Tom Bombadil Tom Bombadil is a minifigure from the theme The Lord of The Rings who appears in " " and " . Background . Novels . In TA 3018 , Frodo Baggins and his company had a chance meeting with Bombadil in the Old Forest after a nearly disastrous encounter with Old Man Willow . Frodo , who had fled from the tree looking for help , enlisted Bombadil , who had been out gathering water lilies . Bombadil went immediately with Frodo to the tree and commanded it to release its prisoners , Merry and Pippin , which it immediately did . He then invited Frodo and his companions to his home , where the Hobbits had an almost dreamlike stay , feasting and making merry with Tom . In this state , Frodo rather inadvertently told Tom all about the Ring and his quest , and when Tom asked to inspect the Ring , Frodo , without question and without any of the reluctance that tended to accompany giving the Ring to another , allowed him to . Tom then put the Ring on his finger , yet not only did he not disappear , but the Ring appeared to have no effect on him at all . After making the Ring itself vanish with a sleight - of - hand trick , he returned it to Frodo , who , slightly suspicious that it had not made Tom vanish , put it on to make sure it was the genuine Ring . Tom surprised him yet again by revealing that he could see Frodo even with the Ring on , and told Frodo to remove it , stating that his hand was fairer without it . After two days resting and feasting at Tom ' s home , the Hobbits set out again , only to be captured the next day by Wights on the Barrow - downs . Fortunately , Tom once again came to their rescue , dispersing the Wights and breaking open their tomb . After this , he escorted the Hobbits to the borders of his land and left them there . The peril of the hobbits was not over ; an attack on their lives was carried out , and their ponies were set loose . The ponies apparently remembered the care they were given in the house of Tom Bombadil , and returned to stay beside Tom ' s own pony , Fatty Lumpkin . He returned them to Barliman Butterbur , the proprietor of The Prancing Pony . Since he had paid eighteen pence as compensation for the loss , he was now the owner of five fine ponies . Over a month later , Tom became a topic of discussion at the Council of Elrond . There , Elrond , who had apparently met Tom in times long past , reminisced about him briefly before the question was put before the Council of whether or not to give the Ring to Tom , as it appeared as though Tom may have had power over even the Ring within his lands . However , Gandalf quickly dismissed the idea , saying that rather than Tom having power over the Ring , the Ring simply had no power over Tom . He was immune to its influence , but he could not alter it , nor break its power over others . Additionally , he said that , while Tom might be willing to take the Ring if asked by all the Free People of the world , he might do so , but would not understand the reason . Due to this , Tom would have likely either forgot about it or thrown it away , as such things had little relevance to him . It was also mentioned that taking the Ring back to him would be impossible to accomplish without it becoming known to Sauron , and that sooner or later , Sauron would bend all his power towards Tom ' s realm to take the Ring back . Despite his mastery within his realm , it was assumed that Tom would not have cared or been able to keep the Ring contained to his realm . Four years after the One Ring was destroyed , Gandalf spent some time with Bombadil . It is unknown how the meeting was or what they discussed between them . Gandalf remarked to the Hobbits that Bombadil would doubtless have little interest in the tales of their adventures , except perhaps their encounters with the Ents . Films / Games . Tom Bombadil is entirely absent from Peter Jackson ' s films , as it was felt he would distract from the story of Frodo and the Ring . He does appear as a character in the LEGO video games , but only as a playable character with no story role .