There are some other sites out there which specialise in bringing you the latest news and rumours about Peter Jackson's epic production of The Lord Of The Rings. Most of them are not as reliable as this site, however, and you need to take their news with a hefty pinch of salt. There isn't much to choose between them all; you can guarantee that when an exciting piece of news appears on one site the others will also have it within a day. Here is a list of the best of them and my thoughts about each...
The Quintessential Lord Of The Rings Website
This site is a real gem. More pictures from the films than you can shake a stick at and all arranged in chapter order too. Brilliant. Highly Recommended
RingFAQ.com
A great site if you know next to nothing about the movies. Answers all the questions a Tolkien fan will ask when they discover that the movies are being made. Recommended
Tolkien Online (was The One Ring.Com)
Best messageboard about, in this Dragon's opinion. Also very good for scoops. For sheer entertainment value, look for 'Kelannar' on the messageboard. Surely no-one is that po-faced? Highly Recommended UPDATE!
After a spat with the moderators, Kelannar has gotten himself banned from the Tolkien Online messageboard. He's now currently holding court at the Ringbearer messageboards.
Force of Hobbit - E!Online
The "official" news conduit for the movie. Updated on the first of every month with exclusive reports from the studios. Sadly it is written in a low-brow populist style (you might have guessed from the name "Force Of Hobbit" - Eeeew!). Has a famous reporter who's name escapes me at the moment.
The One Ring.Net
One of the best for updates and scoops (apart from here of course) but Xoanon, who runs the site, sometimes sounds worryingly uncritical of Peter Jackson. Tolkien purists get very short shrift on the discussion forums which seem to be exclusively populated by teenagers who think Peter Jackson "rocks". Highly Recommended
The LotR Movie site
Used to be the Nightrunner Lord Of The Rings movie site - pretty much the first site to start offering news in August 1998 and with what was the all-time best messageboard, hosted by VantageNet. Then "Tam" who used to run it gave it away because he didn't have the time to maintain it. Under the guidance of its new management, it is now one of the poorest sites around. Lots of "Blind Guardian" fans on the messageboards there, which is quite worrying. Ah well... UPDATE! After an email from Matthew Bass, who runs the site, I went back and had another look. It's not as bad as I remembered, there's a lot more current news on there than there used to be. Maybe I was a bit harsh. And the "Blind Guardian" fans have gone. Worth a look. It's a pity about the annoying massive pop-ups though.
Xenite.org
A pretty good summary of recent news and now even has some scoops of it's own. One tip - don't mention armour!
Ringbearer
One of the original Lord of the Rings movie sites - now back in the capable hands of Joram Manka after an unhappy period under the auspices of Fandom.com. Pretty good up-to-date news and a decent messageboard, livened up by the portentious pontification of the self-proclaimed "celebrity" Kelannar. Recommended UPDATE! Unfortunately, Ringbearer has now gone the way of the dinosaur and the dodo - the site has been discontinued. However some of the regulars from the Ringbearer messageboard have started their own Ringbearer site - if anyone from there cares to drop me a line with their new URL, I'll include it here.
Ringzone.net
Another good site for general news.
Herr Der Ringe
A German site, run by "Cirdan", which has had some great scoops.
Please note - This is not an exhaustive list - there are other sites on the net and general movie news sites also have sections dedicated to the movie.
Other sites
Thornton's Books, Oxford
Thornton's, as Oxford's oldest bookshop, count many famous personalities amongst their customers. To mention just a few; Oscar Wilde, T E Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia),
C S Lewis, Lewis Carroll and of course J R R Tolkien.
The Annals Of Arda
Very well done Dutch (or Belgian or something) site (in English) with lots of Tolkien-related info.
Lalaith's Middle-Earth Science Pages
Fascinating application of Science to Middle-Earth. Worth it just for the projection of the map of Middle-Earth over present-day Europe.
I am the Dwarf
The website of The Dwarf, occasional contributor to this site and would-be paramour of British Politician Anne Widdecombe.
If you have a site that you think may interest the readers of this site, drop a line!
