There is a reason behind his hair. Around the 70s it was not clear which shape the elves had so every artwork kept them hidden under hair. Later it became clear what Tolkien had in mind, I think through some letters they found.
@@mattrasp1615 the merged the character Glorfindel and Legolas. In the book, Legolas doesn’t make an appearance until Rivendell and Glorfindel is the one who helps Frodo escape the riders. In this adaptation, Legolas takes on both roles. Which makes more sense tbh but Tolkien loves to build out his universe
@@slappyjones2136 ahh i was skipping thru I figured they definitely just had glorfindel playing his part and honestly had that in my Memory of this adaptation. Makes you appreciate PJ even more
@@mattrasp1615 and PJ swapped Glorfindel for Arwen! Glorfindel got the shaft in the adaptations, but I guess it’s Tolkien’s fault for not making him do anything else in the books.
No one’s talking about that weirdly long run where we’re looking straight up Legolas and Aragon’s nose for an absurdly slow mo depiction of running for your life 🤣
@@englishatheart Broo you need to use those /s or /j tags or something like this reply has me cracking up. Like I am using old slang that has been popularized to the point of being annoying & makes no sense, it annoys me now too & I was trying to quickly get across how funny that scene was & join in the joking around in the comments. But I can’t tell if this is you snapping, at your breaking point over this term that is not meant to be taken literally and is apart of internet culture understanding, a wink and a nod to each other in a way even tho it’s the perpetuation of the same joke over and over again w a horse long dead, orrrr if you’re trying to be charming and funny in a kind of “well actually 🤓☝️” persona where the love of language and exactitude are meant to be seen as a fun nerd esque (affectionate) style of writing Lol this comment really got my goat and I was stairing at it for far too long and am genuinely wondering what the meaning of it is, like actually no hate I’m just confused
“pippin and merry may be dead by now. we don’t know 🤷🏻♂️” and then the “one of them anyway” after gimli rejoices about them being alive is absolutely insane and i love him
Everyone in this movie is either edited live footage or live footage that was traced over. Very likely that’s the very hair the actors had! Tree beard is the only character in the movie that is completely animated independent of a live reference
At the time it was not clear what ear shape the elves had, so every artwork had them hidden under hair. It later became clear, I think through the many letters Tolkien had sent to his friends about his work.
The way he looked at Sam and rested his hand on him while patronisingly saying 'Sam, No resting can help your mr.frodo now.' Like,he legit sounded like he sighed Sam's name like a fed up parent and followed it with a tone that said 'you're an utter fuckwit but you have a good heart at least.' While explaining how Lord Elrond will help absolutely slayed me.
"What a people you dwarves are for hiding things. On the gates of your most wonderous, ancient kingdom you write, 'Speak, friend, and enter,' and no spell in any language can open the door." I LOVE this line.
@@noldorwarrior7791Oblivion lol lotr 1970s Elves dude with blonde hair , Dwarfs dudes with beards same size as Human N Elves , Human Native Americans
The uniqueness of Legolas here is in when one moment I admire the fact that they bothered to animate the licking of lips while running, but immediately the next second we all wonder what's wrong with his eyes.
I think it’s because his features here are slightly warped. His eyes are close together and are upturned in an odd way, his nose is very narrow and pointy, and they animated his mouth in a very odd way when compared to everyone else. Combine that with the very human movements (because it’s rotoscoped) it makes him kinda uncanny. Which is fitting for an elf, tbh.
I love this!!! Elves are meant to be terrifying yet beautiful and wise. I wish they leant more into this in the movies, I thought the rankin bass version did well at it too
3:31 as they are running away Aragorn‘s looking over at Legolas is hilarious. They’re “flying along” but Aragorn is clearly thinking “What… is up… with your… face…”
So interesting that all three versions have a different character arriving post nazgul blade scene; Glorfindel in the books, Arwen in the movie and Legolas in the cartoon.
@@00Kuja00 yet this part is a bit tricky for adaptations to deal with, since Glorfindel only shows up here and never again. It works very well for the book's worldbuilding (which is fundamental like you said), but on a limited screetime it feels completely missplaced.
@@julespulp214 There is also that Tolkien put him there still thinking that LotR and the Silmarillion would be published togheter as the publisher originally promised him.
I know it's a Legolas compilation, but I wish it went just 10 seconds more to get my favorite Gimli bit! "So all you had to do was say friend and enter" [Gimli lets out a world weary sigh] "Those were happier times..."
What exactly do you mean Legolas has extreme Luigi energy? I'm not seeing any similarities between the two. You do mean Luigi from the Super Mario Bros right?
Dang it I want to like this comment more than once. For how goofy and clunky this movie can be.... you can tell it's still full of a lot of love for the source material.
I read once that the plan was initially to do return of the king as a separate movie, but they never got around to it. Possibly by design. Ralph Bakshi was forced to do this movie against his will, so he may have done everything he could to delay/prevent the sequel
There was an animated Return of the King but it was done by a different Studio that being Rankin-Bass. They were the same studio that did the animated Hobbit (1977).
