An Unexpected Journey?

In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.

J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit.

The first part of Peter Jackson's Hobbit Trilogy made its debut on Friday, and reviews indicate that it's very well done, very much in the spirit of Jackson's work on The Lord of the Rings but perhaps more approachable for the average viewer.  Reviewers also speak very highly of Martin Freeman's performance in the role of Bilbo Baggins, the hobbit who unexpectedly finds himself taken from his quiet if slightly stuffy life in Hobbiton to participate in an epic quest involving dwarves, trolls, wizards, elves, orcs, a dragon and his horde of stolen treasure, and, of course, a magical ring.

None of this is a huge surprise. Peter Jackson has a proven ability to visually portray Tolkien's Middle Earth, and it may well have been for the best that Guillermo del Toro was unable to fit The Hobbit into his directing schedule. However, I'm a little concerned about the fact that it's the first of three movies:  An Unexpected Journey will be followed by The Desolation of Smaug next year, and the trilogy will conclude with There and Back Again in 2014.

My paperback copy of The Hobbit is 272 pages in length, as opposed to the 1008 pages of The Lord of the Rings.  Word count is perhaps a better indicator of relative size - counts vary depending on what's included (chapter headings, appendices, etc.) but online sources have The Hobbit at 95,674 words, and The Lord of The Rings weighing in at 468,420 (not including the appendices).  Short answer, The Lord of the Rings is about four times longer than The Hobbit, and yet the movie adaptation of The Hobbit is apparently going to be about the same length as the Rings series:  three movies and nine plus hours.

I gather from quoted comments by Peter Jackson that some of the extra time will involve Gandalf's various travels and adventures during the time he spends away from Bilbo and the dwarves, and logically there's a lot of room to expand battle scenes and Bilbo's time spent hiding in the palace of the Elvenking and so on.  Even so, I'm worried about story for the sake of profit over story for the sake of story.

I have a lot of confidence in Mr. Jackson, but I also realize that moviemaking is a business.  On that basis, I can easily imagine a meeting in which a group of investment-minded suits suggest that three movies would very likely make three times as much money as one movie, hint hint hint.  In support of this, there's a common thread in reviews of An Unexpected Journey regarding parts that seem to drag on too long, or which have been enormously extended from the original text:  "Things that the book mentions in one sentence are given entire scenes."

I have tentative plans to see the first installment of The Hobbit between Christmas and New Year's, and I hope to go in with an open mind.  But I have to admit that I'm a bit worried that the extra content may mean that Bilbo Baggins isn't the only person going on an unexpected journey. 

 - Sid

Preferably later.

 "God, it's the end of the world, and I'm still 15 minutes late." 

Penny, Seeking a Friend for the End of the World

By the way, speaking of the end of the world, has anyone heard anything new about December 21st?  You know, when the 13th Mayan b'ak'tun* runs out?  Personally, I'd like some kind of solid information about exactly how the world is going to end, it would be a lot easier to prepare. In fact, other than a few end of the world parties, no one seems to have put a lot of planning into this whole thing - there's been no debt holiday, we haven't been told to stay home from work, and as far as I know there hasn't been a single end of the world riot yet.

For that matter, is anyone still tracking the sinister alien objects that were due to arrive around now?  That whole thing seems to have fallen off the map, which is surprising under the circumstances.  Or has it?  Maybe there's a lot more planning going on than we think...

Seriously though, there's been a number of these apocalyptic predictions over the last few years - you know, purely on a statistical basis, sooner or later one of these clowns is going to be right.

 - Sid

*  Did we all get our Olmec As A Second Language credits at university?

Apocalypse Later.

 "Let me put it this way. We lost the Stanley Cup and we rioted.  What would we do if we couldn't put gas in our cars?"

Donovan Hides, TIR Science Correspondent

I’ve just finished reading John Varley’s Slow Apocalypse, in which an rogue bio-engineered micro-organism destroys the world’s petroleum supply by first solidifying it and then making it explode. The result, of course, is the downfall of civilization, after which it's every man (and woman) for him (or her) self, accompanied by widespread rioting and looting, biker gangs roaming the streets (presumably having shown the foresight to stock up on gasoline) and starvation and disease taking their toll on the population.

It was an interesting read, although somehow surprisingly low in drama. To be fair to Varley, I'm willing to admit that I’ve become a bit jaded - I think I may have been to the end of the world one time too many, as per Robert Silverberg. However, unlike zombie apocalypses, giant asteroid apocalypses, alien invasion apocalypses, global warming apocalypses and all-the-electrical-stuff-stops-working apocalypses*, Varley’s end of the world scenario is something that I could see as a very real possibility under the right circumstances. The question of what happens when fossil fuels run out has been a looming spectre for decades now, and all Varley has to do is accelerate the process.

The title of the novel reflects the fact that there is a four month spooling up period during which the governments of the world are apparently aware of the problem. In the case of the U.S. authorities, inadequate stopgap measures such as fuel rationing and car pooling are instituted while they attempt to surreptitiously deal with the situation, after which the penny drops and everything rather suddenly goes to hell in a handbasket.

Varley’s story is set in California, with most of the action taking place in Los Angeles - where better to start a disaster that involves not being able to drive?  More importantly, Los Angeles exists in a desert, apparently completely dependent on outside sources of food, water and energy, all of which would quickly run out if the transportation system was disrupted.

Varley also loads the dice in favour of chaos. Not only do Los Angeles' neighbouring oil fields (and the La Brea tarpits) explode, but there’s a 9.4 Richter scale earthquake and resultant flooding from broken dams, followed by a massive firestorm. On a national level, an attempted military coup adds insult to injury by crippling the ability of the government to address the situation. After the smoke quite literally clears, there appears to be very little left of the various governing bodies, and survivors band together in small self-sustaining** enclaves that exist at an almost pre-industrial level.

But here’s the question: would the elimination of fossil fuels, specifically oil-based fuels (coal and natural gas are unaffected) lead to the end of the world, or, more accurately, to a full-blown Mad Max-style downfall of civilization? Especially if the governments of the world had four months notice?

Given the current interest in global warming, carbon debt, and general environmental awareness, I'd like to think that the answer is "no".  Right now there's no serious incentive for switching to biofuels, but the potential is there. With some minor adjustments, any car can run on ethanol, and diesel engines were originally designed to run on corn oil rather than fossil fuels. It would take more time, but an emergency situation would accelerate the development of vehicles powered by fuel cells, and although hybrid electrical vehicles may not exactly be commonplace,  they're certainly an established technology, as are natural gas vehicles.

I doubt that four months would be enough time for a complete conversion, but it would be plenty of time to first let people know about the upcoming problem, and second to reassure them that solutions and substitutes were being put in place as quickly as possible.  And the punchline?  After all was said and done, it might even be cheaper at the pumps.

- Sid

*Obviously we need to come up with a term for this - I'm open to suggestions.

** There's a slightly snarky little comment at the end of the book about how these communities are completely committed to recycling and reusing absolutely all waste and garbage. Yes, it took a global disaster to make that happen...