4

The Sadomasochistic Soft-Porn Version Directed by John Boorman

Getty/Warner Bros.

John Boorman is an English director best known for Deliverance and Zardoz and ya know what? I'm not even going to say it's weird to go from those two flicks to Lord of the Rings. After all, Jackson's last movie before New Line hired him to do Fellowship was The Frighteners, a comedy/horror/drama/romance in which Michael J. Fox battles ghost Jake Busey, and just before that he did Heavenly Creatures, a true story about teenage murderers. So I'm not gonna say having Boorman direct would've automatically made this movie crazy. The script might have, though.

3

Guillermo del Toro's The Hobbit

Getty

Most people who obsessively follow every bit of Lord of the Rings trivia to the detriment of their personal lives know that Peter Jackson never actually intended to direct The Hobbit -- his (and everyone else's) original first choice was Mexican director Guillermo del Toro (Pan's Labyrinth, Hellboy). Now, again, I try to avoid the wanton use of hyperbole, but this would've been the greatest thing to ever happen.

See, Lord of the Rings is great largely by chance -- Viggo Mortensen (Aragorn) has mentioned that Jackson sorta went nuts with the CGI after the success of Fellowship of the Ring, but this isn't as big a problem as it could have been because it fits with the theme of the series, which is about leaving the comforts of safe familiarity and exploring a larger, weirder world full of surprises. So we can forgive a bit of computer-generated craziness.

New Line Cinema
A little bit.

2

The Version Co-Written by Tolkien Himself

Wikimedia Commons

Though many modern movie adaptations don't seem to give a flying fuck what the original author thinks (in fact, I'm pretty sure Kubrick is openly mocking Stephen King in The Shining), back in 1957 things were pretty different -- at least for Tolkien. The first people to try to adapt his movie (as a cartoon, obviously) sent him a script and concept art, and ol' J.R.R. loved the concept art so much that he sent detailed notes back about the script (which he thought was pretty shitty). Based on what I know about Tolkien (I have read The Silmarillion more than once), and based on his reactions, I'm pretty sure that if this movie ended up being made he would've essentially written it. And that would've been awesome.

Here's the thing: the script Tolkien got makes this really weird mistake where it describes orcs as having beaks and feathers. That seems like an insane error today, because the orc has integrated itself into popular culture, but back when these books came out, nobody really knew what an orc was. They were just human-shaped monsters. Over the years, the depictions have included the weird, glowy-eyed monsters of Ralph Bakshi's cartoon version:

United Artists

The green-skinned monsters from Warcraft:

Blizzard Entertainment

1

The Silmarillion Cinematic Universe

New Line Cinema

OK, so this is apparently nowhere near close to ever happening, and is more realized in my head than anywhere that actually exists. But if you will allow me to stretch my premise here, just a teeny tiny bit, I will describe for you the coolest thing you've ever heard.

See, The Silmarillion as a single story is essentially unfilmable, because it's the Bible of Middle-earth. A lot of it reads like notes Tolkien left to himself, explanations of how the universe was created so Tolkien can keep the little details consistent in The Lord of the Rings -- the real story -- so reading through The Silmarillion is something of a slog. But if you take the time to learn the hundreds of made-up words and keep track of the dozens of intersecting plotlines, you'll find some of the stories way bigger and cooler than the stuff you already know: we get a guy who bites a werewolf to death to protect his friend, an elf who sings her dead boyfriend back to life, a guy who battles dragons with a flying pirate ship, and entire armies of Balrogs.

New Line Cinema
"But how would that impact the smoke detectors?"
Oh, goodness. The smoke detectors would be the least of your problems.

Now, remember when I said that The Hobbit doesn't fit Jackson's style, because it forces him to go smaller-scale when that's clearly not what he wants to do? Silmarillion isn't smaller-scale at all, because Balrog army, you guys. It's the exact same kind of escalation that worked for Alien and Aliens: a mysterious, under-explained monster getting explored in a way that makes it, somehow, even more terrifying. And, best of all, we wouldn't have had to worry about continuity snarls because Tolkien (and his son, Christopher, after J.R.R. died) sorted all that shit out a long-ass time ago (the first draft of The Silmarillion was actually written and submitted to publishers before the first words of The Lord of the Rings book were ever written).

So, what's the hold up? It turns out Christopher Tolkien won't give Jackson the rights, because he doesn't like what's been done with his father's life's work. And that, my friends, is ... shit. It's completely understandable, and even admirable, since he's probably giving up an infinite number of money dollars in the name of protecting his father's legacy. And you know what? If more people behaved like you, Chris Tolkien, the world would be an objectively better place.

You pretentious English butt.

JF Sargent is an editor and columnist for Cracked and a huge Tolkien nerd. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook if none of those things are dealbreakers and you wanna be his buddy/pal.

For more from Sarge, check out 5 Amazing Performances Hiding in Terrible Movies. And then check out 41 Baffling Moments in Otherwise Great Movies.