Orlando Bloom is certainly one of the reasons why Legolas made such a big splash in The Lord of the Rings movies. After all, author J. R. R. Tolkien limited his time on the character in his books, even though he was undeniably an important part of the Fellowship.
Legolas has appeared in more movies set in Middle-earth than almost any other Lord of the Rings character, with the notable exception of Gandalf. Even Gollum has been in fewer movies, and, after all, he’s pretty well one of the most famous of Tolkien’s characters. That’s a big accomplishment for a character who only had a couple lines in Fellowship of the Ring. Therefore, it’s difficult not to give Bloom’s movie performances a great deal of the credit.
Although some could argue that Legolas’ inclusion in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug and The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies was purely for promotional and nostalgic reasons, others could say that Peter Jackson and his team wanted the Elvish princeling because he’s become such a beloved by fans.
Other than Bloom, the success of Legolas could come down to the fact that he’s been given some of the most rousing action sequences in all six of the films, mainly because he’s physically capable of them. After all, when you look into some of the details about Legolas, his Elvish heritage, or his other unique qualities, it does prove that he’s proficient at quite a lot of wicked things.
Here are the 20 Weirdest Things About Legolas’ Body.
20. His Dad is Younger Than him
Legolas is the heir to Mirkwood. His father, Thranduil, is the king and therefore makes Legolas a prince.
Although Thranduil’s name is never mentioned in the actual Hobbit book (he’s only referred to as “Elven King”), he plays quite a large part in the story.
While The Hobbit movies aren’t nearly as beloved as The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Thranduil, played by Lee Pace, was certainly one of the highlights.
A strange fact about the casting of this actor is that he was actually 39 when the movies were filmed. Orlando Bloom, who played his son, was 41.
In most films, this would be completely ridiculous. However, they’re both playing Elves who are immortal and take a great deal longer to show their age than anyone else.
19. His True Age Is Unknown
Like many of cinema’s most engaging characters, little is known about Legolas’ past. The Hobbit movies attempted to uncover some of Legolas’ past, which made the character a little less interesting, but they weren’t able to truly dig-up everything.
One of the biggest mysteries surrounding Legolas, which isn’t specified in the movies or anywhere in Tolkien’s original work, is exactly how old this Elf truly is. The only thing experts can do to determine his actual age, since Tolkien, is long since passed is to coordinate certain dates in his literature in order to come up with some guesses.
Some Tolkien experts place his age around 3000 years old.
However, there’s just not enough firm information that leads to a specific number.
18. He Has A Very High Tolerance
While Tolkien gave no definitive answer on the Elves’ tolerance level when it comes to alcohol, Peter Jackson did make Legolas out to be quite immune to its power.
In a brief moment of levity in the otherwise heavy Return of the King, Legolas and Gimli partake in a drinking game in the Halls of Edoras. While Gimli’s folk are well-accustomed to heavy drinking, he is the first to fall after getting severely inebriated. Legolas, on the other hand, claims that he felt only a “slight tingle” in his fingers.
In The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, Jackson shows a scene of Elves getting tipsy on Thranduil’s wine, so it’s believable that Legolas has a higher tolerance to alcohol than other Elves. That, or there’s a massive inconsistency of Jackson’s part.
17. He Can Sense What Nature Is Feeling
Yes, Legolas is basically Pocahontas.
He knows what every rock, tree, and bit of moss is feeling.
This is something that Tolkien gave all Elves, who have a peculiar connection with nature. It’s one of the reasons why massive negative changes to nature and energy cause them to react so gravely.
He cannot give these skills to others who are not Elves, but he can guide people in the right direction. It’s therefore believable that he taught Aragorn a number of things while spending time with him as a Ranger.
There’s a scene in The Two Towers, for instance, that depicts Aragorn listening to a rock in order to detect how far away and how fast the Orcs are. This is something he probably learned from his Elf buddy.
16. The Cold Doesn’t Affect Him
A memorable moment from The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, depicts Legolas walking on top of the snow while the rest of the Fellowship struggle through when crossing Caradhras. This is because Elves are incredibly light on their feet, allowing them to pass undetected in the silence, as well as shift their weight to their advantage.
The other thing that should be noted about this scene is the fact that Legolas is the only one not uncomfortable in the cold, even though he comes from a warmer climate.
This is because the cold doesn’t affect Elves as it does other beings in Middle-earth.
15. He Can Defy Gravity
^he first time we saw Legolas do something physical that really stretched credibility was in Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers when he surfed down a staircase on a shield while shooting arrows at his opponents. Before this, we only saw Legolas as a particularly skilled fighter who clearly had better agility and hand-eye coordination than anyone else in the Fellowship.
