3. Supporting Characters
Neville Longbottom might be the hero of the series for many Potterheads, but he's certainly not the only famous Longbottom from a fantasy franchise. Longbottom isn't a character in The Lord of the Rings though, it's a location, in the Southfarthing of The Shire. But coincidentally, it's where genius gardener Tobold Hornblower first grew pipe-weed; that's something that Neville might know something about, being a herbology prodigy. Another similarly-named pairing, are Wormtail and Grima Wormtongue, who as their names suggest, are creepy and villainous, but not all that powerful. The snivelling Wormtail, better known as Peter Pettigrew to his friends (or what friends he has left), lived with Ron Weasley as his pet for the first few Harry Potter stories, before outing himself as a Death Eater and a traitor. Similarly, Wormtongue was an advisor and confidant to King Théoden before it was revealed that he was in fact a spy for Saruman. Wormtongue would go on to wreck havoc in the Shire with Saruman, just for fun; likewise, Wormtail was there orchestrating Voldemort's resurrection in The Goblet of Fire, where the pair killed Cedric Diggory with much the same nonchalance. One more allegory that can be stretched between both Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings, regarding supporting characters, is the comparison that can be made between Fred and George, with Pippin and Merry. Both are the mischievous comic relief to contrast against the main characters, and both pretty much exclusively appear as double acts. Until Fred died of course, but let's not talk about that, because it's too heartbreaking to go through again.