Stephen Colbert: geek

Must add Stephen Colbert -- late of The Daily Show and now hosting his own Colbert Report -- to the Gen X arts summit. And not just for his biting, snarky work on The Colbert Report, but for the fact that he has clearly authorized a parody fan site that pokes fun at himself and his own geeky proclivities. (The address of the domain owner is the same as Comedy Central’s NYC address.) And Xers are nothing if not the first to make fun of themselves.

You may not be aware that in addition to being an Xer and one of the premiere cultural commentators of the moment, Colbert is a huge Lord of the Rings geek. He and I were in attendence of the same press screening of The Return of the King a couple years ago, and he was so full of beans in anticipation of the film that while we were all waiting for the movie to start, he literally ran around the theater trying to get us all to join him in doing the wave. And you may have noted that on the recent Daily Show episode on which Viggo Mortensen guested, Colbert was the LOTR dork who supplied Aragorn’s complex lineage to a bemused Mortensen (who, it must be said, is his own kind of dork, but that’s a post for another day).

Anyway, the "fan site" is complete with the requisite mangled images, animated GIFs, and -- oh, my -- fan fiction:

"The name’s Stephen Colbert," said the stranger, offering his hand, which Gandalf ignored because it was not a custom with which he had any familiarity. "I’ve come to help you defeat Sauron."

At this, Gandalf allowed himself a sharp intake of breath. "You must not say his name aloud! You cannot possibly imagine the dangers we face; they are manifold and frightening, the merest mention sufficient to attract the very same dark powers that we seek to eliminate."

Stephen was nonplussed. "Don’t hide behind your precious political double-talk, Gandalf. Let’s call a spade a spade: I know about the Ringwraiths -- who will soon become the Nazgul - not to mention Gollum, Saruman, and Shelob. Just saying ‘dangers’ and ‘dark powers’ doesn’t accomplish anything; you can’t fight a war against abstract nouns."

Colbert Nation also features excerpts from Colbert’s, ahem, unpublished SF novel. No kidding. Well, we’re all kidding, but the bad SF really is there on the fake site.