@@Novusod If I recall that was the one where the animation style was very close to A Flight of Dragons, and where the Witch King sounded like Skeletor from the He-Man series. I don't 'think' I've ever seen the full thing, but my suggested feed keeps getting clips from time to time.
@@tomaspabon2484 Tolkien elves are the same size as humans but a bit slimmer and taller. They even used to be bigger than humans but they shrunk as their magic faded.
I always found this movie extremely interesting. It looks so... special, like as if someone just had the bare minimum of money and used every trick. Also, Boromir is a Viking, Aragorn is a native American, Legolas is an Elve and Elrond is Julius Ceasar, now how do you find that?
The backgrounds weren't made in a botched manner. The film has a lot of different hand-painted landscape fores. This type of details that usually go unnoticed, but where you can see the care with which they made it.
Tolkein's daughter consulted on character design, and told Bakshi what the different Middle Earth cultures were inspired by. it may have been taken too literally but at least they asked a family member.
I think the movies were pretty expensive to make. They filmed everything, then painted over it, frame by frame by hand. That's why they didn't make the second movie, it cost too much and didn't sell well enough. Certainly gave it a unique look though.
I used to watch this repeatedly as a kid and it holds such a special place in my heart. I do remember watching Legolas and thinking to myself thats not how real people's faces work though.
Aragorn(readying himself for the next threat): What do you hear? Legolas(Crosses eyes and bites his lip) : Nothing. But I feeeeeeeeeeeeeeeellllllllllllll
I love the combination of mediums. You've got painted backdrops, live-action, traditional animation, rotoscoping, and one shot where Aragorn and Legolas are running where the background seems to literally be a blue-painted wall. One of the things I find really funny is how some scenes you can tell how obviously rotoscoped the scene is. And it seems like the Hobbits aren't rotoscoped, or at least they didn't follow it as closely, but that's probably due to their size. They couldn't be filmed interacting with the actors who were filmed for the rotoscoping. Gimli is also very tall, which I find funny. Boromir's horned helmet is also very amusing. As is Aragorn's lack of pants.
Hearing that Anthony Daniels (C-3PO) played Legolas intrigued me, so I looked this up. I dunno what exactly I was expecting, but he sounds unrecognizable. Goes to show he’s a very versatile actor who brings a real talent to a variety of character types. An underused actor. Also John Hurt is great in this and his voice is so lovely and soothing, another enormous but under appreciated talent
This version of Legolas had a lot going for it as far as I'm concerned. He's unabashedly beautiful & graceful. His voice is melodious as described. Straight up deadly in battle. I like him , even though he's been erased from existence by Orlando Bloom's portrayal for this generation.
I'd like Legolas in this film too. Appearance and personality. When Jackson's version came out, he became more awesome. At one point he was my favourite character in LOTR.
Christopher Tolkien wrote this in The Book of Lost Tales II: "Ultimately, of course, the Elves shed all associations and qualities that would be now commonly considered 'fairylike', and those who remained in the Great Lands in Ages of the world at this time unconceived were to grow greatly in stature and in power: there was nothing filmy or transparent about the heroic or majestic Eldar of the Third Age of Middleearth. Long afterwards my father would write, in a wrathful comment on a 'pretty' or 'ladylike' pictorial rendering of Legolas: He was tall as a young tree, lithe, immensely strong, able swiftly to draw a great war-bow and shoot down a Nazgul, endowed with the tremendous vitality of Elvish bodies, so hard and resistant to hurt that he went only in light shoes over rock or through snow, the most tireless of all the Fellowship."
@archvaldor Ha! Thanks for thinking I'm that young. Bakshi's Legolas was the first I'd ever seen on film ; I was about 16 and saw this movie during its theatrical run.
I don’t know a thing about The Lord of the Rings (other than the fact that it’s a book series?), but the expression at 1:48 is the best thing I’ve seen this week
This is C-3PO who's voicing Legolas - I loved, loved this film when I saw it in the cinemas - it's the film that really got me into Tolkien (along w that magical Hobbit cartoon w its folk songs and incredible dragon) - nothing compares w Jackson's version, but this film had a major impact on many of its initial young viewers - along w Watership Down and the entrancing Last Unicorn, these fierce cartoons felt like a bridge into being a grown-up
Now looking back at cartoon Legolas, i really don't understand what the hell is up with his eyes, really looks like somebody made custom Dark Souls player model in minute.
His facial structure changes and morphs throughout, especially his eyes. We first see him with big eyes, later they shrink. Like Link in Ocarina Of Time
Man i had forgotten this. It really is a very unique gem of an adaptation. Not to mention it was all done with semi practical sets and rotoscoping. Just the whole idea of: “we cant really do this with practical fx in this day and age, what if we did it with animation? But like… with people.” Its just an amazing product of its time.
