[SPOILERS] Rings of Power: Ah, Mithril, that's the good stuff!

[slant]

11 hours ago, sifth said:

Elrond and Durin remain the only reason I watch this show. I liked Disa as well, but her final scene this week just felt beyond weird.

Yeah Durin and Elrond are solid, its better than Legolas and Gimli. What I really like is they are showing some struggle and suspicion on both sides, even though they are fast friends. 

9 hours ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

Theory time! Elrond doesn’t marry Galadriel’s daughter (because that would be creepy and involve a huge time skip) but instead marries Isildur’s sister, who was invented for the show and has blue eyes and dark brown hair like Arwen. Granted, there’d still be a creepy incest angle with Aragorn, but at least this would give Elrond a more sympathetic reason for why he doesn’t want his daughter to marry a human, if he knew what it was like to outlive his own spouse.

Do I expect this to actually happen? Not really. But a little tinfoil never hurt anyone.

It's still a creepy incest angle with Aragorn, because Arwen is anyway his great-great-great-(repeat like 11 times)-grand aunt. Then, Elendil is also descended from Elros, on one of his great-great-great-(repeat like 22 times)-grandmother's side. But Im really okay if Elrond marries Earien, even though elf-human pairings are supposed to be rare, that would make Arwen half-elven too... which would actually kind of make more sense lore-wise as she gives her otherwise unexplained or at least less clearly explained magic choice of being elf or human to Frodo so Frodo can go to Aman. But... I still think in the end, it is counterproductive, because that would make Elrond more sympathetic of humans rather than hating them.

Should be actually reason enough that his daughter is marrying Aragorn, and he does not really hate humans, especially considering how much he had to work with all the other races. 

[LynnS]

8 hours ago, The Marquis de Leech said:

OK. Time to set the record straight on Glorfindel.

• Glorfindel originally appears in the original 1917-1920 Fall of Gondolin. He fights a Balrog, and falls to his death.
• Tolkien cannibalised the name for The Lord of the Rings decades later. He also cannablised Legolas, BTW. 
• Tolkien pondered: is the Glorfindel of Rings the same as that of Gondolin?
• After faffing about, Tolkien decided they were the same Glorfindel.
• This required Glorfindel to have returned to Middle-earth.
• Cue explanation that he arrived in the Second Age with the Blue Wizards.

And no, he is not Meteor Dude:

• Meteor Dude's beard counts against him. Yes, Tolkien did portray several Elves as bearded - and there is that famous "second cycle of life" line from the late 1960s, but Scond Age Glorfindel ain't old enough. Third Age Glorfindel is beardless.
• Glorfindel's name basically alludes to his golden hair. Meteor Dude is not a blond.
• Glorfindel's still an Elf. The meteor explosion ought to have killed him.
• Meteor Dude comes across as someone not used to being incarnate. Glorfindel, again, is an Elf, so he wouldn't be struggling like this.     

I'm good with all that.   I'm leaning towards the Blue Wizards at this point.  Or someone sent by Yavanna, the giver of fruits and growing things.  

https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Yavanna

Where do you think the Harfoot's Grove is located?  Close to Mordor or Mount Doom?  Did Greenwood the Great extend that far at one point?

[Scott_N]

3 hours ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

Does anyone have a link to an explainer for what’s going on with the elves’ extinction and how this differs from the book (unless you’d rather explain yourself)? I’m not very familiar with the lore.

There are many people on here who know the lore far better than I, but the way I remember it: Elves are of Arda, and tied to Arda, so only when/once Arda ends, do the Elves end. I.e. they are for all sense and purpose immortal. They can be physically killed but their spirit would live on and after some time they would typically be re-bodied in Aman/Valinor (I’m only aware of Fëanor having been refused).

 

Now, and this is the bit the show has twisted, Elves in Middle-earth (maybe also Valinor, I don’t recall) could eventually die of grief and weariness with their spirits essentially consuming their bodies. But this is not a sudden extinction event for all Elves like in the show and, furthermore, it can most certainly not be cured by god damned mithril.

[slant]

^Okay, I'll attempt to explain the way I understand it, but there are people who know the lore better, or a different interpretation of how the show is depicting things and where it is going. 

In the original version, the elves made the rings in an attempt to turn middle-earth to something like Valinor, eternal and resilient to deterioration. When the one ring is destroyed, the power of the elven leaders like Elrond and Galadriel also fades, which are the things preserving their lands. This is why Galadriel says "I will diminish and go to the west". 