This moment changed everything and inspired Peter Jackson to give him another major logic-defying “hero moment” in Return of the King, where he brought down a giant elephant on his own and then slid down its trunk.
Still, none of these scenes rank up to the action sequences he’s given in The Hobbit, where gravity seems to be completely obsolete.
It’s kind of aggravating that he can jump around as if he were Spider-Man.
This is especially true of the scene where he runs up falling stones in The Battle of the Five Armies, which completely obliterates the laws of Physics.
14. His Many Injuries
Orlando Bloom had a boatload of injuries before and after filming The Lord of the Rings. This isn’t completely strange as a lot of cast members were hurt during the highly physical three-movie shoot; Sean Astin stepped on glass in a lake, Andy Serkis strained his back, John Rhys-Davies broke it, and Viggo Mortensen received a black eye, a chipped tooth, and two broken toes.
Orlando had quite a famous accident on The Two Towers where he fell off his horse during an action scene and cracked several ribs.
He claims that he’s broken almost every major bone in his body in various incidents, including skiing, a motorcycle crash, and falling off a roof.
13. His Eye Color Changes In The Movies
Even movies as well made as The Lord of the Rings Trilogy make mistakes now and again. This may be surprising to some fans since Jackson paid such an amazing attention to detail, but Legolas’ eyes actually change color numerous times throughout the three movies.
In some instances, you can see Orlando Bloom’s naturally dark brown eyes in the shot, versus the baby blue eye-contacts he wore for other shots.
The problem was that Orlando really didn’t like wearing the blue contacts in the original trilogy.
The contacts caused him pain and irritation, and would fall out or not look right on camera.
When Orlando reappeared in the final two Hobbit movies, he didn’t have to wear any contacts. Instead, his eye-color was changed in post. However, this led to his eyes appearing unnaturally blue, distracting, and kind of creepy.
12. He May Not Have Been Blond
Now that Legolas is basically a staple of pop culture, everyone and their dog thinks of him as a tall, slender, smoldering, blond man. But this may not have actually been the intention of Tolkien when he created the character.
Tolkien does describe the varying looks and hair colors of each Elven denomination quite well, but he never really talks about Legolas’ look even though he spends some time with him.
Peter Jackson and Tolkien experts usually depict Legolas as a blond due to the fact that his father, Thranduil, was described by Tolkien as possessing this hair color. But this isn’t necessarily accurate by any means, since Legolas comes from two different types of Elves, each having either blond or brown hair.
11. He’s A Silvan And Sindarin Elf
There are many different kinds of Elves. In fact, they are essentially different races of Elves who each have their own dialect.
Though there are strong similarities between both the cultures and the languages they speak, there are differences as well. For instance, the Valinorian Elves were often seen as the wisest of the Elves and didn’t always bear the same trademark blonde, silver, or gray hair of the other Elven races.
Legolas belonged to a minority of Sindarin Elves who ruled the predominantly Silvan Woodland Realm.
These Elves that were often seen as less wise, but highly dangerous.
Due to the fact that Legolas’ father, Thranduil, came from Doriath, an area populated by the elegant Sindarin Elves, and Legolas’ unknown mother probably came from the Silvan culture, Legolas more than likely belongs to both of these Elven groups.
10. His Mysterious Mom
Though many fantasy writers such as George R.R. Martin and Tolkien tend to write a great deal of backstory for minor characters as well as family trees, a major chunk of Legolas’ history is missing.
At no point in any of Tolkien’s work is there a reference to the identity of Legolas’ mother. It’s highly possible that she was a Silvan Elf, native to the Mirkwood region, where Thranduil and his small band of Sindarin Elves ruled. Much else about her– including her name– is unknown.
Peter Jackson and his writers, Fran Walsh, and Philippa Boyens, added some backstory about Legolas’ mother that added to the rift in his relationship with his father, Thranduil. They explain that she passed away earlier and Legolas was still grieving her loss.
9. He Can Lift Up To 1300 Pounds
If Legolas were a Human, he would almost certainly “lift.” The fact is, Elves are superior to Humans in almost every way.
Tolkiens works describe the draw weight of the bow that Galadriel gives to Legolas as 150 pounds.
Legolas is able to draw his arrows and launch them at his enemies with this bow repeatedly without appearing to tire. This means that he likely has a lifting capacity of at least 1300 pounds.
One of the reasons he’s able to bend gravity so well is that he’s able to push his entire body up with the proper leverage. A good example of this is how he swings back onto his horse while it gallops toward battle in The Two Towers.
8. He Has Incredible Eye-Sight
One of the criticisms that The Hobbit films get, that The Lord of the Rings films didn’t, is that they broke certain world rules.
Even Legolas, who got to do some pretty insane things in the original trilogy, seems not to worry about gravity in The Hobbit movies.