Yeah, it’s truly a great film, for all its faults. It has a tone more close to the novels, with a vibe of seriousness and stoic dialogue, which I always had in mind when reading through the trilogy. I prefer it to the Jackson adaptation, but it’s not to say those films are bad - I just feel the Bakshi version has a better atmosphere, and conveys the rugged and ever present danger that Middle-Earth has in it. Jackson just kind of paints this “pretty” and grand version of Middle-Earth, with Mordor being “the bad area”, where Bakshi had the idea to paint the world as being wild and pristine, but always with a hint of danger in the depths. I even prefer the Bakshi orc designs to the Jackson ones, just barely, because they looked more menacing and wild, and closer to the interpretation of them being corrupted men/elves. Dunno. I could talk about this film for hours, it’s just a great oddity. :)
My dad was convinced that this version was more accurate to the book because in the book, Glorfindel showed up to take Frodo to Rivendell. So he turned the movie on and said "look its Glorfindel!" but 0:09 humbled him real quick XD
I get that it's just me, given the rest of the comments, but I love this version of Legolas. He feels much more like a character when compared to Jackson's blander take.
I watched this first before Peter Jackson's Adaptation. Needless to say I was quite upset that Bakshi didn't continue. But back when I was 4-5 years old I thought it was epic, now it's An Awesome Classic!
This movie is incredible. I love how in so many scenes you basically have this dynamic with the voice actors: Gimli--Totally unknown actor doing a respectable job Aragorn--Famous and super-talented actor kind of phoning it in Legolas--Quasi-famous mediocre actor who steals every scene he's in by giving the weird, aloof performance of his _life_ P.S. I adore the scene that starts at 3:30 where it looks like Aragorn and Legolas are trying to run away from the cover art of a late-90s techno album.
Where 👏 are 👏 Aragorn's 👏 pants 👏 This whole thing is like a car crash and I cannot look away. The expressions. The line deliveries. The running. The choice to make every character look like they belong in a zero- budget porn or a tertiary character in a Rob Zombie film. How have I never seen this before. I love it and you can't stop me.
I love how when they blue screen Aragorn and Legolas we get that awful animation of their faces then, just when youre thinking hiw awkward it is,, the camera angle just drops and focuses on Aragorn's mini skirt and bare legs. Outstanding.
I love how Legolas looks like an Oblivion character.
BY AZURA! BY AZURA! BY AZURA!
Oh god he's that yellow haired fanboy mf that got send to death in every possible way known to Tamriel
There is a reason behind his hair. Around the 70s it was not clear which shape the elves had so every artwork kept them hidden under hair. Later it became clear what Tolkien had in mind, I think through some letters they found.
@@PsyCasticAzura the good witch
@00Kuja00 I was also referencing the eyes and general head shape, but that's a neat fact though.
The pants-less Native American Aragorn just ties the whole movie together 🤣🤣🤣
If only his pants were tied up.
@@PsyCasticif only he wore pants
I hate to sound like the 🤓meme, but the outfit is more akin to a Late Roman Tunic.
@@ThePUNISHEDBacon Got it Italian kilts
American Indians don't call themselves that.
i know this is about legolas but Gandalf just emerging from the trees with a blanket over his head cracked me up so bad
The costuming for this version is much more accessible for fans to replicate
Cracking with laughter is exactly the right reaction to most of the shenanigans that goes on in these movies.
Just gandalf pulling a jerk prank on them!
And he's like... 12 feet away. And everyone just sort of watches him walk closer while Gimli screams
"I'm in disguise, this way no one will recognise me!"
I love that during the movie they occasionally decide the animating is just too hard and give up.
😂
I legit think they ran out of budget lol
There was an anime in the 70s where for a few scenes it was just real people with anime heads super imposed on to them. It always cracked me up.
It looks like the entire film is rotoscoped
@@exogenesus6841 I always heard the style refered to as "heavily rotoscoped." It's so uncanny.
Legolas is so disgusted by Potato Sam, even if he tries to smile through it. I love it.
His eye came out for a second 😂😂😂
PO-TAY-TOES!!!...boil em!..mash em!...stick em in a stew!!
1:48 Legolas' attempt to smile at lesser creature, but in his mind his elven supremacy burns with the desire to shut the mutant up.
most accurate comment I have ever read
Accurate assessment. I like Sam in this rendition, but he is NOTHING like the contemplative Samwise in the books.
I thought his name was sandwich
hahahahahahahah take my upvote, you made me laugh. I'm making a meme with this scene.
Reminds me of the smiling scene from Terminator 2.
Now I understand the inspiration behind Orlando Bloom intensely and aggressively existing while in the background of Jackson's films.
"We are proud to pay homage to Bakshi once more."
It’s been a minute since I’ve read but no shot Legolas met them between Bree and Rivendell right?
@@mattrasp1615 the merged the character Glorfindel and Legolas. In the book, Legolas doesn’t make an appearance until Rivendell and Glorfindel is the one who helps Frodo escape the riders. In this adaptation, Legolas takes on both roles. Which makes more sense tbh but Tolkien loves to build out his universe
@@slappyjones2136 ahh i was skipping thru I figured they definitely just had glorfindel playing his part and honestly had that in my
Memory of this adaptation. Makes you appreciate PJ even more
@@mattrasp1615 and PJ swapped Glorfindel for Arwen! Glorfindel got the shaft in the adaptations, but I guess it’s Tolkien’s fault for not making him do anything else in the books.