Now, here, the rings gives them extra powers over what they already have. In the show though, they make it look like the elves will die and fade unless the mithril is extracted, or I guess an alternative is that the rings of power are made if the mithril is inaccessible. In any case, one of the three rings of the elves has a mithril band, it might be changed to all three. So it is the power of the mithril plus the magic of the rings that prevents the elves from fading immediately. 

So you are right about the sudden extinction bits, not so sure about the first part, maybe it only applies to the elves when they are in Valinor. They are immortal though. What you are describing sounds more applicable to the wizards, but AFAIK, there were only two that we know of who were 're-bodied', Gandalf a wizard and Glorfindel, an elf. 

[mormont]

Just a couple of notes:

Galadriel continues to be the best character in this. If you think she's being inconsistent in her attitude towards the orcs, yes, she is, and that's the point. Consider her exchange with Theo here. She's telling him not to blame himself for what happened even as she clearly blames herself. She literally warns Theo what it can do to a person to take on that burden. She did, when her brother died, and she knows it has warped her, and she struggles with that throughout the series. They told you up front she would touch the darkness, and she has. Her hate for Sauron twists her, and she knows it, but she can't help it.

This manifests in her attitude to the orcs, reflecting the main moral question modern readers have with LOTR: can we treat the orcs as just wholly evil, suitable for extermination, or is there room for compassion? Galadriel is aware that there should be but emotionally, struggles to see them as anything other than creatures of the hated Sauron. There's what Galadriel knows she should be, and what she knows she is.

It's very realistic to me that a character who lives for centuries would struggle to overcome such emotions, by the way. If you judge by the standards of humans, then that might seem unreasonable, but humans don't live such long lives. Elves have an intensity of emotion that comes from centuries of shared memories.

Love her story. Love the portrayal. I empathise with her and enjoy that part of the story.

The idea that the writers 'forgot' about Celeborn until this episode: uh, that's not how writers' rooms work, folks. They don't write sequentially. They had a series bible which was written before any episode script and I guarantee Celeborn and his disappearance were in it from the start.

I do find the Harfoot section the least interesting but the idea that the 'evil' Harfoot woman was being inconsistent floors me because there's no such character. There's a non-evil character who has changed her mind as the result of an inspiring speech at a critical time and that isn't inconsistent, that's a perfectly normal bit of writing such as appears in any drama series you can watch.

I've come around completely on Elrond here, and his dynamic with Durin is key to that. Probably my second favourite bit of the show. Doesn't hurt that the exchanges with King Durin and the two of them are so well done.

The Halbrand plot is silly: he's so badly wounded he need elf-medicine to survive, but he can ride? At least give the man a cart. And an escort!

[Scott_N]

1 hour ago, slant said:

So you are right about the sudden extinction bits, not so sure about the first part, maybe it only applies to the elves when they are in Valinor. They are immortal though. What you are describing sounds more applicable to the wizards, but AFAIK, there were only two that we know of who were 're-bodied', Gandalf a wizard and Glorfindel, an elf. 

Whether they perish in Valinor or Middle-earth, Elves definitely reincarnate. After having spent a period of time in the Halls of Mandos, they would reincarnate into bodies identical to before. Now, their spirit could refuse to - but the opportunity was provided by the Valar. By the same token, the Valar could also delay reincarnation, or withhold it altogether, if they felt it was merited.

[Lady Anna]

Thought that was the best episode so far. Felt like the season finale with all the characters going on new paths.

[slant]

Nooo? They do not reincarnate? Glorfindel was the only elf who was reincarnated, it was a very special process, similar to what happened to Gandalf, or marriages between Elves and Humans. 

It gets a bit strange metaphysically, because yes, the souls of elves (so to speak) had to go somewhere, and it was probably the Halls of Mandos, maybe till the time of the last battle when they will be re-embodied... but elves do die, and all of them are not sent back! 

[The Marquis de Leech]

26 minutes ago, slant said:

Nooo? They do not reincarnate? Glorfindel was the only elf who was reincarnated, it was a very special process, similar to what happened to Gandalf, or marriages between Elves and Humans. 

It gets a bit strange metaphysically, because yes, the souls of elves (so to speak) had to go somewhere, and it was probably the Halls of Mandos, maybe till the time of the last battle when they will be re-embodied... but elves do die, and all of them are not sent back! 

No.

Firstly, "Reincarnation" is a tricksy word - to clarify we are talking re-housing, not re-birth. 

Secondly, all Elves are destined to be rehoused after their time in Mandos (with the odd exception for dear old Feanor). Hence you get the reference to Finrod Felagund walking with his father. Glorfindel is only special because he travelled back to Middle-earth after getting re-housed, and didn't simply stay put in Valinor.

