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Tuesday, May 1, 2012

I tried...

Honestly, I wish I could compare either Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings, or Star Wars and Star Trek, but sadly, I've never watched Lord of the Rings or Star Trek. Harry Potter is the only series out of the 4 that I have any experience with. As I recall, I saw most of the movies, but then again I could have missed a few. Anyways, I did enjoy the excitement and suspenseful action packed films, but the length of the movies was too much. Although I really liked them, I had trouble staying awake. I'm not sure this answers the blog prompt at all, but I don't have much to say considering I apparently don't watch enough movies. I will definitely be watching Lord of the Rings soon, so that I can compare it with Harry Potter.

One Does Not Simply Spock Into Mordor

Alas, considering I've never seen nor do I care to see any Star Trek, I can't offer an original opinion on that famous rivalry.  I will say that Gus Logsdon's and Ned Katz's posts definitely enlightened me on the various features that Star Wars and Star Trek boast, and in the end I was not surprised to hear that Star Trek's plot generally lacks the depth of Star Wars', despite its time advantage.  It is my understanding that television in the '60's and '70's rarely if ever approached the depth of plot that HBO programs feature today because, you know, you had to wait a week to see the next episode back then.  So, with my suspicious about Star Trek's shallowness and general cheesiness confirmed, I have to choose Star Wars as my personal favorite.

But my young life has taken me through the vaults and valleys of the epic sagas of TLOTR and Harry Potter, and although I've only read 4 of the Harry Potter books and none of TLOTR books, I can already tell you I'm going to straddle the fence all my life when deciding which series is better.  Because I will always ask, "Better to whom?  Better at what?"

Harry Potter targets an audience so different from TLOTR that comparing the two, whether in the field of writing style or awesomeness of creatures, is almost like comparing Twilight to Dracula.  Blaspheme, I know--to even hint at sticking Harry Potter in the same analogy as Twilight would surely bring a torch-bearing mob to my house if I weren't writing this blog late.  And I would be in agreement with the mob; the epic adventure of  Potter exists on an exponentially higher tier than the melodramatic smut of Twilight.  But while comparing Potter to TLOTR, you should still consider that Potter targets youth while TLOTR young adults, and thus you should compare them on the same scales you would use to compare Twilight to Dracula.  In that light, doesn't Potter come out looking much stronger?  Of course Potter didn't win any Oscars--but I hear it won oodles of Kids' Choice Awards.

So yes Harry Potter's writing style lacks the eloquence, its battles lack the salivation-inducing violence, its good vs. bad story lacks some of the maturity of TLOTR's jaded theme of ubiquitous evil.  But come on, man, for those very reasons most of our parents chose to start our literary adventures with Harry Potter instead of TLOTR.  For what it's worth, Potter offers some outstanding, thought-provoking subject matter and so masterfully spins a story that even young Dylan, an avid anti-reader, couldn't resist turning those pages.  I have a feeling TLOTR would have bored the same young Dylan.  In the end, I recognize that Potter may not satisfy the literary taste buds of the mature reader, but anyone who tells me that the epic fantastical journey of a boy orphaned by the awesome power of a former student of the very school he must, as a wizard, now attend--anyone who tells me that's intellectual candy corn needs to get of their pedestal and stop listening to Radiohead.

In the end, I plan to read TLOTR in the future, but not Harry Potter.  I've already passed my prime to read Potter, and in truth I would like much more to experience the first, the mother of all, and arguably the best contemporary fantasy series ever--The Lord of the Rings.

Monday, April 30, 2012

It's 5 o'clock somewhere

Another one that's a little late...trying to catch up here. Somewhere in the universe, someone is breathing. I know, I know this may be hard to take in all at once but it's true. Someone is breathing at this very moment because breathing is a very essential part to STAYING ALIVE. Without breathing, we all would be dead. It may be possible that someone is breathing at the exact same time as someone else...maybe even multiple people! I'm not crazy people, it is completely possible. Now, someone may not be breathing the same way as another. For instance, someone may be sitting down and breathing normally while someone else is being interrogated for being caught sneaking a "mysterious liquid" through security resulting in heavy breathing and increased heart rate. Ah Haddon, but you forgot that person with a slower breathing pattern...they're sleeping. There, happy? Anyway, somewhere, right now there is someone breathing. Think about it for a second. It's pretty cool