"If we lose even a little time, we lose Frodo" said Legolas while leisurely strolling along after pausing to share a word with Sam.
IKR. With 5 Black Riders travelling at the speed of Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird.
It's because he doesn't give a shit.😅😂
@@MrMegamike2k That would explain a lot.
Just having a casual conversation while frodo dies, very funny.
Did they meet Legolas way earlier in this adaption?
No one’s talking about that weirdly long run where we’re looking straight up Legolas and Aragon’s nose for an absurdly slow mo depiction of running for your life 🤣
You're talking about it, making your statement false and redundant.
@@englishatheart Broo you need to use those /s or /j tags or something like this reply has me cracking up. Like I am using old slang that has been popularized to the point of being annoying & makes no sense, it annoys me now too & I was trying to quickly get across how funny that scene was & join in the joking around in the comments. But I can’t tell if this is you snapping, at your breaking point over this term that is not meant to be taken literally and is apart of internet culture understanding, a wink and a nod to each other in a way even tho it’s the perpetuation of the same joke over and over again w a horse long dead, orrrr if you’re trying to be charming and funny in a kind of “well actually 🤓☝️” persona where the love of language and exactitude are meant to be seen as a fun nerd esque (affectionate) style of writing
Lol this comment really got my goat and I was stairing at it for far too long and am genuinely wondering what the meaning of it is, like actually no hate I’m just confused
3:12 Imagine getting stabbed to death by some guy in shorts and then he points, laughs, and pirouettes at you.
Sounds like a toxic player in a online battle that's been heavily modded.
Literally any MMO, or any competitive multiplayer for that matter
Dude that was fucking hilarious, forgot about that moment, up their with gandalfs little dance at the beginning of the movie 😂
"Dodge this you bastaaaaaard!"
“pippin and merry may be dead by now. we don’t know 🤷🏻♂️” and then the “one of them anyway” after gimli rejoices about them being alive is absolutely insane and i love him
WHY IS HE SO AGGRESSIVE IM GOING INSANE
"There will be no more signs!" *jogs away frustratedly*
His face always looks so mildly disdainful and it's amazing 💀
He’s just very jaded from war and matter-of-fact, he doesn’t sugar coat or mince words.
@@towelgirl21I interpreted it as, “There will be no more signs because we will find them quickly,” but perhaps I was being optimistic 😂
Love how even in their animated forms they all still have the big 70’s hair lol
Everyone in this movie is either edited live footage or live footage that was traced over. Very likely that’s the very hair the actors had! Tree beard is the only character in the movie that is completely animated independent of a live reference
except gimli
Well except for Gimli lol
At the time it was not clear what ear shape the elves had, so every artwork had them hidden under hair. It later became clear, I think through the many letters Tolkien had sent to his friends about his work.
@@jesserichardson8116 I love rotoscoping
I love this sassy Legolas, the way he quickly snapped and delivered "Then you know nothing in Gondor" was hilarious for me xD
The Sass is because is he played by C3P0
Boromir: "One does not simply walk into Mordor..."
Legolas: "THEN YOU KNOW NOTHING IN MORDOR!"
What about Edgy Live Action Legolas?
Proceeds to step on the Hobbits
@@Lemuel928 Edgy?
The way he looked at Sam and rested his hand on him while patronisingly saying 'Sam, No resting can help your mr.frodo now.' Like,he legit sounded like he sighed Sam's name like a fed up parent and followed it with a tone that said 'you're an utter fuckwit but you have a good heart at least.' While explaining how Lord Elrond will help absolutely slayed me.
He sure is a testament to a simple passive aggressive worm trying to sound deep.
I know I loved how patronizing he was 😂 that's how I would talk to a toddler who doesn't understand grandma just died
@@gianna526i'm crying 😂
legolas be like "frodos dying u fucking moron"
The elven way of saying: Bless your heart", I suppose. 🤔🤷♀😁
I really love how whimsically uncanny this Legolas is
Boromir has no pants. Boromir needs no pants.
You mean Aragorn?
🤣
This just made my life.
Pants are overrated.
@@ChihuahuainaTrenchcoat both of them really.
"What a people you dwarves are for hiding things. On the gates of your most wonderous, ancient kingdom you write, 'Speak, friend, and enter,' and no spell in any language can open the door."
I LOVE this line.
One of my favourite lines of his, and after the door to Moria is opened.
I love how this movie ended before frodo destroyed the ring
Gimli: "Yeah, you got me there."
@@ThecoolestgalonthebeachTrue to the book, at least for the most of us
Gandalf - Oh, Gandalf... you old fool! Heh heh! * speaks 'friend' in Elvish, and enters *
Legolas - Well, shit... I guess the joke is on me.
Legolas's skills include, archery, tracking, speaking to trees, and delivering clunky dialogue while chewing on his own lips.
I like the idea of elves having a uncanny appearance to them and not just being humans with pointy ears.
Yes, like his eyes.
I know what you mean. But i think thats more fitting for Elder Scrolls elves.
