Second Breakfast with Cam & Maggie

Back to the books! Join Cam and Maggie for their first foray into Gondor, as Pippin takes the reigns of story and Gandalf the White becomes just as much of a disappointment as his predecessor. Oh and hey what's up with Denethor? Is he a magical, telepathic, wrathful leader or just a terrible father? Tolkien upsets the binary black / white imagery of Middle-earth here with the ominous white tree of...

Join Cam and Maggie for a discussion of David Bruckner's unnerving, masterful new horror film,  The Night House.  So many of our  Lord of the Rings  discussions have centered around echoes and twisted callbacks, and this film takes those ideas and runs a marathon with them. As a work of surreal grief horror, the story deftly avoids all the major modern tropes and pitfalls of the subgenre and brill...

Discussion of The Lord of the Rings, The Two Towers [Extended Edition] in Glorious 4K! Join Cam and Maggie dive into the second half of Peter Jackson's glorious Two Towers adaptation and find a whole host of echoes across the Middle-earth filmography. Théoden goes full Thorin, Helm's Deep turns into the Battle of the Five Armies, the Ents save the day with water superpowers just like Arwen did in...

Join Cam and Maggie for a technicolor exploration of David Lowery's spectacular new film, The Green Knight. You know how much we adore A24 folkloric horror and this movie is quite honestly the bee's knees. Our discussion begins with an investigation into the calm surrealism that Dev Patel's masterful performance lends to the whole film, before we look at its episodic, almost color-coded story stru...

Discussion of The Lord of the Rings, The Two Towers [Extended Edition] in Glorious 4K!   Join Cam and Maggie for an hour of Aragon worship and Théoden hate, in equal measure. The first disc of Two Towers is as much of a devastating villain showcase as the book was, and we're back to break down some new theories, callbacks, and even a call forward to the best moment in the Hobbit trilogy. Maggie is...

Join Cam and Maggie for a discussion of the fantastic new Netflix anime film, The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf. Spoiler alert (and there are spoilers throughout the episode) – we loved this movie. As a standalone spinoff, a prequel, and a jumping-on point for the larger Witcher universe, wowza. We work through all the many tropes upended by this subversive movie, from the Han Solo rogue to the v...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Four, Chapter Ten Join Cam and Maggie for the grand finale of The Two Towers! Viking King Samwise finally gets his day in the sun, and we couldn't be happier. Cam has a new priori-incantatum-style theory about Sam being the last man standing from the original fellowship, and he thinks he's spotted the ghosts of Sam's past companions hidden throughout this chapter...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Four, Chapter Nine Join Cam and Maggie as they do their best to talk about a big spider for an hour without actually thinking about them. The concept of "grey magic" comes roaring back in these pages to throw off our understanding of magical hierarchies and the power players of Middle-earth. Galadriel and Shelob emerge as transcendent, mysterious forces that coul...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Four, Chapter Eight Join Cam and Maggie for a chapter full of character-driven horror and a role-reversal villain introduction like we've never seen. Maggie reaches a conclusion about free will that somewhat bridges the gap between her original position and Cam's. Sméagol breaks through the Ring's death grip on him and Gollum long enough for us to wonder which on...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Four, Chapter Seven Join Cam and Maggie for a spooky, echo-laden chapter of Daddy Tolkien's sci-fi epic, Fantastic Beasts and In the Darkness Bind Them. We're in a good mood this week, it's a fun episode. Faramir leaves and provokes a new evolution in Cam's "living ghost" theory. Maggie gets to talk about Gothic architecture and gargoyles and freaky grinning ston...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Four, Chapter Six Join Cam and Maggie for Frodo's Big Day Out. This is a very busy chapter for our favorite Ring-bearer – he commits to Gollum, (possibly) changes his tune on faith, and becomes an active part of the fellowship for the first time. Cam's theory about ghosts / "middlemen of the twilight" evolves as well, and Faramir evolves to be more like both vers...

Discussion of  The Two Towers,  Book Four, Chapter Five * Video of Andy Serkis performing his new versions of the LOTR audiobooks (coming out this September): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sez-kWSsHr0 * Join Cam and Maggie for a provocative, character-focused chapter of The Two Towers. The headline of these pages has to be the innumerable comparisons between Faramir and Gandalf the White, being...