Let's Fix It

Here is one of my late blogs...plenty more to come. So let me start out with that one on fixing the national debt. First, let's get some things straight:
Taxing the "wealthy" even more is not a solution...they already pay 80% of our taxes. You can tax them 100% and it would only make ehh...about a 3% difference. Our special, elected officials continue to push across the idea that corporations should just get the tax hammer. When a corporation gets a tax increase, what do they do? They pass it along to the consumer in the form of higher prices. It's like a hidden tax on the middle class. So what do we do?
First off, we need a freaking budget. It is required by law to produce and pass a budget every fiscal year.....the administration and those in Congress have failed to do so (three years ago yesterday). We also need to become energy independent. Use all of the different types of resources that we have here (i.e. oil, natural gas, clean coal, and nuclear). This will reduce our need for foreign intervention, thus creating jobs and revenue along with reducing the cost of energy.
Secure the border.
Replace Obama's healthcare plan with a plan that will increase competition and reduce costs. Increase premiums for Medicare and promote health savings accounts.
All of the problems mentioned are some subjects of great debate between the two major parties, both of which don't seem to be getting things done. They just need to agree on something.




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I prefer Harry Potter and Star Wars. Why? It's because I happened to watch these two first and they imprinted in my memory more positively than Lord of the Rings or Star Trek. In my mind Star Trek seemed like a rip off of Star Wars because of their similar themes. Plus Star Wars seems more linear in storytelling and it appears to be easier to follow. Then Harry Potter triumphs Lord of the Rings because the magic and characters in Harry Potter seem more simplistic and less demented. Keep in mind that most of my argument is my impression of each so they are not supported heavily by evidence. Watching each of these series is time consuming and I don't spend too much time arguing which one is better; they are all in a great genre for entertainment. In the end, I believe that each person has their own opinion on which is cooler. Obviously these movies and ideas aren't silly because they've enjoyed an enormous amount of success.

HO SNAP. I forgot the blog again.


I simply do not have the expanse of knowledge required to make comparisons such as these. The only Tolkein novel I ever read was The Hobbit. I own the entire LOTR series, but I was never even able to make it through The Fellowship of the Ring. I’ve read the Harry Potter series and seen the movies; I’ve seen a few episodes of Star Trek. Don’t get me wrong, I totally geek out when I have some spare reading time or one of the movies comes on TV, but my appreciation pales in comparison to most fans. I can’t recite pages of text straight from the HP series, I don’t know the underlying philosophy of the LOTR trilogy—I’m too busy making goo-goo eyes at Legolas—and anytime I watch Star Trek, I am inherently disappointed when Zachary Quinto isn’t the Spock flooding my TV screen.



It’s shallow. So shallow.



I even forgot about Star Wars. Maybe because Zachary Quinto isn’t in it. I don’t know. I will admit to twirling around my light saber every once and awhile, but that’s as far as my fandom goes. The order in which the movies were released confused me from the start; I can’t even recall if I have seen them all. Someone might need to impose an intervention.

Sunday, April 29, 2012

A debate between two fantastical sagas can get rather heated. Believe me, I speak from experience, in that I have witnessed screaming fights over which was better: Star Wars or Lord of the Rings. And to be quite honest, this is ridiculous. I prefer Star Wars. There, that's my opinion. Do you think anything will change my mind? It's a possibility, because I am not obsessed with either series. But take a die-hard fan of either series, and try to indoctrinate them towards the other and you've got a messy situation. I think that both have important lessons, and both could be considered aesthetically pleasing. When I was a kid, I thought that Obi-Wan sacrificing himself to Darth Vader was the coolest thing to hit my little 30" TV, and that movie has always held a special place in my heart. But some could find Gandalf's "death" or Sam's unending care for Frodo moving, so this also fails. Whether we acknowledge it or not, this debate will last for as long as both series do. But the important thing is to enjoy what you like, no matter what. P.S. Hunger Games is the best

My precious...