@@noldorwarrior7791Oblivion lol lotr 1970s Elves dude with blonde hair , Dwarfs dudes with beards same size as Human N Elves , Human Native Americans
Warhammer Elves and Eldar in the original art are like that with the elongated faces and slanted, solid black eyes
The uniqueness of Legolas here is in when one moment I admire the fact that they bothered to animate the licking of lips while running, but immediately the next second we all wonder what's wrong with his eyes.
What would you do if you looked at medusa?
3:39 for those looking
"What do you hear?"
"Nothing." Dramatic turn towards camera. "But I _feel."_
Greatest moment on film. Should have won an Oscar.
Legolas: "Nothing...but I can't feel my face."
That really is gold.
3:14 Aragorn so happy you'd think that was his first time winning a fight
(Trips over his sword)
This Legolas has biblically accurate angel vibes. He's creepy and weird.
Who may have a supply elf spliff.
I'm telling you I feel the same. He's otherworldy here and slightly uncanny. I love this version just for that.
I think it’s because his features here are slightly warped. His eyes are close together and are upturned in an odd way, his nose is very narrow and pointy, and they animated his mouth in a very odd way when compared to everyone else. Combine that with the very human movements (because it’s rotoscoped) it makes him kinda uncanny. Which is fitting for an elf, tbh.
I love this!!! Elves are meant to be terrifying yet beautiful and wise. I wish they leant more into this in the movies, I thought the rankin bass version did well at it too
@@KlutzyNinjaKittyMy eyes are like that 😮
"Then you know nothing in Gondor!"
Holy shit, dude.
3:31 as they are running away Aragorn‘s looking over at Legolas is hilarious. They’re “flying along” but Aragorn is clearly thinking “What… is up… with your… face…”
Lol Legolas sticks his tongue out for basically no reason whatsoever
Aragorn is one to speak
In Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings Legolas is special. In this Lord of the Rings Legolas is _special_ .
Some of the animation is so bad he looks like he has downs syndrome. It's pretty terrible.
Literally what I thought😂
Both elfsesss are precious!
ableist
Everybody is sort of special in this version.
So interesting that all three versions have a different character arriving post nazgul blade scene; Glorfindel in the books, Arwen in the movie and Legolas in the cartoon.
Spoken like Eomer.
I don't know if you can call the books a "version" since they are the fundament.
@@00Kuja00 yet this part is a bit tricky for adaptations to deal with, since Glorfindel only shows up here and never again. It works very well for the book's worldbuilding (which is fundamental like you said), but on a limited screetime it feels completely missplaced.
I forgot Glor' got shafted in the Bakshi 'toon too! 🤓😎✌🏻
@@julespulp214 There is also that Tolkien put him there still thinking that LotR and the Silmarillion would be published togheter as the publisher originally promised him.
Wild that Legolas is voiced by C-3PO himself, Anthony Daniels.
"Oh! Oh, I say! Gimli! Help! Oh, you miserable, stupid dwarf!"
No wonder his voice is so nice
I think this is the only other role I remember him for
And this film was released a year after Star Wars (1977). He sounds so much younger...
THANK YOU was trying to figure out where else I'd heard him!
I love how sometimes the actors were barely traced over, especially the Orcs, it makes the movie feel so surreal.
“Pippin and Merry may be dead by now, we don’t know.” Legolas said with no emotion or feeling whatsoever
Gimli: “They’re alive!”
Legolas: “psh, one of them, I guess. Damn.”
"Pippin and Mary may be dead by now, we don't know (Nor do I give a flying fuck)"
I think you have to remember Legolas is a young man of 3000 yrs old, his view on mortality is a bit different.
Weird seeing gimli as tall as legolas 😂
Nah, Legolas is a wood elf (Bosmer) By Azura! By Azura! By Azura!
@@PsyCastic dude the game you are refering to came out 13 years ago its crazy
Yeah, what the fuck was up with that. it is ANIMATION COULDN'T THEY HAVE JUST DRAWN HIM SHORTER?
@@lang1301 I was referencing Oblivion, which was 17 years ago. Like the time it took Gandalf to research the ring and travel.
@@suggiethames9870 its rotoscoped animation. idk if the hobbit are rotoscoped too..or if its children playing the characters
I know it's a Legolas compilation, but I wish it went just 10 seconds more to get my favorite Gimli bit!
"So all you had to do was say friend and enter"
[Gimli lets out a world weary sigh]
"Those were happier times..."
We all would like more with our camp Elffy Friend. I wish he had interacted more with others. He did more so than Bloom.
It's hard to pinpoint why, but this Legolas has extreme Luigi energy.
What exactly do you mean Legolas has extreme Luigi energy? I'm not seeing any similarities between the two. You do mean Luigi from the Super Mario Bros right?
@@skydancer644 There's not really actual similarities, it's just the energy
That’s what I’m saying😭
I would argue they share contrasting slender shape and no visible jawline.
That’s mama Luigi to you
1:48 The pure look of disgust on his face, priceless. 😂 "What the F am i looking at?!"
watching legolas drop his arrow and cry out in dismay like in the book was a weirdly satisfying touch
Dang it I want to like this comment more than once. For how goofy and clunky this movie can be.... you can tell it's still full of a lot of love for the source material.