(And yes, this creates delightful problems about dead Avari).

Finally, Gandalf's situation was completely different. He died, went beyond the Circles of the World, and literally had to be sent back by Eru Himself. In short, divine intervention.

[slant]

^okay, yes, but getting back their bodies after they die and being sent back around the same time has only happened to Glorfindel right? 

Not talking about the eventual reincarnation for the last battle

[Ran]

4 hours ago, slant said:

^okay, yes, but getting back their bodies after they die and being sent back around the same time has only happened to Glorfindel right? 

Tolkien supposed that the greatest and most noble Elves were rehoused pretty quickly (by Elf standards), but toyed with the notion (at one point, anyways) that the average Elf would reside in the Halls of Mandos for ~1000 years, and others longer still due to evils they had done and so on (the Halls are basically Elven purgatory) before having their fëa (soul) placed into a new hröa (body), an exact duplicate of the body they had previously created by the Valar out of their spirit's perfect memory of their physical form.

[Scott_N]

34 minutes ago, slant said:

^okay, yes, but getting back their bodies after they die and being sent back around the same time has only happened to Glorfindel right? 

Not talking about the eventual reincarnation for the last battle

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elf_(Tolkien)#Characteristics

You are right that Glorfindel's case is special but that is because, the second time around, he was sent to Middle-earth as an emissary of the Valar. He was also imbued with additional powers, iirc, thanks to his self-sacrifice. Nonetheless, he had been re-bodied for some 1,600 years already over in Valinor before he was sent back.

[sifth]

"One cannot satisfy, their thirst by drinking sea water"................someone was paid to write that line. In other news, I've heard grass is apparently green.

So the humans aren't even a little hurt/sick, from taking in that much volcanic ash. I'm all for them surviving, since they have main character plot armor, but at the very least, have them struggling, from being sick by the ash. The most we got from that, is the queen being blinded, but everyone else being just fine as well, did annoy me.

[The Bard of Banefort]

4 hours ago, mormont said:

Just a couple of notes:

Galadriel continues to be the best character in this. If you think she's being inconsistent in her attitude towards the orcs, yes, she is, and that's the point. Consider her exchange with Theo here. She's telling him not to blame himself for what happened even as she clearly blames herself. She literally warns Theo what it can do to a person to take on that burden. She did, when her brother died, and she knows it has warped her, and she struggles with that throughout the series. They told you up front she would touch the darkness, and she has. Her hate for Sauron twists her, and she knows it, but she can't help it.

This manifests in her attitude to the orcs, reflecting the main moral question modern readers have with LOTR: can we treat the orcs as just wholly evil, suitable for extermination, or is there room for compassion? Galadriel is aware that there should be but emotionally, struggles to see them as anything other than creatures of the hated Sauron. There's what Galadriel knows she should be, and what she knows she is.

It's very realistic to me that a character who lives for centuries would struggle to overcome such emotions, by the way. If you judge by the standards of humans, then that might seem unreasonable, but humans don't live such long lives. Elves have an intensity of emotion that comes from centuries of shared memories.

Love her story. Love the portrayal. I empathise with her and enjoy that part of the story.

The idea that the writers 'forgot' about Celeborn until this episode: uh, that's not how writers' rooms work, folks. They don't write sequentially. They had a series bible which was written before any episode script and I guarantee Celeborn and his disappearance were in it from the start.

I do find the Harfoot section the least interesting but the idea that the 'evil' Harfoot woman was being inconsistent floors me because there's no such character. There's a non-evil character who has changed her mind as the result of an inspiring speech at a critical time and that isn't inconsistent, that's a perfectly normal bit of writing such as appears in any drama series you can watch.

I've come around completely on Elrond here, and his dynamic with Durin is key to that. Probably my second favourite bit of the show. Doesn't hurt that the exchanges with King Durin and the two of them are so well done.

The Halbrand plot is silly: he's so badly wounded he need elf-medicine to survive, but he can ride? At least give the man a cart. And an escort!

So far, I would say that Adar is the best written character on the show, primarily because there is some depth there. His line about “having as much a right to live in this world as you do” was the one time that I felt this show really hit on something powerful. But of course, this is the problem with prequels. The orcs, like Sauron, can’t be humanized too much, because they’re flat-out evil in LOTR (more on that in a moment).

Galadriel being as reckless and immature as she is isn’t that unbelievable to me. When you’re a kid, you assume that adults are all emotionally mature—until you reach adulthood yourself and realize, no, actually, plenty of them aren’t. I don’t think immortality would be a sure fire path to wisdom in practice. It wouldn’t surprise me if, in a world where immortal beings were real, they were just as emotionally stunted as mere mortals.