Harry Potter vs Lord of the Rings

Obviously, these two are widely debated by nerds everywhere. However, I must say that LOTR would totally kill Harry Potter. However, overall Harry Potter is more appealing. While there is such a thing as wandless magic, it's very rare, and still couldn't beat The One Ring. That baby can control the minds of mortals, turn mortals invisible, grant the user control over the other rings, and amplify power to an extent only Sauron has utilized. It also instills fear in creatures and can create Ringwraiths for minions. Just Sauron and all his power poured into that artifact could repel anything. Voldemort's mind would be in too much pain to be able to cast spells. However, I do agree with Cracked.com. This is a draw. Simply because of the protagonists. We have Harry, and unfailingly kind teen wizard that just wants to end Voldemort's reign of terror and live a normal life without having to see a guy with no nose and pale white skin in his dreams. Then we have  Frodo Baggins, who may possibly be the wimpiest hobbit the Shire has ever see. Actually, it's hard to decide because of the influence of the One Ring, which if you think about it, is like Sauron's Horcrux. Virtually impossible to destroy and has a mind of its own, that most powerful item in Middle Earth would drive anyone to the brink of insanity. Both universes are pretty awesome. But in my opinion, because the Battle for Middle Earth happened long ago, it couldn't be real since we would see fell beasts and Ringwraiths. However, Harry Potter could totally exist. Im still waiting for my Hogwarts acceptance letter. Maybe one day.

The Lord of the Harry Potters and the Return of the Half-Blood Prince

The only way to figure this out is to be completely and absolutely objective! That’s why I’m going to go ahead and use statistical information to solve the age-old question:

Which is better? Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter?

Let’s start with how the books fared.

The whole Lord of the Rings has sold about 150 million copies. The whole Harry Potter series has sold approximately 450 million copies. Let’s give a point to Rowling on that one.

Critics give the Lord of the Rings a 10/10, while they give Harry Potter a 9.5/10. Tolkien gets this one.

They’re evenly matched here, so on to the movies.

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King grossed $1,119,929,521, the Two Towers $926,047,111, and the Fellowship of the Ring $871,530,324. That’s a total of $2.918 billion in revenue. Harry Potter, however, grossed much more. I’m not going to list off all eight of them, so just trust me when I say that they grossed 7.706 billion. Harry Potter wins this round.

The Lord of the Rings received 17 of the 30 Academy Awards it was nominated for. Harry Potter was nominated for 12 awards, but won none. The Lord of the Rings blows this clearly out of the water.

And…

They’re tied again.

Alas, it looks like it’s impossible to objectively tell which one is better.

I guess it's up to you, [READER NAME], to decide for yourself.

Potter vs. the Ring

Both Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings provided the world with classics that will last for a long period of time. Now I haven't read all of the books for either series but I know enough about both of them to at least try and sound like I know something worth while about them. When coming down to choice, I would have to pick the Harry Potter series. I choose Harry Potter for the completeness of the tale. Don't get me wrong, Lord of the Rings is great, but it is truly one story (two with Hobbit). Overall, I believe that Harry Potter gives more to the reader. One reason is through the evolution of the characters. The books begin with an 11-year old Harry Potter written for the more adolescent while the last book follows the 17/18 year old Harry written more for an older audience. Along with age maturity of the characters, emotional and psychological maturity is also divulged. Situations that Harry and his colleagues find himself in begin within the halls of Hogwarts but then expand into events all over the country in the wilderness surviving on their own with the help of Hermione's endless knowledge and abilities.

Wow, seriously? not even one person does star wars vs star trek?