It still has a certain charm to it. Shame they didn't complete the full book.
I read once that the plan was initially to do return of the king as a separate movie, but they never got around to it.
Possibly by design. Ralph Bakshi was forced to do this movie against his will, so he may have done everything he could to delay/prevent the sequel
Agree. I first saw this back in 95 and I love their take on Sauron and the more dark atmosphere overall.
There was an animated Return of the King but it was done by a different Studio that being Rankin-Bass. They were the same studio that did the animated Hobbit (1977).
@@Novusod They look really bad.
@@Novusod If I recall that was the one where the animation style was very close to A Flight of Dragons, and where the Witch King sounded like Skeletor from the He-Man series. I don't 'think' I've ever seen the full thing, but my suggested feed keeps getting clips from time to time.
At 4:05 "then you know nothing in Gondor!!" His face is something extra.
(ノಠ益ಠ)ノ
"Then you know _nothing_ in Gondor!!"
Gimli being nearly as tall as legolas is really odd
Tolkien elves (and most elves in myth) are shorter than men, only slightly taller than dwarves
@@tomaspabon2484 Tolkien elves are the same size as humans but a bit slimmer and taller. They even used to be bigger than humans but they shrunk as their magic faded.
Legolas smiling while riding his horse and then hugging Aragon was my favorite part of the movie.
Dude looks like he has SEEN THINGS!
I always found this movie extremely interesting. It looks so... special, like as if someone just had the bare minimum of money and used every trick.
Also, Boromir is a Viking, Aragorn is a native American, Legolas is an Elve and Elrond is Julius Ceasar, now how do you find that?
I find it interesting that the animation team conjure their style of the characters. Even if they are not faithful to the book.
*Caesar
The backgrounds weren't made in a botched manner. The film has a lot of different hand-painted landscape fores. This type of details that usually go unnoticed, but where you can see the care with which they made it.
Tolkein's daughter consulted on character design, and told Bakshi what the different Middle Earth cultures were inspired by. it may have been taken too literally but at least they asked a family member.
I think the movies were pretty expensive to make. They filmed everything, then painted over it, frame by frame by hand. That's why they didn't make the second movie, it cost too much and didn't sell well enough. Certainly gave it a unique look though.
Are we not going to talk about the fact that Aragorn isn't wearing any pants? Is he wearing booty shorts or just a miniskirt?
He shat himself on Weathertop and Pippin discreetly lent him a pair of hobbit trousers.
It's too feel the breeze between the knees.
Gondor has no pants. Gondor needs no pants.
@@Elcoreyour comment made me lmao, get a coughing fit & nearly shit myself too. Good job, sir
aragorn in booty shorts are what the peter jackson films are missing tbh
I used to watch this repeatedly as a kid and it holds such a special place in my heart. I do remember watching Legolas and thinking to myself thats not how real people's faces work though.
I like to imagine the woodland elves are just a bunch of airheads tripping on mushrooms.
"His love of the Elves leaf, has clearly slowed his mind."
No, those are the high elves
So funny to remember this was the most popular imagery most people had in their heads about LOTR before the Peter Jackson films for the longest time
An asian, a native American and a viking stepped into Bree…
Ewww! They should wipe it off their shoes!
Aragorn(readying himself for the next threat): What do you hear?
Legolas(Crosses eyes and bites his lip) : Nothing. But I feeeeeeeeeeeeeeeellllllllllllll
I remember when a Legolas was a Scottish girl who liked putting plastic bricks together.
Brother, this has gotta be the most underrated comment of all time, this is an amazing dad joke
Took me several seconds. Lulz.
This comment gave me psychic damage. 😭
The “a” before Legolas was a very important note to make this comment make sense
Jesus Christ…. GO TO BED KENNY…😂
Gimli, tallest of all the dwarves. So tall that if it wasn't for everyone else telling us he was a dwarf, we'd never know...
1:48 It's like he wants to punch Sam but he's fighting his inner demons from doing it 😂
😂😂
I do like his voice. So calm.
Legolas ASMR
Except when he says "You know nothing in Gondor!"
I never noticed how gigantic belt buckles are in this version. Aragorn's is bigger than his head.
Tolkien had a special fascination for belts and their buckles, and for curiously fashioned door knobs
He's got to keep his pants from falling down!
......oh, wait
@@thekiss2083 Gondor has no pants.
Gondor needs no pants
"One of them, anyway."
Goddamn try not to sound _too_ happy about it Legolas 😂💀
0:17 ok as much as I love making fun of this version relentlessly, this is genuinely adorable
One cannot simply have a Logolas highlight reel without the words:
"They're taking the hobbits to Isengard!!"
"Legolas, can you speak Bocce?" -- "Of course I can, sir. It's like a second language to me...."
More second than elvish.
of course, he's fluent in over 6 million forms of communication
I love the combination of mediums. You've got painted backdrops, live-action, traditional animation, rotoscoping, and one shot where Aragorn and Legolas are running where the background seems to literally be a blue-painted wall. One of the things I find really funny is how some scenes you can tell how obviously rotoscoped the scene is. And it seems like the Hobbits aren't rotoscoped, or at least they didn't follow it as closely, but that's probably due to their size. They couldn't be filmed interacting with the actors who were filmed for the rotoscoping.
