Viggo Mortensen Broke His Toe In 'The Two Towers'

About

Viggo Mortensen Broke His Toe In The Two Towers refers to a tidbit of film trivia from Lord Of The Rings that has been repeated ad nauseum by fans of the series, leading to parodies about how often it comes up in discussions of the films.

Origin

In The Two Towers, Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen), Legolas and Gimli are searching for Merry and Pippin after they'd been abducted by orcs in the first film. The trio stumbles upon a pile of burning orc bodies and discovers some of Merry and Pippin's clothing, leading to the mistaken impression that the pair had died. In frustration, Aragorn kicks a helmet (shown below, left). In the Behind The Scenes interviews from the show, it is revealed that Viggo Mortensen broke his toe kicking the helmet, and that his cry of apparent anguish at Merry and Pippin's supposed death was actually a cry of pain from the actor (shown below, right).

Spread

The tidbit of trivia made appearances on numerous pop culture and trivia websites in the decade and a half since the film's release. It appeared on What Culture,^[1] Wordpress,^[2] Today I Found Out,^[3] Reddit^[4] and other places between 2009 and 2016. The repetition of the factoid eventually became a meme among Lord Of The Rings fans in the latter half of the 2010s. It was particularly popular in /r/LotrMemes, where memers often repeated it using the Darth Plagueis the Wise meme (examples shown below).

The factoid has been presented in numerous other formats across the internet by fans, including Sections of a Joint (shown below, left) and Pointing Rick Dalton (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References