The winter is over. Spring is in the air. The show is taking a short break, and then we'll be diving into the lead-up to the "Rings of Power" premiere just on the other side of Summer. If you have topic requests, please send them to thehalflingpodcast@gmail.com. Thanks, friends!
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Hi. Welcome to the Halfling. I’m your host, Jaron Pak, and this is a quick announcement and update.
I started this show in the fall of 2021 because the Amazon Middle-earth series was then one short year away from being released. Since that time, we’ve discovered that the series is going to be called “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.” We’ve also learned a lot about the various characters and places that the show will explore, from age-old classics like Galadriel and
When it comes to our humble podcast, we’ve explored several key characters who could play major roles in the show. Some of these — like Elrond, Treebeard, and Shelob — are well-known characters who have never had most of their backstory explored on screen. Others, like Glorfindel and the Entwives, are unknown to anyone who has never read the books. We also spent some good times offroading to explore Middle-earth holidays and a fantastic interview with the Tolkien Professor, Corey Olsen.
I’m looking forward to exploring the backgrounds of a lot of other characters moving forward. I’m also excited to line up some more interviews for you. But at the moment, I’m feeling burned out from the last couple of months. Things got particularly intense in February when the Rings of Power trailer initially dropped during the Super Bowl. I spent the majority of that night feverishly writing commentary on the new footage for work, and the intensity hasn’t slowed down since. Between the normal podcast episodes, coverage for work, and setting up the interview with the Tolkien Professor, I’ve been happily exhausted week in and week out for the second half of the winter.
Which brings me to my primary point. I’m going to be putting the show on hiatus for the next month. I’m going to use that time to do a few things. First, I want to take some time to recoup, as I’ve found that my creative output (and, by extension, the quality of my content) suffers when it goes too long without a break. Second, I want to use this time to reorient my focus. I’ve been allowing my personal character interests to guide a lot of the episode selection, but I want to give you guys some more input moving forward. So, if anyone wants to hear me cover a certain character, dig into an origin story, answer a tough question, or any other Middle-earth-related item, send me an email at thehalflingpodcast@gmail.com. I’d love to hear from you.
Again, just t o clarify, this is just a temporary break to rest and recoup before we head into the lead-up to the Rings of Power show. When I come back in May, though, I’ll be ready to roll so we can kick off the road to the Rings and start counting down the days before we get a new adaptation of Middle-earth to enjoy, analyze, praise, rip to shreds, and all that fun stuff.
Alright, that’s it for now. I’ll talk to you guys soon. Looking forward to hearing from you via email in April, and we’ll be back in full force after that. Until next time, friends.