Lord of the Nerds
Joey Michaels on December 21st, 2003I want to declare right here, now and forever, that I am a nerd. A dork. A geek. A herman. Whatever negative term you wish to describe somebody who is a little more intelligent and a lot more imaginative and socially inept, that is me. I embrace this totally and unapologetically from this point on.
I do this because I fricken loved Lord of the Rings: Return of the King and because, suddenly, bashing the people who liked it has become vogue again.
If you are over the age of 18 and bash people for being nerds, congratulations! You haven’t matured past high school yet. Since our culture currently rewards youth over all things, you are a good, mouth breathing citizen of the world. I hope you will enjoy your empty life.
Now, mind you, I am not defending people who showed up at the movies dressed as elves. These people are to geeks what the dude who shows up half naked with his chest painted blue for a New England Patriots game in sub zero weather are to sports - extremists.
Alas, the extremists are the most media friendly face of any group of people.
Don’t lump me and my fellows in with some dude who wears hairy feet and calls himself Slobo or something. We are deluxe geeks, with jobs, girlfriends and respectable jobs. And, yes, some of us like fantasy. In light of how crappy the world is, isn’t it nice to be able to escape into something else for a while - be it sports, comedy, porn or a sci-fi book? We don’t live in a fantasy world - but isn’t it nice to be able to ignore the real world for a couple of hours a week. Is that so wrong?
Anyhow, RotK is not perfect - but, hey, it was great fun and I loved it from start to finish. I watched the other two movies on DVD before going to see it and, let me tell you, as a single ten hour film, it is remarkable.
Not for everyone, sure. Nothing is for everyone and it is a mistake to imagine that anything is.
It was definately for me and my ilk, though. That is all.