Discussion of  The Two Towers,  Book Four, Chapter Four Join Cam and Maggie for a fascinating, moody slice of Tolkien. Eyes are watching everyone in this chapter – Sam is watching Frodo, Frodo is watching the Eye of Sauron, Sam is side-eyeing Gollum, Gollum is watching the Ring, the Black Riders are watching everyone from the sky, the God of Middle-earth is looking down on everyone – it's a busy,...

Discussion of  The Two Towers,  Book Four, Chapter Three Join Cam and Maggie for a strange little detour through Frodo's mind. This chapter pauses the narrative as our sterling (and possibly insane) leader mulls over the choice to trust Gollum and take his alternative route into Mordor (which we have dubbed Shelob Boulevard). There is much discussion of "fate" in these pages, and we come out on ve...

*We are the guests on this week's That's What I'm Tolkien About with Mary Clay Watt! Check out her show – it's wonderful and we had a great time! Our episode comes out Tuesday, here's the link:  https://feed.podbean.com/tolkienaboutpod/feed.xml* When Tolkien is on his game, he's simply the best. This chapter is pitch perfect LOTR, an efficient and provocative exploration of Gollum and Sauron that...

Discussion of  The Two Towers,  Book Four, Chapter One Join Maggie and Cam for their first Frodo + Sam chapter in eleven weeks! Tolkien takes us back in time to find out what our hobbits have been up to – lots of wandering and backtracking, apparently. Discussions of moral ambiguity abound in a grey landscape filled with grey magical objects, pale grey light, fishy choices, and our favorite fish-l...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter Eleven Join Cam and Maggie for – BREAKING NEWS: New Lord of the Rings movie just announced! We start the episode by reacting to the exciting announcement of new anime prequel The War of the Rohirrim. Then we move into discussing this wonderful chapter, the last part of the first half of Two Towers [yes that was a lot of math for me]. Crystal balls...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter Ten Join Cam and Maggie for a deep dive into this fantastic chapter. Tolkien is back on his game here, giving us huge character moments, plenty of action, and a fascinating villain-led look at the theology / philosophy of Middle-earth. Gandalf the White asserts his absolute dominance over the existing magical hierarchy and shames Saruman into irrel...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter Nine Join Cam and Maggie for the show's One Year Anniversary. Tolkien got us a very special present (another mediocre chapter) but as always, we make the best of it. If the last chapter was a strange, depersonalized "history" of the events it described, then this chapter is a character-focused oral history of the assault on Isengard. Pippin dominat...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter Eight Join Cam and Maggie for a terribly strange chapter of Lord of the Rings. Tolkien's style changes wildly here, it's like he wrote this chapter in Old English. There's an interesting meditation on history and legacy and myth beneath all of the stilted, depersonalized prose – but it takes a little digging to find it. We've got examples and theor...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter Seven Join Cam and Maggie for one of Tolkien's greatest battles. There's action and fire and terror in these pages, but it's striking how much Tolkien keeps the emphasis on his characters. He is absolutely in his groove here – there's so much to talk about. There are some fascinating echoes back to dead and absent characters [Boromir, Gollum, the B...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter Six Join Cam and Maggie for a spirited discussion of Théoden and Wormtongue! The Meat and Potatoes Detective Agency (Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli) invade the house of the Rohan in this gorgeous, provocative new chapter. But then Gandalf sort of ruins things and resolves all of the new characters' storylines in like a paragraph each. We consider Gand...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter Five Join Cam and Maggie for – shut up, GANDALF IS BACK! Or is he? Cam doesn't think the Old Man / Gandalf the White is really the wizard we once knew and lovingly resented. He works through his whole strange theory, which involves lots of Dante. Maggie argues that Gandalf was able to return because he never really died. It's a fun episode with lot...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter Four Join Cam and Maggie in their quest to defeat Tom Bombadil 2.0! Treebeard sings and wanders and babbles and emotionally detaches and brings the entire story to a screeching, pine-scented halt in this endless, miserable, dry chapter – but we have some fun with it. Pippin seems to be the new Chosen One in Tolkien's Middle-earth, and we wonder wha...

Discussion of The Two Towers, Book Three, Chapter Three Join Cam and Maggie for a chapter that celebrates all things Pippin. I guess he's our main character now, and Tolkien takes great pains to differentiate him from Frodo or Bilbo. The stakes are higher than ever – our new heroes don't have a wizard's protection or any survival skills. Merry and Pippin are launched into a great adventure, withou...