smaller scale.

[paul]

A bit late to the party here but I have to go with Harry Potter. I've never read the LOTR books and while I liked the movies I have no real desire to watch them again.

With Harry Potter I can still remember going to see the first movie on opening day back in 2001 knowing very little about the series. I had finished my classes for the day at the local Community College and decided to go see what all the fuss was about with this new phenomenon.

Within minutes I was completely pulled into this new and fascinating world. It took me back to the wonderous years of childhood. The next day I went out and bought the first two books and finished them both in a matter of days. To this day Chamber Of Secrets remains one of the only books I couldn't put down. I also bought the soundtrack to listen to John William's magnificent Oscar-nominated music. With all due respect to the fantastic work Howard Shore did on Fellowship Of The Ring I still think Williams should have taken the Oscar that year instead of Shore.

I was very disappointed with the Prisoner of Azkaban movie though. I'll never understand why some people consider it the best film in the series. Daniel Radcliffe's performance was laughably bad and I felt the pacing was terrible. I don't think Alfonso Cuaron was the right choice to direct the film. While I didn't know it at the time this film would begin my dislike of most of Cuaron's subsequent films: Don't even get me started on the pretentious snore-fest that Roma was!

I visited the theme park when I was in Orlando about 10 years ago and thoroughly enjoyed it. I was a bit disappointed that the Butter Beer was served as a cold beverage instead of hot like in the books but still found it tasty. I wish I could say the same thing about the Pumpkin Juice though. That stuff was disgusting!

I still think Universal Studios missed out on a HUGE marketing opportunity by not turning the Hogwarts Castle into a themed hotel. Imagine being able to stay in a room decorated just like the ones in the books and movies. They could have made a fortune!