I was going to explain how TLOTR kicks Harry Potter's teen marketed ass, but the vacuum of Star-things on this blog has convinced me to do otherwise.
To preface this argument I would like to make a few observations for the sake of fairness. Anything made after Gene Roddenberry (Star Trek's creator)'s death does not count. That means Ep. 1-3 of Star-Wars, the new Trekkie film, and a few other spin-offs like Deep Space 9. This is because around this time, both series began to degrade substantially. Case in point, the Attack of the Clones sucked donkey balls. The Next Generation still counts because it was started in 1987 before the death of Roddenberry in 1991 (and regardless of your Kirk/Picard allegiance, it cannot be said that TNG was a bad series).
In my eyes, star trek has one thing going for it that Star wars does not -- a decent opening. The concise yet profound opening phrase followed by the star-ship Enterprise still gives even the most jaded of fans spine chills. Just saying "Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before." can make you sound like the billionaire-rockstar-astronaut-cowboy you always wanted to be. By comparison, reading the long and often confusing Star-Wars intro at the beginning of each movie is about as enjoyable as finishing those TPS reports you were supposed to turn in last week. However, beyond the introductions, Star Trek begins to lose its luster.
Visually, Star-Wars is quite stunning. With the razors edge of 1970's tech, we get huge space-ship battles and lighsabers and floating rocks and crazy space explosions and of course a wireframe rendering of a deadly corridor. Today, these effects are just okay, but back in the 70's, this was some hot stuff! Star-Wars had a wigged out trashcan and an expressionless but hysterical tin man who could speak 10000 languages; Star Trek had a boring greyish meat sack named Data. Star-Wars had giant slug things and sand people and ewoks and wookies; Star Trek had a bunch of dudes with wrinkled foreheads. Star-Wars was just more cinematic. And on that note, John Williams had some great music as well. Star Trek tunes weren't exactly phenomenal, but Vader's theme and the main theme and, well, pretty much all the themes in Star-Wars were memorable and musical.
Aside from pure superficiality though, Star-Wars was just a better story. Whereas star wars plot devices include a legitimately surprising father-son dynamic, a coming of age story, the most deadly weapon to ever exist in movie history, and the force, Star Trek had borgs, who basically just wanted to be your friend, a black chick (yes this was a plot device back in the 60's), and the occasional death of an extra "red shirt," a jaded plot device eerily reminiscent of Bonanza's female ranch hands. Star-Wars has a grand story arc that star trek just cant match. Star-Wars also has a cast of characters that feel real and act real while many Star Trek Characters, looking at you Scottie, often just fall flat on their faces in the development department. In the end Star-Wars is literally an epic tale, and Star Trek is just a pretty okay TV show.

Edit: alright, I stand corrected, Ned Katz actually had a good argument going.

HP VS LOR

In my mind, there is no question that the Lord of the Rings is the far better book series. While Harry Potter is a great story, and an interesting read, it is sort of childish and easy to follow. The Lord of the Rings is an intricate, in-depth plot that contains all kinds of political and emotional conflicts in addition to the main plot, including complex regional traditions and differences. The Lord of the Rings is a world of its own that you can really buy into and think about outside of the books. The wizard world of Harry Potter is hard to buy into and is very strained. The only explanations for the world outside of the plot are parts that are needed for the plot. The story of Harry Potter simply does not contain the depth and development that the Lord of the Rings has.

LORD OF THE RINGS

The Lord of the Rings is one hundred million times better than Harry Potter. The Lord of the Rings is a more creative and better written series than Harry Potter. Authors write about sorcerers and dragons all the time, but J R R Tolkien basically (this is a hyperbole) coined the term hobbit. Throughout the Harry Potter series, the plot of the individual books seem to become watered down. I get the feeling that Rowling was thrilled by a lucky instance of success and was rushed to write sequels. Tolkien is excellent at creating imagery; hence the excellent movies. In a movie face-off, The Lord of the Rings slays Harry Potter. The visuals are so much better and the characters are less of nerds. Harry Potter would be the Smeegle of The Lord of the Rings because he is, simply, funny looking. Mr. Logsdon has spent a few class periods showing us the filming set of The Lord of the Rings; Australia is beautiful. It blows my mind that a real place on Earth looks like the books' settings! That is my next vacation spot FO SHO.

Impartial Judgment??? (Nope.)

Unfortunately, out of all four of the major quote-"geeky"-unquote fandoms--Star Trek, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, and Harry Potter--I'm not familiar with any two in a bracket. I've watched the Star Wars movies, and I've read the Harry Potter books, but my main experiences with their rivals, Star Trek and Lord of the Rings, respectively, is minimal. So, theoretically, I guess that Harry Potter and Star Wars would win by a sort of forfeit or something. The only problem is, I've no knowledge of their rivals, so it's not like I can fairly judge this. To use an analogy, it's a bit like watching American Idol and voting after only seeing one person in the troupe--not exactly impartial, and not exactly an educated decision. Still, the whole "rivalry" thing seems kind of pointless. Yes, Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings both are fantasy series. Yes, Star Wars and Star Trek both take place in space and have aliens. But beyond that, the differences don't seem to be great enough to throw a fit over. They all have different virtues, and are somewhat different stories.

But hey, if I have to answer this question, I'll just go with Harry Potter because it's a great series and magic is awesome.

