smaug

My mother was a bootlegger.

If it was filmed in the 70s, 80s or 90s, we had a ripped VHS of that shit. One of my favorites was the 1977 animated version of “The Hobbit.”

Toward the end of the story, the main protagonist, Bilbo Baggins, is up in this dragon’s lair. The dragon’s name is Smaug, and the Dwarves traveling with Bilbo are all pissed off because back in the day Smaug murdered their ancestors and stole their treasure like a real asshole.

So Bilbo’s in there with Smaug trying to figure out a way to take this guy down. The only reason he (Bilbo) doesn’t get roasted by Smaug is because of the magic ring he (Bilbo) stole from Gollum-—a creepy frog-man living underground-—which makes the wearer (at this time, Bilbo) invisible.

Yet despite Bilbo’s invisibility, Smaug can still tell he’s there. He can smell him. And he can feel his air and he can hear his breath, too. In fact, Smaug makes it a point of sharing all that because Smaug likes to talk. And eventually, he goes into this whole monologue about how much of a badass he is.

But as Smaug boasts about killing where he wishes and how he’s strong, strong, STRONG and how his armor is like tenfold SHIELDS and his teeth are SWORDS and his claws SPEARS and the shock of his tail a THUNDERBOLT and his wings a HURRICANE and his breath DEATH, he unintentionally reveals something to the observant Bilbo...

A hole in the gold armor covering his soft underbelly.

Having discovered this, Bilbo relays the intel to a talking bird who flies down the mountainside, bringing said hot tip to Bard the Bowman. Unfortunately, by the time the talking bird arrives, Smaug has already been well pissed off and is raining fiery hell down on Bard’s friends and family in Laketown.

But now Bard the Bowman has an aim--and grabbing his special black arrow (a family heirloom passed down by his father and “he from old” (Bard’s grandpa)) he shoots that shit straight and true, nailing Smaug right where it hurts and taking the son of a bitch down once and for all.

So, yeah. Fuck you, Smaug.

Anyways, I guess one of the main takeaways here is this:

That big, bad motherfucker had a hole in his armor.

And they always do.



 

Mark