it will never cease to delight me that in the trilogy, gimli is shown to be charming, with all the polish and grace of a trained diplomat—he trades wits with elrond and speaks so graciously to galadriel that she gives him a gift denied feanor; his extemporaneous description of the glittering caves is what convinces legolas to travel there with him after the war, he sings the song of durin so well that sam begs to learn it.

whereas legolas is this big cheerful lug of a hunter-tracker, incidentally a prince, only unwittingly beautiful and graceful—his speech is decidedly stiff and formal, even when he’s trying to be gentle, but then turns around and starts singing without realizing he’s forgotten half the song. He has strange moments of seriousness, when the ancientness of him shines through, but then—

I do wonder what their first conversations were, gimli dignified but a little chilly; legolas stiff even as he attempted humor, but a way forward nonetheless.

If Aragorn had had a choice in the matter, he would have sent three companions to Mordor with Frodo: himself, Sam, and Gimli.

Rereading LotR for the first time in a couple of years and rediscovering yet again how poorly Gimli was treated by the films. His first ever line in the book is “faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens”. He is continually shown to be loyal, strong, eloquent, and kind. I wish we’d had more of that in the films.

magic-redhead:

When Gimli misses his dear husband…

Gotta give the trees some love.

Re: Sneak Peak 2 – Loving the letter fomat! Poor Leggy. I can feel the anxiety radiating off that letter. All those false starts and cautious wording. (Also Poor Laindawar – all those short jokes XD) Gimli’s letter is absolutely everything and makes me so incredibly happy.

HELLO THERE HOOPY FROOD, HOW YOU BEEN *hugs*

yeah, Legolas is a lot more cautious than Gimli. Like, a lot. A LOT. It’s not that he’s more afraid? He’s doing this, after all, he’s putting pen to paper and writing it down, which is a very brave thing to do. But he has over 2000 years of family history with these people, and he is a prince, he has a high station to uphold… and he knows what his father has lost. nnngh idk, I wanted to find the young Legolas in that letter, the child we see in Midwinter. Like all his years and layers strip away. These are people he’s always looked up to, and he is

almost more

frightened of disappointment than he is of disapproval.

Gimli has plenty of trepidation too – but he’s very much of the ‘RIP THE BAND-AID OFF IN ONE GO, FAST AS POSSIBLE’ school of thought, lmao!!! “here’s the situation, I know you’re gonna hate it, someone stop Bofur laughing, do it for me please.” End of story.

he’ll chew it endlessly in his own mind, of course. But as he said before, what can be more scary than facing the entire horde of Mordor without a hope of victory? he’s totally riding on wings of HOLY SHIT WE WON, SOMEONE BUY ME A LOTTERY TICKET, audacious little thing!

HAHAHAHAHAHA LAINDAWAR THE GRUMPY TERRIER ELF AND HIS TEASING TALL YOUNGER BROS welp I’m definitely shorter than him, so he’d be able to look down his long aristocratic nose at me as well 🙂

thequeenofallmonsters:

What if elves were the short race and dwarves the tall race? Can you imagine a short Legolas and a tall Gimli? Or a short Thranduil? Or a tall Thorin? Because I sure can.