Harry Potter vs. Lord of the Rings

In the world of entertainment getting the audience's attention is key, while both of these books later turned movies effectively hook the audience they each do them in very differently. Harry Potter written by J.K. Rowling uses immature prose style that allows the predominantly younger readers to connection with the main characters, as if they were in the story themselves. On the other hand, Lord of the Rings J.R.R. Tolkien used his mastery of literature and style to create a novel that hooked the older and more mature readers through a complex plot line and rhetorical strategies. The story lines for each book are both different but at the same similar because they each start using basic trite ideas, magic and fantasy adventure. Both have a single main character that has a group of companions that have to face adversity to defeat the ultimate evil. But Tolkien advances his story creating multiple races and territories; when Rowling's story is very focused on Hogwarts and the small magical community. The argument between which story is better is all in the eye of the beholder, but Harry Potter is obviously more focused on younger readers while Lord of the Rings is focused on more mature readers, thus I personally believe that Lord of the Rings is a better novel, movie, and overall more entertaining.

I like both!

Okay I would definitely say Harry Potter or Star Wars.  Considering that I haven't seen either Lord of the Rings or Star Trek, I cannot make an adequate comparison between either of the pairs.  I've never had any interest in seeing either of these other movies.
Harry Potter unites us all through its account of an epic, common human struggle.  We can all relate to its timeless plot.  It takes an ordinary boy and makes him into an extraordinary protagonist.  He is "the boy who lived."  He represents the ability to overcome any obstacle that might be in one's way.  His courage and determination triumph over evil.  He represents the purest form of "good," and his story is one of the classic good vs. evil.  
Star Wars fuels the imaginations of so many young people, and allows them to reach for something more.  When you think of action-packed space adventure, what pops up first in your mind?  Star Wars, without a doubt.  Both Harry Potter and Star Wars are simply classics that many Americans hold near and dear to their hearts because of their entertainment value, the lessons we learn from them, and because of their relatable, independent characters.

Harry Potter v Lord of the Rings

Considering I've never seen both Star Wars and Star Trek I cant argue about either of those. However I have read about half of the Harry Potters and The Three Lord of the Rings books as well as seen all the movies in both series I can judge these. In my personal opinion the characters and plot of Harry Potter are greater then that of Lord of the Rings. The accessibility of the characters as well as the pure enjoyment of Rowlings plot exceeds that of the Lord of the Rings. However the writing of the Lord of the rings is much better. The epic fantasy feel that is felt while reading lord of the rings really transports you into another world. It is wordy at times but none the less keeps you engaged and kept someone like me, who doesn't usually read much fantasy, interested through all three books. While Harry Potter was something that could just be picked up and enjoyed no matter if its for ten minutes on your phone or in long sittings. However Lord of the rings was not something that was just easy to read a little on your phone. I had to carve out large segments of time in order to read it. The scope of the books was just to large to pick up easily.

HARRY POTTER.


Debating series is a pointless topic. Although Harry Potter reigns supreme compared to all of the other series, it is impossible to decide which series is truly better than another. My reasoning for liking Harry Potter resides solely in the fact that I grew up in the generation of Harry Potter fanatics. Age is definitely a major contributing factor in the decision of which series is better. Also, I find the story line of Harry Potter more fascinating than any other books I’ve read because of the creation of an entirely fictional world that seems so plausible (I’m still waiting for my owl). Even though the magical world of Harry Potter is full of evil, it sounds like the most appealing world to stay in. Also, the Harry Potter series creates very likeable characters that make it better than other series and the different tales of each book are not boring or repetitive to me like some of the other series mentioned in the prompt and the Series of Unfortunate Events. While I can say with full certainty that Harry Potter is the best in my opinion from this list, it really seems to depend on which generation you are from to determine which one is best. 

Can't Answer This One

Well, I'm really not in the position to answer this question because I've never seen StarWars, Star Trek, or Lord of the Rings, but I liked Harry Potter a lot. Rowling's plot I thought was brilliant, enticing, fantastical, and appealing by how she built the world of Harry Potter to each and every detail and then placed the plot she had created for it in this world. Additionally, every book she wrote for it added something cool and unique and also added more details to the world of Harry Potter. However, I think that pitting all these series up against each other is sort of stupid because why can't we all just accept each and every one of them as great pieces of unique media that have all helped in defining popular culture. I mean I'm sure they're all great and everyone is entitled to their own opinion, I just don't see why individual preferences should be pressed upon the preferences of others in order to make a point. I think I've reached the word limit now so I'm going to stop but with all due respect I'm not really a fan of this prompt.