A surprising number of people have taken Celeborn’s alleged death as fact (as ASOIAF has taught us, you ain’t dead until there’s a body, and even then it’s not a sure thing). There are also some people angry that they “killed off” Celeborn so that Galadriel could have a relationship with Halbrand, which I find ironic, because I see it as quite the opposite. If Galadriel hadn’t met Celeborn yet, then her and Halbrand could very well have their own Aragorn-and-Arwen-esque romance, with her meeting Celeborn long after his death. The show has definitely been teasing that with all their heart-to-hearts and quippy banter. By only bringing up Galadriel’s marriage now (to a man that we know is alive based on the OT), we’re being clued in that Halbrand isn’t going to be this series’ Aragorn, but—psych!—he was Sauron all along! 

I’ve already talked a bunch about why the Sauron reveal doesn’t work for me, but to bring it back to Adar and the orcs, we already know that this isn’t like Darth Vader or even Kylo Ren: there is no redemption in store for any of these characters. So we’re left with a character who hasn’t really done anything bad this season (unless you count repeatedly trying to get away from Galadriel) who is nevertheless going to be inexplicably evil from this point forward. Let’s just hope they don’t make him an incel too, because then I won’t even be able to blame all the YouTube bros for hating on this show.

[Le Cygne]

On 9/30/2022 at 11:54 AM, The Bard of Banefort said:

Yeah, call me a mush, but I like the budding romance between Galadriel and Halbrand too. I would like to see it continue.

From the first time I saw them on screen together, I saw the spark between them, too. The interesting thing is what is it about Galadriel (and the audience, as well) that makes her respond to him?

What drew her to Halbrand, after Celeborn? They must be very different. And how will she feel if Halbrand turns out to be Sauron (which I am thinking he must be). Hopefully they cast someone good as Celeborn!

[Darryk]

33 minutes ago, Le Cygne said:

From the first time I saw them on screen together, I saw the spark between them, too. The interesting thing is what is it about Galadriel (and the audience, as well) that makes her respond to him?

What drew her to Halbrand, after Celeborn? They must be very different. And how will she feel if Halbrand turns out to be Sauron (which I am thinking he must be). Hopefully they cast someone good as Celeborn!

Yeah I can see it now. A teary-eyed Halbrand says to Galadriel: "You keep asking 'where is Sauron', but did you ever think to ask 'HOW is Sauron'"

[The Bard of Banefort]

38 minutes ago, Le Cygne said:

From the first time I saw them on screen together, I saw the spark between them, too. The interesting thing is what is it about Galadriel (and the audience, as well) that makes her respond to him?

What drew her to Halbrand, after Celeborn? They must be very different. And how will she feel if Halbrand turns out to be Sauron (which I am thinking he must be). Hopefully they cast someone good as Celeborn!

I’m thinking they’ll try to play it as Galadriel having been blinded to evil by her anger and short-sightedness, but really, if the one person you still trusted (given her falling out with Elrond and how her men mutinied her) turned out to be your archenemy in disguise, wouldn’t that just make you more bitter and paranoid?

[Le Cygne]

I really enjoyed this episode, and want to watch a second time.

The Stranger and the Harfoots make me happy. He keeps trying so hard not to be a peril, but to be good, it breaks my heart when nobody understands him. The actor playing him is doing such a great job, getting so much across while saying so little.

Nori decided to go after him, then Poppy (Sam!) said I'm going with her, and Marigold, then Sadoc said me too (might as well, we're all going to die anyway!) (Is he Gandalf? I'm thinking maybe yes, Treebeard said he's "the only wizard who really cares about trees.")

At the end of each episode, I want to see more, so I hope they don't take too long getting season 2 out. I'm wondering how they will pull off the Sauron reveal in the next episode, seems like a lot to happen in one episode, so that will be interesting.

[Le Cygne]

22 hours ago, The Bard of Banefort said:

I’m thinking they’ll try to play it as Galadriel having been blinded to evil by her anger and short-sightedness, but really, if the one person you still trusted (given her falling out with Elrond and how her men mutinied her) turned out to be your archenemy in disguise, wouldn’t that just make you more bitter and paranoid?

I think someone will talk to her (maybe Elrond?) and reassure her that it wasn't her fault, just like she reassured Theo in this episode. (Also, she was also right about Sauron, too.)

[Corvinus85]

Watching the episode again - so we see how the ash is now all over Mordor, and Galadriel tells Theo that Orcs can walk in daylight now. Then halfway through the episode, it's nighttime and the skies are clear enough to see the moon. lol