Gimli is also very tall, which I find funny. Boromir's horned helmet is also very amusing. As is Aragorn's lack of pants.
2:35 That is one tall dwarf.
i just love Aragorn being so happy to see Legolas and them immediately sharing a big ol hug. Such bros
Yes… bros….
@@Edge_Boye just bros being bros
1:07 Omg they're friends tho. I love it. 10/10 no notes, change nothing.
Hearing that Anthony Daniels (C-3PO) played Legolas intrigued me, so I looked this up. I dunno what exactly I was expecting, but he sounds unrecognizable. Goes to show he’s a very versatile actor who brings a real talent to a variety of character types. An underused actor. Also John Hurt is great in this and his voice is so lovely and soothing, another enormous but under appreciated talent
0:45 I died laughing Gandalf is such a troll lol.
This version of Legolas had a lot going for it as far as I'm concerned. He's unabashedly beautiful & graceful. His voice is melodious as described. Straight up deadly in battle. I like him , even though he's been erased from existence by Orlando Bloom's portrayal for this generation.
I'd like Legolas in this film too. Appearance and personality. When Jackson's version came out, he became more awesome. At one point he was my favourite character in LOTR.
" I like him , even though he's been erased from existence by Orlando Bloom's portrayal for this generation." For YOUR generation perhaps.
Christopher Tolkien wrote this in The Book of Lost Tales II: "Ultimately, of course, the Elves shed all associations and qualities that would be now commonly considered 'fairylike', and those who remained in the Great Lands in Ages of the world at this time unconceived were to grow greatly in stature and in power: there was nothing filmy or transparent about the heroic or majestic Eldar of the Third Age of Middleearth. Long afterwards my father would write, in a wrathful comment on a 'pretty' or 'ladylike' pictorial rendering of Legolas: He was tall as a young tree, lithe, immensely strong, able swiftly to draw a great war-bow and shoot down a Nazgul, endowed with the tremendous vitality of Elvish bodies, so hard and resistant to hurt that he went only in light shoes over rock or through snow, the most tireless of all the Fellowship."
@archvaldor Ha! Thanks for thinking I'm that young. Bakshi's Legolas was the first I'd ever seen on film ; I was about 16 and saw this movie during its theatrical run.
@@uphilliceskater
Damn...
So you're saying Legolas was the original gigachad and not the skinny wood-elf stereotype we see everywhere?
Gimli isn't even a dwarf. He's just some 5'6" middle aged man.
I don’t know a thing about The Lord of the Rings (other than the fact that it’s a book series?), but the expression at 1:48 is the best thing I’ve seen this week
This is C-3PO who's voicing Legolas - I loved, loved this film when I saw it in the cinemas - it's the film that really got me into Tolkien (along w that magical Hobbit cartoon w its folk songs and incredible dragon) - nothing compares w Jackson's version, but this film had a major impact on many of its initial young viewers - along w Watership Down and the entrancing Last Unicorn, these fierce cartoons felt like a bridge into being a grown-up
Now looking back at cartoon Legolas, i really don't understand what the hell is up with his eyes, really looks like somebody made custom Dark Souls player model in minute.
His facial structure changes and morphs throughout, especially his eyes. We first see him with big eyes, later they shrink. Like Link in Ocarina Of Time
I assume they were trying to make him look otherworldly. How well that worked is another question.
Man i had forgotten this. It really is a very unique gem of an adaptation.
Not to mention it was all done with semi practical sets and rotoscoping.
Just the whole idea of: “we cant really do this with practical fx in this day and age, what if we did it with animation? But like… with people.” Its just an amazing product of its time.
A bunch of talented people at the right place at the right time. To create this impossible masterpiece.
It's just the CGI of its era.
Yeah, it’s truly a great film, for all its faults. It has a tone more close to the novels, with a vibe of seriousness and stoic dialogue, which I always had in mind when reading through the trilogy.
I prefer it to the Jackson adaptation, but it’s not to say those films are bad - I just feel the Bakshi version has a better atmosphere, and conveys the rugged and ever present danger that Middle-Earth has in it.
Jackson just kind of paints this “pretty” and grand version of Middle-Earth, with Mordor being “the bad area”, where Bakshi had the idea to paint the world as being wild and pristine, but always with a hint of danger in the depths. I even prefer the Bakshi orc designs to the Jackson ones, just barely, because they looked more menacing and wild, and closer to the interpretation of them being corrupted men/elves.
Dunno. I could talk about this film for hours, it’s just a great oddity. :)
3:38 licking his lips while running, i can relate.
My Favorite Line is at 2:49 its like you just told him the same joke for 3 days now at every turn.
My dad was convinced that this version was more accurate to the book because in the book, Glorfindel showed up to take Frodo to Rivendell. So he turned the movie on and said "look its Glorfindel!" but 0:09 humbled him real quick XD
The funny thing is I wondered why Arwen took him in the movie even before I knew better. Like it seemed like a weird way to introduce her character.
