It's been since possibly the actual '80s since I saw either, but I feel like the cartoon hobbit was different folks than the cartoon lotr, which was indeed pretty tripy. My favourite part of that one is the scene where they're all relaxing in Lorien and Boromir is sharpening his sword on a rock.

Yeah there were two different companies involved, I think--one did the Hobbit, and then the LOTR one was half-completed by somebody but finished by someone else. I can't remember which of the LOTR halves was made by the Hobbit people, but there was some crossover.

I thought they did a decent job on the art for the hobbits, but oh gawd the Elves. Also LOL that's not how sword-sharpening, or anything else, works. :D

Rankin-Bass did The Hobbit, and then Ralph Bakshi did his LOTR, but he was unable to fit Return of the King into that movie before running out of money, so Rankin-Bass came back and did their ROTK. ... I personally like the Bakshi LOTR, but that's because it absolutely terrified me as a kid. :-D Proud to own the DVD nowadays.

Sounds like I should look for the DVD then. XD I remember renting it on VHS and watching when I was much younger.

If you do that, note that it looks very different on DVD, much brighter and easier to follow. In some ways, though, that's kind of a loss, since all the darkness and grit of the older VHS releases really added to the Ringwraith sequences, IMO.

Oh yeah, Rankin-Bass, that's who I was forgetting. :D