Star Wars and LotR

For this fictional comparison, i would definitely have to say that the better stories are those of Star Wars and Lord of the Rings, over Star Trek and Harry Potter.

On the Space side:

Star Trek, despite covering much more space in it's galaxy due to it's adventurous nature, is a smaller story. It focuses on the exploits and travels of one ship (please note, I am discussing the original series here) and it's crew members. There is little to no cohesive narrative, and very few looks at the workings of the entire galaxy, just the adventures of the Enterprise and it's crew. There is nothing wrong with episodism, but when performed without any over-arching narrative it falls flat. This can be attributed to it's age, yet many shows from the late 60's and early 70's were able to achieve continuous storylines with an episodic structure, so Star Trek cannot use it's age as a crutch.

(seeing as I only commented on the original Star Trek, it is only fair to comment solely on the Original Trilogy for Star Wars)

Star Wars, on the other hand, is a single story that, although not covering as much ground as Star Trek, is able to delve more into the workings of it's universe. The political intrigue, the military superpowers that battle each other, etc etc. We see characters grow and develop more as our heroes complete their journeys, due to the defined story structure and continuous narrative Star Wars has over Star Trek. In addition to the  successes of it's story-telling, Star Wars also has superior visual effects due to ingenious usage of PFX in regards to the small scale models it employs to carry out it's space battles. The scenery is also enhanced by the use of canvas painting to show an entire planet that looks completely different from our own, whereas Star Trek used mainly a rocky area in california with little alteration to their set.


Now I could go on about Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings, but after all I wrote about Star Wars and Star Trek, i'm just going to say one thing. Dumbledore was a mortal, and died. Gandalf is literally an immortal demi-god. He wins. That compounded with the far more advanced literary quality (Lord of the Rings really is good literature, it is written very well, whereas Harry Potter relies on strong characters, the quality of writing is not superb), and the vast superiority of it's film adaptations, Lord of the Rings is extremely better.

Lord of the Potters: An Epic Saga of Love and Loss

I guess you could call me culturally deprived, but out of the four, I've only seen Harry Potter and Star Wars. Rather than looking up the other two on Wikipedia and then proceeding to make a fool of myself on things that I clearly don't know anything about, I'll write on the two that I already am familiar with.

At first, it was clear which one is superior. Yet the more I thought about the two, the more I realize that they're not all that different. Sure, one is located in the magical school of Hogwarts, and the other in a galaxy far, far away. But when it comes down to it, there is a rather simple formula for a multimillion blockbuster.

 Checklist
- Parent-less boy who grew up living with his uncle, actually boy of Prophecy (Harry, Luke)
- Trusty sidekick (Ron, Han)
- Female sidekick, later totally digs trusty sidekick (Hermione, Lela)
- Hairy sidekick (Hagrid, Chewbacca) 
- Evil villain with deformed face (Voldemort, Vader)
- Wise old Sensei who was also the teacher of evil villain with deformed face (Dumbledore, Obi-wan)
- Magic (magic, the force)
- Token black guy (Dean Thomas, Lando)

With this valuable information, I will no doubt create my own sensational hit about Barry Otter, the child who survived. I think I shall call it...


Harry Potter over Lord of the Rings

While many of these fights may seem silly and like fantasies, which they are, they also provide a source of amusement and exhilaration to our everyday lives.
in a fight to the death between Harry Potter and Lord of The Rings, Harry Potter wins every single time. This is because there are magicians in both of them and being a magician in the realm of Middle Earth is infinitely better than being a lowly archer. Gandalf and Saruman are far and away the most elite fighters in middle earth. on the other hand, everybody in Harry Potter is a magician. by this reasoning alone Harry Potter wins the battle. But wait, some might argue that the fantastical creatures in Lord of The Rings give an advantage to middle earth. Harry potter has mystical creatures too. Buckbeak the hippogriff, all the different kinds of dragons, dementors, and other creatures too. in a fight between just the creatures in both lands Harry Potter wins again. in both of these categories Harry Potter trumps Middle Earth, and that is why i believe that in a fight between the two worlds of Harry Potter and Lord of The Rings, Harry Potter wins.
Also i just enjoyed the Harry Potter books more, they feel like they have more sway on my childhood than did JRR Tolkein.