It actually was Glorfindel
@@teresaharris-travelbybooks5564 in the book not this movie
@@HiHi-lt1cb well the movie is wrong. That's all I'm saying.
@@teresaharris-travelbybooks5564 I know? That was the point 😂
Aragorn with no pants is killing me. A small gust of wind and all of Middle Earth is getting a show.
@@riversnow5771 Well it's just the Earth getting the show.
Ah yes, the three great hunters:
*Unique-olas, Gimli the Tall Bearded Man, and Native Amaragorn.*
The greatest of them all
Legolas slowly turning towards the camera saying ‘but I feel…’ has killed me. It’s like a scene from The Office 😂
Ralph Bakshi's work is very distinct. Also Legolas has Steve Irwin's face in the thumbnail 😂 Love it.
Crikey!
4:00 *Jesus* Boromir, what happened to your sword?!
He was stressed so he chewed it like a pencil
He ran out of repair hammers. :P
I can’t remember if this happens in the movie, but in the book it mentions that he notches the hell out of it by wailing on the cave troll.
Legolas at 2:53: “hey animator you forgot my eyeliner”
Animator: “oh my bad”
Legolas: 2:54
Bro turned and gazed right into my soul
You guys 😭😭😂😂
Legolas looks like an occasional recurring character from the Prince Valiant cartoon series.
So this is where Bethesda got their visual ideas for elves in Oblivion
LMFAO
The people who made this film didn't have to make it so comedic, yet here we are, and I am happier for it.
I own a lot of the animation cells from this! My treasured one is the balrog ❤
Haha that's really cool! :D
I don't care what anyone says. This is a very likeable Legolas. His voice is wonderfully pleasant to hear, and his dorky looks are rather endearing.
I get that it's just me, given the rest of the comments, but I love this version of Legolas. He feels much more like a character when compared to Jackson's blander take.
"You're not alone."
More like a character, yeah, but not a GOOD character 😬
The heights of all the characters are completely inconsistent
Sam: * speaks *
Legolas: what a disgusting little creature
Trying to sneer and smile at the same time is the elf condition in a nutshell.
Rotoscoping looks a bit wack, but it does have a certain charm
May I recommend watching: A Scanner Darkly. It's a bit psychedelic but great.
Wizards
@@BlackSeedCH Wizards is great too. If were going with Bakshi's Rotoscope, then Cool World too.
@@PsyCastic Cool World, i lost this, we had to get the VHS from a friends dad, from his special casket... 😁, same for Heavy Metal 🤣
@@PsyCastic great suggestion - everyone should see this
As clunky and silly as some moments were, I did enjoy it. It's really too bad they didn't finish it.
I watched this first before Peter Jackson's Adaptation. Needless to say I was quite upset that Bakshi didn't continue. But back when I was 4-5 years old I thought it was epic, now it's An Awesome Classic!
Clunky..that is rotoscope animation. Meaning its copied cells from live actors movements. I guess live action movies is CLUNKY.
People trashtalking Legolas when Gimli is a 6 foot tall dwarf.
I think we need to appreciate the size of Aragorn's belt buckle.
He's about to pierce a lung or kidney or something if he bends over.
I love it! Unapologetically and unirronically I enjoy this film!
0:17 A heavy drunken pal and me when we finally find each other in a party while congratulating in Simlish.
That's oddly specific
@@ilikechoccymilk5605 And oddly looking like this according friends.
This movie is incredible. I love how in so many scenes you basically have this dynamic with the voice actors:
Gimli--Totally unknown actor doing a respectable job
Aragorn--Famous and super-talented actor kind of phoning it in
Legolas--Quasi-famous mediocre actor who steals every scene he's in by giving the weird, aloof performance of his _life_
P.S. I adore the scene that starts at 3:30 where it looks like Aragorn and Legolas are trying to run away from the cover art of a late-90s techno album.
Where's hypnosis when you needed it
"YOUR BOW LEGOLAS ITS ARUMAN!"
"Who???"
He's so cavalier about Mery or pippen being possibly dead. Like "one of them anyway" with the slight shrug
Thank you for this. It's such a weird looking movie, and I never focused on how off Legolas' every expression in here XD
I actually think Frodo and Legolas in this version were the only characters that felt like their book counterparts.
Hearing AURUMAN just cracks me up every time lol
Legolas was truly special in this version.
Where 👏 are 👏 Aragorn's 👏 pants 👏
This whole thing is like a car crash and I cannot look away. The expressions. The line deliveries. The running. The choice to make every character look like they belong in a zero- budget porn or a tertiary character in a Rob Zombie film. How have I never seen this before. I love it and you can't stop me.
Imagine the whole fellowship with no pants... or even Middle Earth.
I love how when they blue screen Aragorn and Legolas we get that awful animation of their faces then, just when youre thinking hiw awkward it is,, the camera angle just drops and focuses on Aragorn's mini skirt and bare legs. Outstanding.
@@PsyCastic imagine all gondorian men in LotR without pants, be it Boromir or a brave unnamed soldier
can we talk about the balrog just standing completely straight and raising his hands straight up as if with no intention to move forward