But just because these things don’t make sense doesn’t mean that Legolas doesn’t have incredible powers that are consistent with his character. One such power is his incredible eye-sight, something that all Elves are gifted with.
In The Two Towers, Legolas is able to track the Orcs while being 20 kilometers away from them, as well as know that “The White Wizard” is coming long before Aragorn and Gimli can. His “Elf-eyes” are basically binoculars.
7. His Skills With A Bow Are Unmatched
There’s just nobody in any of The Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit movies who could go toe-to-toe with Legolas when it comes to archery skills. The Elf just has everybody beat by a mile.
Even Bard, who brought down Smaug the Dragon with his giant bow, couldn’t outshoot Legolas.
Aside from the fact that Legolas is just plain faster than Bard, or any other Human, Hobbit, Wizard, or Orc for that matter, he has superior vision. This Elven quality allows him to see his targets more clearly and at a further distance. Pair that with his calm, patient demeanor, and you have one incredible archer.
6. He’s Supremely Fast and Agile
All Elves have amazing physical abilities that are unmatched in Middle-earth. While Wizards, who can do magic, they don’t even possess the agility, strength, and talent of the Elves. In almost every way, Elves are superior beings.
This is one of the reasons why so many other races see Elves as beautiful, mysterious, and fascinating creatures, and also why others demonize them.
Additionally, these qualities can make certian Elves, like Thranduil, highly arrogant.
Granted, Legolas has a lot of experience of being a warrior, so some of his abilities must be due to these facts and not just his Elven heritage.
5. He Speaks Multiple Elvish Languages
Not only did Tolkien create an entire world for his characters, but also made-up languages from scratch. Among them, Elvish is probably his most famous. His Elvish language was made up of a larger family of related dialects.
All Elves can understand the language of Quenderin, which was the proto-language for their species.
The language was separated into different dialects depending on the region and race of each Elf.
Of all the Elven languages, Sindarin became the most commonly spoken, while Quenya is usually the one that’s used for poetic and written purposes.
Aside from the common tongue of Middle Earth and the root of all Elvish, Legolas can speak both Sindarin and Silvan Elvish, as he grew up in a mostly Silvan area, Mirkwood.
4. He Can Dream While Awake
A really interesting fact about Elves is the fact that they don’t need to sleep at all. Though they can sleep if they choose to, they can also get their rest while awake.
In The Two Towers book, Tolkien described Legolas as laying down with his eyes open in a sort of meditative state. This is how he’s able to get rest but still remain alert enough to be able to strike an approaching enemy. Essentially, Elves merely rest their minds.
This isn’t the only interesting fact about the Elves’ sleeping abilities. Since they are always awake, they have the power to dream while in this meditative state. It’s beyond a day-dream– much like an actual dream except they’re merely resting their minds.
3. He’s A Talented Singer
Aside from a very popular spoof music video where Legolas constantly reminds us where the Hobbits are being taken to, he doesn’t appear to do much singing. Well, at least in the movies he certainly didn’t.
In the books, Legolas was quite the talented singer. In fact, he did quite a lot of it.
Most famously, he sings a lament with Aragorn after Boromir’s passing.
He also sings “The Song of Nimrodel” while in Lothlorien.
Elves are known for being highly musical creatures. Additionally, many of the characters in Tolkien’s books take the time to sing while on the road. It’s one of the reasons why the animated Hobbit movie was mostly musical.
2. He’s Also Skilled With Knives
To seemingly further differentiate the weapons used by each member of the Fellowship, Peter Jackson’s team decided to give Legolas two small, but very sharp, smaller blades to use in the movies. This is different from the books, where he only used one when he wasn’t slinging arrows at his opponents. In either case, it’s true that Legolas is particularly skilled with small blades.
These blades, like all Elvish weaponry, are extremely elegantly made. They have ornate vine-like designs running up both the hilt and the blades themselves.
Additionally, they are very light, as Elvish swords and daggers, like Sting, are known to be.
1. He’s Really Just A Normal Elf
After learning all of these fascinating and strange things about Legolas’ abilities and traits, it may be hard to believe that he is, in fact, just a normal Elf. Like anyone, he specializes in certain skills that he’s taken the time to master, such as archery.
Most of his qualities are shared with Elves along his level.
Each Elf has incredible eye-sight, as well as being able to walk on surfaces and be light as a feather. They also all have a connection with nature that allows them to understand what it’s feeling at any given time. They are all tremendous warriors.
Sure, Legolas is royalty, but that doesn’t contribute to his skills. He has some physical and intellectual traits due to his Elven race, but they aren’t uncommon.
When up against abnormal Elves, including those with Rings of Power such as Galadriel, he really isn’t comparable.
What do you think is the weirdest trait about Legolas’s body in The Lord of the Rings? Let us know in the comments below!
